1. socialbrands!
the future of marketing!simon kemp

2. the most successful
brands don’t just predict
the future; they define the
future on their own terms.!
2

3. SocialBrands:TheFutureOfMarketing
You have permission to print, post and share this
document for free in any online or offline channel,
provided you make no changes or edits to its
contents or format.
In fact, I’d be delighted if you shared it with everyone
you know, so I’ve included some ready-made
tweets throughout the document to make sharing
easier. Simply click this symbol whenever you see it:
Please note that the right to sell this document, or
any of its contents, in any format, is strictly reserved.
3

4. Introduction

5. SocialBrands:TheFutureofMarketing
The world’s best brands don’t just predict the future;
they define the future on their own terms. However,
it’s the brands that define their future in terms of the
enduring value they add to people’s lives that are
most likely to succeed.
This eBook presents a series of provocations to help
you define your brand’s vision of the future, and
helps you to start bringing that vision to life today by
building a more social brand.
5

6. The8PrinciplesOfSocialBrands
1. Social Equity Drives Brand Equity
2. Communities Have More Value Than Platforms
3. All Your Marketing Must Add Value
4. Go Mobile Or Stand Still
5. Evolve From Big Ideas To Leitmotifs
6. Move From Selective Hearing To Active Listening
7. Experiences Are The New Products
8. CSR Must Evolve Into Civic Engagement
6

7. 1
social equity drives brand equity

8. StartingOutRight
The key to delivering returns on marketing
investments (ROMI) is to set clear business
objectives at the outset of marketing activities, and
to ensure that everything the brand does is then
focused on delivering those objectives.
This goes for social media too; if social activities are
not focused on delivering bottom-line benefits for
the brand, they quickly become a dispensable cost.
However, many brands are still stuck in short-term,
cyclical marketing, and objectives are often overly
focused on each quarter’s financial results.
8

9. As a result, marketers often set short-term, sales-
related objectives for social media, instead of
thinking about the longer-term benefits of an
approach that builds meaningful engagement with
audiences over time.
This is also partly because relationships take time to
deliver their full potential – often too long to satisfy
Finance’s relentless demands.
Consequently, brands often miss the wood for the
trees when it comes to social ROI, and focus on
delivering short-term increments at the expense of
valuable, enduring relationships.
9

10. DeliveringLonger-TermValue
However, deep audience relationships offer a
different kind of value. Once brands achieve a
certain level of affinity and engagement with an
audience, the returns become more sustainable.
So ‘returns on relationships’ aren’t limited to one-
time results; they’re the marketing gift that keeps
giving.
But how do we build these meaningful
relationships? The answer lies in understanding the
reasons why people choose to talk about brands.
10

11. The Sociology Of Choice

12. Humans are highly social creatures, and it’s
important to remember that people don’t make
choices in isolation.
Our decisions are often influenced by our
expectations of other people’s reactions. The more
confident we are that those expectations will be
met, the greater our conviction when making those
choices.
As a result, the conversations we have with other
people are one of the most important factors in
determining our brand choices.
12

13. Conversation Drives Compensation

14. TalkIsCheap,ButConversationsHaveValue
Humans are inherently social beings, and we like to
share our discoveries and experiences with others.
As a result, brands that inspire favourable
conversations between people are more likely to
achieve higher awareness, interest, and trial.
Brands that can manage these favourable
conversations over time are also more likely to "
build enduring loyalty and value.
14

15. the brands that drive the most
favourable conversations are the
brands that will achieve the most
favourable financial outcomes.
15

16. It’s the conversations between people that matter
most, though, and these are not necessarily the
same conversations that they have directly with the
brand.
Conversations don’t have to start in social media for
them to have value, either; everything the brand
does – from its packaging to its advertising, and
from its customer service to its recruitment – should
be designed to inspire meaningful, peer-to-peer
conversations.
16

17. 17
products
customer"
service
pos activity
advertising
packaging
recruitment
Everything Should Drive Conversation!

18. Building Brands Worth Talking About

19. The implications of this are huge; for example, when
it comes to a ‘content’ strategy, we should not start
with the usual suspects such as videos or ‘fill-in-the-
blanks’ status updates.
We must stop relying on conversations about
content, and use content as a means of fuelling the
conversations that really matter.
This means re-thinking our approach to brand
communications. We need to start by identifying
what we want conversations to be about, and then
identify the most engaging and motivating ways of
inspiring those conversations.
19

20. stop fuelling
conversations about
content; use content to
fuel the conversations
that really matter.
20

21. ConvertingToConversations
That inspiration can come in many forms, and only a
small number of those catalysts need to originate in
social media.
Before you make any investments, be very clear
about why the audience might want to be a part of
this conversation.
Be honest with yourself; will anyone actually care?
21

22. ask yourself:
is it really worth
talking about?
22

23. ROI Becomes Return On Interest

24. SocialEntitiesDriveSocialEquity
The good news is that getting this right has huge
financial potential; a brand that’s worth talking about
is a brand that people are willing to pay more for.
In order to take advantage of this potential value, we
must spend more time working out how our brands
can become relevant ‘social entities’.
By building social entities, we in turn build social
equity, and, if managed consistently over time, this
social equity builds financial equity.
24

