Social Media & Promotional Products

Social Media & Promotional Products
Mark Graham
June 2010

Mark Graham
Founder of Distributor, RIGHTSLEEVE.COM
Social media and technology enthusiast
I am one of you

#promotionalproducts
@RIGHTSLEEVE

I want you to consider 3 things

#1. The immutable law of sales
People buy from people they like

#2. A distributor’s biggest challenge
Buyers struggle to see the difference between us

#3. Buying behaviour
People trust their friends more than institutions

In the next 75 minutes …
What’s all the fuss about?
Specific social media tools
How to do this right

A Social Media Primer
Social media consists of online conversations between real people - customers, employees, vendors - using websites or online platforms.
Image credit http://www.flickr.com/photos/matthamm/2945559128

Why Invest in Social Media?

New way of engaging clients

Point of Differentiation

Builds Trust

Cost Effective

Communication Tool of Next Generation

Network effects

Thought Leadership in your Niche

Social Media Tools
Blogs
Online video - YouTube
Microblogging - Twitter
Social networking - Facebook
Professional networking – LinkedIn
Product Comments and Ratings
Company newsfeed

Blogging Basics
Be a Storyteller
Be Human
Have Fun
Blogger, Wordpress, Typepad

blog.epromos.com

brandedmatters.com

swag20.com

Online video platform
Free distribution for your content
Anyone can be a star
Product Information Tool

What are you doing … right now?
140 characters
“You are who you follow”
#Hashtags
Professional/mature demographic
See what people are saying about specific topics (incl. you)!

Proactive Sales Opportunities

Fan “shout-outs”

Recommendations

The New How Shirt w/ Wearing Instructions
Yes, it’s true, no one really needs another t-shirt. But we do wear logos, designs we care about. And we often wear things that embody our values.
So I recently decided to order t-shirts for the #NewHow movement. The process itself was entirely a process of collaboration. Let me share it.
First, I reached out to a person I have only met a few times in person but stay regularly in contact with on Twitter, @missrogue. Having watched her do a #karaoke tour across the US last year, I figured she had to know something about swag vendors. And because I really do still have a day job I wanted to find the vendor to work with, and go fast. No surprise, 5 minutes later, I got an introduction to Mark Graham at #RightSleeve. Within hours, I had a reasonable quote, options to pursue and a rough schedule that would let me take shirts to my #fidelity talk on innovation. Mark uses email like I do — highly efficient, asynchronous conversation to let us move faster and truly do high-baud work.
But at that point, I still hadn’t decided what I wanted the design to be. So I emailed a collaborator and asked him something simple like, “thoughts?” and got back a very fast note that set the theme of the shirt: I am the New How. Which I liked. I asked to see the designs in context with the shirts and color choices. When I got drafts (from RIGHTSLEEVE), I simply forwarded to the #Rubicon team and a few other folks and asked for feedback. 5-10 minutes later, I had what I needed. Decisions were made. Order placed. Literally, the whole process probably took me a total of 30-45 minutes to do. And all in 5 minute increments. That’s a vendor and an extended set of collaborators I want to work with.

Talk about an emotional connection!
Audience = 57,500 people
Cost = zero

Effective PR Tool/Damage Control

Online community of friends (social graph)
800 pound gorilla
Fan Pages & Groups
Emotional connection with your products

“Bridging the gap between all generations of Promotional
Product professionals”

Online community of business contacts
Online resume
Great prospecting tool
Online recommendations

Product Comments and Ratings
Client ownership
Builds credibility with “real” comments
Ability to quickly react to negative feedback
The products become “yours”
Getsatisfaction.com, Yelp.com

Company Newsfeed
Web 2.0 inside your company (how we work at RIGHTSLEEVE)
Critical selling activities displayed in real time
Eliminate silos b/w sales and operations
Complete transparency
Fosters teamwork

What you can do now
Locate your customers/competitors
Interview a customer and post the content online
Start practicing to find your “voice”
Setup profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube
Create a video (Microsoft MovieMaker, Apple Final Cut Pro, iMovie, Flip Video)
Write about stuff that interests you
Join the conversation

Resources
Tara Hunt The Whuffie Factor
Chris Anderson The Long Tail
Clay Shirky Here Comes Everybody
Joel Comm Twitter Power
Mitch Joel Six Pixels of Separation
Mashable www.mashable.com
ReadWriteWeb www.readwriteweb.com

@RIGHTSLEEVE

Social Media & Promotional Products

by Mark Graham

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