You are here: Home / 2014 / Archives for September 2014

Archives for September 2014

When Branding Turns Negative

September 19, 2014 by 1 Comment
negative branding

negative branding

I made a call this morning to the International Special Events Society and a pleasant voice answered “ISES”. Now, I’m sure no one out there is going to associate an event organization with a terrorist group that beheads journalists, but still, it must suck to have your brand hijacked by a negative situation.

Apparently ISES isn’t the only organization having to deal with this. The ISIS mobile app is changing its name to avoid any association with the terror group. Again, I don’t think people would confuse a mobile app with a terrorist group, but as a brand owner myself I can see where it would probably leave a bad taste in your mouth when branding turns negative.

Steve Gause bought a security company in Texas two years ago with the unfortunate name of ISIS. He could argue that the terror group actually infringed on his good name, which has been an upstanding company for many years. But I don’t think you would be successful in getting a group of jihadists into a courtroom over trademark infringement.  [Read more…]

Filed Under: Blog

Why I Will Or Won’t Follow Someone on Social Media

September 1, 2014 by Leave a Comment
followers on social media

followers on social media

I remember some years of high school as being better than others. A lot of it had to do with the people I was hanging out with. I always judged people by the way they treated me and other people and not by how much money or power they had, or by how many friends they had. Sometimes I hung out with the most popular kids in high school and sometimes I didn’t. I’m still like that today.

Social media reminds me a lot of high school, with the “likes” of Facebook, and terms like “followers” on social media. Like in high school, people are judged by how popular they are and how many “friends” they have. But as someone who has spent most of my life in the entertainment industry, the word “friend” is bantered about loosely, and your real friends can be counted on one hand. Your real friends are the ones who are still there when the chips are down and you’re at your lowest point.

Social media reminds me of the same cliquish hierarchy as high school, and why I would hang out with certain people and not others. Here are some of the reasons I will or won’t follow someone on social media:

  • Information isn’t useful to me or my own followers – The first thing I do is look through someone’s thread to see what kind of things they post. If there are endless posts about what someone had for lunch or things that wouldn’t be of interest to the other people on my list, I don’t follow them. Nothing personal, it’s just not my cup of tea. [Read more…]
Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: ,