First off congrats to the Islanders fans for getting the best player in the draft. As a long time Islander fan, I can say with certainty that this has been a long time coming. I don’t remember what it is like to enjoy playoff hockey! So maybe in the future John Tavares and company can remind me.
Second, watching from Boston I couldn’t help but notice how Islander fans were pretty adamant about who they wanted the Islanders to take with the first pick. Most of the reports I was reading online said that the Islanders front office was leaning towards Matt Duchesne. Even this morning reports were coming out that the Islander really wanted Duchesne. So what happened?
Take a look at this post from Chris Botta of NYIPoint Blank. He asked the question “Will You Really Be Done With This Team?” – if they don’t pick Tavares. The result? 478 passionate responses with a vast majority saying “no Tavares, no more!” In the days leading up to the draft I noticed Twitter posts, Facebook comments from complete strangers who are also fellow Islander fans pleading with Islander GM to pick Tavares. 10,000 fans showed up at the Nassau Coliseum with one message, draft Tavares. The message became viral and social media channels played a huge part in it.
Today the islanders are applauded by fans and media alike for their selection. The incredible pressure and buzz that the fan base created using Social Media had made it virtually impossible for them to not make the selection. If they had chosen Duchesne-those very same channels would have gone silent and been filled with negative sentiment about the organization.
When you give your customers (the fans), what they want, when they want it – you win their business over and over again! Proven fact! The Islanders front office will have a record day for season ticket sales today. They might even get the back page of the NY Post- something they haven’t sniffed in years. The Islanders are a case study on the use of Social Media from both the customer end as well as the organization listening to its constituent sentiment.
I was flipping through ESPN the magazine last night when I was reminded of a disturbing trend. Aaron Curry of the Seattle Seahawks has a Twitter handle of @SeaHawk59. What is worse is Stephen Curry, a soon to be drafted NBA player, has a handle of @classof2027. My question to both would be, how are people supposed to find you if they actually wanted to follow you? How is Google supposed to attach your Twitter feed to your search rankings? As it stands now, when you Google “Stephen Curry” his Twitter address does not appear within the first 50 search results. I gave up after 5 clicks on the next tab. Not good, and certainly not good for his Twitter presence. A SEO nightmare by his own creation!
This got me thinking about how companies can utilize Twitter more efficiently. Really the same way athletes should, but don’t! An athlete’s name is not their brand due to free agency. Sales is nothing more than real world free agency. With that in mind-I have compiled a list of Twitter best practices with an eye on maximizing your companies brand on Twitter, and ultimately driving brand awareness and affinity:
Twitter users are 37% more likely to be followed when they spell out their full name instead of attaching their brand to their username. With that data in hand, I suggest that your company have one corporate username and all other employees make their user name an extension of the company’s brand. This will allow your company to be able to speak to all business avenues -instead of being pigeon-holed based on his/her username.
Every piece of content created in blogs, Youtube, Flickr, deep discussions, new events- need to be shared on Twitter. We suggest connecting Friendfeed to the corporate Twitter account.
I suggest your company share tidbits of knowledge daily. At least 10 twitter posts per day using keywords from a yet to be established keyword list. 60% should be of the thought leadership variety, while 40% of the posts should talk about the Twitter personality’s life. The corporate account should be purely talking about company happenings and posting links for “link juice”, while responding to mentions. Always post an opinion on industry specific news.
I suggest creating a template thank you note for every new follower. This template will link to the company’s website and be accompanied by a thank you with a clear call to action.
I suggest your company closely monitors the Twitter members that are talking about the organization on http://www.search.twitter.com. Track the results by simply copying the RSS feed of the results and placing it in an RSS reader.
Your organization should comment on other posts of interest as much as time allows. This opens up free flowing conversations. The organization can track these conversations by keyword and put the RSS feeds into a Netvibes to follow effectively.
