Social Media Toolkit

Social Media Toolkit
click
1 2 3 4 5
Social Media: Get Started Here
do you need a social media sherpa?
click
Social Media Deep Dive: Tools, Tactics and Ideas

tools and trends in marketing technology
click
Policy + Hiring: The Social Enterprise at Work

social media policy and hiring for social media
click
Social Media Strategy Guide
mapping the diagnostics of effective social media
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

dana@marketingsavant.com | twitter.com/danavan | www.marketingsavant.com
Dana VanDen Heuvel is a widely recognized expert on Thought Leadership Marketing and Social Media. Dana is the founder and president of The MarketingSavant Group and previously held several leadership roles in Internet marketing. Dana has been a featured speaker at dozens of American Marketing Association events and is a regular contributor to a variety of industry publications, sharing his expertise on blogging, social media, Internet marketing and emerging marketing trends. Dana is the author of AMAs Marketech 08 and 09/10 Guide to Marketing Technology. Recognized as one of the 50 People You Should Know by the Green Bay Chamber of Commerce, Dana serves on several advisory boards for nonprofits and community organizations in and around Wisconsin. Dana is also an adjuct professor at St. Norbert College and teaches a course on social media and thought leadership marketing.
toby@bloombergmarketing.com | twitter.com/tobydiva | divamarketingblog.com
Toby Bloomberg is passionate about working with people (not companies) to create strategies that combine social media with traditional marketing drivers (strategy, customer insights, segmentation, etc.) while maintaining the authenticity of digital conversations. From 2004, when she chaired AMAs first Hot Topic workshop on social media/blogs, Toby has been speaking, teaching and consulting about social media at national conferences and for organizations that range from Fortune 500 to startups within the B2B, B2C and nonprofit worlds. Toby not only talks about the social web but is actively involved in the conversation. Her blog Diva Marketing was named one of Forbes 20 Best Marketing & Social Media Blogs By Women. Her media credits include being profiled in books on social media: Naked Conversations, Now Is Gone, Twitterville and The Digital Handshake. She has been quoted in publications such as INC magazine, BusinessWeek, Wall Street Journal and Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Entrepreneur.com, MSNBC and the Atlanta Business Chronicle. In addition, she was an adjunct professor at Goizueta School of Business at Emory University where she taught an innovative course on management consulting. Toby is a Yankee from Boston living in Hotlanta with her YouTube rock star Westie pup - Max. Continue the conversation with her at divamarketingblog.com and on Twitter @tobydiva.
back to top
click
1 2 3 4 5
click

click

click
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
DoYouNeedaSocialMediaSherpa?
AnExecutiveBriefingonSucceedingwith SocialMedia
byDanaVanDenHeuvelofMarketingSavant
DoYouNeedaSocialMediaSherpa? AnExecutiveBriefingonSucceedingwithSocialMedia
AGameYouMustPlay.ABattleYouMustWin
Socialmediahasquicklygonefromanicetohavecomponentofyourgotomarket strategytoamusthaveweaponinthefightforshareofvoice,shareofmindand ultimately,shareofmarket.Thepowerofsocialmediaasagreatcreatorofmarket dialogueandconnectorofpeers,prospectsandpunditshasreachedacriticalmassand theresnoturningback.Thecurrentquestionsthatyoureaskingaboutsocialmedia donthaveanswerslikeifandmaybebutrathercomeintoneswhenandhowdo Iandthenwhat? AsrecentlyasthisJuly,MicrosofthasannounceditsalliancewithYahootoprovide searchresults,thuschangingthesearchgameforever.Notonlyinthesenseofthe overallcompetitiveandInternetpowerlandscape,butinwaysthatwillshapehow consumersfindthingsontheInternetandhowtheydeterminewhatmatterstothem throughtheirwindowontheInternetworld.Whyisthisrelevant?Forexample,some recentclientsearchesonBingconsistentlyplacedslightlyhighervalueonsocialmedia sitesthanGoogle.Infact,blogsandsocialmediawebsitesthatoncesimplydottedthe landscapehavebecometheperennialsceneryalongtheinformationsuperhighway. Withintheforeseeablefuture,brandsseekingrelevanceinsearchresultswillneedto havesecuredarelevantpositioninthesocialmediaoutpoststhataremostrelevantto theirtribe.
MeetTheminTheirMedium
OneofthemostprofoundmarketingdiagramsthatIhaveeverseenisthefollowing illustrationfromtheMarketingLeadershipCouncil.
TheMarketingSavantGroup|888.989.7771|www.marketingsavant.com|info@marketingsavant.com
Theaforementioneddiagramshowsthevastproliferationofmarketingchannelsinjust afewshortdecadescomparedtotheotherwiseslowadvancementofmarketingupto about1980.Sincethen,weasmarketersandbusinessleadershavebeenchargedwith adaptingtoaworldwhereourcustomershaveaseeminglyinfinitechoiceofchannels withwhichtocommunicateandfurtherdepthsoftoolswithinthosechannelsthatthey canemployattheirwhim.Ourjobasmarketersistosimplymeetthemintheir mediumandfindthemostrelevantchannels,toolsandcommunicationstyletomatch toensurethatweremainrelevanttoourtribe.
IfMarketingMovesFast,SocialMediaMovesFaster
Ifpicturesareworth1000words,whatareimagesthatinclude1000logosand1000 wordsinthepictureworth?Asatest,lookatthefollowingdiagram.Howmanyofthe logoswithinthevariouschannelsofsocialmediacanyourecognizeandaccurately describewhatthesocialmediaserviceactuallydoesandhowitcouldbenefityour organization?
Source:www.theconversationprism.com

Thatwasfun,wasntit!Whileitscertainlynotimperative thatyouknoweachandeverysocialmediatoolandwhat theydo,thatssimplynotnecessary,thepriorillustrationis actuallyaoldversionofthatparticulardiagrammeantto showjusthownuanced,complexandfullofopportunity andpromisetheworldofsocialmediais.Inkeepingwith thepaceofsocialmedia,anewerupdatedversionofthatsamediagramisavailableat www.theconversationprism.com,butitssocomplexthatitsactuallydifficulttofitinto thiswhitepaperwhilestillmakingthetextonthegraphiclegibleenoughtoread!
ShowMetheROIFirst
Manyofyouwillrecall,orhaveheardaboutthesceneinthemovieJerryMaguirewhere andexchangebetweenTomCruiseandCubaGoodingJuniorunfoldsasCruiseis pitchingGoodingonusinghimashisagentasallwhileCruiseisabouttobeusheredout ofhiscurrentfirmtoventureoutonhisown.BeforeGoodingsignswithCruise,heasks him,quiteemphaticallyandrepeatedly,toshowhimthemoney.Manyofusfeellike thatwithsocialmediashowmethemoney! Well,themoneyisthereinsocialmedia.Infact,arecentWetpaintandAltimeterGroup studyconfirmsthatdeepengagementwithconsumersthroughsocialmediachannels correlatestobetterfinancialperformance. TheENGAGEMENTdbstudy(www.engagementdb.com)showedsignificantpositive financialresultsforthecompanieswhomeasuredashavingthegreatestbreadthand depthofsocialmediaengagement.These"SocialMediaMavens"onaveragegrew companyrevenuesby18percentoverthelast12months,whiletheleastengaged companiessawrevenuessink6percentonaverageoverthesametimeperiod. TheENGAGEMENTdbstudyreviewedmorethan10discretesocialmediachannels, includingblogs,Facebook,Twitter,wikis,anddiscussionforumsforeachofthe100 mostvaluablebrandsasidentifiedbythe2008BusinessWeek/InterbrandThetop10 ENGAGEMENTdbbrandswiththeirscoresare: 1.Starbucks(127) 6.ThomsonReuters(101) 2.Dell(123) 7.Nike(100) 3.eBay(115) 8.Amazon(88) 4.Google(105) 9.SAP(86) 5.Microsoft(103) 10.TieYahoo!/Intel(85) Ifyourelookingforgoodexamplesofhowbrandsareembracingsocialmedia,lookat thoseinthelistabove.
StreamingSocialMediaintoYourMarketingMix
Themostimportantthingfor marketerstofocusonwithsocial mediaishowitwillfitwithintheir existingmarketingand promotionalmixandwithintheir overallgotomarketstrategy.In fact,werefondofsayingthat socialmediastrategyisabitofa redherringbecausetobetruly strategicaboutsocialmediaisto consideritholisticallyaspartof anintegratedapproachto marketingandbusiness development. Atthispoint,marketersgenerally startlookingaroundforbest practices,forakitorasetof templatesorsomeexamplesthat pointtheway.Wewantturnkey strategiesthatplugandplaywith builtinshortcuts.Thetroubleis, therelittleofanyofthattobe foundinsocialmedia. Thebottomline,atleasttoday,is thattherearefewbestpractices (currentpractices,yes,butbest practicesweregettingthere) Thereisnokitofpartsinsocial media.Therearesomeexamples ofwhatworks.Thereare examplesofwhatdidntwork. Theansweris,tomanysocial mediaquestions,well,itdepends. Itdependsonyourgoals,yourlineofbusiness,theresourcesyouhave,thecorporate cultureyoulive,yourIT/Marketingrelationships,theregulatoryissuessurroundingyour industryandawholehostofotherfactors.Likeanymarketing,whereweredealing withirrationalhumansandemotionalbeings,there'smuchmorethatsfluidthanthats concrete.
Nowisagoodtimetobeginaskingsomequestionsabouthowsocialmediawillfitinto yourmarketingmix.Thesearejustsomeofthequestionsthatyoushouldaskatthis point. Whyissocialmediaofinteresttous? Dowebelievesocialmediawillhaveanimpact?Ifso,inwhatway? Whatassumptionsdowehaveaboutsocialmedia?Whataboutourexecutives? Whodowewanttoreachandwhy? Isourindustryaheadofthecurve,behindit,orinthemiddle? Howdoweasacompanyfeelaboutopeningupthedialoguewithourcustomers? Whatareourmeasuresforsuccess?(qualitativeandquantitative) Howmuchtimeandmoneyareweexpectingtodedicatetothis? Whatpracticesdoweseefromourpeers/competitorsthatwedliketoemulate?
RulesoftheRoadforDIYSocialMedia
Thesocialmediadeadpoolischockfull ofgreatexamplesofwhatnottodo!Its litteredwithexamplesofsocialmedia initiativesthatwerecompletely unencumberedbythestrategicprocess. Thus,theybothfizzledanddisappeared, doinglittleinthewayorgood,orharm. Or,theywentdowninablazeofglory, ultimatelydamagingtheirbrandsinthe processandleavingascaronboththe companyandthenameofsocialmedia. Ifyouaskanysocialmediapurist,youll likelyencountersentimentsthat,inonewayoranother,pointstothefeelingthatsocial mediawasnotmadeformarketing.However,intherealworld,weknowthatany chancewehavetoreachhumanbeingstoinfluencetheirdecisionforcorporategain willbefoundandleveragedwithhaste.Nevertheless,socialmediahasitsownrulesthat eventhestrongestbrands(especiallythestrongestbrands!)mustabideby. Firstandforemost,authenticityandgenuinesentimentsarereveredwhilefakeryis reviledandswiftlypunishedbywayofbloggeroutrageorotherformsofwidespread Internetandsocialmediabadmouthing.
Todaysconsumerhasahighlytunedsensefornonsense,fraudanddeceit.Any attemptatlessbeinglessthan100%honestandaboveboardinsocialmediaismetwith scrutiny. Consumershavecometoexpectaccesstobrands(afteryearsofsocalledvoicemail andjailandphonetreeclimbing)andwanthonestandopenconversations.They furtherhaveexpectationsthatifabrandisengagedinsocialmediathatitabidesby thoseprinciples. AgreatexampleofwhatnottodocomesfromWalMartwiththeirWalMarting AcrossAmericaepisode.Thiswasalessthanauthenticblogfeaturingacouples journeyacrossAmericainanRV,encounteringmanyWalMartsalongtheway. TheblogwasquicklyexposedandtheensuingfalloutdamagedtheWalMart brand. Anothermisconceptionthatmarketsholdisthatsocialmediaissimplyanewoutletfor yourconventionaladvertisingmessages.Infact,Twitterisfullofjustthiskindof messagingeveryday.(OnTwitter,spammessagesarecalledTwam)Theresno quickerwaytobescornedinsocialmediathanbyofferingthesameonewayad messagesinsocialmediachannels.Youwillbeimmediatelylumpedintothenoise categoryandyouwillbepromptlyandpermanentlyignored. Finally,socialmediaisacontentgame.Thetwoquestionsthatallbrandsshouldaskare howamIbeingusefulinthesocialmediachannelsthatImparticipatinginandwhat kindofvaluablecontentcanIcreateandsharetooffersomethingtomyaudiencethat willreallyengagethem?Consumershavenotoleranceorpatienceforselfserving, uselessandstalecontent.Manysocialmediaprogramshave,areandwillcontinueto failforthisveryreason. Itsbecauseofthecontentimperative,asweliketocallit,thatwecantrecommend stronglyenoughthatyoucreateasocialmediaeditorialcalendarwellinadvanceof launchingyoursocialmediaprogram.Ifthiseditorialcalendarsoundslikesomething thatsonlyforotherorganizationsandnotforus,thenperhapssocialmediaisfor otherorganizationsaswell.Werarelyseesuccessfulsocialmediaprogramsthatdont havesomeformofeditorialcalendaroreditorialsystemorprocessinplace.
YourBlueprintforSocialMediaSuccess:10KeySteps
1. Strategiceducation Knowingwhatyoudontknowaboutsocialmediaisagreatfirstplacetostart.From there,therearemyriadconferences,books,webinarsandallmannerofeducational vehiclesthatonecanleveragetolearneverythingyouandyourteamneedtoknowin ordertomoveforwardandmakesounddecisionsaboutyoursocialmediastrategyand tacticalplan.IadvocatethatbrandsfindtheirDeltaconnectionunderstandthe gapthatyouretryingtofillbetweenyourcurrentmarketingstrategyandthenew marketingoftheworldofsocialmedia. Thegoalofthisstepistounderstandwhatsoutthere,whatspossibleandtogiveyou somefodderforformulatingyoursocialmediavision. 2. Defineyourbusinessobjectivesandriskprofile Onceyouhaveasenseofthepossible,theprobable andarestartingtogetyourarmsaroundthedoable, itstimetoformulateyourgoalsandbusiness objectivesforsocialmedia.Herearefewquestionsto consider: a) Doyouwanttousesocialmediaforlistening orforoutreach? b) Howwillyouleverageyourbrandassetsto maximizepresenceinthesocialmedia environment? c) Doyouwanttousesocialmediatogetinput onyourproductdevelopment? d) Whatareourmeasuresforsuccess? (qualitativeandquantitative) Insofarasyourriskprofileisconcerned,manycompanieshaveemployedthe3Rtest forenteringsocialmedia.TheylookattheirRiskprofile,Resourcesrequiredand Rewardsexpectedtodeterminehowwellpositionedtheyaretoleveragesocialmedia. Hereareafewquestionstoconsiderasyouassesstherisk: a) Howdoweasacompanyfeelaboutopeningupthedialoguewithour customers? b) Whatdoweperceiveasthebiggestobstaclestoouradoptionofsocialmedia practices? c) Whatifpeoplesaynegativethingsaboutourcompany? d) Whatifoneofouremployeessharessomethingproprietaryorjuststupidor embarrassingaboutourcompany? Thegoalofthisstepistooutlinewhatyouexpectfromsocialmediaandtodetermine yourtoleranceforthepotentialrisksthatgoalongwithsocialmedia.
3. Understandyourcustomers(theconversation) Internally,wegobackandforthonwhetherornotthisshouldbefirst,butyouneedto understandsocialmediaandgettoknowyourselfbysettingavision,goalsand objectivesbeforeyouturnoutwardandlooktoyourcustomersandexternal stakeholders. Whilesocialmediaisallaboutconversation,itsalsoaboutpeopleandcontent.Justas youwouldnotgotoaninpersonmeetingwithaprospectortoanetworkingmeetingto connectwithotherprofessionalswithoutaclearsenseofwhoyouareandwhatvalue youaddtotheworld,youwouldntentersocialmediawithoutthesamelevelof personalunderstanding. Thatsaid,thisisthepointwhereyouengageinonlinesocialmedialisteningthroughRSS feeds,blogsearchesandTwittersearchestodeterminehowinvolvedyourpotential audienceisandwheretheyrehangingout.Askthesequestionsaboutyourcustomers: a) Whatareourcustomersdoingonline?Issocialmediarelevanttothem? b) Whodowewanttoreachandwhy? c) Whatdowewantfromthemandwhatdowewantthemtodo? d) Whatarewegivingback(value)thathasnothingtodowithourproduct/service? e) Whatdatadowewant/needtogatherduringourefforts? Bythispoint,youwanttohaveaclearunderstandingofwhatyourcustomersand prospectsaredoingwithsocialmediaandbegintoformulatesomeideaofhowyour brandsentranceintothespaceisvaluableandusefultothem.
UsethisInternetUseStages diagramto profileyourcustomersandcommunitymembers. TheMarketingSavantGroup|888.989.7771|www.marketingsavant.com|info@marketingsavant.com
4. Understandthecompetitiveandindustryenvironment Competitiveanalysis,whileimportant,shouldnotbethedeterminingfactoronwhat youdowithsocialmedia.Thereismuchmetooismgoingonoutthere,andits understandablydifficulttowatchyourcompetitiongetaleguponsocialmediawhile youreonthesidelines.However,ifyouregoingtotrumpthem,youneedto understandwhateveryoneisgoing,andthencraftastrategyonhowyoulldobetter. Onceyouunderstandthesocialmediasceneinyourcompetitivespace,yourmost importanttaskistocraftastrategythatputsyououtinfrontofthem. 5. Anticipatecorporatecultureshift/shock Thisstageisarealitycheckformostorganizations.Understandinghowyourteam,your salesforce,yourdistributorsandotherstakeholderswillreacttosocialmediaisan importantstepinmakingyoursocialmediastrategyareality.Forsomecompanies,this isanonissue.However,formany,especiallylarger,moreconservativeorganizations, thisissomethingtobestudiedandthoroughlyunderstood. a) Doouremployeesengageinsocialmediaintheirpersonallives?Whatlevelof familiaritycan/shouldweexpect? b) Doesourinternalaudienceunderstandthebusinesspotentialofsocialmedia,or aretheyskeptical? c) Whatarethebiggestfears/hesitationsthatwehaveasacompanyaboutusing socialmedia? d) Howdetaileddoweneedtobeaboutourcommunicationpolicies? e) Areweempoweringouremployeestorespondatthepointofneed,regardless oftheirrole?Isthereachainofcommand? Thechangeprocessmaponthefollowingpageillustratessomeofthepitfallsand highlightsoftakingtheorganizationsdownanynewpath,includinggettinginvolved insocialmedia.
6. Assessyourresourcesandcapabilities TheastutemarketerwillworkonforgingstrongrelationshipswithIT,legal,HRandthe otherstakeholdersthatcanbeimpactedbyabrandsinvolvementinsocialmedia. Gettingallofthesepeopleinaroomtodiscussyourprogresssofar,thegoalsthat youveputforth,thecustomerpotentialandtherationalethatyouvedevelopedfor whythecompanyneedstopursuesocialmediawillgiveyouaclearviewofwhatyou havetoworkwithandwhatworkyoustillneedtodotogettheorganizationaligned behindthesocialmediaprogram.Thereareafewquestionstoaskatthispoint: a) Howmuchtimeandmoneyareweexpectingtodedicatetothis? b) Canweaffordtokeeppartofourallocated$budgetflexibletorespondto evolvingneeds? c) Ifweresuccessfulwithsocialmedia,canwescaleourinteractionstocontinueto meethigherexpectations?How? d) Areweflexibleenoughwithinroles/responsibilitiestoshiftthemasneededto accommodatewhatwelearnfromsocialmedia? Gettingeveryoneinyourorganizationalignedonthegoals,objectives,outcomesand roadblocksandworkingtowardthemasateamisthemilestoneforthisphase.
7. Immerseyourmarketingteaminsocialmedia Theorganizationswiththebesttrackrecordforimplementingsocialmedia,Internet marketing,CRMoranythingnewarethosethatimmersetheirteamsinthepracticeand applicationofnewthingstoensurethattheyhavetheskillsandmentalhorsepowerto seetheprogramthrough.Gettingyourteamtoexperiment,attendwebinars,readand otherwisegetafullgraspontheworldofsocialmediawillhelpyourprogrammoveat lightspeedinsteadofatasnailspaceaseveryoneplayscatchup. Gettingyourteamexcitedaboutsocialmediabyencouragingandenablingtheir participationisasurewaytospeedupthesuccessofyoursocialmediaefforts. 8. Formulatethestrategyandtacticalplan Youvelaidthefoundationforputtingtogetheracomprehensivesocialmediastrategy. Yourstrategyshouldbeaplantoutilizeyourresources,capabilities,andlearnedsocial mediaskillstomanifestthegoals,objectivesandcustomervaluepropositionthat youvearticulatedintheprevioussteps. Yourstrategyneedstohaveanarrowfocus,initially,toensurethatyouredoingthe doableanddoingsocialmediawellbeforebranchingoutintotoomanysocialmedia channelsatonetimeanddoingthemallhalfbaked.Createaplatform,suchasablog, onwhichtolaunchyourstrategyandpursueavettingprocesswitheachnewtechnique andtoolsuchthateverythingsupportsyourinitialstrategyandbuildsonwhatyouve alreadylaunched. Yourstrategyshouldcoveryoursocialmedialaunch,orpilotprogram,alltheway throughyourfirst912monthsofactivitytogiveyouanideaofwhatspossibleand whatsinvolved. 9. Prioritizetheplanandexecutewithvigor Awellcraftedstrategywithatacticalplanthatsexecutedlikeyoumeanit,regardlessof howgoodtheoverallstrategyistobeginwith,isgoingtosetyouapartfromyour competitorsinrapidfashion,bringquickandmeaningfulfeedbackintoyourprogram andattractthefollowinginsocialmediathatyoureseeking. Commitmenttodisciplinedfollowthrough(bloggingdaily,tweetingregularly,posting frequently,creatingmeaningfulcontent,engaginginmeaningfuldialogue)willbring yourstrategytolifeandestablishmomentumthatshardtoovercomebyevenyour bestcompetitors. Yoursuccessisalsodeterminedbytheresourcesyouputtowardyoursocialmedia tacticalplan.Dontskimponthis.Youcanworryaboutputtingthingsonautopilotlater. Fornow,ensurethatyouremanningthebattlestationsandarereadyforanything! Theprioritizationexercisewillhelpyoudecidewhattodofirst(nextactions)when launchingyoursocialmediatacticalplanandputtingenergyintotheexecutionwill ensureanoexcusesrollout.
10. Measure,reportreviewandrevise Measuringsocialmediaperformance,onbothquantitativeandqualitativescales,isan essentialactivity.However,clearthinkingaboutReturnonInvestment(ROI)istodays greatestchallengeandthusgreatest opportunityforsocialmedia marketers.Inspitethecurrent pressuresonmarketingdepartments tojustifytheirexpendituresand deliverROI,andalarmingnumberof companieshavecommittedtosocial mediaeffortswithoutfirstestablishingparametersfordefiningsocialmediasuccess, clearcutmetricsandaccountabilitymeasures. Socialmediameasurementcomeswithitsownsetofchallenges,whichispartofthe reasonforthecurrentsituation.Classicmeasuresofreachandfrequencyoftheold mediaworldwillnolongersufficeandthenascentmeasurementconceptslike engagementarenotuniversallyunderstoodanddifferfromagencytoagencyand brandtobrand.Nevertheless,establishingbaselinesbeforeenteringsocialmediaand theniteratingonthemetricsasyoumoveforwardisasurewaytogaugesuccess,even ifyoucantfityoursocialmediametricsintoatidyspreadsheetondayone. Metricsvary,butmanycompanieshavemeasuredsocialanddigitalmediasuccessby adaptingtheirmetricstotheReach,Acquisition,ConversionandRetention(RACR) modelpopularizedbyanumberofInternetmarketersoverthepastseveralyears.
SocialMediaSherpaDiagnosticDoINeedaSocialMediaGuideor Consultant?
Thebeautifulironyofthesocialmediaspaceisthatassoonassomeonedonsthe expertcap,itsasthoughtheyveputonadigitalduncehatandtheyresoon ridiculedbythesocialmediainsecureandviewedwithscrutinybyanycommercial concern.Inanyotherindustry,expertstatusisagreatachievement. Thebottomlineisthis:thinkingintermsoftoolsorplatformsisthewrongviewpointas theiruseisonlylimitedbyyourcreativity.Aliteracyofallcommunicationsplatformsis necessary,asthenandonlythendotheyfadeintothebackgroundofyourthought processesandallowyoutodevelopgroundbreakingsolutions. Inspiteoftheeasewhichanorganizationcanpickupasocialmediatuneandbeginto play,justbecauseyouanhumafewbarswithaplombdoesntmeanthatyouhavea socialmediastrategyandthatagoodsocialmediacoachwontbeofvalue.Onthe contrary,themorefacileyouarewithmarketingandtechnology,themoreeffectiveyou willbewithasocialmediaguidetohelpyoufocusandstrategizetoensurethatyoull getsomequickwinsandlongtermimpact.DoyouneedtohireasocialmediaSherpa, guide,orexpert?Askyourselfthesequestionstohelpdetermineyourneeds: 1. HowdidIarriveatsocialmediaandwhyamIaskingaboutitatall? Areyourcompetitorsalreadyinsocialmedia?Areyoutryingtogetaheadofthecurve, buildapersonalbrand,establishacommunityorreclaimyouronlinereputation?Do youwanttobuildbuzzaboutyourbrandormaybeshowtheGenYcrowdthatyoure withit?
Whiletheseareallwonderfulgoals,nowisthetimetoreflectonyouroverarching marketinggoalsandhowsocialmediafits.AskyourselfcanIachievealloftheseonmy own?DoIhavethetools,time,knowhow,stamina,foresightandinsighttomake thesegoalsarealitythroughsocialmedia?Iftheresahintofno,consultsomeone. 2. Whoarewetryingtoreachandwhy? Areyoutargetinganewaudience,tappingintoyourindustryveterans,ortryingto moveamarketupthetechnologyladder?Doyouknowwheretofindyourtargets onlineandhowtointeractwiththemwhenandwhereyoufindthem?Ifnot,itmight betimetoseektheassistanceofsomeonewhosdoneit. 3. Areyoucomfortablewiththetechnology,theambiguityandthefastpaceofsocial media? Ifyoureacandopersonwithnofear,thenbyallmeans,goforit!Ifyoureagreat strategistbutlackthetechnologyskillsofifyoureunsureaboutwhetherornotyourIT personnelwillunderstandyourneedtounblockthesocialmediasitesthatyoucant seefromyourcorporatecomputer,perhapsitstimetocallinsomeonewhosrunthis racebefore. 4. AmIinformedaboutsocialmedia? Theveryfirststepinthesocialmediastrategythatweadvocateistogeteducated. Therearemyriadconferences,webinars,books,whitepapersandblogswithwhichto getacquaintedwitheverynuanceofthesocialmediaspace.Regardlessofwhetheryou hiresomeone,thisisthebestinvestmentyoullevermakeinsocialmedia! 5. DoIhavethetimetodothisallmyself? Youprobablyalreadyhavesomeideaofwhatyoushouldbedoing,butmaylackthe inhouseresourcestogettheballrollingortosustaintheeffort.Awordofcautionhere weneverrecommendthewholesaleoutsourcingofsocialmedia.Socialmediamust besomethingthatthecompanyisinvolvedin,notthattheyvendout.Ifyourelooking forsomeonetoTweetforyour,reconsideryoursocialmediamotivationsbefore proceeding.
FindingYourIdealSocialMediaSherpa
Ifyouvereachedtheendofthediagnostic questionsthatyouvedecidedtoreachout forsomehelp,itsnowtimetosortoutwho therealsocialmediaSherpasare. Theyreactuallyprettyeasytofind. Considerthesequestions&criteria: 1. Tellmeaboutthebestoutreachyouve donelately.Whatdidyoudo? Askaboutspecifics,whathavetheydone? Noteveryfirmhasagreatdealof experience,butsomeisnecessary.What strategiesdidtheyuse?Whatweretheirresults?Iftheyhaventbeeninthetrenchesof aprojectsometimeinthelast12months,youshouldaskthemwhy.Yes,thisindustry movesthatfast. 2. Tellmeaboutacampaignthatdidntgosowell.Whatdidyoulearn? Socialmediaisinitsnascentstagesnow.Afirmwithsocialmediafailuresislikelytobea betterorganizationbecauseunderstandtheissuesandshouldshowwillingnesstoshare misstepsandthelearningthatcameabout. 3. HowdoyoufeelaboutTwitter? Iftheytellyouthatyoushouldbeonitandthattheycanhandleitforyou,theymaynot beafit.IftheyhaveaprocessfordeterminingifTwitterisrightfortheclient,youreon therightpath! 4. DoI/weneeda(blog/Facebookpage/podcast/viralvideos)? Lookformorequestionsthananswersonthisone.AgoodsocialmediaSherpaisthere toguideyoutotheidealsolutionforyou,notpushyouintosomethingyoucant sustain.ExpecttobeaskedquestionslikeWhoisyouraudience?Whatisyourgoal? Whysocialmediaandwhynow? 5. Whatoutcomescanweexpect? AgoodsocialmediaSherpawillworkwithyoutosetrealisticexpectations.Not everythingwillworkforyou,butagoodSherpashouldbewillingtohelpfindthemost resonant,effectivestrategies.IfyouareguaranteedahighnumberofTwitterfollowers orFacebookfriends;iftheytellyou,unequivocally,thattheycandeliverastronomical trafficorconversions,thenbeskeptical.
6.Whatisyourpricingstructure? SocialmediaSherpaswilltypicallyworkonaperprojectorhourlybasis,unlessyoure seekingaretainedresourceorpartnerforthelongterm. 7.Whatcanwedonowtogetstarted? Thebestsocialmediaprogramstypicallyinvolveparallelpathsofresearchandstrategy combinedwithimmediateaction.LookforsomepublishedresourcesfromtheSherpa thatyoucangleanthebasicsfromalongwiththeirinitialassistancetogetyouoffthe groundwhiletheyhelpyoubuildyouroverallsocialmediastrategy.
MovingForward
Thesocialanddigitalmediaworldmovesrapidly,tosaytheleast.Newtools,newideas, newstrategiesandadigitalmedialandscapethatsconstantlyinastateoffluxmakes thingsinterestingandchallengingforeventhemostastutemarketertokeepupwith. Certainlymanybrandshavegoneitaloneupthesocialmediamountain,butitcanbea lonelyjourney.Thestoriedsuccessesthatyoureadaboutinthisguideandsee mentionedeverydayinthemediaarebrandswhichhave,byandlarge,chosentoseek outasocialmediaguidetoleadthemontheirjourney.Ouraiminthisguideistoshare yousomeperspectiveonwhatyoucanandshoulddonowtoboostyoursocialmedia effortswhilesharingsomeperspectiveonwhentoengageandwhattolookforina socialmediamarketingguide. Alittleknowledgeisapowerfulthing!Onceyouvearmedyourselfwiththetoolsand thehelpyouneedtosucceedonyoursocialmediajourney,restassuredthatthe journeywillbeasuccessful,profitableandexcitingone!
DanaVanDenHeuvel
DanaisthefounderandchiefconsultantatTheMarketingSavantGroup. Hisspecialtiesincludesocialmediastrategydevelopment,instructionand training,marketingstrategydevelopmentandfacilitatedbrainstorming andthoughtleadershipmarketingstrategydevelopment. Anawardwinningbloggerhimself,Danahasengagedover2000marketerssince2004 onthesubjectofsocialmediamarketingthroughhiscourses,AmericanMarketing Associationtrainingevents,directconsultationsandthroughhisblogsat www.danavan.net,www.marketingsavant.comandreachesmanymorethrough articles,podcasts,webinarsandwhitepaperslikethisone.
TheMarketingSavantGroup
MarketingSavantisaconsultingledB2Bmarketingfirmspecializinginhelpingour clientsattainthoughtleadershipinthemarketstheyserve. Wehelpourclientscreatetheirownwhitespaceinafieldofcompetitionenablingyour successthroughcontentandgotomarketstrategythatmotivatesyourprospectsand drivesbusiness. Werenotanadagency.Infact,wereaconsultingshopwithpassionateleaderwho lovestheintersectionofcontent,marketing,technologyandhelpingtheinsurgent marketerwinthebusiness. HowCompaniesUseMarketingSavant Entrepreneursandstartupsuseustoplantheirattackandputtogetheragoto marketstrategythatacceleratestheirgrowth. Smallandmediumsizefirmsuseustohelpthemstandoutfromthepackina crowdedlocalorregionalmarketplace. Largecompaniesuseustohelpthemfocustheexpertise,resourcesandbudgeton creatingandchannelingtheirexpertiseandintellectualcapitalintothought leadershipcampaignsthatwinbusiness. YoucanlearnmoreaboutMarketingSavant,oursocialmediaandthoughtleadership marketingservicesandourprocessandpointofviewatwww.marketingsavant.com. Copyright2009TheMarketingSavantGroup.Allrightsreserved.
Answers To The Questions You Didnt Ask

