Naturally we get a lot of calls these days from folks wanting social media programs.
When you’re building out a marketing strategy which calls for communication & outreach with/to/from brand fans and consumers on the Web:
DON’T say “What are we doing on Twitter and Facebook?”
Say “What are our goals? What are we hoping to achieve here?” and build your strategy from there.
From Paul Carr’s TechCrunch piece on integrated advertising, especially on Twitter (the piece is wonderfully entitled NSFW: Give Me Ad-Free Conversation or Give Me Death (Please RT):
A tweet isn’t a “piece of content”. It isn’t editorial. No matter whether we’re talking about what we’re having for lunch or suggesting a new movie or sharing a piece of news, what we’re really doing is having a good old-fashioned conversation. Following people on Twitter is like organising the world’s largest cocktail party – we’ve decided who’s opinions we trust, and we’ve invited them to come into our homes and talk to us about things they are genuinely interested in. The moment people start screwing around with that principle, the whole system collapses.
Couldn’t define the current and/or idealized nature of Twitter any better. As marketers (Carr: “What I do is Good and Pure; what they do is Bad and Dirty.” So true) we are faced with a world where any traditional notion of advertising is easily avoided by all smart people and most not-so-smart. So we leverage ourselves into content and “conversations” because people like those. At which point, like an airborne contaminant, we risk ruining that content/conversation experience by rendering it no longer genuine (the word “authentic” is currently in my “social media cuss jar” via which folks in our meetings are fined for egregious buzzword use*).
One answer to this is to leave the conversations alone in order to maintain their authentic real and genuine nature, thus retaining what is currently a quite effective marketing tool.
Over/under on that happening? Thought so.
* Social media cuss jar is combined with Internet jargon cuss jar and includes such words and phrases as “100,000 foot level”, “drill down”, and the execrable “best practices”. You get the picture.
I’ve talked about blogging vs. microblogging and do on occasion make my blog solely from my tweets, but I think one of the best uses of both forums is in a case where I want to expand past 140 characters on something that’s come up on the Twitter feed.
This came up today on Twitter – companies using recession/recessionary thinking in campaigns. Is this effective? (Yes, you’ll have to read the below Twitter convo bottom up just like in the Twitterverse.) The gist of this is: recession as marketing tool and is it effective, particularly in lifestyle businesses?
I don’t think so. I think consumers want reality, not recession talk. Instead of inflationary thinking (make your product so aspirational that you can charge whatever you like), they want realistic thinking (good product at an acceptable price point). That’s an appropriate response to recession. I think in olden days they called it “value”. Perceived value can be everything. Will write about that later, especially as it relates to digital entertainment content.
Anyway, the CEO of Citizens of Humanity denim gave me this excellent mini-case study. As a response to the economic climate, Citizens dropped a particular style’s retail price to $149 (Citizens jeans tend to start around $175, standard for premium denim). They did not reduce the quality – in fact they used a slightly more expensive fabric. Like smart businesspeople they asked their retail partners to participate in the bite and set the wholesale price a bit higher than normal, reducing the retail markup.
The jeans sold like crazy. Meanwhile- Rock & Republic, which is a highly aspirational brand- is not doing well with its “Recession Jeans”, which are actually called that, at an even lower price point.
Recession isn’t fun, and when we integrate it into our lifestyles as consumers, I think we want to call it “value” or being “conscious” – something that makes us feel as though we are gracefully relating to reality- maybe even making reality cool (as in, it’s now cool to downsize your lifestyle). I don’t want to wear the recession.
BTW, @bkm55 is Brian Mitchison, VP of Marketing at Blast Radius. They do GREAT work.
@bkm555 I don’t think “recessionista” has worked as a term that resonates with consumers, do you? Who wants to wear the recession?
@bkm555 Exactly- the appropriate action in a recession is more or at least the same for less, not less for less with a cute name.
bkm555@elizabrooks great example. I understand appropriate actions are required in a recession, but not marketing spin.
@bkm555 Rock&Republic did “Recession Jeans” at about $120 & failed. Citizens did $149 jeans @ usual quality & no recession talk w/success
bkm555Using recession themes in mrk seems too contrived.
bkm555Journalist request: looking for companies that are using the recession in their campaigns. Not a big fan of this approach.
Just finished lunch with Marc Gobé, friend, mentor, and the man behind Emotional Branding (where I’m an advisor):
emotionalbranding.com
The topic of conversation was largely…conversations. The conversations brands have with their customers, the conversations customers have with and around brands, and how to aggregate the conversation in a way that makes sense. For instance, I’m working my way through and testing the available Twitter tools so that I can ask a question both here and on Twitter, and bring the various comments and discussions back here in one place, making the discussion more immediate and vibrant.
The conversation idea is of course not new. It’s the tools we have to engage it which are multiplying. But does every brand need a conversation? If I’m P&G and a majority of my brands improve various areas of the home experience, I’m going to build something successful like homemadesimple.com . This is an ongoing engagement with my customer and although my brands are present throughout, it’s not blatantly brandcentric nor intrusive, and in fact it’s possible to completely miss the branding (this is a good thing). So, P&G and Tide, Cascade, Dawn, Swiffer, Mr. Clean, Febreze, etcetera, definitely benefit from having this conversation and so do their consumers.
Marc and I wondered, though: does a company which makes, say, galvanized pipe for irrigation need a brand conversation? What attributes does pipe need to have besides being strong, not leaking, and being well-priced in its market? It would seem ridiculous to have social actions for a pipe manufacturer, right? Well, yes, and no.
