Yes, I’m wearing shorts in the DC blizzard

OK. I’m going to admit that it was pretty fucking cold walking around Capitol Hill in DC in shorts today.

But it’s a pretty epic blizzard around here. So I’m going to check it our with my friends Katie and Tyler. We got up, went and grabbed some grub and bloody mary’s at the bar down the street. Then we cruised around the Capitol on their trademark mini-tour.

I’m naturally taking photos along the way today, so you can see what this epic blizzard is all about. In shorts. See the photoset here. I’ll also be adding photos on twitter as I can.

Night Putting: Why Tiger Woods shouldn’t have fucked up

The PR shitstorm that has come from Tiger Woods’ marital transgressions is pretty unavoidable, in my estimation (I liked the New York Times’ take on it). You can’t possibly fuck up that bad while having been perennially in the media’s spotlight for more than 10 years and get away scot-free (unless your name happens to be Bill Clinton).

You’re going to lose sponsors, and some major ones, even. But even Kobe Bryant survived his scandal in Eagle County, Colorado – and is now one of the NBA’s biggest stars again (I heard so much about it, living in Vail when it was happening). I’m pretty sure that Tiger Will come back after a while off, his wife will gain a new set of diamond earrings, a beach villa in the South of Italy, and a tighter leash on one of the world’s most iconic personalities.

But Tiger Woods could have avoided this fate if he just listened to the advice of another iconic (and rich) golfer.

Caddyshack is one of my favorite all-time golf movies (it is also one of my favorite all-time comedies). I have a feeling that I’m not the only one who has watched it. In fact, I bet a lot of pro golfers out there would list Caddyshack in their “favorites” list. I am willing to bet that it’s not one of Tiger Woods’ favorite movies, otherwise he probably wouldn’t be in the hot water he’s in. But it should have been. Caddyshack isn’t just a light comedy movie with booger, sex, and golf jokes. It’s an invaluable tool to teach you how to live your life by contrasting the exploits of overprivileged snobbery with those of the underprivileged service industry supporting them. Take this scene, for instance:

It’s all spelled out here for Tiger Woods. What a bummer he didn’t heed the attention of Ty Webb (played by Chevy Chase), who tells a young Danny Noonan about the pitfalls of “night putting”. Two points if you know who he was talking about.

Yes, it was Mitch Cumstein, Ty’s roommate. Had Tiger Woods heeded Ty’s advice to avoid night putting and not fucked all these chicks all over the world (or not gotten married in the first place), apparently, he wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place. But no, he had to do it wrong. And he got busted for it.

When behavioral advertising goes wrong, but is also funny

So I was reading the news yesterday, and got a little sidetracked. But it turns out that Marilyn Monroe smoked pot (see video at reuters.com). But are you really surprised? I’m not. I think she liked to have a good time. But that’s not the best part of this video. You see, the best part is who was advertising on the page when I happened to look at the video:

FedEx is advertising on this page, probably the result of some sophisticated ad serving algorithm, no doubt. This is really funny when you know and love Mitch Hedberg’s stand-up comedy. Because one of his jokes is “I like the FedEx guy, ’cause he’s a drug dealer and he don’t even know it! And he’s always on time.”

This is most likely an unintended behavioral advertising placement, but in the age when context is everything, you need to look at what you’re advertising on and if it fits who you are as a company.

The real story of Hanukkah

OK, so you all think you know the story of Hanukkah, right? Wrong again, my friends. I’m not sure if you all know about it, but sushi plays a large role in the *real* story of Hanukkah!

photo from NPRDigiMedia on flickr

After Judah Maccabee and his brethren rededicated the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, they went looking or some oil – you know, to make their celebratory shrimp tempura sushi handrolls. This has been Jews have known to do in time of victory, most notably after they regained Jerusalem in the 1967 war).

But the problem, you see, is that the Maccabees only had enough oil to make one shrimp tempura. So they fried it up and ate the other seven shrimps they had completely raw, and didn’t get sick. It’s now known as the miracle of Hanukkah.

Bet you didn’t know that.

This comes up because we are discussing where to go in Boulder for our family Hanukkah celebration. I suggested Japango and wanted to beef up my argument with something relevant to Hanukkah. So I made up this very plausible argument, with a little help from my brother Alan.

Why varied content related to your brand’s community helps your brand’s social media conversation

One of the keys to successful social marketing is to be an active participant in the community where your fans are also actively participating. If you stick to the traditional model of only spouting talking points to your consumers, they’ll realize they’re being marketed to and I feel they’ll generally tune you out. Consumers are savvy folks, and they know when they’re being bullshitted, I think. It’s important to relate to them without sounding like you’re broadcasting a canned message.

For example, Flying Dog Brewery is part of the larger Craft Beer community, and today marks the day in 1933 when Prohibition was repealed. By letting our fans know about this day, and subtly asking them about drinking our beer, we were able to get folks actively talking about our beer. This conversation hopefully will compel consumers to take that extra step by picking up a 6er of Flying Dog beer the next time they’re at a liquor store, or at a bar that serves Flying Dog.

In addition to this conversation on Facebook, the same content in the form of a tweet was retweeted out by a bunch of folks, even on a Saturday, which is traditionally a pretty slow social marketing day.

The total marketing time for this social media conversation starter was about 3 minutes. The other key is to repeat this 10 times a week, by seeing what your followers are talking about, determining how you can be a relevant part of the conversation, and being a part of your community.