Samuel Ekstrom - National Scout Reserve Scholarship Award Winner

I'm proud of Samuel for earning the 2017 Scouts - Summit Bechtel Reserve Scholarship in honor of Dan McCarthy. The Summit Bechtel Reserve (SBR) Staff Association awarded $2,000 to the 2017 recipients. Samuel served as the Aquatics Director at the waterfront for camp and used the scholarship to help pay for his last year at Central Michigan University.

Samuel Ekstrom was the Lead Professional Lifeguard and Lead Instructor for all Aquatics related programs at Summit Bechtel Reserve - James C. Justice Summer Camp.

Sam was responsible for developing an advancement program, training/supervising staff and overall responsibility for the well-being of all participants taking part in any aquatics activity including Paddleboarding, kayaking, swimming, water reality and fishing. 

 The waterfront at the James C. Justice National Scout Camp at SBR is the busiest in the nation. His responsibilities including overseeing all aquatics activities for the Senior Scout Camp, Appalachian Adventure programs on Goodrich Lake. 

The waterfront had as many as 800 scouts in attendance at any one time, with professional staff and volunteer staff under Samuel's leadership and supervision. 

Samuel attended the BSA National Camping School and received his Aquatics Director certification in order to take on this significant aquatics and management position.

This year he worked as a Manager at the waterfront and completed his Marketing/Advertising internship at SBR by working as a Media Content Creator. Samuel shot photos and video at SBR to help promote the program on all media and social channels.  

Sam shot photos and video for Facebook, Instagram and more for the 2018 year for Summit Bechtel. 

Prior to working as the Aquatics Director, Sam worked at the Shooting Sports Academy as an NRA certified Rifle and Shotgun instructor. Sam helped scouts and visiting guests to camp experience and develop their rifle, shotgun, muzzle loader, pistol and archery skills. 

What is an Ad Impression?

What is an Ad Impression?, a photo by lee.ekstrom on Flickr.

An ad impression is a measure of the number of times an ad is seen by a user. It is also known as an "ad view."

Social media plays a role in ad impressions, and can reap big benefits at little upfront cost. Consider how the Jeep brand reaped hundreds of thousands of impressions when Evan van der Spuy, a mountain biker on team Jeep South Africa who was hit by an antelope (red hartebeest) was interviewed by numerous networks post t-bone.

The crazy footage was launched on YouTube and was an instant hit. This kind of event is rare - it's kind of like winning the lottery.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxFIX0oPTso

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxFIX0oPTso&list=PL42A30968D1...

Social Suicide

I couldn't resist posting this mash-up of the Social Media playing field by Tom Cunniff. Looks live a mutant virus at pre-pandemic stage.

My kids were recently fishing in a small pond had a couple of huge fish and all the rest were stunted little micro-fish. Too many fish and not enough food. The big ones chow on the smaller ones, but there is no chance for the little guys to mature and grow in size in the pond's competitive environment. In similar fashion, todays market has some big players that will continue to get bigger as they feed on smaller wannabes.

The social networking trend is growing at an exponential rate thanks in part to the back-up parachute plan-B mentality. Networking has never been more important. We'll have to see if many of these small social media upstarts can make it once the economy picks up ...

God bless this mess.

Try Ladies Tea

What's more social than a Ladies Tea? I found this wonderful site through a digital back door or sorts. A friend on Facebook forwarded a clever "Original Design Gangsta" video she found on YouTube. The video, produced in 2007, was good enough to keep my attention until the credits ... www.kyletwebster.com. Thought I'd check it out. Nice clean site - my attention was drawn to a plug on his site: "Noteworthy - My wife's BRILLIANT networking idea for women."

Click on it and it takes you to theladiestea.com created by Kyle's wife Sonja Webster (Bunzendahl). Brilliant it is. Beautiful design and a wonderful concept that blends a traditional social network idea (ladies teas) and brings it into the digital domain.

An excerpt from the FAQs page:

"The Ladies Tea provides quality lady-time that will inevitably open new doors for you. When you get a diverse group of open-minded and positive women together, so much can happen: a new friendship, an idea, a job opportunity, a valuable life lesson… host The Ladies Tea and see! Hosting The Ladies Tea definitely makes a positive statement about you and your interests. It says that you are a modern and classy lady, eager to network with other ladies who want the most out of life and are open to new ideas."

Who wouldn't want to be modern, classy and want the most out of life? Any time my wife comes back from a Ladies Tea she's happy. Anything that brings happiness at a minimal cost is bound to succeed in today's world. Sugar anyone?

Skittles.com is Social Slick

The Palm Pre promises to be effortlessly blend a sea of social networks into one easy-to-use device. We did something similar at the Jeep brand when we pooled all the social media sites into one hub. The innovative Jeep Experience portal is the collective home to Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace and more. It's your one-stop-shop for everything Jeep.

Now Skittles has launched skittles.com and it's based on a floating navigation menu that remains the same regardless of the social media site your on. Instead of importing videos or photos to their site, or linking the user out to Flickr, or YouTube - the navigation follows you on your path to social serenity. While this navigation system won't work for most applications - it is a strong hint at things to come in the future in regards to fluid infrastructure and seamless integration to social networks. Bravo to the Media Planner who bought into this elegant experiment.