What I'm learning from my Give Evo an EVO campaign

Image by otherthings via Flickr

Can one man really influence a large telecommunications company? Sure. Am I that guy? Hard to say. But I'm going to find out.

In case you missed the news, Sprint has a new smartphone coming out by HTC called the -- of all things -- the EVO. As I'm a customer of Sprint and a sucker for new gadgets, I obviously want one. Read up on the "why" here.

For the past five days, I've been producing a video a day on YouTube. And of course I've been tweeting and chatting it up on Facebook. Contrary to the evidence of those last 5 days, I'm a pretty lousy self-promoter. So I'm learning a lot that may be of some use to the readers of this blog. I don't think my actions as an individual make a direct parallel for businesses, but some lessons may be applicable. Like this:

• Respond to comments. No big secret here. Conversation begets conversation. I asked my friend iJustine to spread the word on one of the videos. She did, and I got a load of comments, mostly from her fans. And mostly -- not surprisingly -- addressed to her. I blew it by not responding to these folks right away, but have since corrected my errors. If they took the time to comment, I should take the time to respond. And maybe they'll become a fan of mine, too.
  
  
• Enlist those who do self promote better than you. Last night I roped Tyler Hurst into helping. He didn't need a lot of convincing to jump in front of the camera. And since he's part of the content, he's going to talk about it, too.
  
  
• Don't neglect the backchannel. Not everyone wants to tweet, facebook and generally help a social thing spread. But some have connections and are happy to send emails. I'm getting some traction there, so maybe my goal will be realized!
  
  
• Experiment! I didn't have much of a plan when I started this. That's OK. I'm refining as I go. Also OK. If you have discretionary time -- and I have only a little -- it's OK to take this route. But note that I didn't go out and spend a thousand bucks on new equipment or start paying people to help me. That needs a touch more planning.

A lot of folks are asking me about my end-game. Simple: I want that phone. But I also want to see how this process works and how it might be applied in other directions. Welcome to the experiment. I'm going to start a daily log over on FunAnymore.com that covers all the stuff I'm doing, and how I feel about it any given day. Watch over there if you like.

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• Giant Sprint HTC EVO 4G Ad At Times Square (ubergizmo.com)
• Sprint's HTC EVO 4G the World's First 4G Android Smartphone (phonereport.info)
• Help me convince Sprint that I need the new HTC EVO 4G... NOW! (funanymore.com)