A LETTER TO .. WELL .. EVERYONE
Hey guys!
so i’m sitting here thinking… this is a Word Of Mouth campaign… so, what if we all banded together and hit up some major blogs and influential people?? I’m thinking they would have to take notice… no? 
so, this is a letter that i have drafted that i’m going to send to as many people as possible, BUT i need your help to make it count. This isnt just for me… and i’m not asking for votes… this is for the contest and for everyone! please feel free to use it!!!
dear “insert name here”
I’m writing to you today because i wanted to tell you about the coolest campaign i have ever been involved with in my life! Nissan Canada is giving away 50 Nissan Cubes to creative Canadians! And by word of mouth, i really mean word of mouth! This whole campaign has been 99.9 percent solely done via social media. Mainly… Twitter via the name TheHypercube. Yes i know twitter is all the rage, BUT think about this… The automotive industry has shifted it ways of thinking… no more big billboards, shiny commercials… print ads… they’re letting the consumer, no wait, the PASSIONATE consumers get the word out there for them! You what i call this? Innovation…. and you know what… it’s about time!!!
Now, 500 lucky Canadians, including myself have been chosen out of thousands to “audition” for the top 50 spots via this website: http://hypercube.ca Everyone get’s to show off their creativity and why they should win a Nissan Cube.
Now if you think about this… it’s not just about getting consumers to promote the product for you. Nissan is giving Canadians the opportunity to show off their stuff! A little bit of give a little bit of take… PERFECT!
If you have a moment, please take a look at what Canadians are doing to win themselves a Cube!!! And if you’re feeling super generous … VOTE!
Thanks for your time
Telma
Now, who to send this to??? well, i’ve listed below all the sites i’m going to send it to… if you want to add any, please let me know!!
MASHABLE
news@mashable.com
WIRED MAGAZINE
http://www.wired.com/services/feedback/general
KEVIN FRANKISH (BT TORONTO)
Kevinf@citytv.com
CANADIAN DRIVER – Greg Wilson
greg@canadiandriver.com
GEORGE STROMBOULOPOULOS
http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/georgereadsthemail.html
PEREZ HILTON
Perez@PerezHilton.com
please leave a comment with more places to hit up!!!!
April 21st, 2009 at 5:52 pm
Great contribution, since the start you have been so helpful and ‘bring-together-ish’ you absolutely got my vote!!!
‘
April 21st, 2009 at 6:46 pm
Brilliant !! I was trying to get a lot of local people and businesses involved but a lot of people in my city still have that smaller town mentality they look totally confused when you say Twitter lol. I think it’s a great idea to approach these places tho! I will try to do it myself when I can, I have maybe 1hr free each day that I can canvas others!
April 21st, 2009 at 6:47 pm
You definitely want to send this to ignacio@ihaveanidea.org and cc brett@ihaveanidea.org when you do. Feel free to ad a “PS. Sunny sent me.” if you want, I know them well, but I don’t want to e-mail them myself. There’s also a thread in their forum that I started last month that NO ONE has posted in, so if people made accounts for their forum (www.ihaveanidea.org) and posted in it, it may get people talking. I mean, the opportunity’s already there, might as well. (Be like “why the fuck aren’t you assholes talking about this??” LOL)
Then you gotta hit up the fine folks at Marketing Magazine. You want Christopher Loudon, the Editor-In-Chief and you want to cc Matt Nichols who is the Editor. I’d word it more like a letter to the editor than how you have it now and use your full name at the end. Their e-mail addresses are:
christopher.loudon@marketingmag.rogers.com
matt.nicholls@marketingmag.rogers.com
Also something to keep in mind: I know for a fact that if you send them a REALLY well-written letter to the editor that’s over 800 words, there’s a chance that they’ll publish it as an article. (Long story…but they offered me my own column several years ago based on that.)
