Tagged: honest

Viralocity Friend or Foe

You can trend your brand on Twitter fairly easy. But with that comes accountability. Two latest campaigns have showcased this well.

Brands on Twitter follow “hashtags” and topics that are trended in an attempt to be apart of the Tweeting action. Hashtags are # signs combined with terms that denote a conversation. Example, conferences use #BWE09 or #140conf to tag conversations about their conferences. #BWE09 = BlogWorld 2009 in Las Vegas and #140conf = the 140 Conference in New York City.

Hashtags create a vehicle to track and trend conversations about specific subjects. When the Iran Election protest blew up on twitter a hashtag became a trend using #iranelections. Brands use hastags for their own campaigns. Recently two similar companies (one US based the other UK based) have created and trended their own hashtags. One was a big fail in the Twitter universe and the other has hit in the community to the pont that the viral buzz around it has caught the eyes of main stream media.

These two campaigns are focused around website development companies SquareSpace and MoonFruit.

SquareSpace and Moonfruit are “turn key” web development platforms for any type of user who wants to create a web presence. From the pro-webdeveloper to the novice, both these companies offer tools and packages to help build your website.

A few weeks back SquareSpace launched a campaign where they offered 30 new iPhones to 30 twitter users within a one month period. The only catch was that the Twitter user must use the hashtag #squarespace in their tweets. Our good friends over at Mashable wrote about the campaign here: http://mashable.com/2009/06/10/iphone-squarespace/

The issue, as Mashable points out, was the “fine print.”

However, there is one issue with this campaign: they aren’t really giving away a free iPhone. If you visit the site for the promotion, you’ll note that down the page, in light grey text, that the prize is actually a “$199 gift certificate to the Apple store, which may be used toward the purchase of an 8GB iPhone.”

Why is this a big deal? Because the only way to get an iPhone for $199 is if you also sign up for new service with AT&T. Otherwise, your $199 gift card will go towards the purchase of an iPhone at full retail price, which can run as high as $699 for existing AT&T customers, as we reported yesterday.

From Apple’s iPhone page: “For non-qualified customers, including existing AT&T customers who want to upgrade from another phone or replace an iPhone 3G, the price with a new two-year agreement is $499 (8GB), $599 (16GB), or $699 (32GB).”

In other words, if Squarespace were actually giving away iPhones, they’d be laying out a total of at least $15,000 for the 30-day campaign, versus the $6,000 that 30 $200 gift certificates will cost them.

Folks began Tweeting #squarespace left and right. Congrats… it becomes a rapidly growing trending topic for the $6,000 campaign, but it became more. When people started asking about this hashtag they discovered the fine print and began tweeting about borderline false advertising using SquareSpace’s hashtag. Misleading and deceptive accusations were tweeted about the giveaway using the exact same brand vehicle that was associated with SquareSpace’s campaign.  All of this twittering began to trigger spam filters on Twitter. So now negative and positive tweets began to spread like wire fire. In the social web, it is very hard to recover, if even possible, to such a negative wild fire. Further, when your brand vehicle, in this case #squarespace, becomes a spam phrase on Twitter, you have just spent $6k to opt out of the fastest growing social network on the web. Wise?

This last week Moonfruit, a competitor, learned from these mistakes and capitalized on the lessons learned by the #squarespace campaign. Mashable compares these two campaigns here: http://mashable.com/2009/07/01/moonfruit-macbook/

Like the Squarespace promo, Moonfruit is offering up free Apple products for tweeting their company name as a hashtag: #moonfruit. Specifically, they’re giving away 10 MacBook Pro computers in 10 days, as a celebration of the company’s 10th anniversary. Each day, a random user who includes the hashtag will win one, and Moonfruit makes a point to eliminate confusion and say “if you win we’ll deliver your new baby to your door!” Winners are announced via the company’s @moontweet account.

Not surprisingly, this promotion is working. #moonfruit is Twitter’s top trending topic today, beating out the likes of Michael Jackson, #iranelection, and Wimbledon-related tweets. The lesson is becoming pretty clear: free stuff works as well on Twitter (and perhaps even better thanks to Trending Topics) as on the rest of the Web.

