This Friday, I’m heading down to the Blogworld Expo in Las Vegas.  I’m super excited to be going and I have one of Invoke’s social media marketing clients tagga to thank for sending me down there.  I’ve been heading tagga’s Social Media Marketing campaign since they launched this summer and we’ve been running several cool campaigns for them.  The most interesting and fun by far though, are the campaigns that are revolving around Blogworld.

Over the three days at blogworld, tagga is going to be throwing 8 taggamobs. Once you get there, we’re going to give you something fun to do and the winners will walk away with cool swag and prizes. The first two taggamobs are going to be held at the TechSet party at Bare where tagga has a cabana, so make sure you are there!

If you’re heading to Blogworld, make sure you follow tagga on twitter and text ‘tagga’ to 82442. Also, if you want to get mobile updates on the taggamob’s, make sure you subscribe to mobile on the tagga blog - this way you’ll know before everyone else when and where the next taggamob will be held!

We have tons of cool prizes lined up to give out - I get to feel like Santa at Christmas all weekend - ending with a grand prize of a $500 Apple GC.  I’ll give you a huge hint now, in order to win the grand prize, you’re going to have to answer a riddle.  I’ll be dropping hints throughout the weekend on the tagga mobile RSS (make sure you subscribe to mobile on the tagga blog) and through the tagga twitter account.

It occurred to me the other day that I don’t like talking on the phone much, I greatly prefer to text, email, IM or twitter someone.  Don’t get me wrong, I still do call people regularly when it is needed, but you will no longer find me calling friends and acquaintances without a specific reason or spending copious amounts of time on the phone in a single conversation.

This struck me as somewhat odd, as when I was younger, I was on the phone constantly.  So much so, that when I was a teenager, my Mom actually gave me my own personal phoneline for my 13th birthday so that other people in the house could actually make a call when I was at home.  I would spend hours on end having random unfocused conversations.

This made me wonder, at what point in my life did my preferred method of communication shift from that of the traditional telephone to these newer methods of reaching out and touching someone.  The very first time I made an email account was in 2001, when I went back to University and they required us to have one for an online marketing class that I took.  And I never used MSN until I’d graduated University in 2006, when my job required it.

At first, I found IM to be very annoying and distracting from work and really only used email when I needed to send a file over to a classmate.  Today, at any given time I’ve got a dozen IM tabs open, am twittering regularly, and am constantly sending emails. Quite often now, my phone will ring and I’ll think why is someone calling me?

So I can narrow down the scope of this communications shift to the past 2 years, but why?  Is it because of what I do for a living and it’s just a natural communications progression, as you’re far more likely to find me infront of a computer than not?  I can’t really answer this question, but it’s got me thinking anyhow.

Has this happened to you? Do you still chat on the phone regularly with friends and family or do you pick up the phone to call a store instead of heading over to their website to see if you can’t source the information your searching for yourself? Or is this just me?

If you live in Vancouver, Lululemon is practically synonymous with the city.  You don’t have to go more than a block in pretty much any neighbourhood to find someone decked out in head to toe in Lululemon.  It’s part of the active lifestyle that is pervasive in Vancouver.  The clothes are incredibly comfortable and the yoga pant are very flattering.

I was in the Lululemon on Robson street the other week buying a rain jacket for running when the girl helping me in the change room recognized me from a previous visit.  She asked me if I was interested in joining a clinic that they were hosting.  What they did, was ask 20 people who came in to the store if they wanted to take part in a four week - 8 sessions in total - bootcamp style class called Endorphins, that is taught by the owners own personal trainer. The best part about it, is that it’s free.

I was quite surprised that they were offering this for free and jumped at the opportunity to participate in the class.  To sign up for a 4 week bootcamp class, the cost is between $200 and $300. Anyway that you look at it, it’s a great deal for me.  I’m not sure exactly what is involved in an Endorphins class, but I’m definitely looking forward to going to my first one tomorrow.

It got me to thinking about why they were doing this.  They didn’t know anything about who I was, other than they recognized me from a previous visit and I was offered this before I’d purchased anything - and they didn’t have a purchase requirement in order to participate.

All to often these days, companies want you to jump through hoops in order to partake in a promotion that they are offering with all sorts of small print in there to catch you on the back end.   Think about all of those “free” digital camera’s that the telecom’s give you to sign up to their internet or phone services.  They are never free and you’re better off just buying one yourself.

There isn’t anything involved with this offer that Lululemon gave me.  What they have created is a loyal customer who is more than willing to tell all of my friends - and in my case readers - about this.  The next time I need to buy athletic gear, you can be assured that I won’t be hitting the Puma store on Granville or the closest big box sports store, I’ll be heading down to my local Lululemon.  If I wasn’t a loyal consumer before, you can be sure that I am now.

So other companies out there, you can take a cue from this.  Don’t make your customers jump through hoops to participate in your promotions.  You’re far more apt to create a loyal customer by treating them well than by trying to trick them with your “free” promotions.  I know that I loyally avoid several companies now due to their ‘free’ promotion giveaway’s.

Thanks Lululemon!