Yes, I know so many people are on linkedin (an online business networking social media tool)…so many people are connected, and that is great.  I hope that it changes how people do business.  I hope that it turns the business world upside down with the social media/networking capabilities!

But here is one of my biggest problems with these start ups and many other small businesses.  In order for any business to grow, you have to make the customer happy.  You have to make any process easy whether it be signing up, changing a password, or changing your service.

Well, guess what?  Linkedin has made signing up very easy but when it comes to tweaking your subscription package, they make life very difficult.  First, you can’t downgrade your account online (even though you can upgrade, change your password, enhance your profile….).  There is no 800 number to call…all you can do is send an email and hope for the best.  I made my request through an online cust. svc. email and it took about 24 hours for a response.  The response that came back claimed they were cancelling my subscription.  That was it…no futher explanation from Loretta at Linkedin.

This is not what I asked for!!  I sent a reply email and again no repsonse so I went back online to go through their cust. svc. email.  I got an email back which said that they were not able to do downgrades.  They had to cancel my subscription and then I would have to sign up again and pick the package I wanted.

Reid Hoffman, CEO, Allen Blue, VP Product Strategy, Keith Rabois VP Business and Corp Dev and other Linkedin staff…I thought the scare tactics went out when social media came in!!  Don’t tell me that you can’t do what I ask cause that is just stupid with the technology you have involved in your service. 

What is apparent to me is that Linkedin doesn’t care about their customers and their needs.  What is my motivation to sign up again…I can’t get anyone on the phone, they don’t respond in a timely manner, they lie and say they can’t do something they can do.  I am no longer a strong advocate for Linkedin.com!

As I have stated before, high quality customer service needs to be the new marketing tool (especially for linkedin).  The best way to maintain and get new customers is by listening and acting wisely.  Just ask Dell who is trying harder at customer service!  Just ask the Creative Concepts clients!

Greg Verdino over at Digitas has a great blog!  He writes about trends among other things and is now being quoted in the press.  One of the latest subjects has been about Second Life.  Greg talks about how Starwood Hotels got a lot of hype for creating “Aloft” which was an online resort in this online world where you can live a second made up life, buy things (with Second Life money) and now, experience violence.  The draw for many is that any player can recreate themselves and be anything they want to be.  Well the problem with Starwood is that they carved out a spot for themselves but didn’t work their new place after all was said and done…they have a hotel but no greeeters or staff which in the real world wouldn’t be good for business and in Second Life amounts to the same.

As Greg points out, when any company makes a bold move into these new forays, you can’t just create it, walk away, and think you are getting anywhere.  As with anything else in business (or life for that matter), make a choice, stick with it and work it the best you can.  This applies to blogging, podcasting, press releases or just keeping up with the bookkeeping.  If you let things go, any initial effort is a waste of time and money!  Consistentcy with every campaign or any effort will win the prize at the end of the day!

Just to finish up on the Disney story, Spocko, the guy who reported that Disney’s super right wing radio affiliate KSFO condoned torture and murder, was supported and given a big hurrah from the blogging world. 

Once the blogoshpere learned about Spocko’s site being taken down because of uploading audio files from the radio station, other bloggers (both national and international)  posted the audio files on their sites and different hosts offered their services to bring Spocko back up.

What are Disney’s lawyers going to do now?  It’s only a short time before mainstream media picks up the story.

This is what I love about blogging, the internet, and consumer generated content: the truth has an easier and faster way of bubbling up to the surface.  The big guns like Disney can’t beat the small guys into submission any longer because there is no controlling the messaging.  This scares some (and many Public Relations people fall into this category of fearing the uncontrollable) but to me it brings total satisfaction.  The blogosphere can bring down the bad but at the same time it can boost up the good ones (and the bold ones)  :)

Hello everyone and welcome to 2007. I have started out the year with a bang by dropping a new blog design for your pleasure…it matches more closely with the Creative Concepts website and was designed by my web guys at Fat Free Studio. Enjoy!

So with a new Year comes the all mighty and very tiring predictions. Every email and every article I have read today talks about Google, AOL, MySpace, Social Media, Online Networking…the predictions list goes on and on! Where are we going, how are we getting there, who is doing what …you know how it goes.

One article by Bart Cleveland was a bit unique. He talks about how the small agencies need to embrace social media. He says, and he is right, that the small agencies often have the flexibility to be the innovators but they may not be keeping up with the social media revolution because it is moving so quickly and they can’t keep up because of lack of staff, lack of time, lack of faith in successful outcomes….this could be true for many but not for Creative Concepts.

We work hard at staying ahead of the curve at Creative Concepts but it doesn’t come quickly or easily. We research and study the trends and the marketplace, we listen to our clients who are thankfully asking us to help them with the online world which includes SEO, blogs, podcasts, video, optimized press releases, websites and more, and we make a decision about what works and what doesn’t which often comes through hard work, courage and a lot of business know-how.

As a small agency we are proud to be offering something to our clients that they can’t seem to find elsewhere! It is our goal and ambition to use these social media tools to enhance what already exists in the PR and Marketing worlds. The ability to guide our clients through the new and ever changing internet terrain is not only our mission but our pleasure as we continue to be ahead of the pack by merging the old tricks with the new plays.

I won’t even attempt to make a prediction for 2007 other than we are looking forward to an exciting year with clients who are willing to take the internet ride! Yahoo!!