The difference is, be clear and honest with the campaign. Moonfruit’s $15,000 week long campaign has successfully lead to nearly all positive tweets associated with this brand vehicle. Sure, the campaign is more expensive, but they also are getting great user generated content outside of the Twitter universe.

Here is an example of authentic positive blogging from our friend’s PaigeIam blog:

Twitter is where I saw it first.

Twitter is where I hashtag it.

MOONFRUIT is where I can build beautful simple websites.

MOONFRUIT is where I can win a free MacBook pro.

So Im going to nom away on some #moonfruit and out eat everyone hashtagin’ it on Twitter

As well as 100’s more on the blogosphere: http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch?q=moonfruit&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&tab=nb

This is proof that trending campaigns do peculate from Twitter to the entire social web.

The most amazing thing about this is that the trend is about how real and honest the campaign is; most twitteres do not have brand loyalty or even really know about Moonfruit.  However, Moonfruit has created marketers who are saying positive things about your it brand by being honest about the campaign specifics.  Who knows these people might actually take the time to click on Moonfruit’s website.

Simply put, honesty and integrity results in respect and the ability to create marketers for you on the social web.

This is a word of mouth win.

On the Social Web, Respect – Not Numbers, Matter

By Kevin Spidelistock_000003808019xsmall

People often look at the number of followers/fans of others’ online networks as a way to evaluate the network’s influence.  In the beginning…numbers mattered on the social web; however, we have evolved and are now entering a social web Renaissance where the number of engaged followers matter.  Engagement is measured by followers’/fans’ responses to your content.

On social network sites such as YouTube and Flickr, where the content is the central piece of the conversation, view counts are still relevant.  Yet, with networks like Facebook and Twitter (the two largest growing networks) the central content focus is the conversation.

So those of you reading this blog who are not already faithful followers of our writings, we will once again reiterate the importance of authentic conversations on the social web.  Since social networks revolve around conversation, authentic engagement is a must! The culture of Twitter and Facebook is very open and welcoming; however, if you begin even the slightest spam, repeating, mass messaging technique versus real engagement, these networks are very unforgiving. Users can block your content with a click of a button; forever shutting you out of their content stream. You have one chance to capture social network users in a positive manner, so make a positive splash on the social web and engage authentically.

How?

Social network users are real people, real potential customers or fans of you. They are online to connect to like minded folks.  Brands do not engage, people do!  Remember that you are an individual who is talking about a brand.  Be human first.

In the latest blog post from Social Media Marketing UK they talk about the social web replacing corporate CRM software because of the authentic real and accessible value of the social web: (link here.)

What impact will this have on you and your company?

If you approach social web engagement as a numbers game, you will fail.  If you approach it as building your name identification and engaging into a larger community, you will win. Don’t focus on the numbers. Why, you ask?  Here is an example of authentic respect on the social web versus quantity of fans.  Let’s take a look at the ever so popular actor Aston Kutcher’s influence on Twitter.

As of 6/16/2009 he has 2,212,447 followers; one of the largest, if not the largest, following on Twitter.  Is that influential? Possibly…but let’s really look at the numbers.

•    In the last 24 hours Ashton had 300 ReTweets (Fans who replicated what he was saying verbatim) – That is approximately .013% of his network.

•    His last TwitPic (photo posted live from his mobile device to Twitter) received 44,235 views. That is approximately 1.9% of his network.

Sure the numbers are there, but is he an influencer to his network?  We argue no.  He is not engaging in even 3% of his network.  The value of having over 2 million followers is diminished if less than 5% of those followers do not actually engage and respond to your content.

From an athlete’s sponsor or a brand associated with a personality do these numbers (eyes) matter as much as the interactions of those who listen, ReTweet and evangelize content from a strong network? No.

Sponsors, brands, and those who want to really impact the social web care about strength in the network. This is something you can’t fake.  You can’t buy billboards and ask folks to “follow you on Twitter” as Ashton did and expect quality network.  You must engage naturally and earn your network’s respect. We are here to help coach you in that process.

Below is an example of a strong network.  Let’s stay within the celeb world since we picked on Ashton’s network and take a look at actress Alyssa Milano.

Alyssa_Milano has 89,225 followers but is an active Twitterer.

