We Want A Junior Social Media Coordinator, Please

Nov162011
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Early Bird got this worm and the position has been filled. Thank you to all our wonderful candidates

Jane Creative is looking for a creative, outgoing and social media savvy candidate with a passion for writing and fashion. The person we hire will be responsible for managing vendors, interfacing with clients, conducting online research and writing for social media and blogs.

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It also wouldn’t hurt if the candidate:

+ Was familiar with all social media platforms including but not limited to Tumblr, Facebook, & Twitter

+ Fancied themselves a strong and clever writer

+ Had 1–3 years experience in fashion and/or marketing

+ Had a passion for photography

+ Was proficient in Photoshop

+ Loved dogs and candy (not a joke)

If you or someone you know fits the bill, have them reach out with resume and cover letter to jobbyjob@janecreative.com.

The Internet Now Accepts Bribes

Nov102011
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Think of the Internet as a gigantic shopping mall. There’s a Gap, a Cinnabon, a Lady Foot Locker… the works. Every store and decadent pretzel vendor you can think of is in this massive complex, and you are standing in the middle trying to find a pair of skinny jeans. Do you turn left? Do you head up the escalator? Do you fall to your knees and cry like a lost dog? Your inability to answer this question on your own is exactly why Google’s stock price is hanging around $600/share.

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Google, and all other search engines (big up Altavista) provide the big glossy map in the middle of the shopping mall. They give you the giant red arrow that says “You are here” and tells you where the nearest American Eagle can be found. They are your guide. Your online Sherpa who will help you summit the great peaks of the web to find whatever video you want to watch or Justin Bieber poster you want to bid on.

The issue arises when you’re friendly mall guide starts taking bribes. Thanks to a cleverly transferred $20 from JCPenny (hypothetically speaking, of course), your guide will walk you to their location instead of the Banana Republic, who actually has the exact Jeans you are looking for. Is this unethical or should you know better as a patron of this gigantic shopping mall? It’s a touchy subject that services like SEO and SEM are forcing into the spotlight.

By purchasing adwords or manipulating the algorithm search engines use to give you the answers you’re looking for (SEO), marketers are essentially bribing the mall guide. They are using tricks and cash to redirect your search. The results you see when you search “skinny jeans” are no longer the best sites, but the highest paying ones, regardless of whether the money went directly into the hands of the search engines or indirectly towards purchasing backlinks. Put simply, the search engines have sold out and you can’t trust the results they are giving you as the best results. It’s a sad reality, but a reality nonetheless.

So what now? Well, as someone who uses search engines (which it’s fairly safe to assume you are) you just need to be more critical of the results you get. It may take Google .25 seconds to produce your results, but you should give those results a few more seconds to see which of the options is really the right one for you, rather than just clicking the top link. As a website owner, it seems your only option is to keep up with Pennies and do your own SEO and SEM campaigns. Like it or not, the Internet now accepts bribes, and if you’re not slipping $20’s of your own, your site will be banished to oblivion or worse… Page 2. Of course, running SEO and SEM campaigns can be complex, meaning you could probably use a Sherpa of your own to help guide your campaigns. If that’s the case, it’s time for you to Meet Jane.

Social Media is a Big Old Fad

Jun132011
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The notion that social media is a fad has been floated around like water wings ever since the Twitter bird became more recognizable than Big Bird. The principle itself is simple, suggesting that like bell bottom pants, slap bracelets, and Tamagachis, all social media sites and services will ride off into the sunset only to be revived ever so briefly by an hour long VH1 special entitled “Remember the 2000’s.”

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The error in this belief is the disregard for the fact that social media fills a genuine need in the online realm; it gives people an identity. By creating a Facebook account, someone is not just looking to reconnect with the kid who sat next to them in 4th grade social studies, they are taking the identity they’ve created for themselves in the real world and recreating it on the Internet. It’s not a virtual identity; it’s you.

Once you exist online, the Internet becomes a very interesting place. You can connect with thousands of people and influence them to start a revolution or not buy a certain kind of toaster. In essence, social media has democratized the Internet and returned power to the hands of the people. It has changed the way we interact and changed the way companies do business. Long story a bit longer, social media is very important and is not going anywhere.

All that said, social media is a fad. That’s right, we said it. It’s a fad. A big stinking trend that will in time fade. There will be a point when old folks no longer get a kick out of saying “tweet” and news broadcasts will no longer insist on signing off with “don’t forget to Like us on Facebook.” However, this will not be because Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, FourSquare, or even Friendster (fun fact: Friendster is at present the largest social network in Asia) will cease to exist. Rather it is because these social networks will become so integrated into our daily lives and business operations that they won’t be worth giving specific mention.

