Author Archive

Social Networks Mean New Revenue & Customers

Social networks proving their value as a marketing channel. Social media, social media, social media, social media, social media. It seems that’s all anyone is talking about these days. And for GOOD REASON, it appears. According to eMarketer, a survey by office services firm Regus shows that companies around the globe are already realizing returns [...]

Social networks proving their value as a marketing channel.

Social media, social media, social media, social media, social media. It seems that’s all anyone is talking about these days. And for GOOD REASON, it appears.

According to eMarketer, a survey by office services firm Regus shows that companies around the globe are already realizing returns on their increased social media investments from earlier this year.  In the US, 43% of businesses used social networks successfully for winning new customers in 2011. That represents an 8 percentage point increase over 2010.

• 50 percent of businesses in the U.S. use websites such as Twitter to engage, connect with and inform existing customers
• In the U.S., 55 percent of firms encourage their employees to join social networks such as Linkedin and Xing
• 38 percent of U.S. companies dedicate up to 20 percent of their marketing budget to business social networking activity

Google Piloting Authorship Markup in Web Search

Google has begun its pilot program (announced a couple of weeks ago) to start highlighting the authors creating web content in Google.com search results. Its Google’s way of identifying, verifying and then highlighting high-quality content. They say the logic behind the move is that the web is people-centric and that “people discovering content on the [...]

Google has begun its pilot program (announced a couple of weeks ago) to start highlighting the authors creating web content in Google.com search results. Its Google’s way of identifying, verifying and then highlighting high-quality content. They say the logic behind the move is that the web is people-centric and that “people discovering content on the web often want to learn more about its author, see other content by that author, and even interact with the author.” As you can see from the example the author’s profile picture and name appears to the right of the search results.

The new feature will identify quality content if you are familiar with the author. Will content farms be able to game the system? What implications do you think this will have for search users and for content providers?

Resource notes:

Google’s blog post about the pilot program.

How to participate in Google’s new Authorship markup program.

Google Quietly Developing City Pages – Competition for Yelp, CitySearch & Online Yellow Pages.

This week David Mihm wrote (with credit to Linda Buquet) about finding city-specific directories that Google is quietly working on in apparent preparation for a national rollout.  They found city portals that mirror Google’s Offers/Places launches:   Austin, TX |   Portland, OR |   Madison, WI |  San Diego, CA What does this all mean? Well for starters, Google [...]

This week David Mihm wrote (with credit to Linda Buquet) about finding city-specific directories that Google is quietly working on in apparent preparation for a national rollout.  They found city portals that mirror Google’s Offers/Places launches:   Austin, TX |   Portland, OR |   Madison, WI |  San Diego, CA

What does this all mean? Well for starters, Google would advance it’s dominent position in search, create the perfect platform for local social networks, and now will more firmly plant its local marketing flag on the web.

The city portals neatly package many of their local initiatives like Places Pages, interior location photos, Maps, Offers, Mobile apps, local Events into one easy-to-use directory. What catches my attention is the ease with which local businesses will be able to take advantage of the new platform, both with free entries and premium paid features and promotions. It also looks like each city will have a community manager for the portal along with a local blog.

The recurring comments I’ve heard on this subject have universally been, “What took them so long?”  Only time will tell how these city portals will be accepted and how they will evolve. One thing is certain, this has to be making some executives at Yelp, CitySearch, Online Yellow Pages, Yellow Book and others lose a little sleep.  My biggest question is how will this affect popular local and hyper-local sites, many of whom are struggling to grow in the current economy? Oh, and WHERE IS FACEBOOK?  Do they have plans in the works as well?

What do you think? Leave a comment or start a discussion. Or drop me a line and let’s talk about how I can help your business take advantage of these advances and future features.

The Official Facebook Marketing Guide

Reminiscent of the Twitter Guide for Business, Facebook has now released the Best Practice Guide: Marketing on Facebook. It’s the official resource on how to make the best use of Facebook’s advertising products, analytics, social plugins and a host of resources to grow your business. The introduction states that Facebook “allows businesses to create rich social experiences, [...]

Reminiscent of the Twitter Guide for Business, Facebook has now released the Best Practice Guide: Marketing on Facebook. It’s the official resource on how to make the best use of Facebook’s advertising products, analytics, social plugins and a host of resources to grow your business.

The introduction states that Facebook “allows businesses to create rich social experiences, build lasting relationships and amplify the most powerful type of marketing – word of mouth.” The guide further defines that they call the Facebook Ecosystem of Build, Engage and Amplify.

The heart of the guide is divided into two parts. The first is the Five Guiding Principles of best practices for Facebook marketing, but they also apply to any Social Business Marketing efforts:

Five Guiding Principles

1. Build a strategy that is social by design
2. Create an authentic brand voice
3. Make it interactive
4. Nurture your relationships
5. Keep learning

The second part of the guide provides key business objectives and for each one describes a five-step process for achieving those objectives.

