In this annual volunteer event, nearly 1,300 people will take to the streets, community gardens, public parks, and community centers to give our beloved Emerald City a little TLC. It’s a good way to find your passion in volunteering (maybe you’ll discover you want to volunteer at the Braille Library or for a P-Patch). There’s just so much going on in Seattle!

As the dedicated social media team for Seattle Works Day, the Banyan Branch crew probably won’t be getting our hands too dirty, but you can bet we’ll be putting our thumbs to work. Our plan is to spread out in pairs all over the city to interview volunteers and organizers at different project sites, and drive conversation about Seattle Works. In other words, we’ll be live-tweeting!

Look for pictures, interviews, and updates on Twitter with the hashtag #SWDay.

Our goal this year is to get #SWDay trending, so don’t forget to use the hashtag in all conversation about Seattle Works Day, and retweet @SeattleWorks and @BanyanBranch to your heart’s content. We would have gotten #SWDay trending last year if it wasn’t for the Rapture, which was on the same day.

It’s not too late to sign up for a team, and if you can’t make it to the main event on Saturday, May 19, you can still help spread awareness and drive conversation with the hashtag #SWDay!

We’ll see you out there!

Banyan Branch President Blake Cahill hosted the final round of UW Bothell’s second annual Business Plan Competition on May 4, and was very impressed by the range of innovative ideas on display.

Though dozens applied, only four teams made it to the final round of the competition: Art of the Soul, CondoBids.com, EzCar, and Valeni Boots. These teams put their classroom experiences and unique ideas to the test in a head-to-head competition for $20,000 in cash and prizes. They competed in front of a distinguished panel of judges that included Dr. P.V. (Sundar) Balakrishnan (Professor, UW Bothell School of Business), Trisha Gross (President and CEO, Hubspan), Dave Parker (CEO, bundled.com, Inc., and Director, Founder Institute Seattle), and Richard (Rick) Shea (President and CEO, Spiration).

Banyan Branch was proud to sponsor the event, and Blake was excited to witness the creativity and business savvy of all the student competitors. “The overall concepts and plans were strong and well thought-out,” he says. “I would be interested in learning more about the execution tactics each team would use to bring their ideas to market.” Blake’s favorite business plan was the team that won the competition: Valeni Boots. “I was surprised and impressed by the inventive business model Valeni came up with, and I could tell the judges were, too.”

It’s exciting to see the wealth of ideas and ambition coming out of the UW business program, and we predict a bright and successful future for all the competing students. The many Puget Sound area CEOs, entrepreneurs, and angel investors who were sitting in the TEC Competition audience no doubt feel the same.

The web is buzzing with Facebook IPO chatter and new predictions are rolling in daily. All eyes in the tech world are watching closely to see if Facebook’s IPO will mimic the incredible success of Google or the rocky path of Groupon.

Banyan Branch created an infographic comparing the wildly successful social network to other recent tech IPOs to get a better idea of how Facebook stacks up to the competition. Take a look below to see where Facebook stands in terms of user-base size, CEO salaries, values vs. revenue, and online chatter related to the IPOs.

Does seeing this data change your predictions in any way?

One of our clients, Ultherapy, has partnered with Banyan Branch’s Social Interactive team for a fun and creative Mother’s Day campaign called Laughable Mom Moments. This photo contest gives users the chance to win an Ultherapy treatment (to keep for yourself or give to your mom) by submitting a fun photo of a “laughable mom moment.” Ultherapy is a non-surgical procedure for the face that uses ultrasound technology to lift and tone loose skin without any downtime.

Any picture that reminds you of fun times with your mom, or as a mom yourself, is fair game. So break out the shoebox under your bed and find that photo that always makes you smile (or giggle). Whether it’s a picture of your mom in 5-inch shoulder pads from the 80s or a snapshot of you and your kids at the zoo last weekend, anything goes.

Here’s how it works:

Visit Ultherapy on Facebook and “like” the page, then submit your photo by May 13. There are two ways to win:

• Fan Favorite: For the social media butterflies. The top three vote-getters will be deemed finalists and qualify to win. Grand prize winner will be selected randomly from finalists; other two finalists will be named runner-ups.
• Ultherapy Favorite: For the more modest social networkers. The top Ultherapy favorite wins!

Grand Prize winners will win a Full-Face Ultherapy Treatment, the Runner-ups will win a $100 digital gift card to Shutterfly, and the four Weekly Winners leading up to the end of the contest will each win a $50 digital gift card to Shutterfly.

Let’s see those Laughable Mom Moments!

