Headstand Media

Youth for Christ USA is a non-profit Christian youth organization founded in 1944 with a mission to work with the local church to build lifelong followers of Jesus Christ. Many communities across the US have YFC’s “Campus Life” and “Campus Life/JV” programs for high school and junior high students.YFC has also been very successful in working with at risk and institutionalized youth through their “Youth Guidance” ministry. Since the early days, YFC has grown into an international organization with the founding USA organization as a member. Today, over 1500 paid staff members and 15,000 volunteers serve in over 100 countries around the world through programs like “Project Serve.”

In 2009 YFC/USA has determined a need to rebrand themselves and establish a new web strategy and presence that reflects the new direction of the organization in the 21st century. Headstand Media initially engaged with YFC in April of 2009 in a consulting and advisory role. Randal Birkey visited the YFC/USA headquarters near Denver CO and facilitated a 2-day discussion centered around YFC’s web strategy and web presence. From this discussion, a new strategy was described and funding for the project was sought. In 2010, as funding was realized and new staff resources were put in place, Jake Bland, Director of Digital Innovation developed two requests for proposal which were released in May 2010. Headstand Media responded to these RFP’s and in June 2010, was selected to be the implementation vendor of the new web strategy.

The two 2010 projects consist of providing technology, search and social media advice during the design phase, and then production and implementation of the national organization’s public website, and 5 chapter websites by Fall 2010.

Headstand Media is honored to be selected to partner with YFC in this strategic role and looks forward to the successful implementation of an effective new web and social media strategy for the organization in 2010.

Melissa Meulenberg from Hard Rock Hotel Chicago delivered a great presentation on “Jumping into the Social Media Moshpit” to a packed house at Nightstand 15 on Thursday night, May 27, 2010. In focus were Melissa’s experiences and expertise using social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and TripAdvisor.com to promote the hotel’s brand identity, rock ‘n’ roll culture, and personality on the web. The presentation was split up into 4 segments:

• Background: on the hotel itself, the Hard Rock brand, and why they decided to jump into the social media moshpit to begun with
• Implementation and Strategy: general info about listings, strategies used to pick up fans and followers, and some sample guest interactions
• Social Media Method to Providing Kick Ass Service: discussing rewards programs, and some entertaining social media guest stories
• Damage Control: how Hard Rock Hotel responds to complaints, and strategies for acquiring positive consumer reviews

Melissa and the rest of the Nightstand attendees discussed the ins and outs of social media, how it applies to the hotel and service industries, and what kinds of things might be coming down the line.

As always, we enjoyed a tasty dinner and spent time meeting new people, networking, and having a grand old time. We would like to thank Melissa for presenting well-organized and engaging material that provided some great fodder for discussion. Thanks also to all our guests who came out to Nightstand 15. See you all next time!

How does a Chicago hotel use its social media programs to stand out amongst dozens of competitors with a similar product?

The Hard Rock Hotel Chicago presents tips and tricks of how a soft-branded hotel was able to use a brand culture of authenticity, and occasionally even irreverence, as a guiding force in interactions with guests on Twitter and Facebook, and its success in balancing that cheeky voice with a true focus on customer service.

Headstand Media is excited to welcome Melissa Meulenberg, eCommerce Manager at the Hard Rock Hotel Chicago, for Nightstand 15 on May 27th. Melissa will host a discussion on using promotions, making relevant (and even irrelevant) posts, and taking the Hard Rock’s commitment to pleasing the customer offline to provide truly awesome customer service. Don’t miss the opportunity to hear about a sassy mom caught tweeting on the toilet, and a 22-year old Army couple whose Facebook post gave them the stay of a lifetime on Michigan Avenue.

About Melissa Meulenberg

Melissa Meulenberg has been the eCommerce Manager at the Hard Rock Hotel Chicago for 2 years. She joined the hotel in 2008 after 3 years working for the online travel company Expedia Inc. (owner of expedia.com, hotels.com, and tripadvisor.com). She has been (mis)quoted in HOTELS Magazine (but she’ll take what she can get), is a featured speaker at the 2010 BrandSmart Conference in June, and is in the running for a featured spot at the EyeForTravel 2010 North America Travel Distribution Summit in October.

Melissa holds a (much-neglected) bachelor’s degree in psychology and Russian/East European studies from the University of Michigan. Outside of work, she spends her free time schooling her friends at pool and training for races (she completed a Half-Ironman race last summer and is registered for the Chicago Marathon this year).

May 27, 2010
6 PM – 7PM: Food & beverages, informal networking (We’re ordering in from Star of Siam!)
7 PM – 8:30 PM: Introductions, presentation, discussion

Invite Others!

We’d love to see many of our past guests again, and we encourage you to pass on this invitation to others in the industry who would benefit from this presentation topic and networking event. RSVP by leaving a comment with your name and company or organization below.

