Ken Hittel, VP Corporate Internet, at New York Life Insurance Company (NYL), a client of FairWinds, did a great interview for Forbes.com this week about social networking. Hittel expertly argues that allowing consumers to speak freely, even negatively, on social networks has actually helped NYL build a positive brand presence.

He explains that the few negative comments that have appeared have been drowned out by a chorus of positive comments from loyal customers. Essentially, negative comments are an opportunity for the community to unite around the brand, and as a result, build up the brand’s image. The leap of faith involved in exposing a brand to the uncensored openness of social media may seem risky, but working for an insurance company, Hittel is used to managing risks. His approach has paid off, with NYL’s Facebook fan base closing in on 100,000 members.

Hittel also points out that brands, even if they feel they are not “ready” for social media, need to be on Facebook and Twitter. The best approach, he says, is not to try to control social media, but rather to manage it by being present and participating in it. At FairWinds, we know that it all starts with getting there, and being where your customers are looking for you, by owning the best usernames and handles.

Congratulations to Ken on all his success!

This week, I wrote an article for Forbes.com about what retail brands need to know about new gTLDs. All brands will have to adapt their digital strategies to the new gTLD space, but global retail brands will face particular challenges and opportunities.

For retail brands, perhaps more so than other industries, the branding implications of being “left behind” and seeming out of date if they do not adopt new gTLDs could be significant. If they stick to their .COM addresses, they could risk appearing “so 1999” as compared to their competitors who begin using branded gTLDs. Since ICANN will not publish the list of applications until after the application round closes, retail brands will have to take a gamble, and for many, the safe bet will be to assume that their competitors are, in fact, applying.

But on a brighter note, new gTLDs could offer interesting marketing opportunities for retail brands. Take back to school shopping as an example. Right now, most top-level domain equity lies in .COM, and there can only be one BackToSchool.com. In the new gTLD space, we could see addresses like BackToSchool.Target and BackToSchool.OldNavy, which could redirect to Target and Old Navy’s back to school sale pages.

On the subject of redirects, in most cases retail brands (and all brands) should not attempt to fully transition content to new gTLD domain names right away. They have made significant investments into optimizing their current sites to rank highly in search engine results, so until we know how search engine algorithms will account for new domains, brand owners should consider redirecting new domains to their existing .COM URLs.

New top-level domains will present online retailers with unique and unprecedented opportunities and challenges over the next few years. But the first and most crucial step that all brand owners must take between now and the opening of the application period is to gather facts and take the time to really explore whether or not applying for a new domain will be advantageous for their business.

The McRib is back.  For the first time in 16 years, McDonald’s is offering its boneless pork patty sandwich at restaurants nationwide for approximately six weeks.  And people are thrilled.

The McRib was first introduced to the McDonald’s menu in 1981, but since 1994, it has not been offered at all restaurants at the same time.  According to McDonald’s USA President, as quoted in the Wall Street Journal, the McRib simply does not sell well throughout the year because people get tired of it.  But the scarcity created by having only certain restaurants serve the sandwich at certain times has created a base of die-hard fans who will travel substantial distances – sometimes even hundreds of miles – to munch on a McRib.  A meteorologist in Minnesota even developed a McRib Locator website, where users can peruse a map to see where the McRib has been spotted recently.  Here’s a screenshot of the site:

The mystery of when or even whether the McRib will appear is a huge part of its appeal, and the sandwich has become somewhat of a cultural icon.  There are hundreds of Facebook groups dedicated to the McRib, including those demanding that it return permanently, and various McRib pages have thousands of “likes.”  McDonald’s couldn’t buy this kind of fan loyalty and fervor even if it wanted to, but the company clearly understands the McRib’s appeal – billboards with a photo of the sandwich carry the simple but sassy tagline, “Sorry for being awesome.”

Yet, despite the McRib’s huge following, McDonald’s owns McRib.com but does not point it to any content.  According to Alexa, traffic to McRib.com is up over 600 percent this month, so clearly people are going to the site looking for content.  Just think of what kind of marketing it could do if the domain resolved to a specialized site with all of the things McRib lovers use the Internet for: locator maps, social networking opportunities, McRib meet-ups, etc.  The only thing that would be better than that would be for McDonald’s to offer the McRib and the Shamrock Shake at the same time.

If and when it comes time for businesses to decide whether to apply for their own gTLD or register domain names in other new gTLDs, one question marketers will have to ask is how they will spread the word about new domain names.  Specifically, how will they persuade Internet users to type new combinations into their browser bars, as opposed to sticking with standard forms like .COM, .CO.JP and .FR?

Here’s another question: if and when marketers do accomplish that goal, how will new gTLDs affect the way everyday people perceive certain messaging?  It stands to reason that once Internet users get used to seeing a variety of words or phrases to the right of the dot, they will begin to perceive any word.word construction as a possible domain name.

I thought of this because I recently saw a Sony ad that featured the slogan “Make.Believe,” pronounced “make-dot-believe”.  (The accompanying website is sony.com/makedotbelieve and Sony also owns makedotbelieve.com, although it currently doesn’t point to the campaign site.)  Because I regularly deal in (and constantly think about) domain names, I thought it sounded like a domain name, and wondered if Sony had plans to apply for a .BELIEVE gTLD. 

I’m willing to bet that right now, most people who see the campaign do not interpret “Make.Believe” as a possible domain name.  But if the proposed flood of TLDs become reality, then five or ten years from now, once they become accustomed to seeing anything.anything advertised as a website, they just might interpret it that way.  If Sony plans to continue the “Make.Believe” campaign beyond the next few years, and ICANN’s unpopular plan becomes reality, I wonder if they will look into securing the .BELIEVE TLD – not only to create the make.believe domain, but perhaps to extend “Believe” to customers who could offer loyalty in exchange for personal websites and email addresses.