WebSite Marketing Strategy

I have been invited to moderate a panel on social media next week in Chicago.  The panelists include marketing and sales professionals from Myspace, Bebo, Facebook and CafeMom.    I am super excited to attend the event and meet some of the panelists, especially since Andew Shue (co-founder of CafeMom) will be sitting on the panel. In case you don’t know, Andrew is a pretty awesome actor and was “Billy” on Melrose Place.  He is also the brother of Elizabeth Shue, an actress who gained her popularity playing Daniel’s girlfriend in the Karate Kid (and yes, like most boys my age … I did have a crush on her).

The goal of the panel is to provide brand and advertising professionals with a unique perspective on social media.  Here are some of the questions I plan on asking the panel:

1. What is your unique value proposition as it relates to social media and advertising?
2. Can you give us any specific examples of how companies have used your site in previous marketing campaigns?
3. How did you/they measure the success of such campaign(s)?
4. How can success be measured in social media (be specific)?
5. Is it possible to measure a conversation?
6. What are the benefits of using social media as part of a broader marketing campaign?
7. Can social media be used as a “real time” focus group?
8. What are the challenges and risks of social media (not being specific to any companies)?
9. What does your company do to protect an advertiser?
   Is there a lack of control for brands who participate in social media? If so, what is your best advice to deal with this?
10. There is a lot of talk in the industry about the concept of community.  What is your opinion of the term “community” and is it just a fad?
11. What is the future of social networking?

 Is there anything else that you recommend that I ask the panel? I would appreciate your feedback.

The other day, I was involved in a rather heated, yet enlightening discussion with a dude who really hates marketing; and I don’t blame him. Here is an excerpt of one of his comments:

Yes, consumers want to be heard. They also want the option to NOT be annoyed by marketing. They want the option of not having to put up with marketers exploiting a medium meant for communication and turning it into one more TV commercial. Consumers should not have to spend time and effort to block marketers. Consumers do want a choice - given their druthers, most would choose to have no marketing at all.

He was responding to a comment I made about consumers demanding to be heard online; and even as a marketer, I unequivocally agree with his assessment. In later comments, he said that he was tired of marketers like me just “talking about having conversations with consumers” and that there is way too much “talking about talking” and very little two-way communication. I agree.

A lot of marketers, including myself, talk the talk and rarely walk the walk. I often write about the need for marketers and brands to engage in “real” conversations with “real people” i.e. their customers; and I am sitting back asking myself … what in the heck I am doing to talk to my customers?

It’s one thing to write about conversational marketing (and I know that some of you hate that term); but it’s another thing to actually do it. And, I agree that many marketers still don’t “get it”; and either don’t use social media as a conversational channel or use it to spam the heck out of everyone. But there are some companies that realize the true value of conversations (Intel, Lego, Starbucks, Dell) and they are doing a really good job at it. Why? Well, that leads me to my next point.

Are conversations really the holy grail of social media?

I think I may have been wrong with this one. Anyone can have conversations. Go to a used car lot and you will be bombarded with them the moment you step on the lot.

Maybe it’s the content of the conversation that is the core. Perhaps it needs to be presented with a “real voice” and relevant to the other person. Isn’t that the true nature of human interaction?

Real voice, relevance = valuable conversations = trust = the beginning of a “real” relationship

Reflecting on my own personal experience … when my wife and I first met, our initial conversations didn’t revolve around sports, video games or politics. We talked in depth about our past experiences, lifetime goals and achievements; and relationship expectations. These topics were important and relevant to both of us; especially since we were getting to know each other. And, as the relationship blossomed and now that we are married, we talk about anything and everything. And, our conversations are still relevant because of that relationship; even though my wife doesn’t really like sports, video games and politics.

The point is that marketers need to take off their marketing hats for a second; and presents themselves as real people with real emotions and real perspectives. This level of authenticity will not only help make their jobs easier, but it will also help consumers relate to them more effectively.

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Tags: social media, conversational marketing

I came across this excellent resource (thanks Beth) this morning on several methodologies to measure social media.