Lemme think some more on other contacts….I’ve been up for 2 days straight and my brain is so not working…
When you e-mail Perez, perhaps find some info on the US version of this contest that I’ve heard rumours about and include that. He may be more likely to post it if it’s pertinent to his readers who are predominantly American. He may ignore it since it’s a Canadian contest at this point.
I’m gonna go do some digging and I’ll post here with whatever I find.
)
Oh fuck, yeah duh, Ad Age. http://www.adage.com You want this guy: sdumenco@adage.com
K. Gossip Girl while I think. BBL! <3
April 21st, 2009 at 7:07 pm
GREAT idea Telma. I have sent it out to the places you have listed as well as:
torontonewsdesk@metronews.ca,
newsonline@ctv.ca,
news@ctv.ca, (Also with attn to their Autos.ctv.ca section)
April 21st, 2009 at 8:15 pm
The basic problem I’m encountering when I spin this social media phenomenon, is that whomever I approach in the traditional media sector always takes the stance that this is circumventing traditional advertising. Those that have not figured out how to use it to their advantage feel that they are losing advertising dollars. So the final stance is that they won’t touch it.
This is all very interesting considering that our own Canada Post, a government agency, has actually figured out how to use social media, and some of these other “modern” media-based corporations have not figured it out. These corporations need to kick the old marketing fuddy-duddies to the curb and bring in the young guns who understand how to ride this gnarly wave.
Unfortunately, I don’t have the power to kick out those fuddy-duddies.
I will, however, put my thinking cap on, check my bookmarks and email contacts, and try to pull a few magic straws outta the haystack. Unfortunately, right now, I have some household chores to complete that I’ve been neglecting.
April 21st, 2009 at 8:22 pm
Qubic! See THAT RIGHT THERE is the kind of conversation that should be happening at http://www.ihaveanidea.org in the thread I started. It is THE hub of the Canadian advertising world, everyone goes there, everyone reads, everyone’s an anonymous dickhead and it’s a boy’s club so there’s a lot of pissing contests but still, it’s the playground of ad people all over Canada.
Anyway, I’m going to bed. I just wanted to check in here before I did. Night all!
April 21st, 2009 at 11:40 pm
[...] plus d’infos sur le concours, vous pouvez lire cette lettre (en anglais) le [...]
April 22nd, 2009 at 4:05 am
I have been contacting the media – I have had luck so far with only 2 media sources, the rest unfortunately saw this as a way of promoting a contest they weren’t a part of…and they didn’t want to get involved…sigh.
I will keep trying though – yes, we definitely need to spread the word more! It’s amazing what Word Of Mouth can do! Good luck to everyone – I would love to meet all of you at some point…haven’t been able to make it to a Tweetup but hopefully we shall see each other soon!
Take care, Sandy (savvari on Hypercube)
April 22nd, 2009 at 4:23 am
This is great! I am going to send i it out asap!
will report back with where i send it!
April 22nd, 2009 at 4:43 am
wrote the
thechronicleherald
automonster.ca
CANADIAN DRIVER
i will keep my eyes open for more good spots!
(babin on Hypercube!)
April 22nd, 2009 at 6:36 am
I’ve sent a similar letter last week to most of the radio stations in southwestern ontario, ckco, rogers community 20, our local paper, and much more.
April 22nd, 2009 at 12:24 pm
I just dugg the hypercube.ca’s media page that has all of the info on the contest and what they’re doing but we need all other hypercubists to digg it too or it won’t go anywhere. Spread this link! http://digg.com/d1pNtR
April 22nd, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Just e-mailed TechCrunch.com which is basically the hub of all things Web 2.0.
April 22nd, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Just submitted story to Slashdot.org.
/. & TechCrunch are the only major blogs I could think of who might run the story. There’s also the possibility of Gawker but they’re American and likely wouldn’t touch a story that’s strictly Canadian.
April 22nd, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Btw, here’s the link to the thread on IHAI I keep referencing:
http://ihaveanidea.org/cgi-bin/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1237951503
April 24th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
I just sent an e-mail to Mr. Tweet.
http://blog.mrtweet.net/