Some Thoughts on Social Media

By now, you know that we love social media. After all, we attend Social Media tradeshows, we author not one, not two, but three blogs and we are avid commenters and Facebook contributors (particularly on our favorite Facebook page, "What I Saw at the Direct Marketing Revolution").

We've even taken the additional step of proposing to be blog authors for some of our very favorite clients. Hey, we think we're pretty good at it -- why not help our customers be good at it, too?

So, today when I came across two really interesting and insightful articles from a couple of fellow bloggers about what Social Media is and isn't, you can imagine that I thought it was definitely worth a blog post to share these musings with our favorite readers.

First, I read Marc Meyer's post on his blog "Emerson Direct Marketing Observations." Marc discusses 11 things that Social Media is Not. As you can probably guess from the title, Marc outlines his thoughts on what social media isn't . . . all in an effort to gain a clearer definition of what it is. He brings up some great points . . . it's not static -- it's ever-changing; it's not calm -- it disrupts and is meant to disrupt; it's not many-to-many and not necessarily one-to-one -- but it can be better than that -- one-to-one realtime.

Finally, Marc ends on the point that Social Media is not the Final Frontier of Marketing -- giving full credit to a post by Brian Solis of Futureworks. In Brian's post, he discusses some of the thoughts of Pierre Far, who had originally discussed this point in an interview on the Techipedia blog (phew!).

Brian succinctly states:

If anything Social Media, as it exists today, has simply created a more efficient platform which amplified and organized people’s voices as well as democratized content, and in doing so, collectively built a foundation for a new level influence between companies, traditional media, influencers, and people in general.

Social Media doesn’t necessarily replace traditional marketing. Everything is concentric. Everything should work together.

Brav-o! This view is very much in line with our view that Social Media is yet another tool in the overall marketing toolkit. If you integrate it into what you are doing today now, you will be well ahead of your competitors over the long-run. Why? Because despite all of the hoo-haa over Social Media, it is still not widely used or accepted by the many . . . and those few who see this and use it now will definitely have the upper hand.

The reason for this is that it is becoming increasingly apparent that consumers and businesses alike want to be involved in the conversation. It isn't just the younger generations -- it's all generations. There is a simple reason for this . . . people are sick of being marketed at. Businesses and consumers alike want to be involved in what messages are sent to them and the overall process of deciding what products and services to purchase.

While not the final frontier of marketing, social media is definitely the newest kid on the block -- and the channel that will separate companies from one another when integrated into the marketing strategy and executed really well.

Take a look at these posts -- both offer really compelling insights and will get you thinking about your own social media strategy. And, if you have any other ideas as to what social media is and isn't, shoot us a comment.

Happy Birthday to the Direct Marketing Blog!

Yes, that's right . . . our Direct Marketing Blog is 1-year-old today. In blog years, that's all grown up! And, we are still loving having this blog, 233 posts later. When you subtract out weekends and holidays, that means we've posted pretty much every other day in the last year. We're feeling pretty, pretty smug about that! :)

Seriously, we hope you, our valued readers have enjoyed our posts on all things direct marketing. And, we hope that we've been able to provide you with a new nugget or two as food for thought for your direct marketing strategies over the past year.

Now, down to the brass tacks . . . so, after a year of blogging are we rich, are we famous? What exactly has this blogging thing done for you? . . . you may be asking. Good question.

Well, we aren't exactly rich (except in character), but perhaps we're just-a-little-bit-famous (at least we have t-shirts from the Blogworld Expo that say we are). In reality, this blog has accomplished exactly what we wanted it to accomplish for us. It's established our foray into social media/marketing. We have over 1,000 unique visitors per month that read our blogs and many more than that who visit often. We believe we have brought our direct marketing expertise to a world-wide audience who we may not have otherwise been able to reach as a West-Coast-based-in-the-US consulting firm.