Rachel Happe, who blogs over at the Social Organization put together this quite awesome list of metrics used to measure social media in the enterprise. This list goes beyond the common metrics used to measure the effectiveness (or not) of marketing activities. One metric that is not on the list – and I think we all struggle with this - is the ability to measure conversations. I mean, really, how do you attach a metric to a two-way dialogue? There are some really cool tools available that monitor conversations and brand mentions online though. Some even use algorithms that rate these conversations based on where they are taking place. Expensive but might be worth the investment.

Tags: measuring social media, social media metrics

Well, personally I think that conversations are the core of social media, but don’t take my word for it. I just launched a new blog authored by several internal marketers from industry leading companies like Intel, HP, Cisco, Yahoo, Yum Brands and Cadence who think the same. The blog, titled “Conversations Matter: Bridging the Social Media Gap” is focused on providing a unique perspective of social media; one that I believe is not well represented on the internet today. Unlike the Blog Council, everything we share on the blog is open to just about anyone who is interested in learning, listening and even contributing. We do not require membership or registration to have access to this information. We also take it one step further and discuss a holistic view of social media strategy; with corporate blogs being one element of that strategy.  If you would like to contribute to the blog, please give me a holler and we can discuss the next steps.
We will discuss a variety of different topics revolving around social media to include:

- internal challenges of evangelizing social media
- key learnings and best practices of social media campaigns we managed
- using social media for internal communications
- our point of view of social media in general

Please stop by and let me know what you think. Feedback, criticism and praise would be greatly appreciated.

Tags: social media, conversational marketing

Remember G.I. Joe and those pretty awesome public service announcements, where one of the Joes would give an important safety lesson to a group of kids engaged in questionable behavior? They always ended with the famous exchange: “Now we know!” “And knowing is half the battle.” Well I say that “listening is half the battle” but I am willing to compromise. How about:

“Knowing when to listen is half the battle”

However you arrange the words, it makes complete sense when you apply it to social media. Listening and responding are only half the battle when engaging with consumers online. The other half of the formula is acting. It’s like being in a relationship. If my wife is upset that I leave my dirty socks on the living room floor every night; and I listen to what she is saying but continue to leave my socks there … well, you catch my drift. There will be hell to pay if I don’t “act” on her politely spoken “recommendations”. ; )

Case Study

Here is a real life case study when I launched my first community back in 2004 that illustrates this point effectively. A few jobs ago, I worked as an Interactive Marketing Manager for 8×8. They are a consumer and small business VoIP provider branded Packet8. At that time, the company was growing pretty strong with close to 100K subscribers. The CEO Bryan Martin expressed concern to me that he wanted to launch a blog. I thought this was a perfect opportunity to create a community for our subscribers at the same time. We had three objectives for this community:

1. To provide an infrastructure for our CEO to speak to our users and the media
2. Allow the community members (subscribers) to leverage the communities’ collective knowledge and help each other troubleshoot minor issues. (note: the call center was also based in Santa Clara; and the cost per call was astronomical)
3. Listen and engage with our subscribers, personally. Each 8×8 employee had a profile at that time.

After a few months, the community began to blossom and the conversations began. At first, the conversations revolved around the stock price and how low it was; but then, the community members began to ask simple troubleshooting questions to each other and others responded. I left the company before I was able to quantify whether the call volume decreased in the call center. Nonetheless, there was a ton of chatter about product related requests and recommendations. Most subscribers expressed deep concerns about having an additional RJ11 connection on their BPA (Broadband Phone Adapter) – the device that allowed them to make calls over the internet — in case they wanted to add a second line and/or wanted to connect a fax machine. Not only did we listen, but the Director of Product Marketing added that feature set into the product road map for the next release of the adapter. It was a huge success because we listened and acted. And, while subscriber growth expanded, subscriber turnover decreased.

There are also some other great examples of more well-known brands that are using conversations to innovate on future products and designs. I often talk about Dell IdeaStorm; where they ask users to “post a new idea, promote interesting ideas, discuss with Dell and other users, and see what they are planning to develop.” The keyword here is Dell. They are actually participating in the discussions.

Starbucks is following the same model “share, vote, discuss and see” and inspire their community with the following message:

Help shape the future of Starbucks—with your ideas
You know better than anyone else what you want from Starbucks. So tell us. What’s your Starbucks Idea? Revolutionary or simple—we want to hear it. Share your ideas, tell us what you think of other people’s ideas and join the discussion. We’re here, and we’re ready to make ideas happen. Let’s get started.

