BlackDoor MediaComm

Photo by  claire jones  on  Unsplash By Deron Snyder I was at church about 30 years ago when my pastor mentioned a movie theatre where imperceptible suggestions were flashed on the screen.  One message was, “Drink Coca-Cola.”  The other was, “Eat popcorn.”  He said sales of Coke and popcorn shot through the roof as a result, even though moviegoers received the prods only subconsciously. That story always impressed me and served as proof of subliminal messages. But in my studies on message development and placement this week, I learned that the tale is a hoax. Turns out that James Vicary, the man who coined the term “subliminal advertising” and conducted the theater experiment in 1957, eventually confessed to lying about the results. There are questions as to whether he actually conducted the experiment at all. I’m still debating whether to share my findings with Rev. Wilson. But despite Vicary’s admission, the notion of subliminal adverti...

Photo by  David Beale  on  Unsplash By Deron Snyder -- "Where there is no vision, the people perish" Proverbs 29:18. Just like people, organizations are at risk of perishing when guidance and direction are insufficient. Picking out prime examples is easy, considering how hindsight is 20-20. But perhaps no company proves the point more convincingly than Blockbuster. By 1993, the video rental chain had more than 3,400 stores and was encouraging consumers to “make it a Blockbuster night.” But the leaders' FutureVision googles were faulty and led to failure in navigating an oncoming tidal wave that turned the company’s fortunes upside down. A June 1999 article in the Chicago Sun-Times asked readers to “imagine a Blockbuster night without Blockbuster, a time when no video store will ever slap you with a late fee or fine you for failing to rewind. Because in this world, there are no videos, only home computers.”   In that world, Amazon ...

By Deron Snyder If nothing else, the University of Maryland has proved itself to be an equal-opportunity violator of communication best practices. The school has demonstrated extraordinary incompetence in virtually every conceivable way.  As a government entity. Through its internal communication. As an institution of higher learning. Via its external communication. As an athletic department. Just as the University of Alabama and Auburn University are shining examples of excellent communication in reaction to a crisis – the 2011 poisoning of Auburn’s venerable oak trees by an Alabama fan – Maryland forever will be the first chapter in “What Not to Do” for its response to the tragic death of 19-year-old Terrapins football player Jordan McNair. “We have got politicians involved, students upset and the public wondering what’s going on,” a former Terrapin Club president told the New York Times last week after a chaotic series of events . In a span of roughly 48 hours, we re...

By Deron Snyder How does a 50-year old man go from the obscurity of managing casual restaurants in Richmond, Virginia. to become a media celebrity in a Top 10 market like Washington, DC? How does he break into journalism at such an advanced age, with no training, no experience and no connections? How does he develop a cult-like fan base that grows to include the likes of NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt Jr.? The answer is easy to guess: He does it by being social. Rich Tandler was 63 when he died suddenly last month , sending a shockwave through journalists, fans and personnel associated with Washington’s NFL franchise. He was a prime example of the power of social media, which catapulted him from Applebee’s and Panera Bread to stadiums and locker rooms around the country – and even London, where Washington and Cincinnati played in 2016. The team “retired” his seat in the FedEx Field press box and marked it with a plaque. Tandler began blogging about the team, as a hobby, in...

Photo by  Rakesh Shetty  on  Unsplash By Deron Snyder According to an old saying, folks should either lead, follow or get out of the way. But nowadays, it’s harder to do the latter without running the risk of being trampled. Our society seems to move at warp speed, with the next new thing arriving daily. We’re like Sandra Bullock’s character in “Gravity,” buffeted by zooming debris as we float helplessly through space. Except the hits and misses aren’t totally happenstance. Sometimes we’re steered onto a collision course without even realizing it. But that’s only fair, since we sometimes unconsciously nudge others in likewise fashion. Between intentional persuaders and unintentional influencers, we are surrounded by legions of leaders, swarmed by a wealth of words from a multitude of mouths. The deluge exists not only within our personal networks through face-to-face communication, but whenever we venture onto the congested Internet. There, whether throug...

Photo by Jeremy Galliani on Unsplash By Deron Snyder If printed newspapers have lost me as a customer, I fear that their prospects for developing future customers is between infinitesimal and nonexistent. I still love newspapers, which have been part of my life since elementary school, when I devoured the New York Daily News every day (as a sports fan, backwards) and later added the New York Post to my reading list. During visits back home after leaving the city to attend Howard University and start my journalism career, I’d stop at newsstands and purchase the aforementioned papers as well as USA Today, The New York Times and New York Newsday. Nothing quite compares to flipping through the pages of a “daily miracle,” the term some journalists use to describe a newspaper. I’m convinced that the physical act, the tactile experience, provides some sort of subconscious mental reward, like the release of endorphins during exercise. Sipping coffee, scanning the headline...