25. 2
build communities, not platforms

26. SocialIsABehaviour,NotAChannel
Most people visit social networking sites to connect
others: to stay in touch with friends and family; to
share things with colleagues and peers; and even to
meet strangers with similar interests and needs.
There are times when technology plays an important
part in facilitating these connections; the filters on
Instagram, or the sharing features common to most
social networks, are important parts of the social
networking experience. However, for most people,
social media are just means to an end, with that
‘end’ being social interaction.
26

27. PeopleBeforePlatforms
People connect around the personal, social benefits
the technologies provide, not the functionality itself.
Critically, if those social benefits don’t exist – if the
people we want to connect with are not present, or
if our networks move on – then the platform quickly
loses its value.
We’ve seen this happen many times before; the
declines of Second Life, MySpace, and Friendster
were all driven by the migration of their audiences,
not by technical failures.
27

28. Single-Serve Audiences

29. Sadly, when audiences move on from incumbent
platforms – and they invariably do – marketers
quickly lose out.
The investments they’ve made in building a large,
platform-specific audience stop delivering
meaningful returns, because such audiences are
invariably ‘non-transferrable’. How many brands
succeeded in migrating their Second Life audience
over to Facebook without paying for the privilege?
Marketers need to stop buying attention within
specific platforms, and find a more enduring way of
managing social media engagement.
29

30. From Platforms To Communities

31. We need to stop thinking of social media as media,
and instead focus on the motivations and behaviour
that drive people’s social activities in the first place.
Instead of buying attention in the biggest platforms
of the day, the successful brands of the future will
spend time understanding how to deliver value to
audiences across different settings and contexts.
They will nurture active communities that choose to
engage with and around the brand and its activities
wherever and whenever they can. They will use new
platforms to offer incremental value, and not simply
to interrupt people in new ways.
31

32. use new technology
to add new value,
not just to interrupt
people in new ways.
32

33. From Eyeballs To Heartstrings

34. CommonUtilityForCommunities
The secret to building ‘migratory’ communities is to
understand people’s wants, needs and desires, and
to build relevant and engaging connections around
them at every opportunity.
We need to understand what brings communities
together, and build our strategies around their
shared interests and passions, and not around
technical functionality or platforms.
Above all, we need to add value to our audiences’
lives at every opportunity.
34

35. build strategies
around passions,
not platforms.
35

36. 3
all your marketing must add value

37. Too much of today’s marketing relies on elaborate
spectacle to divert people’s attention. Brands have
come to rely on interrupting people with increasingly
shiny distractions, placing their emphasis on short-
term gains instead of longer-term, mutual value.
The result is ‘one-night-stand marketing’:
transactional relationships based on pick-up lines
and instant gratification, at the expense of more
meaningful, enduring relationships.
However, this approach is unsustainable. We need
to think about getting engaged.
37

38. shouting
for attention
rarely wins
people’s
hearts.
38

39. From Interruption To Interaction

40. BetterEngagement,BetterResults
The secret to better marketing is not about finding
more efficient ways to interrupt people. Rather, it’s
about finding new ways to engage people as
effectively as possible.
The secret to this engagement lies in understanding
what people want, and in adding value at every
possible opportunity; offering people things that
make their lives better, and adding to their
experiences instead of interrupting them.
40

41. in the future,
marketing that
doesn’t add
value will simply
be ignored.
41

42. From Ads To Added Value

43. MarketingMustBeAboutThem,NotYou
This shift from interruption to added-value
interaction will impact media too.
Publishers will need to evolve from ad-funded
models that are inherently value-detractive, and
rethink their business models around an approach
that delivers a more integral value proposition.
It’s the shift to an audience-centric model – rather
than a brand-oriented, media-centric model – that
will have the greatest impact on marketing though. If
we are to succeed in this future, we need to put our
audiences’ needs, wants, desires first.
43

44. engage people
around their
passions, not
your products.
44

45. 4
go mobile or stand still

46. MobilePhonesAreEverywhere
Google tells us that more people around the world
now own a mobile phone than a toothbrush, while
the UN tells us that more people have access to
mobile phones than toilets.
However, despite the mobile phone’s ubiquity, a
recent study revealed that just four in ten brand
advertisers in APAC consider mobile to be ‘very
important’ to their current marketing, while a scant
three in ten actually have a mobile strategy at all.
So why aren’t marketers’ plans more in tune with
their audience’s existing behaviour?
46

47. 47
north america
latin america
africa
middle east
western europe
central &
eastern europe
asia pacific
103%
114%
71%
109%
128%
132%
100%
china
84%
india
56%
Source: Ericsson Mobility Report, June 2013
Mobile Penetration By Region, June 2013!
eskimon.com

48. Although it’s difficult to measure these things
accurately, data suggest that more people around
the world now subscribe to a mobile phone plan
than have access to TV.
In other words, it’s highly likely that, around the
world, more people now use mobile phones than
watch TV. That’s a huge shift.
Moreover, according to Ericsson, global adoption
of mobile phones is still growing at a rate of 130
million new subscriptions per quarter.
48

49. 49
mobile subscribers
television viewers
4.5 billion
4.2 billion
VS
Today’s Media Reality!
Sources: mobile subscriber data from the Ericsson Mobility Report, June 2013; television viewer data extrapolated from data cited by BrightSideOfNews.com

50. MobilesAreOnTheMove
Of course, many people around the world still rely
on relatively basic ‘feature’ phones rather than the
more sophisticated smartphones, but these devices
still provide a level of intimacy that TV can’t match.
What’s more, the shift to internet-connected
smartphone devices continues to accelerate, and
Ericsson reports that global mobile data usage is
currently increasing at close to 30% per quarter.
50

