Archives for posts with tag: Social Marketing

The state of Social Media & Social Media Marketing in the second half of 2012

July 4, 2012 //

View more presentations from Esteban Contreras

Good aggregation of data by Esteban. Below are a few notes:

– Ranked by growth, India (51.7%) and Indonesia (51.6%) are the Top 5 social networking countries, followed by India, Mexico and Brazil.

– Only 16% of Facebook “fans” see posts. Make sure that is communicated to stakeholders when you report your Facebook reach.

– U.S. Social Media ad spending to reach $9.8 billion by 2016, challenging traditional advertising and threatening display ad growth.

– Google+ has 150 MM monthly active users after only 1 year, less of social network more of a SoLoMo layer.

– Since December 2011, YouTube views have dropped by 28% while YouTube tries to be a TV-like appointment viewing platform with their premium channels.

– 75% of U.S. Smartphone owners regularly use location-based services.

– Pinterest visits are slowing down, just like the number of users of FB Connect. A correction or a trend?

– “Social Business” shifting from buzzword to market reality.

Tags Facebook, location-based service, smartphone, social business, Social Marketing, Social Media, SoLoMo, YouTube

Categories Uncategorized

Don't follow the rules

May 30, 2012 //

Whenever I see links with titles like “10 ways to get…” or “6 proven tactics to achieve…” I shudder. Same goes for diet books, career advice sites and any lists that try to tell you what to do. Media conferences are filled with case studies, successful implementations and amazing success stories. When Old Spice works, hundred of copies will be launched a month later. When one movie hit comes out of nowhere, hundreds of quasi-sequels will find their way to the screen quickly. Vampires everywhere, housewives everywhere, American Idols everywhere.

Have you ever copied the copy of a copy of a copy?

It doesn’t look fresh, it’s hard to decipher and feels tacky. That’s how customers feel when you follow the rules and copy the copy of a copy. When everybody copies each other, the original always wins. And the copies are just that: copies.

20 years ago, advertising had only one option to differentiate: through the creative. The channels were pretty much set, not many options to have meaningful impact through radical changes in the media mix.

20 years later, we have millions of options to connect a brand with a customer or prospect. Still, the majority of marketers continue to rely on proven tactics and copying success stories of their competitors. What does it mean to your brand when your competitor was able to lift sales by 50% through a Foursquare promotion? What does it say about your brand that your competitor has 50,000 more followers on Twitter than you? What does it say about your company when your competitor deployed sophisticated, behavioral targeting to lift engagement rates by 25%?

Nothing. Nada. Nichts.

Just because your competitor or any brand was successful with one specific tactic or media plan, doesn’t mean a carbon copy for your brand will produce the same results. More likely than not, the results will be way below your expectations.

I get it: You want to beat the competition, want to win, sell more than ever before. Following your competitors or act based on past learning is a losing game. Next time, you start a marketing initiative with a competitive review, why not focusing on doing the exact opposite? Why not staying away from implementing another average Facebook page and, instead, becoming the leader on a different platform? Why not implement a display campaign exactly the opposite way than your competitor? Following the rules has lead to bloated web pages, irrelevant Social Media initiatives, underperforming display ad campaigns and less than mediocre results.

Following the rules was a winning strategy in the industrial age. Breaking the rules is a winning strategy in the information age.

Tags breaking rules, broken rules, old spice, performance marketing, Social Marketing

Categories Uncategorized

You need to get the fundamentals right

May 3, 2012 //

My daughter is in an interesting phase: She can read but she can’t comprehend fully what she’s reading. A picture book with a few sentences per page is perfect for her developmental stage. No, she wants to read a chapter book without any pictures. She proclaims proudly: “I’m on page 55.” When I ask her about the content, the answer is very sparse.

When she gets her homework, she wants to get it done in a few seconds: “Easy peesy, lemon squeezy.” Once I note a mistake, she freaks out and never wants to touch any homework again.

