Pu#ng social media to work
The Publicity Club of New England
09
N ov. 2, 20

10 Emerging Best Prac8ces
Cisco, GE, Intuit, IBM, Best Buy,
UPS, Visible Technologies,
Cymfony, Radian6, Market Sentinel
Download here:
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Advice highlights from study
1. Don’t just jump in; spend 8me listening, observing
2. Start with an objec8ve that’s 8ed to a priority
3. Don’t worry about bad experiences
4. Employee social media guidelines/policies should
reflect corporate values
5. Involve legal from the beginning
6. Educa8on beats legisla8on
7. The human element is essen8al
8. Involve your agencies, but don’t outsource to them
9. Share the data
10. Invest as if it maTers
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What we’re seeing
Business skills
• ConversaFonal wriFng
• Sharing + influencing messaging
• Ecosystem mapping, planning
• Social analyFcs
• Video
• Changing behavior via FUN
Business value/SM Applica8on
• PR: storytelling, corporate blogs, WOM
• Sales: reviews, word of mouth
• Customer service: TwiEer
• Innova8on: communiFes, online jams
• Research & strategy: SM monitoring, analyFcs
• Marcom: mulF‐channel, mulF‐commerce
• Leadership: diverse social media involvement
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Social media comes down to one thing: SHARING
On mul8ple pla`orms:
Advice
blogs, forums, wikis, communiFes,
News Stories Complaints microblogs
Event info QuesFons
Personal
experiences Links On mul8ple social networks:
Ideas
Sharing Photos
TwiEer, Facebook, Linked‐In, Digg,
Delicious, Slideshare, YouTube,
Resources
Finds Flickr
Praise
RecommendaFons
Points of view
Why will people share your content or ideas?
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9 themes that get no8ced, passed around ‐‐
in all forms of customer communica8ons and sales
Contrarian, Avalanche about
Anxie8es
Counterintui8ve To roll
Aspira8ons &
Beliefs How‐to Personal stories
Seasonal,
David vs. Goliath Glitz & Glam
Event‐related
Source: Beyond Buzz
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Understanding communi8es
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Easy‐to‐use, inexpensive pla`orm is “8pping point”
• 1.6 million Ning communi8es
• 4,500 new communi8es a day
• 1 million members register every 12 days
• 52 million registered users

2009 Tribaliza8on of Business Study*
Top business objec8ves for communi8es:
• Increase word‐of‐mouth (38 percent)
• Increase customer loyalty (34 percent)
• Increase brand awareness (30 percent)
• Improve idea generaFon (29 percent)
• Improve the quality of customer support (23 percent)
Greatest obstacles to crea8ng successful community:
• Get to Join (24 percent)
• Stay engaged (30 percent)
• Keep returning (21 percent)
* Study of 400 companies, conducted by Beeline Labs, DeloiEe, Society for New
CommunicaFons Research. Click here for more study results.
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What makes communi8es successful
• Clear purpose
• Deeply‐felt and/or widely felt issue
• Help and get help: people you trust
“People eagerly engage when they
want something to improve.
Seth Godin, Tribes

Mo8vators: to help and get help about things they care about
“People eagerly engage when they
want something to improve.
Seth Godin, Tribes
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“Social mediafying”
your programs
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Map your social media ecosystems
Use social analy8cs to understand
‐‐ What’s being talked about
‐‐ Your social media hot spots
‐‐ Who your Influencers are
‐‐ What content your audience likes
‐‐ Gaps: opportuniFes
‐‐ Where, how to engage
‐‐ PrioriFes
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To get more interest, be more interesting.
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Put your point‐of‐view together in a shareable form
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Share it where people are browsing:
1. Your site/blog
2. YouTube
3. Twitter
4. SlideShare
5. Delicious
6. Digg
7. StumbleUpon
8. Facebook, LinkedIn Groups
9. Etc.
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Embed reviews/recommenda8ons
VALUE: shorten sales process
Online reviews are second only to
personal advice from a friend
as the driver of purchase
decisions. "Web users and web
community," Rubicon ConsulFng, Inc. October
2008
The Trust in AdverFsing survey of
26,000+ found that Consumer
RecommendaFons are the most
credible form of adverFsing. "Social
Media MarkeFng: The Right Strategy for Tough Economic
Times" Awareness, 2008
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Do more with social media tagging
Add social media bookmarks
/tagging
funcFonality to every page on
sites
Increased keyword relevancy
results in improved organic
rankings and traffic; spend less
on paid search
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Use social sharing sites
Upload/tag your content on free
info‐sharing sites like Slideshare, Squidoo.
Value
Reach more of the right people;
Relevancy, search value.
Free. Leverage good content.
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Create channel strategies
Value
• Free media channel for adverFsing
• Way to engage fans, advocates,
• Opportunity: user generated videos
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Take blogging to next level
Thought leadership blog Corporate blog
Blog contributors are well known experts with Company experts who typically do not have
their own followings established audiences
Value: greater readership, more quickly
Editorially independent Content controlled by company and seen as
Value: trusted as a credible source for blog readers such.
Considered a news site or online media property A component of corporate markeFng, and
Value: can be listed by news search engines for with associated skepFcism
be@er search results than corporate sites and blogs
Steady and engaging volume of posts (30‐50 per Onen a struggle to maintain a consistent flow
month) of posts
Value: a conAnuous “content generator”
Example of thought leadership blog Beeline Lab produces for Microsoft
On enterprise 2.0 adoption: FastForward
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Create ambassador programs
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Measurement
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To measure, first define business objec8ve…
New product ideas?
Earn customer confidence?
Improve Net Promoter Score?
Reduce customer service costs?
Awareness in category?
Reduce training, educaFon costs?
Change percepFons?
Get votes? …AND DESIGN FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE
Get sales?
Solve more problems, faster?
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Measuring: many ways to approach
Benefit
Metric
Value
Traffic # page views, visitors Cost in similar ad
channel
Press menFons # stories in media, high profile bloggers Ad cost in publica8on
Search engine % of top search results driven by blog, Cut SEO costs, paid
posiFoning community search keywords
Word of mouth # people commenFng Cost of buzz agent, share
of conversa8on
consumer insight # Fmes provide useful business insight Cut focus group, survey
savings costs
Increased sales # prospects, customers, sales who read; Decrease in sales cost;
efficiency content to be repurposed for lead gen content crea8on costs
Influence # incoming links from prominent sources; Reduced PR effort
/leadership # new relaFonships
Reduced training # of employees, customers who read Reduced prof’l
costs development costs
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Map month‐to‐month SM ac8vi8es to key
performance indicators to prove rela8onships
Examples of key performance indicators:
• Retail traffic (online and bricks)
• # new customers
• $ per customer
• TransacFonal precursors for industry
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5 trends to keep on your radar screen
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5 trends to pay aTen8on to
1. Transparent customer service = markeFng +
reputaFon
2. ATen8on: to get more interest, need to be
more interesFng
3. Customer collabora8on: people expect to be
involved
4. Employee communi8es: Ning/Facebook on
steroids vs. Intranets
5. FUN: tap into what people like to do for
business gain, e.g. mobile games, predicFon
markets
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Free Resources: www.Beelinelabs.com
Lois’ blog: Foghound.com
Community for marketers, PR pros: MarkeFngtwo.net
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