51. 51
Q4"
12
Q1"
07
Q2"
07
Q3"
07
Q4"
07
Q1"
08
Q2"
08
Q3"
08
Q4"
08
Q1"
09
Q2"
09
Q3"
09
Q4"
09
Q1"
10
Q2"
10
Q3"
10
Q4"
10
Q1"
11
Q2"
11
Q3"
11
Q4"
11
Q1"
12
Q2"
12
Q3"
12
Q1"
13
0.2 EB
0.4 EB
0.6 EB
0.8 EB
1.0 EB
1.2 EB
100% growth"
in 12 months
1.4 EB
1.6 EB
Source: Ericsson Mobility Report, June 2013. Figures represent total global monthly mobile data traffic (uplink + downlink) in exabytes (1 exabyte = 1 million terabytes)
Global Monthly Data Traffic!
eskimon.com

52. Out Of Sync

53. Perhaps more tellingly, people are increasingly
emotionally connected to their phones too.
70% of people in China say that they “can’t live
without” a mobile phone.
People used to say the same of TV, but ironically,
many people now download ‘TV’ content to watch
on their mobile phones whenever they choose,
without the adverts.
This isn’t about replacing one medium with another,
though; TV still has a vital role to play in the mix.
53

54. InvestmentsToGo
On the contrary, mobile has a big part to play in the
evolution of TV, by enabling and promoting
phenomena such as second-screen interaction and
trans-media storytelling.
But in a world where mobile helps us reach more of
our consumers, more of the time, in more
contextually relevant ways than TV, we must invest
more of our time and budgets to explore how
mobile can help us succeed.
54

55. If It’s Not Mobile, It’s Not Going Anywhere

56. Mobile offers a very different kind of audience
experience to TV. The latter is still largely a
communal device; a centrepiece that takes pride of
place in our living rooms.
However, mobile is more personal; its primary
purpose has always been to connect us with other
people, rather than to deliver passive entertainment.
Critically, people have more control over their
phones. They alone decide which activities they
participate in, what content they consume, and
where and when they do so.
56

57. 57
93%
52%
70%
55%
40%
44%
81% 80%
43%
84%
58%
67%
62%
59%
39%
71%
75%
43%
45%
17%
15%
26%
11%
8%
13%
15%
7%
China
South Korea
India
SMS! Email! Instant"
Messaging!
Mobile"
Shopping!
Web"
Browsing!
Using"
Apps
Video &"
Mobile TV!
Streaming"
Music!
Social"
Networking!
Source: Nielsen 2013 mobile consumer report (Feb 2013). Figures represent the percentage of respondents in each country performing the specified activity on their phone in the past 30 days
Activities Performed On Mobile Phones!eskimon.com

58. My Precious

59. Because of their size and flexibility, mobiles have
also become many people’s most important
devices, following us to the boardroom, to the
bedroom, and even to the bathroom.
Surveys have found that one in three American
smartphone owners would rather give up sex than
give up their phones, although 20% of young
Americans also admit to having used their phone
during sex.
Perhaps because of this device intimacy, however,
people don’t welcome interruptions on their phones.
As a result, interruptive broadcast approaches are
definitely not the best use of the medium.
59

60. Car
PublicTransport
Travelling
LivingRoom
Kitchen
Bedroom
HomeOffice
InStores
Friend’sHouse
Outdoors
School
Work
Restaurant
Library
60
51%
68%
74%
67%
53%
65%
31%
74%
22%
60%
75%
58%
65%
20%
eskimon.com
Mobile Web Usage Locations!
Figures represent percentage of US smartphone users who access the internet via smartphones in each location. Source: Forrester’s North American Technographics Online Benchmark Survey, Dec 2012

61. 1 in 3 smartphone
owners would rather
give up sex than give
up their phone.
61

62. Social By Design

63. ConnectingPeople
Mobile phones started life as a truly ‘social medium’;
they were always intended to be a means of
connecting people.
However, as they’ve evolved from voice-and-text
handsets into today’s multi-purpose connected
devices, the scope of social interaction that they
offer has increased dramatically, to the extent that
telephony now only accounts for a fraction of our
mobile activities.
63

64. Crucially, the importance of social networking on
mobile devices continues to grow.
819 million people accessed Facebook from
mobile devices in June 2013, accounting for 71% of
the site’s total user base, and British smartphone
users check Facebook an average of 14 times
every day.
Meanwhile, American smartphone owners spent
40.8 billion minutes using social media mobile
apps in July 2012. On an annualised basis,
that’s close to 1 million years of human time spent
on mobile social activities in the US alone.
64

65. J.D. Power found that American smartphone users
spend an average of almost two hours per week
using social media apps, while comScore reports
that 55% of all social media activity in the US takes
place on a mobile device.
These trends aren’t unique to the US either; our
recent SDMW research indicates that mobile’s
share of social activities around Asia is even higher.
What’s more, with the increasing use of mobile
instant messaging apps like WeChat, Line, and
Kakaotalk, mobile social’s share of our attention is
only set to increase.
65

66. Marketing Implications

67. FiguresOnTheGo–GoFigure
Mobile doesn’t just offer new opportunities to drive
attention and engagement though; it is increasingly
becoming a key channel for conversion too.
Here again, the role of mobile social media comes to
the fore, with around half of Facebook’s users in
the UK checking the site while in physical stores.
Within the next few years, marketing strategies that
don’t come to life on mobile devices will never come
to life at all.
67