Check out this fun online card created by Digitas…make your own and send it on!  Happy New Year!

So what is a flog? It is a fake blog (writers from PR firms who pretend to be blogging honestly about a product or company in order to start a buzz) created by the geniuses at marketing and pr firms. Just kidding about the genius part. Edelman PR, one of the largest firms in the world and most recently Zipatoni have mislead their clients into believing that they know the best way to get exposure and get new clients and they know what is going on with emerging technology and viral marketing…for this Wal-Mart and Sony pay the big bucks.

Well if any of these men and women from these firms took the time to truly learn about blogging and its effectiveness within its communities and if these men and women were clear about doing business ethically, then the word flog would never exist.

Corporate blogging is a highly effective communication and marketing tool. eHobbies is a toy site. Once they created a blog, sales increased by 2-4% which is the trend for retail sites with blogs. There are many reasons to blog for business: increased search engine rankings, new clients get a feel for the business, reaching out to past and present customers…the list goes on and on. And yes PR and Marketing firms can be involved but only if there is full disclosure!!

As with everything else in life, there is no shortcut. Success comes from honest hard work.

Read about Sony’s flog debacle here.

Just returned from the Techcrunch Meetup. Jeanne, the event organizer, and Jennifer, the Techcrunch business manager, were awesome to work with! The event was a hit, the sponsors happy (especially HitTail), and the party smooth. Mike Arrington wasn’t used to a loud New York crowd and didn’t want to take the elevator but he made his way just fine anyway.

In case people don’t know who Creative Concepts is, we are an East Coast based PR and Marketing firm working with the  social media tools (check out the Bigelow Tea blog in its infancy), so if you are a tech startup anywhere and you want to reach out to our coast, we can help you. If you want to reach out to the corporate sector, we can help you do it with the Business Smart Tools Conference.

Sorry Mike Dunn that you missed it, but Greg Verdino, John Boehmer and Elizabeth Tarbell, it was great to see you and thanks Erin and Michelle for a job well done!

Pictures tomorrow.

Well, I have done it again…I have had a gap with the entries but I don’t want to write unless I have some news or some interesting thoughts so today I am writing about news and I am writing about Creative Concepts.

Constantin Basturea’s blog reports a list called PR meets WWW.  This is a fully detailed list of pr agencies and consultants worldwide and their blogs along with some interesting entries.  Creative Concepts was mentioned so thank you for that!

Also take note, Techcrunch is coming to town (NYC) for a Meetup and Creative Concepts is their communications sponsor.  While the event is already sold out, I am looking forward to meeting all of those who are ready to party in bed in nyc with techcrunch!!

And for those of you out at the blog business summit in Seattle, look for Sabine Kirsten, Emerging Tech Director for Creative Concepts.  She is enjoying the conference and will be attending the Blogher meetup tonight.  Ask her about all of our corporate blogging projects…we have lots to share!

Went to OMMA today and was pleasantly surprised.  Heard from Rishad Tobaccowala, CEO, Denuo (what a smart and funny guy with lots of common sense), Ross Levinsohn, President, Fox Interactive Media who I had read about…was impressed then and impressed now by his gut instincts and his ability to move quickly and smartly into the digital age.  We all broke out into mini sessions where my favorite moment of the day came during the “Creative that makes friends with Social networks” where Henry Copeland, CEO, Blogads moderated…smart comments came from Sandy Marks on political campaigns online (she made statements like “you can create a sexy ad with click throughs but once the viewer has clicked are they finding what they are truly looking for or was the image/copy a ruse to get some fleeting attention from the viewer that in the long run doesn’t make sense (or get business or votes) for the client”) and Frank Radice, SVP The NBC Agency (the inhouse agency for NBC) said that less copy, more images and video makes for a strong presense on the web and can drive online users to TV which is a new equation for many to think about.

So the cool thing that I have concluded on my own especially after today is that this social media new digital age has leveled the playing field which is something to take advantage of.  All ages have entered the race and all backgrounds, men and women….it takes passion, thinking out of the box and flexibility to make something happen.  The truly creative, the truly hard working and the great listeners of the world will be able to make something of this new media.  It is very cool to be a part of this change in media and communications!!

One of our clients, The Orthodontic Center, had an interesting task for us to accomplish. Dr. Christie, the Director, wanted a website that not only gave out meaningful information about his practice but he wanted to share his research (he is internationally known for developing the Facial Print technology) in addition to finding new patients both near and far.

We at Creative Concepts had the perfect solution. We created a website that had a home page and 2 static pages (about us and “how we keep you smiling” which explains the Facial Print technology) plus we included 2 blogs that were seamless with the static pages.

The first blog titled, “we are talking,” is for the parents of the patients or the adult patients to read the latest news and also share their comments and/or questions. Also on this page, Dr. Christie can reveal his latest research and his staff can relay tips for the kids and parents. This page helps any new family feel comfortable with the process of braces because they can speak with The Orthodontic Center without going into the office….they can discover more on this page compared with many typical static pages of most websites because the information is always evolving because it is a blog.

The second blog is for the kids (the design is focused on the kids too). Kids are blogging and sharing their thoughts about getting braces plus their news about school, music, sports….this is a place where the kids can talk if they are getting nervous about getting braces…this is a place where they can make friends which may end up being the biggest marketing tool around.

We are very excited about this site and how blogging is being used as a communication and marketing tool. This is truly an example of how any business can use blogging for many purposes.