However, we believe that aside from our great readers, the next greatest benefit to us has been the partnerships that we have developed with other bloggers that are also in direct marketing -- but in complimentary spaces.

Here's a concrete example . . . we often refer to Robert Rosenthal of the Mothers of Invention Creative Agency and his Freaking Marketing blog. Robert operates a brilliant creative agency that provides his customers with out-of-the-box creative development and campaign deployment, along with a myriad of other very forward-thinking services that we simply don't offer. However, with our data and analytical services expertise, we, too, offer services that Robert doesn't offer. Together, we think we can provide a very compelling and complimentary service offering that it's tough to find in the marketplace.

Don't get me wrong, you can find other agencies and analytical firms out there and even some companies who offer it all. What I'm saying is that with our very specific expertise -- and our very different approach to direct marketing -- you can hire in some non-traditional direct marketers that will be able to provide you with solutions very different -- and we believe better and more relevant today -- than the traditional DM firms.

Our point here is that we've figured this out through authoring our respective blogs. We found Robert and Robert found us. From the purest sense, this is the beauty of Social Media . . . building communities, linking with others and creating relationships. See . . . it ain't just for the teenagers! And, by the way, isn't this what pure business strategy is all about, too? Making connections with the right people and creating value for your customers, while building profitability for your business. Yep, sounds about right.

So, yes . . . our blogging experience has been very successful from our viewpoint. As we embark on our 2nd year, we'll continue to comb the news and the industry for thought-provoking information that we hope you'll find interesting and will help you do what you do more successfully. Meanwhile, thanks for reading and commenting on our blog posts over the last year. Keep your comments coming -- we love them! And, we'd love to hear how social media has helped your business. If you have a story to share with us and our readers, please do so!

Great Links!

Welcome to another edition of the Friday Blog Log! Here are our favorite links of the week. We hope you enjoy them as much as we did!

To start off, we loved this post from the Email Marketing Feed blog. This is a blog that collects all things e-mail marketing and reports it to the world. imediaconnection.com is the author of this particular post and they do a good job of discussing how to create e-mail messages that take into account the user experience when receiving the message. Oftentimes, as we create our e-mail messages, we focus primarily on the content, the offer and the target market. This is all very important, too. However, this post talks to the importance of conducting some simple usability studies that take mere hours to increase the open and response rates of your message. This post gives some examples of how to integrate this into every campaign. It's jam-packed with great information!

Our second link comes from e-consultancy's News and Blog post on Forrester's recent research on how spending lots of money on social media can sustain companies in these tough economic times. e-consultancy's author rips this research apart and provides some great (and pretty humorous) examples of why this isn't such a great idea. Here's a snippet from the article: "Given the fact that it’s increasingly becoming clear that marketing on social networks for the vast majority of marketers who have tried it, and is losing money for even the Googles of this world, Forrester Research’s 'research' seems to be quite contrarian to say the least." Read the full article for some thought-provoking ideas around this important subject -- and what this author's ideas are on what's really important. Good stuff!

Finally, we loved this post from Ron Shevlin's Marketing Whims Blog. In this post, Ron dispels the myth that you can advertise your way to greatness. With his tell-tale humor, he discusses the real elements that create iconic companies. Ron points out that Nike and Apple have accomplished this because they have done things in addition to advertising that helped them achieve their iconic status. "In Apple’s case it’s customers who are really into computer-aided graphics and design, and in Nike’s case it’s athletes and aspiring athletes." This is a wonderful and humorous read on what makes great companies just that -- great companies. And, under no circumstances can you become great simply by building a great advertising campaign. We know you'll enjoy this one!

TGIF!

Word-Of-Mouth (WOM) More Important than Ever!

In this faltering economy, direct marketers need to make use of every possible strategy to gain the loyalty of their customers and prospects. As you know, we're big believers in utilizing social media as part of the overall marketing strategy. Part of participating in this brave, new world is extending your reach via Word-of-Mouth (WOM).