68. 68
China
Australia
India
Vietnam
Thailand
South Korea
Philippines
Indonesia
Malaysia
Japan
55%
24%
26%
15%
23%
37%
23%
26%
17%
22%
Web Users Making Mobile Purchases!
Figures represent internet users who have made purchases via their mobile phones. Source: Global Web Index, “The State of Global e-Commerce 2013” (Feb 2013)

69. in the future,
strategies that
don’t come to life
on mobile will never
come to life at all.
69

70. Connecting

71. So how do marketers make better use of mobile
apps? The answer doesn’t need to be about
building native apps.
Indeed, even when native apps are available, people
don’t always use them. Mark Zuckerberg reported
that ”there are more people in the world using
Facebook on mobile Web” than using the iOS and
Android native apps combined.
To make better use of mobile devices, we first need
to understand why people use them; what are the
wants, needs and desires driving their behaviour?
71

72. Simple principles for better mobile marketing:
1. Deliver value: utility, entertainment, or social interaction.
2. Harness mobile context: tailor experiences to the
different situations in which people engage.
3. Streamline the experience: adapt content for a range of
different devices and connection speeds.
4. Make it portable: enable people to continue their
experience across devices, especially when sharing
things.
5. Offer varying depths of immersion: e.g. for people with
a 30-second work break, or with a 30-minute commute.
72

73. Stay In Touch

74. SociallyMobile
Take advantage of the fact that most people use
their mobile devices in some kind of social context,
whether they’re in the company of others, or simply
connected via social media.
People’s social media activities will increasingly
come to life on the go, so marketers must integrate
mobile and social seamlessly in order to provide the
best possible experiences, wherever and whenever
the audience chooses to engage.
74

75. 5
the rise of the comms leitmotif

76. RethinkingTheModel
For the past few decades, marketing has been
dominated by a mass-media paradigm.
During that time, we’ve defined the ‘best’ marketing
as that which makes the most efficient use of
broadcast media, and as a result, we’ve spent
decades perfecting an approach that’s all
about reducing the cost of interrupting people.
76

77. The result is communications that have been
distilled down to their lowest common denominator:
a selection of sound bites designed to be shared as
succinctly as possible across a range of media,
repeated again and again in the hopes of eliciting a
Pavlovian response that will deliver optimum
scores in campaign research tracking.
But this paradigm is broken; we’ve become
obsessed with media efficiency, and as a result,
we’ve lost sight of what effective communications
look like.
Note: effectiveness is doing the right thing; efficiency
is doing that thing right.
77

78. Back To Basics

79. A quick look at definitions reveals our fundamental
error. The English word ‘communication’ evolved
from ‘communicare’, a Latin verb meaning ‘to
share’.
At its heart, therefore, communication is about
creating a shared understanding. It isn’t about what
you say; it’s about what other people understand.
However, as part of our relentless drive to maximise
media efficiency, we’ve become overly fixated on
‘the message’ (i.e. what we want to say), and we’re
failing to build a common understanding of what our
brands and their offerings stand for.
79

80. communication isn’t
about what you say;
it’s about what other
people understand.
80

81. Brands As Social Entities

82. Before we can build a shared understanding with
our audiences, we need to gain greater clarity of
those audiences’ motivations, and the dynamics
that shape our exchanges with them.
However, in order for brands to achieve their full
potential, they also need to integrate more actively
into the social dynamics that define the world in
which they come to life.
Sadly, most brands are more interested in
themselves and their egos than they are in the
audiences they are supposed to serve.
82

83. most brands behave
like new-born children:
entirely egocentric,
and totally oblivious to
the needs of others.
83

84. However, studies have found that the traits we find
most appealing in other people are those that are
socially oriented:
! Be Natural
! Be Considerate
! Be Generous
! Be True
! Be Social
For a brand to function as a meaningful social entity,
it must embody these traits too, so we’ll explore
each of them in detail over the coming pages.
84

85. BeNatural
Popularity is more pull than push, and trying to
become popular through hollow flattery and false
mirroring is unsustainable. Impressing people is
much easier if you lead by example instead of
screaming for attention. As a result, it’s far better to
champion the cause than it is to ride the
bandwagon.
85

86. leading by example
impresses people
more than screaming
for attention.
86

87. BeConsiderate
People appreciate a good listener, so don’t talk
about yourself all the time. Take time to hear what
your audience wants to say to you, and not just to
work out what you want to say to them. Embrace
everyday people as well as celebrities.
87

88. BeGenerous
In order to build trust, give before you take. What
does your audience want, need and desire? How
can you help them achieve it through your
communications alone?
88

89. in order to
build trust,
give before
you take.
89

90. BeTrue
Stay true to your ideals, but don’t force them upon
other people. Strength, honesty, humility and
kindness are far more meaningful brand values than
‘dynamic’ or ‘cool’.
90

91. BeSocial
Conversations are as much about social discourse
as they are about the sharing of information. Avoid
an over-reliance on monologue and one-line
statements. Use dialogue to reinforce bonds as well
as to establish new relationships. Treat others as
you’d hope to be treated yourself, and always be
ready with the proverbial olive branch.
91

