Green Biz Wichita Features FanCam in Newsletter

Ten Thousand Fans offered the FanCam at a recent Green Biz Wichita event and members enjoyed taking their photo and watching it post on the Green Biz Wichita Facebook page.

Here’s an article written for the Green Biz Wichita newsletter.

MEMBER PROFILE:
FanCam and Ten Thousand Fans 

It may be the purest form of social marketing and advertising.

The FanCam enables customers to promote a business directly through its own social media.

The FanCam is a new system created in Wichita and managed by Mia Lee, who recently joined Ten Thousand Fans, LLC as a co-owner. For 15 years, Lee and her creative team have worked to promote businesses through websites and social media. Lee herself has taught college courses and written degree programs and curriculum on websites and social media marketing.

One year ago, the group installed the first FanCam at Meads Corner Coffee Shop, 430 E. Douglas. The concept utilizes a camera and touch-screen computer placed indoors of a business or stationed at a kiosk, allowing customers and clients to “take a FanCam photo,” which is instantly placed on the company’s Facebook page.

Since April 2011, nearly 25 FanCams have been installed throughout the city, in locations including the Kansas Humane Society, Wichita Thunder, De-Al Salon and Eddy’s Toyota. One optometry business installed a FanCam in its glasses studio. Customers could then try on frames, post the photo and review comments from family and friends on which pair of glasses to choose.

Lee is truly motivated by opportunities the FanCam can provide to businesses.

“It’s like watching the marketing industry turn inside out,” she says. “Figuring out how to advertise and communicate to businesses and how the customer wants to do business is the key. With social media you can see relationships in front of you that you couldn’t see before.

Customers of the new Chick Fil-A on Rock and Central should look for a FanCam. Lee says the restaurant broke the company record for the most “Likes” on Facebook of any of its stores, even before its doors officially opened. This, she says, is a positive sign about how a fan base can be created through social media.

Ten Thousand Fans offered the FanCam at a recent Green Biz Wichita event and members enjoyed taking their photo and watching it post on GBW’s Facebook page.

“The Fan Cam can be used full-time or at a one-time event,” Lee says. “We’re even incorporating it into weddings, parties, open houses.”

Lee says prior to the FanCam, customers would go to a place or event, use their phones to take a photo then upload it to their personal Facebook page. The camera’s touch-screen computer allows the customer to post to the business’ Facebook page instead. The customer can also tag themselves to post the pic to their personal Facebook page.
“It gives customers a chance to be involved in a business even after they post their photo,” Lee says. “FanCam is also easy for business owners who may not know what to post, since it lets customers do some of that work. It provides a type of visual advertising for a business.”

Lee says social media has become part of every day life. Whether through Facebook or Twitter, people spend hours of time using online channels. A high-paid ad or business claim simply can’t compete with a direct recommendation by a current customer to a potential customer.

“I strive to work with people and businesses that really care about their customers,” she says. “They are the best to work with when comes to social media. A company can’t hide anymore using advertising claims when they’re not really true. In this day and age, the customer will be the ones doing the marketing.”

Go to takeittagitshareit.com for more information on FanCam. –