The Winners 1-5: Twin Cities Top Ten Titans In Social Media

1.  DUSTY TRICE:  POLITICAL NINJA

Dusty is a political consultant well known for his social and new media skills, specializing in graphic design, video production and viral marketing.  Having worked on 9 campaigns, most recently on Sen. Al Franken’s 2008 campaign, he has been a trusted name in Midwest politics for the last 14 years.

The amazing story with Dusty this year, and the reason he is number one on this list, is that he just started blogging in March of 2009. The other really outstanding thing about Dusty is that he is completely independent and self funded.  Dusty started a political gossip blog, dustytrice.com,  that was frequently featured on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, The Ed Schultz Show, FOX and Friends, The Washington Post, Gawker, Boing Boing, TPM, Politico, Wonkette, City Pages and numerous other national outlets.  The blog was one of the top read political blogs in Minnesota, spawned several viral youtube hits with over half a million views and was banned in China.  Yes, it was banned in China, believe it.

Unfortunately, Dusty recently quit blogging to focus on taking new clients and projects outside the political realm.  Dusty’s story truly is the “Twin Cities Social Media Story of 2009”.  Watch Dusty’s now famous video of Al Franken talking down an angry mob.

If you want to follow Dusty (and I highly suggest that you do) click here.

2.  BLOIS OLSON & DAVID ERICKSON:  PR-MAGEDDON

David and Blois are two leaders at Tunheim of what is emerging as the most innovative social media team at a larger agency in the Twin Cities.  The two first teamed up in 1998 to launch the first email newsletter on Minnesota politics with MN-Politics.com.

An example of how Blois and David use social media to help clients is what they did for Punch Pizza.  Blois and David used social media and online strategies to make up for a reduction in Punch Pizza’s paid marketing efforts.  One was Snowmagedon, when they generated a Twitter offer to their followers when a blizzard was about to hit the Twin Cities.  The offer, allowed Punch to be profitable on a night they would have otherwise not been due to built in labor and food costs.

Another great campaign was the Bacon Chocolate Conan O’Brien Head. Conan O’Brien declared he would bring his show to the Minnesota State Fair if he could get his weight in some delicious chocolate-covered bacon. Unfortunately, he had to remain in Los Angeles, so a likeness was commissioned in his spirit by No Name Premium Meats (including bacon!) and seafood. Using white chocolate for his complexion and bacon to capture his wavy hair, the bust was delivered to his studio on Tuesday, August 25.  The bacon-chocolate likeness made it on the air, and it was really funny too.

Follow Blois or David on Twitter by clicking here.

3.  KELLY GROEHLER:  MAY THE TWELPFORCE BE WITH YOU

Kelly works for Best Buy Co., Inc., a key player in one of the most fascinating and rapidly-changing industry sectors: consumer electronics and technology. She initially joined Best Buy to help build a reputation management framework, so the company could better understand stakeholder perceptions at a time of massive business growth, expansion, and transformation.

Today, her team helps guide the actions and words of Best Buy in ways that tell their story of continued, sustainable growth and differentiation as the technology sector evolves. She also leads an initiative to overhaul the role of public relations within the company: Through use of consumer technology, including social media, they can create, aggregate, and distribute news and information that keeps pace with the rapidly-changing global media landscape – and actively engages our employees, consumers, journalists, communities and stakeholders worldwide. (Watch her for the unveiling of The BBY in fiscal 2011!)

Kelly is one of the people at Best Buy that helped to shape the corporate social media guidelines for employees and started the innovative Twelpforce at Best Buy.  Twelpforce is a way for employees of Best Buy to share and stream Twitter feeds so a big company can communicate and connect with each other as well as with customers.

Kelly currently serves as a member of the advisory board for the M.A. in Strategic Communication program at the University of Minnesota. She also volunteers for women’s and public policy causes, including the communications committee of the Citizens League. Follow Kelly on Twitter here.

4.  JASON MATHESON & ALEXIS THOMPSON: STAR CATCHERS

Jason Matheson was just a simple boy with a dream.  That dream was to get in touch with Katie Couric.  This is where his co-host on the popular FM107.1 radio show Jason & Alexis, Alexis Thompson, and social media come in and make this dream come true.

A Facebook group was started named “Katie Couric please call Jason Matheson and give him a CBS hat and mug.”  Within a short period of time the group had over 200 members (including me, I am a contributor to the Jason & Alexis show) and the group had also launched a grassroots Twitter campaign of people contacting Katie to call into Jason’s show.  After a few months, Katie Couric did contact Jason via Twitter, letting him know that both she and her staff were aware of the Facebook group and thought it was a hoot.  Since that initial contact Couric has been on the Jason & Alexis show, recorded promo’s for the show, and been in contact via Twitter frequently.  I would say that this is truly a social media dream come true.

Jason & Alexis also hold seminars teach people over 40 how to use Facebook, and create really funny videos that are posted to the FM107.1 Facebook group (I highly suggest watching some of these.)  Listen to Jason & Alexis on FM107.1 or follow Jason or Alexis by clicking.

5. JENNIFER KANE:  SOCIAL MEDIA MENTOR

Jennifer Kane is principal of Kane Consulting, a social media marketing and PR firm that specializes in research, strategy and measurement/monitoring, in addition to producing events and providing training in these areas.  She is an award-winning strategic planner with more than 15 years of experience in marketing, and is a sought after speaker, writer and facilitator. She also tweets an awful lot.

Jennifer is a member of the Editorial Board for Minnesota Meetings and Events Magazine (for whom she writes columns about social media), is on the Ambassador Council for Author Teleseminars, and in 2009 was named one of the Top 20 Social Media Innovators in the Twin Cities.

In 2009 she developed and produced “Kane Camps,” a series of day-long seminars and evening classes designed to introduce small businesses to social media, which attracted more than 200 participants.  These camps have been so successful, and Jennifer so popular, that she received more nominations for this award than any other person, mainly from past camp attendees.  To become one of Jennifer’s “followers” click here.

Tags: Jason Matheson, Minneapolis, minnesota, Social Media, Twin Cities, Twin Cities Top Tehn Titan In Social Media

This entry was posted on December 9, 2009 at 1:27 pm and is filed under TwinCities. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.