92. For brands, the last principle – Be Social – is
perhaps the most important when it comes to
building enduring success.
Of course, working for a ‘Conversation Agency’,
I’m biased in this regard, but We Are Social’s
positioning isn’t an accident; we strongly believe that
there’s far more value in dialogue than there is in the
broadcast paradigm of a repetitive monologue.
So how do brands ‘grow up’ and evolve from their
current communications infancy to become more
socially engaged entities?
92

93. The Art Of Conversation

94. It’s important to assert here that you can’t ‘win’ a
conversation. Conversations are about a mutual
exchange of value; if you’re trying to win, that’s most
likely called an argument.
Beyond the sharing of information and knowledge, a
big part of the mutual exchange of value in a
conversation is the opportunity to deepen bonds
and strengthen relationships.
But this is an area where many marketers fall down:
in our arrogance, we believe that we have more to
teach our audiences about our brands and offerings
than we might learn from those audiences in return.
94

95. To this point, let’s borrow a section from a Wikihow
post entitled “How To Stop Talking About Yourself”:
Respond to questions without turning the focus
onto you. When asked, “Did you see Survivor last
night?”, avoid an answer like: “Yes! I never miss an
episode; in fact my husband and I watched
Survivor, Idol, and Dancing with the Stars. Did you
see how well Kristen danced last night?”
You answered the question, but redirected the
focus onto you. Instead, try something like: “I
missed it; was it good?” Simply answer the
question they asked you, and give them a chance
to talk with you.
95

96. thetruespiritofconversationconsists
moreinbringingouttheclevernessof
othersthaninshowingagreatdealof
ityourself;hewhogoesawaypleased
withhimselfandhisownwitisalso
greatlypleasedwithyou.
–JeandeLaBrùyere
“
“
96

97. Making people feel like they’re an important part of
your brand’s world, and welcoming them into your
communications, both have huge opportunities.
For most brands, of course, it’s still financially
infeasible to have one-to-one conversations with
each individual member of the audience, but
channels like social media make these interactions
much easier than they were in a broadcast-only
world.
However, harnessing ‘conversational’ channels
involves a very different approach to the ‘lowest-
common-denominator’ communications most
marketers have become used to.
97

98. Change Is Coming

99. OneRingToRuleThemAll?
It’s becoming increasingly clear that the ‘matching
luggage’ approach associated with Big Advertising
Ideas is not as relevant to social communications as
it is to broadcast media like TV.
A single-minded communications approach may be
a great way to drive media efficiency, but it only
works effectively if we get it right first time. More
importantly, most people’s brains work in slightly
different ways, so the search for an all-powerful Big
Idea is often as futile as the quest for the Holy Grail.
99

100. One of the reasons why this approach is rarely the
best option is because lowest-common-
denominator messaging rarely delivers the highest
possible engagement or audience value.
The challenge is that single-minded
communications are only designed to convey that
single message, and that’s only efficient if conveying
that single message successfully establishes the
total desired understanding across the whole
audience.
100

101. In order to maximise effectiveness, therefore, we
may need to convey our ‘message’ in a variety of
different ways over time, and to different groups of
people, before we can establish a sufficient level of
shared understanding across the whole audience.
That was rarely an option in an expensive, TV-
dominated world, but our media mix options have
evolved, and we have new opportunities.
It’s time to rethink our commandments.
101

102. Enter The Leitmotif

103. RiffingOnATheme
In musical theory, a leitmotif is:
“a musical term referring to a short, constantly
recurring musical phrase, associated with a
particular person, place, or idea… In particular, [it]
should be clearly identified so as to retain its
identity if modified on subsequent appearances,
[but] it is transformable and recurs in different
guises throughout the piece in which it
occurs.”[ source ]
103

104. If that all sounds a bit complex, this Star Wars
explanation nails the concept beautifully:
“Each important idea [and character] in Star Wars
has its own leitmotif. At the beginning of A New
Hope, Luke watches the suns set, wondering
what his destiny in the world could be. His
leitmotif [or 'Luke's Theme', if you will], is
played wistfully and slowly to reinforce this idea.
Later, when he is in the midst of rescuing Leia, his
theme is stronger, more percussive, and rhythmic.
Essentially, the same notes are being played, but
the style with which they are played makes all the
difference in the tone of the scene.”[ source ]
104

105. Critically, a leitmotif isn’t the same as the constant
repetition of music like techno, nor that of broadcast
advertising for that matter.
Rather, it’s about a theme that changes and evolves
over time, adding new value or meaning with each
evolution. As a result, a ‘communications leitmotif’
may offer a route to more effective marketing.
Rather than relying on the constant repetition of a
single message, marketers can adopt a broader,
richer communications agenda, using a variety of
activities to engage more of their audiences in more
meaningful ways over time, thus ensuring a greater
chance of success.
105

106. Leitmotifs: From Theory To Practice

107. TheDandelionApproach
As Cory Doctorow asserted in a seminal blog
post a few years back, the dandelion doesn’t put all
its eggs (or seeds) in one basket. Rather than
investing all its efforts in nurturing a single offspring,
the dandelion spreads as many seeds as possible in
the hope that at least some will fall on fertile ground.
This is not about random dissemination though;
despite slight variations in each seed, every one
contains the DNA of its parent plants, and each one
is designed to travel as far as possible. Critically, the
‘costs’ associated with producing each seed are
low enough that individual failures are not an issue.
107