In a recent article from BizReport, WOM is examined and is reported as being "seriously underestimated by many communicators and often overlooked as a valuable component to a communications strategy." These are the new findings in the annual “Media, Myths and Realities” report from Ketchum and the USC Annenberg Strategic Public Relations Center. The study reports that "less than a quarter (24 percent) of communicators have a word-of-mouth strategy in place." At first blush, this may not alarm you, however, when you consider that WOM is estimated to grow from $981 million in 2007 to $1 billion in 2008, with a continuing upward trend forecasted through 2011 . . . well, let's just say it may be high time to get a WOM strategy in place!

WOM is simply about looking at your prospective audience as a "public of one," as opposed to creating messages for the masses. Said differently, this means that marketers must begin to provide "relevant, meaningful and entertaining content that their audiences will feel inclined to share with others."

In this frenetic shopping season, we marketers can't help but feel the impact of advertisers and the myriad of messages aimed at us -- just like the rest of the consumers out there. And, as we examine our own actions, it is now more apparent than ever that we seek out products and services that we are interested in . . . and are becoming better and better at filtering out what is not relevant or meaningful to us. This is exactly why WOM is so important to consider right now as we communicate with our customers and prospects. As the Ketchum-USC study suggests, "Communicators must focus on speaking to individuals, not just broadcasting to the masses, when getting their messages across to this new 'public of one.'"

The net net . . . creating messaging that appears to be highly individualized, highly targeted and perfect for each one of us.

Adding Social Media to your Direct Marketing Strategy

We've provided a lot of food for thought this week on the use of social media as part of your direct marketing strategy. It's probably quite apparent that we really got a lot of value for the time and money spent at the BlogWorldExpo. If any of the information that we've presented thus far resonates with you, we highly recommend taking part in this conference next year. You get a huge bang for your buck -- that's for certain.

To summarize, here are our key takeaways for your consideration:

• Creating a company blog allows you to demonstrate and discuss your core strengths to both your existing customers, as well as to potential prospects. And it allows them to effectively interact with you -- thus, allowing you to build stronger customer relationships.
  
• You can effectively build your customer base through building a community online. At the same time, you are also building the reputation of your business through an effective and thought-provoking blog.
• You can add to your profitability by effectively leveraging your blog and building your online community.
• Utilizing social media to create open and honest dialog with your online community will help to create credibility for your company. It also can establish you as the company with the expertise that serves a particular industry best.
• Social media is transparent -- so be aware of this. If your corporate culture isn't healthy, sooner or later this will come through loud and clear to your online community. On the other hand, if you have a healthy and positive corporate culture, this will also come through and will be of huge benefit. Through your online community, your customers will have a better chance of understanding what you are all about -- and this builds customer loyalty.
• Finally, use controversy but never use it to evoke anger. Your posts live forever! Don't write anything that you think that -- when calmer minds prevail -- you'll wish you hadn't.

We hope you've enjoyed this social media interlude this week. And, we hope that it will cause you to consider how you can begin to build social media into your marketing strategy. Again, we feel strongly that by embracing this direct marketing channel today, you'll be setting yourself up for success in the future. We already wish we'd begun a few years ago . . . so, keep that in mind.

As you begin to consider this, please let us know how it's going. We'd love to hear your comments of how you are creating success through your online community. And, as always, if you don't agree -- and think that this may be a passing trend, let us hear about that, too. We'll update you from time to time on how our strategy is helping us to build our business, in the hopes that we may be able to spark a Big Idea for you and your business.

TGIF!

Building an Online Community

So, now that we've looked at some successful corporate blogs and some ideas around building profitability using your blog as the catalyst, let's focus on another great session that I attended at BlogWorldExpo: Building an Online Community. This session was led by the two extraordinary entrepreneurs and bloggers pictured here: Wendy Piersall of eMomsathome.com, and Dave Nalle of The Republic of Dave. This was yet another outstanding session. I've capsulized some of what I learned from these fine folks in this post.