Typical behavior for brands in the emerging marketing space

Many brands have not yet fully deployed all basic digital marketing tools. Instead of focusing on getting the fundamentals right, they rather develop a comprehensive Social Marketing strategy.

Others have deserted Facebook/Twitter/YouTube presences. Why bother improving these important platforms for their brand? Let’s just start a Google+ page.

The fancy commercial not matching the dirty store layout.

The radio spot not matching the horrendous attitude of your employees.

The list is endless.

We should strive for innovation and amazing ideas.

First, we need to clean-up the store.

Change the attitude of employees.

Get the fundamentals of marketing right.

Get the fundamentals of the business right.

Then, and only then, should you consider the newest platform aka toy.

Tags brand, business, digitalmarketing, Google, Marketing and Advertising, Online Communities, Social Marketing, Twitter

Categories Uncategorized

Digital is not social. And social is not digital.

April 4, 2012 //

Many agencies have added social to their list of offerings. Some have added new people with specific skills to support/activate and engage social platforms. Other agencies just added social to the responsibilities of the media department.

That’s a big problem. Because social and digital are not the same.

A digital skillset involves software programming, interface design, content management, data management, analytics, media planning/buying, etc. That doesn’t mean you know anything about social.

When you are adept in the ways of Social Media, it’s also likely that you’re familiar with the technologies that support these communications. You understand the rules of engagement on Facebook; you know how to create a refined social advertising campaign; you can hop on CoTweet and know exactly what you’re doing; you’re focusing on the right metrics and deliver. That doesn’t mean you know anything about digital.

In good agencies, digital marketing services are organically integrated with Social Media. It doesn’t make it any less distinct a discipline.

The biggest difference: the mindset.

Digital and interactive are primarily either one-to-one or one-to-many communication forms.

Social is many-to-many communications. And that makes all the difference.

In one-to-one communication, the brand (in this case) knows what it wants to communicate, and perhaps has some idea about who it is talking to.

One-to-many communication is the most prevalent form of broadcast with the hope that the message is something that the target audience will appreciate and take action on.

Social is many-to-many, and here the crux is uncertainty. Brands may assume that they know what they are getting into, who they are talking to but they can’t predict the reaction.

Digital does not require any internal attitude change or rallying of other divisions – it is merely extending the brands’ communication into yet another broadcast media.

Social requires a different mindset and the understanding that brands are just incidental to the conversation online.

Apples and oranges.

Tags analytics, data management, digital, digital marketing, Facebook, interface design, media planning, social, Social Marketing, software programming

Categories Uncategorized

Are you making your customers feel stupid?

January 12, 2012 //

These infomercials have been around forever and they tend to pollute the TV screen in January:

Lose weight while sleeping.

Gain muscle mass while laying on the couch and doing nothing.

Stop smoking without any effort.

When you finally buy the product, it barely works, ends up collecting dust, and in a few years you toss it in the trash.

Ultimately, we don’t blame ourselves. Our lack of follow-through and self-discipline. We blame the product. It just wasn’t what we expected. We didn’t fail. The product failed.

I wish products like that wouldn’t exist but they are out there, and people will continue to buy them. Not a biggie.

The real problem is when marketing pushes responsibility towards the customer.

I got rich in 2 days. You can, too.

Learn to play the violin in 24 hours.

Become a Social Media rockstar in 1 day.

Work from home and become an instant millionaire.

People have dreams. Some lofty, some small. When you to tap into these dreams and try help people achieve them, you better execute flawlessly. You market knowledge, claiming you have found an easy formula to reach these goals. If your customers can’t make their dream come true, they will blame themselves. They will start to believe they are stupid, dumb, not good enough.

“If anyone can become a Social Media rockstar in 1 day, how come I’m the only one who failed?”

Is that how you want your customers to feel? Sad, depressed, defeated?

Empower people

Many companies and people are falling for these claims. They think Social Media is something you can learn in a quick seminar or by reading a book. When I talk to them, they feel like they’re the only one who didn’t get it. Everybody else seems to be doing so well.