108. TheTapasApproach
Meals comprising many small, shared dishes are
popular all over the world, from Tapas in Spain
to Dim Sum in the Orient. Each individual dish can
be quite different, but each combines to deliver an
overall meal ‘experience’ that is both reliable and
enjoyable, even if each individual dish doesn’t meet
everyone’s tastes. This approach can work well for
communications too: by harnessing a variety of
smaller activities in different channels, brands have a
greater chance of delivering something that
resonates with each member of the audience to
establish a common understanding.
108

109. TheKaizenApproach
Kaizen is a Japanese term meaning “change for the
better“, and is a central part of a continuous
improvement approach. The same concept lies at
the heart of effective conversations too: each time a
participant in the discussion shares new insights or
information, the other participants can refine or
modify their opinions or approach, in order to reach
an optimum, collective understanding. The Kaizen
approach is a bit more direct than the previous two,
but it has a clear role to play in a variety of brand
situations, particularly where the topic is more
complex, or where rational motivations dominate.
109

110. 110
Sharing a wide variety of
disparate content that "
appeals to people in different
ways at different times
Bringing a variety of
approaches and themes
together at the same time to
deliver diverse engagement
dandelion
tapas
A test-and-learn approach
where the brand constantly
tweaks variations on themes
to build deeper connections
kaizen
Alternatives To Homogenous ‘Big Ideas’!

111. ListenAndLearn
There will be many more ways to bring such an
‘evolving theme’ approach to life, but the
approaches that win through will be those that
deliver a new kind of efficiency: the ability to identify
when the desired understanding has been shared
with the audience, and when investments can move
to a new communications task.
In order to achieve this efficiency, however,
marketers will need to get much better at listening to
– and measuring – audience response and reaction,
and using these inputs to refine their
communications approach.
111

112. 6
from selective hearing to active listening

113. As we saw in Chapter 3, marketing is all about
creating mutually beneficial exchanges of value. The
nature of that value exchange will vary between
brands and audiences and over time, but in order
for marketers to deliver maximum value to their
brands, it holds that they need to understand
what that value looks like to their audiences.
This isn’t just a case of asking people what they
want, though; as Steve Jobs astutely pointed out,
“It’s really hard to design products by focus
groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what
they want until you show it to them.”
113

114. MarketersNeedToBePeopleWatchers
If you want to deliver real value to people, you need
to understand them as people: their behaviour, their
attitudes and beliefs, their motivations… In short,
you need to understand their lives.
Conventional marketing research is great at finding
specific answers to specific questions, but the real
magic for marketers lies in modern-day
anthropology – not the 19th Century ‘home-stay in
Borneo’ variety, but a fresh, always-on digital
approach to meaningful people-watching.
114

115. if they are to add real
value, brands need to
understand people’s
lives, not just their
demographic profiles.
115

116. Enter Social Media Listening

117. Every day, hundreds of millions of people around
the world share valuable insights about themselves
via publicly accessible social media.
Not all of these posts mention brands, but that
doesn’t mean they’re not of value to marketers.
Indeed, almost all public posts can help inquisitive
marketers to build a richer understanding of their
audiences that they couldn’t obtain elsewhere.
Even those ubiquitous ‘photos of my lunch’ can
reveal powerful insights into an audience’s
worldview: do they opt for expensive restaurants?
Do they look for healthy alternatives? Do they
mention brand names, or stick to generic topics?
117

118. It’sThereIfYouListen
When we explore people’s social media activities
with an open mind, we’re almost certain to find
something of value.
However, almost all marketers miss this value,
because they’re too busy ‘listening’ for explicit
mentions of brand names or campaign hashtags.
As a result, we’re leaving far too many rich insights
uncovered in the feed.
118

119. From Big Data To Big Insights

120. One reason why we’re missing this value is that
marketers are too often caught up in the demands
of a quarterly sales cycle, and the ‘quick wins’ that
offer the easiest way to achieve short-term targets
often come at the cost of bigger, longer-term
opportunities.
This focus on ‘delivering the numbers’ means
marketers spend too much time looking for ways to
barge into audiences’ lives and conversations.
120

121. We spend too much time looking for ways to
interrupt people. But it doesn’t need to be that way.
Indeed, this interruptive approach – even though it’s
become ‘industry standard’ – contravenes one of
the most important rules of communication: when
you’re talking with someone, actively listen to what
they’re saying, and don’t simply wait for your turn to
speak.
Sadly, too many brands don’t even wait for their turn
to speak though; they’ve become far too used to
interrupting people whenever they have sufficient
budget.
121

122. Even amongst those brands that do listen, most
only do so on an ad-hoc basis, usually by paying a
research agency to ask a series of brand-oriented
questions. The danger with this approach is that
marketers only pay attention to a summary of
aggregated findings, and miss the motivations and
context behind people’s statements and behaviour.
In order to become more successful, marketers
need to move beyond ‘brand egocentrism’, and
start to think of their activities in the context of
people’s lives. We need to spend more time actively
getting to know our audiences, by being personally
involved in the listening process.
122

123. Social Listening vs. Social Monitoring

124. Fortunately, rich insights are readily available to
marketers with the willingness to listen.
By paying attention to the statements and
conversations that people share in public social
media, we can gain a far deeper understanding of
what people actually want, need and desire.
We don’t need to collect everything in one go,
either; by spending just 5 minutes a day actively
listening to the conversations of a subset of your
audience, you’ll quickly gain an affinity for the things
they care about.
124

