Apple has officially announced their iAd development kit, “iAd JS”, which enables agencies to develop interactive ads for their clients. As explained in Apple’s technical documentation, it gives more interactive capabilities than any other existing interactive media, including Adobe Flash.

First, it can accept a user’s gestures, not only on the touch screen but also by motion. For example, you can create a banner ad showing a soda bottle, allowing users to shake it until it explodes. Using the kit, you can also develop ads that detect orientation.

Next, the iAd JS provides for integration with social media. When iAd is activated, the user is online; therefore, it can connect to a social network and download dynamic content to the banner. It’s also possible to update real-time status of an advertising campaign, such as competitive or ranking information.

Based on user interaction, it can also store an image generated by the banner to the iPhone’s photo gallery, so users can see ad images on their albums. For example, by utilizing social media integration, an iAd banner can create and save a user’s future baby photo with campaign copy based on a photo identified by Facebook ID.

Domus has full iAd creation capabilities and is actively involved in development projects for our clients. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Last year Microsoft introduced the world to an up-and-coming technology called “Project Natal”, its Xbox appliance that enables gamers to interact with Xbox games without any hand-held controllers. This week at the E3 conference Microsoft is finally introducing it for delivery this holiday season. But as part of all of the fanfare, Microsoft officially named the device “Kinect”.

Now, “Kinect” is actually a good name for the product, and the device has the potential to be incredibly successful, but that’s not the point of this blog post. Rather, I’d like to muse about the strategy to use one name for the many months leading up to the actual launch, and then change the name just before the launch. Microsoft has always done that with its operating systems. For example, Windows Server 2008 was referred to as “Codename Longhorn” from early 2005 through August, 2007, when Bill Gates announced its official name in anticipation of its February, 2008 release.

Although that might be fine with operating systems, especially those designed for the corporate server market, Project Natal – er, uh, Kinect – is different. It is a consumer product, not a corporate one. And 2010 is not 2005. When Microsoft announced Project Natal in 2009, it released a video showcasing its capabilities. That video has been on the Top 10 viral video charts every month since then. It has received millions of views, and virtually every gamer has heard about it. Moreover, forums and social media sites have been abuzz over it non-stop.

In other words, social media is the name of the game in 2009/2010, for those companies who know how to use it well. Microsoft certainly did use it well this past year, getting the whole gaming world knowing about and discussing their upcoming product. But they didn’t hit a home run because of their naming tactic. Some of that branding value will now disappear because the word “Natal” no longer exists for Microsoft. They absolutely can – and will – spend lots of money to imprint the new name in people’s minds, but a more nimble and cost-conscious company might have come up with the final brand name a year ago. Then they could have gotten their branding done for them without a massive advertising campaign (allowing that money to be used more effectively elsewhere).

Domus is a marketing communications agency specializing in integrating social media, digital, and traditional advertising and PR into effective brand strategies. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

The NY Times reported that yesterday GM sent a letter to its headquarter employees that they should stop saying “Chevy” when communicating with people, instead exclusively using “Chevrolet”.

“We’d ask that whether you’re talking to a dealer, reviewing dealer advertising, or speaking with friends and family, that you communicate our brand as Chevrolet moving forward,” said the memo, which was signed by Alan Batey, vice president for Chevrolet sales and service, and Jim Campbell, the G.M. division’s vice president for marketing.

“When you look at the most recognized brands throughout the world, such as Coke or Apple for instance, one of the things they all focus on is the consistency of their branding,” the memo said. “Why is this consistency so important? The more consistent a brand becomes, the more prominent and recognizable it is with the consumer.”

Every once in a while some piece of news leaks out that just offers so much opportunity for fun. Everyone is talking about how stupid this is. Just as a few examples:

• Do they truly think that Chevy is made or lost as a brand by refusing to use the name that most of the public regularly uses?
• Might the GM executives have considered that the inconsistency of using “Coke” as an example of why they shouldn’t use a brand nickname?
• If they wanted to tell their employees not to use “Chevy”, might they have also considered changing their web sites, TV, and other advertising? All of them still use “Chevy” throughout. (In fact, tonight every TV commercial that I saw referenced “Chevy” exclusively – not a single mention of “Chevrolet”. And the web site presented was chevydealer.com, not chevrolet.com.)

Did Alan Batey and Jim Campbell not think that in today’s internet-based social media world, their ridiculous directive wouldn’t be discussed by everyone around the world? Did they not realize that they would be mocked and that Chevy’s (and GM’s) brand image would be hurt>

Isn’t the internet fun? Too bad not everyone knows yet how to play in it.

Domus is a digital agency and a full service marketing agency that combines expertise in marketing and technology to effectively communicate brand platforms. For more information visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

BP’s oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico might be the first true national calamity to occur during the social media era. As such, exploring what BP has done and has not done, along with the unfolding consequences, offers the rest of us an illustrative case study on how best to act before, during, and after events such as these – even if on much smaller scales.

Here’s one initial observation. Prior to the spill, BP’s overall reputation was generally neutral – relatively evenly split between people who had positive, neutral, and negative opinions about them. However, since the spill opinions are strongly skewed to the negative.

Also, prior to the explosion, BP had very litle presence on major social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. They did a lot of advertising (“Beyond Petroleum”), but not much engagement with the public, especially the online public.

So, whatever they have tried to do since then cannot be effective because they have no initial base of fans from which to draw help and support. As a counter example, consider what would happen if some disaster involved a company such as Starbucks. Excluding all discussions of the nature of the disaster itself, Starbucks would at least have a couple of million people with whom it has established an online relationship and who could (and would) join the discussions from an initially positive perspective.

So, one lesson to be learned is that engagement in social media is not just for ongoing brand strength; it’s also an insurance policy against unanticipated problems – even on scales much less than BP’s disaster.

Domus is a creative and digital marketing agency based in Philadelphia. We combine expertise in classic marketing, social media trends, technology, and business acumen to provide effective short- and long-term solutions for our customers’ marketing needs. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.