And, lastly Lego (yes the toys we all played with as kids) did something interesting a few years ago. The company called up a bunch of Lego geeks and asked if they wanted to help with the development of a new product. The end result was Lego Mindstorm; a very cool line of Legos combining programmable bricks with electrical motors, sensors, Lego bricks, and Lego Technic pieces (such as gears and axles). They have also built a pretty awesome community as well.

It’s great to see that companies are beginning to build communities and interact with their users/consumers. What’s even better is that they are now using this feedback to help influence future product designs, service offerings and value props.

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Tags: social media, conversational marketing

… and maybe, just maybe you will be hitting home runs in no time.

I agreed to review this ebook back in late 2007; and I just finished it last night. Sorry it took me so long (Darren & Julie); but life has sure been hectic transitioning to a new job, computers crashing, etc. It literally took me a few hours to get through the entire book. It was an extremely easy read and Darren and Julie did an excellent job articulating the basics of social media.

The target audience for this book is just about anyone who dabbles with social media in any capacity (internal marketers, agencies, consultants, small business owners). It is filled with tips, tricks, strategies, tactical elements, and case studies.  By reading this book, you will:

1. Understand the landscape of social media
2. Learn how to launch a social media relations campaign
3. Learn how to optimize your web site for social media (SMO)
4. Discover new ideas and inspiration for social media
5. Understand the risks/challenges of social media

Most of the ebook is focused on the acquisition side of social media; and less with the conversational element.  This led me to reach out to Darren via Facebook and inquire about this.  I asked him if he had any plans on writing a follow up book about using social media as channel to engage and foster conversations.  Here was his response:

I think it’s fair to say that the ebook does focus on starting the conversation–getting to that first date, as it were. To rephrase your question, how does one manage the second date, and all the ones thereafter?

Just like the dates, I do think the process gets easier. That said, we’re expanding our ebook–doubling its size, actually–for offline publication. That’s definitely something we could include as a section in the expanded book.

It turns out that their ebook will be published as a hard copy, in Darren’s words “ into a full-on dead-tree edition”, published by No Starch Press. More details here. A big congratulations to Darren and Julie for this awesome achievement.

Getting to First Base: A Social Media Marketing Playbook.

Tags: social media, Darren Barefoot, Julie Szabo, getting to first base, a social media marketing playbook

Let’s see … is social media about conversions, traffic, click though rates and sales; or is it more along the lines of conversations, authenticity, transparancy and building a sense of community? I guess it really depends on who you ask. My colleague at Intel, Bob Duffy, who works on my team came up with this awesome cartoon that illustrates my point precisely (his post also touches on this subject).

In Bob’s post, he talks about being “in” the conversation versus “at” the conversation. Clearly, being “in” the conversation means participating in online discussions; and “at” the conversation could mean buying a banner ad on Techcrunch or Facebook, for example. As someone who is passionate about social media and is responsible for driving conversations about Intel, I believe both approaches are important … as long as the end result is centered around the latter, conversations.

One way to think about it is the following:

Strategy = participate/facilitate conversations and community building
Tactical = buy a banner add on Techcrunch driving traffic to those conversations.

Thoughts?

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Tags: social media, conversational marketing

Last weekend my laptop crashed. When I restarted it, it said that the systems.32\hll.dll file was corrupt and that I need to reinstall it. I called Dell, they couldn’t help me. I stressed about it all night because I have some really important data there. So Sunday morning, I brought my laptop to Best Buy/Geek Squad so they could at least save my data. Someone had told me that they were awesome and can fix anything.

I got a call this morning from the Geek Squad and they told me that they couldn’t retrieve my data; and that they could send my laptop to their offices in Kentucky and use advance data retrieval techniques but it would cost me anywhere between $400 - $1600. Ugh.

So I posted my no-so-rant on Twitter.

A few hours later, I get an email from Robert Stephens, the Founder and Chief Inspector of the Geek Squad. He asked me what my issues were and that he would look into it. Let’s see if he lives up to his promise of personally resolving the complaints of those who read the The Consumerist(lol, not really a consumerist reader though).