We’d love to have you join us!
Headstand Media: Randy, Benjamin, Kyle, Matt, Taylor, and Megan

CONFIRMED ATTENDERS – 34
Headstand Media (6)
Melissa Meulenberg – Hard Rock Hotel
Steve Wilson – McDonald’s
Jake & Ali Bland – YFC/USA
Alex Garcia – Chicago Tribune
Tim & Lauren Schwaar
Jim & Mary Whitmer – Jim Whitmer Photography
Katie Scarpelli – Scholle Packaging
Diane Chewning – Scholle Packaging
Nastia Kryvulia
Shane Montgomery – VIP Property Chicago
Corey Wilkinson – Bolder Image
Patrick Richards – Richards Patent Law
Kent Thompson – Action Web Apps
Conor McCarthy – TheTalkingMirror.com
Donny Williams – Independent Producer
Lauren Dillon – Oasis International
George Gill – RentaBikeBow.com
Evelyn Way – Acoustics Consultant
Marina Beric – Designer
Debbie Kong – Designer
Eric Vorhes – VSA Partners
Greg Forst – Moji
John Stoffer & Maura Gaskill – Stoffer Photography
Andrea Nordstrom

Visit the Wellness House Website

Wellness House is a non-profit organization that provides information, support, and a community to help families living with cancer. Founded in 1990 by a committed group of community leaders in Hinsdale, Illinois, Wellness House serves the western suburbs of Chicago as a vital complement to medical treatment for anyone experiencing the effects of cancer by providing a comprehensive array of programs at no cost to participants.

Wellness House contacted Headstand Media near the end of 2009 with their need for a new, redesigned website – one that would effectively communicate a new branding message and marketing direction. We also discussed their desire for the site to help them reach more people. In the end, a balanced Creative + Technology strategy was adopted, to ensure that both the user experience was great, and that the site would perform well in the search engines.

Based upon this strategy, we recommended a WordPress-driven foundation with a custom designed web 2.0 interface that added new features such as: interactive events calendar, event registrations, blogging, links to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media sites. We also designed the home page to invite visitors to “Please step inside…” and view engaging, people-centered real-world video stories of people helped by Wellness House. We also integrated a “Virtual Tour” of the facility and a “What’s New” slider allows Wellness House to feature important events and resources on the home page.

Over the last couple of months we have been training and working with the team at Wellness House, and are happy to announce that the new website is now live. If you or anyone you know is living with cancer, be sure to check out this great organization in Chicago’s west suburbs, and consider extending their reach by “Following” them on Twitter and to “Like” their Facebook page.

During a recent film shoot for WebSmart.tv, we decided to put our brains together and film a funny video surrounding the idea of “How to Market on the Web.” “Marketing speak” is rampant, and since so many folks have taken it to the web, we wanted to expose and expound: this kind of language is ridiculously lofty and incomprehensible. And SO easy to use!

We broke the content down into “5 simple steps” for web marketing “success”:

• Ideate
• Define Back-End Paradigms
• Cultivate Cross-Media Benchmarks
• Curb Your Infomediaries
• Execute Leading-Edge Initiatives

As you can tell from the video, we simply threw together as many ridiculous words, phrases, and colloquialisms as we could manage, put them randomly into a 5-step format, and then spent the rest of the time trying to get through takes without exploding with laughter. Not so easy!

How to Market on the Web was from the very beginning a viral campaign idea, so we also planned a strategy for spreading it around on April Fool’s Day to various social media sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, Yahoo! Buzz, Twitter, Facebook, etc. We evaluated the nature of each of these sites, and came up with a time-sensitive plan of attack that would give our video the best possible chance at spreading. It’s important to note that while many people try to shamelessly push their videos and content during viral campaigns, a real winner starts simply as a good idea that real people like. It catches on and spreads online not because its creators know how to play the system, but because it is genuinely entertaining.

Our How to Market on the Web campaign is underway, and time will tell what kind of impact it has virally. We had a lot of fun creating the video!

Headstand Media has a dedicated web page on our site addressing this question (What is WordPress?). However, on our WebSmart.tv site, we have also just launched a video version that addresses the same question… “What is WordPress?”

If you are new to the “web 2.0” world, and are wondering what these new terms mean, this YouTube hosted, video blog site is for you. Each video topic tackles one aspect of the web in about a minute.

If you learn something new, and find WebSmart.TV to be useful, tell your friends and colleagues!

One of the things you will hear Headstand Media talk about with our customers is the diminishing returns related to traditional mass media advertising and marketing, and the increasing ROI and effectiveness in engaging with prospects customers via social media.

In support of our point of view, here is a great article that highlights how Pepsi is following this path. After 23 years of advertising in the Super Bowl, Pepsi is skipping any advertising there in favor of investing in the Pepsi Refresh Project using social media!

In our opinion Pepsi “gets it” and we expect many more businesses, organizations and institutions will follow.