Pinto Productions

On December 4th and 5th, 2010, my family made a visit to Disneyland that we will never forget. Partly because we made a video of it and sent it all over creation. If you haven’t seen it yet, or if you’d like to see it again, here it is:

As it says in the credits, we were very much inspired by Matt Harding’s Where the Hell Is Matt video series, as well as Ellen DeGeneres’ non-stop dancing goodness. Much to our surprise, the video was QUITE the hit among our family and friends. So much so, it was shared on Facebook over 1,000 times! No, really, it was. Here’s the proof:

What was downright mind-blowing to us was that the video was shared by friends of friends, and even some of their friends’ friends I think. I’d search for “Dancing Around Disneyland” on Facebook and it would turn up on the walls of people across the US and in countries like Costa Rica and Italy. It was posted in different languages (OK, just Korean, but still) and, for the most part, all of the comments were overwhelmingly positive (a rarity for the Internet, right?).

At the suggestion of quite a few people, we submitted it to Disney, Flip Video, Ellen DeGeneres, and even Vampire Weekend, the band who sings the catchy little tune that just so happened to accompany the new Honda Civic commercial (I think we inspired them, even though their commercial allegedly started a few days before we published our video on YouTube). Quite a few people have said that whenever they hear the commercial, they immediately think, “That’s the Dancing Around Disneyland song!” and not the other way around. So there.

Flip Video was definitely the most supportive. They featured us on their Facebook page and Tweeted us (twice). We’re still waiting for our commercial deal though. We’re starting to think it might not happen though. Vampire Weekend’s band manager responded with a thumbs up and an account of his childhood visit to Disneyland. It was better than no response, or the dreaded, “Stop using our song,” but we were a little disappointed that they didn’t get behind it and use it to their advantage (at our expense). We’re still waiting on Disney and Ellen to call. Any day now, we can feel it…

As of this posting (1/6/2011), the video has had over 4,500 views. Not bad! OK, so it’s not 2 million. But it also has nothing to do with Justin Bieber. Hmm… maybe we should have chosen a Justin Bieber song? Dang it!

A few people have pointed out that YouTube’s count seems awfully low considering the number of times it was shared on Facebook, and the number of times these same individuals have said to have played the video themselves. It’s a good point. I know we’ve watched it at least 10,000 times myself (we’re a very narcissistic family). I suppose it’s possible that YouTube incorrectly counts the number of views via Facebook, whether unintentional or intentional, considering that Google owns YouTube, and Google and Facebook are sort of at war over the privacy and ownership of their respective “data.” Who knows?

Anyway, the best part of the whole experience was reading all of the great comments. People said it brightened their day, or that their kids asked to watch “the Disneyland video” over 10 times. Rad.

We’ve also received quite a few requests for a sequel. We’re thinking about a group flash mob version some time this summer. We’ll take Disneyland by storm! If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll definitely keep you in the loop as we start to organize it. Who knows, maybe THAT will get the attention of Disney or Ellen. Gotta dream big, right?

P.S. Just for kicks, we registered the domain www.DancingAroundDisneyland.com, which currently takes you straight to the YouTube video. What’s next? We’re not sure. Maybe a Facebook page?

Update: Done.

Here’s the updated version of the very popular Social Media Revolution movie that I blogged about a year ago. I think what rocked my world the hardest was how much the stats have changed in less than a year. I can’t vouch for all of the information, but it certainly lines up with what I’ve been reading, doing, and personally experiencing.

PLEASE take a few minutes to watch this if you haven’t already seen it (or watch it again and see what you may have missed the first time). Social Media is NOT a myth. Social Media is here to stay. And Social Media is changing everything we know about communications and marketing/advertising.

Since Facebook keeps complaining about my RSS feed not being valid, I’m going to try a different approach – Twitterfeed – which allows publishing to both Twitter AND Facebook. This is a quick test to see how well it does.