125. SocialValueBeyondSocialMedia
More importantly, these insights can add value well
beyond your social media activities too; most people
[i.e. non-marketers] use social media to talk about a
wide variety of their everyday lives, so proactive
listening can inform every aspect of your brand’s
value proposition: advertising, packaging, CSR
opportunities, in-store activities, and even R&D.
In order to do this effectively, though, we need to
move beyond ‘ego monitoring’. Instead of listening
only to what people are saying about your brand,
use more generic keyword terms in your searches.
125

126. PeopleBuyBenefits
For example, if you’re a shampoo brand, don’t just
listen out for mentions of Pantene, Dove and Head
& Shoulders; ultimately, people don’t pay for
shampoo, they pay for beautiful hair, so listen out for
the broader conversations they’re having about hair.
By adopting this broader approach, you’ll quickly
gain insights into people’s problems and
motivations, their preferences, and their needs.
126

127. 127
products
customer"
service
pos activity
advertising
packaging
recruitment
Social Listening Can Add Value Everywhere!

128. Furthermore, by moving beyond the simplistic
measurement of ego metrics like share of voice or
campaign engagement, you’ll start to find
opportunities to join larger, organic audience
conversations where your brand can actually add
real value, without needing to interrupt people.
The real opportunity for social media listening is to
identify ways brands can use communications to
add real value to people’s lives, and become
welcome participants in more meaningful
conversations.
128

129. Getting Started

130. The first step towards uncovering these rich insights
is to identify who you want to listen to.
Don’t restrict this definition to your consumers
though; listening to broader audiences such as
influencers, advocates, detractors, NGOs and
regulators can add rich and unexpected insights.
Once you’ve defined your audience, you’ll need to
find where they are in public social media. You don’t
need to find everyone in your audience of course,
and you certainly don’t need to analyse every one of
their posts.
130

131. ScheduleYourListening
A great way to start is to find a few dozen people
talking about something generic (but brand-relevant)
on Twitter, and then read through some of their
other recent posts. Inevitably this will include some
photos of lunch, but you’ll start to get an affinity for
who they are as real people.
Once you do this a few times, you’ll probably want
to adopt a more systematic approach. Start by
putting together a simple list of keywords to search
for, and make a regular ‘appointment’ to listen to the
people who’re talking about those terms.
131

132. Select a few people from these conversations at
random, and take some time to listen to what
they’re saying about other things too; this way, you’ll
quickly build a more intuitive understanding of your
audience that goes well beyond demographics.
Using social listening tools can help make your
anthropological efforts more effective too; harness
the power of always-on listening tools like
Tweetdeck and Hootsuite, as well as powerful
aggregators such as Sysomos and Radian6, to
keep an ear open throughout the day and identify
opportunities to join other people’s conversations.
132

133. tools offer little
value if they’re
managed by tools.
133

134. TryItForYourself
There are a number of great, free listening tools out
there too, so don’t let budgets stop you – we
regularly use socialmention, addictomatic and
twazzup, and great new tools launch all the time.
You’ll still need to analyse conversations of course;
the tools can’t do everything on their own. However,
once you have your tools set up, you’ll only need to
listen for a few minutes every day before you start to
identify new ways to add value to your audiences’
lives and to your brand’s bottom line.
Go on, try it out now. We’ll wait for you in Chapter 7.
134

135. 7
experiences are the new products

136. TheDifferenceBetweenBuyingAndSelling
When people buy brands, they’re usually paying for
something more than a core product or service. For
example, they don’t really pay for the liquid inside a
shampoo bottle; they pay for beautiful hair, and for
the confidence which that brings.
The most successful brands understand that
broader, benefit-led marketing allows them to
extend their impact beyond core products and
services to deliver ‘augmented’ offerings that create
far greater value to both them and their audiences.
136

137. people only really pay
for benefits; products
and services are just
means to an end.
137

138. This approach applies to brands across categories:
! Nike uses participative events like We Run as core revenue
streams, not just advertising.
! The iTunes Store moves Apple from a technology manufacturer
to a broad lifestyle brand.
! Madonna earns more from concerts and merchandise than she
does from albums.
! Red Bull has repositioned itself as a ‘media and experiences
company’, extending the brand well beyond energy drinks.
! American Express uses activities like OPEN forum and Small
Business Saturday to extend beyond payment services and
become an overall ‘partner in success’ for its merchants.
138

139. ExperiencesAddMoreValueThanProducts
It’s clear to see why this approach works:
augmented experiences offer people something
more than a mere means to an end, and as a result,
they succeed in delivering a differentiated value
proposition that people are willing to pay more for.
Moreover, these experiences are inherently more
‘social’ than simple products and services too – it’s
easier for people to share an experience than it is for
them to share most products.
139

140. Critically, there are also more compelling reasons for
people to talk about great experiences than there
are to recommend products. As a result,
augmented experiences can inspire activity that
extends beyond the reach of customer reviews or
the brand’s own social media posts.
So, when it comes to your brand’s social media,
don’t just think about how you’ll drive greater
engagement with your own social media posts; use
augmented experiences to inspire organic audience
conversations.
140

141. the social marketer’s
mission is to create
brands that are always
worth talking about.
141

