360DigitalInfluence

As a follow up to our recent webinar, Facebook Bootcamp for PR, you’ll see five blog posts in the coming weeks exploring the five trends set out in our presentation.

There are two distinct forms of currency set to expand on Facebook: Facebook credits and cold, hard cash. Months after Facebook playing around with gift credits and launching a candy coated beta test, Facebook announced last week that it will be rolling out more gift monetization options. And just on Wednesday, Facebook posted a Payment Terms of Service Agreement on their developers’ site showing that this option is not far off. In this post I’ll touch on both and what each trend means for brands. continue reading

Join me on June 16 & 17 as I and, presumably 139 other characters kick off a Jeff Pulver extravaganza - 140 Characters -  in NYC that is bound to be the must-participate Twitter event on either coast. Twitter is being applied to brand marketing and business everyday. It’s simplicity and power has captured people’s attention beyond other Web 2.0 platforms and even the big social nets, themselves. Brands like Dell, WellsFargo, Ford, Marriott, Kodak, Comcast, PBS and so many more are on there driving results.

Here’s how Jeff describes the conference:

“While the original scope of the event was to explore “the effects of twitter on: Celebrity, “The Media”, Advertising and (maybe) Politics”, the scope of the event has expanded and we will be covering these topics and a lot more. #140conf will be taking a look at twitter as a platform and will be taking a look at some of the industries which have been disrupted by the advent of twitter.”

I will be running a panel on Twitter and brands. Don’t just come for one panel. Come for the rapid fire, immersive collection of characters from all sorts of brands, companies, orgs and individuals. If you are into Twitter or know you need to be, please attend:

What: 140 Characters Conference

When/Where:  June16 & 17  - NYC

Get more and register now>

Get our Twitter for Business seminar >

Last week at WOMM-U, I had the opportunity to sit down and talk to Jason Anello, an Ideologist of Yahoo’s Buzz Marketing Group, about influencer marketing. As you can imagine, we do a lot of influencer outreach here at Ogilvy, so it was interesting to hear Jason share some of his personal viewpoints on determining influence and overall thoughts on the conference in general.

You can check it out below:

John Bell and I will be introducing Conversation Impact ™ - Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence’s simple, actionable model for evaluating the impact of social media - on June 23rd at the Advertising Research Foundation’s Audience Measurement 4.0 in New York.

Conversation Impact sorts through “metric chaff” to focus in on tracking and measuring a small set of metrics that impact brand relevant awareness, preference and action.

More to follow on the model, but for now, you can take advantage of a special $545 discount we are able to offer our readers through 5/22.  We look forward to seeing you there!  Read on for discount details.

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What if all the people who were truly passionate about your brand had a single place to gather? Somewhere that they could share content and opinions, organize real life events, ask one another questions, and just about any other activity that happens in a real community. It’s pretty obvious to see the value in something like that - which is probably why many companies have tried some version of it. Yahoo launched and then abandoned their Brand Universe concept. Sites like Squidoo, Ning and Alltop arguably had some version of this vision in mind when they launched as well.

Today, word of mouth marketing company BzzAgent is launching their effort, called BzzScapes. I had a chance to take a preview demo of it recently, and the thinking behind the site is that if you can give members of the BzzAgent community (who number over half a million and are already self-described “brand enthusiasts”) a place to share content about their favourite brands, they will create a valuable community for any brand marketer (and advertiser) to be part of.
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To spite the lack luster economy, I’ve been seeing stories in WWD, The New York Times and Wall Street Journal that suggest consumers are shopping.  Perhaps not as much and not for the same things they used to, but they are out there shopping.  BIGresearch reports 4o percent of women said that shopping for themselves is at the top of their priority list.  The key to consumer spending today is value, according to Yanklovich and Ropers recent consumer studies.  Consumers want to know when they make a purchase they can feel good about the money they spent because they know they are getting a great deal.  These changes have led to a shift in how retailers reach consumers.   The world’s largest retailer, WalMart, is taking advantage of other electronics retailers closing to revamp their offerings so they will reach those consumers who used to shop at said closed stores.  They are taking a look at their product offerings and adding more than just entry level as suggested in the following article.

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Updated with slight correction from Chris Pan at Facebook.

More from The Word of Mouth Marketing Association University (WOMMA-U, Twitter #WOMMA).

Day 2 kicks off with a panel that is very much top-of-mind for many social media marketers … MySpace vs. Facebook (or both).  Empowered by a healthy dose of morning caffeine I will attempt to live-blog the panel (as such, please pardon my grammar).

The panelists are Heidi Browning, SVP, Insight & Planning, MySpace and Chris Pan, Head of Brand Solutions, Faceboook.  The panel is moderated by David Berkowitz, 360i.