When was the last time you heard a company say “Yes, we have a telephone” or “sure, we receive mail?!” These services and utilities are in this day and age taken for granted and they should be. You can’t be a legitimate business and not have a mailing address. The same will soon be true for social media. The luster will wear off, the new car smell will fade, and what will remain is a basic consumer expectation that you have and properly maintain a Facebook page, a Twitter account, a YouTube channel and/or whatever other social media channel is right for you. Of course, picking the right social media channel for your company can be difficult, and managing the properties can be overwhelming , so when you’re ready to be on the right side of the social media fad, it’s time for you to Meet Jane.

Facebook Never Forgets

Feb152011
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What’s going to happen when our college students of today (each more hopelessly addicted to social networks than the next), try to become our politicians of tomorrow. What will political campaigns be like when both candidates have entire Flickr accounts devoted to their first Saturday night with FourLoko or that thing in Mexico (which we all swore we’d never speak about)? If you thought politics were ugly now, just wait until 20 years from now when the mudslinging goes digital.

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It’s not entirely clear to what degree Facebook accurately reflects the realities of its users, but surely profiles can flatter or shame those whom they are supposed to represent. The pictures might be the most obvious example (keg stand candids come to mind), but sometimes its an ill-conceived status update or even an ill-conceived affiliation (Steven “Likes” Mel Gibson), but information a user chooses to share creates a virtual identity and permanent file that will live as long as the Internet, which we think is going to be at least another month or so.

For our millennials the serious implications of Facebook over-sharing start in their senior year of high school, when everything they’ve ever done apparently seems to matter. The increasingly picky universities are doing a little Facebook stalking of their own and the kids with weak privacy settings are seeing the rejection letters fly in. Now, as this generation enters the nightmare that is the job market, they will once again learn about the damage a virtual existence could have on one’s actual existence. Yet unreserved online social networking persists.

The children are our future, and so too are their social habits. While that can sound scary, it may also be the dose of pragmatism that we all need. If we had access to the Facebook photo albums posted during the college days of today’s politicians we might just be forced to take on more realistic standards for the folks who run Washington (and not to mention ourselves). Thanks to social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and Foursquare, everyone’s dirty laundry is airing in public, meaning it might be hard to criticize your neighbor’s soiled skimpies, when they can look out the window at your dirty draws flapping in the wind. Point being, at one point, we’re all young and stupid, and just because there’s a video of it, doesn’t make the actions captured any more condemnable or out of the ordinary. Who knows? Perhaps the social network revolution will change the way we look at candidates, allowing us to focus less on who did or did not “inhale”, and more on those secondary considerations we call the issues.

Special thanks to contributing Writer Alanna Vaughns

Introducing the New JANECREATIVE.com

Oct182010
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Despite what Peter Pan and my 40-year-old uncle who still sleeps in a racecar-shaped bed might want you to believe, we all need to grow up sometime. No matter how many chemical peels, Botox injections or face lifts you subject yourself to, at some point you lose the fight against time and find yourself as the old guy in the club complaining about the volume of the music and ordering a prune juice. It’s the way nature works. What is young and fresh one day is old and smelly the next. Websites are no exception to this principle.

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While the original JANECREATIVE.com, which was built on a shoestring budget and a litany of still unreturned favors, had its charm, it too needed to grow up. To speak technically, we tearfully packed the bags, exchanged hugs and sent the kids off to college. We rebuilt, remade, redesigned, rebuffed, removed, and reworked the old site to make a new sleeker, smoother and sexier site primed to take on the world.

For those of you keeping score at home, here are some of the changes that we made:

  • As you’ve probably realized by now, we’ve cleaned up the blog, making our diatribes a bit easier to enjoy
  • The clients section has been upgraded. We offer lots of samples of the work we’ve done for you to marvel at and enjoy
  • You’ll notice most of the playful animations have gone the way of the Do Do. We liked them too, but the site was starting to get mistaken for a progressive preschool. (R.I.P. the ducks)
  • We’ve added the Facebook Like button to every page, so you can give the thumbs up to the pages you like the best
  • We added some bios to the site so you can meet the brains behind the beauty
  • We added every way under the sun for you to Meet Jane, from LinkedIn to a Google map
  • We’ve updated our list of services so you can determine how Jane can help you
  • Last but not least, we’ve added some of our favorite quotes to the footer of every page so you can get to know what makes us tick

The new JANECREATIVE.com is the second best way to learn all about Jane and figure out just what is with those drops. For the best way, well, you’ll just have to reach out and Meet Jane yourself.

