Tag Archives: innovation

Wells Fargo… Center Stage

Tomorrow, Wells Fargo will launch its newest social media venture, Center Stage in the Rose Parade. It’s a super funny idea: They have different musical genre takes on the “The Wells Fargo Wagon” song from “The Music Man.” Anyone can create their own music video to any of the five versions, and submit it to the site.

Registration is quick and easy. And the prizes are amazing:

The Grand Prize winner could have his or her video highlighted in our Wells Fargo national TV advertisement during the Tournament of Roses Parade and on wellsfargo.com. That’s a lot of eyeballs. We’re also awarding two (2) 8GB Apple iPhones, as well as ten (10) 1GB Flip Video Ultra Cameras to other lucky winners.

Nice!

I also noticed that the platform they’re using is a viral video platform by local Vancouver digital agency, Invoke Media whom I’ve worked with a couple of times over the last few years.

In the end, this gives Wells great content, helps them identify some brand enthusiasts, lets people play with the brand and humanizes the company. Plus free content. Nicely done, which is hardly a surprise considering how amazing their VP of Social Network Marketing is, Ed Terpening.

They just keep rolling out interesting projects, and no one else seems able to keep up in the banking industry.

Black Hole Blog.

An article in the newest (September 2007) edition of Enterprise Magazine features an interview with me. Black Hole Blog covers social media and how credit unions can embrace it. I talk about how CUs can respond to bloggers, and the writer, Laureen Griffin, also writes about ChangeEverything.ca.

She also interviewed Gene Blishen and Trey Reeme.

I’ve seen a few articles like this, but I thought this particular one was insightful. It must be hard to write an article that is at once basic and also helpful, knowing that your readers will range from those who don’t know social media at all, to those who are eager to try it out.

I like this quote a lot:

If a member of your credit union was standing in the middle of a town square in front of a rapt crowd, praising or criticizing your service or products, would you go outside and listen? If you could go to free credit union conferences to learn about the biggest innovations in credit union marketing, would you go? If your credit union could be the Roman Forum of the community, where people shared their concerns, and spoke from their hearts, would you do it? If you answered “yes,” then you are ready to dive into the blogosphere.

A nice way of framing the issue, I think.

Live blogging at Finovate.

I’m very pleased to be going to NYC in October for Finovate. This is a new conference created by Jim Bruene who runs NetBanker. According to the website:

Following the popular format pioneered by DEMO, FINOVATE 2007 will provide each company with a mere 7 minutes to “wow!” an audience of 200 leading executives, investors, analysts, members of the press and bloggers with an actual demonstration of their latest and greatest product or service. The demos will be followed by intimate networking sessions where the attendees will get unprecedented access to the executives from these innovative companies.

Twenty leading companies have already committed to present including (in alphabetical order): Andera, Billeo Inc, CheckFree, ClairMail, Firethorn, Digital Insight (an Intuit company), Geezeo, Identity Theft 911, iPay Technologies, Jwaala, Lending Club, Metavante, mFoundry, Mint, Monitise, MortgageBot, MShift, Online Resources, Prosper Marketplace, and Yodlee.

I’ll be a fly on the wall for the day, live-blogging the whole thing. I’m very excited to be covering the event and getting a chance to learn from all the innovative presenters. See you there…