Summary:
One Corporate Account (example @authoritydomain)- At least 10 Tweets a day (60% business/40% casual & fun- be a human) Attach a trending term: Example #authoritydomains. If you are a Mets fan: #Mets
Numerous Individual Twitter accounts–For example put http://www.authoritydomains.com in the BIO, spell out full name (example: @derekshowerman). Shot for 10 Tweets a day, 60% business/40% casual & fun- be a human!
Thank every follower and have a clear call to action.
Suggestion:
Please be sure to engage social media with an eye on fulfilling real business objectives and a roadmap to see real ROI. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Trent Reznor’s (from Nine Inch Nails) recent announcement that he is leaving Social Media because of trolls sums up the need for all business to- “have a plan”. Whether you are a musician or a corporate giant – a Social Media marketing strategy with a clear map to real business objective is necessary.
Reznor (@trent_reznor )says: “The reason no record label knows how to market anything to new media is they don’t live there. They don’t get it because they don’t use it. What you’ve seen happen with the marketing and presentation of NIN over the last years is a direct result of living next to you, listening to you, consuming with you and interacting with you. Directly. There’s no handlers or PR people here, it’s me and my guys – that’s it. There’s no real plan, even – it’s just trying to do the right thing that respects you the fan, the music, and me the artist. That’s the goal – a mutual and shared respect.”
He is right! In a perfect world he could engage his fans transparently and be free and clear of negative sentiment. But the fact remains- transparency will lead to as much negative as positive. But to combat it, businesses need the resources to answer to both the negative and the positive. Reznor’s comments are nothing more than a call for help- not a white flag!
Here are 5 action items that Trent can do to remedy his troll problem and create a solid foundation fora true Social Media Strategy Plan:
Hire a Social Media Director – I am sure there are a great deal of recent college grads that would kill to put Nine Inch Nails Social Media Director on their resume. I am also sure this person would work on the cheap! They would be in charge of monitoring, responding, engaging, and consistently push/pulling relevant content to Nine Inch Nails. Essentially being the overseer of the NIN brand in Social Media channels. Instead of Trent doing it, this person will carry out tedious tasks and put the most important content in front of Trent daily to respond to. Everything between the good ideas to negative sentiment! This essentially removes the trolls and lets Trent focus on making great music. Lastly, this person will work under NIN’s PR folks.
Purchase a Social Analytics tool- these tools help track, reply, document and recognize real ROI. For $500-$750 per month a business can have a birds-eye view of their social media presence. I recommend Techrigy – although the marketplace is becoming flush solutions. I would suggest demoing several and deciding what would work best for a music artist.
Migrate to Modlife: Because Modlife is fee service for fans to join, it eliminates trolls and allows musicians to create almost their own safe market research community. They can share, test, and interact with passionate fans. My suggestion is to utilize Modlife as a musicians center location, and use Myspace, Twitter, Facebook and Social Bookmarking sites to push information, take information- but most importantly to draw in the “real fans”. The innovators if you will- NIN’s very own market research community. Look no further then what Angels & Airwaves have done here: http://modlife.com/angelsandairwaves Perfect for NIN!
Create a Recognition Rewards Program- Use meet and greets as a way to build a group of online body guards. Dangling a “meet Trent Reznor opportunity” is a stellar reward for being a pro-NIN presence that pushes the band in the social channels. This is enabling and empowering and can be done with nothing more than a bit of organizing and a brief shining of the spotlight on these do-gooders electronically. It is amazing what a simple tweet from rock star can do from an ego perspective.
Build a Content Schedule & Engage- Start doing chats on TinyChat. Conduct monthly webinars and podcasts where fans get to hear new material or offer feedback on what artists NIN should tour with. The content schedule should be focused on the business goals of fan feedback and innovation to their voice. When you give your customers what they want, you will win their business repeatedly. Once again, the content schedule is geared towards enabling, empowering and organizing NIN’s own market research community. It is no different then what Barack Obama did to get elected.