As direct marketers, we understand the value of effectively targeting your customer base to build loyalty and long-term customers. In the world of Social Media, this happens through the connections that you make online with like-minded people. By building your online community through a company blog, you are encouraging -- if not downright enlisting -- your valuable customers to participate in conversations that you bring up about your company's core competencies. The best thing about this is that you have the ability to get open and honest feedback about your offerings from those who mean the most -- your customers and online community participants.

So, how do you go about building a successful online community? Some of the ideas here have already been presented in the BlogWorldExpo-specific posts this week . . . and once again, it all starts with good quality content that is both thought-provoking and relevant to the community. Here, again, controversial points-of-view will help to drive comments. And comments really drive traffic.

Let's start with a few words about comments . . . did you know that most blogs get an average of 3.2-3.3 comments per post? If you start to get some repeat commentators and they are adding good insight and provoking more comments, you should invite them to become blog contributors. This helps you to bring in a variety of differing opinions and adds a little thought-diversity to your posts. Plus, repeat commentators are oftentimes members of other online communities, and their posts may attract other communities to yours.

When managing comments, try to guide the discussion in a positive way. This way, eventually, the good comments will override the negative ones. Another sure-traffic driver is having a comment snippet side bar on your blog that features recent comments. Both presenters of this session, do an excellent job with this concept on their blogs. Not only do they both feature recent comments, Wendy also features "Top Commentators" on her blog. This rewards top commentators with a widget. Cool stuff!

Dave features a "welcome mat" on a sidebar for new visitors. So, when you visit Dave's blog, you can see a few people who have recently been there, and provides the new visitor with the opportunity to join his community (this really works because I did it!). The sidebar tells a little about the blog and gives contact info in case visitors have any questions. According to Dave, this can also help visitors feel comfortable, and encourages them to comment.

A final word on comments -- 15-20% of people generate all of the comments, so you really want to reward your top commentators, as both Dave and Wendy do on their blogs.

In terms of post content, while controversy does bring people into your community, you need to be careful not to put people off -- or just make a bunch of people angry. Mark Cuban put it best last week in his keynote when he said that your blog posts live forever -- even if you try to delete them. If you put something out there that you come to later regret, you can bet it'll rear it's ugly head at a most inappropriate time somewhere. That's just life.

A definite do is to use humor. Humor engages people and allows them to see part of your personality. This attracts people to your community.

As you are focusing on building your community, make sure that you provide relevant content in your blog-posts. Make sure that your content speaks to your community and that it demonstrates that what you are providing as content is for the benefit of your specific community. There's that value-add that all of us direct marketers are always striving for in our campaigns -- so that our piece or ad or whatever, truly speaks to the prospect or customer. It's the same with online communities. In order for them to take the time to participate in your community, participants need to feel that what you are doing is for them.

When you join with a group of like-bloggers (bloggers with the same or complimentary content), you'll not only build your community but you can all benefit from a larger combined community. If you decide to monetize your blog with well-placed ads (see yesterday's post on this subject), this provides another benefit -- increased profitability.

As a part of this, you can also become a sort of "blog critic." Here, you provide content that points your readers to the other blogs in your bloggers community. Thus, your community starts to spread the word for you. If all of the bloggers in your community do this, you can imagine all of the various mentions that you, your product/service and your blog will receive online. This tactic will boost your placement with the search engines, too -- Google is always on the lookout for how often you are mentioned. And, proper blog etiquette states that you should always throw a good mention out to a person who mentions you!

In tomorrow's post, look for a summation of my learnings from the BlogWorldExpo. I hope you are all enjoying learning from what I've learned. And don't forget, this is all about marketing -- social media is the future of where we are going as direct marketers. Those of us who are embracing this shift are going to be in good shape as we go from Web 2.0 to Web 10.0!