Reprinted From the Age of Conversation 2 By Toby Bloomberg Diva Marketing
When was the last time you talked, listened, laughed

and learned with .. not From .. but With your customers or clients? Marketing teaches us the more we know about our target audience the better we can service them. "The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself." - Peter Drucker. When Peter Drucker wrote that statement, over fifty years ago, formal market research was how most marketers obtained insights about their customers. Marketers asked the questions and customers gave their opinions. Marketers listened and learned. Flash into the 21st century technology has changed global communication and that influenced business communications. An internet playground developed that toppled the walls of culture and geographical distance. Conversations exploded. Social media people-to-people talk often includes discussions about experiences with specific brands. In unfiltered, non-directed discussions on blogs, in communities, on review sites, in videos and through photos the good, bad and ugly are now in full Google view for all. An informal consumer review network is being created that often influences, not only brand perception, but purchase decisions. For the first time, our customers are providing answers to questions that were never asked in formal research studies. We now have additional, valuable insights that can supplement traditional research. However, some marketers dismiss this online chat as irrelevant. Others listen in frozen fascination. A few companies are doing something radical that marketers never had the opportunity to do before: talking with their customers in their worlds. Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, is active on Twitter - a micro blogging community. His advice to CEOs who want to bring social media to their companies - I think if the CEO
Age of Conversation Book 2 Diva Marketing www.divamarketingblog.com @tobydiva http://twitter.com/tobydiva
starts using Twitter on his/her own and is actually passionate about it, then that passion will eventually rub off on the rest of the organization. Dell is also changing its business model by engaging with its customers. According to Richard Binhammer, Social media helps us: learn from conversations with customers every day. That has influenced internal processes as we have identified issues sooner than we might otherwise have, learned to respond faster and generally listen and be in touch. Understanding your customer and knowing what she wants is like finding the holy grail of marketing. Adopting your business model to include engaging with your customers can help make that happen.
The Age of Conversation 2 book brought together nearly 300 of the worlds leading marketers, writers, thinkers and creative innovators for a global collaboration where the impact of digital conversations was explored.
Age of Conversation Book 2 Diva Marketing www.divamarketingblog.com @tobydiva http://twitter.com/tobydiva
Technology Is Recreating Business Intimacies Reprinted from Age of Conversation

By Toby Bloomberg Marketing, Diva Marketing www.divamarketingblog.com
Customers from India, Canada, New Zealand C and Europe. Technology swings open the doors to a global marketplace. Our cyberspace offices and storefronts keep the lights on 24/7/365 allowing us to conduct business with a mere click and an internet connection. Life is good. Or is it?
In their rush to enter this new environment companies often sacrificed personal connections with their customers and other stakeholders. Understanding the individual needs of a growing and often geographically dispersed customer based is not an easy or inexpensive undertaking. Attempting to service and engage customers, some organizations turned to non traditional solutions including: out sourced online service chat reps who often had limited understanding of the businesss culture; interactive websites that flashed messages that were pretty but of little value; and email tactics where questions were gobbled up by cyberspace gremlins who of course never responded back. Misunderstanding and brand devaluation were frequently outcomes of non relationship service. Customers wanted high touch along with convenience of immediate access to information. Even businesses with only a local focus were being challenged with how to stay connected to their clients. About this time a strange dichotomy began to occur in the world of virtual business. The technology, that fostered impersonalization, was being used to create corner grocery store relationships. Through funny little websites called blogs companies began to engage with their customers in people-to-people conversations. Those conversations occurred not with the marketing, PR, tech
Age of Conversation Bloomberg Marketing www.bloombergmarketing.com 770 496.1711 1 Diva Marketing www.divamarketing.com Toby@bloombergmarketing.com
support departments but with people within those departments who shared common interests and passions. The exchange was richer, deeper and more satisfying relationships for both customer and company. When we get to know people more than product information is usually exchanged. Thats exactly what happened online. Stories about personal interest from wine to family vacation were blogged. Photos were shared. Relationships that were as intimate and important as those created by neighborhood green grocers were being formed. Through social media marketing initiatives: blogs, podcasts, vlogs, mash-up communities, social book marking and photo sharing organizations were rediscovering that the corner grocery store relation was attainable in an online environment and more important than ever before to foster and maintain. It's not personal, Sonny. It's strictly business, said Michael Corleone to his brother. However, the son of the Godfather was wrong. Dead wrong. Business is personal. Technology is fueling the emotional engagement that leads to long-term customer interactions.
Reprinted from The Age of Conversation, a book that brings together over 100 of the world's leading marketers, writers, thinkers and creative innovators in a ground-breaking and unusual publication.
Age of Conversation Bloomberg Marketing www.bloombergmarketing.com 770 496.1711
2 Diva Marketing www.divamarketing.com Toby@bloombergmarketing.com
back to top
click
1 2 3 4 5

click

tools and trends in marketing technology Policy + Hiring: The Social Enterprise at Work
click
click
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
02
G o v e r n a n c ec H a s k , a n T l c o m p l i a n r e , ri per Ti d e Goes Hec
white paper
Two Sides of Consumer-Generated Media:
Listening and Participating

ocial media is providing marketers with an array of tools and opportunities that offer an unusual entre into understanding the good, bad and ugly of how customers use and perceive brands, your company and even your employees. In todays world, it is increasingly critical to understand your specific
Companies cant watch the action from the sidelines; they need to get in the game for themselves.
customer needs and to build business relationships both on a local and global basis. Those strategies become more challenging, however, as the landscape grows more complex. New media strategies present a means of closing the communication gap brought on by time and distance. Valuable global relations are being created through tools that range from text mes-
sages, microblogs, podcasts, vlogs (video blogs), social networking communities and traditional blogs. By leveraging these new technologies, people exchange ideas and information, and discover common experiences that transcend cultural differences. Listening and participating in ongoing conversations enables organizations to develop a stronger emotional engage-
p PERFORM: The Marketing 2.0 Authority
www.revenuetoday.com/perform/XXXXX
ment with customers, prospects and other stakeholders.
LiStening
These virtual back fence conversations, commonly called consumer-generated media or content (CGM/CGC), are found in the comments of blogs, bulletin boards, social networking communities and product reviews. The unfiltered, raw voices of peer-to-peer discussions are frequently rich in passion and emotion, thereby offering a window into a world that previously eluded traditional marketing research methodologies. Since these virtual chats are Internetbased, they can be tracked, measured and analyzed. Consumer-generated
media, therefore, becomes one more source of information that should be scrutinized to mitigate the risk in making business decisions. Although monitoring social media is gaining acceptance as a complementary piece of marketing research strategy, marketers should keep in mind that there is a difference between data mined from CGM and the information derived from formal surveys or focus groups. Control of the sample is one varying element. CGM seems to have more in common with ethnography than it does with a quantitative study. The information mined from consumergenerated media ranges from product review sites where customers candidly offer their opinions and often vote on the best product within a category to positive and negative customer service experiences and trends. A significant benefit of keeping a watchful eye on new media conversations is the ability to tap in to information in real time. The opportunity for rapid response in a crisis situation can be a powerful outcome of consistent listening. Trend analysis is gaining acceptance as a valuable tool for understanding CGM and dealing with extreme content contributed by specific individuals. At least one major automobile manufacturer, for example, began mining data at a high level to measure consumer attitudes toward specific models. This led to a more granular analysis of features and attributes, which then was used to provide insights for product design and development. Although the customer purchase decision is complex, and social media is but one influencing factor, information gleaned from listening to digital conversations can
have an impact on how an organization conducts business and, in turn, can set internal cultural changes in motion: From a C-suite perceptive, the challenge becomes how to integrate this new type of information to support customerfocused business decisions. From an operational perspective, the challenge becomes how to develop internal processes that will quickly pass the right information to the people with authority to take action. From a marketing perspective, the challenge becomes how to leverage the information to develop a better customer experience that supports the brand identity. From an R&D perspective, the challenge becomes how to use this type of customer insight to create new products and services that tie back to the brand.
ParticiPating
Consumer-generated media is Web-based and can easily and quickly be passed along to friends and relatives. However, it is not unusual for a comment from a blog post or discussion points in a social media networking community to find their way from the blogosphere to mainstream media. The Internet has made speed and expositional networking the new customer capital. Through sites such as LinkedIn or Facebook, networking has expanded to include friends of friends of friends. Conversations can spread around the world in seconds, influencing sales and the hard-won good will of the brand. What may appear at first glance to be an innocuous customer service complaint may find its way to a front page story in the New
by Toby Bloomberg, Bloomberg Marketing/Diva Marketing

Toby bloomberg, president of Atlanta-based bloomberg marketing, has a passion for the Internet. Her background includes more than 15 years of traditional and new media marketing experience, and in the spring of 2004, Toby launched the Diva marketing blog, www.divamarketingblog.com. She is a national speaker and facilitator of social media and traditional marketing topics for organizations like the American marketing Association, the olympic organizing Committee, PrSA and 3m. She serves on the board of the Atlanta Interactive marketing Association and conducts a class on management consulting for goizueta School of business at emory University.
www.revenuetoday.com/perform p
02
G o v e r n a n cc H a p s k , a n T l c o m p l i a n r e e, ri Ter Ti d e Goes Hec
white paper
York Times or Wall Street Journal once it spreads around the Internet and becomes an online cause clbre. In fact, its not uncommon anymore for a reporter to base a story on a blog post. Frequently, the article appears both in the hard copy and online editions of the media outlet, thus extending the firestorms reach and awareness still further. As more people copy and paste the media link into emails, blogs and product reviews, the buzz continues to build. Johnson & Johnson provides an interesting example of corporate participation in the new media conversation. In the summer of 2007, J&J leveraged its blog, JNJ BTW, to address a crisis situation that was rapidly escalating in both mainstream media and among bloggers. The company sued the American Red Cross for what it considered to be inappropriate and illegal use of the Red Cross trademark, as explained in this public statement: After more than a century of strong cooperation in the use of the Red Cross trademark, with both organizations respecting the legal boundaries for each others unique legal rights, we were very disappointed to find that the American Red Cross [ARC] started a campaign to license the trademark to several businesses for commercial purposes on all types of products being sold in many different retail and other commercial outlets. These products include baby mitts, nail clippers, combs, toothbrushes and humidifiers. This action is in direct violation of a Federal statute protecting the mark as well as in violation of our longstanding trademark rights. For the past several months, Johnson & Johnson has attempted to resolve this issue through cooperation and discussion with the ARC, and recently offered mediation, to no avail. The Company was left with no choice but to seek protection of our trademark rights through the courts. Although Johnson & Johnson did use traditional public relations tactics to air its side of the story, Vice President Ray Jordan elaborated further on the J&J corporate blog in a post entitled, Youre Doing What?! In keeping with the writing style of social media, he explained the companys point of view in a personal voice using casual language. His efforts produced a significant number of positive posts from other bloggers, which in turn provided support for Johnson & Johnsons position. Although negative comments were allowed on the J&J corporate blog, they actually served to reinforce the perception that the company was open and transparent about the situation, thus garnering even more respect for the organization. The blog achieved what no other crisis communication strategy could: It allowed Johnson & Johnson to tell its story the way it wanted to, in its own voice, without mainstream media clouding the message with its own interpretations. The truth is that companies could never fully control the way customers talked about their products and services before either. Those conversations have always occurred in one-on-one chats or in small group discussions. Prior to the Internet, informal customer word-of-mouth might have been slower to impact the brand and more difficult to track, but its certainly not a new concept. Its just taken on a new dimension in the online space. It would be nave not to acknowledge the inherent vulnerability that comes from allowing unfiltered conversations to take place in the public forum of a blog. Will the brand be compromised? Will negative comments impact sales? Will the blogger represent the company fairly? Can the people writing for a corporate blog hold honest discussions without compromising a competitive advantage? As Johnson & Johnson learned, people are talking about your products, services and employees anyway whether youre part of the dialogue or not. So the question becomes: Where would you prefer that those conversations be held on a competitors blog or on YouTube? Creating a corporate blog or a YouTube channel provides an opportunity to participate and listen in on the discussion on your own turf. By allowing constructive criticism on your company blog and responding to it head-on, you may discourage a negative post elsewhere. In summary, a successful social media strategy is one that involves two elements: listening and participating. Step one is to develop a continuous, action-focused listening strategy that tracks your customers conversations. Step two is to engage your customers with simple and genuine people talk. The bottom line is that people want to do business with people they know and like, and consumer-generated media strongly influences the way your brand is perceived and how purchase decisions are made. Whether through Facebook, YouTube, blogs or another new media entity, your company forfeits a critical competitive advantage if it is not an active participate in the conversation. n
A corporate social media strategy can support various marketing functions and tactics and deliver benefits including the following:
A forum for telling your stories Ability to determine when,

where and how your stories are published Encouragement for online brand champions to tell your stories for you Enhanced relationships with customers, prospects and stakeholders A sense of community created around the brand More and better feedback from customers and stakeholders your way
For some organizations, this type of unstructured, conversational dialogue with the public might be an intriguing concept, but it is a risk they are unwilling to consider. Some fear that the application of a social media strategy results in the loss of control of their carefully crafted brand message.
p PERFORM: The Marketing 2.0 Authority
marketech
revised and updated
forward
forward
The MarkeTech Guide to Marketing Technology and Social Media Marketing is an updated and upgraded version based on the successful e-book originally written for the American Marketing Association in 2008. Marketing used to be simpler. Fewer technologies, fewer channels, less direct consumer influence and frankly, lower risk all of which made our jobs easier. That said, I personally cant think of a time that marketing has been more fun. Our jobs have been transformed by technology To say that much has changed in 18 months is a bit of an understatement. For example, Twitter was on the scene but was far from being a marketing opportunity. In fact, as of Q4 2008, HubSpot estimated that 70% of all Twitter users signed up in 2008 , in spite of Twitters founding back in March of 2006. The effectiveness of the tools that weve used for decades has been called into question on the past few years. Its interesting to note that consumer time spent watching video on the best screen available continues to rise quarter-to-quarter while their usage and consumption of CGM (consumer generated media) content represents almost 20% of their time (surely theres some
Marketech www.marketingsavant.com
ii
overlap there!) but grabs a paltry 3% of the average marketing budget .
forward
Marketing technology goes well beyond and before the advent of social media. Surely, some of the tools we discuss in this e-book are social media tools. However, and more importantly, they are the state-of-the art vehicles that todays marketers need to understand to grow their bottom line and keep pace with the ever-advancing customer base and marketplace.
10 Questions Marketers Want Answered About Digital & Social Media

Youre not alone if you have more questions than answers when it comes to approaching social media marketing and marketing technology. Michael A. Stelzner, author of the, Social Media Marketing Industry Report , conducted a survey of 900 people regarding social media marketing. They received 700 open-ended responses and summarized the major questions marketing professionals wanted answered. Ive included these questions because they so closely reflect the same questions that Ive been receiving month after month while conducting the AMAs two-day TechnoMarketing training course on marketing technology & social media. They include: 1. What are the best practices and tactics to use? 2. How do I measure the effectiveness of social media? 3. Where do I start? 4. How do I manage the social balance? 5. What are the best sites and tools out there? 6. How do I make the most of my available time? 7. How do I find and focus my efforts on my target audience? 8. How do I convert my social media marketing efforts into tangible results? 9. How do I cohesively tie different social media efforts together? 10. Does social media marketing work, and if so, how effective is it? One in three marketers surveyed indicated that identifying best practices, measuring results and knowing where to begin were their top questions with social media. The MarkeTech guide aims to address many of these top-of-mind questions in the following pages.
1. State of the Twittersphere, HubSpot. Q4 2008. http://cdnqa.hubteam.com/State_of_the_Twittersphere_by_HubSpot_Q4-2008.pdf 2. A2/M2 Three Screen Report, Nielsen/Netratings. Q1 2009. 3. Media Trends: Time Spent on The Internet Continues to Grow, Forrester Research. May 2009. 4. Interactive Advertising Forecast (U.S.), Forrester Research. April 2009. 5. Social Media Marketing Industry Report: How Marketers Are Using Social Media to Grow Their Businesses, Michael A. Stelzner. March 2009. Tools and Trends in Marketing Technology
iii
table of contents
table of contents
Social Media Mining, Buzz Monitoring, Customer Listening
......1 Twitter, Microblogging & The Statusphere......7 Blogging.....12 Facebook.....17 LinkedIn.....25 Social Networking Environments.....30 Video Sharing.....34 Email.....38 Automated email (autoresponders).....42 Social Media Optimization.....44 Widgets and Gadgets.....49 Photo, Slideshow and Media Sharing Environments.....51 Honorable Mentions in Marketing Technology.....53
Appendix I: Marketing Technology Resources
.....58 Glossary.....69 Sources, References and Citations.....79

www.marketingsavant.com
Marketech
social media mining, buzz monitoring, customer listening
chapter 1
Social Media Mining, Buzz Monitoring, Customer Listening
This guide is about what leading marketers are doing with marketing technology in 2010. There are opportunities abound for the savvy marketer, but none is more important than listening to the customer by tuning into their frequency in newsgroups, blogs, podcasts, and social media sites. In fact, as the marketing mix moved from a monologue model to one of dialogue and conversation, success with marketing technology will be predicated on a successful buzz monitoring and customer listening strategy.
What Is Social Media?
Social media are primarily Internet- and mobile-based tools for sharing and discussing information among humans. It most often refers to activities that integrate technology, telecommunications and social interaction, as well as the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio. Social networking, on the other hand is nothing new. Humans are all about everyday social interaction; social media offer ways to exchange information through the use of a few clicks or uploads.
What Is Buzz Monitoring?
Marketers are known for talking, not listening. Sure, we listened, but if advertising history is telling of anything it tells us that marketers love to produce stuff that they hope consumers will like. Social media listening and buzz monitoring flips that mind-set; its a phrase used in online public relations and social media marketing to track relevant conversations on the Internet. It provides great opportunity
Tools and Trends in Marketing Technology

to learn at a grassroots level what people really think about your brand, products or services in the statusphere, the collection of all the online conversation in social networking areas such as Facebook, Twitter and others. By monitoring the online conversation happening in blogs, forums, social networks and other social media channels, businesses can bring the voices of their customers directly into their marketing departments and cut down on the need for expensive market research tools such as focus groups and phone surveys. In fairness to the market and marketing researchers worldwide, social media listening will never fully replace a scientifically developed panel, customer advisory board or survey that gives us statistically significant and valid data on which to base our marketing decisions.
Buzz monitoring can be accomplished by paying for the service through a major provider of online conversation monitor methodology, or can be done in house through a variety of free services that are available to all marketers.
Why Social Media Monitoring for 2009?
While there are a good number of large organizations engaging a professional firm to understand the marketing conversation about their business, products or services, there are countless other companies from small business to Fortune 1000 enterprises that have yet to learn what the buzz is about. People are talking through blogs, social networks like Facebook and Twitter, wikis, etc. Knowing what theyre saying is crucial because their discussions influence consumer attitudes and behaviors and show up prominently in search returns, all of which affect your business. Its a huge change because businesses no longer own their own brand. For a growing number of companies, hiring a full-time social media marketer is the way they ensure they interact sufficiently with their customers via Facebook, Twitter and other online sources. Dell, for example, has more than 40 full-time employees charged solely with social media marketing on behalf of the brand. Wells Fargo has had a vice president of social media since 2005. Buzz monitoring can be accomplished by paying for the service through a major provider of online conversation monitor methodology, or can be done in house through a variety of free services that are available to all marketers.
It All Starts With Social Media Monitoring
In order to fully engage in a customer community, develop a widget, or produce a worthwhile video that goes viral; you need to be in touch with the buzz about your business. Consumers want to talk to consumers. They dont trust marketers; they trust each other. Social media is a linkable, findable conversation medium and your customers are talking about you, right now, and you likely dont know what theyre saying (Yet!).
1. Coining the Statusphere: The Social Webs Next Big Thing, Brian Solis. March 2009. http://briansolis.tumblr.com/post/85090914/coining-the-statuspherethe-social-webs-next-big Marketech www.marketingsavant.com
Social media or buzz monitoring can be done professionally. Firms like Radian6, Vocus, ScoutLabs, Cymfony and dozens of other companies have sprung up to go beyond the blogs. Theyre monitoring and tracking ALL mediums used by social media-enabled consumers. Its more than just listening; its about applying benchmarks, heuristics and intelligence around social media, not just one-dimensional DIY tools.
How Do Marketers Find Out Whos Talking and What Do They Measure?
There are different parts of the conversation - enterprise, mainstream media, and consumer generated content. Unless youre monitoring the buzz, you wont know whats there. In every social media monitoring program, there are a few fairly obvious things that every marketer should track. If you need more reasons to track social media, think of the new product ideas, keyword research for SEO, warnings of possible scandals and customer reactions that youll be able to amass.

