A Rock Star Marketer's Journal

Relationships?  Yes, relationships.  And not just any relationship.  Really solid relationships.  If you and your company have solid relations then you have the greatest potential of success within this new business and marketing landscape.  Social media has changed the way we communicate, engage and contribute .  At the very core, if your company “gets this” than you have the basic understanding of social marketing.  People and Relationships.

So put down the spreadsheets, strategy meetings, etc. and take one day to talk to your company about this concept:  Have good relations with every customer.

They say that everything that goes around, comes around.   Today this is true in two cases:

1.  This isn’t a new concept, but one that’s becoming more important.  Relationships work best where one party treats the other party how they would like to be treated.  If you treat others well the favor is returned.

2.   It’s also true in business trends.  Think back to the early days of companies (I’m talking early days, before the internet and big box retailers).  Let’s use the example of the local drugstore  where everyone knows your name, they know what you are going to pick up before you even come to the register and they even make house calls to get your medicine at all hours.   Aren’t we coming back to that?

At the very core of this business and marketing evolution its about people.  Individual people.  It’s not about a company relating to customers.  It’s about a company’s people relating with other people (historically called customers).  What social media has done is open the channels of communications.    Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and various other social mediums has allowed us to expand our relations instantly.  We can now communicate with other people singly through older methods (phone, snail mail) or several through new technologies Twitter, Facebook, email. Companies can now drill down to individuals.  And individual people (easily swelling  through these mediums) can relate back to companies through people.  Look at your personal life.  Are you communicating with more people in different way?

Are you good at relationships?   You always continue to build and build your circle of friends and network? You are a people person, have strong relationships than guess what, you are a natural-born social marketer!  Now just translate that asset company wide.

When it comes right down to it, one of the key elements in building a strategic social media marketing plan is building relationships. And those relations have are built on trust.  It was, in traditional marketing, marketers would send out messages about how good their products were. Blast them out through traditional vehicles such as TV, radio and print.  But now know there’s evidence that consumers/customers have learned to ignore these messages. Not only are we ignoring these messages through new technologies and the internet, we don’t trust them. Customer relationships with traditional brands have diminished.  This is partly why we are seeing new companies emerge and take brand equity and market share away from established competitors.  It’s why we are seeing new brands emerge, like Zappos - who ever thought a shoe store would be so successful online?  Do you think Nordstrom is running scared?

If you take the simplicity of what it takes to build relationships and you build that into a company’s core values, you are definitely strengthening your chances of succeeding in today’s market.

Relationships.  Are they good?  Then that news will be shared.  From one person to the next.  Are they bad relationships?  Well then watch out.

Let’s face it, social media is changing the way companies are going to succeed. Companies will be built on integrity and trust. And if they aren’t, they aren’t going to make it.

Bold statement? Look at Dell, Inc. As described in a Business Week article and in more detail in Jeff Jarvis’ book, “What Would Google Do?”; a simple blog post changed the way a company operated.    After Mr. Jarvis bought a Dell “lemon” and had a bad experience with customer service, he blogged about it.  And lots followed.

Dell, Inc. completely changed their customer relations program based on one customer’s complaint that groundswell through social media.  They realized they had to work with their customers, engage with them and ultimately build their trust back.  If your company is built on trusting relationships you’ll never have to worry about this problem.  It’s easier and cheaper to keep trust than to try to win it back.

Another example is Nestle’s newest social marketing blunder.  Nestle disrespectfully responded to some fans on their Facebook fan page.  This again ground swelled.  We’ll see what Nestle does to turn their brand equity around.

Ultimately, what social media is doing, is making companies built on integrity and trust and in turn deliver that to customers. If they don’t, customers, through new social media outlets will make sure others know about it.

Think of your company as the next Cheers. Where everybody knows your name.  Or at least what it stands for.

I just got this video from @mashable on Twitter.  It’s an updated version of a previous post – and has VERY current data.

To summarize:

• Over half the world’s population is under 30 years old
• 96% of  Millennials have joined a social network
• Facebook tops Google for weekly traffic in the US
• 1 out of 8 couples in the US met via social media
• 80% of companies use social media for recruitment (and 95% of that percentage useLinkedIn)
• Ashton Kutcher and  Britney Spears have more Twitter followers than the entire populations of Sweden, Israel, Switzerland, Ireland, Norway and Panama combined – 4.8 million each
• 50% of mobile internet traffic in the UK is for Facebook
• 78% of Wikipedia content is in languages other than English
• 25% of search results for the world’s top 20 largest brands are links to user-generated content
• 90% of people skips ads via  TiVo/ DVR

A little more then a fad is my guess.