For the sake of galvanized pipe discussion, I looked at Morrill Industries . Turns out there are an awful lot of attributes to galvanized irrigation pipe, none of which are probably fascinating to brand people- but they definitely justify a conversation about “Couplers, Tees, Crosses, 90° Ells, 45° Ells, Hex Bushings, Bell Reducers, Reducing Tees, Street Ells……..” – in the right venue.
Facebook’s the wrong place for this, as is any broad-based social application which is difficult to shrink to a specialization- but an aggregated Twitter discussion group could definitely work. Morrill could have the only hex bushing for particular situations, and its audience would never know that if it were not engaged in the conversation. (I have absolutely no idea what a hex bushing is, btw.)
Moral of the story: yes, Dorothy, you can engage social media, but not in a paint-by-numbers way. Find the right destination; don’t just toss darts at Twitter and Flickr; and if what you do/sell is specialized, corral that community even if you do so within a larger social context .
I was committed to never using the term “social media” on my website, but I’m afraid it’s going to be unavoidable in my blog. With the prevailing marketing chatter over the last 48 hours or so about the new skittles.com , there’s really no other term to employ.
To put it in its simplest terms, Skittles has removed a traditional home page from its website; instead, you hit the Skittles Twitter home page and an overlaid nav which will take you to: the Skittles Facebook home, the Skittles YouTube brand channel, a Skittles Flickr page, and yes, information about the (limited but tasty) Skittles product line.
I saw a tweet fly by about how this was an incredibly brave move and that courageous brand managers should sit up and take note.
Well…it’s still fairly cool for a mass-market brand to be active on Twitter (that’ll last about another four days). And I am happy that the Skittles team are together enough to have their, um, social media pieces sorted.Today it would be a bit sad, ok, unheard of, to not have one’s Facebook brand page and so forth set up.
But may I ask what all of this does for Skittles?
What exactly will Skittles-centric Twittering do to increase candy awareness and consumption? Is this where the Skittles core audience is to be found? To judge from Skittles-Twitter-Homeland, all Skittles has done is bait the Twitterverse into snarky comments. That doesn’t matter, it’s still discussion- but how is this discussion going to drive sales? Maybe one or two hungry Twitterers will develop a sudden craving upon the reminder of Skittle deliciousness, but it hardly seems that Twitter should be the Skittles focus area. I applaud the willingness to have unfiltered content displayed around the brand (the Flickr page is a random search)- it’s brave and could lead to some cool usergen content – but again, exactly how does this move candy?
Facebook and YouTube make a little more sense, as engaging a community around a brand is always a good move. However, again, the aggressive social stunt has only brought activity to these pages which is negative. It would seem the campaign is not reaching Skittles fans en masse, nor engaging discovery of Skittles.
There are exactly 3 videos on the Skittles YouTube brand channel at this moment. Wouldn’t it be far more productive to pour some of this energy into having more and better brand-related content? Or, if the point is to drive more Skittle conversation, why not center it around a new development or some really cool event Skittles is supporting?
If the Twitterverse were discussing how Skittles had just planted forests in deforested areas, or built houses in disaster-struck areas, the brand conversation would be a lot more positive, and a lot more interesting. They could even be rainbow-colored forests and rainbow-colored houses – but at least they’d be on point.
I can’t wait to see what this does for Skittles in the actual marketplace. Very curious.
more tweeting:
leaked photos of next-gen Mac mini? I was more excited to see the Kindle, but still cool http://bit.ly/3SZ9E
RT @SLAMonline: Manu Ginobili Out 2-3 Weeks: http://tinyurl.com/bqr6sa
Hulu pulls its content from Boxee as well as tv.com. “does not play well with others” http://bit.ly/Ffym7
RT @dweekly: Home ownership was the 20th century American dream; the 21st century dream is to realize the potential of each individual.
RT @SocialMedia411: Would You Trust a PR Agency Not Involved in Social Media with YOUR Social Media Programs? (PRMM): http://bit.ly/11hDDT
differing takes on Touch & Go dropping mfr. & distrib. Many great indie labels-will find. a home http://bit.ly/11u6M9 http://bit.ly/IROdF
So completely thrilled with a customer acquisition strategy just designed for a client. It’s green, it’s good, it’s inexpensive- love it!!
From DwellBlog: Palm Springs Modernism Week & modern shopping guide: http://bit.ly/WDewT
MSFT getting into 3D w/ 3D camera co. 3DV – finally move toward digital 3D gaming, which should be HUGE. What’re other gamecos doing in 3D?
Desalination startup Oasys Water raises 10M Series A. Desalination = usable seawater= important http://bit.ly/16wbnc (more…)
RT @mkapor: RT @nink RT @akYip “Microsoft In Talks To Acquire 3D Camera Company 3DV (MSFT)” http://tinyurl.com/cppfdz
RT @lala_com: Frost/Nixon, the interviews http://www.lala.com/album/4…
Japan’s economy contracted at fastest pace in nearly 35 years in q4 2008; finance minister to resign after seeming “drunk” at press conf.
Whenever CNN Breaking News mobile alerts go over 160 chars, the second part of message always comes in first by 5-10 mins. Can be scary.
Pirate Bay copyright infringement charges dropped, trial goes on its merry way. Fun! http://bit.ly/iMg4j
Games selling better than ever in the recession- so why are all the companies in trouble? Dev costs & new bad attitude: http://bit.ly/DsDg7
Liberty Media loans Sirius XM $530 million, Sirius promises to mow lawn and take out garbage: http://bit.ly/SVl9r
wish it were easier to find highly targeted, highly viral sponsorship opps á la Adobe and Layer Tennis.
Update on Twitter over $35M raise (Benchmark, IVP, Union Sq, Spark) from @TechCrunch: http://bit.ly/K4ozQ
Shazam hits 35 million users- 20 added since September http://bit.ly/jlqTP