In addition, there are three key metrics involved in what is referred to as Online Reputation Management: 1. Share of voice. This is a measurement of how much and to what degree people are talking about you. 2. Tone of voice, a.k.a. Sentiment analysis. This is a measurement of whether the conversation is largely positive or negative. If the sentiment is positive, reward those who speak well of you. If the tone is largely negative, you need to take action to get to the root of the problem IF one really exists. If its based in misinformation, youll need to engage the critics and correct their misunderstanding. 3. Trends over time. Its important to monitor the above metrics over time to see the effects of your advertising, marketing and public relations efforts.
Best Practices for Monitoring the Conversation
Getting started monitoring the online conversation can be pretty straightforward, but there are a few guidelines that can help you get a jump start. 1. Look for evangelists and help the spread the good word 2. Engage with middle ground consumers to influence them. 3. Look for incidental detractors and engage with them to fix problems. 4. Seek out and minimize determined detractors - the people who just cant seem to be happy.
Monitoring Steps
Marketech
www.marketingsavant.com
1. Conversation discovery Use brand monitoring services, keyword watch lists and alerts or, at a minimum, at least doing persistent searches? 2. Conversation aggregation How are you gathering your data? Options include Google Reader or MyYahoo. 3. Conversation escalation The decision to move from passive to active participation in online conversations. 4. Conversation participation Determining how to participate. It could be via emails, comments, posts, tweets, etc. OR you can participate more indirectly through social bookmarks, tagging, etc. 5. Conversation tracking There are many options, from customer relationship management software to review of email strings.
Whats Next for Social Media Listening/Buzz Monitoring?
There is a move from the belief that markets are conversations to a scenario in which online conversations are becoming markets or, at a minimum, that theres a market for monitoring conversations. A whole class of technologies is emerging to help companies track the conversations exploding online. More and more companies are embracing social media monitoring. A reported entitled Social Media Monitoring and Analysis: Generating Consumer Insights From Online Conversation produced by the Aberdeen Group, determined that 52 percent of companies currently had a social media monitoring and analysis solution in place and another 33 percent either had budget planned for these solutions within the next 12 months, or were interested in the technologies and were evaluating providers. In addition, survey respondents indicated that social media monitoring

and analysis can benefit a greater than expected number of corporate functions, from customer care to public relations and legal.
What to Monitor
What to Track? Company name Products/Brands Executives Key Customers Patents Press releases Competitors Stocks Services
Blogs Newsgroups Social networks Podcasts Q&A venues (i.e., Yahoo Answers) Search engine results Wikipedia
Buzz Monitoring Tools

Google or Yahoo Alerts Google Blog/Web Search Google Reader Google Trends or Trendrr Twitter YackTrack Social Mention FriendFeed search Technorati Serph SocialMention FeedRinse BlogPulse Backtype BoardReader Summize (search.twitter.com) Filtrbox.com Flickr (photos) YouTube (videos) Facebook Lexicon
Sou
rced
fro
av m: D
id A
rma
ttp o-h
://w
ww.
jro avid
man
o.co
m/
l% socia
20m
edia
on 20m
itorin
g.ht
ml
Marketech
Twitter, Microblogging & The Statusphere
chapter 2
Microblogging is a Web service that allows the subscriber to broadcast short messages to other subscribers of the service. The appeal of microblogging is both its immediacy and its portability. Posts are brief typically 140 to 200 characters and can be written and received by a variety of devices including cell phones. Although most microblog broadcasts are posted as text, some services allow video or audio posts. Microblogging is slowly moving into the mainstream. In the United States, President Barack Obama microblogged from the campaign trail using Twitter, one of the most popular microblogging services. Traditional media organizations, including The New York Times, have begun to send headlines and links in microblog posts.
Microblogging is Growing. Fast.
http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-comparing-the-first-three-years-of-growth-2009-4
A survey from Nielsen showed that between February 2008 to February 2009, Twitter grew at a whopping 1,382 percent growth rate. In February 2008, it had 7.038 million users in comparison to the 65.7 million on Facebook at the same time. Twitter, which counts the 35-to-49-yearold age range as its biggest demographic) has a huge advantage in that it is easy to use via a mobile phone (whether through mobile Web or text messages). In January

2009, 735,000 unique visitors accessed Twitter through their mobile phones. The average unique visitor went to Twitter 14 times during the month and spent an average of seven minutes on the site. And since people are on their computers or their cell phones multiple times a day with Twitter, its an ideal tool for selling something online. Another microblog innovator is Buzzable, which attempts to create in-social networks on a microblog platform. In other words, by creating small networks of highly targeted individuals, you can distribute time-sensitive materials and collaborate in a community without having to create an entire social network.
What Marketers are Doing With It
Marketing savvy companies are using Twitter in a multitude of ways, primarily to establish contact between its staff and customers, giving the company an aura of being human and approachable. Dell Computer, on the other hand, has several customer service people who find complaints about the companys products and address them at the earliest possible opportunity. They also offer more general technical advice. Case in point: Zappos.com Online shoe and clothing retailer, Zappos.com, CEO Tony Hsieh regularly uses Twitter to update on anything from work travels to what he is eating to company news. All Zappos employees are allowed to join Twitter and/or write for the company blogs. The company also sues Twitter to engage with customers and provide personalities for the people working at Zappos. Twitter is an excellent tool to show a personality and have fun. Twitter has enabled this and other companies to put a personal face on an impersonal entity: the corporation. To date, Hsieh has used his account to share details about what hes up to, provide behind-the-scenes info about what its like to work at Zappos, launch a Twitter contest asking people to help them rewrite their confirmation emails, incubate an idea for polling customers on Twitter and explain why hes using Twitter. Collectively, these efforts are putting a human face on the company and engage customers more deeply. Case in point: Dell Twitter is especially suited to promoting online contests. It can also be used as an additional sales channel; Dells Twitter account DellOutlet has generated about $500,000 in sales by offering special discounts to Twitter users.
Microblogging Tools
Microblogging Tools Twitter Neighbr Buzzable Shout Em Ning Pownce Plurk you are Identi.ca Jaiku Kwippy
Marketech

Case in point: Ben and Jerrys Ben and Jerrys turned to microblogging to further its engagement with loyal consumers. The company wanted a social media program that would align with the Ben & Jerrys mission of Peace, Love and Ice Cream, fit its culture and met its key performance indicators of relationships strengthened and built. They partnered with a social media marketer to create a peace sign mosaic to which users could contribute pictures and text with their own vision of world peace in celebration of the new Imagine Whirled Peace ice cream. The campaign is available at www.benjerry. com/imagine. The results: The campaign yielded a 42-fold increase in time spent engaged on the site. The campaign also strengthened relationships with loyalists and introduced younger audiences.
A social media campaign by Ben & Jerrys yielded a 42-fold increase in time spent engaged with the Website, strengthened existing relationships and introduced younger audiences.
10
Best Practices
Here are a few basic steps to help you get the most out of using a microblog without getting yourself in too deeply, or overwhelming others: 1. Consider your audience. If youre speaking to friends, its OK to share personal details. But if your feed is open to the public, make sure its something of value to them. 2. Post regularly but dont go overboard. Bloggers often feel the need to update their blogs regularly, and the same rings true for microblogging. 3. Dont include personal details in an open broadcast. If your feed is public and you have a lot of followers you dont know well, leave out specific details about where you are and what youre doing. 4. Turn off phone alerts for feeds that dont feed you. If you get too many text messages from Twitter feeds that arent relevant to you, you can stop getting text alerts from that person or completely remove the person from your friend list.
Ping.fm
Ping.fm is a free social networking and microblogging Web service that enables users to post to multiple social networks simultaneously. Making an update on Ping.fm pushes the update to a number of different social Web sites at once, so users can avoid logging into multiple accounts to send the same message to different groups and contacts on the Internet. Its a huge time-saver, making it particularly appealing to social media and online marketing professionals. Ping.fm groups services into three categories status updates, blogs and microblogs and updates can be sent to each group separately. Users can configure their Ping.fm account
Leverage Microblogging to Help Your Business These Ways:
1. Monitor your industry and competitors. Southto aggregate content to services like west Airlines, for example, has used microWordPress.com, Facebook, LinkedIn, blogging to keep an eye on long lines at its Twitter and many more. airport gates so it can respond to and help passengers. 2. Track conversations about companies and their brands. 3. Grow sales. Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, for example, may occasionally give away shoes through Twitter, building loyalty to the brand that will result in additional sales in the future. Dell has used Twitter to broadcast closeout sales on product lines. 4. Enhance customer service. Microblogging posts can be directed to the general audience from a user; to a particular user but read by the general audience; or to a user via a direct message. An employee can follow these posts and address a customers request in any of them quickly, directly and personally. 5. Expand communication with stakeholders. Distribute short messages to direct readers via URLs to your Web site, blog or other Web sources where you can offer more information about the company or relevant issues.
Marketech
11
Twitter Dos and Donts

Dos Do create a Twitter profile that helps people verify your legitimacy Do let consumers know who they are talking to (a real person, not a bot) Do protect consumer information Do provide customer care and feedback Do include your social media affiliations on your corporate Web site Do empower your Twitter representative to make a difference Do see what other businesses are doing on Twitter Do use Twitter search engines for keyword searches around brands, products and topics of interest. Do follow Twitterers with similar interest to establish a brand presence with conversation Do use Twitter to start a conversation ask your followers to come up with new ideas or ask what theyre doing now Do learn about customer needs what other things are customers interested in? Do advertise an event or promotion Do ask questions and get feedback from your followers Do engage consumers in co-creation and get constructive insights for future company developments or publications Do follow the Blogger Code of Ethics (be transparent in your reason to Tweet, Respect other Twitterers, think before you direct message, make sure your message directly relates to those you are reaching out to, provide value to your followers). Donts Dont Dont Dont Dont
use Twitter to push ads or brand messaging. just Tweet but also follow others to join in or start a conversation. use Twitter to tell your everyday tasks; make sure your Tweets are valuable. Tweet anything about clients, co-workers or others that you would not want them to see.
Where Is Microblogging Going?
While Shout Em and Buzzable havent hit Twitters strides, they and thousands of other microblogs are appearing on the Internet everyday. Eventually, its anticipated that the microblogging world will become so cluttered that segmentation will be required to specific niches and targeted industries.
12
Blogging
chapter 3
Blogging
A blog (a contraction of the term Weblog) is a type of Web site, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, description of events or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. The word blog can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs. Most blogs are primarily textual, although some focus on art (an artlog), photographs (photoblog), sketches (sketchblog), videos (vlog), music (MP3 blog) and audio (podcasting). A blogosphere is the collective community of all blogs. Since all blogs are on the Internet by definition, they may be seen as interconnected and socially networked. Discussions in the Blogosphere have been used by the media as a gauge of public opinion on various issues. But as the Blogosphere grows in size and influence, the lines between what is a blog and what is a mainstream media site become less clear. Larger blogs are taking on more characteristics of mainstream sites and mainstream
Marketech
13
sites are incorporating styles and formats from the Blogosphere. In fact, 95% of the top 100 US newspapers have reporter blogs.
Blogging
Blog Basics
Blogs have been around since the late 1980s or early 1990s, but the official terms Weblog, blog and blogging didnt surface until 1997 and gained popularity a few years later. Blogs are often the foundation of corporate social media and customer community programs. Currently, 27.9 million U.S. Internet users have a blog they update at least once a month, and they represent 14 percent of the Internet population. By 2013, 37.6 million users will update their blogs at least monthly, according to emarketer.com. Even more important than the number of bloggers, though, is the number of blog readers. eMarketer estimates that in 2009, 96.6 million U.S. Internet users will read a blog at least once a month. By 2013, 128.2 million people, or 58 percent of all users, will do the same. While blogs in the beginning were used for one-way expression, theyve evolved into two-way conversations. This interactive format presents new opportunities for marketers to influence and monitor conversations that might be relevant to their businesses. The bottom line is that blogging is a global phenomenon. Bloggers have been posting for an average of three years and are collectively creating close to 1 million posts every day.
It has been estimated that by 2013, 128.2 million people--almost 60% of all users-will read a blog at least once a month.
Whos Using It
There is tremendous room for opportunity on blogs not only in the small business market, but also in the Fortune 500 segment. Only 16 percent of these companies surveyed have a publicly facing blog, according to a new study by Nora Ganim Barns, Ph.D., chancellor professor of marketing at UMass Dartmouth and Eric Mattson, CEO and Financial Insite. Eighty-one (16 percent) of the primary corporations listed on the 2008 Fortune 500 list have a public-facing corporate blog with a post in the past 12 months. These early adopters include three of the top five corporations (Wal-Mart, Chevron and General Motors). Blogging differed by industry type, with computer software, peripherals and office equipment companies having the most blogs (eight). Companies in this category include Xerox, Dell, Microsoft, Oracle and EMC. The telecommunications industry represented by compa-
Only 16 percent of Fortune 500 companies have a public blog, which means tremendous opportunity for these companies to engage their audiencece through blogs.
14
Blogging
nies like Verizon, Sprint and Virgin Media had five of the blogs studied. Food-related companies like McDonalds, Tyson, Whole Foods, General Mills and Safeway also had five blogs. Of those using it, their uses and appeal vary widely. For example: Wal-Mart has a checkout blog geared to the consumer and discussing the latest in gadgets, green, gaming, etc. Coca-Colas conversations has a single author blogging about the history of the company. Southwest Airlines has multiple authors writing about corporate culture, developments, services and offers, and is very clear about its call to action access to exclusive Southwest offers.
11 Reasons
Why Blogging Matters

1. It brings ideas out to the public. 2. It provides a forum for communicating. 3. It showcases new ideas. 4. It presents different perspectives. 5. It allows for disintermediation traditional media (if something written about you was wrong, set the record straight). 6. It allows people to find you through search and search engines love blogs. 7. It empowers people to respond. 8. It allows for communication with very niche segments. 9. It allows you to spark conversation. 10. It encourages collaboration with community to solve problems. 11. It helps to create your brand and get your message out.
The Blogging Bottom Line
According to Technorati: State of the Blogosphere 2008 report, The majority of bloggers we surveyed currently have advertising on their blogs. Among those with advertising, the mean annual investment in their blog is $1,800, but its paying off. The mean annual revenue is $6,000 with $75K+ in revenue for those with 100,000 or more unique visitors per month. Note: median investment and revenue (which is listed below) is significantly lower. They are also earning CPMs on par with large publishers. Bloggers are sophisticated in using self serve tools for search, display, and affiliate advertising, and are increasingly turning to ad and blog networks. Many bloggers without advertising may consider it when their blogs grow the inability to set up advertising will not be a factor.
Marketers blog
Establish authority Converse with customer base Search related benefits Instant feedback, reciprocity and commitment Easy syndication with RSS
Why
Tips for Creating An Effective Blog
Create an authentic blog personality. Dont formulate your posts let your real voice shine through. Its casual, conversational, anything-goes nature makes it both so appealing to blog writers and readers - and so potentially dangerous to business.
Marketech
15
Blogging
Blog search engine Technorati has:

indexed 133 million blog records indexed since 2002 tracked blogs in 81 languages since June 2008 determined bloggers collectively create 1 million posts per day learned that company information or gossip and everyday retail experiences are fodder for the majority of bloggers
Top bloggers, according to Cisonblog, are:

ReadWriteWeb Mashable Seth Godins Blog Scobleizer How to Change the World ChrisBrogan.com Micro Persuasion Successful Blog Marketing Pilgrim Logic + Emotion
Go into your blog writing with the intent of writing to inform, not to sell. Set clear objectives for your blog management. Why does your organization want to blog? Evaluate the benefits and assess the risks before leaping in. Look at other industry blogs to see how they are engaging their readers and see what response theyre receiving. Comment on other blogs to leave a footprint back to your own. Quality on-topic and knowledgeable comments will engage readers to inquire more about the writer. Be consistent. In the beginning, try to post at least three times a week. Keep it simple. Dont get caught up in the length of your posts. The key is to make them interesting and valuable. Allow comments. You can moderate them, but comments create the viral effect by allowing readers to interact with you. Monitoring is crucial. Use a succinct and appealing headline. This is what draws your reader in. Ask for some action in your post. Provide unique content that makes your blog a destination for the user. Link your blog to other reputable sources of information. Blog links can also help in increasing the page ranks of the blog. Use newsletters to promote engagement.
16
Blogging
Whats Next for Blogging
Today, blogs are everywhere and they have changed the way publishing works. What used to be about a cluster of a minority around a single tool now refers to hundreds of millions of people using a warehouse of tools so that they can behave online the way they do in real life. Collectively, weve entered the Age of Normalization in the Blogosphere, according to Shel Israel, social media writer and speaker, co-author of Naked Conversations. The process which content is created will continue to evolve. This past year included the introduction of countless microblogs such as Twitter, long blogging and video blogging prompting the creation of microcommunities. Video is anticipated to become increasingly important to convey complex messages that are often lost in text.
Marketech
17
Facebook
chapter 4
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking Web site; users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages. The Web sites name refers to the paper facebooks depicting members of a campus community that some colleges and prep schools give to incoming students, faculty and staff as a way to get to know each other on campus. In fact, Facebook originated with college students at Harvard University. Today, Facebook has catapulted into the lead of social networking sites. As of Jan. 4, 2009, Facebook had more than 42 million users in the U.S. alone. The biggest surprise is that Facebooks 35-54-year-old demographic segment has continued to grow the fastest and even accelerated to a 276.4% growth rate over the past six months. Its definitely not your college students Facebook anymore! According to Facebook, it has more than 200 million active users and more than 100 million of those log on to Facebook at least once each day, and two-thirds of Facebook users are outside of college age. Not surprisingly, people who use Facebook on their mobile devices are almost 50 percent more active on Facebook than non-mobile users. About 30 million active users currently access Facebook through their mobile devices.
18
Facebook
Facebook Success Stories

Business-to-consumer: Specialty Color Services. This photo retail business decided to use Facebook to promote their business and to showcase how much they care about their work and the photography industry. They wanted to show how much they adored their passionate, enthusiastic and loyal customers in the process. They used Facebook to get their message out: Photograph your love. They spread the word about a contest built around that theme. Participants were encouraged to upload photos representing their interpretation of Photography your love to the Specialty Color Services Facebook page. In the process, they would Become a Fan on Facebook and via word-of-mouse, encourage others to do the same.
Best Practices for Marketing in Facebook

Based on the experiences of organizations marketing in Facebook and conversations with small- and medium-size business owners, several best practices for using Facebook have been identified, including: Assign a specific person to create and manage your companys Facebook Page. Its important to post new information, photos and videos regularly to keep it fresh. Respond to messages and questions left on your Pages discussion board and Wall within 24 hours. Post all of your events, videos and relevant photos to Facebook. Consistent activity and active sharing are critical to Facebook success. Dont fall victim to the mentality: If I build it, they will come. Develop a strategy to attract fans, which may involve both paid and unpaid approaches. Promote your Facebook Page outside of Facebook to attract more fans. This can be as simple as adding a line to your current marketing or PR materials, such as Find us on Facebook. Be sure to review Facebooks guidelines for external promotion. Facebook also offers a Share button you can add to your Web site to make it easier for your content to be shared on Facebook.
When the contest ended in January 2009, Specialty Color Services had received almost 2,000 entries, boosting business and re-creating the community feel that owners Gabe Cano and Glen Hodges said they missed from their days running a smaller photo business. They also posted videos on Facebook (such as one in which Gabe talked about the stores Valentines Day services). Since he began doing the videos, Gabe said that when people call the store and recognize his voice, they want to talk. He finds this to be an amazing level to achieve with a customer he may never have met. Now, they have a forum for customers to come and share their love, and to establish relationships with customers beyond the retail transaction. The store said they are able to add to their level of authenticity, something they cant get from a Web site or e-mail campaign. In the end, Gabe and Glen are photofinishers and do tell their customers its critical to print their pictures and store them
Marketech
19
Facebook
and catalog them. And when you build that trust with them through Facebook, theyll be more willing to do that, he said.
Business-to-consumer: IntenCity Global. Bryce Gruber, the owner of this marketing and public relations firm in New York, used Facebook to draw more than 300 people to an opening party for a clothing store that expected would only attract 150 to 200 people. She said the people who learned about the party through Facebook bought several thousand dollars in merchandise. Her approach is to post information and reminders about her events regularly, and to upload plenty of party pictures afterward. Each day, she gets 20 to 30 messages on her wall and keeps that going with quick replies. The effort means she shows up often in her Facebook friends news feeds, where people are notified of their friends activities on Facebook.
20
Facebook
How Nonprofits Can Benefit from Facebook
20 Ways to market in Facebook