Nonetheless, this is a great illustration of how a company can use social media to track conversations and (hopefully) take action. We will soon find out if the Geek Squad is going to create a loyal customer, with lots and lots of friends, family and acquaintances. ; )

UPDATE (6:30 PM): Got another email from Robert. He did follow up with the local technician at Best Buy and confirmed that my issue could not be resolved at that facility. While I am a little disappointed that I don’t have my data; I take my hat off to Robert and team.  This is exactly what conversational marketing is all about!  Good job Geek Squad.

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Tags: social media, conversational marketing, the geek squad, twitter, Robert Stephens

I just finished reading, “Digg is Not Social Media Marketing” and I’d have to agree that using Digg alone is not social media marketing. While this may be an important tactic in the overall scheme of things, there is much more to social media than Digg. And, It is quite apparent that many marketers spend a considerable amount of time trying to game the Digg algorithm, grow their friend’s list, and seed content in hopes of achieving front page placement.

Why? Well…usually in the form of linkbait, most savvy SEO practitioners have found that achieving front page placement on Digg equates to high visibility, traffic and links. Here is a quick and basic formula:

(Digg front page = high visibility = many links = higher rankings = even more traffic)

But as a marketer, what else can Digg do other than drive short term traffic to a site coupled with a few hundred links? Is it really worth the effort and can a positive ROI be extracted from the amount of time invested? Is there a transparency and authenticity issue when building a sense of community for the sole purpose of getting others to digg your story? This is a clear example of Digg-Enomics; where there is an over abundance of supply (content) with no real demand.

Could it be an ego thing? Bragging rights of achieving front page placement?

Marketers are aware that conversion rates from Digg are minimal. And, despite the many efforts to camouflage marketing messages in content, Digg users are sharp and notice the little details. All it takes is one person to notice it, comment on it and then bury it. I even know of one of the top SEO agencies that was banned from submitting content to Digg; and it wasn’t even their fault.

In my opinion, Digg is just another customer touch point in the long list of social/traditional media outlets. It’s a potential distribution channel for content to reach a target consumer group just like paid/natural search, display advertising, traditional media, community related marketing, etc. If you are tying to reach main stream consumers (stay-at-home moms, baby boomers, college students), Digg is obviously not the place you should be spending all your time and effort.

Here’s an analogy.

Digg is a one night stand. You submit your content, get it on the home page and reap the rewards of a ton of traffic, links and more traffic. Then you wake up, reality kicks in, the fun is over and perhaps you sneak out the back door before she wakes up.

My point is simply that the core of Social Media is embedded in the conversations between marketers and consumers, whether it happens on-domain or off-domain. It’s about cultivating long-term relationships and empowering brand ambassadors of your product. It’s a multi-directional conversation, with no room for marketing messages. It’s about acknowledging, listening and creating a sense of community.

Direct marketing is important. Don’t get me wrong. But, perhaps social media in general is not the best channel for customer acquisition. Unless, of course you are a new Web 2.0 start up with an innovative technology.

There is so much more to social media than discussed in this post. Look out for additional posts on this topic real soon! If you enjoyed this article, please subscribe to my RSS feed and recieve all future posts delivered straight to your inbox.

Tags: social media, conversational marketing, digg, banned

The new blog is launched! Please tell me what you think and be honest. I actually designed the look and feel myself in Photoshop; and then hired the guys over at Unique Blog Designs to program it and build in the functionality. We ran into some problems with the latest version of Wordpress not being compatible with the version of MySQL database on my host; and we were locked out of the control panel for a few days because the license expired on Plesk (I hate Plesk by the way). Customer support was horrible; well…a good friend of mine was hosting the site for free so I should be nice (even though he was so darn non-responsive for like two days). Nonetheless, we moved hosts and everything seems to be working properly.

So please take a moment and click around the blog and tell me what you think. Do you like it? Hate it? Envy it? And, please be specific; if something doesn’t work, please tell me. So far I tested it in IE.6, IE.7 and Firefox. And, if you like what I have to say, you can always subscribe to my RSS feed and receive all future posts delivered straight to your inbox.

Now that I am up and running … let the posts begin!