We’ve been posting screencasts on Nuts About Southwest, our latest project with Southwest Airlines. When building the site, it was important for us that users be able to access as much content as they wanted on the site, or view each piece separately in various forms. This way more users could interact with more content in more ways, fitting various life styles and preferences. The last few screencasts have been focused around how to interact with Southwest content off the actual site - so far, on Flickr and through RSS feeds. The latest screencast is on how to subscribe to Southwest’s podcast through iTunes.

Enjoy!

Nuts About Southwest part 5 - Subscribing to the SWA podcast in iTunes

Other screencasts in this series:

• Nuts About Southwest 2.0 - An Introduction
• Nuts About Southwest part 2 - Logging In
• Nuts About Southwest part 3 - The Southwest flickr Feed
• Nuts About Southwest part 4 - RSS Feeds

For some people, RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a way of life. For others, it’s just another acronym that they kind of/mostly/pretty much understand. In part 4 of our screencast series on Nuts About Southwest 2.0, Eric discusses RSS basics using examples from the various feeds on the Nuts About Southwest site.

And don’t worry, I’ll be back around next time. Enjoy!

Nuts About Southwest part 4 - RSS Feeds

Other screencasts in this series:

• Nuts About Southwest 2.0 - An Introduction
• Nuts About Southwest part 2 - Logging In
• Nuts About Southwest part 3 - The Southwest flickr Feed

We’ve added a lot of functionality to Nuts About Southwest (Airlines), and we’re filming this screencast series to be sure that none of the cool new features get lost in the excitement of a new site. The following screencast is “a behind the scenes look” at the flickr images you see on the Nuts About Southwest site. It presents a basic step by step look at how to post images on flickr and to the Southwest Airlines group.

Presenting, part 3: Nuts About Southwest part 3 - The Southwest flickr Feed

If this is basic knowledge to you, you are among the few flickr users who know how to join a group (many don’t). If this screencast shows you something you didn’t know before, you’re definitely not alone.

Other screencasts in this series:

• Nuts About Southwest 2.0 - An Introduction
• Nuts About Southwest part 2 - Logging In

It’s the same Nuts About Southwest, but of a slightly different variety. Some like their peanuts dry roasted, some like them salty. Even if honey-roasted is your flavor of choice, there’s something for you at BlogSouthwest.com.

The blog for Southwest Airlines just turned two, and we are celebrating by bringing the conversation to a wider audience. We know that people engage websites in different ways. While I might prefer to spend my time reading Brian Lusk’s blog posts, others may prefer to listen to Steve Heaser’s radio voice on RedBellyRadio. Then, if you are into watching video, Christi Day shares her enthusiasm on the Video Blog. Of course, there are many who like it all mashed together, providing everything in one place.

We hope you enjoy the new BlogSouthwest.com. We have had such a great time working on this and have had a rare experience to do exactly what we LUV to do. Gotta hand it to the Southwest team. They have the content part of this whole thing figured out.

We’ll be posting more later on this as we want to help Southwest share the features and functions. Our team is preparing presentations for our blog where you will get to meet them and hear about their contributions.

Many thanks also to Paula (did you think I would forget you?). Not least, Paula Berg (AKA BlogGirl) is a rock star who does everything at 100 mph… without sleep!

UPDATE:

Here’s an introductory screencast, the first in a series we’ll do on the new site. Thanks Caitlin and Eric for the narration!

Nuts About Southwest 2.0 - Introductory Screencast

UPDATE #2:

Screencast part two - logging in to the new Nuts About Southwest. Enjoy!

SWA screencast part 2 - logging in

There’s (still) lots more to come!

UPDATE: The CNN URL has changed, but you can also check out the press release on Yahoo business here: http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/080506/0394111.html

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We’re thrilled to see this press release on CNN Money on the Nuts About Southwest launch.

If you scroll down, you’ll see a quote from our very own Chris Ronan:

“Southwest took a big step when it launched Nuts About Southwest two years ago, and they’ve proven their ability to conquer the most difficult challenge our clients face — consistently creating great content,” said Chris Ronan, President of RD2. “What’s different this time — we know that the Southwest Team generates meaningful content, which has allowed us to focus more on context. We asked ourselves, ‘Who are the users? What are they reading? How do we give them a more diverse tool set to communicate with Southwest?’ In applying these contexts, we can think of Nuts About Southwest as a platform for many applications, instead of just an application itself.”

The launch has been several months in the making - and we’re all really proud of our team who has been working hard to get the site up!

So it’s been a really busy couple of weeks here in the West End, but that hasn’t dampened our enthusiasm for blogging. And we couldn’t be happier that one of our favorite clients still LUVs to blog.

Here’s wishing you more candy than you should be allowed to eat at once for Valentine’s Day.

Southwest Airlines had a booth at the BlogWorld Expo in Vegas, and I was lucky enough to hang out with them for the show. There was a lot to learn and a myriad of vendors showing off their technologies and services.

For the show, I had my MacBook Pro with iMovie and Final Cut Studio. Pairing my computer with a handy little Sanyo cam, and we were able to fire off a few clips (also seen on blogsouthwest.com). For these videos, Christi and I put together some “on-the-fly, up close and personal” videos. So fun…

Here’s a couple of the rock stars Brian Lusk and Bill Owen. And, I’m not kidding, these guys are rock stars in the community. Everyone at the show knows them. They provide great content and have quite the following.

With the holiday spirit abound and many people planning winter vacations, the thought of getting the heck out of Dodge is almost palpable. Not bad timing for Southwest Airlines’ newest addition to the online community: a brand new video blog inviting all to post their versions of the popular “Wanna Get Away� ad campaign. The site was launched yesterday, and has had well over 1,000 unique visitors already.

The idea behind SouthwestWannaGetAway.com reflects one of the main components of web 2.0: allowing users to contribute content. Anyone from the general public is able to create their own “Wanna Get Away� moment, film it, upload it to YouTube, and submit it to Southwest. Winners receive tickets to any of Southwest’s 63 destinations, and one grand prize entry will be aired nationwide.

RD2 is of course excited. In a lot of ways, it was a unique achievement for us. We like to play the role of designer and builder, but this time, most of the design ideas were left up to GSD&M, Southwest’s ad agency since 1980. Collaborating with one of the biggest agencies in Texas and a member of the Omnicom Group (NYSE: OMC) – a major player in global marketing – was definitely a big first for all involved in the project.

Last night, as I was attempting to convince a friend to set up a Wordpress blog, I noticed under the Wordpress “Notable Users” page sat our very own Nuts About Southwest Blog!

From Wordpress.com, under “Why Blog?” there is a link titled “All the cool kids are,” which leads straight to the Notable Wordpress Users page.

The Southwest Blog is Under “Big Companies,” among the likes of About.com, The New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal.

It’s very exciting to see all the buzz surrounding our work!

It has been great watching the success of Southest Airline’s corporate blog, Nuts About Southwest since launch two months ago. Last week, Easton Ellsworth reviewed the blog on BusinessBlogWire.com.

From Ellsworth:

“Yes! Finally! A corporate blog that emphasizes its visitors! I’m impressed.”
“Now this is the way corporate blogs should be - conversational, friendly, open and even fun. Way to go Southwest!”

Read BusinessBlogWire’s full review

This acclaim from such an authority on the subject is very exciting for all of us!

Note: The review was followed up Friday with a post on how well Southwest responded to the review and its comments.