My life as a social media consultant consists of creating plans such as these-although much more in-depth than this blog. But every business is different in their needs, desires, and objectives. In fact, how each business measures ROI is vastly different. In Trent Reznor’s case, his ROI is to be able to engage Social Media effectively so he can listen to his customers (the fans) and innovate his music based on their feedback. His desire is no different than a billion dollar corporate empire- to be able to go direct to consumer with new products-thus lowering marketing churn, while having a product that is created based on the voice of the customer. Trent just needed a strategy plan….
Tuesday, June 30, 2009 6:00-8:30PM
FELT Boston
533 Washington Street
Boston
Come meet up with Authority Domains at this event with our friends at commonground and Metropolis Creative. Hear a live presentation about the ROI, impact and launch of commonground — the global community of environmental and commercial real estate professionals.
Mark will share information on why commonground was launched, the importance of a clear and concise business plan to achieving success, and the value online community has for both EDR and its members. A question and answer session will allow you to have your questions answered in a lively and informal setting.
Felt and Christiana Vodka will provide complimentary appetizers and spirits.
Authority Domains will offer a gratis social media assessment for all guests
Thanks to Chris Angus for the props and kind words. He is regarded as one of the Top 100 Online Marketers in the world and is currently ranked at #2 in the UK. Here is what he has to say…
Social Media is still relatively new and not understood very well and being successful is still something of a “dark art”. I think a lot of “social media experts” consider themselves a kind of artist. They write or build something pretty creative (if it’s going to be successful) and then promote it. If they get the mix of creativity and interest right whilst following the rules that you need to appeal to Social Media geeks then it will probably be a “success” and garner a high volume of traffic.
That’s kind of how these people sell themselves, “We’ll create something awesome and it’ll go popular and get a bunch of traffic and maybe some bloggers will link to it” – and that’s where it ends for most people selling their “Social Media Expert” services.
The blog owner and writer is called Derek Showerman, looking at his blog and playing a bit of email Ping Pong, he seems to be a very switched on kid *ahem* (okay, he looks too old to get asked for ID) with an excellent business grounding who’s going to do great things in this crazy world of Social Media.
Social Media needs good people like this in the industry, this is for two reasons:
1. There are too many people that don’t know how to produce a good ROI for a client.
2. We need people that know what they are doing to produce positive results which will be good for the ecology of Social Media and bring a lot of good work in for the industry as a whole.
Happy Social Media Marketing!
The only items I will add to this post is that it is important to:
Map to attainable business objectives
Set realistic benchmarks for success
Most of my work, at the outset, is nailing down the items above-while setting up process and expectation that make sense for the business. Every business is unique in this respect. But the need to do so remains the same every time….without fail!
I was introduced to this viral marketing idea this morning and it got me thinking about how every brand is sitting on a viral marketing opportunity. All it takes is a bit of planning and execution.
Exhibit: A dance group of 200 did a rendition of Rodgers and Hammerstein (The Sound of Music) “Do Re Mi”, in the Central Station of Antwerp.
Think about the amount of opportunities that dance group received after pulling off this stunt. Your home work for this weekend is for you to think about how your brand can use a viral campaign for exposure, because beleive it…………..your brand is a candidate for a viral marketing campaign! If it can work for a dance group-it can work for anyone!
There are a host of blog posts that speak to the “how” of TinyChat. What I have not seen is a blog post that speaks about the “why” of TinyChat. It is a huge business tool if used right. Here are a few ideas:
Business Communities: Use the correct keywords for your community to create an embeddable chat page. Set a chat schedule of at least one chat per week. This helps make business communities sticky. Plus, chat is considered safe for newbies to Social Media. Not to mention the ability to chat with your webcam helps put a face to the voice-a very valuable feature for business communities as they evolve. The business benefit is more reasons to utilize the community and yet another channel to communicate.
eStores: Many eStores already have a chat tool. But think about the ability to chat with peers about the products on the eStore. Having a list of buyers to chat with in order to make an educated purchase will drive sales like never before. It is one thing to talk to a store associate that is paid to speak to the customer, it is quite another to have a face to face conversation with willing peers. This will take planning and a Recognition Rewards program for the eStore staff. But the long term ramifications are huge is executed correctly. The business benefit is quicker decisions to the buy!
