Archive for the ‘Social Media Strategy’ Category
Posted by Drew Miller on July 21st, 2009
With more and more marketers trying to expand their reach beyond just a database of prospects, many are digging deep into their social networks – specifically LinkedIn and Facebook – to amplify their marketing message. While this may be acceptable within the walls of these specific sites, it by no means gives any marketer permission to do so outside of them – especially for Email Marketing.
I recently received Email Marketing from a person I was connected to on LinkedIn. This was by no means what I would consider a “strong” connection, but a person I had casually met through a conference a few years ago. I didn’t immediately recognize the from name, and wasn’t particularly interested in the subject line offer (solicitation for his website development company), but out of pure curiosity decided to open it anyways.
I could easily go through this email message and point out a number of things that were wrong with it, but I’ll save that for another email marketing review. What bothered me the most about this message was the little note about why I was receiving this email:
My first reaction was: “Wow – that’s one heck of an assumption.”
I’ve never visited my connections’ website, never opted-in for email (other than that within the walls of LinkedIn) and have never agreed to accept solicitations from companies my connections are employed by. Instead of trying to deepen the business relationship using a more personal approach, this particular person abused it.
The bottom line: Don’t get desperate when you are trying to expand the reach of your marketing message by dipping into trusted relationships on social networks. Abusing these connections and friendships might do more harm than good.
Tweet This Post
Posted by Dave McCue on January 23rd, 2009
For anyone still unsure if social media fits into their company model, yesterday’s BlogWell event in Chicago made it abundantly clear that, at the least, it’s a path worth exploring.
Speakers from The Home Depot, Mayo Clinic, Procter & Gamble, Sharpie, Allstate, Molson and H&R Block (recognize any of those names?) shared their stories about social media use at their companies and the challenges they faced.
One of the most common themes among the case studies seemed to be overcoming an initial resistance within the company from individuals who were not well-versed in social media. Susan Wassel of Sharpie (a Newell-Rubbermaid brand) mentioned the importance of explaining that a foray into social media can produce great word-of-mouth results with a relatively minor investment.
What social media is not, as mentioned by Home Depot’s Nick Ayres, is a tool for driving sales. Rather than promoting special offers or pushing products, some of the Home Depot’s greatest social media successes have involved the use of Twitter to communicate with customers in the southern U.S. during hurricane season—which THD locations would be open extended hours, where certain supplies could be found for home repair, etc. According to Ayres, the goal of social media should be engagement, rather than short-term sales, and sites such as Twitter allow a large corporate brand to take on a more personal tone.
Other notes:
- Andy Sernovitz from GasPedal (hosts of the event) gave an interesting talk about the importance of honesty in social media. Like anything else, those who abuse social media or operate within the “grey area” reflect poorly on all those who attempt to use social media for its true purpose—personal connection.
- Sernovitz also mentioned the 10 magic words that should be used (literally or implied) during social media interaction, in the interest of full disclosure: “I work for ____ and this is my personal opinion.”
- Interesting point from P&G’s Stan Joosten (paraphrasing): Your brand is no longer what you tell your audience it is, it is what they tell each other it is.
- Rather than arbitrarily saying “you there, you are now responsible for our company’s social media identity,” the best way to have social media success is to identify qualified individuals within your company—individuals who are passionate about social media and see its potential—to contribute to social media efforts.
Tweet This Post
Posted by Jordan Ayan on November 9th, 2008
Back in my University days I took quite a number of
economics courses. One of the
first books most
economics students read in those days (and maybe still do) was
Scottish economist Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations originally published in
1776. I enjoyed that book
immensely and thought it gave a great explanation of how an economic system was
driven by individuals. One key
premise that Smith built his economic treatise on he dubbed “The Invisible Hand.”
“The Invisible Hand,” was a great metaphor for how markets
used to work. The basic premise
was that in free-markets, individuals, driven by their own-self interest, will
act in a way that ultimately maximizes the wealth of a community. “The invisible hand” will guide each in
a way that ensures that by maximizing their own self-interest society as a
whole gains the most. Individuals
neither intend to promote the public interest, nor do they even know that they
are doing so, yet they do, by trying to maximize their own lot in life.
We know much more about economics today than we did in
Smith’s time (yet we still manage to screw it up), however this is not my point
here. I believe that “The
Invisible Hand” can now be seen in a way that it has never been visible before. I was first excited by the Internet and
what it initially did to reduce friction on economic activity. Now, along come social networking tools, and I
think they are in the process of severing the invisible hand. For if you are listen to the social media/net world, it is easy to hear discussions that lay out market direction,
before the market actually move.
Honest dialog is occurring about products, companies,
politics, ideas, movements, organizations, events and tribes (to use Seth
Godin’s metaphor). People may
still operate in their own self-interest, but communicate about it in a rare
and extended way that distributes that which is of value to society at
lightning speed. So, self-interest
that is self-serving is self-destructive in an unprecedented way. We are at the dawn of the social
network era (think Internet 1995) the basic social networking tools of today, blogs, wiki’s, photo sharing, etc along with popular commercial resources (Twitter,
LinkedIn, Facebook, Plurk, etc) are empowering people to help each other in
ways that are extremely transparent and would have been impossible in the past.
If you are in the conversation, you know what I mean. If not, be prepared to wake up some day by being slapped in
the face by a very visible hand that you just haven’t been looking at.
Tweet This Post
