Jack Tells All

Fortnite: Save the World [from Fornite]

4th Dec 20185th Dec 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in Uncategorised

No, but seriously, we need to save the world from Fortnite.

Beauty of the Beast

Yes you heard me. I’m about to nail some honest facts right now. Don’t get me wrong though, I am in no way slating the game.
The online beasts rise to success over the last years is unparalleled in the industry. According to cnbc.com, the free-to-play online shooter is on pace to make $2 billion in the year 2018 alone. How is this? Well, through in-game purchases of course.

Its fast paced design and art style is what differentiates it from most games. As it’s a shooter, Fortnite does feature guns, explosions and all that fun stuff. But it’s all presented in a colourful cartoon style, and there’s no blood or gore.

I mean you can’t even go near YouTube Trending in Gaming unless you want to be blasted with Fortnite content.Where ever I go online, its there. It follows me. YouTube. Instagram. Facebook. You name it. There is no escape from this unmerciful beast.

The Beast Claims the Rebel County

All of sudden, especially with Christmas around the corner, this online beast has submerged and caught a hold of Cork. Leaving traces of its popularity in shop windows and down historical streets. As children traverse Grand Parade with their parents wearing their Fortnite shirts and hats, teenagers flock to outside Tesco on Paul Street to “floss”and do the “worm”.

Fornite Bars In Stock Now — Aunt Nellies Sweet Shop, Paul Street, Cork is one of the first to fall victim to Fortnite

Fornite Twilight News — Twilight News, Patricks Street becomes yet another victim of the beast, Fornite.

Now if you thought it was just our traditional and family run SME’s that were being gobbled by the Beast, you’d be wrong.

Fortnite at Penneys — The fashion industry becomes the latest to fall, will it survive? Will Fortnite take over all forms of fashion? Will markets drop as shares and stocks deplete? Is there anymore hope?

The above images see, my own employer, Smyths heavily scarred by the beast. Fortnite console bundles, action figures, Funko Pops, board games and collectibles. Has this beast any mercy?

Hunger of the Beast

Not even our schools are safe. The beast in its fearless efforts has managed to sink its teeth into our classrooms as children walk the corridors with Fortnite backpacks on them.

Even birthday celebrations have been targeted. Children asking their parents for Fortnite themed parties.

Feeding the Beast

During the summer, when school was out and Fortnite was in, the game was at its upmost peak. An article by numerous news outlets revealed some parents had been paying for grinds in Fortnite.

End of the Beast

Remember moms and dads, stay strong, stay vigilant. There is light at the end of the tunnel, we will see this to an end, be it us or Fortnite that is left standing – one will be victorious.

Brands That Rock Instagram

4th Dec 20184th Dec 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in Brands, Instagram, Marketing, Social Media

I won’t lie, not to you – oh not to you at all. When I was a young lad, 16, 17 I carried the name @Jafolad and an Instagram following of over 2,500. Ronan, another lad in my year carried the name @Roozoca and had a following count similar to mine.

Followed by a short suit of untraceable gloom, I began to realize how toxic social media could be. I dialed back gradually, unfollowing people I had once glorified and measured my own self-worth through their eyes. Deleting all posts and eventually removing the account in its entirety.
I’d honestly say I was addicted to both Facebook and Instagram. I cared more about the number of likes I was getting than the grades I was receiving in school. Signs on, I did end up repeating.

Years later, I keep a close circle on social media. Friends and family mostly. The only form of influencers or “brands” that I follow are game journalists and actors.
That being said, I would consider Kevin Hart and The Rock to be major brands. Both at international levels, Kim K wouldn’t have much of a hold on the Chinese market you see.

Now, I already spoke about the idea of brands using social media to build communities and relationships with consumers and fans in my tribes blog. Here lets take a lot of brands that stand out when it comes to Instagram.

1) Marvel

Marvel Entertainment, the official Instagram for Marvel comics, movies, games and more currently has 25.9m followers as of the 3rd of December 2018, having posted a new poster for their upcoming film Captain Marvel, the brand has seen 49,049 new followers.
They post teasers, promotional clips of upcoming films and dvd releases, comic book sneak peaks and of course some fan content such as cosplay and art work.

