HIRE ME TO SPEAK
HIRE ME TO SPEAK

Citizen journalists love interesting experiences

I write about strategies to turn fans into customers and customers into fans. I also share ways to use real-time strategies to spread ideas, influence minds, and build business.

Social Media  |  Best Practices

A great way to get your organization noticed is to share an interesting experience with "citizen journalists" and let them tell your story. (Citizen journalists include bloggers, podcasters, video-bloggers, people active on Twitter, and the like).

For example, at South-by-Southwest, my friend Christopher Barger, Director, Global Social Media at General Motors organized an opportunity for people to test drive the not-yet-released Chevy Volt electric car. That resulted in hundreds of blog posts and thousands of tweets.

When I was given an opportunity to open the NASDAQ stock market last year, 50 people joined me in the worlds first Tweetup at a stock market open.

Or consider what the United States Marine Corps did this week at Marine Week Boston. Media and bloggers were given an opportunity to take a 20 minute flight in a V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft.

Direct link to video in high definition.

The flight originated at Hanscom Air Force Base in Bedford, MA, went out into suburban Boston, flew over downtown and returned. Unlike commercial aircraft, we were encouraged to use our wireless mobile devices throughout the flight. It was very satisfying to live tweet while flying.

On the flight I was on, several of my Boston-area friends were aboard. You can read reports from:
Steve Garfield
CC Chapman
Eric Schwartzman
Doug Haslam

If you don't have a hot toy to give people rides in like GM and the Marines, why not organize a dinner for bloggers with your CEO? Or a special Webinar to pre-announce a new offering. Or a product sample? Or something even more clever?

Disclosure: I have done pro-bono work for the U.S. Department of Defense and the Marines.