Impatience is a Virtue

Jul162010
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You’re told a lot of things when you’re young that you just sort of accept as true. Perhaps the most obvious of these falsehoods is that a magical fairy sneaks into your bedroom after you’ve fallen asleep and swaps out your baby teeth with money. Sure you have your doubts upon hearing this legend, but without knowing the black market value of children’s teeth or seeing the winged tooth peddler in person, you’re left to pretty much just trust that this is how you woke up with a buck under your pillow.

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Another of these unquestioned life lessons is the notion that good things come to those who wait. You’re told this in many different ways (some that even rhyme), and as a quixotic young’n, you take it in stride. And so you wait. Patiently. Quietly. Holding on to your Pacman ghost-shaped ticket until your number is called and you can approach the counter and order your deli meats. This virtuous patience is not necessarily a bad thing either. It maintains order and keeps people calm and orderly when stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic or awaiting a 120 second ride on Splash Mountain. In fact, the only real drawback with telling people to be patient, is that it completely contradicts human nature. In our heart of hearts, we want things fast and now. We want same day delivery, instant rebates, and movies on demand. Everything needs to be at hand, easy and delivered at lightning speeds. More often than not, we repress this nagging desire when in public in the interest of playing well with others, but there are certain times when we just let the impatient tiger out of the cage.

One of these instances is when we’re sitting in front of our computers. Whether it be Googling recipes, ordering sneakers or watching a YouTube clip our tolerance for delays goes right out the browser window. The simple fact is that when people browse the Internet they are allowing their primal instincts to run wild and their consciousness to stream. Their searches come from the gut and are rooted in raw selfish desire to buy, play, engage and learn. They don’t want to be told to wait or that your awesome flash site is “Loading 45%.” They want what they want now, and if you cant offer that, then they’ll perform a search for someone else who can.

This is not to say that there is no room for flash or any other fanciful means of presenting information on the web. Rather it is to suggest that companies need to be selective with when they decide to offer their content in the indirect, pretty way vs. the straightforward, get ‘er done way. They need to take a good hard look at their target visitor and determine what content these people will wait for and what they want right away. It’s a deceivingly trying decision, but when you’re ready to take it on, it’s time for you to Meet Jane.

Don’t Sweat the Numbers

Jun92010
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Mark Twain, or maybe it was Mark McGwire, was once famously quoted as saying, “there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” This adage is of particular importance when referring to home run records during baseball’s infamous steroids era and social media. In both of these arenas, its easy to get distracted by the flashy numbers; the bold, beautiful, gaudy digits that when taken at face value are indicators of wild success. Yet, when the surface is scratched and the congressional hearings come to a close, these statistical facts are often revealed to be the damnedest of lies.

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Allow us to explain: when evaluating a company’s relative success on Facebook or Twitter, the easiest thing to do is look at the big, busty numbers on the page and say they are doing a good job or a bad job. For instance, if Company A has 17 fans, and 8 of the 17 are employees and/or relatives of employees, it’s easy to assume they are doing a poor job with their social media. Similarly, if you look at the fan page of Company B and they need scientific notation just to fit all the digits of their fan count on one page, it’s rather easy to jump to the conclusion that they are doing a good job with their social media. These assumptions are the source of unbridled jealousy and raw envy felt in conference rooms around the world, and just like seeing 70 home runs hit in a season, can be extremely misleading indicators of aptitude.

The number of fans, followers, subscribers, friends, buddies, viewers, contacts, comrades, amigos and any others social network statistic that you may come across on the Internet are only as valuable as they are effective. Sure, Company B might have millions of fans on Facebook, but that doesn’t do much for them if all their fans are single, elderly men in Wisconsin and they are a manufacturer of silk kimonos. The point is that it’s not enough to just have a lot of fans; you need to have a lot of the right fans. This fact is something that can’t be determined by just looking at the big numbers on the screen. You need to go a bit deeper to know the truth.

So when it comes to social media, keep in mind that size doesn’t matter. It doesn’t hurt, but it also shouldn’t be the goal of your marketing efforts. Amassing fans or followers for the sake of keeping up with the Joneses or Coca-Colas, is a foolish pursuit and a waste of good competitive energy. If you really want to set an ambitious goal for your company, aspire to have a ton of the right fans. Make sure there is not one person who falls in your target demographic and who owns a computer, who isn’t a fan. Make your fan page something so cool, intriguing, interesting, rewarding and/or compelling that they’re willing to sign up for Facebook just to become a fan. This is clearly a challenging pursuit that should probably be left to the experts, so when you’re ready to get a whole lot more of the right fans for your business, go ahead and Meet Jane.