1. Profile Page 2. Groups 3. Pages 4. Events 5. Notes and Photos 6. Messages 7. Marketplace 8. Share/Posted Items 9. Networks 10. Mini Feed and News Feed 11. Social Ads 12. Contests 13. Polls 14. Facebook Platform Ad Networks 15. Sponsored Facebook Groups 16. Profile Box 17. Mini Feed 18. News Feed 19. Invitations 20. Email Notifications
Nonprofits can probably benefit most from the use of Facebook, versus their for-profit peers, in that they dont have to make a financial expenditure to reap its benefits. Instead, using Facebook for nonprofits requires personnel resources. Here are a few innovative ways nonprofits can benefit from having a presence on Facebook 1. Raise funds for the organizations fund-raising campaign 2. Find and communicate with potential supporters and create a sense of community 3. Stir and broaden support for important social issues 4. Empower members to engage in their own actions 5. Organize, promote and manage events 6. Promote the organizations blog, latest news, meetings and other Web content 7. Raise public awareness and money for advocacy efforts 8. Find and recruit volunteers the abundance of young professionals on Facebook make it an ideal place to attract volunteers 9. Create a single branded page of your organizations work 10. Stay in touch with core audiences on an ongoing basis flexibility to have open, closed or secret groups as needed
Tips for Effective Facebook Marketing
Facebook offers a number of features that can be used to market products and services, as well as a business Web site. For example, Facebook Ads offer the ability to target a niche market based on age, gender, interests, location and more. If youd like to begin without making a financial expenditure, here are a few ways to tap Facebooks grassroots marketing potential: Create a profile. This is your presence and expressed the passion you have for your brand. Its a crucial page and the most frequently browsed page of your online presence. Share the story of your product or service, how you started, how youve grown/evolved, where youre headed, etc., here.
Marketech
21
Facebook
Organizations have tapped Facebook Fan Pages, Groups and social ads. With Facebooks array of options for businesses to connect with customers, it is quickly moving from a nice to have to a must have element in your business outreach strategy.
Promote events. Post your marketing events, training programs or even company news here to your customers, partners and world at large. Send messages. You can send them to a more captive group (those who are in your network) or out of your network as well. Conduct polls. You can conduct market research on your target market using this offering. One of the greatest advantages is that youll likely receive a large number of responses in just hours. Join pertinent groups. Use the sites group feature to network with your target audience. Create a group for your business. Groups are the oldest and simplest way to build community around your brand or company on Facebook. This will serve as a central place for people to congregate and participate in conversations around your brand. You can post photos, discussion topics, videos and links as well as easily send news and updates to your group members as often as you like. Groups are also one of the simplest ways to do viral marketing on Facebook. An alternative is to create a page for your business; these are similar to groups but are more customizable and get more prominent real estate. Assign a specific person to create and manage your companys Facebook page to ensure it features new information, photos and videos. Consistent activity and active sharing are critical to Facebook success. Create a marketing strategy for Facebook so you attract fans; this may involve both paid and unpaid approaches. Promote your Facebook page outside Faebook - ad it to your marketing materials, Web site, etc. Establish a Facebook badge. Facebook describes its badge feature as a customizable way to share your Facebook information on other Web sites. Creating your own Badge will link Facebook friends to your companys Web site.
22
Facebook
What about Facebook Advertising?
With the ability to reach into a rich and interactive base of 250,000,000 people on Facebook, it can be a marketers dream or a marketers nightmare, depending on your approach. Successful advertising campaigns on Facebook are dependent on a few factors. Target, for one, has had much success with their Facebook campaigns. Certainly, as a large consumer brand with broad appeal and the budgets that they can allocate for testing make Target a challenging act to follow for most marketers. However, there are scores of marketers with far more obscure products and target markets who are finding success with Facebook advertising ranging from agricultural chemical manufacturers to welding to appliance companies
Facebook advertising is a very new field, with new strategies, tactics and ideas that have never been used before. No one has figured it all out yet, but unlike channels like Google AdWords, the competition is less, and the potential rewards are much larger than many other more traditional methods. When looking at the Facebook campaign AKQA ran for Target, AKQA did exactly what you are supposed to do when running an social media marketing campaign. Here are some of the lessons learned from that campaign.
Adjust the message for your audience and use unique targeting tools
Rather than just talking to their audience, they made their campaign more about party planning. Our attitude had to be that we were taking advantage of an environment that already exists; we arent there so much to tell a story, but to put on a party, giving the students a platform for social interaction, says Mauro Cavalletti, AKQAs creative director.
Marketech
23
Facebook
Target and AKQA monitored Facebook to track the conversation
One of the key differences between advertising or engaging in Facebook and any other type of non social-network advertising is that you have to engage, or be social, so to speak, to track how your ads are performing and to stay engaged with the audience for the duration of the campaign. This goes double if the landing page or call to action for the ad is a Facebook group or fan page where people are expected to comment or post. The ads need to speak the language of your audience The ads, the landing page, and everything about a Facebook campaign need to be highly relevant for the audience, which almost goes without saying, but they also need to speak the language that the audience speaks right down to the keywords in the ads.
Marketers are getting great results with Facebook
In Targets case, they were able to effectively measure the ROI of their Facebook efforts. By September 31, the sponsored page had 7,176 members, 409 photos, 483 posts and hosted 37 discussion groups. Many of the posts provided positive feedback on Target stores, members informed other members where good deals were, which Target store had short coffee lines, and bargain shoppers praised the dollar bins. All that having been said, Facebook campaigns are not for everyone. Wal-Mart has had their share of failures with Facebook, Wal-Marts failure was due, in large part, to their decision to restrict comments and feedback on its Facebook page to Wall Posts instead of having a discussion board like http://www.insidefacebook.com/2009/02/14/facebook-surpasses-175-million-users-continuing-to-grow-by-600k-usersday/ Target did. Their reluctance to truly engage in the social aspect of social media advertising was the beginning of their undoing.
24
Facebook
Whats Next for Facebook?
Facebook is an evolving animal; in early 2009, it underwent several changes in the form of its design format (which people either loved or hated), its terms-of-service agreement (which generated controversy), the departure of Gideon Yu, its chief financial officer, its cash flow situation (in April 2009, its CFO indicated Facebook doesnt need additional financing and is not short on money). Perhaps the most controversial of all the changes is the opening of part of Facebooks code to the public in April 2009 (Facebook Open Stream API); third-party developers can now build Facebook applications that will allow users to post status updates, share pics and links and interact with most elements of the site without visiting Facebook.com. This is sure to impact the traffic levels and the resulting potential touchpoints for businesses advertising on Facebook. Not surprisingly, Facebooks future is largely in the hands of its users literally, those who use mobile devices. The number of Facebooks users who access it via their mobile device every day is four million and growing. With the increased use of superphones, mobile and wired Web are going to become tighter than ever. Looking forward, Facebook is open to a much broader inflow of ad dollars given that it is designed for both casual users and professionals.
Marketech
25
LinkedIn
chapter 5
LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking site founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003 mainly used for professional networking. As of May 2009, it had more than 39 million registered users spanning 170 industries. The site began as a resume-sharing site with networking functionality. Although it has been around for several years, its site traffic grew 153 percent in 2008 and 319 percent since 2007. In todays economic climate, its no wonder LinkedIn is thriving. Overall traffic has more than doubled to 6.9 million users in February 2009 from 3.3 million a year earlier. LinkedIn continues to be the destination for people who want to connect for business ONLY. Other social networks typically have professional and personal components.
LinkedIn Success Stories
Business-to-business Davis & Kelthau, s.c. In fall 2008, this Milwaukee law firm joined LinkedIn at the urging of the firms director of marketing and business development. Among the attorneys who took her advice was a partner who was skeptical at first. But, he later told that, in response to two of his emails asking clients to connect, not only did they accept his invitation, but also contacted him saying, Ive been meaning to get in touch with you about and two new matters landed on his plate with very little effort on his part. Business-to-consumer. Employers are increasingly relying on LinkedIn to recruit and vet their potential hires. Drew Patterson, vice president of marketing for Kayak.com, used the site to find two of the five employees he hired last year, paying $195 to list his job posts for 60 days.
26
LinkedIn
LinkedIn Features
At the root of LinkedIn is the intent to allow registered users to maintain a list of contact details of people they know and trust in business. The people in the list are called Connections. This list can be used in a number of ways: o A contact network is built up consisting of their direct connections, the connections of each of their connections (termed second degree connections) and also the connections of second degree connections (termed third degree connections). This can be used to gain an introduction to someone you wish to know through a mutual, trusted contact. o It can then be used to find jobs, people and business opportunities recommended by someone in ones contact network. o Employers can list jobs and search for potential candidates. o Job seekers can review the profile of hiring managers and discover which of their existing contacts can introduce them. The feature LinkedIn Answers allows users to pose questions for the community to answer. The searchable LinkedIn Groups feature allows users to establish new business relationships by joining alumni, industry or professional or other relevant groups. Make or obtain recommendations of people with whom you are connected. These online testimonials a key component of your LinkedIn profile not only enhance your profiles completion percentage, but also give people researching you a reference point for how professional and credible you and your business are.
Top Tips for Effective LinkedIn Marketing
LinkedIn is the biggest business networking community online. If youre not using it, youre missing out on exposure and networking opportunities for yourself and your business. See the Build Your Best Profile sidebar on the next page for more tips.
Marketech
27
LinkedIn
Ways to Use LinkedIn to Promote Yourself and/or Your Business
Customize your URL. Your profile information may be indexed by search engines. LinkedIn profiles rank pretty highly with Google. Instead of using the default URL, consider customizing yours with your companys name. If youre a small business thats not well known, consider using a great keyword. Include a photo. A picture aids recall when youve met face-to-face and people with pictures are far more likely to be contacted. Ensure your entry doesnt contain misspellings or other errors. Use Status Visibility, LinkedIns internal version of Twitter to keep your connections current on whats important to you today. Based on what youre doing, they can reach out to help you. Use the summary to show you are qualified to do what you want to do; use the experience area to support the summary. Tap the Specialties area for keywords associated with the people you want to attract. These are bait and you want LinkedIn members searching for these keywords to find you. Go ahead and give your profile greater visibility. Use your customized LinkedIn URL as a signature when you leave comments in business or industry-specific blogs. Optimize labels. Add your Web site, blog and other relevant URLs to your profile. LinkedIn allows up to three. Use the headline to define yourself. Use words that clearly define you and your business in the field directly below your name; these will help others easily find you. Promote your blog. LinkedIn allows you to sync your blog posts with your LinkedIn profile. Use the e-mail signature. LinkedIn offers you the option of creating a custom e-mail signature in Outlook, Outlook Express and Mozilla Thunderbird with a short version of your LinkedIn profile
Can Benefit from LinkedIn

Fund-raising and partnerships go hand in hand with networking. Everyone knows you begin by asking the people you know for support, then ask the people they know, then the people they know, and so on. That is the premise of how LinkedIn works. It also presents a new way to find like-minded organizations for possible partnerships. LinkedIn is also a likely place to kickstart a donation drive with your own network and beyond. Its demographic is a wealthier one, with executives from some of the Fortune 500 as members and more than 1,500 C-level business owners. Start a group. Most nonprofits dont have anything formalized unless theyre part of a larger organization, so a DIY LinkedIn group can let your past and future supporters stay in touch. Forum for discussion. If you have a question, pose it via your LinkedIn group. Not only will this let you pose a question to your network, but also to the entire LinkedIn community. Access. If your nonprofit depends on involvement from younger age groups, youre better off reaching them through a networking site than traditional media
How Nonprofits
28
LinkedIn
Build Your Best Profile

Join LinkedIn and complete the overview information Complete employment and education history Add a profile summary Select an industry and add your specialties Add your website(s) Create Public Profile URL Determine your Public Profile URL Set your Contact Settings Upload your Contacts from your email client Make introductions to connect via LinkedIn Collect at least 3 recommendations from your network Regularly monitor the Q&A section for questions you are able to answer Ask questions that can help you do your job.
and a link to your complete profile. Add an image to your profile that will add to your credibility and professionalism. Make or obtain recommendations regarding your business peers, vendors, associates and others with whom you do business. Dont make the mistake of being careless with them; view them as a portfolio and use them to support the themes of your portfolio. Dont hesitate to ask the recommender to highlight a specific aspect of your work on which to comment. Join groups related to your industry and participate in the discussions starting discussions responding to questions and sharing resources and tips that might be valuable to our network even if they dont generate direct business for you. Take advantage of LinkedIn Answers. These discussion forums can be included with the profile and add significant value because they allow people to see your expertise and professionalism in context.
Whats Next For LinkedIn
Perhaps the most notable factor about LinkedIn is its explosive growth among individuals seeking professional networking and business productivity. Its also tailored its offerings to users who want special features by offering premium plans to those who want more options for staying in touch professionally. LinkedIn already has 35 million members since February 2009 and that number is expected to grow making it in-line with many of the top social networking sites on the Web. Developers are working hard to implement new features like the LinkedIn Polls along with a set of other applications since they launched their new applications platform back in fall 2008.
Marketech
29
LinkedIn
a bakers dozen smart ways to use LinkedIn

Adapted from Guy Kawasaki
1. Increase your visibility.
By adding connections, you increase the likelihood that people will see your profile first when theyre searching for someone to hire or do business with. In addition to appearing at the top of search results.
6. Increase the relevancy of your job search.
Use LinkedIns advanced search to find people with educational and work experience like yours to see where they work.
2. Improve your connectability.
7. Make your interview go smoother.
Most new users put only their current company in their profile. By doing so, they severely limit their ability to connect with people. You should fill out your profile like its an executive bio, so include past companies, education, affiliations, and activities. You can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature.
You can use LinkedIn to find the people that youre meeting.
8. Gauge the health of a company.
Perform an advanced search for company name and uncheck the Current Companies Only box. This will enable you to scrutinize the rate of turnover and whether key people are abandoning ship.
3. Improve your Google PageRank.
LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. Since LinkedIn profiles receive a fairly high PageRank in Google, this is a good way to influence what people see when they search for you. To do this, create a public profile and select Full View. Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profiles URL to be your actual name.
9. Gauge the health of an industry.
If youre thinking of investing or working in a sector, use LinkedIn to find people who worked for competitorsor even better, companies who failed.
10. Track startups.
4. Enhance your search engine results.
You can see people in your network who are initiating new startups by doing an advanced search for a range of keywords such as stealth or new startup.
In addition to your name, you can also promote your blog or website to search engines like Google and Yahoo! Your LinkedIn profile allows you to publicize websites. There are a few pre-selected categories like My Website, My Company, etc.To make this work, be sure your public profile setting is set to Full View.
11. Ask for advice.
LinkedIn Answers aims to enable this online. The product allows you to broadcast your business-related questions to both your network and the greater LinkedIn network.
12. Integrate into a new job.
5. Perform blind, reverse, and company reference checks.
LinkedIns reference check tool to input a company name and the years the person worked at the company to search for references. Your search will find the people who worked at the company during the same time period. Since references provided by a candidate will generally be glowing, this is a good way to get more balanced data.
When people start a new job, ordinarily their roots arent that deep in the new company. However, with Linkedin, new employees can study fellow employees profiles and therefore help them get to know more people faster in a new company.
This seems like its a no-brainer, but you can use LinkedIn to scope out the competitions team as well as the team of customers and partners.
13. Scope out the competition, customers, partners, etc.
30
Social Networking Environments
chapter 6
Its hard to turn around without hearing a reference to one social network or another Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube But they are by far not the only ones on the Web. In fact, an article in USA Today in May 2008 estimated there would be nearly 250,000 sites calling themselves social networks within a year, compared to the about 850 recorded in May 2008. While there may not be THAT many social networks on the Internet, one fact thats indisputable is that the number of users is growing, and theyre gravitating toward several key sites. According to comScore, social networking users grew at 25 percent from June 2007 to June 2008 and the number increased from 0.46 to 0.58 billion. According to Hitwise, heres how they rank with regard to market share: myspace.com is continuing as social networking market leader with 72 percent of market share,; Facebook.com has 16.91% of market share. MyYear.com is in third position with market share of 1.54 percent. Tagged is in fourth position with 1.08 percent. Bebo is in fifth position in social networking sites with 1.05 percent market share.
Marketech
31
http://www.insidefacebook.com/2009/02/12/hitwise-facebook-steals-more-us-market-share-from-myspace-in-january/
Niche Social Networking Environments.
There are niches in social networking, just as there are niches in business. These have exploded, springing up to cater to peoples interests, backgrounds, professions and age groups. For many bloggers, niche sites offer more targeted links and a much smaller base of competition. According to a eMarketer, of the millions spent to advertise on social networks. 8.2 percent went to niche sites in 2008 went to niche sites, up from 7 percent in 2006.ASmallWorld.net, for example, has become a destination for companies that make luxury goods and want to reach people who can afford them. These niche sites are as diverse as peoples interests, from Dogster for people who are passionate about their dogs and their computers, to TeeBeeDee.com for people over 40, to Active Rain for real estate agents and mortgage professionals. Examples include: Fuzzster, a social networking site for your cats, dogs or other fuzzy pets. NurseLinkUp, geared to nurses. MOG, which targets music lovers. Iliketotallyloveit for shopping aficionados. Mixx, which prides itself on being you link to the Web content that really matters. Small Business Brief; provides valuable exposure and legitimacy. When members post entrepreneur-related articles, a photo and link to their profi Of course, niche sites exist in all areas, such as sports, technology, business, entertainment, art and design and social causes as well.
32
Social Networking Environments Listen to the conversation

As part of our social-media strategy, lets presume all businesses need a way to listen to their audience, their customers, their partners, and their detractors. Lets begin with the tools we use to listen to the conversation. Start with Google Alerts and subscribe to keywords pertinent to your brand. Youll get daily emails telling you when your keywords show up on the Web.
www.google.com/alerts www.keotag.com www.technorati.com www.summize.com
- a self-guided tour
Other Social Networking Environments
MySpace MySpace is a social networking site with an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music and videos. It was a pioneer in the social networking world, offering people an online community where they could communicate with people around the world and share photos, music and videos. Xanga Xanga is a community of online diaries and journals; its best described as a social blogging Web site like Blogger or LiveJournal. It originated as a site for sharing books and music reviews. Today, its a cross between a social network and a blog host, allowing users to maintain a list of friends and join blog rings. Hi5 Hi5 is a social networking site that targets a general audience. It became a very popular site when it went through a huge growth spurt in 2007, with much of that popularity coming from Central America. While its often found in the top 10 most visited Web sites in the world, it often fails to make the top 50 in the United States Famiva Famiva is a family social networking and family tree building tool. Basically, you can add family members and friends to your tree and then email anyone in your tree who is not yet a member. Orkut Orkut is a social networking site run by Google and named for its creator, a Google employee. Like most social networking sites, it was created to help users meet new friends and maintain existing relationships. Its the most visited Web site in Brazil and India; a large percentage of its users are high school and college students in India.
social media
http://crazyegg.com
Social Bookmarking
Social bookmarking is an excellent way to share the collective intelligence of the Internet. This is near the top because you may want to bookmark some of these other sites using del.icio.us.
http://delicious.com/ www.digg.com www.reddit.com www.diigo.com
RSS Feed Aggregators

Sign up for Bloglines, a free http://www.bloglines. Web-based RSS reader com that will allow you to follow numerous blogs and news sites. Add the feed from www.danavan.net to get started, then look Google.com/reader for the RSS button on your favorite news sites to subscribe to more feeds.
Wikipedia
Do you know whats been written about your brand (or your competitors) on Wikipedia? If youre not www.wikipedia.org in Wikipedia, write a mock version of your own Wikipedia entry.
Marketech
33
If theres one message that rings loudly and clearly when it comes to social networking, its this: Social networks are here to stay. What is anticipated to change is its existence as a distinct product category HOW they will exist that will change as we move from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0.
According to Global Enterprise Web 2.0 Market Forecast: 2007 to 2013, a report issued earlier this year by Forrester Research, large companies are expected to spend $4.6 billion by 2013 on Web 2.0 technologies, with social networking, mashups and Real Simple Syndication capturing the biggest share. Its part of a trend that, over the next decade, will morph into Web users looking not just for Web pages that contain the information they want, but also for Web services that provide constant updates on items that appeal to their individual interests and needs. Well be moving toward a platform that interconnects people, organizations, services, products, Web sites and more. It is anticipated to include features that move us toward making existing applications more interconnected and cooperative: A browser that instantly shows you the content youll find most interesting Search engines that return fewer, better results every time Access to contacts current details all the time
Whats Next for Social Networking Environments
Sourced from: www.ethority.net
34
Video Sharing
chapter 7
Video Sharing
While its often YouTube [www.youtube.com] that gets the majority of attention in the online video space, there is so much more to video that drives its efficacy for marketers. Take, for example, the once small high-end blender company, Blendtec. A 186-employee company in Orem, Utah, that built brand awareness with its Will it Blend? [www.willitblend.com] series. Millions of online viewers have watched Chief Executive Tom Dickson blend up dizzying array objects from lumber to the iPhone. For Blendtec, it was not really a question of Will It Blend? but Does It Sell? The answer is: Yes. According to George Wright, Director of Marketing for Blendtec, consumer sales have increased five-fold since the videos went up on YouTube and Revver [www.revver.com].
Why Video Matters to Marketers
Well, for starters, you just cant beat the price! Even large brand marketers like Nike are producing quick, offbeat videos that cost little to produce and return millions of views and thousands of website visitors each month. Secondly, in one UK study online video consumption has nearly doubled in the past year with an ever-growing appetite for online video content. Viral video is simply another way to reach an ever fragmenting group of consumers who have led to a more
Marketech
35
Video Sharing
than 100-fold increase in the number of videos viewed on YouTube since the end of 2005. More to the point, videos are powerful tangible artifacts that are showing up increasingly in Googles blended search results.
Whos Using Online Video?
Hundreds of small companies, ad agencies, large brands and Fortune 500s. Even Ophah Winfrey now has her own YouTube channel [http://www.youtube.com/user/OPRAH] which she says will bring unique perspectives to this ever-expanding international online community. Brands like Nike, Warner Bros., MTV2, Dimension Films, Blendtec, Intuit, Nestle and dozens of others have created online videos or embraced their users creating them for marketing gain.
Whats the Best Way to Use Video Sharing & Viral Video?
Viral success is never assured with video, but by following some proven tactics and creating videos that users will want to share with their friends and colleagues you can be successful, even if you dont get millions of views on YouTube. The key is to make sure that your video has a real/authentic feel and a relevant message. This, and avoiding the typical marketing or sales pitch video will help you build trust and credibility which will serve you as you roll out future videos. When youre ready to deploy your marketing strategy that spreads your video across many digital and social media outposts of the web, so it can more easily be shared, start with putting the video into the video sharing site of your choice (see list of popular sites later in this section) and the post onto your own website or blog. Make sure its easily shareable, meaning it can be easily emailed or posted to different social media sites (video sites like YouTube include this feature). And make it search friendly (good headline, metatags, etc) to make it easier for the search engines to find your video.
Whats the Quickest Path to Success with Online Video?
Virility of online video is hard to predict, but not impossible. Heres a collection of tips from marketers who have achieved success in the online video space: 1. Focus on something fun or funny. Dont force your point; it has to be worth watching. 2. Tie branding closely to product attributes. Yes, drive awareness, but for the right reasons. 3. If youre trying to sell something, demonstrate the product. Show your product performing or resolving a problem. 4. It has to be real. Consumers have little patients for hyperbole or smoke and mirrors. 5. Get to the point. Videos should be less than 2 minutes. 6. Tap into celebrities. Bonus if they have a cult following that matches your brand. 7. Create a viral launch. Videos cant stand alone; seed them on blogs, the media and your network at launch.
36
Video Sharing
Popular Video Hosting Web sites
YouTube - This popular video sharing Web site allows users to upload, view and share video clips. Google recognized its value in November 2006, purchasing it and operating it as a subsidiary of Google. Most of the content on YouTube is uploaded by individuals, although some media corporations use the site as well. Its a powerful tool, as evidenced by the Susan Boyles Britains Got Talent snippet of video posted on YouTube that was subsequently viewed by more than 13 million YouTube viewers within a few weeks. www.youtube.com Viddler - This video site allows users to upload, enhance and share their video from their browser. It was noted for the introduction of online commenting and tag annotations in online video, as well as on-the-fly video recording. Viddler gained popularity in 2007 when popular video bloggers such as Gary Vaynerchuk, Sarah Austin and Justine Ezarik began using Viddlers technology to publish their shows. Viddler is one of the most popular sites for business videos, following YouTube, because its terms of service are favorable to businesses. www.viddler.com Revver - This video sharing Web site hosts user-generated content. It attaches advertising to user-submitted video clips and shares ad revenue 50/50 with the creators (40/40/20 if the video is hosted by a third party). www.revver.com Vimeo - This video-centric social network site supports embedding, sharing, video storage and allows user-commenting on each video page. Its gained a reputation as catering to a high end, artistic crowd because of its higher bitrate, resolution and relative HD support. Vimeo launched support for high definition video in October 2007, further establishing itself as a leading video hosting platform. One caveat is that Vimeo is designed primarily for non-commercial uses. www.vimeo.com Scanscout.com - ScanScout is the market-leading instream video advertising network. The company partners with major advertisers and publishers to maximize video advertising opportunities. ScanScout creates a new significant revenue stream for publishers, helping them to extract the
Marketech
37
Video Sharing
most value out of their video content and monetize it in a user-friendly manner. For advertisers, ScanScout provides the ability to target, optimize and deliver ad messages to the right content and audience, maximizing user engagement. ScanScout is one of the largest online video networks on the web, serving hundreds of millions of ad impressions every month. The company is headquartered in Boston with offices in New York and Los Angeles. www.scanscout.com blinkx.com - blinx is the worlds largest and most advanced video search engine. blinkx has built a reputation as the Remote Control for the Video Web. Now, with an index of over 35 million hours of searchable video and more than 450 media partnerships, including national broadcasters, commercial media giants, and private video libraries, it has cemented its position as the premier destination for online TV. Today, blinkx is the worlds largest single index of rich media content on the Web, delivering more content from a broader range of sources than either Google or Yahoo! www.blinx.com Ustream While not a video hosting site per se, Ustream is a popular website for stream live video to Twitvid This tool is living proof that video has become integrated into just about everything we do. Twitvid allows you to post video with just a Twitter account and a mobile phone. If your phone connects to the Internet and can record video, you can likely use Twitvid to get short videos onto the Internet quickly. Of course, you can use Twitvid via traditional means by uploading videos from a computer, but the power is in the mobile aspect of the site. www.twitvid. com
Whats Next in Internet Video?
Video has been a fairly easy trend to track. As people become more mobile, so does video. As viewers expect more content from TV to specialty shows to web-only webisodes, video content producers have obliged and viewers have responded by devoting an increasing amount of time, attention and bandwidth to online video. For creators of business video, theres an extraordinary opportunity to take whitepapers, howto guides, blog posts and all manner of content to the video screen to engage consumers in a more engaging and relevant manner. The laggards who fall behind on this trend will find themselves passed over by prospects and customers looking for more interesting and engaging content that holds their interest.
38
Email
chapter 8
Email
Life before e-mail (electronic mail) is a distant memory. E-mail (any method of creating, transmitting or storing primarily text-based human communications with digital communication systems) is an integral part of many of our daily lives.
Email Campaign Stories - Who is Using It and How
Case in point: Trek Bikes for business-to-consumer email marketing - Trek Bikes is the largest U.S. manufacturer of bicycles and related products. It has used email marketing to propel new product releases, to notify customers of new Trek bikes available at local retailers, to drive traffic to the Trek Web site, and to communicate with Trek dealers.
It collected an extensive list of email addresses during the 2005 and 2006 Tour De France races and Web site contents. When it was time for one of its largest product releases in June 2007, Trek tapped email marketing in conjunction with print and paid search campaigns to successfully communicate its new offering. It did this through some very purposeful and strategic email marketing efforts including: Linking sent emails to an online version Balancing text and images Allowing plenty of space to surround the image and text block Including important messaging above the fold Including a call to action with a promise Always including its physical address and a clear unsubscribe link It also employed a double opt-in email acceptance process to ensure its delivery list was clean and the users were truly interested in receiving mailings. An example of success? Trek used email marketing for the product release of its all-new Madone bike, devoting much of the campaign to email marketing. Customers printed out the mail
Marketech
39
featuring the bike and brought it to their local stores. The campaign generated: 50 percent clicked to open rate 36 percent open rate (the industry average for the retail sector is 13.9 percent) 18 percent click-thru rate (the industry average is a 3.7 percent click-thru rate)
Email
How Nonprofits Can Profit From E-mail Marketing
Email is a very effective and low-cost tool nonprofits can use to communicate with members, donors and the community at large. It can be used to: Launch a membership drive Solicit donations Sell tickets to fund-raising events Communicate whats new to volunteers, members and others to keep them engaged Conduct surveys/gather feedback from volunteers, members and others
1. Create a face-to-face sign-up sheet
20 Ways To build an email list
2. Put a sign-up form on your Web site home page 3. Allow people to forward your communications to others via a forward this newsletter to others option on your email communication 4. Paid search 5. Search engine optimization 6. Link to your sign-up on your email signature line 7. Link to your online donation or event registration 8. Include it in your shopping cart mechanism 9. Promote your Web site sign-up on brochures and other sales collateral 10. Send direct mail highlighting the online discussion 11. Put the newsletter subscription URL on the footer of catalogs or printed newsletters; offer incentives or discounts via e-mail only 12. Ask for business cards with e-mails on them at trade show booths 13. Feature the newsletter subscription URL on print ads 14. Promote sign up via messaging on hold and voice mail 15. Offer opt-in incentives - white papers, discounts or access to special reports 16. Pay for search engine services and promote your email on the landing page 17. Hand out sign-up forms at speaking engagements and seminars 18. Make changing an address very easy; ideally, simple enough for subscribers to update on their own 19. Require email when people register for events 20. Sponsor a contest or drawing to encourage people to sign up
40
Email
E-mail Statistics Indicate Flurry of Emails
According to Pew Internet and American Life Project data from March 2007, 91 percent of U.S. Internet users have gone online and sent or read email. The same source suggests that 56 percent do this as part of a typical day. As of April 2008, the most popular e-mail Web sites based on U.S. Internet usage and in descending order of popularity) were: mail.yahoo.com mail.live.com (Windows Live Hotmail) gmail.com mail.aol.com Hitwise notes that while Gmails users are fewer in number, they tend to be younger and richer than Yahoos and Hotmails. A study conducted by the Radicati Group in August 2008 estimated 210 billion emails were sent each day. E-mail is both a marketing tool and a challenge: 44 percent of email recipients made at least one purchase last year based on a promotional email People who buy products marketed through email spend 138 percent more than people who do not receive email offers If marketers optimized their emails for image blocking, ROI would increase nine percent 17 percent of Americans create a new email address every six months 30 percent of subscribers change email addresses annually 84 percent of people ages 18 to 34 use an email preview pan
Tips for Effective Email Marketing
Whats very insightful is that people no longer perceive spam as just unsolicited email. Instead, theyre assigning the word spam to all email they dont want. That poses additional challenges for an email marketing program. Here are a few tips for increasing the likelihood your email message will be received and read: Make it easy to subscribe - an even book in your store, a simple form on your Web site that gives people access to discounts or promotions if they provide their e-mails. Keep it confidential. Assure your customers you will never sell their information.
Marketech
41
Email
Dont waste the subject line. Instead, use eye-catching headlines. Avoid abbreviations, slag and hyperbole. Minimize imagery. Too many graphics makes an email slower to load. Label the imagery you have so people see what they are missing if they dont download it. Include a visible call to action above the fold. Use a tone similar to what youd use n a face-to-face meeting with prospects: direct and professional. Clearly state the purpose and value to subscribers. Personalize the message whenever possible. Give the reader a clear way to contact you. Get in their address books by reminding them to add you to their whitelists. Nix attachments. Some people will not open emails with attachments because of virus fears. Avoid purchased lists of emails. Make it easy to unsubscribe to your messages. Make your emails mobile-friendly - click here to read on your mobile phone is becoming more commonplace. Use from to your advantage; emails from a CEO to a fellow executive tend to resonate. Ensure your from line is from someone who matters. Keep messages short and sweet. Respect the audiences time - do not send messages too frequently. Offer something unique to the email audience. Add a link to your companys Twitter account to all mass email communications and even to event invitations and email newsletters. Link to a form landing page from your company Twitter account. Post links from your email newsletter articles on Twitter. Ensure all email newsletter article authors have their Twitter account listed on the email.
Dont forget ...