They don’t see the hard work, the long hours, the overall communication and marketing knowledge you need to have to develop successful programs. They just see that people promise an easy way out and they believed them.

And they are so relieved when I tell them they’re not the only one. There are more Social Marketing disasters out there than successful programs. They just need a little help, put the hours in and commit for the long run.

Companies are in the business of helping people. If you want to have a loyal customer, you better empower them and make their lives easier and better. And make them feel good about themselves.

Tags customer perception, follow-through, infomercials, insights, Marketing, self-discipline, Social Marketing

Categories Uncategorized

How to emerge victorious after the imminent Social Crash.

August 16, 2011 //

I’ve been interested in investing and macro-economy after I lost my shirt wasting money before the dot-com bubble burst. (eToys, anyone?) That came in handy in the last few years, helped me understand where we are going from here and how one can profit from these challenges. Bubbles are very common symptoms of a misaligned system and when you’re not prepared for their explosion or deflation, you will get hurt and suffer.

So, let’s talk about the imminent Social Crash.

More and more people are using social channels. This trend will continue, I don’t foresee people going back to their traditional ways. The tools will change, how people will use the tools will change and how brands will engage with people will change. (Let’s hope.) Social Marketing is a toddler, temper tantrums and amazement over little things (Oooh, Facebook integrated Skype: GAMECHANGER!) included.

It’s a pretty safe bet to say that the big players of the industry will be fine: Facebook, Twitter, Zynga and the other few billion dollar players. They might lose a huge chunk of their valuation over time but the Zuckerberg’s of the world will be doing well.

I’m not worried about them.

I’m worried about the smaller guys.

The social media consultants, the little shops that evangelize Social Marketing and execute smaller initiatives. The ones that struggle to get a $5,000 project and make a tiny profit from it. And all the startups that bank on social remaining to be the next big thing. The entrepreneurs building the new Twitter. (The next big thing won’t be social, trust me. It will have social features but the focus won’t be social.)

I suspect all of them will be gone in no time.

Why?

The more social the Web becomes, the less valuable weak connections and relationships will be.

Most social initiatives disappoint. They don’t perform as expected, don’t result in a measurable ROI or are plagued with extremely high expectations. The aftermath will make clients gun-shy. And make them move their money to more buttoned-up shops, firms that are part of a bigger network with access to analytics tool and other capabilities to make better informed decisions.

The majority of brands are starting to understand that social media experts are too limited in their capabilities. They desire a holistic, integrated approach that regards Social Marketing as one part of the marketing mix and not the holy grail of marketing.

The social space is moving on from media to social business. You need to understand the enterprise space, organizational structures and have deep insights into current CRM systems to be able to play in this new field.

The overall feeling in the market place is that anybody can do Social Media.

That’s the moment when the bubble goes “BOOM”. In the dot-com bubble, everybody thought they were Warren Buffett. During the housing bubble, everybody thought they could flip a house. And, now everybody believes to be a Social Marketing expert.

The crash is imminent. Maybe next month VC’s will stop investing in social sites. Maybe next year the majority of small shops focusing on Twitter pages will close down. It might happen any moment. But it will happen.

How to emerge victorious after the imminent Social Crash.

Don’t have all your fortunes tied up in high-risk social platforms like Facebook or Twitter. Diversify. Spread your investments to other platforms.

Diversify around user behavior. It changes constantly. Who knew people would check into places and expect discounts 5 years ago? Are you sure they will continue to do so in 12 months?

Think outside your current capabilities/expertise. Just ask the HTML programmers that received a BMW as a signing bonus in 2000 and flipped burgers in 2002. Educate yourself constantly.

Eliminate loss leaders. You might be comfortable building Facebook pages for smaller clients but is it profitable? Do you spend too much time with one client and don’t get enough in return? Time to cut ties.

If you’re struggling now; exit today. It won’t get easier. Time to move on.