Facebook By Business Objective

1. Foster product development and innovation
2. Generate awareness
3. Drive preference and differentiation
4. Increase traffic and sales
5. Build loyalty and deepen relationships
6. Amplify recommendation and word of mouth
7. Gain insights

The real-world value come from the examples they give of how prominent brands (Levis, Clorox, M&M’s, Adidas, OnStar, Alamo, and more) have used the Facebook Ecosystem to accomplish their goals. For learning about social business, it doesn’t get any better than that. Well, it does actually, but only if I work with you to do the same for your brand (just let me know if you’d like to talk about it).

Oh, one last thing: Here’s the link to download the PDF file of: Best Practice Guide: Marketing on Facebook .

Presentation Tip #140: Make it Tweet-Worthy

I was listening to Mack Collier (@MackCollier on Twitter) presenting to a social media group in Birmingham on the subject of How to Handle Negative Comments (follow the link to the slideshare presentation). I was following the hashtag (#alsocme) on twitter (using the HootSuite client) and I thought of an important tip when giving a presentation [...]

I was listening to Mack Collier (@MackCollier on Twitter) presenting to a social media group in Birmingham on the subject of How to Handle Negative Comments (follow the link to the slideshare presentation). I was following the hashtag (#alsocme) on twitter (using the HootSuite client) and I thought of an important tip when giving a presentation to media savvy audiences. I noticed that when someone in the audience would turn a good phrase into a tweet, that message would get retweeted by many in the room. Those not so eloquent did not get many retweets.

As a presenter you want to get tweeted and re-tweeted. The best way to facilitate that is to spoon feed the audience with a Tweet-worthy message. Something akin to the 10 second sound bites that politicians use to drive home their point.  So, for each presentation select about three key points you want to get across and craft them in Tweet-friendly style and length (about 120 characters to allow for the tweeter’s username).  One popular example from today’s presentation was:

RT @griner: When companies respond to negative comments, 33% of customers follow up w/ positive review. -@MackCollier #ALSocMe

In this instance, an interesting factoid caught the attention of the audience, but it doesn’t have to be fact-based. Opinions and quotes can be Tweet-worthy as well.  Next time you’re viewing a presentation’s hashtag search results conduct some research of your own and then see what you can add to your next presentation. I’ll retweet if for you!

7 Types of Social Data That Help You Understand Consumers

I attended the 2nd of an 11-part webinar series today (Eleven Social Media Tips for 2011) sponsored by NetBase. I don’t attend that many webinars any more unless I can be assured it will be intermediate to advanced information.  I thought that was the case for today’s session headed by strategist/analyst/insightful professional Jeremiah Owyang.  I [...]

I attended the 2nd of an 11-part webinar series today (Eleven Social Media Tips for 2011) sponsored by NetBase. I don’t attend that many webinars any more unless I can be assured it will be intermediate to advanced information.  I thought that was the case for today’s session headed by strategist/analyst/insightful professional Jeremiah Owyang.  I really liked the fact that he polled the audience with specific questions to gauge  the overall level of social media use so he could tailor the presentation.

He discussed the 7 distinct types of social data available and how they can be used to better understand your customers. The first tier held the most familiar and prevalently used data types: Demographic and Product; then Psychographic, Behavioral and Referrals; ending with Location and Intention data. A quick poll of the audience showed that in terms of what marketers are currently using, his order was correct.

While I’m tempted to walk you through each of the 7 types, I’ll resist and suggest that you instead watch the presentation (check back if archive link is not posted yet). There’s no point in me rehashing Jeremiah’s good points. I will say that there are some practical examples/case study overviews that help bring clarity to the concepts.

What’s the takeaway? You NEED to be familiar with each of these data types, what they measure or show you, and how you can use them to improve your results. It’s a great way to get a leg up on your competition and to help your organization or client understand the value your analysis brings to the table.

What I got out of it was a better way to categorize the data types that I already deal with. That will help me to draw better insights and to better explain my thoughts to others.

Next week I may write my own commentary on each of (or some of) the 7 types to provide a bit more advanced thinking on the subject.

Meanwhile, please take a second to leave a comment here or tell me which of the data types you work with and how you use the information.

You’re Not Getting Older, You’re Getting Better (Networked)

If you don’t recognized the headline of this post then you’re likely not among those in the latest survey of Boomers about social networking (The slogan is from a 1970s ad for Loving Care hair color).  AARP just released the results of its national telephone survey: Social Media and Technology Use Among Adults 50+.  Among the [...]

If you don’t recognized the headline of this post then you’re likely not among those in the latest survey of Boomers about social networking (The slogan is from a 1970s ad for Loving Care hair color).  AARP just released the results of its national telephone survey: Social Media and Technology Use Among Adults 50+.  Among the results of adults age 50 and over 2/5 of them consider themselves extremely or very comfortable using the Internet. That number of comfortable Internet users rises to almost half if you look at adults ages 50 to 64.

The most popular networking site among the  over-50 crowd is Facebook followed by MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter.  Kevin Donnellan, the chief communications officer at AARP says the latest data tells us that social networking is becoming a part of everyday life for Americans 50 plus, and boomers in particular.