Audiences:

• MySpace: 18-34 is sweet-spot.  125 million worldwide users
• Facebook: 60 million active users in US; 200 million (thanks, Chris Pan of Facebook for the correction) 100 active globally (active = have logged in the past 3 days)

Best practices for working with MySpace and Facebook:

• Know your audience.  Bring your challenge to MySpace and Facebook and they will help you understand your audience’s behavior on the network and how to reach them.
• Brands should strive to be entertaining, engaging or offer some kind of utility.
• Convenience is key.  Users are busy -  make it easy for them to find, consume and share your content.
• Make your profile picture interesting and captivating (see Aflac or Cheetos for good examples).
• Beta mentality … your page doesn’t have to be perfect at launch.  It’s a continuous process, not a one-time event.
• Use their resources:  MySpace created their ad platform to give musicians and small businesses a self-promotion tool.  It’s simple to use, but MySpace also has service representatives to help monitor a brand’s presence on MySpace if the brand doesn’t have the bandwidth.  Facebook also has a sales team that can help brands plus-up their presence with different products and consultation on best practices.
• Yes, marketers should look at social networks as a continuum, but shouldn’t get too caught up in the semantics of campaign vs. conversation.  Use the community tools to create dialogue in between key announcements and product releases.

Measurement

• MySpace looks at the momentum effect …  the value of WOM.  Using a combination of behavioral and survey technology to measure the effect.
• Facebook provides a lot of tools to track engagement - comments on posts, page ratings, etc.

Mistakes marketers make working with Social networks

• Thinking of a your page/presence as something static
• Too consumed with making it perfect right off the bat - be in perpetual beta
• Using canned ads in social networks when these communities offer such rich user targeting data

Other panel notes:

• Vitamin Water distributed 24 million bottles of water with caps that drove to MySpace for access to music and other musical content.  This promotion is being supported by above-the-line tactics.  Music is a big driver of MySpace activity.
• Chris showed Vitamin Water’s presence on Facebook.  The brand used a Kobe vs. Lebron theme, which Chris says was very well received.  Currently 334,000 fans (Facebook estimates that about half those fans would be on Facebook on any given day).
• Chris pointed out that when social data is added to ad content on Facebook (e.g. Your friend Bob likes this video) it’s more well received.
• Chris compared a microsite to a “farm” (a place you visit occasionally); a Facebook page as a “convenience store;” and Facebooks ads as the “delivery service.”
• Jack Bauer has more Facebook fans than “24.” “Gossip Girl” more than the CW.
• Social networks can be used for B2B marketing.  You can target by industry, geography, function, etc.
• Marketers can go here and here to see what other marketers are doing on these networks
• Both MySpace and Facebook will collaborate with brands to maximize their presence.

The CEO of Federated Media, Chas Edwards, presented a number of case studies from their network – and gave an overview of their thinking on social media measurement. continue reading

More from WOMMA-U (#WOMMA)

As I was listening to Matt Allen of NBC.com and Sarah Hofstetter of 360i I noticed an emerging conference theme … proving the value of WOMM to the leaders in your organization (or your client’s organization if you are at an agency).

Conventional wisdom goes that innovation comes from the bottom of organizations, culture from the top. If you want your organization/clients to embrace WOMM, maybe the first step is executive training. Trust me – if they buy it, everyone else is more likely to fall into line.

In my opinion, the key to engaging the C-suite is showing, not telling.  A few quick thoughts on what I’ve seen resonate with senior executives:

• Give the social media/WOMM overview in the context of your/your client’s business.  Don’t give the text-book version of social media – give the real-time case study.  Lots of screen shots of conversations taking place about your brand … Twitter conversations, Flickr photos, YouTube videos, Yelp reviews and blog posts. This is the most powerful argument you can make for getting into the WOMM game … People are already talking about you – you can either bury your head in the sand or get your skin in the game.
• Address measurement and ROI.  Tell them what exists, and don’t be afraid to discuss current measurement gaps (and how organizations like WOMMA are aiming to fill those gaps).
• Show what the competition is doing in the space.  It’s not a scare tactic, but rather a wake-up call.
• Give them some what-ifs … pique their imagination.
• Leave them with a toolkit that gets them involved and excited.  Keep it simple. The Daily Influence is a good start.

Securing WOMM and social media buy-in from the top brass will help unlock resources, make your WOMM efforts more effective/efficient and aid greatly in the case of a crisis (see John Bell’s post about digital crisis management).

I’m at the Word of Mouth Marketing Associations WOMM-U event for the next day – and while there promises to be a wealth of content published here and through our team’s various twitter handles (@jbell99, @virginiamiracle, @iansohn, @tanyachadha) I’m going to focus my blog updates on measurement stories generated by the great brands in attendance.
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