Learn from Joseph P. Kennedy

The father of JFK, Bobby and Ted Kennedy saw his wealth increase from $4 million to $180 million. ($2.8 billion in today’s money.) These years were the dog days of the depression: 1929 to 1935.

When nobody wanted to invest in Real Estate, he doubled up by looking for value.

He diversified (liquor after the prohibition ended, reorganizing and refinancing several Hollywood studios) and developed powerful business networks.

Now, I know that many things done by Joseph P. Kennedy were unethical (insider trading, just to name one) but my point is that there are amazing opportunities once Social crashes. Capitalism is about creative destruction.

When the dot-com bubble burst, the Internet population continued to grow. People became more digital. And new ventures were born. History will repeat itself after the Social Crash. The Social Web will continue to prosper. It will become less media and more business, part of the collaborative enterprise.

You can prosper, too. If you prepare for a crash now and get your affairs in order.

Unfortunately, the majority of people don’t believe in crashes, just in minor corrections.

From where I sit, they look like lemmings heading towards a bluff, beneath them only the cold, stormy sea.

Don’t be one of them.

Tags Facebook, market crash, social crash, Social Marketing, Social Media, startups, Twitter, zynga

Categories Uncategorized

Newt Gingrich – The Social Marketing Shanty Town Mayor

August 3, 2011 //

A few weeks I wrote about “The Shanty Towns of Social Marketing”:

“It’s a world filled with anarchy, impenetrable walls that make it hard for people from the outside to see what’s going inside and it’s an unethical world. In this world, you can buy Facebook fans by the thousands. You can ask them to “like” your brand in exchange for goods. They give you options to download your pricey apps in exchange for credits. Need 10,000 more LinkedIn fans? That creepy guy with the fedora and mink coat can help you. Have to pump up your follower number on Twitter by 100,000? Enter the greasy door next to the red neon sign, flashing “Open”. It’s a shanty town comprised of people who work for improvised, unsustainable companies that might go out of business any day.

An island filled with bottom-feeders, preying on the innocent. And supporting the cynical and unethical marketers.”

Either Mr. Gingrich didn’t read my post (likely) or he read the post and got a “good” idea (unlikely): No matter what, it seems Mr. Gingrich and his team (allegedly) were buying fake Twitter followers. PeekYou dug a little bit deeper and they concluded that just 8% of Newt Gingrich’s followers are real people.

Mhm.

I briefly glanced at Mr. Gingrich’s followers and, well, it doesn’t look good.

The egg screen of death.

What about Obama?

Some eggs but not as eggtastic as Newt. But that’s just silly me, having a glance.

PeekYou went even further and analyzed the GOP 2012 contenders for comparison: Still, 8% of Gingrich’s followers are real, 20% real followers for Sarah Palin and Pawlenty tops the chart with 32% real followers. (Allegedly.)

I’m glad this happened.

Not many people have written about the rotten eggs of Social Marketing. It finally sheds a bright light on this unethical practice. (Especially when you boast about the number of followers.)

Clearly, Mr. Gingrich uses the follower count to stroke his own ego and get attention/respect from the clueless press. That’s about it.

A high number of fans is meaningless if no one ever shares your stuff or does anything to advance your cause.

Who knows, this might be the beginning of the end for these silly services. It’s a definite wake-up call for agencies and their clients to have a second look at their Social Marketing strategy. Especially when all you see is the egg screen of death.

Tags Facebook, followers fans, Newt Gingrich, PeekYou, Social Marketing, Strategy, Twitter, unethical marketing

Categories Uncategorized

How to get real insights. (And, no, it's not in your reports…)

June 6, 2011 //

When you ask people who’s running the United States, you will get many answers. The most common one is: “The President”. A popular one will be: “Wall Street.”

There’s no wrong answer. The first answer provided me a data point/a fact, the second offered me an insight.

Brands don’t care about data. They want insights.