When building your email marketing campaign, dont forget to include a call to action, provide easy-to-find contact information and add links to your companys Twitter account or other microblogging sites.
42
Autoresponders
chapter 9
Automated email (autoresponders)
An autoresponder is a computer program that automatically answers e-mail sent to it. They can be very simple or quite complex. Autoresponders are often used as e-mail marketing tools to immediate provide information to prospective customers and then follow up with them at preset intervals. Examples: I Received Your Email Off Email; Call If Urgent Im Out of the Office, Returning on X Date Thank You For Registering The greatest appeal of autoresponders may lie in the ability to automated some of the email responses that people who email you demand. Autoresponders can be a relatively inexpensive means of responding to incoming emails as soon as theyre received. They can be as simple as an email program that sends information about a product or service via standardized messages or can send an unlimited number of follow-up messages sent at predetermined intervals.
How Marketers Are Using Automated E-mail
Here are just a few ways you can use autoresponder programs to do more than automatically answer your e-mail: Publish a newsletter. Some autoresponders will manage subscriptions and follow up with interested prospects. Conduct simple polls. Send welcome letters to new members of your program or answer emails about frequently asked questions about a service or product. Deliver an email course that shares the benefits of your product/service. Deliver training courses. Write reviews and put each review in an autoresponder.
Marketech
43
Autoresponders
Distribute your articles. Distribute advertising. It can send information about rates to prospects e-mail addresses and even follow up. It can also send notification of any special deals. Distribute an e-mail course. Create mailing lists. Notify subscribers when youve written new articles. Offer a trial subscription of your product. You can capture their email addresses when you offer a free trial from your Web site, then follow up. Link to hidden pages. Post a request form for visitors to be notified of special offers or discounts in the future.
Tips for Effective Automated E-mail
The most basic reason to use an automated e-mail is to follow up with customers who have taken the time to reach out to you. Consider using it to tout store hours, current specials, etc. Tips for making the most of your automated e-mail include: Choose and main message to share with customers and Repeat your main message over and over and over again. It may feel like overkill to you, but people just dont read things as carefully as youd think. They may read the first message, but miss the second and third. Write the message to write about your reader and not you - use your and we instead of me. Write to emphasize benefits, not features. Answer the whats in it for me? question your readers will inevitably ask when they receive and read your autoresponse message. Personalize your emails to include your prospects first name or full name in your autoresponder message. Keep messages short and sweet and keep the beginning and end very strong and on-point, as your skimmers may look at only these lines - if any. Use a variety of fonts, images and pictures sparingly. The old adage holds true - just because you have the tools doesnt mean you should use all of them. Include a signature line that contains all your contact information.
44
Social Media Optimization
chapter 10
The Social Media Optimization (SMO) concept is a simple one, according to blogger Rohit Bhargava. Implement changes to optimize a site so that it is more easily linked to, more highly visible in social media searches on custom search engines (such as Technorati), and more frequently included in relevant posts on blogs, podcasts and vlogs. While its easy to get caught up in the tools that comprise the social media optimization kit, a more coherent and effective approach is to start with your companys target audience and determine what kind of relationship your company wants to build with them, mainly based on where theyre getting information from in your industry (dictates what tools to use), how they engage with that information and with each other, and ultimately, what they are ready for. Social media optimization (SMO) is a set of methods for generating publicity through social media, online communities and community Web sites. Moreover, its also about the merging of traditional media, search engine marketing and social media marketing. The tools and methods can include RSS feeds, social news buttons, blogging and incorporating community functionalities like images and videos. Social media optimization is similar to search engine marketing but is different in the respect that the focus is on driving traffic from sources other than search engines. SMO is an integral part of an online reputation management (ORM) or search engine reputation management (SERM) strategy for orMarketech
45

ganizations or individuals who care about their online presence. And it should co-exist with search engine optimization as a way to get content seen by a wider audience.
Examples of Sites for SMO (courtesy of SearchEngineGuide.com):

Here is a very short list of some of the most popular sites for social media optimization: Digg: Digg is a user-driven content site where members can vote, bury and comment on stories submitted by other members. Getting onto Diggs front page often results in thousands of visitors flocking to your site and can have lasting ranking effects. Digg Tip: The same story can only be submitted once, so craft your titles carefully. Also, dont forget to embed the Digg This button on your site so users can easily submit content for you. Del.icio.us: Del.icio.us is a Yahoo-owned social bookmarking site. Del. icio.us allows members to publicly save bookmarks using tags. Dont be afraid to tag your own content. Del.icio.us Tip: All links are nofollow so youre not getting link love, but you may get click thrus and direct traffic when users find your del.icio. us bookmarks through the search engines index. YouTube: Well-known video upload site. Acquired by Google, so look for YouTube videos to start appearing in Googles index. YouTube Tip: The five sites that bring the most traffic to YouTube receive a link back from the site. This probably wont help with your Google rankings, but it may help your rankings in the other engines. Newsvine: Another social news site where members can submit news stories, comment on other popular stories and create connections with regular users. Newsvine Tip: Your Newsvine user name becomes your own subdomain, so make sure to use keywords in your profile. StumbleUpon: StumbleUpon acts as a discovery/recommendation engine and match users with Web sites, videos, images, etc. based on their interests that they may have been previously unaware of. Other social media sites to consider using are Wikipedia, Flickr, MySpace, Reddit, Spurl, Blinklist, Shadows, Simply, Yahoo Answers, Ning, 43 Things and Frappr.
How Should Marketers Use SMO
There are some generally accepted practices for social media optimization that roll up into a set of 10 guidelines derived from the initial SMO guidelines posited by Rohit Bhargava, Cameron Olthuis and Jeremiah Owyang. Marketers following these are assured at least a modest degree of success with their social media optimization efforts.
46
Top 10 Guidelines:
1. Increase your linkability - This is the first and most important priority for websites. To optimize a site for social media, we need to increase the linkability of the content. Adding a blog is a great step, but there are more ways such as adding ShareThis buttons and simply creating content that readers will be inclined to link to. 2. Make tagging and bookmarking easy for readers Adding content features like quick buttons to share this or add to del.icio.us are one way to make the process of bookmarking and tagging pages easier. 3. Reward inbound links Internet marketers know that inbound links are paramount to rising in search results and overall rankings. Often called trackbacks in blogs, displaying the inbound links as a means of offering credit to linkers is a best practice in further encouraging this positive behavior. Encourage them by providing provide clear rewards. 4. Make your content portable and syndicate it - Unlike much of SEO, SMO is not just about making updating site. When you have content that can be portable (such as PDFs, video files and audio files), submitting them to relevant sites will help your content travel further, and ultimately drive links back to your site. 5. Encourage mashups and content co-creation It pays to be more open about letting others use your content (within reason). YouTubes idea of providing code to cut and paste so you can imbed videos from their site has fueled their growth. Syndicating your content through RSS also makes it easy for others to create mashups and widgets that can drive traffic or augment your content. 6. Be a useful resource SMO is about being useful, whether thats content or though simple bookmarking and link sharing, adding value to and for users will put you miles ahead of your competitors. As this sharing this adds up, it will become more and more relevant in search engine results.
Marketech
47
7. Reward helpful and valuable users - Sometimes a quick email or direct message note in Twitter telling them you appreciate the link, the re-tweet or the quotations can go a long way. 8. Participate - Join the conversation - Social Media is a two way street. The best ways to social media optimize your firm and your content are to be involved and conversing with the community that you serve. While participating you are creating valuable awareness and prolonging your buzz. Participating helps your message spread further and faster. 9. Know how to SMO for your audience Again, like the Obama Everywhere strategy, you have to know where your tribe is and optimize for their consumption and sharing habits. If they using Stumble Upon, then do that. If theyre part of the Digg Nation, then offer than. 10. Create great content Theres just no substitute for great content. Whether search or social media optimization are part of your plan, or both, content wins the day most of the time. There are certain types of content that just naturally spread socially. Work with your audience, your web stats and your social media listening program to determine what type of content can work for you and create more of it.
Barack Obama is an excellent case in point for social media optimization. He needed to reach college students, African Americans, women, blue-collar workers and independent workers. He went full force into video sharing networks, uploading more than 1,000 videos to his Youtube channel and had more than 19 million views and 133,000 subscribers. He put photos on Flickr and moved other users to upload their own Obama-inspired photos. He had a Linkedin profile with Q&A groups. When you search for Obama now, his profiles show up all over. And the result: he won the female, African American, young, blue collar and independent vote. He lived the mantra for social media optimization by using various tools for being social, starting a conversation, being transparent and remembering the end user.
Whos Using SMO
48
Examples of SMO and Their Results
While in its early stages, Universal Pictures plans to integrate Twitter into media ads that will promote two separate movies scheduled for release this summer. The tweets will appear in the banner similar to a ticker feed. Most major news organizations and content websites have SMO as an integral component of their websites.
Whats Next for SMO
Marketers now understand that Internet marketing and social media is about meeting people in their medium. Referring back to the Obama example, his team knew that they would not reach the entire population by putting up a blog and a Facebook page. Thus, the spread their efforts across 15 separate social networks and hundreds of other websites, using social media optimization to give everyone they touched an opportunity to link, share and contribute to the cause. The future of SMO is a fairly simple story to tell in that it will soon be as widespread and common place and common practice as search engine optimization (SEO).
Marketech
49
chapter 11
Widgets and Gadgets
According to MarketingSherpa: Widgets are small applications used to meet computer users specific needs by providing quick access to Internet sites; desktop utilities, such as to-do lists, calendars, clocks, weather, games, entertainment; and tools, such as system resource monitors or application launchers. Most widgets look like a tiny window on the users desktop or Web page. You might also see widgets referred to as gadgets, badges, capsules, gizmos, minis, modules, plug-ins or snippets. Widgets (or Gadgets, as Google calls them) are stand-alone min-applications usually tied to a larger data source, such as a widget that showcases updated quotes on your favorite stocks. Widgets were made popular by their availability on Apple computers and the widget creating company, Konfabulator, later purchased by Yahoo! and renamed Yahoo! Widgets.
Why Use Widgets in Marketing?
Widgets work at the intersection of an acute need for specific information and an accessible source of valuable data. Marketers are already jumping on the widget bandwagon, but their ease of creation and perceived high value from consumers make then uniquely positioned to deliver positive ROI in 2008. Widgets are becoming ubiquitous, with nearly 30% penetration in 2007, their poised for rapid growth. Widgets can be developed for Facebook, Google homepage, My Yahoo!, computer desktops and for placement on blogs and websites.
50
Email
Two Ways That Widgets Work For Marketers (via Marketingsherpa):
Merchants can deliver offers via images, multimedia and coupons so viewers can click through to the product page and complete the transaction. Publishers can stream content to build brand and advertising dollars or increase paid subscriptions.
Widgets Seem So New, Whos Already Using Them?
In spite of their newness, they hold great possibility for almost any company who has bits of data to share with its customers and wants access to their Yahoo or Google homepages or their computer desktop. UPS offers a widget to customers to track shipments right from the desktop and also provides an integrated RSS reader to keep up on important news. Sunflower Market, used a desktop widget shaped like a potted plant to send coupons and relevant information to consumers who downloaded it for their first store in Indianapolis. The widget helped exceed opening-month sales expectations by 18%.
How to Succeed with Widgets:
There are a few basics to leveraging widgets in your 2008 marketing plans. Widgets are not, nor should be complicated or too sophisticated. Their value lies in their simplicity and their ability to deliver and acute, highly relevant service of piece of information (think UPS shipment tracking or the Motley Fool stock tracker widget). Keep these things in mind: 1. Type of Widget - Deciding what type of web widget to build is important; not all types of widgets will work on all platforms. For marketing ends, you want the content of your widget to be as viral as possible. Youll also most likely want to build your widget in Flash, as its the most accessible technology. 2. Widget Functionality - You can build a widget to support almost any feature you can imagine. Stock trackers, feed readers, games, weather, rate quotes, etc. Make sure that the content of your widget is of the utmost value to your customers and prospects to ensure pass-along and sustained interest and usage. 3. Widget Seeding & Marketing Offer it on your home page, seed it in widget galleries, build it for multiple platforms (Yahoo Widget Engine, Facebook, desktop) and cross-promote the widget in your existing channels.
Marketech
51
Photo, Slideshow and Media Sharing
chapter 12
Photo, Slideshow and Media Sharing Environments
Photosharing on a broad basis is the publishing or transfer of a users digital photos online, enabling the user to share them with others (whether publicly or privately). This functionality is provided through both Web sites and applications that facilitate the upload and display of images. The term can also be loosely applied to the use of online photo galleries set up and managed by individual users. Their appeal is in their free or low cost means of sharing photos and ease of incorporation into personal blogs and Web sites.
Why Media Sharing Matters to Marketers:
Sharing photos isnt the only type of static (non-video) visual media thats proving successful and useful for marketers. Sharing documents such as PDFs and PowerPoint files through document sharing sites like docstoc.com, scribd.com, Slideshare, box.net and others has become a way of driving traffic, reaching new prospects and adding a new range or portability to documents, like large PowerPoint files, that can sometimes be clumsy to share with an audience let alone use as content fodder for search engines.
Tools for Sharing Photos, Slides and other Media

There is a maze of tools for sharing media and content but the following are the ones that are most often used for documents, photos and slideshows.
52
Photo, Slideshow and Media Sharing

SlideShare is the worlds largest presentation-sharing community, allowing people to publicly or privately share Word documents or PowerPoint presentation. In the process, individuals and organizations share their ideas, connect with others and generate leads for their businesses. Visit SlideShare at www. slideshare.net. Photobucket is a media sharing and hosting site that allows users to store thousands of photos and hours ov video to share with friends and family. Users can link their images and videos to their blog, social networking sites, etc., use the site as repository for photos needed for listings on eBay or Craigslist and easily print quality images from their albums. Visit Photobucket at www.photobucket.com. Piczo technology allows users the ability to create comprehensive personal Web sites that dont require html code or programming know-how. Its Web sites look professional, feature a home page and other Web site contents such as photos, text, guestbooks, chat boxes, music and more. Piczo caters to teens who want to express themselves and build personal communities in a safe online environment. Its purported to be easy to use and very flexible for members who want to design their sites and spotlight their creativity. Visit Piczo at www. piczo.com. Flickr is an image and video hosting Web site, Web services suit and online community platform. Not only is it a popular Web site for users who want to share personal photographs, but also a widely used service by bloggers who use it as a photo repository. As of November 2008, it claimed to host three billion images. Visit Flickr at www.flickr.com. SmugMug is a photo sharing site that has come into favor with several commercial organizations interested in sharing photos on the web as some sites like Flickr have kicked off organizations sharing images explicitely for commercial purposes (in spite of the many commercial images still on Flickr). SmugMug is an ad-free environment that has gotten national acclaim for its business-friendly photo sharing & hosting environment, which includes an account with unlimited storage. You can find SmugMug at www.smugmug.com.
Whats Next for Media Sharing?
Its easy to see that companies will want to share nearly any type of media that they create in an online environment. Look for the continued merger of content and document types as holistic content packages (similar to the Slidecast that you create on SlideShare by uploading audio along with your presentation).
Marketech
53
Honorable Mentions in Marketing Technology
chapter 13
As we illustrated in the Marketech 08 Marketing Technology Guide, theres no shortage of marketing technology for marketers to pursue in their future marketing plans. For 2009 and be. In fact, there are many more technologies that we can discuss, but as much as we would like to believe that the long tail of marketing technology will lead to riches, there is only so much budget and bandwidth available to the modern marketer and we all need to focus our limited resources on those tactics and techniques which are likely to net us the greatest gain. All that said, there are a series of remaining marketing technologies which may be just the ticket for certain marketers trying to reach specific demographics, but which fall outside the realm of mainstream for the purpose of most of you reading this document. If youre the type thats looking for ever more ideas to reach your increasingly attention starved customer base, read on. What wed like to leave you with are a host of definitions and a few ideas on whats next in marketing technology.
54
iPhone and Mobile Phone Applications
While iPhones and mobile PDAs and smart phones are are not an honorable mention in daily life, nearly all of use reading this guide have some form of mobile phone, many of them with Internet access, it is still new territory for most marketers. However, in the past year, we have seen numerous successes with marketing in the application space for iPhones, BlackBerrys and other similar devices. Something else to bear in mind is that the user base for apps is growing by leaps and bounds. In their latest quarter, Apple sold 5 million iPhones and 3 million iPod Touches. This means that the potential market for an app grew by more than 20% in only 3 months! One last thing to note is that while iPhones are all the rage, theyre not the only game in town. In fact, Blackberry outsells the iPhone every day. When considering mobile applications for marketing, consider development for multiple platforms or at least developing the application for the platform that the majority of the addressable base of customers will use.
Internet Protocol Television (IPTV)
IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) is a system where a digital television service is delivered by using Internet Protocol over a network infrastructure, which may include delivery by a broadband connection. A general definition of IPTV is television content that, instead of being delivered through traditional broadcast and cable formats, is received by the viewer through the technologies used for computer networks. For residential users, IPTV is often provided in conjunction with Video on Demand and may be bundled with Internet services such as Web access and VoIP. The commercial bundling of IPTV, VoIP and Internet access is referred to as Triple Play service (adding mobility is called Quadruple Play). IPTV is typically supplied by a service provider using a closed network infrastructure. This closed network approach is in competition with the delivery of TV content over the public Internet, called Internet Television. In businesses, IPTV may be used to deliver television content over corporate LANs. Certainly IPTV has arrived, as has movie delivery over IP. However, the promise of more interactive television remains elusive.
Marketech
55
In-game advertising (IGA) refers to the use of computer and video games as a medium in which to deliver advertising. 2005 spending on in-game advertising was USD$56 million, and this figure is estimated to grow to $1.8 billion by 2010 according to Massive Incorporated, although Yankee Group gives a lower estimate at $732 million. Ingame advertising is seen by some in the games industry as offering a new revenue stream, allowing developers to offset growing development costs and to take more risks in game play. When consumers think of the technology advances that they have witnessed in the past decade, its hard to argue that video games, game consoles and online games have come a long way. The advances for marketers, however, have yet to arrive. Major universities have applied time and resources to developing models for determining the most effective in-game marketing models, but at the end of the day, the results amount to little more than understanding the most effective virtual billboard placement for novice vs. advanced players. The application for mainstream marketers here is still quite limited.
In Game Marketing/Advertising (IGA)
Mobile Marketing
Mobile Marketing is meant to describe marketing on or with a mobile device, such as a mobile phone. Marketing on a mobile phone has become increasingly popular ever since the rise of SMS (Short Message Service) in the early 2000s in Europe and some parts of Asia when businesses started to collect mobile phone numbers and send off wanted (or unwanted) content. The major problem that mobile marketing faces is one of acceptance. 75% of adults surveyed have no interest in receiving marketing messages on the mobile phones. Mobile marketing is almost always combined with another promotion or integrated marketing vehicle, such as an in-store contest, television or radio ad, pass along viral MMS video or something that requires an SMS message interaction to engage in the marketing message. Mobile marketing or marketing with SMS is popular, and is poised for growth in 2008, but it has not yet reached critical mass in the US where mobile is the killer marketing app for
56
reaching all but a teenage demographic. Look for more about mobile marketing in the resources section.
Virtual Worlds, Second Life, Avatars
Second Life is a 3-D virtual world entirely created by its residents. Since opening to the public in 2003, it has grown explosively and today is inhabited by millions of Residents from around the globe. Youll also be surrounded by the Creations of your fellow Residents. Because Residents retain the rights to their digital creations, they can buy, sell and trade with other Residents. The Marketplace currently supports millions of US dollars in monthly transactions. This commerce is handled with the in-world unit-of-trade, the Linden dollar, which can be converted to US dollars at several thriving online Linden Dollar exchanges. In this case, the fiction has predicted a major new paradigm where interactive marketing is concerned. Businesses and individuals are looking towards Second Life as a new medium to grab attention and promote their products and themselves. Wells Fargo Bank, Sun Microsystems, Coca-Cola, and Toyota have all started building stuff and doing stuff in Second Life as a method for marketing themselves online. In August, Susanne Vega became the first musician to perform a live concert in SL space, through her avatar.
Podcasting
A podcast is a digital media file, or a related collection of such files, which is distributed over the Internet using syndication feeds for playback on portable media players and personal computers. The term, like radio, can refer either to the content itself or to the method by which it is syndicated; the latter is also termed podcasting. The host or author of a podcast is often called a podcaster. Though podcasters web sites may also offer direct download or streaming of their content, a podcast is distinguished from other digital media formats by its ability to be syndicated, subscribed to, and downloaded automatically when new content is added, using an aggregator or feed reader capable of reading feed formats such as RSS or Atom.
Marketech
57
While podcasting is a high profile marketing technology, it is very much like blogs, and the metaphors of blogging, mixed with the metaphors from radio apply to the medium. Look for more from this medium as we reach ubiquity with mobile phones that thoroughly integrate music and data storage into them, and as radio stations around the country, still stuck in a 1960s model, get with the program and start offering more of their content in podcast mode.
Mashups
In technology, a mashup is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool; an example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data from Craigslist, thereby creating a new and distinct web service that was not originally provided by either source. Mashup originally referred to the practice in pop music (notably hip-hop) of producing a new song by mixing two or more existing pieces. A mashup isnt so much something that a marketer would produce as much as your fans and customers would product on your behalf. The key to allowing your customers to create mashups on your behalf is to open up data such as a directory or something similar of worthwhile information that can be combine with something else to create a valuable web based tool (like a widget)
58
Appendix I: Resources
appendix I
ADDITIONAL MARKETING TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES WEBSITES, LINKS, BOOKS, BLOGS AND EVERYTHING ELSE
The purpose of this section of the guide is to give you a wealth of resources that can further the learning process on any of the technologies that weve discussed herein and help you put your marketing technology plans into action
General Resources, Publications and Websites for Marketing Technology Information

