We couldn’t have been more proud on launch day, outside U.S. Airway Center, when Lift Up America founder Dave Hannah, Honorary Campaign Chairman Jerry Colangelo and Campaign Director Russ Dickey were flanked on stage by an All-Star lineup of big-hearted sports heroes including Kurt Warner, Luis Gonzalez, Larry Fitzgerald, Steve Kerr and Anne Meyers-Drysdale, who voluntarily offered their support to the campaign.

Addressing one of our core values of serving the community, Barclay performed this work on a pro-bono basis. ]]> Advertising & Creative, Agency News, Branding, Public Relations 2010-05-20T00:24:28+00:00 http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/facebook-vs-face-time/ http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/facebook-vs-face-time/#When:16:12:44Z
I’ve loved it since I made my first “connection” on Friendster, formed my “Top 8” on MySpace. I love it even more as I sit back and watch my “network” grow on Facebook and Twitter. I’m obsessed, addicted. I get excited thinking about what’s awaiting me in the news each morning. And by “news” I mean, my news feed. Yes, Facebook has become my morning coffee and newspaper. Sad, I know.

What I don’t love is how easy it is to go for an eternity without actually talking to your dearest friends and family. Remember talking? I mean REAL talking with your voice, a.k.a picking up the phone to use said voice to mouth actual words. Not texting. Not pinging. Not posting. And not tweeting. But actually generating words… that I’m sure add up to more than 140 characters.

Technology has made it so easy to skip human connection altogether, hasn’t it? Yes, I know all of the benefits of our tweeting, global online village filled with links, photos and updates. And some of this is good and even thrilling to be a part of the Digital Media Revolution. It’s just that I’m often reminded of the lovely sound —that fantastic squeal, I guess –coming from the other end of the phone when a friend yells “Hey, it’s so good to HEAR from you! What’s new?!?!”

Then there’s the lost traditional art of face time – a.k.a “f2f”And I’m not talking Skype chats or even Elfing Yourself. In person is as real as it gets.

So, even though I love social media –um, like truly, madly, deeply --this here Facebook addict is vowing to give some love to face time. Yes, I, Shannon Keller, hereby pledge to: 1) call old friends, frenenemies, Aunt Sue, eighth grade locker-mate, old teammates, buddies, the guy I dated a year ago, anybody who deserves to actually hear a person connect vowels and consonants; 2) have face to face — that is, IN PERSON meetings for personal and business reasons (not Meet Ups or Tweet Ups or any mash-up of this concept).

Of course, I will continue to social media to the max, blog, update my status with random insights that hit me mid-day, etc. My pledge is not meant to be either/or, real vs. virtual. Rather, it’s a promise to remain Little Miss Uber-social, while continuing to remember how important and amazing it is to have personal interaction. You know, seeing and hearing my friends in the real world.
]]> Consumer Division, Social Media 2010-05-07T16:12:44+00:00 http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/today-seo-tomorrow-the-world/ http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/today-seo-tomorrow-the-world/#When:17:58:12Z SEO (search engine optimization) workshop through IABC Phoenix featuring one of my favorite presenters. One of my 2010 goals as online media manager was to shove as much info about SEO as humanly possible into my brain.

As my pen flew across the paper to write down every priceless jewel of information being shared (Side note: I’m a black belt-level note-taker— 9 pages, front and back!), my brain swam with visions of dominating the world with my SEO aptitude. Yes, it’s true, I had fantastical schemes of “optimizing” every press release, tweet, Facebook status, etc. I was going to type up all of my notes and immediately share them with my colleagues.

And then, as so often happens (here is where the story turns) I had client projects and events that were priority, countless meetings to attend, Twitter accounts and Facebook fan pages to update, and so on. Ugh, how to achieve my SEO glory?? Then, the rational part of my brain reasserted itself and I read an article on Mashable.com about reactionary work flow and tips for online community managers. Both of these articles stressed the need to step back from the constant demand to know about what’s going on online.

So, I stepped back.

First, SEO is important and we need to start paying closer attention to it when working with online planning. But if you really want to get all nitty-gritty, the rules of SEO change as they upgrade the algorithms search engines use, and they all use different algorithms -- optimizing for Google is different from optimizing for Bing. The short answer to my dilemma is to put forth the best effort possible to optimize the content we put online and practice my, um, Zen.

What it really comes down to, despite all of these fabulous technologies, is people. The people behind the Facebook fan page, behind the Twitter account and blog posts. It is my opinion that the reason so many of these “social networks” took off is because the Internet was finally leveraged to not only share info but to bring people together – a “virtual village,” if you will, that has no limitations.

Finally, what did I gain out of the SEO workshop? One of the reasons this online strategy is important is because “if you can be found, then you can connect with the customer.” Google is our world’s library and just as libraries have rules about how to shelve books… Google runs on rules about how to categorize websites.

Who knows how the web will change in the next few years, after all, social networks sprang up and took off within the past five years. In the meantime, we can work at tailoring our content, not to beat the system (when SEO rules are abused they are changed!) but so that our target audience can find us.

So, I bid you adieu at this point, fair reader. For, I’m off now to rule the world in SEO…feel free to come along!



]]> Consumer Division, Social Media 2010-04-20T17:58:12+00:00 http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/when-the-jokes-on-you/ http://www.barclaycommunications.com/get-buzzed/comments/when-the-jokes-on-you/#When:23:46:21Z
Let’s start with TBS. In an effort to promote its late night animated series Aqua Teen Hunger Force, TBS hired a guerrilla marketing agency to implement the plan, which was to place huge light boards that resembled a circuit board in various locations in 10 cities. The light boards displayed an image of a character from the show that would appear on Cartoon Network. Along with the plan was a list of do’s and don’ts of where to place them. In most cities, there were no apparent problems. I know, because I saw those weird, creepy looking boards on my way to Port Authority in New York City– and didn’t give it a second glance.

Unfortunately, when motorists in Boston spotted the odd-looking boxes, there was great concern that they might be a terrorist plot. Remember, NYC, Boston, Chicago and other major cities were still jittery from so many real and false threats. The result was 10 hours of chaos that disrupted traffic, closed bridges and put the city into terror alert mode. It was the largest ruckus ever created by a guerrilla marketing effort. Another problem was that the agency went to court, laughed it off and lampooned the press.

Unfortunately for TBS, it wasn’t a laughing matter. The company angered citizens and was responsible for over $1 million in retribution to Boston. While some believe it was an intentional hoax to stimulate buzz, getting national coverage for a million is worth it…they say. Most PR experts say it was a mistake.
]]> Advertising & Creative, Consumer Division, Public Relations 2010-04-14T23:46:21+00:00