Brands are clamoring for insights. They built their own CRM systems, work with media companies that add more data sets and are starting to tap into the social conversations. Just to get more data. And no insights. Brands spend millions on surveys, research, data mining, data analysis, focus groups, brand experts – and what they get are facts. Self-congratulating facts to keep things the way they are, rather than mind-boggling, enterprise-changing insights.

The false promise of Social Marketing

We just analyze social conversations about our brand as well as the competitive space and we finally get the insights we were waiting for, right?

Wrong.

Mining social conversations will get you a lot of data. A lot of sentiments. A lot of analysis. But when the agency or technology provider comes to the conclusion slide, you’ll only get facts. Interesting facts, maybe. But not insightful or valuable enough to transform your brand. To steer the brand ship into a new direction.

How to get real insights

The likelihood that pure observation and analysis of social conversation will offer actionable insights is extremely low. I’d rather invest $50,000 in the California lottery than investing $50,000 in research based on that premise.

You have to start out by asking the right questions, go way beyond pure observation. Why do have people stronger relationships with vertical A and not your vertical? What drives them to fall in love with a brand, what are the emotional drivers? Can we transfer those drivers to our brand? When do customers fall in love with your brand? When do they fall out of love, divorce or write threatening letters? What part of your mission and vision connects with people? Insights come from an open mind.

Agencies and technology providers have to listen to people and the brand. Be empathetic to the truth of who they are. Understand the soul of the brand and then make that soul more relevant to a greater number of people.

If you want to transform your brand, you need to step away from the data pile.

Nobody has ever discovered an insight on a spread sheet.

Expand the idea of what an insight is, ask the right questions and listen.

“Only he who can see the invisible can do the impossible.”

Open your eyes.

Tags data analysis, data mining, data pile, focus groups, inside, research, social conversations, Social Marketing, Social Media, survey

Categories Uncategorized

The Shanty Towns of Social Marketing

June 2, 2011 //

When you think of the Social Marketing landscape as a city, you see a lot of beautiful, innovative and glitzy buildings, whole business districts powered by the Social Web, public squares where people discuss freely with brands and communities that try to make the world a better place.

You walk past these beauties and suddenly the landscape turns ugly and desolate. Small communities filled with abandoned Twitter feeds and Facebook pages, big loudspeakers blasting out commercial messages to no living soul, communities disappearing before our eyes because they were built on quicksand.

And then you enter Snake Plissken’s island.

It’s a world filled with anarchy, impenetrable walls that make it hard for people from the outside to see what’s going inside and it’s an unethical world. In this world, you can buy Facebook fans by the thousands. You can ask them to “like” your brand in exchange for goods. They give you options to download your pricey apps in exchange for credits. Need 10,000 more LinkedIn fans? That creepy guy with the fedora and mink coat can help you. Have to pump up your follower number on Twitter by 100,000? Enter the greasy door next to the red neon sign, flashing “Open”. It’s a shanty town comprised of people who work for improvised, unsustainable companies that might go out of business any day.

An island filled with bottom-feeders, preying on the innocent. And supporting the cynical and unethical marketers.

Once again: It’s about quality, not quantity

Agencies are under immense pressure to perform, to deliver measurable results. Just like paid media campaigns, Social Marketing initiatives can fail. It’s part of our business. But, clients need wins. They need (and should require) incremental profits. Or, at least they need a good metric to communicate a win to executive management.

55,000 new “likes” in a month sounds great, right?

100,000 new followers on Twitter must translate to some sales, correct?

250,000 views on YouTube is worth something, isn’t it?

Fact is, these bottom feed feeders deliver nothing more than a number. More often than not, these new followers will unfollow you within a week or so. Or they’re just bots. One thing I can guarantee: They will NEVER buy your product. They will NEVER read your status updates. They will NEVER join the conversation. They will NEVER be of any value.

I get pitches from Snake Plissken’s island each and every day. Your agency does, too.

Just make sure they never paid a visit to the island. If they did, make sure you escape from that agency as fast as you can.

Tags communities, Facebook, snake plissken, Social Marketing, Twitter

Categories Uncategorized