In terms of news preferences:

• Most adults 50+ prefer to get their news from print newspapers and magazines  (40%) or through a combination of print and online news sources (26%)
• Among adults 50+ who use social media websites, three-quarters (73%) are connected to relatives other than children and grandchildren, three-fifths are connected to their children (62%), and one-third (36%) are connected to grandchildren.
• Among those introduced by a family member, three-fifths (63%) said it was their child.

See the survey: http://www.AARP.org/socialmediasurvey

WordPress Foundation Says “Hello World” With New Site

The official word on the official birth of The WordPress Foundation came in the wee hours of January 22, 2010 (there’s still a few minutes left of January 21 in my time zone). It reads simply: Hello, world. The moment we’ve all been waiting for: the WordPress Foundation is now public. As they say, slow cookin’ makes [...]

The official word on the official birth of The WordPress Foundation came in the wee hours of January 22, 2010 (there’s still a few minutes left of January 21 in my time zone). It reads simply: Hello, world. The moment we’ve all been waiting for: the WordPress Foundation is now public. As they say, slow cookin’ makes good eatin’.

So what’s this all about? WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg explains:

“The WordPress Foundation is a charitable organization founded by Matt Mullenweg to further the mission of the WordPress open source project: to democratize publishing through Open Source, GPL software.

The point of the foundation is to ensure free access, in perpetuity, to the projects we support. People and businesses may come and go, so it is important to ensure that the source code for these projects will survive beyond the current contributor base, that we may create a stable platform for web publishing for generations to come. ”

The move is an effort to further gather broad community support to make sure that the freely accessible software project remain that way.  When you look at the numbers you realize just how important WordPress has become:

• WordPress is available in 23 languages and has been downloaded about 18,000,000 times in 2009
• The more-than 1,100 free WordPress Themes have received over 11,000,000 downloads
• The 8,000 WordPress plugins  have received over 71,000,000 downloads

So, whether you are a WordPress user / fan or not, head on over to http://wordpressfoundation.org/ and have a look around on this momentous occasion.

(Hat tip to @acnatta for pointing this out on Twitter)

What’s Missing In Your Social Media Program?

I was having lunch with my friends Ike and Jacob Pigott recently and we were discussing the state of social media here and across the US. I got on a bit of a rant but I think I had a good point to make. As a strategic marketer it drives me absolutely nuts to see [...]

I was having lunch with my friends Ike and Jacob Pigott recently and we were discussing the state of social media here and across the US. I got on a bit of a rant but I think I had a good point to make. As a strategic marketer it drives me absolutely nuts to see companies (and professional marketers) executing tactics without a solid STRATEGY. This practice seems to be even more prevalent in the emerging social media field. Everyone with a Twitter account is an expert. Every company with a Facebook fan page is “doing social media.”  Social networks are tools, tactics are tools, heck, a hammer is a tool. Would you hire anyone who can use a hammer to build a house for you? I hope not. You’d want someone who could help you develop a PLAN for the house. Not just a plan for putting up walls and a roof, but a plan that would create a house that does what you need it to do. A plan that ties the different systems together in an elegant and useful way.

Then I started thinking about what else is missing. It stands to reason if there is no strategy and your just swinging your social media tools at random people, you probably don’t have much CREATIVE thinking involved either. After all, CREATIVE is what conveys the message that came out of the, you guessed it: STRATEGY.  I happened upon a post by Edward Boches, Creativity in the age of social media. Bam! Edward hit the nail on the head. He says that in social media’s infancy, the the tendency is to “simply abide by the protocols of social media:” i.e. listen, learn, share, engage and be transparent. His next questions are exactly the ones I’ve been thinking about:

But what happens when every brand is on Facebook and Twitter, when there are so many communities and conversations that we encounter cacophony? Will it be possible for a brand to gain notice or attention without it? Perhaps. But my instincts tell me that we, as marketers, will have to get more inventive with our content and that we as consumers will demand it.

We have an unprecedented opportunity for unlimited creativity not just in the content itself but also in how it’s presented and how users interact with it. Have you noticed that the most creative ideas are part message, part meme, part distribution? My two favorite examples that  Boches provides are Nike’s use of the Chalkbot and the Boone Oakley website that they executed on YouTube. See the embeds below and then next time you’re thinking about social media, think about creating an effective STRATEGY and stretching your CREATIVE muscle before picking up the social media tools.

Two Dell Executives to Perform Keynote at Social South

Social South™ has announced that two exciting speakers will perform Friday’s keynote address at the social media conference: Richard Binhammer, Strategic Corporate Communications, Social Media and Corporate Reputation Management at Dell and Lionel Menchaca, a 15-year Dell veteran and chief blogger at Direct2Dell. Richard and Lionel will take the stage together for the first time [...]

Social South™ has announced that two exciting speakers will perform Friday’s keynote address at the social media conference: Richard Binhammer, Strategic Corporate Communications, Social Media and Corporate Reputation Management at Dell and Lionel Menchaca, a 15-year Dell veteran and chief blogger at Direct2Dell. Richard and Lionel will take the stage together for the first time ever. It promises to be a lively and enlightening discussion as they reveal the strategy behind Dell’s successful social media presence. See Social South for more.