2) Netflix

Netflix, the official Instagram for media streaming platform, currently has 11.6m followers. The page is known for also posting promotional clips and sneak peaks but also enagages in fan activity posting the likes of memes and gifs. The page is extremely relatable and receives a lot of engagement via users tagging their friends in said memes. What there doing is encouraging engagement, but they’re really doing is creating awareness.

3) The Rock

Dwayne ‘The Rock‘ Johnson, former professional wrestler, turned Hollywood mega-star has a staggering 123m followers. He’s up there with the best for fan engagement. He’s always replying to top comments on his posts. His content is mostly of him thanking his fans for their loyalty. He posts endless videos discussing the importance of loyalty, had work, patience, self believe and respect. Other posts are of him promoting his gym-wear, work-out sessions and his notorious cheat meals where he’s known to devour absolute rakes of feed.

4) Kevin Hart

Kevin Hart, the (what I personally refer to him as) ‘rags to riches’ actor (Click here for a larger explanation on that). This man has gone from playing the “token black guy” in film to becoming the leading actor in billion dollar franchises. The man plans to be a billionaire by 45. Similar to the Rock above, Kevin seems a bit more genuine in his posts. He always has that smile on his face as he preaches about positivity, motivation and the importance of love and family. Posts again include press tours, promotional material and some fitness updates.

It’s safe to say these brands rock Instagram at this moment in time. Marvel films don’t seem to be slowing down at any rate, Netflix is only growing and the Rock and Kevin Hart are at their absolute peaks as of right now.

Its nice being connected to the world with so many people on platforms such as Instagram, buts it’s very also important to know that you are not better than anybody else and no one is better than you. You can only try to be better than yourself for others.

UPDATE: 05/12/2018
While recently talking to Ronan about this blog, he sent me an old Instagram of mine.. It was all he had (fortunately). Looking back now, good god I was some wipe…

YouTube Bumper Ads Explained

28th Nov 20184th Dec 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in AdWords, Digital Advertising, Marketing, Social Media, youtube

Ah YouTube, the cabbage to my bacon and the sugar to my tea. Honestly, I spend at least three hours a day on the video sharing platform. From watching vloggers like Casey Nesitat and film makers like Dan Mace, to videogame walkthroughs with Call Me Kevin and Funhaus.
From a marketing standpoint, I feel that YouTube still has a whole lot of potential that we will see more off in the future. From unboxings to reviews, the platform is home to many influencers and tech shows.
Now, although I could go on for days without an end about my love for YouTube, I am going to explain the concept of the YouTube bumper ad instead.

Bumper ads are a short video ad format that let you reach more customers and increase awareness about your brand by using a short, memorable message

-Google Support

Be they famous or infamous, these six second ads have been in existence since 2016 although it feels like they’ve been around for longer. Early testers included ads from companies like Audi Germany and Atlantic Records.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlXSToaJzis&index=2&list=PLIeYKIU1QcUJBR73Wf_W1Ai9tP41P8nXp&ab_channel=AudiDeutschland

What was noted that these quick-shot bumper ads helped enforce brand awareness amongst consumers. Created with mobile devices in mind, these ads are for viewers who are on the go.

Like all things in life, there is the good, the bad and the ugly and this can be said with the use of bumper ads as well. Some are good, some are bad and well, some are just downright ugly.

The Good

I once watched a pre-roll ad on YouTube that had a 6 second teaser before playing a full advert that lasted 6.03. Why I did this? Because I was being entertained. I was hooked. Have a look for yourself.

Since first watching this, I have watched all three of these “Jameson First Shot” films. Was it because of my interest in whiskey? No, in fact the drink didn’t make one appearance in the whole short. I watched it for the story. It had comedic elements and I was enjoying it. Since then, I have become an avid customer of Jameson. Once that 01:00 appears on my phone – I am hitting the Jameson faster than an alcoholic in Wetherspoons on a Monday.
The take away from this is – bumper ads have to be appealing. They have to be creative. They have to give a reason for the viewer to remember them. Be it the audio, the art style, the animation or even the colours. Take Oreos & Cadburys Chocolate Covered Cookie ad for instance.

The idea is making big impact with small stories. You get the idea. Here is an Oreo. Here is Cadburys Dairy Milk Chocolate. They are now one. Any questions? No, I thought just as much!