"May the Fourth be with you!" - Erik

Did you notice anything unusual about the conversations you had on Friday, May 4? Star Wars fans and nerds everywhere know the fourth of May is a special day, but some of you may have been surprised to hear your cashiers and coworkers uttering phrases like “May the Fourth be with you,” throughout the day.

Contrary to popular belief, #StarWarsDay is not tied to the film’s anniversary or even the official Star Wars Day (May 25). It was created by clever Star Wars fans who simply couldn’t resist seizing the opportunity to make a play on the film’s famous phrase: “May the Force be with you.”

It’s been a few days since the fourth (we hit a little snag in the space/time continuum here at Banyan Branch), but we felt it would be exciting to examine Star Wars’ cultural impact. How does a low budget sci-fi movie from the 70s come to define so much of modern American culture? Here are some of our favorite examples of how Star Wars fans are pushing the envelope to replicate the future (or the past, if you want to get technical) they fell in love with as a kid:

• “Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope.”  – Princess Leia. Scientists in the UK are busy trying to create holographic projectors just like the one R2D2 used to deliver his all important message from Princess Leia. Tupac may have been the first hologram to break into mainstream entertainment, but he won’t be the last.
• “In my experience there is no such thing as luck.” – Obi Wan Kenobi. NASA is working on creating “smart SPHERES” inspired by the hovering droid that shoots lasers at Luke Skywalker when he is learning to use the Force. Would you expect anything less from the engineers who grew up with Star Wars?

• “Imperial troops have entered the base! Imperial troops have entered the [static]” – Rebel commander on the ice planet Hoth. Researchers working for the United States Military are working on technologies that would give our troops a serious leg up (or four) on the battlefield. Designing military grade walking robots can’t be easy, but these nerds are no doubt having the time of their lives working on real-life AT-ATs.
• “Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen.” – Emperor Palpatine. The design of the new window on the International Space Station looks a lot like the inside of a Tie fighter. Sure, there are plenty of science-based explanations for why this is (pressure distribution and stuff like that), but it’s not hard to imagine these engineers were influenced by the Star Wars design aesthetic.
• “Do or do not do, there is no try.” – Yoda. Now for my personal favorite: In the UK you can actually mark “Jedi” as your religion on the census form, and in 2001 almost 400,000 people declared their allegiance to the light side of the force.

What does all this mean for your brand? #StarWarsDay was only “formally” established in 2011 after a totally organic grassroots movement of dedicated fans built it up. George Lucas and Co. knew a good thing when they saw it and have since encouraged the movement to continue by offering special e-cards, events and deals to celebrate the day.

In today’s YouTube society, artists and musicians also recognize the value of encouraging and celebrating fan art and fan covers. Can you imagine Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used to Know” becoming the hit song it is without the many fan covers that have been released since it came out?

Not all brands can hope to achieve the gravitas of Star Wars, but letting your fans influence the marketing and communications decisions you make is a lesson everyone can learn from. The (likely) increase in sales of Star Wars merchandise on this day alone should prove to every marketing manager why encouraging fans to show their creativity can be a huge boon to the bottom line.

*Photos licensed under Creative Commons: Legoland Star Wars by elfidomx and Jedi Training Academy by Armadillo444.

Fewer companies are blogging these days, according to a new survey from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.  Only 37% of Inc. Magazine’s 500 fast-growing companies maintained a blog in 2011, down from 50% in 2010. Among Fortune 500 companies, the 2011 rate was the same as 2010: just 23%.

Why the low numbers?

Once the Wild West of digital marketing, social media is no longer an unfamiliar arena in which companies swing blindly at everything in hopes of hitting something. But while it’s fantastic that businesses are getting strategic about channel management, there’s still plenty of opportunity for Fortune 500 companies in social media. They’d be wise to think carefully before calling it quits on blogging.

Where does blogging fit in?

A blog is the ideal hub from which to drive the conversations you want to have online. Since it tends to be more time-intensive than micro-media channels like Facebook and Twitter, it’s often the first platform that businesses looking to cut corners throw on the chopping blocks.

It shouldn’t be.

At Banyan Branch, we’ve advised clients not to abandon blogging in favor of [insert flavor of the week here]. We feel strongly that a company blog is more than just another social network. That’s why we’ve established a dedicated Content Creation team, staffed with devoted storytellers who constantly evaluate and improve upon the blogging strategies we employ with clients.

As social media enthusiasts, we see blog content as a digital asset. It enables brands to share authentic stories that compel, inform, guide and entertain their communities. Yes, it takes time to create content that strengthens relationships and builds lasting brand awareness, but it also helps ensure that we deliver on our clients’ goals for community management, thought leadership, reach and influence.

