I feel sorry for Tish Harkus, Manager at Canadian Club Whisky for it’s obvious she has a real passion for this beverage, and a powerful gift for communicating the essence of the Canadian Club experience, but sadly, even her professionalism and compelling stage presence couldn’t cut through the lunacy of the Apr 18 tasting event. On April 18th 2013 Praxis PR invited me to join the Canadian Club Chairman and share his Whisky Whisdoms at the inaugural #CanadianClub national meeting in the Great Hall at Hart House. It was a boondoggle. Honestly, I would like to report nice things, and ‘give back’ to the PR community, but it was like this gathering was organized by people who had never thrown a party before. There were so many rookie mistakes. The huge Twitter wall was impressive, and I liked the Prezi style presentation. Congrats @TheDanLevy who won a nice prize for composing… Read more »
Posted in: Friends of Smojoe, Interactive, Personal Blog, Photography, Toronto, Video
Taged with: #CanadianClub, Canadian Club whisky, Chairman, no common sense, Praxis PR, rookie event mistakes, Tish Harkus, Whisky Whisdom
Ice Cross Downhill is a new sport that has been live-branded by the Red Bull energy drink beverage company as Red Bull Crashed Ice. The sport is simple; its a speedy race downhill on skates between four heavily padded participants, the best time wins. So Crashed Ice is a combination speed skating meets alpine skiing with a hint of ice hockey, and always in an urban environment. The 2013 Red Bull Crashed Ice season starts in Niagara Falls this year, just down the road from the waterfalls. The best view of the whole affair will undoubtedly be from atop the Skylon Tower which is very close to the STARTING line atop Clifton Hill. And inside the Red Bull Fan Zone should be thrilling – I will update you with pictures and text from that event next week. Read more about Crashed Ice on Skylon’s Niagara Falls blog. Below is the… Read more »
Posted in: business storytelling, Interactive, Personal Blog, Smojoe Clients, Video, Web Marketing
Taged with: Clifton Hill, Crashed Ice, fans, Kyle Croxall, Niagara Falls, Red Bull, Scott Croxall, Skylon Tower, Web Marketing
Inside the 2011 Search for Miss Teen Canada World Saturday July 9th was a very special Registration Day for at least seventy five participants in the 2011 Search for Miss Teen Canada – World, as one by one teen girls age 14-18 from all across Canada checked their luggage into the sponsor hotel in downtown Toronto to start their week long adventure. One at a time they met each other in the lobby and corridors the massive historic hotel complex at the base of the city. In the antechamber of one of the enormous ballrooms, they found Michelle Weswaldi and lined up there to present her with their head shots, and CDs filled with pictures, videos and audio that they recorded at home in which they demonstrate their acting, singing and special skills for the upcoming talent show. After a brief question and answer with the Pageant Director they went… Read more »
Posted in: Friends of Smojoe, Interactive, Smojoe Clients, Social innovation, Toronto, User Submitted Content, Video, workshop
Taged with: 2011 Search, ballroom, banquet dinner, blog network, bloggers, doentown Toronto hotel, friends, July 15th Talent Show, Michelle Weswaldi, Miss Teen Canada World, particpants, Registration Day, Video, volunteers
Somebody put me on the list and I got invited to the YYZ LIVING magazine second issue launch party at Ultra Supper Club on Queen St West on Thursday 16 June 2011 evening 8pm. It wasn’t hard to get invited to this event, everyone was there. The evening started at 8pm upstairs on the white paint of the Ultra patio which had just come into shade cast by taller brick buildings west on Queen St. The food was tasty. The free drink was orange juice and champagne w strawberry The two bartenders on the south bar were overworked from the start. It was a nice night that actually got warmer when the sun went down. It was downright steamy later. This highly anticipated party did indeed bring out some interesting people from the world of fashion art and media, and this really was an almost perfect evening for an outdoor… Read more »