The Bad

Too much of anything is bad for you right? The majority of consumers are not the biggest fans of advertising. Throughout the years we have discovered ways to avoid advertising. In a recent survey by HubSpot Research, 83% of respondents agree that not all ads are bad, but they want to filter out the really obnoxious ones. 77% agree that they would prefer to ad filter rather than completely ad block.
In conclusion, what we can take away from this is that people do not hate adverts. They hate bad ones. And boy, so do I.

My absolute worst enemy is the online store Wish and their painful bumper ads but more on them later.
The bad side of bumper ads in my opinion is the overuse of them. Take for example when I’m playing music from my playlist and after every single song ends, an ad decides to play. Often I have the phone out of reach – be it I’m studying or in the shower – and often it’s an advert that goes on for another two minutes after the initial six second window. Now, I either have to get a hold of the phone to skip or I have to suffer and listen to nonsense I have more than likely listened to more times than I can count.

Playlists aside, YouTubers aside have control of ad placement in their videos. Of course, advertising = revenue. Most YouTubers will enable ads at the start of their videos and of course why shouldn’t they? They’re more than entitled to make money for the creative efforts. My problem however, is when YouTubers decide to push it.

YouTuber LegacyKillaHD places 9 bumper ads to his much anticipated walkthrough of Red Dead Redemption 2

YouTuber Call Me Kevin places 5 bumper ads in a daily 8pm walkthrough video

Be it for need or greed, the above YouTubers, Micheal and Kevin have placed between five and nine ads all in one video. Not alone is this extremely intrusive, but it also has an impact on the actual quality of the videos themselves. To have the video regularly interrupted is an absolute downer and ruins the experience.

The Ugly

Now this is the downside of YouTube, this where AdWords and Team YouTube need to come together and work as one. As of right now, YouTube does not give the user an option to report bumper ads. Now, this may be out of pure laziness. I believe them to be [too] confident with their monitoring of bumper ads – if they even monitor them that is. My main concern for YouTubes lack of monitoring Adverts is that many aren’t safe. Lets [finally] talk Wish. They have a never ending film of YouTube bumper ads that for some reason are solely focused on following me into the depths of my music playlists.

The ads do nothing but attempt to up-sell their products. Their poorly produced and cheaply sold products, that is. The use of visuals is poor and lackluster. The audio is overbearing, repetitive and at this stage, like nails screeching on a blackboard.
Others agree.

SMM Youtube Reddit on Wish 1 — Reddit user u/Disney/Vader complains about the repetitive placement of Wish bumper ads

Now while the actual product itself of course has nothing do with YouTube Bumper Ads, the YouTube community has also had its say on Wish.

Whats ugliest about this whole mess is; YouTube still allows these businesses to promote themselves. Despite the warning signs being out there:

And the worst of the worst when it comes YouTubes lack of concern with scams is the recent surge in Fortnite VBucks.

Anway back on the track that is YouTube Bumper Ads. Overall, my impressions of YouTube Bumper ads are that I do like them. I do hate the bad ones – especially when their upbeat and overbearing and play in between slow beat songs. My personal favorites are all the Irish ones. Having no where to actually find them – from the top of my head, my most memorable ones are by Aviva, AIB and Centra.
They can be used cleverly enough but they can also be done the dog on and it reflects a lot on the business itself.

Marketing to Digital Tribes

8th Nov 20183rd Dec 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in gaming, Marketing, Social Media

Seth Godwin once said

“The internet eliminates geography”

which I believe to be the absolute backbone of digital tribes.

Digital technology has been the best thing in erasing barriers in communication since the telegraph. The great thing about digital is observation. Here, individualism dissolves as users find others with similar interests and hobbies.

In researching Digital Tribes, I discovered that I myself am part of many. I’m an avid gamer and am extremely in tune with all that goes in the industry. From pre-release development to post-release financial figures. With this, I decided to research digital tribes in the gaming community and boy, are there plenty.

Mostly recently, an exceptional example of a business/developer marketing to
their digital tribe would be Insomniac Games, who in September, released the record breaking highly successful and high earning Spider-Man PS4.
Prior launch, creative director Bryan Intihar, art director, Jacinda Chew and community developer James Stevenson would all interact with eager fans, answering questions and retweeting fan art. Since the launch of the game, they have used the very successful in-game photo mode to share creations that the fans have made.

Bryan Intihar — Spider-Man PS4 Creative Director Retweets in-game moments captured by the fans

During development They watched several YouTubers discussing their game and would often take on-board gamer/consumer advise.

