Month: July 2011

What Makes People Follow a Brand?

Audience 2.0, Social Media, Strategy

When I first really became interested in social media, I was working for a marketing and promotions agency as head of their interactive division. This gave our work a particular skew – we were always looking at the performance metrics of our efforts – how could we drive trial, influence people to consider and love our clients’ products – and how do we measure and improve on this over time. And since that time, it has been clear to me that social media really is about promotion – in that industry sense.

And now the GetSatisfaction team have put out an infographic that confirms at least part of this theory – the largest proportion of people surveyed follow brands so they can learn of special offers and deals (36.9% on Facebook and MySpace, 43.5% on Twitter). So if your online strategy doesn’t have a promotional component you’re going to be disappointing much of your audience.

infographic-follow-brands-large-570x1836

Five Must-Read Posts from Last Week

5 Must-Read Posts

With the launch of Google+ last week I could easily devote this week’s five must-reads to posts demonstrating the more interesting aspects. But it’s still early days – and marketers would be well served to follow the 3Ps of innovation discovery –> peruse-play-participate (that is, check it out by watching what others are doing, try a few things by signing up and dip your toe in the water by participating with selected groups). In the meantime, here are five posts from last weeks that you can share on your new Google+ stream:

  1. While we are all immersed in technology and connectivity, Ross Dawson reminds us that there is real value in physical space and distance – especially when it comes to team building retreats
  2. I’m fascinated by the concept that social media is a cultural resistance to what Umair Haque calls the Great Stagnation. In this cracking post, he asks us to reconsider what we invest our resources in – claiming the “best investment you can make … is in living a life that matters”
  3. What would it take to reinvent your city? What could or should be possible? Craig Wilson puts forward his plan for creating an innovative city – focusing on reinventing Newcastle in New South Wales’ Hunter Valley. A SXSW for the Hunter anyone?
  4. Can you promote your community via crowdsourcing? Drew McLellan shows how you can apply the Age of Conversation principles to your own business activities
  5. Chris Brogan puts in the hard work of discovery and analysis and shares his thoughts on Google+. He reminds us that in social media – it’s never a lock-in – people migrate and change. Remember Friendster? Remember MySpace? Think it can’t happen to Facebook? Chris gives it a GooglePlus50.

Take the Net with You with Telstra MiFi

Gadget Weekends

I’m always buying gadgets of some kind or other. Sometimes they are things I will use for work, sometimes it is software. Sometimes it’s just something fun – or that I “always wanted”. But rather than keeping it to myself, I thought I’d share it with you – as part of my Gadget Weekend posts.

At the recent Gathering11 event in Melbourne, Telstra provided excellent wireless network and internet connectivity through their Elite mobile wifi devices. These neat personal routers use prepaid SIMs to connect to the Telstra NextG network and allow up to five people to share the connection at one time. We were even allowed to keep devices (though need to sign up for data plans or prepaid ourselves).

elite But even better than that – multiple devices can be meshed together to support a larger number of connections. Telstra had provided about 50 or so devices for the conference and handed them out to attendees. As they provide about 4-5 hours of solid connectivity on a single charge, we turned the devices on in shifts – delivering plenty of bandwidth and speed for media-rich note taking on Twitter, photo sharing and even video capture for over 100 conference attendees.

So now – all you conference producers out there – there really is no reason not to be providing internet access at your event. Just grab a handful of these MiFis and grid them together. Moreover, with capacity for a a 32Gb MicroSD card, you can also load your conference presentations directly onto the local network for sharing.

The admin interface is pretty straight forward – anyone who has setup a home modem/router should be able to deal with it. When you login to the admin panel you are automatically connected to your Telstra prepaid account as well – so you can see how much bandwidth you have left. This is quite a welcome feature.

glenrowan The speed and throughput of the device depends entirely on the strength of the mobile signal. In driving back from Melbourne to Sydney, I used the device to upload twitpics from my rest breaks – finding surprisingly good coverage and upload speeds throughout rural New South Wales.

There were only a couple of spots where I stopped that I had trouble – and I obviously had no need to upload or download while driving!

So now, I carry this little baby with me everywhere. I have registered the wifi SSID with all my mobile devices so that I can connect wherever and whenever I want. And now that the Telstra data plans are so much more affordable, there’s no reason to be unconnected.

What Content Do You Post Where and When?

Branding, Digital Strategy, Infographics, Social Media

Once you have your strategy in place, it’s time to get down to the nitty-gritty of publishing. It’s time to determine the types of content you will be producing and where and how you are going to publish it. It’s time to setup an editorial calendar.

But I don’t want you to think of an editorial calendar as a series of items which you post over time. I want you to think of an editorial calendar as a way of engaging your customers at different stages of your customer relationship. I want you to think about how you tie content to ROI – and to delivering value against your key performance indicators.

Take a look at the content grid chart below (hat tip toiLoveCharts). It is a great starting point for your content planning. Think particularly around the borders between elements. What kind of content will help your customers move from awareness to consideration? How can you brief and deliver your creative elements in such a way that they remove barriers for your customers moving from one stage to another?

And finally, find easy ways for your customers to engage and buy from you. Don’t make it too difficult. And once they buy once, make it easy to do so again. Help them talk about their brand experience. Encourage it. And remember, every little tweet is magic. Every Like can recommend. And sometimes the best branded content you can have is produced by someone else other than you.

ContentGrid

Escape Mediocrity

Good Works, Rant, Smart Bloggers

manifesto-image1 We live in a time where apathy has become a way of life. Where near enough is good enough. And where we only open our mouths to receive another spoon-fed morsel.

We have lionised failure and hardened our hearts. We’ve lost the art of adventure and dampened our curiosity, and cocooned ourselves in the safety of our own beliefs.

It’s a shame.

In fact, it’s a travesty.

Don’t you think it’s time we reignite and live by the daily miracles that make life worth living? Sarah Robinson does – and has produced an Escaping Mediocrity Manifesto. Check it out – and share what you believe.

How Data Creates Collective Action

Smart Bloggers, Storytelling, Strategy

If you have not subscribed to Mike Arauz’s blog, then remedy this quick smart! Dig back through his writing and plunder his brilliant ideas and analysis. I am sure you will find more than one or two things you can use to dazzle your boss or your clients.

But while you are doing this plundering, put your headphones on and listen in on Mike’s great presentation from the Next Conference. It’s the perfect way to round out your week!