American Marketing Association >> www.marketingpower.com eMarketing and Commerce >> http://www.emarketingandcommerce.com/ MarketingSherpa >> www.marketingsherpa.com ClickZ >> www.clickz.com MarketingProfs >> www.marketingprofs.com Marketing Charts >> www.marketingvox.com Marketing Vox >> www.marketingvox.com TechCrunch >> www.techcrunch.com
BLOGS & BUSINESS BLOGGING
SixApart: Guide to Business Blogging >> http://www.movabletype.com/SixApartGuidetoBusinessBlogging.pdf Ogilvy PR: Welcome to Blogosphere: An Executive Bloggers Guide >> http://www.ogilvypr.com/pdf/bloggers-guide.pdf Cerado: The Business Blogging Field Guide >> http://www.cerado.com/download/CeradoBusinessBloggingFieldGuide.pdf ProBlogger: A - Z of Professional Blogging Tools >> http://www.problogger.net/archives/2006/06/27/a-z-of-professional-blogging Fortune 500 Business Blogging Wiki >> http://www.socialtext.net/bizblogs/index.cgi iMedia Connection: 10 blogging tips from 10 bloggers >> http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/17490.asp
Marketech
59
BLOG PLATFORMS (THERE ARE HUNDREDS, THESE ARE THE MOST POPULAR)
Blog software comparision chart from USC >> http://www.ojr.org/ojr/images/blog_software_comparison.cfm
Blogger >> http://www.blogger.com TypePad >> http://www.typepad.com WordPress >> http://www.wordpress.org and http://www.wordpress.com MovableType >> http://www.movabletype.com Squarespace >> http://www.squarespace.com/ Awareness (formerly iupload) >> http://www.awarenessnetworks.com
BUZZ MONITORING
Marketing Pilgrim: Buzz Monitoring: 26 Free Tools You Must Have >> http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2007/08/26-free-tools-for-buzz-monitoring.html Small Business SEM: SES Session Recap: Buzz Monitoring >> http://www.smallbusinesssem.com/ses-session-recap-buzz-monitoring/872/ How to put the B in Buzz Monitoring >> http://www.wiliam.com.au/wiliam-blog/buzz-monitoring Search Engine Roundtable: Buzz Monitoring >> http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/014609.html Web Strategy: Companies that Measure Social Media, Influence, and Brand >> http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2006/11/25/companies-that-measure-social-mediainfluence-brand/ Center Networks: Firestorm 2.0 - Using Social Media Services to Track The California Fires >> http://www.centernetworks.com/california-fires-social-media Media Guerrilla: More on Social Media Monitoring >> http://www.mguerilla.com/media_guerrilla/2006/07/more_on_social_.html
EVENTS & CONFERENCES
Technology For Marketing & Advertising 2008 >> http://www.t-f-m.co.uk/page.cfm/link=151 New Marketing Summit >> http://pages.newmarketingsummit.com/WebSite/Index.aspx?C=70000047&S=50000081
60
IN GAME MARKETING/ADVERTISING (IGA)
Wikipedia: Definition >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-game_advertising Engage Advertising >> http://www.engageadvertising.com/ Massive Incorporated >> http://www.massiveincorporated.com/ iMedia Connection: In-Game Advertising Dos and Donts >> http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/8489.asp cnet: In-game ads work, study says >> http://www.news.com/In-game-ads-work,-study-says/2100-1043_3-5887880.html
IPTV
ArsTechnica: An introduction to IPTV >> http://arstechnica.com/guides/other/iptv.ars DailyIPTV >> http://www.dailyiptv.com/ Wikipedia: IPTV definition >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPTV
MASHUPS
iMedia Connection: Marketing Mashup Tools >> http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/10217.asp Web 2.0 Mashup ecosystem >> http://www.ipods-and-onlinevideo-reviews.com/web_2_0_news_page_11.htm
MOBILE MARKETING
Wikipedia: Mobile marketing definition >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_Marketing Mobile Marketing Association >> http://www.mmaglobal.com/ Retail Wire: Overall receptiveness to mobile marketing >> http://www.retailwire.com/SmartReply/Images/Cht_Tip7-1.gif NOC: Mobile marketing in the U.S. vs. Europe >> http://newsweaver.co.uk/noc/e_article000554240.cfm?x=b11,0,w Mobivity >> http://www.mobilemarketing.net/
Marketech
61
Cellit Mobile Marketing >> http://www.cellitmarketing.com/
PODCASTING
Wikipedia: Podcast definition >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcasting Business Podcast Marketing Case Study Proves Results >> http://ezinearticles.com/?Business-Podcast-Marketing-Case-Study-Proves-Results&id=69230 MarketingSherpas Practical Podcasting Guide for Marketers >> https://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.html?ident=29679 Podcast Design: Step-by-Step to a Plan >> http://podcastingscout.com/
RSS REALLY SIMPLY SYNDICATION
Definition of: Wikipedia >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format) NYTimes RSS Feed page >> http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/ Stephan Spencer: RSS and SEO: Implications for Search Marketers >> http://www.stephanspencer.com/archives/2005/03/02/rss-and-seo-implications-for-searchmarketers/ MarketingStudies.net: Do Marketers Really Need RSS? >> http://rssdiary.marketingstudies.net/content/do_marketers_really_need_rss.php MarketingSherpa: MarketingSherpas RSS Help Page >> http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.html?ident=27189 iMedia Connection: Start Using RSS Today! >> http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/9606.asp ClickZ: 10 Ways for E-Marketers to Use RSS >> http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3623776 RSS Service Vendors Pheedo: RSS Advertising >> http://www.pheedo.com FeedBurner (Google) RSS Analytics >> www.feedburner.com About.com: Top 10 Windows RSS Feed Readers and News Aggregators >> http://email.about.com/od/rssreaderswin/tp/top_rss_windows.htm
62
RSS Compendium - RSS Readers - Web-Based >> http://allrss.com/rssreaderswebbased.html
SEARCH & UNIVERSAL SEARCH
Search Engine Land: Google 2.0: Google Universal Search >> http://searchengineland.com/070516-143312.php Search Engine Watch: What Does Universal Search Mean for SEM? >> http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=3625951 HP Blog: Universal Search and Ask3D What Blended Search Models Mean to Marketers >> http://h20325.www2.hp.com/blogs/webexperience/archive/2007/09/14/4426.html Online Marketing Blog: Small Business Guide to Optimizing Universal Search >> http://www.toprankblog.com/2007/10/optimizing-universal-search/
SOCIAL MEDIA OPTIMIZATION
Search Engine Watch: Social Media Optimization: Its Like SEO, For Social Sites >> http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/060829-150053 eBizMBA: 30 Largest Social Bookmarking Sites | October 2007 >> http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/social30.html Rohit Bhargava: 5 Rules of Social Media Optimization (SMO) >> http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com/weblog/2006/08/5_rules_of_soci.html Search Engine Guide: The Beginners Guide to Social Media Optimization >> http://www.searchengineguide.com/lisa-barone/the-beginners-guide-to-social.php GrayWolfs SEO Blog: The Dark Side of Social Media Optimization >> http://www.wolf-howl.com/seo/the-dark-side-of-social-media-organization/ Social Media Optimization - SMO SMOmashup >> http://www.smomashup.com/ Pronet Advertising: Introduction to Social Media Optimization >> http://www.pronetadvertising.com/articles/introduction-to-social-media-optimization.html Social Bookmark Creator >> http://www.toprankblog.com/tools/social-bookmarks/
Marketech
63
Social Media Optimization Blog >> http://social-media-optimization.com/
SOCIAL NETWORKING
TechCrunch: Details Revealed: Google OpenSocial To Launch Thursday >> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/10/30/details-revealed-google-opensocial-to-be-common-apis-for-building-social-apps/ Mark Granovetter: The Strength of Weak Ties >> www.si.umich.edu/~rfrost/courses/SI110/readings/In_Out_and_Beyond/Granovetter.pdf Cnet: Five reasons social networking doesnt work >> http://www.cnet.com/4520-6033_1-6240543-1.html CNNMoney: The Missing Link >> http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2006/12/01/8394967/index. htm Social Customer Manifesto: Why You Shouldnt Ignore Social Networks >> http://www.socialcustomer.com/2007/01/why_you_shouldn.html JasonKolb.com: Ciscos Social Networking for Business >> http://www.jasonkolb.com/weblog/2007/03/ciscos_social_n.html Information Today: Online Social Networking for Business: An Interview with Konstantin Guericke, Marketing VP, LinkedIn >> http://www.infotoday.com/online/nov04/bardon.shtml Wikipedia.org: List of social networking websites >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_networking_websites Rev2.org: 33 Places to Hangout in the Social Networking Era >> http://www.rev2.org/2006/07/11/33-places-to-hangout-in-the-social-networking-era/ Top Ten Reviews: Social Networking Sites >> http://social-networking-websites-review.toptenreviews.com/ Neighborhood America: Enterprise Social Networks >> http://www.neighborhoodamerica.com/
SOCIAL SHOPPING
The New York Times: Like Shopping? Social Networking? Try Social Shopping >> http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/technology/11ecom.html?_ r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
64
TRENDS
IBM: IBM Consumer Survey Shows Decline of TV as Primary Media Device >> http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/22206.wss TV & Online Video Convergence http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/54425.html
VIDEO
Blendtec interview on Forrester Groundswell: willitblend.com: Speaking through YouTube >> http://blogs.forrester.com/charleneli/2007/07/willitblendcom-.html Blendtec Will it Blend viral video site >> http://www.willitblend.com/ YouTube >> www.youtube.com MarketingProfs (Stephan Spencer): How to Market on YouTube >> http://www.marketingprofs.com/7/how-to-market-on-youtube-some-examples-spencer.asp MarketingSherpa: Video + Humor + Viral = Lead-Gen Success for Data Backup Firm >> http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.html?ident=29883 USA Today: Marketers are into YouTube >> http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2006-04-17-youtube-marketers_x.htm?POE=TECISVA 8 tips to make your YouTube video go viral >> http://www.webinknow.com/2007/08/8-tips-to-make-.html MarketingCharts: Google Video Sites Capture Lions Share of Viewers, Videos Viewed in July >> http://www.marketingcharts.com/interactive/google-video-sites-capture-lions-share-ofviewers-videos-viewed-in-july-1617/ Contentinople (CMP Media): List of video sharing sites >> http://www.contentinople.com/proddir/dir_list.asp?dir_id=7 Light Reading: List of 45 video sharing websites >> http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=112147
Marketech
65
Complete list of video sharing websites from Light Reading. Enter video site name into a search engine to locate the current URL 5min Addicting Clips Aggrega AniBoom ApnaTube Atom Films Blinkx Blip.tv Bolt Break.com Brightcove Buzznet Castpost Clesh Clickcaster Clipshack College Humor Cozmo.tv Current.tv Cuts Dailymotion Dave.tv DivX Stage6 Dovetail.tv DropShots.com eSnips Expert Village Eyespot Famster Flixya Free IQ Funny or Die GodTube GoFish Google Video Grouper Helpful Video iFilm JibJab Jumpcut Kwego Liberated Films LiveDigital LiveVideo Lulu.tv ManiaTV Mediabum Meevee MeraVideo Metacafe Middio Motionbox Multiply.com MyHeavy MySpace MyVideo OneWorldTV Ourmedia Panjea Pawky Phanfare Photobucket Podcast Spot Podshow Pooxi Porkolt.com PureVideo Putfile Revver Rooftop Comedy Scenemaker Sclipo Sharkle Soapbox Stashspace Stupid Videos Sumo.tv Super Deluxe SuTree TeacherTube Treemo Twango Uncut Video uVouch UVU Veoh Viddler Video Webtown VideoJug VidiLife Vidipedia Vidmax ViewDo Vimeo vMix Vodpod vSocial VuMe Yahoo Video Youare.tv YourKindaTV YouTube ZippyVideos Source: LightReading.com
66
VIRTUAL EVENTS
BtoB Magazine: Virtual events success grows >> http://www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071008/FREE/71008034/ Biznology: Virtual Events Return Real Value >> http://www.mikemoran.com/biznology/archives/2007/09/virtual_events.html Virtual Event Best Practices with Unisfair >> http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2007/09/virtual-event-b.html A Virtual Events Snapshot: (All data provided by Unisfair) Average live duration: 1.5 days Average archived days: 90 Average registration: 3,102 Average attendance: 1,587 Show Up Rate: 52% Sponsor/Exhibitor Booths: 15 Leads Generated per Sponsor: 348 Conference Sessions: 5 per day Average attendee time at event: 2 hours 31 minutes Average Locations Visited: 16 Average Attendee Interactions:13 Average Downloads per attendee: 5 U.S. Attendees: 58% International Attendees: 42%
VIRTUAL WORLD (SECOND LIFE) MARKETING
Naturlasearchblog: Brave New Future of SEO & SEM? Marketing thru Second Life >> http:// www.naturalsearchblog.com/archives/2006/10/24/brave-new-future-of-seo-sem-marketingthru-second-life/ Webpronews: The Marketing Potential of Second Life >> http://www.webpronews.com/blogtalk/2006/06/26/the-marketing-potential-of-second-life Second Life: Marketing Section >> http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Marketing openPR: First customer satisfaction survey in Second Life >> http://openpr.com/pdf/17221/First-customer-satisfaction-survey-in-Second-Life-insufficientcustomer-care-and-opportunities-for-interaction-between-Second-Life-users-and-companies-identified-as-the-main-weakness.pdf
Marketech
67
Second Life Grid: How Organizations Use The Platform >> http://secondlifegrid.net/how
WEB 2.0
All things Web 2.0 directory >> http://www.allthingsweb2.com PEW Internet: Riding the Waves of Web 2.0 >> http://static.scribd.com/docs/aoi8swiquwc99.swf?INITIAL_VIEW=width
Web 3.0
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles. showArticleHomePage&art_aid=57532 http://www.personalizemedia.com/index.php/2006/08/27/virtual-worlds-web-30-and-portable-profiles/ http://civicminded.corante.com/archives/2006/08/second_life_targets_existing_b.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/eric_schmidt_defines_web_30.php http://www.beloit.edu/~pubaff/mindset/ http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/12/business/12web.html http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/23/business/web.php
WIDGETS
UPS Widget >> http://www.widget.ups.com/widget/en-gb/index.html MarketingSherpa: Special Report: Marketing With Widgets - Usage Data, Tactics & Test Results >> http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.html?ident=30137 Widget Best Practices: Clearspring >> http://www.clearspring.com/docs/tech/widget-dev/best-practices TechCrunch: Desktop Widgets 101 >> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/29/desktop-widgets-101/
68
Sexy Widget: Reviews and analysis of widgets, toolbars, and distributed businesses of all flavors. >> http://www.sexywidget.com/ Makeuseof.com: 6 Cool FREE Widget Platforms for your PC >> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/widgets-and-widget-platforms/ Popular Widget Platforms & Providers: Yahoo Widget Engine Facebook Google Gadgets Clearspring Widgetbox Musestorm Snipperoo MySpace
WORD-OF-MOUTH MARKETING
WOMMA >> www.womma.org MarketingCharts: Word-of-Mouth Marketing Spending to Top $1 Billion in 2007 >> http://www.marketingcharts.com/interactive/word-of-mouth-marketing-spending-to-top1-billion-in-2007-2424/
Marketech
69
Glossary
glossary
Before you pack your marketing bags and embark on a journey into the world of social media, youll need to know the language. Listed below are some basic conversation starters, partially excerpted from OneUpWebs recent Pocket Guide to Social Media. For the purpose of consistency and timeliness, most other definitions herein are sourced from Wikipedia [www. wikipedia.org] or Webopedia [www.webopedia.com].
Advocacy
Creating a movement of net-fluencers to influence conversation, actions or motives in support of ones objective.
Aggregation
Gathering and remixing content from blogs and other Web sites that provide RSS feeds; typically displayed in an aggregator like Bloglines or Google Reader, or directly on your desktop using software (often also called a reader). Beneficial for breaking news.
Alerts
Search engines, like Google, allow you to specify words, phrases or tags that you want checked periodically, with results of those searches returned to you by email.
Archive
May refer to topics from an online discussion that has been closed by saved for later reference. On blogs, archives are collections of earlier items usually organized by week or month. You may still be able to comment on archived items.
Authenticity
The sense that something or someone is real. Blogs enable people to publish content, and engage in conversations that show their interests and values, and so help them develop an authentic voice online.
Avatars
Graphical images used in virtual worlds to represent people. Users can create Avatar visual personalities selecting a gender, body type, clothing, behaviors and name.
Back Channel Communications

Private emails or other messages sent by the facilitator or between individuals during conferencing.
Blogosphere
Used to describe the totality of blogs on the Internet, and the conversations taking place within that sphere.
70 Blogs
Glossary
Shortened from the original term Weblogs, these self-published web sites containing dated material, are usually written in a journal format. Content such as text, pictures, video and/or audio have URLs plus other ways of identifying them by keywords (tags). This allows visitors to pull items to their desktop through subscriptions or aggregators without having to visit the actual web site. Blogs often have links to other relevant online content, plus invite feedback through posts which are comments from readers.
Blogroll
A list of sites displayed in the sidebar of a blog showing who the blogger reads regularly.
Bookmarking
Saving the address of a Web site or item of content, either in your browser or on a social bookmarking site such as Delicious. By adding tags, others can also find your research and the social bookmarking site becomes an enormous public library.
Browser
The tool used to view Web sites and access all the content online.
Bulletin Boards
The early vehicles for online collaboration where users connected with a central computer to post and read email-like messages.
Buzz Monitoring
Buzz monitoring is a phrase used in Online Public Relations and social media marketing to track relevant conversations on the Internet.
Bulletin Boards
The early vehicles for online collaboration where users connected with a central computer to post and read email-like messages.
Categories
Pre-specified ways to organize content -- for example, a set of keywords that you can use but not add to when posting on a site.
Champions
In order to get conversations started in an online community, you need a group of enthusiasts willing and confident to get things moving by posting messages, responding and helping others.
Chat
Real time interaction on a web site, with a number of people adding comments via text entries.
Marketech
71 Comments
Adding feedback comments under blog posts and other content.
Glossary
Community Building
The process of recruiting potential community or network participants, helping them to find shared interests and goals, and using technology to develop useful conversations
Conferencing (online)
Happens in a Web forum and is the conversations of those involved, organized around topics, threads and a theme or subject .
Consumer-generated media (CGM)
First-person commentary posted or shared across a host of expression venues, including message boards, forums, rating and review sites, groups, social networking sites, blogs, video-sharing sites, etc.
Content
Text, pictures, video and any other meaningful material that is on the Internet.
Content Management System
Software suites offering the ability to create static Web pages, document stores, blogs, wikis and other tools.
Conversation
Commenting or contributing to forums is the currency of social networking, which puts the social in this form of media.
Cookie
Information (i.e., URLs, Web addresses) created by a Web server and stored on a users computer. This information lets Web sites the user visits keep a history of a users browsing patterns and preferences.
Sharing through social media is enhanced by attaching a Creative Commons license specifying, for example, that content may be re-used with attribution, provided that a similar license is then attached by the new author. .
Copyright
This refers to harnessing the skills and enthusiasm of those outside an organization who are prepared to volunteer their time contributing content and solving problems.
Crowdsourcing
Creative Commons
Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organizationa nd licensing system tha toffers creators the ability to findtune their copyright, spelling out the ways in which others may use their works.
72
Glossary
Deconstructives Domain Name
Systematically working back from a specific issue to identify influencers through viral mapping.
A method of identifying computer addresses. For example, a .com extension means the account is a business-related, and .gov is government related.
Email lists
Important networking tools offering the ability to starburst a message from a central postbox to any number of subscribers and for them to respond.
Embedding
The act of inserting video or photo to a Web site or email.
Facilitator
Someone who helps people in an online group or forum manage their conversations.
Feeds
The means by which you can read, view or listen to items from blogs, podcasts and other RSSenabled sites without visiting the site, by subscribing to a directory or aggregator such as iTunes or Bloglines.
Flash
Animation software used to develop interactive graphics for We sites as well as desktop presentations and games.
Folksonomy
A term for the collaborative, but unstructured, way in which information is categorized on the web. Instead of using one, centralized form of classification, users are encouraged to assign freely chosen keywords (called tags) to pieces of information or data.
Forums
Discussion areas on Web sites where people can post messages or comment on existing messages.
Friends
On social networking sites, contacts whose profile you link to in your profile, thereby creating your network.
Groups
Collections of individuals with some sense of unity through their activities, interests or values.
Marketech
73 Hashtag
Glossary
Similar to regular tags, these are keywords associated and assigned to an item of content with a hash mark (#) attached to the front of the word.
Hyperlink
Text, images or graphics that, when clicked with a mouse, will connect the user to a new Web site or Web page.
Instant Messaging (IM)
Chatting with another person using an IM tool like AOL Instant Messenger, Microsoft Live Messenger or Yahoo Messenger. The tools allow you to indicate whether or not you are available to chat and can be a good alternative to emails for a rapid exchange.
Link Baiting
The process by which web sites, blogs, etc. encourage links from other sites to improve popularity and raise positions on search engines. The enticement may include content, online tools, free downloads, or anything else that another site owner might find worthy of a link.
Listening
In the blogsphere, the art of skimming feeds to see what topics are popular and setting up searches that monitor when an organization is mentioned.
Listserve
A list of email addresses of people with common interests. Software enables people who belong to a list to send messages to the group without typing a series of addresses.
Lurkers
People who read but dont contribute or add comments to forums.
Mashups
An online service or software tool that skilled techies develop by combining two or more tools to create an entirely new service.
Meme
A unit of cultural information such as a popular tune, catch-phrases, beliefs or fashions that can virally propagate from one mind to another. Online, it may be shared among bloggers or participants of social sites as a game, activity or quiz (e.g., name 50 favorite authors, the 100 worst songs, 10 favorite movies).
Microblogging
A form of blogging through which the entries/posts are limited to a certain number of characters or words, i.e., Twitter.
74
Glossary
Mobile Marketing
Mobile Marketing is meant to describe marketing on or with a mobile device, such as a mobile phone. Marketing on a mobile phone has become increasingly popular ever since the rise of SMS (Short Message Service) in the early 2000s in Europe and some parts of Asia when businesses started to collect mobile phone numbers and send off wanted (or unwanted) content.
Narrowcasting
A term used in opposition to broadcasting to describe a podcasts ability to reach a narrowly focused, highly interested audience.
Networks
Structures defined by nodes and the connections between them. In social networks, the nodes are people and the connections are the relationships they have. Networking is the process by which you develop and strengthen those relationships.
Newsgroups
Internet site centered around a specific topic or course. Some newsreader software can thread discussion so there can be various topics centered around a central theme.
Newsreader
Web site or desktop tool that acts as an aggregator, gathering content from blogs and similar sites using RSS feeds so you can read the content in one place instead of having to visit different sites.
Open-source software
Refers to any computer software whose source code is available under a license that permits users to study, change, and improve the software, and to redistribute it in modified or unmodified form. It is often developed in a public, collaborative manner.
Peer-to-Peer Permalink
Direct interaction between two people in a network.
The address (URL) of an item of content, for example a blog post, rather than the address of a Web page with lots of different items.
Photosharing
Uploading your images to a Web site like Flickr. You can add tags and offer people the opportunity to comment or even re-use your photos if you add an appropriate copyright license.
Ping
An acronym standing for packet Internet grouper or packed Internet gopher, this is an automatic notification sent when a blog has been updated. It also describes the automatic communication between networked computers/servers.
Marketech
75 Podcast
Glossary
A digital broadcast made available on the internet. Currently the majority of these broadcasts are audio files sent to directories through XML feeds and RSS or Really Simple Syndication formatted XML files. The word podcast is derived from pod as in Apples iPod, the popular portable audio player, and cast from broadcast, meaning to transmit for general or public use.
Podcatcher
A term for programs used to automatically subscribe to and download podcasts; also called an aggregator. Podcatchers typically seek out new podcast episodes or items as soon as the program is opened.
Post
Item on a blog or forum.
Profiles
Information that users provide about themselves when signing up for a social networking site. This may include personal and business interests, a photo, a blurb, and tags to help people search for like-minded people.
Remixing
Social media offers the possibility of taking different items of content, identified by tags and published through feeds, and combining them in different ways.
RSS
Standing for Really Simple Syndication, RSS is the XML format that allows you to subscribe to content on blogs, podcasts and other social media, and have it delivered to you through a feed.
Search engine optimization (SEO)
Is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a Web site from search engines via natural (or organic or algorithmic) search results.
Shockwave
A three dimensional (3D) animation technology/format.
Sharing
Offering other people the use of text, images, video, bookmarks or other content by adding tags and applying copyright licenses that encourage use of content.
Smartmob
When users get together for an activity or event as a result of an online connection or network.
76
Glossary
SOA - Service oriented architecture
In computing, SOA provides methods for systems development and integration where systems package functionality as interoperable services. An SOA infrastructure allows different applications to exchange data with one another.
Social bookmarking
The collaborative equivalent of storing favorites or bookmarks within a web browser. Social bookmarking services such as del.icio.us or Furl allow people to store their favorite web sites online and share them with others who have similar interests.
Social media
The term used to describe the tools and platforms people use to publish, converse and share content online. These include blogs, wikis, podcasts, and the sites dedicated to share information, stories, photos, audio and video files, and bookmarks.
Social media optimization
Social media optimization (SMO) is a set of methods for generating publicity through social media, online communities and community web sites. Methods of SMO include adding RSS feeds, adding a Digg This button, blogging and incorporating third party community functionalities like Flickr photo slides and galleries or YouTube videos. Social media optimization is a form of search engine marketing. Social media optimization is in many ways connected as a technique to viral marketing where word of mouth is created not through friends or family but through the use of networking in social bookmarking, video and photo sharing websites. In a similar way the engagement with blogs achieves the same by sharing content through the use of RSS in the blogsphere and special blog search engines such as Technorati.
Social networking
Sites developed to help people discover new friends or colleagues with shared interests, related skills, or a common geographic location. Leading examples include Friendster, LinkedIn and MySpace.
Streaming Media Video or audio that is intended to be listened to online but not stored permanently. Tagging
A way of categorizing online content using keywords that describe what can be found at a web site, bookmark, photo or blog post.
Threads
Strands of conversation.
Marketech
77 Trackback
Glossary
A facility for other bloggers to leave a calling card automatically, instead of commenting. Blogger A may write on blog A about an item on blogger Bs site, and through the trackback facility leave a link on Bs site back to A. The collection of comments and trackbacks on a site facilitates conversations.
Transparency
Enhances searching, sharing, self-publish and commenting across networks, makes it easier to find out whats going on in any situation where there is online activity.
Troll
A hurtful, but possibly valuable, person who, for whatever reason, is both obsessed by and constantly annoyed with and deeply offended by everything you write on a blog. One may not be able to stop the commenting of trolls on your blog, but you cant ban them from commenting on other sites and pointing back to the blog.
Tweet
A microblog post on the Twitter social network site.
URL Unique Resource Locator is the technical term for a Web address. User generated content
Text, photos and other material produced by people who previously just consumed content.
Web 2.0
A term that describes blogs, wikis, social networking sites and other Internet-based services that emphasize collaboration and sharing, rather than less interactive publishing (Web 1.0).
Video Podcast
A podcast with enclosures containing video files rather than audio ones. Unlike audio podcasts which may only contain MP3 files, various file types can be used when podcasting video.
Viral marketing
The planned promotion of a product, brand or service through a process of interesting actual or potential customers to pass along marketing information to friends, family, and colleagues. This word-of-mouth advertising is usually accomplished by a creative use of social media and other nontraditional marketing channels.
Viral Video
The term viral video refers to video clip content which gains widespread popularity through the process of Internet sharing, typically through email or IM messages, blogs and other media sharing websites. Viral videos are often humorous in nature and may range from televised comedy sketches to unintentionally released amateur video clips.
78
Glossary
Virtual worlds
Sites such as Second Life, where individuals can create profiles and representations of themselves (avatars) to interact with others in an imaginary world. Marketers have taken up real estate on Second Life in an attempt to extend their brand to potential new customers.
Web 2.0
A term coined by OReilly Media in 2004 to describe blogs, wikis, social networking sites and other Internet-based services that emphasize collaboration and sharing. It is associated with the idea of the Internet as a platform.
Whiteboards
Online are the equivalent of glossy surfaces where one can write with an appropriate marker and wipe off later. They enable someone to write on a Web page and are used in collaboration online.
Widgets
Stand-alone applications that can be embedded in other applications like a Web site or a desktop or viewed on a PDA.
Wiki
An online, collaborative work space for multiple users of a web page or set of pages that can be edited collaboratively. The best known example is wikipedia, an encyclopedia created by thousands of contributors across the world. Once people have appropriate permissions set by the wiki owner they can create pages and/or add to and alter existing pages
XML
Extensible Markup Language. A system for organizing and tagging elements of a document so the document can be transmitted and interpreted between applications and organizations.
YouTube
YouTube is a video sharing web site where users can upload, view and share video clips. YouTube was created in mid-February 2005 and uses Adobe Flash technology to display a wide variety of video content, including movie clips, TV clips and music videos, as well as amateur content such as videoblogging and short original videos. In November 2006, Google Inc. acquired YouTube.
Source: OneUpWeb,Wikipedia, Webopedia, Air Force Emerging Technology Division and the American Marketing Association.
Marketech
79
Sources, References & Citations
sources, references & citations