I’m curious to see how much text it pulls over, and also whether it grabs the image. By default, Facebook pulls blog posts into Notes, which are really ugly. Embedded videos are lost in transit and, even though I was able to import about 10 posts a few months back, it suddenly stopped working, and now it won’t even recognize the RSS feed. Lame.

I tied these posts into my bit.ly account, so I should get a nice count of click throughs. Although I don’t anticipate it will be able to separate the Twitter clicks from the Facebook clicks. Oh well, I guess you can’t have everything…

And if anyone has any better suggestions, I’m all ears! I’ve played with a number of solutions and read countless blogs on the subject, and have yet to find the perfect solution.

Dilbert has always been one of my favorite comic strips. I honestly don’t know how Scott Adams does it. It’s not like he has worked in a traditional office setting in the past two decades. He must have some good spies!

Here’s one aimed at Social Media Marketing Managers (SMMMs?!?), a position that is popping up at more and more companies these days:

The Social Media Marketing Manager’s job is often made difficult by their company’s general distaste and distrust for social networks based on statistics (and rumors) about lost productivity and other negatives such as poor company representation (aka, employees and others who openly slam the company), affiliation with irresponsible employees, leaking of company secrets, etc.

But I think you’re far better off having someone in this position who knows what they are doing than to 1) do nothing, or 2) let a random employee who “has a lot of Facebook friends” and Tweets a lot take the lead on your company’s Social Media Marketing efforts.

Here’s another one that made me laugh:

There’s another misconception nothing “serious” happens on social networks, that it’s just a of soccer moms and juveniles posting worthless drivel and embarrassing photos for all their friends and family and future (or current) employees to see.

Not true. Those “soccer mom’s” are also avid consumers, and they talk a LOT about the products and services they use most. And when you reach them on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, they have a much easier time spreading your message, both positively and negatively (if/when necessary).

As for the “juveniles,” not all of them are irresponsible. Not only that, they will eventually become customers, so if you have a message that is right for them, go ahead and share it now. And again, don’t underestimate their ability to spread the word (good or bad) – and FAST!

Outside of those two stereotypes, there are people from just about every other walk of life joining Facebook and Twitter and other social networks every day. Baby Boomers are on the rise at the moment. I’m sure kids are the next wave, as Facebook continues to refine their privacy settings. Heck, they even made a movie about social networks. It’s here. Everyone is doing it. Stop resisting (if that’s describes you) and just embrace it. You’ll gain more in friendships, business, and enjoyment than you will ever lose in privacy or productivity. I promise.

These Dilbert comics and more can be seen at www.Dilbert.com.

Coca Cola was VERY smart to do this. A little creativity and a couple thousand dollars to plan and shoot a guerilla-style video has gone a LOT farther than it would have using traditional advertising methods. When’s the last time any of us wanted to “share” a commercial with somebody? Brilliant!

After shooting some great video footage up in Lake Tahoe with my friends Jodi and Jason Womack, we came to the conclusion that I should offer a “package deal” of some sort so I can start doing more video work, which I enjoy. So here it is:

Ten HD Web Videos for $995

That’s it. Less than 100 bucks a video. A few people have already told me that’s too cheap. We’ll see. I think it’s a pretty good deal, considering what you get.

So, what kind of videos could you record? I’m glad you asked. You could do a 1-2 minute introduction for your company’s web site or blog:

You could also do some FAQs, sales letters, product demonstrations (for Amazon.com), customer testimonials, book reviews, quick tips… just about anything! The key is to be natural, transparent, and genuine. Just be yourself.

In less than a day we can plan, shoot, edit, and upload the 10 videos to YouTube (in HD), and you can start adding them to your company web site, email marketing campaigns, Facebook business page, Twitter, etc.

So why would you want 10 “pretty good” videos versus one amazing video? Personally, I think there’s more benefit in having several shorter pieces rather than one longer, high-end video, especially if your videos are providing little nuggets of value as opposed to boasting about why you or your company is so great.