Your blog is where you tell your story

There’s no better way to communicate a message than through storytelling, and your company blog is a blank canvas that is entirely yours to paint.  Unlike Facebook and other external platforms that own the content you create, your blog is an asset that’s all yours, and with that ownership comes limitless value.

Many companies believe they’ll benefit most from using a blog to pitch products and share press releases, but it’s unlikely that readers are coming to your blog to see what crossed the wire at 6am this morning. A blog is a vehicle through which to increase search traffic to your website, to shape the niche conversations happening in your industry, to give readers insight into your company culture, and to lend more authority to the posts you make on other channels.

Know what your audience cares about, what will trigger their emotions and elicit their feedback, and write exactly that. Be consistent and true to your company values and people will come back on their own. Before you know it, they’ll be the ones telling your story.

Other key findings include:

• 27% of customer loyalty program members prefer to utilize a mobile device to access program features.
• 32% of customer loyalty programs reward members with points or other currency for participating in social media and/or online discussions about their brand.
• While only 17% of customer loyalty programs offer members a mobile application to use when redeeming rewards, another 30% have a mobile app currently in development: meaning that 47% of loyalty programs have a mobile app either in place now or will soon.

This survey was conducted during a recent webinar presented by Banyan Branch and VIPdesk called “Engaging and Retaining Customers through Social Media and Mobile-Enabled Loyalty Programs”. The webinar reviewed how brands can strategically incorporate social media and mobile applications into their loyalty programs in a manner that resonates with their customers and gets results.

“When properly motivated and encouraged, brands’ most loyal customers can become their most active advocates,” says Dave Hanley, co-founder and principal at Banyan Branch. “This path of integrating social media with loyalty programs and rewards will ultimately allow brands to grow their online conversation and provide deep and interesting content created by those who know them best.”

Adds Mark Robeson, senior vice president of sales and marketing at VIPdesk: “These research findings are proof positive that the advent and growth of mobile communication and social media is significantly influencing the way consumers interact with the brands with which they do business.”

Listen to the recording of “Engaging and Retaining Customers through Social Media and Mobile-Enabled Loyalty Programs” featuring Banyan Branch co-founder Dave Hanley.

Labradors are common dogs so you can probably conjure an image of one in your head without much effort. Short hair, floppy ears, a big wet nose and a slightly droopy grin…you’ve got it. Weighing in at a solid 100 pounds, though, Bear is not your average lab.

When Megan Fleming of our Influencer Relations team adopted him last year, she was more than a little nervous about how well such a big dog would do in our space. Would he burn off his boundless energy running laps around the office? Would he bump into desks, unaware of his own size? Nope. It turns out Bear is a hibernator. He spends most of his time snoozing under Megan’s desk and occasionally gets up to do yoga stretches. She just taught him to do “downward dog” on command last week!

• Name: Bear
• Owner: Megan Fleming
• Age: 5
• Breed: Yellow Labrador Retriever
• Treat of choice: Anything that drops on the floor while my parents are cooking.
• Favorite place to sleep: My parents’ bed or the couch—both places I am supposedly “not allowed.”
• How I spend my day at the office: I really enjoy sleeping at Mom’s feet and showing off all the cool noises I can make during meetings. I get lots of treats, plenty of love from co-workers, and occasionally get put to work filming for company videos.
• My story: My parents don’t know much about my first 4.5 years, but they stumbled into my life after finding my picture on the Seattle Humane Society website. They came to meet me and instantly fell in love with my handsome looks and friendly demeanor. Now I spend my days in my very own backyard, playing in the mountains or on the coast, and sleeping—a lot. I have no interest in tennis balls or Frisbees (unless they have treats in them), but I love tug-of-war, squirrels, and cuddling!

The new Facebook profile picture size is 160 x 160 pixels, which is noticeably larger than the old size of 125 x 125 (as you can see by Coca-Cola images below).

On April 26, Facebook automatically made this update and left many users and brands asking why their profile pictures were now so blurry. It’s a minor change but a must to fix. After all, no one likes a blurry brand image.

It’s also important to note that Facebook crops images when generating a thumbnail, so part of the image you use will be lost. This is why many users and brands end up dragging the image so it’s either centered or positioned correctly. Facebook asks that you upload a profile picture that is 180 x 180 pixels and it will crop the image automatically.

Lastly, the new Facebook profile picture size changes the image position slightly. It now sits at 23 pixels from the left and 210 pixels from the top of the page. Again, you can see from the Coca-Cola images below there is a clear difference between old and new.

OLD PROFILE PICTURE SIZE:

NEW PROFILE PICTURE SIZE:

I love this. By our very own Jason Barbacovi.