Intro Social Media Marketing Industry Report; How Marketers Are Using Social Media to Grow Their Businesses, March 2009, by Michael A. Stelzner Chapter 1 Social Media: Listening is the New Marketing, Practical ecommerce for Online Merchants, Feb. 18, 2009, www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/976-social-media-listening-is-the-new-marketing Forrester report says its time to take social media marketing seriously, Fierce Content Management, April 8, 2009, http://www.fiercecontentmanagement.com/story/new-forrester-report-says-time-takesocial-media-marketing-seriously/2009-04-08 brandweek.com article Do You Need A Social Media Marketer?, April 4, 2009, http://www.brandweek.com/bw/content_display/news-and features/digital/e3ie2a94edbc5b0a7c1150d6cbf4741ded e?pn=1 Marketingpilgrim.com 8 Essential Free Social Media Monitoring Tools, 2008, www.marketingpilgrim. com/2008/12/social-media-monitoring-tools.html Mike-Manual.com/blog on How to Create A Social Media Monitoring Strategy, July 17, 2008, http:// www.mike-manuel.com/blog/2008/07/17/how-to-create-a-social-media-monitoring-strategy/ Radian6, radian6.com/cms/home www.vocus.com/content/social-media.asp News.cnet.com Nielsen: Twitters growing really, really, really, really fast, March 19, 2009, http:// news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10200161-36.html Tracking the Buzz: Tools to Monitor your Brand Effectively, SocialMediaTrader*, March 17, 2008, http:// socialmediatrader.com/tracking-the-buzz-tools-to-monitor-your-brand-effectively/ Use of social media monitoring growing; direct can reap benefits, too, BtoB, March 31, 2008, http:// www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080331/FREE/399769714/1146/FREE#seenit What is Scout Labs? Scoutlabs.com/features/ Social Media Monitoring Grudge Match: Radian6 vs. Scout Labs, April 13, 2009, http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com/2009/04/13/social-media-monitoring-grudge-match-radian6-vs-scout-labs/ Chapter 2 What is microblogging?, http://searchmobilecomputing.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid40_ gci1265620,00.html http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1808077,00.html Twitter Growing Twice As Fast As Facebook, April 1, 2009, http://www.allfacebook.com/2009/04/ twitter-google-growth/
Marketech
80

Your Guide to Micro-Blogging and Twitter, http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2007/05/your-guide-tomicro-blogging-and-twitter135.html Five Ways to Leverage Microblogging, Aug. 28, 2008, by Blake Cahill, http://www.emarketingandcommerce.com/story/five-ways-leverage-microblogging MarketingProfs.com article, Microconnecting With Your Customers Via Microblogging, Sept. 23, 2008, http://www.twine.com/item/11hksjn7k-5k/microconnecting-with-your-customers-via-microblogging-q-a-with-connie-reece-marketingprofs-articles 360 degree Digital Influence, Ogilvy Public Relations WorldWide, The Creation of Twitter Best Practices: Round 1, http://blog.ogilvypr.com/2008/08/ The Bivings report, A Blog by The Bivings Group, Zappos.com: A Twitter Case Study, May 6, 2008, http://www.bivingsreport.com/2008/zapposcom-a-twitter-case-study/ World is all a-twitter over micro-blogging success story, Belfast Telegraph, Feb. 3, 2009, UK, www. belfasttelegraph.co.uk Zappos: Microblogging with Twitter, http://sarahlokitis.com/2009/03/23/zappos-microblogging-withtwitter/ Twitter Best Practices, April 16, 2009, http://strategicsocialmedia.wordpress.com/2009/04/16/239/ Ping.fm/ Use Ping.fm to Reach All Your Online Profiles at Once, March 31, 2009, http://webworkerdaily. com/2009/03/31/use-pingfm-to-reach-all-your-online-profiles-at-once/ Chart of The Day: Twitters Early Growth Dwarfed By YouTubes, http://www.businessinsider.com/ chart-of-the-day-comparing-the-first-three-years-of-growth-2009-4 Chapter 3 Wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog Nevillehobson.com/2008/09/28/the-evolution-of-blogging/, Sept. 28, 2008 Microblogging Communities, The Merging of Microblogs and Social networks, CMS Wire, Dec. 3, 2008, http://www.cmswire.com/cms/social-media/microblogging-communities-the-merging-ofmicroblogs-and-social-networks-003621.php Blogging Has Come A Long Way, Baby, eMarketer, emarketer.com, April 22, 2009, http://www. emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007027 Technorati: State of the Blogosphere 2008 report, http://technorati.com/blogging/state-of-theblogosphere// Fierce Content Management (fiercecontentmanagement.com) featured The Fortune 500 and Blogging: Slow and steady and farther along than expected, http://www.fiercecontentmanagement.com/story/only-16-percent-fortune-500-companies-have-public-facing-blogs/2009-04-22 Fortune 500 Business Blogging Wiki, April 17, 2009, http://www.socialtext.net/bizblogs/index.cgi
81

Fortune 500 Corporate Blog Adoption Slow and Steady According to Society for New Communications Research Chair Dr. Nora Ganim Barnes and Eric Mattson of Financial Insite, Society for New Communications Research, April 22, 2009, http://www.newcommreview.com/?p=1412 Web content management continues its upward trajectory, Fierce Content Management, fiercecontentmanagement.com, March 23, 2009, http://www.fiercecontentmanagement.com/story/webcontent-management-continues-its-upward-trajectory/2009-03-23 10 Best Fortune 500 Blogs by www.rsspieces.com/10-best-fortune-500-blogs, March 30, 2008 ProBlogger.net, Nine Signs of an Effective Blog Post, July 10, 2008, http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/07/10/nine-signs-of-an-effective-blog-post/ 15 Reasons Why Blogging Matters More than Ever, March 14, 2008, http://www.twistimage.com/ blog/archives/15-reasons-why-blogging-matters-more-than-ever/ Istrategylabs.com, 2009 Facebook Demographics and Statistics Report: 276% Growth in 35-54-yearold Users by Peter Corbett, Jan. 5, 2009, http://www.istrategylabs.com/2009-facebook-demographics-and-statistics-report-276-growth-in-35-54-year-old-users/ WebMarketing Therapy, Social Media Marketing Boosts Business and Cool Factor for These WMT Positive Role Models, April 16, 2009, http://www.webmarketingtherapy.com/blog/social-media-marketing-boosts-business-and-cool-factor-for-these-wmt-positive-role-models/ Facebook Marketing Success Stories for Businesses, Buzz Marketing for Technology, Innovative Ideas for B2B Technology Marketers, Dec. 19, 2007, http://buzzmarketingfortech.blogspot.com/2007/12/ facebook-marketing-success-stories-for.html Facebook Marketing Success: The Target Store Example, blogs.praized.com, posted Oct. 15, 2007, http://blogs.praized.com/seb/facebook/facebook-marketing-success-the-target-store-example/ The Importance of Blogs In The Relationship Economy, onthemarkwriting.com, Feb. 17, 2008, http:// onthemarkwriting.com/2008/02/17/the-importance-of-blogs-in-the-relationship-economy/ CisionBlog Top 100 Social Media & Internet Marketing Bloggers, Jan. 22, 2009, http://blog.us.cision. com/2009/01/top-100-social-media-internet-marketing-bloggers/
Chapter 4 Wild Apricot Blog: Ten Innovative Ways Nonprofits Can Use Facebook, Nov. 16, 2007, www.wildapricot.com/blogs Tips for Effective Marketing with Facebook, Micleeblog.com, April 13, 2009, http://www.micleeblog. com/2009/04/13/social-networking/tips-for-effective-marketing-with-facebook/ Facebooks for Nonprofits, www.slideshare.net/Griner/facebook-for-nonprofits-presentation How non-profits are using social networking to raise money and awareness, by Wailin Wong, April 30, 2008, archives of the Chicago Tribune, archives.chicagotribune.com/2008/apr/30/ Attorneys are getting LinkedIn to clients online, Sept. 22, 2008, http://www.wislawjournal.com/article. cfm/2008/09/22/Attorneys-are-getting-LinkedIn-to-clients-online
Marketech
82

Inside CRM, The Facebook Marketing Toolbox: 100 Tools and Tips to Tap the Facebook Customer Base, Dec. 9, 2007, http://www.insidecrm.com/features/facebook-marketing-toolbox-012308/ The Facebook Marketing Toolbox: 100 Tools and Tips to Tap the Facebook Customer Base, Jan. 23, 2008, http://www.insidecrm.com/features/facebook-marketing-toolbox-012308/ Biz Networking on Facebook Could Soon Supersede LinkedIn, Aug. 30, 2008, http://mashable. com/2008/08/30/b2b-ad-networking/ Gigaom, Why Facebooks Future is Mobile, Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2009, http://gigaom.com/2009/02/10/ why-facebooks-future-is-mobile/ http://social-media-optimization.com/2007/10/a-failed-facebook-marketing-campaign/ http://imarketu.wordpress.com/2009/06/02/facebook-advertising-success-if-done-right/ http://www.purposeinc.com/pwp/2009/03/04/facebook-advertising http://www.facebook.com/advertising/
Chapter 5 Talance, Nonprofits Can Be Linked In, Nov. 20, 2007, talance.com/blog CNN Money.com, Recession lifts social networking site LinkedIn, March 24, 2009 Biznik.com, LinkedIn Marketing How to Use LinkedIn to Promote Your Business, Feb. 17, 2009, http:// biznik.com/articles/linkedin-marketing-how-to-use-linkedin-to-promote-your-business Linked In Social Networking Success Story, part 2, Feb. 13, 2009, http://www.linktoprosper.com/ blog/2009/02/linked-in-social-networking-success-story-part-2/ Step 4: LinkedIn Marketing 6 Reasons to Use LinkedIn to Market Your Business, by Zeke Camusio, http://www.startupnation.com/series/132/9338/linkedin-marketing-6-reasons.htm http://www.linktoprosper.com/blog/2009/03/the-history-and-future-of-linkedin/ Chapter 6 Internet Service Deals, 50 Fastest Growing Niche Social Media Sites and Networks. www.internetservicedeals.com/blog, posted June 26, 2008 Social Networks: Facebook Takes Over Top Spot, Twitter Climbs, Compete, written Feb. 9, 2009, http://blog.compete.com/2009/02/09/facebook-myspace-twitter-social-network/ Traffic & Market Share Social Networking Sites, Sausage Factory Seminars http://www.sausagefactoryseminars.com/blog/2009/02/09/traffic-market-share-social-networkingsites/ Growth Trends of Social Networking Sites in 2007-2008, Lyons International, http://www.lyonsinternational.com/2009/04/17/growth-trends-of-social-networking-sites-in-2007-08/
83

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/techinvestor/industry/2008-05-11-social-networking_N.htm http://socialmedia.globalthoughtz.com/social-network-market-share-myspace-down/ http://blog.compete.com/2009/02/09/facebook-myspace-twitter-social-network/ Niche social networks will continue to be hot in 2008, Jan. 7, 2008, http://social-media-optimization. com/2008/01/niche-social-networks-will-continue-to-be-hot-in-2008/ ActiveRain.com, webnewsforus.com/blog, June 26, 2006, http://webnewsforus.com/blog/activeraincom/51 Famiva.com What is Xanga, http://webtrends.about.com/od/pro5/fr/what-is-xanga.htm What is Hi5?, http://webtrends.about.com/od/profiles/fr/what-is-hi5.htm Phone & Social Networks: Whats Ahead for Techs Survivors in 09? Social Networking Disappears, http://cws.internet.com/article/4240-.htm Web 3.0 the personalized web experience for your customers,Oct. 8, 2008, http://searchcio.techtarget.com.au/articles/27270-Web-3-the-personalised-web-experience-foryour-customers The future web2.0 social experience, web design from scratch, http://www.webdesignfromscratch.com/future-social-web-experience.php Social Blogging - What is Xanga?, webtrends.about.com/od/socialnetworking/p/xanga_profile.htm, About.com Web Trends, Chapter 7 Talent trumps all for YouTube sensation Susan Boyle, http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-etsusan-boyle17-2009apr17,0,2767635.story Viddler, http://cwanswers.com/8921/viddler Vimeo, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimeo About ScanScout, http://www.scanscout.com/about_us_our_vision.html blinkx, http://www.blinkx.com/about Chapter 8 Email and webmail statistics, April 2009, www.email-marketing-reports.com/metrics/email-statistics. htm 15 Email Statistics That Are Shaping The Future, Oct. 22, 2008, www.convinceandconvert.com How to: 13 Tips for Effective Email Marketing, March 26, 2008, www.marketingvox.com/how-to-effective-email-marketing
Marketech
84
Email marketing for Nonprofits, May 13, 2008, www.marketingprofs.com, 29 Ways to Build Your House List, danavan.net/publications/2004/02/29_ways_to_buil.html February 2004 Gmails Users Fewer, but Younger and Richer, Than Yahoos and Hotmails, http://www.marketingcharts.com/topics/demographics/gmails-users-fewer-but-younger-and-richer-than-yahoos-hotmails-366/ 10 B2B Email Marketing Best Practices, March 17, 2008, B2Bemailmarketing.com/2008/03/10-b2bemail-ma.html, 10 Tips for Using Twitter and Email Marketing for B2B, Dec. 21, 2008, http://anythinggoesmarketing. blogspot.com/2008/12/10-tips-for-using-twitter-and-email.html Chapter 9 http://www.piczoinc.com/about.html http://www.slideshare.net/ http://photobucket.com/faq?catID=29&catSelected=f&topicID=317 15 Creative and Profitable Ways to Use Autoresponders, http://www.imnewswatch.com/archives/2007/11/15_creative_and.html?visitFrom=1 First Time Using Autoresponders?, Sept 23, 2007, http://www.internetmarketingtips4u.com/index. php/list-building-strategies/15-autoresponders/25-using-an-autoresponder-for-the-first-time 5 Ways to Turn Customer Inquiries Into Sales, June 18, 2006, http://www.effective-internet-marketing. net/email/email-automatic-responders.html Chapter 10 http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com/weblog/2006/08/5_rules_of_soci.html http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2006/08/13/rules-of-social-media-optimization/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media_optimization http://indigitalmarketing.com/2008/01/21/a-social-media-optimization-strategy-the-participationladder/ http://social-media-optimization.com/2008/03/top-10-social-bookmarking-sites/ http://www.masternewmedia.org/the-social-media-optimization-manifesto-key-social-marketingprinciples-to-increase-the/
85
Marketech
back to top
click
1 2 3 4 5

click

click

click
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
Hiring for Social Media Positions
Hiring For Social Media Positions

Its no secret that many brands are embracing social media. From international heavyweights like Ford and Coca-Cola to local ice cream shops, everyone is trying to figure out how to get social media done. In several client meetings recently, the discussion has turned to the subject of staffing up for social media and to then training those staff to ensure that they do the right things right in the social media space and flawlessly perform the role of brand steward. There are a few questions you should ask as youre considering the social media staffing issue. Should I hire or outsource? Im biased here, but Ill tell you from experience that the most successful social media work that Ive seen involves social media personnel inside of an organization. Yes, you need to have some who gets your company, culture and (deeply) understands the market(s) you serve and the industry youre in. A true steward of the brand (a phrase I use daily to describe those who work in the social media space on behalf of their company) should be embedded in the company. (caveat: A contract social media person can be embedded as wellbut they need to really get you in order to work out). If you want some more ammo for this discussion, check out Beth Hartes 25 Signs Youve Got a Strong SM Consultant or Agency. What role should I absolutely hire for? If youre really serious about social & digital media, one of the most popular roles that brands hire first is that of community manager. Basically, the community manager is the brand steward within the community of customers, prospects and partners that you serve. What qualifications should they have? I could write a laundry list of which qualifications one should have to do social media for your brand, but at the end of the day, there are a few non-negotiable things that Im stuck on.
Page1
Community managers should be advocates, ambassadors and stewards of the brand in one This is a delicate balance, but they are first, and foremost, representatives of the company but they must understand and communicate well with the community they serve. Community managers must be able to communicate in writing, video, audio, 140 characters and in any other mode thats social media ready A good sense for good copy, proper etiquette & tact and a generally approachable nature are essential. Believes in the core social media ethic which is to always ask how can my company be useful, relevant and helpful to the community we serve? A sharing, caring & ready to educate mentality is the hallmark of a good social media community manager.
The MarketingSavant Group | 888.989.7771 | www.marketingsavant.com | dana@marketingsavant.com
Hiring for Social Media Positions
Loves what they do and loves people! Great community managers love people, love helping out and love technology and communication. They will be as adept behind a Twitter handle as they will be out at a trade show catching video from community members.
What if I cant hire anyone? Thats a great question, and you have a couple of options. First, you can do social media in less than 20 minutes a day if you have a defined process. That way theres no capital investment, only your time (which can be worth quite a lot, so choose your channels wisely). You can also hire in help. While I dont advocate that brands outsource social media wholesale, a growing number of businesses are embracing social media by hiring part-time employees or contract social media folks to operate Twitter, Facebook and similar sites on their behalf. Some companies, like Garrett Popcorn, have hired people to tweet for them. In their case, they hired Alecia Dantico, a doctoral student in communications. If youre going to go it alone, then your readiness comes into question. Here are a few questions to ask, compliments of David Armano, that I feel you should take pretty seriously: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Do you have a passionate and dedicated team who will obsess over your efforts? Are you trying to provide value or quick hits? Are you willing to engage your customers/consumers? Are you willing to empower your employees/agencies to represent you? Are you willing to risk failure?
At the end of the day, I believe that organizations that take social media seriously will either dedicate staff, or a portion of their time to the discipline, or hire in professionals to help out with social media. Ive advised a number of brands to hire community managers and interns to help out with the process with great success.
Page2
Social Media Job Descriptions
Were often asked to chime on the job descriptions for candidates that will have purview over an organizations social media efforts. Below is a collection of the things that weve found that are useful to consider. 1) A person who blogs or understands blogging and participates in social networks and online communities, has an understanding of web TV, podcasting, wikis and social bookmarking sites, and can translate that knowledge in to recommendations for the Company. The experienced individual should understand the importance of ongoing monitoring and response speed in social networks. 2) A person who is comfortable teaching social media to others. (Some internal evangelizing will be required.) 3) A person who enjoys engaging in conversations, both on-line and off. 4) An excellent writer. 5) An independent thinker and task master. 6) An insistence on honesty, transparency and integrity. 7) A quick thinker and witty conversationalist/writer. 8) The ideal candidate should have a LinkedIn profile, a Twitter account, a Facebook page, and should have his or her own blog already. 9) The candidate would be expected to create a private Content Calendar so that s/he has material to talk about based on the Companys announcement schedules. Of course, s/he can blog about lighter topics along the way. The candidate should have the authority to conduct written or video interviews w/ execs and/or the occasional guest blog post. S/he should have companywide authority to track down anyone at any level to get answers that have been posted outside the Company. 10) The candidate should be focused on content creation, but s/he will also work w/ the PR Team and PR Agency to develop overall communications strategies and rapid response plans. 11) Recommended reading: on Twitter, the candidate should start following @Comcast_cares, @RichardatDell, @Zappos, @JetBlue, and @Southwest. The candidate should also subscribe via RSS to PR and marketing-oriented blogs found in the AdAge Power150.
Social Media Job Descriptions
The following is a social media manager job description that has been widely cited as one of the best: Were fortunate to now be in a position to hire a social media manager. I am the primary decision-maker. While our Sr. VP for Human Resources, will certainly be posting the official position in various and sundry places around the on- and off-line world, consider this the job announcement. WHAT WE NEED 1. An experienced (2-5 years) social media marketer. Someone who blogs or understands blogging and participates in social networks and online communities, has an understanding of web TV, podcasting, wikis and social bookmarking sites, and can translate that knowledge in to recommendations for clients. 2. Someone with a more than rudimentary understanding of search engine optimization. 3. A person who is comfortable teaching social media to others. 4. A person who enjoys engaging in conversations, both on-line and off. 5. An excellent writer. 6. An independent thinker and task master with the appropriate organizational skills to be a good one. 7. Someone with an insistence on honesty, transparency and integrity. 8. A person I can put in front of a client. (i.e. You speak and present well, arent a slob and dont smell bad.) WHAT WE WANT 1. Someone with community management experience. And not just a blog with comments, but forums, message boards or small social networks. 2. A person with web-TV and/or podcasting experience. 3. Someone with an impressive social media profile in one or several of the popular social networks or social bookmarking/news sites. 4. A salesperson who can help us grow our social media clientele. 5. Someone who can navigate their way around HTML and PHP code or at least do so without screwing something up. WHAT I GET OUT OF THIS 1. An easier, more social method of finding someone to hire. 2. Someone to tackle the world with. WHAT YOU GET OUT OF THIS 1. A good-paying job with a visionary marketing agency working with national clients. 2. A competitive benefits package including medical and dental insurance, disability and retirement. 3. Staff blogging privileges on Social Media Explorer and Doe-Andersons blog. 4. Sole responsibility for accounts to build your resume and reputation.
Social Media Job Descriptions 5. The chance to live in a pretty damn fine town, some call it Possibility City, with a burgeoning pool of social media and tech talent. 6. A pretty swell boss. HERES HOW YOU GET THE JOB 1. Dont send me resumes. Connect with me. Im easy to find. 2. Give me an elevator pitch on why you are the person weve described. 3. Send me (via whatever electronic method you deem most efficient) a short list of what youve done and where I can find evidence of it. Or have a full profile on LinkedIn. Its easier that way. 4. If your profiles are hard to link to you on social media sites, tell me which are yours and what youre hiding. 5. Understand this will be a competitive search and Im hiring one person. Be outstanding. The only other disclaimer Ill throw in there is that if you have issues working in the [your industry] category, youre not going to like this job. That wont be the only category youll work in, though. Experience in travel, banking, medical, non-profits or B2B environments is a plus. Social media community influence in those categories is a super bonus. If you can talk circles around lawyers, youre already at the top of the stack.
Creating The Social Enterprise
From social media networks to blogs, widgets, tweets and hot mobile apps marketers are faced with more choices than we ever could have imagined. It seems every day brings a new shiny toy to try and to confuse. Add a few traditional tactics such as PR, email, advertising, research and search and the marketers job becomes overwhelming. Overlay that with an internal structure where functions are silo-ed by departments and you have a frightening disjointed marketing program. As our understanding of how our customers, the media, prospective employees, current employees and share holders use the social web it becomes evident that social media does not live only in the world of marketing. Public relations, customer service, operations and human resources are exploring ways to incorporate online digital conversational tools. Comcast is using Twitter as a customer service channel while the while the business-tobusiness company Indium has tapped its engineers and scientists to created twelve niche topic blogs. Small businesses like Atlanta restaurant Pizzeria Vent are on Twitter building relations with neighborhood patrons through special offers and conversations. Isipho, a small nonprofit thats mission is to improve the lives of the children in Nzinga, South Africa, has raised its awareness and brought in funding through its Facebook page, blog and tweets. However, the digital conversational exchanges our customers and stakeholders have created a set of expectations that they bring with them when interacting with the enterprise at-large .. online or offline. Is service better on the Twitter channel than in your call center? Does a blog or Facebook post provide more relevant information than your website or brochures? Do your enterprise bloggers or twitters understand the needs of your customers better than your traditional sales force? Is the HR specialist bringing in more qualified candidates through LinkedIn than ads or recruiters?
Toby Bloomberg www.divamarktingblog.com @tobydiva
Every time a customer or client interacts with your employees on your social media assets it creates not only a new experience for the company but one that can be viewed by hundreds if not hundreds of thousands of people. Keep in mind that the secondary audience also experiences your brand and expectations of how they will be treated. One of the benefits that social media brings to the enterprise is a .. we can not wait any longer .. critical need to ensure cross functional communication systems is in place. A process should be developed to capture the learnings and information occurring from each social media touch point. Ideally, that information should be analyzed and placed in a common, lets call it digital repository. In addition, critical information should be directed to employees who can quickly provided a response and begin a solution process. Un-soloing an organization, whether it is a Fortune 100 enterprise with global divisions or a small business with three employees with distinct responsibilities, takes time and team work. Following is a first step to align internal stakeholders and help them understand the social media landscape. The P-I-E-C-E conversation is a process developed to build a foundation for The Social Enterprise; it also sets the stage for creating an integrated marketing plan. PIECE Conversation: Prepare-Invite-Encourage-Confirm-Engage Step 1: Prepare: educational component. as it relates to social media: competitive analysis, customer activity, industry trends Step 2: Invite people who perceive they have a stake: C-suite, marketing, legal, technology, customer service Step 4: Encourage people to talk openly Step 5: Confirm and prioritize issues (including objectives/goals) Step 6: Engage next steps create a Red Flag Memo
Toby Bloomberg www.divamarktingblog.com @tobydiva
Integrating Social Media Into The DNA Of Your Brand