SPud SQuad — Spidey-Squad official twitter page

For example, YouTuber and founder of the “Spidey-Squad” Evan Filarca suggested that the game should feature the option to perform free-style tricks while swinging from webs over NYC. Two weeks later in a gameplay trailer, the team featured said tricks. Even giving Evans tribe its own in-game mention once the game released in September.

Moving on to some moments of backlash in the gaming tribal community. In 2016, Publisher Activision announced its 13^thgame in its and highly successful Call of Duty series. The past few games were drastically different to past settings, being much more fast paced. For quite some time, fans of the COD series had been pleading for the series to return its roots as the “boots on ground” game it once was. Instead, the 2016 entry was to

infinite warfare reaction — Disappointing Fans of reacting negatively during preconsumption stage

be Infinite Warfare, set in the year 2054. The trailer became the third most disliked YouTube video of all time (3.7m). A year later, the series returned to their roots and released World War 2 which was received quite well. While Infinite Warfare’s trailer was being ripped apart by gamers, competing publisher EA, Battlefield 1 (although their 15^th entry) received great praise being set in the first World War. The trailer received 2.2m likes and won over many COD fans as a result.

This year however, due to a poorly planned marketing campaign and the fear of financial jeopardy has delayed the upcoming Battlefield V (although the 16^th game in the series – I know these titles don’t make that much sense anymore, but we still buy them). The game has received negative attention for their trailer featuring major historical inaccuracies and forcing an apparent SJW agenda in the game. Game Devs handled the situation on Twitter in a way that brought more negativity.

Dont like it dont buy it. — EA chief creative officer Patrick Soderlund takes on controversy directly:

I believe the message here is that a good business knows when to listen to their consumers but a great business knows when not to.
In 2014, Ubisoft was under serious negative spotlight. Along with Sony’s PlayStation 4, Ubisoft decided to jump on the hype-train and release a number of launch games with the console. The two most notably being Watch Dogs and Assassins Creed Unity. Both games suffered an abundance of problems.
Assassins Creed Unity, the eight entry into the historically set action adventure games. The game was also shown off at E3 2014. The game itself looked and played amazingly. Upon release, the game was poor. Bugs, glitches and obvious drops in frame rate. The game was full of pointless microtransactions, some even costing up to €99.

Broken AC Unity — AC Unity’s Graphic Issues Upon Launch

In 2015, due to some poor PR in relation to female characters being non-playable in AC Unity due to time restraints in the animation department – Ubisoft were under a lot of heat. Later that year, Ubisoft announced for the first time in six years, there would be no annual release of Assassins Creed in the year 2016. Ever since Assassins Creeds first entry in 2007, fans of the series have pleaded with Ubisoft to establish a game in Ancient Egypt. 2017 saw the successful return of the series take place in exactly just that setting while its most recent entry, AC Odyssey has been deemed the best game in the long-running series by many.

AC Or — After taking a year off, Assassins Creed returned in 2017 with a refreshing take on the beloved series

There is a lot of opportunities existing in these tribes. The modding community are also another vital tribe in gaming. These skilled gamers are able to code and programme assets themselves, creating in-game objects, audio and even entire different modes. An example to why these people are so important is the fact that Athy native, Brendan Greene modded the popular Arma 2 to have a Battle-Royale mode.

Fornite at E3 2018 — Fortnite at E3 2018, LA

This mode is so popular today that Fortnite is in existence. This free to play game has so influential right now that both Call of Duty and battlefield are including their own battle-royal modes. are the number one trending games in the industry right now. Fortnite earned $296m in April.

Another great example of digital tribes in the gaming community are our vast oceans of endless forums. Here gamers come to discuss upcoming games, current gaming news and even nostalgic games from the past. Said forums can be found on reddit, Gamespot and IGN.

IGN Boards — Gaming News and Content Website IGN hosts an online forum for avid fans to gather and discuss their favorite games.

It’s safe to say that digital tribes do indeed exist in the gaming community and will continue to be as active and important as they are today.