This video gives you a snapshot of the trends in social media, the ROI and some stats/information on companies that are getting this right.

Disclaimer: I have not validated the data released in this video.

I recently came across this term. Dunbar’s number. I could pretend I knew what it was. But I’d be lying. Intrigued by the term in the context of a conversation with MIT students at Sloan’s Business in Games Conference, I decided to check it out. First stop: Wikipedia.

Here’s the explanation I found.

“Dunbar’s number is a theoretical cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships. These are relationships in which an individual knows who each person is, and how each person relates to every other person. No precise value has been proposed for Dunbar’s number, but a commonly cited approximation is 150. On the periphery, the number also includes past colleagues such as high school friends with whom a person would want to reacquaint themselves if they met again.^“

Wow. Rinse. Repeat. Let me summarize. The ” limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships” is guesstimated to be 150. Is that possible? Is it low? Still questioning the basis of this theory I went on to find further information. Next stop. Google Advanced Search.

In a nutshell this theory was introduced by Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar “a British anthropologist and evolutionary biologist, specialising in primate behavior. The term became most popularized by Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, where it plays a central role in Gladwell’s arguments about the dynamics of social groups.” This popular book was released in 2006.

In 4 years opportunities to connect with others have multiplied through social networks including Facebook, Myspace, LinkedIn among all the others. I know for myself that I have with high school and college friends, colleagues from my previous professional lives, etc. I have a lot more “connections”. We may not talk to each other every day, we may not see each other every day, but for those that I’m connected with I stay connected to their lives based on how much they publicize.

Does this impact Dunbar’s number? I guess we’ll have to wait to see how this all plays out. I think at the end of the day our definition of “friend” is going to change.

I love this commercial.  Not sure if it actually sells their services, but certainly makes you laugh….

Thoughts?  Does it make you want to fly AirTran?  Or does it make you laugh?

I was getting itchy to upgrade my phone. I knew I was close to the end of my contract. Maybe I should go with the Iphone?

But Verizon has been my mobile carrier for several years now. As much as I wanted an Iphone, I refused to move services over to AT & T. I had AT & T once for a contract. I said I’d never go back. I lost more calls than I kept, I couldn’t even pick up service in several locations and the customer service was below par.

So I brought my Blackberry Curve into the Verizon store to see if I was eligible. Walah (pronounced wa-la). I was. Next decision was which phone. I liked my Blackberry but craved for a touch screen. The Blackberry Storm was getting terrible reviews. The salesperson convinced me to go with the Droid.

So far, after a month of use, these are my observations:

1. It’s not well made: Ok, I dropped it once while walking. But still. The slide keyboard is loose.

2. It’s heavy: It’s much fatter than the Iphone, and heavier. This is in compromise for the large screen and full keyboard.
But if you are on long conference calls, which I am often, it’s best used with Bluetooth, speaker phone or headset. It’s just cumbersome to hold for any length of time.

3. Not intuitive: The setup and menu screens are difficult to navigate. And Verizon/Motorola has done a horrible job in using YouTube and other video social mediums to get the directions circulated.

4. Touchy: This is a positive or a negative. For me it’s a negative. I find it impossible to use the touch keyboard while holding the Android vertical. The horizontal touch keyboard is a little easier. However it than uses too much of the screen. The slide keyboard is the best but I find that challenging as the keys are not raised at all. I may have to get rid of my finger nails. I think the phone is designed for men.

5. Notification System is Annoying: This is a problem only because I haven’t found a solution. I’m SURE that Droid/Google/Motorola COULD not have possibly made this without customization. But I have yet to figure it out. I have notifications going off for calendar reminders, email notifications, Twitter, Facebook and phone. Which has caused me to turn it off the phone completely. Doesn’t this defeat the purpose of having a phone?

Now, onto the positives.

1. The screen is beautiful: So crisp. And larger than the Iphone. I do warn that it is impossible to see in the sun, but I don’t know a smart phone that is.

2. Camera is awesome: Enough said. Much better than the Blackberry.

3. Microphone works: The Droid has a voice activation search feature. It’s so helpful and functional. It helps me work around the keyboard issues I have from above.