Posted in: Actually sharing secrets, Canada Blog Friends, Fashion Blog, Friends of Smojoe, Personal Blog, Search Engine Marketing, Smojoe Clients, Social innovation, Toronto, Video
Taged with: bartenders, Lisa Charleyboy, Mario Miotti, patio, rooftop, The wine Ladies, Toronto, Ultra Supper Club, YYZ Magazine, “FREE”, “PB $TYL$”
Something unusual happened on Tuesday 31 May 2011 - I went out after work! I went out to see Keisha Chante and Casie Stewart rock the Pepsi Throwback Event at Revival, on College St. Casie Stewart does it again, and Keisha Chante was there too. They went on stage and spoke to the assembly at around 7pm. Keisha told everyone to get twittering. Casie Stewart thanked all her friends for coming out. Look in the picture, do you see how she’s looking directly at me. You can see that right? Do you follow me on Twitter? @roberrific This is someone else’s tweet and i show it here because its good storytelling – perfect use of twitter – ‘excited for the #PepsiThrowback Retro Party tonight! Looking forward to seeing @TheSpoons, @KeishaChante, and @CasieStewart!‘ Casie warned us about tonight in her blog, then she asked for input in What Do You Think… Read more »
Posted in: Friends of Smojoe, Personal Blog, Toronto, Video, workshop
Taged with: 80s music, Casie Stewart, College St, John Leschinski, Mark Pavlidis, Pepsi Throwback, Raymi The Minx, Revival, The Spoons, Tweetagora
On Thursday April 30th, Smojoe had lunch on the patio of Jack Astors at Yonge and Bloor with Julian Brass of Notable.TV, and together we enjoyed a terrific social media marketing brain share over fajitas and fresh tomato juice. Short story, today’s lunch occurred rather spontaneously because I happened across Julian’s ad while trolling Toronto craigslist marketing and PR boards on the weekend; he was on there Friday looking for an intern to help out a busy social media start-up. No I didn’t apply for the job, I wanted to know more about the start-up. What does he do exactly? Notable.TV is a streaming video site that targets 25 – 39 year old people and shares exclusive ‘insider moments’ from some the most noteworthy and inspirational happenings all over the country. The Features section showcases Notable Happenings that must be seen, while other sections cover Fashion, Music, Events, People, and… Read more »
Posted in: Future Technology, Interactive, Search Engine Marketing, Social innovation, Social Media, Toronto, User Submitted Content, Video, Web Marketing, Web Resource, workshop
Taged with: affiliate marketing, craigslist, engage.com, Julian Brass, Notable.tv, Social Media, web videos
On Friday April 3rd, 2009 Rob Campbell was in the right place at the right time to rock out with Rob Reiner, the drummer of Anvil. There I was strolling through the movie theatre lobby when i spotted the rock legend holding court at the base of the escalators. He was surrounded by some attractive leather clad, middle aged groupies with big hair. Anvil: The Story of Anvil At fourteen years old, best friends Steve Lips Kudrow and Robb Reiner made a pact to rock together forever. Their band Anvil, hailed as the “demi-gods of Canadian metal,” influenced a musical generation including Metallica, Slayer and Anthrax. Though Anvil never made it, they never stopped playing or believing. Following a calamitous European tour, Lips and Robb, now well into their fifties, set off to record their thirteenth album, “This is Thirteen,” in one last attempt to fulfill their boyhood dream. http://anvilmovie.com… Read more »
At the start of this month, Microsoft Corporation posted a five minute video that visualizes the year 2019. Because it’s Microsoft, it shows a lot of gadgets. The irony of the situation for me is that I’m trying to use my Smojoe blog software to embed the video right here in this post, and I have… succeeded! Now I have to erase and rewrite everything I wrote about how technology fails people that are too cheap, dumb and lazy to utilize the software‘s most basic functionality. But the lesson remains – don’t give up. Just keep trying and you will eventually succeed, and perhaps you will get to live the dream presented here: The video was debuted at Wharton Business Technology Conference on Feb 27th, 2009. The media is titled 2019, and now I shouldn’t have to remind you that’s only ten years away. Arthur C. Clarke once said, “any… Read more »