142. 8
csr evolves into civic marketing

143. Society increasingly expects brands to give back at
least as much as they take. As a result, CSR is
moving higher up the executive agenda, but many
companies still think of CSR in terms of corporate
philanthropy.
While this approach is more constructive than the
guilt-avoidance that characterised CSR in the
1980s, it misses a much bigger opportunity.
Brands that get CSR right don’t think of it as an
obligation; they see it as an opportunity to build
mutual value for the brands and its communities.
143

144. Civic Brands

145. MoreThanMarketing
Many of the world’s best-loved brands started out
with a civic agenda at their heart. A great example
is Cadbury, who went beyond offering world-leading
working conditions to build an entire community
around its Bourneville factory:
“In 1893, George Cadbury bought 120 acres of
land close to [the Bourneville factory] and planned,
at his own expense, a model village which would
‘alleviate the evils of modern more cramped living
conditions’. By 1900, the estate included 314
cottages and houses set on 330 acres.” [ source ]
145

146. Modern-day civic-minded brands have extended
this sense of community beyond their own workers,
and brands like TOMS are defining compelling new
standards of ethical business.
By putting CSR at the heart of the brand’s
proposition, TOMS has created a truly remarkable
brand, inspiring so much admiration and interest
that people feel compelled to share its story for
themselves.
146

147. 147
TOMS: Making Shoes, Making A Difference!

148. Brands are also increasingly using CSR as a
cornerstone of their marketing. American
Express’s Small Business Saturday initiative has
redefined the ambitions of marketers everywhere,
driving billions of dollars in sales for small
businesses, and delivering a huge boost to AmEx’s
revenues in the process.
Effective CSR doesn’t have to be large-scale to add
community value though; brands like Ben & Jerry’s
and Oreo have incorporated civic-minded
messaging in their marketing too, taking a public
stance on issues that they believe in and supporting
communities that they care about.
148

149. 149
Earned Media That Money Can’t Buy!

150. 150
Making A Stand Helps Build A Brand!

151. AHappyCompromise
Most people still recognise that these activities as
marketing, but when the alternative is interruptive
advertising that’s trying to sell things people neither
want nor need, it’s easy to understand why
community-minded marketing gets more positive
feedback across different audiences.
151

152. making things people
want is much more
effective than making
people want things.
– John Willshire
“
“
152

153. Giving And Growing

154. Brands can also use community programs as part
of their market development activities. A great
example is Nike’s ‘Reuse-a-Shoe’ programme,
where the brand recycles old sneakers to create
pitch surfaces for inner-city sports grounds.
Communities benefit through access to state-of-
the-art sports facilities where they can exercise and
train for free, while Nike benefits by getting people
more actively involved in sports, thereby increasing
potential sales and offering the chance to identify
star athletes of the future.
154

155. CSR Should Be Win-Win

156. This ‘mutual benefit’ approach is the key to
sustainable CSR success, and offers the greatest
potential rewards too.
The obvious goodwill benefits that these activities
generate mean civic-minded brands are more likely
to be welcomed into people’s daily lives.
Beyond straightforward preference drivers, CSR can
be a powerful part of a brand’s social media
activities too.
At the most basic level, CSR initiatives offer brands
a meaningful way to engage their audiences in
conversation.
156

157. More importantly, though, audiences are far more
likely to share their own stories about brands that
make a real difference to people’s lives, and this
sharing can result in powerful, organic conversations
across social media and beyond.
So, instead of an approach that requires brands to
reach into their coffers to relieve the corporate
conscience, brands need to start thinking of CSR in
terms of opportunities to add tangible value to a
variety of stakeholders.
157

158. 158
Rethinking The Concept Of Brand Value!
Activities focused "
solely on maximising "
short-term profits
Activities designed to
maximise returns for
employees and partners
shareholder
stakeholder
Activities designed"
to contribute to the"
greater good for all
societal
VSVS VSVS

159. the brands that will win
tomorrow won’t just give
back to communities;
they’ll actively nurture and
build communities too.
159

160. 9
next steps

161. You’ll only succeed if you put your plans into action.
The sooner you start testing your hypotheses, the
sooner you’ll know what works and what doesn’t,
and the greater your chances of getting to the future
first.
So go do.
161

162. About The Author

163. Simon Kemp is a marketing strategist and practitioner with
a particular enthusiasm for all things social, digital, and
mobile. He is the Managing Director of We Are Social in
Singapore, where he helps clients across Asia to listen to,
understand, and engage in conversations in social media.
Before joining We Are Social, Simon was a strategic planner
with BBH, Universal McCann, and Starcom Mediavest. He’s
also been a global management consultant, with stints at
Accenture and ascension strategy consulting.
Outside of work, Simon pretends to be a DJ, and you’ll find
him around the web under his eski alter-ego. If marketing’s
more your thing though, you’ll find Simon across the social
web as eskimon. He’d be delighted if you said hello.
163

164. 164
Connect With Simon!
twitter
linkedin
slideshare
email
website

165. About We Are Social

166. We Are Social is a global conversation agency. We "
help brands to listen to, understand, and engage in
conversations throughout social media.
Our team brings together 350 social media enthusiasts
across 8 offices on 5 continents.
We’re already helping many of the world’s top brands,
including Unilever, Adidas, Intel, Red Bull, Diageo, Lenovo,
Heinz, and Louis Vuitton.
You can email us at sayhello@wearesocial.sg if you’d like
to know more, or say hello on twitter via @wearesocialsg.
166

167. This eBook © 2013 by Simon Kemp. All rights reserved. Find out more at eskimon.com