Interested in learning more? Drop me a line or give me a call at (818) 398-9406 and let’s discuss how easily you could get videos like these, even if you HATE being in front of the camera. (Trust me, most people do. You just can’t tell in these videos. Mostly because I make silly remarks just before hitting the record button.)

Here are a few more examples from the same location, featuring Jason’s wife, Jodi Womack. Although Jodi is much less experienced than Jason in public speaking, you’d never know based on her performance in these videos (and a little bit of editing):

We live in some pretty exciting times, technologically speaking. I haven’t picked up a newspaper in years. I don’t watch the news on TV. I get almost 100% of my news and information through social media.

Twitter allows me to follow the news and, almost more importantly, to follow the people following the news. For example, I know that I can trust people like Robert Scoble and Chris Pirillo to stay on top of technology. I know people like Chris Brogan, Jim Kurkal and Gary Vaynerchuk are going to show me what’s new in social media. For better or worse, I trust them.

On YouTube I can catch any TV “moments” I may have missed. Jennifer Lopez fell on stage? Let me YouTube that. They did a remake We Are The World? Cool. I’ll watch it online. The only thing I use my TV for these days is to DVR The Office and a couple other shows, or to watch my Netflix movies. Read more…

Google Search results for "Tony Pinto"

OK, so it’s not an AMAZING feat of strength, but it has been a goal of mine for some time. It started about a year ago when I first noticed the domain www.tonypinto.com was available. I was lucky enough to buy it for less than $10 bucks!

Then I created this WordPress blog, started Tweeting as @tpinto3 (had @tonypinto at one point, but lost it), and began to comment on other blogs, with links back to my site. I also created a Google profile that links all of my social media, including Facebook, LinkedIn and Foursquare.

The journey continues, but I’m just glad now that whenever somebody types “Tony Pinto” into Google, they find me right up at the top.

Can you say the same for yourself?

OK, so the title of this post is a little misleading. I don’t actually work AT McDonald’s (not that there’s anything wrong with that, except for the pay I guess).

What I’m referring to is some recent consulting work I completed while eating breakfast at a McDonald’s down in San Diego, just before visiting one of my clients.

With the addition of free Wifi and a recent change in decor, McDonald’s almost feels like a Starbucks these days. I even heard that there’s a McDonalds (somewhere) that offers free use of a conference room. Nice!

I suppose the other reason for this post is to express my amazement over the fact that I can actually conduct business from a McDonald’s restaurant. I’m 100% freelance now (web product development, social media marketing, and video production, in case you were wondering), so I find myself travelling a bit more than I used to. But on this particular morning I found myself eating an Egg McMuffin, replying to emails, reviewing my calendar, and editing videos for one of my clients. Pretty much exactly how I conduct business in the privacy of my home office, and with almost the same efficiency (two 24″ monitors usually helps – but not always!).

Ironically, I found it easier to focus on what I was doing at McDonald’s than at any corporate office I’ve ever worked in. Sometimes it helps to get away from the office (home or otherwise) and to have fewer distractions (people or otherwise) while you’re focusing on a chunk of work.

The icing on the cake was witnessing one of the best McDonalds managers ever. She was so nice to her team, and they seemed so happy. I almost thought I was at In-N-Out.

That’s it from me. What’s your most unique work experience?

I had the unbelievable good fortune of being invited to visit the corporate offices of social media platform Ning this past week to participate in the Ning Network Council program. There were ten community managers in attendance, ranging from my little cooking community (NoTimeToCookDinner.com) to huge communities like Ellen, momlogic, and Extra, which currently has over 800,000 members.

Special thanks to my new friend Alice for this photo.

I met some of Ning’s most outstanding employees, shook hands with (and possibly insulted with a back-handed compliment) CEO Gina Bianchini, and compared notes with some amazing network creators who are just crushing it (as Gary Vaynerchuk would say) on sites like MyModernMet.com, BabySpot.com, tudiabetes.org, BroadwaySpace.com, BJPenn.com, DesignDemocracy.ws and LiveHereOakPark.com.

Read more…