ONIT

With the opening of our second office in Denver, CO this past month, the Onit staff has been back and forth between the east and west, having fun and building our boutique business. While our business expansion has meant the tough task of lugging office gear from Piermont, NY to Denver,  we were still able to break free and enjoy a lobster at Jordan’s Lobster Farm in Long Beach and devour AMAZING mussels at the Sidewalk Bistro in Piermont (Fun Fact: It’s one of Bill Murray’s known local restaurants!). We even drove over to visit our TLC friends from Cake Boss to enjoy a Canoli at Carlos Bakery and for the grand finale cracked crabs at the Chesapeake Bay.
During our travels we became deeply immersed in the remarkable world of homeopathy as we met with Onit’s new client Boiron in Newton, PA. What an amazing and interesting group of people with a fascinating business model: “To stimulate the evolution of healthcare by promoting scientific homeopathy as a more compassionate, more ecological and more comprehensive approach to medicine and to allow every physician to know homeopathy and integrate it into their daily practice.” This is a mission that Onit breathes and is excited to represent.
When we made it back to Denver, it was almost time to pick up and hit the road again, this time for a reunion with our friends at Merrell. Team Onit spent the next few days brainstorming new ways of becoming socially savvy in the outdoor industry while on our way to Grand Rapids, MI. From coffee shop to rental car to the Grand woods Lodge, Onit had no problem working while mobile. Ahhh, the beauty of social media!
After Onit and Merrell met “staff-to-staff” we decided “Okay, Merrell is the coolest outdoor brand there is hands down.” Merrell truly represents their brand message “Get Outside.”
Now back in Denver, we could not be happier to know that we work with and represent high caliber brands with authentic messages.
…Onit to continue our journey into the social jungle…

I’m attached to my blackberry like an IV to the vein. With the world of technology today we can do virtually anything on the web from our handheld devices. I can instantly access any of my five email accounts without logging in, now I receive my Gmail messages faster than my text messages.
Want to update your Facebook status while trying to make it through that boring date? No worries there’s “an App for that.” Technology has made it easy to write and send memos, files, emails, tweets and posts instantly from our mobile devices. Is this really convenient or could this potentially be cumbersome? On the flipside we could be damaging ourselves as business professionals. Once you hit “send” there is no message forgiveness. Think about the main reason we turn to our iPhones and Blackberrys, its fast and easy. Anything that cuts corners and time potentially diminishes our desire to slow down and review what we are sending over the web. Until the “Grammar App” makes its way to stores we should defer from sending company wide memos from our mobile devices.

It’s no secret our World has been impacted by tragedies over the past few months, after a magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti to the devasting quake in Chile. How does this affect the rest of the World? Various Social Media platforms have formed a way for people to connect across the web to virtually help in any way they can. Communication platforms like Twitter and Facebook have delivered methods to instantly update our World via the web, far faster than print media. Additionally donation accounts have been set up where you can donate directly from Twitter and Facebook or jump on the charity text messaging stream that has been spreading. Social Media has given us the resources to get connected and delivered more opportunities to help out, the next step is for the drive to kick in from each indivudual to get involved.

The 2010 Winter Olympics are a perfect example of  how technology has evolved in such a short period of time through interaction and conservation.

Besides missing out on the sweet tricks, like Shaun White’s Double McTwist 1260, thanks to social sites like Twitter and Facebook, the internet stream has made it so you can be virtually anywhere and read a tweet about USA’s standings in the Olympics and be up to date on each of the athletes standings, or visit the official Facebook game page and see whats going on. Even the sponsors are taking a role in marketing campaigns surrounding the social world. Coke created a virtual snowball fight for consumers to share via twitter, perfect, a snowball fight for the 2010 “Winter” Olympics. Socially creating a virtually fun Olympic experience for everyone.

Beyond our efforts of becoming interactive on the web we have decided to makes this Olympics more earth friendly as well. What is unique about our Vancouver Olympics is that all of our athletes will all be taking home the most honorable kind of medal out there, “green” medals. When our champions are honored at this year’s winter games in Vancouver,  they will be rewarded with a tiny bit of the more than 140,000 tons of e-waste that otherwise would have been sent to Canadian landfills. It’s not about gold, silver or bronze its about green.

Our world as you know it, changing for the better. Tweet That!

Now that Steve Jobs has relieved the suspense of the new Apple products, the crowd has turned to reviews, iPad competition with the Kindle, what the iPad is missing, and what to expect next. For the social media community, the new iPad is a device that will grow usability and access.

Apple’s high-resolution images of the iPad.

Because the new device is built on Mac OS X, the iPad runs almost 140,000 apps from the App Store. New apps designed specially for iPad will be highlighted, so you can easily find the ones that take full advantage of its features. You can be sure that a iPad-specific Facebook and Twitter app are already in development.

I have grown accustomed to the Facebook and Twitter apps (mainly Tweetdeck) on my iPhone, but the large iPad Multi-Touch screen will add a whole new dimension. The user interfaces have a lot more room for GUI(graphic user interface), allowing users more convenient access to their feeds, photos, videos, and news with vibrant color and sharp text. And don’t forget, with iPad, navigating the web has never been easier or more intuitive with only the use of your finger.

Any thoughts or great application ideas for the iPad?

To follow up on our last blog post, social media and the outdoors industry go hand-in-hand! To reiterate, what better way to be social than to enjoy the outdoors and then share the experience with your friend online.

Social media in the outdoor industry must take into account the unique nature of the products and environment. Trained social media professionals can provide in-depth analysis and research into the best methods and tactics to connect your audience to your products.

We here at ONIT believe social media is unlike many traditional forms of marketing in that several departments must be involved in order to be fully successful. Marketing, branding, and interactive have a role in social media. A media campaign requires monitoring and revision. Social media can identify consumer wants and needs online and then develops ways to satisfy them. Social media can support all initiatives.

Onit is out west for a few weeks! Nothing beats the cool coffee shops you can find out here. Current location is the Java Stop in Longmont. Pretty sweet decor, huh?

Looking forward to the trip to Outdoor Retailer! Make sure to follow the updates at @onitmarketing and @merrelloutside.

Outdoor brand marketing is changing at an alarming rate. Social media influence and brand messaging can connect you to highly-qualified outdoor enthusiasts across the globe.Your brand’s social media can be found by millions of users on Facebook and Twitter on news feeds and those performing targeted searches by location, activity, product type, and service.

Top Tips for the Outdoor Brand:

1. To maximize exposure, a company should place its brand messaging in all appropriate categories, directories, sub-directories and searches within its industry.
2. Today’s fans can become tomorrow’s ambassadors.
3. Users have great content: Weekend hikes and climbs continue onto cyberspace as adventurers post onto Facebook and Twitter.

Some big players to follow on Twitter:

@MerrellOutside: Merrell celebrates the slogan “Let’s get outside!” and tweet s about events, great stories, causes, gear, and our love of the outdoors!

@REI_CoOp: They continue to inspire, educate and outfit for a lifetime of outdoor adventure and stewardship.

@OnitMarketing: We’re on top of and responsible for the latest and coolest outdoor social media marketing!

(And check out our tweets from #ORWinter 2010 this weekend)