More Effective Webinars & Podcasts: The premium fee is worth it with its screen share functionality. Simple and effective! This tool could shirt many users from WebEx and Skype to this one universal tool. Note: Only hardcore Skype users would actually pay for the differences.
Peer Supported Customer Service: Simply create a page on your branded website where peers can help each other out, real time. Again, at the outset this will take planning on the part of the business and a recognition rewards program to empower members to help each other out. But the technology is easy enough to use it on a per need basis. The business benefit is reduced customer service costs.
Authors: Having writers block? Invite your readers to help you brainstorm your way out of the writer’s block. Or, let it be an innovation opportunity for future writings.
Product Innovation: Is your company at the key phase of a new product and you wanting real time beta feedback? Bingo!
These are just a few of the ideas I have, I could chirp all day about the different uses for this very innovative tool. I am happy to talk to your organization about how this and other Social Media tools can be utilized to recognized real benefits and ROI. For now, think about how Tinychat can be used to help your organization recognize its current business objectives. Expect to see me start using it regularly…please excuse me while I finally bend and get a webcam.
I was going to devote this post to talking about iPhone apps that will change the Real Estate landscape., but I found many really great items to comment about. So with that, I reference the Joker and say “here………………weeeeee…………………………………GO!”
Zillo- Zillo is a game changer! Instead of having to call to get information on a home you are interested in, you can now use this app to simply look. In fact, you can put in an address and widow shop what is for sale in the area and what other homes are selling for. You don’t have to be sitting on that street to use the app. This makes selling, buying and browsing for real estate much easier. Not to mention you can make educated buys and know the right time to sell based on selling trends in your neighborhood.
I thought that the website, when it came out, would make the Real Estate agent more of facilitators of transactions. The app can virtually make you a short term real estate agent.
Bing-Google now has more competition! After playing with it this weekend I was impressed to find that a search of me turned up everything Google did and then some.
Microsoft has made no bones about their hot spots at the outset being in these buckets:
Automobiles (car models, car manufacturers)
Travel & Local (countries, cities, states, points of interest like stadiums and parks)
People (celebrities, athletes, musicians, bands, politicians)
Sports (NBA, NFL, NHL and MLB teams)
Health (cancer, diet, over-the-counter and prescription drugs, symptoms, genetic and conditional disease, injury trauma)
Entertainment (popular television shows, movies)
Retail (certain electronics such as cameras, cell phones and optics products)
Events (Oscars, Fourth of July, NASCAR, etc.)
I however loved how clean everything looks and how in-depth my search was. I would love to see a rating & review section for each search result.
Two questions, did they steal Google’s algorithm? What effect does Bing have on SEO optimization?
Google Wave: I sat down and watched the video and came away with this: Google Wave is a wiki on steroids that has the usability that traditional wiki’s have not had. Personally, I think wiki’s could have replaced a companies need to create a user manual for products. Let the users create it and download it upon purchase. Anyways, I digress…what’s your opinion?
Jeremiah Owyang- Went transparent and teed up the ability for anyone to tell him how he can improve. A great post! Now if every CEO would take his lead-we might now have any more GM bankruptcy’s on our hands!
First off congrats to the Islanders fans for getting the best player in the draft. As a long time Islander fan, I can say with certainty that this has been a long time coming. I don’t remember what it is like to enjoy playoff hockey! So maybe in the future John Tavares and company can remind me.
Posted by derekshowerman 
Mark will share information on why commonground was launched, the importance of a clear and concise busi