•    She has over 350 ReTweets in the last 24 hours that is approximately .39% of her network.

Although she has significantly less followers then Ashton; she has nearly the same return on ReTweets.

Imagine if her numbers were double and she still actively engaged on Twitter in her naturally authentic way.  Her influence level would be double Ashton’s with far less followship.

Let’s take a look at her last twitpics:

•    One received 5,362 views, which is approximately 6% of her network.
•     The other received 4,782 views, which is approximately 5.35% of her network.

The best part about these two photographs is that they were taken by her fans, of her fans, wearing HER jeans in a place she loves to spend time (a baseball park.) She merely ReTweeted what her fans did and earned them nearly 10 thousand in views. This is true engagement!

Photos here: http://twitter.com/Alyssa_Milano/status/2171411248
http://twitter.com/Alyssa_Milano/status/2171383587

What is the difference between these two celebs?  Alyssa is actively engaging in conversations with her fans rather then using Twitter as a megaphone.

On the social web, it is about respect and authenticity of your networks… not numbers.

Is SEO Dead?

There has been a lot of talk about PR firms embracing current SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques  in their digital service packages. Today, for example, Jason from C&C posted a really great post outlining the details that should come in these packages.

He lists some great “How to” steps to familiarize yourself with this word and how it MUST be included in current PR work.

I couldn’t agree more, but there is a big part missing; the evolution of search engines, semantic data, and word of mouth is the trend of Web2 to Web3 boundaries.

There are technical limitations to typical “meta data” that is associated with traditional SEO data. The New Media Knowledge group has pin pointed this as why SEO might be dead in an article here.

Technical limitations such as code standards and non-indexable data (videos, flash, etc.) are only small aspects to why traditional SEO techniques are dying. As the web evolves, influence/word of mouth marketing and transparent networks are increasing online traffic to brands. What does that mean?

Think of it this way. If you know what you are looking for and can break it down into keywords, then by all means Google it. You most likely will find it. Just like you would if you went to a library and searched for something on a subject using the dewey decimal system system. There is still a need for that fundamental way of searching for your product online and making sure your data is coded and optimized for this standard.

However, as conversational networks exponentially grow daily, semantic (conversational, back and forth exchange of data) data is being indexed. There are no influencer gatekeepers on the web. If someone loves Oprah and wants to buy everything she suggests, she is on Twitter, Facebook, Skype, etc. The content that she puts out as an influencer in the market attracts consumers already willing to buy these products. Her conversations are retweeted by lesser influencers to networks and then talked about again and again. If you wanted to know about the best products to buy in your given trade or hobbyist obsession… you can find those influencers in that trade, interact with them, and every little didgibit is archived and index into searchable content. This is the new SEO. Semantic search and inflencual conversations.

SEO is still important, but without a comprehensive word of mouth plan that involves strategic semantic optimization, PR firms will not be ready for Web3. Web3 is transparent, honest, and all about word of mouth. Traditional SEO was about frequency of keywords and searches. Word of Mouth & Semantic Marketing is about authenticity. It is not about frequency of conversations, it is about the integrity of the conversation.

Is SEO dead?

No… but the methods have evolved.

Time to catch up.

Authentic Word of Mouth is not a Campaign

David Berkowitz wrote an article yesterday discussing the fact that the one word you can not mention in a social media conference is “campaign.”

If you approach word of mouth advertising as a traditional media campaign, you will fail and do damage to your brand. Social networks are for social engagement, not for you to spam users. Don’t get confused by the technology, social networks are gatherings of individuals… much like a cocktail party. If you approach these networks as such you will succeed.

Here is a video about Whuffie and Tara Hunt. Take a moment and listen to her background at the end:

Our firm identifies authentic influencers on the social web and engage them with quality brands that are interesting to those individuals.

Again, thinking of the cocktail scenario, your impressions of various people at that cocktail party is defined by honesty, influence, your history with them, and their background. The same thing is true about social interaction on the web. These influencers have the same variables. Authentic word of mouth comes from these relationships and influencers; not a campaign, pure visibility, and traditional marketing strategies.

In Activating Word of Mouth we determine the influences for your brand and develop strong relationships with these individuals. Their mentions and marketing of your brand is authentic.