Email Marketing – A Dying Animal?

Jan152010
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As we enter a new year, dare we say decade, it’s fun to look back on a simpler time. The year was 1999 and the Internet bubble was so large you could build an underwater city in it. We bought our dog food from Pets.com (God love that sock puppet) and downloaded our music (illegally?) from Napster. It was a glorious time and companies, huffing the fumes in the bubble, started realizing that this series of tubes, known as the Internet, may be more then a fad. So in a stroke of edgy genius, they instructed their cashiers to ask shoppers if they’d like to subscribe to their email list. Shoppers, just proud that they had an email address, which more likely than not ended in @aol.com, gladly forked over this piece of personal information, viewing their inbox as nothing more than a hub for receiving discounts and forwarding chain e-mails. As a result, these companies developed massive subscriber lists and a quick, effective and extremely cost-efficient way to communicate with their shoppers. Thus, the practice of email marketing was born.

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3 years later, the bubble burst, taking that adorable sock puppet along with it, but in the process we all got a little bit smarter. We learned not only that you couldn’t just slap .com on the end of a bad business idea and make it a gold mine, but also that our email was more than just a way to send e-cards. As time passed, and boy bands went further and further out of style, email only became more important in our lives. Flash forward to today when email is the most important communication tool available. It is the way we send invoices and the way we hear about newborn babies. We email someone before we call them and our fax machines are just collecting dust in the back office.

Fact is, our email account is the communication nucleus of our lives. Yet, as the importance of email in our daily lives grows, our tolerance for emails that don’t directly affect our daily lives shrinks. The last thing many of us want to see when we’re waiting to see if a client has approved our latest (groundbreaking) proposal, is that we can save 15% on khakis. We, the consumer, have learned how valuable our email address is and as such, don’t wan’t to give it out to just anyone.

This being said, email marketing remains the most effective communication tool at the disposal of brands today. It is nearly a matter of fact that when a company sends out an email to their subscriber list that they will see a bump in sales on the day it is delivered. But, a closer look at the stats will also reveal that as much as 3% of those recipients reached their boiling point, and chose to unsubscribe from the mailing list, sending a message to the company that my email address is worth more than 2-for-1 tube socks. So the question is, will these 3% chunks eventually lead to a 100% whole? Will email addresses become more valuable than email marketing? Are Facebook and Twitter the future of brand communications, or is there something else out there that will make us all laugh like when we look back on 1999? These are the hard questions, but if you’d like a little help finding the answer, come Meet Jane.

Fight Night: Facebook Ads Vs. Google AdWords

Dec112009
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When it comes to strategizing online media campaigns, it’s easy to fall in love with Facebook. The blue-bordered behemoth not only gets more traffic than a Chinese super highway, it lets us, the lovable advertisers of the world, target our ads in ways previously thought impossible. By knowing the age, gender, location, school, work place, sexual preference and interests of all its 3 gagillion+ users, Facebook lets you craft ads that walk right into your demographic’s house and put their feet up on the dining room table. So that’s it, right? Facebook ads are the greatest ads ever and they can beat up your ads. Well, not exactly.

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The defense calls to the stand Google AdWords. Google AdWords are another form of cost-per-click (CPC) ad unit only they operate a bit differently than Facebook. Rather than appearing to only select users who fit a mold, they are only shown when users Google, or search to the laymen, for select terms. This means that as a BBQ sauce company, I can choose to only show my ads to people who are looking for “delicious ribs” or “creepy ways to spend a Saturday night with your dog.” So how does this advertising model stack up against Facebook?

The answer is simply a question of stated versus actual interest. Here’s an example: let’s say you are secretly obsessed with show tunes, but as the captain of the football team, you’d rather be beaten with a sack of rusty nickels than have that information get out. So you do everything in your power to keep this private infatuation on the low, which certainly includes not posting “Hello Dolly” as your Favorite Music on your Facebook profile. However, when it’s late and nobody is home, you may find yourself googling the lyrics to “Oklahoma.” As a distributor of show tune karaoke CD’s, we’d have no idea that you were an interested consumer if we advertised solely on Facebook. Google on the other hand would basically give us the keys to your car.

The point is that while Facebook presents companies with an unparalleled opportunity to target media, it doesn’t necessarily reach all of your brand’s potential consumers. However, the same can be said for Google AdWords. So ultimately it can be concluded that if you are planning on running a targeted and cost-efficient advertising campaign, the key is run both a SEM and social network campaign. Sound complex? It is. Which is exactly why if you want to do this you should Meet Jane first.