4. Google Maps is Fantastic: I work in Boston. Google maps help me navigate through the streets while walking or visiting another city. This feature helps me feel safe wherever I am, particularly while I’m in another city.

And saving the best for last……..(drum roll)

5. Gadget Master: This phone, added with apps and apps, becomes the best gadget in the world. I can link to all my social network accounts, Twitter, can keep track of shopping lists, emails, music (my favorite is Shazam. It’s come in handy during those times that song is playing somewhere and I need to have it), my calorie intake, coupons, news, dictionary…..blah, blah, blah. Finally in one place, I can store everything.

All in all it’s been a good experience.  For the most part, other than the input challenges, most of it’s been “user error”.  Trial and error.

However………Verizon and Apple just announced the Iphone for Verizon service.  Doesn’t it just figure?  Grrrrrr.  Technology is becoming a lot like purchasing cars.  As soon as you take it off the lot, it decreases in value because something newer and better becomes available.

A couple of months ago I had a very interesting meeting with a VC backed social gaming company.  Honest to goodness, I was told from this highly educated CEO of a social gaming company,  (don’t even ask, I’m not revealing the name),  ”We don’t need marketing.  Read Jeff Jarvis’ book, “What Would Google Do?”

SO, off I went, bought the book and read.  I do recommend the book.  It’s a lot about the “network effect”, social networking and marketing, although none of those words are used in the description of the book.  And it does in fact paint a simple picture, supported with examples (obviously the largest being Google), that marketing is not needed these days.  And, as this VC guy had done, had bought into the ideation of “If you build it, they will come.”

Well, as a marketer, I beg to differ.  And it’s not just about defending my talent or even my career.  Really.

But it can be very dangerous to think that anyone can have success in not doing “some” sort of marketing.  Unless of course you are first or the best. (more on that later).

Take social gaming for instance.  When games first appeared on Facebook, very few were actually marketed in the traditional sense.  However, the expansion of those games (take Who’s Got the Biggest Brain (from Playfish, who was purchased for $600M to traditional video game company Electronic Arts) for example took advantage of the network effect, viral loops, social media and lots and lots of publicity.  The marketing was built “in the product” from the beginning from its inception.  And now that there are more competitors in the social gaming space we do see games advertised on FB.  Social City certainly just made an effort to get out of the clutter with their new ads clearly targeted to other social gaming customers.

My point is this, at the beginning of any new business growing sector there are success stories of those that launched companies or products without marketing.   But as competitor’s step in, it’s time to add in your marketing engine.

As a social media consultant, I usually work with CEO’s or top executives on a daily basis.   My observation is this:  MOST companies are running scared with this new addition of social media.  ”And I use this how?”

Most don’t understand it, don’t know how it fits into their strategic objectives – they just know they need to be there and quick before they miss the boat.

Now as a consultant, I work for the client, so I make every effort to do what the client wants.  But I always lead with this question, “Why do you want to be there?”  And the answer I get, “Well, everyone else is there – we need to be there too.”

I don’t necessarily disagree with these statements, however, what several forget is that you need to have a reason for a marketing vehicle, a strategy and techniques that make sense.  Social media is another tool in a marketer’s toolbox.  Like this and all the others, they need to be integrated with the rest of your marketing initiatives to work.  A Twitter account with tweets about the company (ie, tweets of Press Releases) is not a way to get a following.  What you need to do is Tweet about what your customer cares about.  They don’t care that you are expanding, they don’t care that your financials were on target for the quarter, or that your top sales person was promoted to VP of Sales and Marketing.

What they do care about is how they can use your product or service.  Not the features, but the benefits.   A great example of a company that gets it is www.hubspot.com.  As for Twitter, they tweet about useful information to do with social media, its uses and how to use it to your advantage.  They offer a software application which they want you to buy eventually but they don’t talk about their product directly, just how important social media is and how to use it.

My point is this:  Don’t jump on the social media bandwagon without a good solid strategy.  Yes, it “may” be important for you to use these tools – but use them correctly.  And don’t forget that there is still a place for traditional marketing (more on that later).

Or even better, hire me.

I have found an important part of this blogging process is finding “your voice”.  Should I write in first person? Third? Casual? Professional?

This is the era of transparency; I’m going to err on the side of just being me.  I’ll try it on for a while.

Now honestly, I’m going to go to bed.