Domino's Pizza, they got it right.

One of the newest examples of corporate use of social media is the Domino’s website, http://www.showusyourpizza.com.  The idea for this website is founded on transparency, customer interactivity, and customer involvement.

The campaign is aimed at mocking how other pizza companies prepare their pizzas for photo shoots. When other companies take pictures of their pizzas for advertising, they often use camera tricks to represent a better than reality version of their food.

Showusyourpizza.com has photographs of real Domino’s pizza. The pictures were taken by random customers all across North America who upload their pictures on the website.  Dominos then looks at all the pictures and selects eight $500 winners.

Thousands of people have shown their pizzas on the website. Entire families have gotten involved in the fun.  The site can connect to your facebook and twitter accounts, linking the entire social media network together. Dominos has been able to activate their consumer base by giving them a medium to broadcast themselves in a fun, simple way.

The sensation is driven by this promise made by Dominos.

• We will only photograph real, honest-to-goodness pizzas.
• Domino's employees will make the pizzas we shoot.
• We will not artificially manipulate our pizzas when photographing them.

-Russell Weiner, Chief Marketing Officer

The website has been “liked” over 6,000 times on facebook.

Just from following the links on showusyourpizza.com I stumbled across Domino’s YouTube page. Domino’s YouTube has over 3.9 million views.  Domino’s has utilized the power of social media in a very impressive way.

On their videos, Dominos allows all comments and discussions to unfold. They also personally address many comments. Dominos utilizes two-way communication with their customers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-lphVQkM1s

Domino’s “Pizza Holdouts” was a campaign of videos used in their last blitz of commercials. Dominos found people who had not tasted their new pizza and made an ad campaign directed at one individual.

Some people questioned the validity of the commercials, claiming everyone was in on the commercial and the entire commercial was a set-up. Dominos responded on their comment section.

The way Dominos has created a network of social media sites to bring them good press and tons of earned media is remarkable. They facilitate two-way communication and have involved many fans with their company in a very personal way.

They have created buzz and proven the power of modern social media. They have taken the average customer and made them a part of Dominos.

News Wars - Citizen Journalism and PR

Frontline recently produced a series of videos titled, "News Wars." News Wars investigated the power and role of media in society. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newswar/view/19.html

One of the video segments examined the idea of citizen journalism. Citizen journalism has grown to new heights as online media has become more available and user friendly.

A perfect case of citizen journalism is Rocketboom. Rocketboom is a short amateur newscast that airs daily online. Rocketboom is downloaded or viewed around 400,000 to 500,000 times a day.

Rocketboom is generated in its entirety with one table, one camera, one light, and one computer. The creator of Rocketboom, Andrew Baron, said he has never studied journalism, but people identify what he does as journalism.

I think people should identify what he does as journalism. What is journalism after all? An exclusive club full of individuals with extra privileges allowing them to report? No.

Jeff Jarvis, founder of BuzzMachine.com and founder of Entertainment Weekly, put it this way.

            “Journalists are not the only ones with a license to operate journalism. Anyone can perform an act of journalism. It is a big mistake to define journalism by the person who does it.”

The media is the watchdog. I believe the more people that participate in the watching the better off this country is.

Markos Moulistas, founder of the popular blog Daily Kos, said people want to be part of the media. They don’t want to sit and listen anymore. Moulistas believes people are too educated to be passive consumers.

This emerging trend of citizen journalism will have a huge impact in the world of Public Relations. PR professionals have a huge responsibility of maintaining relationships with the public’s a company has. One of these publics has always been the news media.

The implication of citizen journalism for PR professionals now means this:

You have lost a lot of power in how you can influence your image through the news media. You can no longer concentrate on how your company looks in front of a group of reporters at a press conference, but how your company looks every second of everyday.

Potentially, every person that comes into contact with any employee of your company has a blog or they have a smart phone capable of documenting anything and broadcasting what they have found to the world.

Transparency is increasingly becoming the most important mission for PR professionals operating in a world where everyone is a journalist and everything is documented.

My First Blog

My name is Josh Blankenship. I am a Junior Public Relations major at Texas Tech University.

I will be maintaining this blog throughout the semester with the purpose of discussing the implications that both social media and new media have on the Public Relations industry.

Hope you all find it interesting! Feel free to leave comments and discuss the posts