UPDATE: 03/12/2018:

The most anticipated game of the year was released October 26th. Earning a record breaking $725m opening weekend, the game is currently listed as the highest rated game for current-gen consoles. Since then, Rockstar (the developer) has gone on to launch the games seriously anticipated online mode via a public beta. Although early reactions are positive – if not neutral, many gamers have a problem with the level of grind involved and the poor reward system that follows. In light of this, Rockstar has issued a statement saying feedback is appreciated changes will be made.

Top Five Tips To Improve Your Businesses Facebook Page

2nd Oct 201828th Nov 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in Facebook, Marketing, Social Media, Uncategorised

With over 2.6 m of Ireland’s population on the Social network Facebook according to statistica.com, it is no secret that the platform is the place to go if you’re looking to reach a large audience. As opposed to one’s personal profile on Facebook, I believe it to be essential for businesses to plan and strategize when adopting a social media approach to connect with its customers. After all;

“A vision without a strategy remains an illusion” – Lee Bolman

Now whether you’re seeing poor ROI on your time spent posting on Facebook or if you are simply looking to reach out to a larger number of people, here are five tips you should consider to improve your businesses Facebook page.

Visuals! Visuals!

As marketing consultant Roy H Williams once quoted; “A visual image is a simple thing, a picture that enters the eyes”. A company without a logo is a company without an identity, therefore the profile picture should be a recognisable one. The cover photos display at 820x312p on a computer and 640x360p on a smartphone (https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-to-create-facebook-business-page-ht) and should communicate the first initial message of what your brand is about – be it your mission statement, tagline or a more tangible image. The inclusion of photo, video and colour are also key visuals. All visuals should look both professional and relative.

Content Creation

Your content must be visually appealing. It must entice the user to look at it.
It must also encourage engagement. The aim of having an online presence on social media should not be to solely promote but to socialise. The idea of building a community, a relationship
between your brand and the people who follow it. Articles, staff interviews, behind the scene content and funny pieces should invite socialization between you the brand and your
customers.
The better the content, the more engaging it will be.

Community Engagement

Encouraged by content creation,
engagement includes the public likes, shares and comments for an online businesses’ social media efforts. Unless you engage with your
community, you are not going to know how they feel about you or what they want from you.
Show behind the scenes footage, ask questions, share your fan’s content run competitions, host live videos and be you! Have fun and be social. Afterall it is called social media.

Engagement in communication is also important. If replying to public comments – always address that user by their first name and always remain positive.
For private (i.e. Facebook Messenger) enquiries, reply time is of importance, “Typically replies instantly” is a must have especially if you provide a service such as a food or hairdressing.

Plan = Action

With almost half the countries population on Facebook, I feel my emphasis on strategy to be justified. With so many different brands fighting for attention, you are going need to plan your social media activity. What are you posting, when are you posting it? Why and are you posting it? It is said that early afternoon hours are the best time (https://buffer.com/best-time-to-post-on-facebook) but thanks to Facebook’s algorithm, time is no longer a major considerate.

Take Advantage of the Tech

Lastly, don’t make your business a private page on Facebook otherwise you are essentially locking yourself in a room and throwing away the keys. By making your public page a business, you will gain access to Facebooks, stats, analytics and even ads. Use hashtags to create trends and encourage engagement from the community. Enable location settings if your brand is established in several countries. Having several public Facebook pages for different regions can become both clustered and downright messy. Use Facebook Ads often and update your pinned post as regularly as possible. Call to Action buttons should be focused on providing information (i.e. a video) as opposed to making a sale. Monitoring and analysing community engagement is key. Here you can gain an approximate measurement on ROI and make any changes you see fit to your plan.

These five tips are for sure going to help you get more out of your Facebook page. If used cleverly, they should lead to a boost in engagement, likes, interest and eventually sales.

Happy Facebooking!

About Jack Foley

26th Sep 20187th Nov 2018 by jacktellsall, posted in Uncategorised

Hi all, my name is Jack Foley. I am a marketing student in Cork Institute of Technology.

Originally from Glin, West Limerick, I am now living in student accommodation not too far from my college. I work part time in a bar and on an intensive pig farm back home.

Having never played sport as a child, I played plenty of PlayStation. This is where I see and hope my career to go. As part of a module in social media marketing, I and my peers have been tasked with creating a blog. In this blog, we are to discuss social media marketing.

Social Media Marketing Quote — https://www.youtube.com/user/caseyneistat

This is my first blog and I do invite you to join me in my efforts of broadcasting my thoughts and opinions.