For brand management social media can be a balancing act. As customers come to expect the opportunity to interact with (hopefully!) the people who are behind brands marketers are finding the need to address new aspects of brand development. The first step in this new game is for marketers to understand how social media can change the perceptions of a brand and impact the value of a brand. Successfully balancing social media inputs (from customers and other stakeholders) while maintaining brand values can be a precarious under taking. Brand marketers are charged with one over riding responsibility: to be good stewards of the brand. What that means specifically will of course, vary from organization to organization and from department to department. However at the minimum it includes: developing the brand promise and values, logo/graphics protector, ensuring the voice of the customer is reflected, consistent cross channel messaging. When social media is introduced into the DNA of brand development there are two points of view that must be taken into consideration: organization/employees and customers. Organization: how will social media be used to reinforce the brand and tell its story? Customer: how will your customers use social media to tell their stories about your brand? Although the enterprise can not control the how, what, where or when customers will interact in the multiple opportunities that present themselves in the social web, the challenge of managing brand perception is not a new one. Customers have always done just what they wanted to do when it came to how, what, where or when they discussed our brands. With the onset of the Internet, the difference now is our customers voices are louder and more likely to find others who agree and look towards each other for confirmation and information. The influence that those groups, or individuals, have can directly impact purchase behavior of many more people than conversations did even five years ago. Although social media may be shaking up some marketing departments, the social web does bring brand managers new, exciting opportunities to get to know their customers better: from listening to the customer raw voices without filters to platforms (that are consistent with the brands promise) where you can help customers engage with peers and with the people who are the heart of the brand. An interesting example of how one company did just that is Cumberland Farms, a Massachusetts-based convenience store chain. Cumberland Farms developed a Facebook fan page for customers to talk about just one of its products Chill Zone. The company knew that they had a segment that was passionate about this frozen drink. Creating an online space offered a way to build community for over 80,000 of those loyal customers. Fans not interacted with each other but the people behind the brand took an active role in posting comments and responses. http://www.facebook.com/chillzone Successful social media ccommunication is built on authentic interactions where people just talk to each other instead of passing on pre-crafted tag lines. Opening the enterprise door to allow employees that level of being your self in the very public social media world can be disconcerting especially if your job is to protect the brand. Two important questions for brand management to explore Before including social media into the brands DNA: What does it mean to protect the brand in the social web? How can you be a steward of your brand while maintaining your authenticity? To help incorporate social media into the DNA of your brand what follows is a thought process model to get you started.
Toby Bloomberg, Diva Marketing www.divamarketingblog.com @tobydiva
1
10 Suggestions To Integrate Social Media Into The DNA Of Your Brand

1. Determine what sets your brand apart from the rest. How is it special and unique to your target marketing? Our brand is the only ________ that ___________. 2. Especially in the social media world brand values become important in building content direction. In 3 words what is the essence of your brand? Or if you want to get social .. describe your brand value in 140 characters. 3. People use social media networks, platforms, tools different making identifying your audience critical. Who do you want to talk with or who is your target audience? 4. Determining what you want to accomplish will guide your decision in what you consider to be success. This in turn will lead to your metrics. What are your objectives and goals? How will you know if you succeed? 5. Determining resource allocation: people, time and money will impact which tools, or tactics, you choose to use Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Flickr, Video, etc. What are tactics will you use? How will these tools reinforce brand value? 6. The more you can integrate social media tactics into your marketing initiatives the more benefits you'll derive. Identify current programs where social media can support the brand and build relationships with customers (and other stakeholders). 7. Have you developed guidelines that can be used to give your social media content developers (bloggers, Tweeters, Vloggers, photographers, etc.) direction? 8. Have you ensured that all of the people who will be developing content understand the brand promise and values? 9. Are you listening to who, what, where and how your customers and stakeholders (media, analysts, job seekers, stock holders, etc.) are saying about your brand, company, sector? 10. How are you incorporating the lessons learned and information gained from social media to support your brand value?
Toby Bloomberg, Diva Marketing www.divamarketingblog.com @tobydiva
back to top
click
1 2 3 4 5

click

click

click
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
Social Media Planning

Strategy Map Worksheet
Your Name: Your Organization: Use this form to help you think through your organizations social media marketing strategy.
1.
Objective
a. What do you want to accomplish with social media? Research and Learning Lead generation E-commerce sales Store traffic Increase Brand or Issue Awareness Reputation management Get your fans to talk about you (word of mouth) Content Generation and Issues Awareness Increased Relevant Visitor Traffic and Page Rankings Take Action (sign petition, send email, leave comment, etc) Other:
b. Now, restate your objectives so that they are SMART specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time-based.
c. Describe how your social media objective supports or links to a goal in your organizations communications plan.
Page1
The MarketingSavant Group | 888.989.7771 | www.marketingsavant.com | dana@marketingsavant.com Portions dapted from: WeAreMedia: Nonprofit and Social Media Starter Kit

2.
Target Audience
a. Who must you reach with your social media efforts to meet your objective? Why this target group?
b. Is this a target group identified in your organizations communications plan?
c. What do they know or believe about your organization or issue? What will resonate with them?
d. What key points do you want to make with your audience?
e. What social media tools are they currently using? If they congregate in certain online locales, what are they talking about in relation to your brand/goals/issues/competitors? Describe based on direct observation, primary research, or secondary research.
f. What additional research do you need to do to learn about your target audiences online social behavior or understanding/perceptions about your organization or issues?
Page2

3.
Integration
a. How will your social media strategy support and enhance your marketing & Internet strategy?
Strategy Component Email Web Site Search Engine Optimization
How Does Social Strategy Support
Search Engine Advertising
Others:
b. How will you support/connect your offline marketing efforts with social media?
4. Culture Change
a. How will you get your organization to embrace your social media strategy?
b. Can you think of any internal champions to drive it forward?
c. How will you address any fears or concerns?
d. What is the rate of change your organization can tolerate?
Page3

5. Capacity
a. Who will implement your organizations social media strategy?
b. Can you allocate a minimum of five hours per week to your strategy?
c. Do you need any outside expertise to help implement your strategy?
d. Will your content updates depend on any other resource or person? (Do they know your intentions?)
6. Tools and Tactics

a. What tactics and tools best support your objectives and match your targeted audience?
b. Now, take a second look at what you are planning. What tactics and tools do you have the capacity to implement?
c . Are you prepared to allow additional time for researching new social media tools or changing tools?
Page4

7. Measurement
a. What hard data points or metrics will you use to track your objectives? How often will you track? Do you have the systems and tools set up to track efficiently?
Measurable Objective
Before
During
After
b. What questions will you ask to generate insights?
c. What qualitative data will you take into consideration to generate insights or help you improve what your social media strategy?
8.
Experiment
a. What small piece can you implement first as a pilot?
b. Aside from the metrics described above, how will you track the implementation so you can learn from it?
c. Use the following table for analysis after you implement. Dont focus so much on numbers but rather on insights.
Before Test 1: What did you plan to do? What did you think would be the result? After What actually happened? How could your results have been improved? What did your audience think?
Page5
What will you do differently in the next iteration?
Social Media Strategy Questions

Social media is simple, but not easy. I think thats the best way to explain it. To that end, one of the best ways to drill down on what the best strategy is for your organization is to ask the right questions. Its that simple! In the absence of decades of best practices that are well known, universally understood and (hopefully) applied across industries, we have a set of questions that can help anyone, in any industry, get to the core of what their social media strategy should be and how they should proceed in making the most of social media. Its not about whether or not you should be on Facebook or have a YouTube channel - it all depends on the answers to the questions. If you ask me whether or not you should be on Twitter or whether you should be blogging or producing a podcast, its tough to say. However, Im confident that by going through a process, asking the right questions and being confident in the outcomes, youll be on the right path to creating a best in class social media strategy. The other thing to know about social media is that its changing. Fast. Just as someone once said about sports records, todays records are tomorrows averages, you need to stay tuned to the changes afoot in social media because todays breakthroughs are either going to be, at best, tomorrows best practices or at worst, lessons of what not to do. All that having been said, lets look at some questions: Setting Your Goals and Expectations for Social Media How to we plan to measure the success of our social media efforts? (Qualitative and quantitative metrics) Who do you want to reach and why? What other benefits can you derive, such as creating a community with suppliers, vendors, and partners? What do we expect people to do with the social media tools that we roll out? What are we prepared to share with our audience in social media that doesnt directly benefit the bottom line? What are our data do gathering objectives? (email, address, downloads only) Are we ok with not seeing an immediate and direct return on are social media investment? What are our short term and long term investment expectations? Industry Impact & Feasibility How are social media impacting our industrys customers and other stakeholders? Where are our competitors in social media? (conduct a competitive social media inventory analysis) What is the technology usage profile of our typical customer? How well/much do they use our website, email newsletter, etc? Do we believe social media will have an impact on our customers? In what way(s)? Why? Why is social media of interest to us? Is our industry ahead of the curve, behind it, or in the middle? Is discussion about our brand and our industry positive, negative, or neutral? Are we being talked about at all? Have we learned anything about our company or industry from listening to social media?
Page1
Assessing Our Corporate Social Media Readiness What is our companys tolerance for risk (e.g., initiating new or untested marketing tactics, launching bold corporate initiatives, etc.)? How does our company normally react to negative commentary from the media, customers, competitors and other stakeholders? How uncomfortable would our company be advertising in a publication or on a web site that often contained editorial content critical of our company or industry yet whose readers very closely matched our target audience? Please rank your knowledge of social media in general i.e., how familiar are you with various forms of social media and how they are used? How do you feel as a company about engaging in a public dialogue with your customers? What do you perceive as the biggest obstacles to our adoption of social media practices? What approaches can we take that are evolutions of our current practices (vs. complete overhauls)? Who on our staff is most enthusiastic and passionate about talking to customers? Who on our staff is most enthusiastic and passionate about social media? Can we first use social media to improve how we communicate internally, cross departmentally? Determining Resources Needed for a Social Media Effort How much time and money are we expecting to dedicate to social media? What are we willing to spend for technology, development and social media tools? What level of human resources are we willing to dedicate to our social media plan? Who are the point people, and what are their roles? Who are the faces of the organization online, and where? Can we afford to keep part of our allocated $ budget flexible to respond to evolving needs? If were successful with social media, can we scale our interactions to continue to meet higher expectations? How? Are we flexible enough within roles/responsibilities to shift them as needed to accommodate what we learn from social media? Social Media Specific Education and Training Are our employees using social networks in their personal lives? What level of familiarity can/should we expect from our employees and what gaps do we need to fill with training? Does our internal audience understand the business potential of social media? What are the biggest fears/hesitations that we have as a company about using social media? Are we empowering our employees to respond at the point of need, regardless of their role? Is there a chain of command? How are we going to structure the flow of information so that necessary learnings get back to the right people?
Page2

Participating and Engaging in Social Media What is our unique voice and point of view that we want to take to the social media conversation? What practices do we see from our peers/competitors that wed like to emulate? What do we see from them that wed like to avoid at all costs? What unique voice can we contribute to the conversation in the industry? What is it that we want to convey to our community through our participation in social media? Are we going to encourage community generated content? Do we plan to heavily moderate or edit community contributed content or let it stand & play out? How are we ensuring that were providing a two-way channel for dialogue? Social Media Policy & Crisis Communication Planning What direction or advice should you offer about peoples conduct on personal pages after (and, sometimes, during) business hours? What is our policy for handling social media feedback? What is our policy for our employee engagement in social media? Are we covered by our ethics, computer usage, code of conduct of HR policies or do we need a specific social media policy? How will we respond to negative feedback/criticism when we discover it? Are we ready to empower our team to resolve customer issues in social media channels? How detailed do we need to be with our communication policies? Who is to speak officially about your organization, and about which topics? Who are the people who can promptly grant permission to discuss new products and industry trends, and what can you share? Whats the process for responding to legitimate (and illegitimate) online criticisms of your company or its products? What can you do to prevent (or survive) a Twitterstorm or any social media crisis? How can people authentically engage in the conversation as individuals without speaking for the company? Following-up On Our Social Media Strategy Implementation What social sites are working for us, based on the objectives weve stated? Which social sites and channels are easy to interact in and responsive to our message and which ones do we have to force? What has emerged from our social media interaction and conversations that we hadnt anticipated? What are we doing with the information we learn? How are we distributing it internally and acting on it? What new metrics should we be tracking based on what weve learned? Were our original assumptions about social media correct? If not, what do we need to adjust as a result? What have we learned from our customers and competitors that we didnt know before? Whats next? Remember, none of us has all of the answers, all of us are smarter than any of us and our job here is not to deliver all of the right answers on social media but rather to ensure that were asking the right questions.
Page3
back to top
click
1 2 3 4 5

click

click

click
click
Appendix
mindmaps and more
Powered by
Social Media Listening Blog Implementation Blogging for Thought Leaders Social Networking Map Twitter for Business
Social Media and Digital Marketing Mind Maps
Green Bay, WI 54301 888.989.7771 dana@marketingsavant.com www.marketingsavant.com
MarketingSavantMindMap SocialMediaMonitoringandEngagementProcess
www.marketingsavant.com 888.989.7771
MarketingSavantMindMap CreateaSocialMediaMonitoringStrategy&Toolkit
MarketingSavantMindMap InsidetheThoughtLeadershipBloggingProcess
MarketingSavantMindMap TwitterforBusiness
MarketingSavantMindMap WeblogImplementationRoadmap
MarketingSavantMindMap SocialNetworkingContactMap
MarketingSavantMindMap ThoughtLeadershipMarketing
Social Media 101 Digital Marketing 101 The Lowdown on LinkedIn Blogging to Build Your Business Facebook Search Engine Optimization
Social Media and Digital Marketing Tip-sheets
Green Bay, WI 54301 888.989.7771 dana@marketingsavant.com www.marketingsavant.com
How to grow your business through digital and social media marketing
Social Media 101

Social Media Tools
Blogger - www.blogger.com Word Press - http://wordpress.com/ Blog search engine technorati.com
What is Social Media?

No doubt youve heard plenty about social media by this point, but many business owners are challenged with how to make it relevant for their business. According to Wikipedia, Social media are primarily Internet- and mobile-based tools for sharing and discussing information among human beings. The term most often refers to activities that integrate technology, telecommunications and social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio. This interaction, and the manner in which information is presented, depends on the varied perspectives and "building" of shared meaning among communities, as people share their stories and experiences. Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content (UGC) or consumergenerated media (CGM).
Free blogs:
Technorati
Free Micro Blogging sites:

Source: Universal McCann Wave 3 Report
Social Media Platforms
Essential Steps to Social Media Success

1. Establish Clear Business Objectives and Metrics Social media marketing should not be an executive pet project. As a marketer responsible for a social media initiative, you should never move off the starting mark without clear and measurable business goals. 2. Marketing Communications Moves from Monologue to Connected Dialogue When customers control content, marketers inevitably lose some control of the message. But that doesnt diminish the capability of good marketers to communicate effectively with their marketsin fact it can create a significant competitive advantage. 3. Clarify Your Positioning For all the novelty of social media, successful execution invariably hinges on an age-old fundamentala clear and consistent position across all business touch points. 4. Identify the Influencers The first meaningful step of engagement is to identify where the conversations are taking place that are relevant to your market community, and who is shaping those conversations. 5. Listen Before You Launch In any conversation, a smart communicator spends time listening to the dialog before they engage. 6. Integrate Your Social Media with SEO One of the most powerful capabilities of social media, especially blogging, is the ability to dramatically
www.marketingsavant.com 888.989.7771 info@marketingsavant.com
Twitter - twitter.com/ Plurk - www.plurk.com
impact search engine positioning. 7. Engage Your Audience Whether youre launching your own social media application or engaging in others, the key to building influence in your community is getting involved. 8. Engage Your Employees Social media programs are a valuable opportunity to build cross functional teams in your organization. 9. Engage Your Customers Nothing filters up good ideas and new content like talking directly to customers. Interview a few of your customers or partners and ask for their take on the issues. 10. Be Honest and Up Front Whether youre launching your own social media site or just participating in discussions around the Web, be conspicuously honest and straightforward about who you are and who you represent. 11. Define Metrics According to Business Objectives Get involved in defining what business outcomes are relevant for your social media program, and look for ways to measure progress toward the goal. Chances are, the data is available. 12. Fail Quickly. Fail Cheaply If you are launching your first social media program, focus on an initiative with minimal investment in time and money.
Google Reader - www.google.com/reader Flickr - www.flickr.com YouTube - www.youtube.com Delicious - www.delicious.com Jaiku - www.jaiku.com
RSS Readers
Photo Sharing Video Sharing
Social Bookmarking
How much time & money will this take?

Most businesses can implement a social media strategy for very little money; however, the best strategies that generate leads and revenue are launched in conjunction with professional help and can cost a few hundred to several thousand dollars. Moreover, social media takes time and personal involvement that are unprecedented in the world of mass media.
Social Media 101

social media - a self-guided tour
What is it?
What is it good for?

Free to low-cost User comments are free feedback on services, prices Creates searchable archive for search engines Acceptable to discuss topics or ideas that are not yet fully developed Educational information Ability to increase traffic through repeat visitors Organization gains more creditability Builds relationship with visitors
MarketingSavant Social Media Marketing

Social media consulting and coaching by an award-winning blogger. Award-winning blogger and internet marketing expert, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides social media education and consulting to corporations, non-profits and educational institutions. Our training and content consulting services are the product of more than five years years of intensive study, training, writing and practice in the area of social and new media. MarketingSavant can save you months of learning and prepare you to enter the global online conversation with a strategy, and voice that stands out from your competitors. Our training and custom consulting services address these key business priorities: 1. Understanding social medias growing importance in the changing media landscape; 2. Tools and tactics for tracking online conversations; 3. Turning online feedback into actionable information; 4. Overcoming internal obstacles to social media initiatives; 5. Selecting tools and metrics to match business objectives; and 6. Building and sustaining effective online communities. Services begin with the strategic education phase and proceed through strategy and implementation. www.marketingsavant.com www.marketingsavant.com/newsletter 888-989-7771 dana@marketingsavant.com LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/ danavandenheuvel Twitter: www.twitter.com/danavan Blog: www.marketingsavant.com Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/danavan
Blog A blog (a contraction of the term "Web log") is a Web site, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Message Boards/Chat Rooms/Forums An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site. It is the modern equivalent of a traditional bulletin board. From a technological standpoint, forums or boards are web applications managing user-generated content.
Listen to the conversation

As part of our social-media strategy, lets presume all businesses need a way to listen to their audience, their customers, their partners, and their detractors. Lets begin with the tools we use to listen to the conversation. Start with Google Alerts and subscribe to keywords pertinent to your brand. Youll get daily emails telling you when your keywords show up on the Web.
www.google.com/alerts www.keotag.com www.technorati.com www.summize.com http://crazyegg.com
Social Bookmarking
Social bookmarking is an excellent way to share the collective intelligence of the Internet. This is near the top because you may want to bookmark some of these other sites using del. icio.us.
VERY simple to use Micro Blogging (Twitter) Multiple ways to send updates: text mesMicro-blogging is a form of multimedia blogging that saging, instant messaging, email, MP3 or allows users to send brief text updates (140 characters the Web. or fewer) or micromedia (photos or audio clips) and Computer not needed to send an update, can publish them, either to be viewed by anyone or by a use a mobile phone restricted group. These messages can be submitted by a variety of means, including text messaging, instant messaging, email, MP3 or the Web. Micro-blogs provide short commentary on a person-to-person level or to share news about a company's products and services. Photo Sharing (Flickr) Photo sharing is the publishing or transfer of a user's digital photos online, thus enabling the user to share them with others (whether publicly or privately). This functionality is provided through both Web sites and applications that facilitate the upload and display of images. The term can also be loosely applied to the use of online photo galleries that are setup and managed by individual users, including photo blogs. Podcasts A podcast is a series of audio or video digital-media files which is distributed over the Internet by syndicated download, through Web feeds, to portable media players and personal computers. Though the same content may also be made available by direct download or streaming, a podcast is distinguished from other digital-media formats by its ability to be syndicated, subscribed to, and downloaded automatically when new content is added. Free or low-cost Easy to use and share photos Great tagging and organizing system Can be incorporated into personal blogs and Web sites Easy to buy prints and other photo specialty items Good backup for paper and digital photos Communicate with large numbers of people via the Internet Incorporates video, audio, music and effects Syndicated via RSS feed or archived on the Web Listeners can download podcasts to their mobile players or listen to at their computers Production is fairly inexpensive with the right equipment
http://delicious.com/ www.digg.com www.reddit.com www.diigo.com
RSS Feed Aggregators

Sign up for Bloglines, a free Web-based http://www.bloglines. RSS reader that will allow you to follow com numerous blogs and news sites. Add the feed from www.danavan.net to get started, then look for the RSS button on your favorite news sites to subscribe to Google.com/reader more feeds.
Subscribe to Blogs of Interest

Reading blogs through RSS readers is google.com/blogsearch how blogs were meant to be read. Use Google Blogsearch and other resources www.blogpulse.com to find blogs you like using keywords from your hobbies, company or industry. Subscribe using your new Bloglines www.technorati.com RSS reader account.
Contact us:
Connect with us:
Wikipedia
Do you know whats been written about your brand (or your competitors) on Wikipedia? If youre not in Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.org write a mock version of your own Wikipedia entry.
The Lowdown on LinkedIn

Finding a Job with LinkedIn
Adapted from Guy Kawasaki and Liz Ryan
What exactly is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking site founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003 mainly used for professional networking. As of February 2009, it had more than 35 million registered users, spanning 170 industries.
1. Get the word out.Tell your network that youre looking for a new position because a job search these days requires the law of big numbers. 2. GetLinkedInrecommendationsfromyourcolleagues. A strong recommendation from your manager highlights your strengths and shows that you were a valued employee. 3. Findoutwherepeoplewithyourbackgroundsare working. Find companies that employ people like you by doing an advanced search for people in your area who have your skills. 4. Findoutwherepeopleatacompanycamefrom. LinkedIn Company Profiles show the career path of people before they began work there. 5. Findoutwherepeoplefromacompanygonext.LinkedIns Company Profiles also tell you where people go after leaving the company. 6. Checkifacompanyisstillhiring.Companypageson LinkedIn include a section called New Hires that lists people who have recently joined the company. 7. Gettothehiringmanager.LinkedInsjobsearchengine allows you to search for any kind of job you want. However, when you view the results, pay close attention to the ones that youre no more than two degrees away from. 8. Get to the right HR person.The best case is getting to the hiring manager via someone who knows him or her 9. Findoutthesecretjobrequirements.Joblistingsrarely spell out entirely or exactly what a hiring manager is seeking. Find a connection at the company who can get the inside scoop on what really matters for the job. 10. Find startups to join.MaybethisrecessionisGodtelling you its time to try a startup. 11. Buildyournetworkbeforeyouneedit.Asalasttip, no matter how the economy or your career is doing, having a strong network is a good form of job security.
Building your best profile

Join LinkedIn and complete the overview information Complete employment and education history Add a profile summary Select an industry and add your specialties Add your website(s) Create Public Profile URL Determine your Public Profile URL Set your Contact Settings Upload your Contacts from your email client Make introductions to connect via LinkedIn Collect at least 3 recommendations from your network Give and you shall receive! Regularly monitor the Q&A section for questions you are able to answer Ask questions that can help you do your job.
Top Ten LinkedIn Profile Errors

1. Misspellings or nonstandard names prevent people from finding you. 2. Being faceless; a picture aids recall when you've met people face-to-face, and people with pictures far more likely to be contacted. 3. Not using "Status Visibility," LinkedIn's internal version of Twitter, to keep your connections current on what's important to you today; based on what you're doing, they can reach out to help you. Better yet, connect to ping.fm and use Twitter to update LinkedIn. 4. Not using the summary to show how you are qualified to do what you want to do; use the "experience" to support the summary. 5. Not leveraging the "Specialties" area for keywords that are associated with the people you want to attract; these are bait, and you want LinkedIn members searching for these keywords to find you. 6. Being afraid to list multiple activities as "Positions" under "Experience." Although members have to make sure that concurrent activities could not be construed as conflicts, employers increasingly understand that employees
Source: Christopher Rollyson, www.rollyson.net/
have side businesses and activities. 6. Being careless with Recommendations. View them as a portfolio and use them to support the themes of your profile, so "set the table" when you ask for one. Ask the recommender what aspect of your work you would like him/her to comment on. 7. Missing the gold mine of LinkedIn Answers. These discussion forums can be included with the Profile and add significant value because they enable people to see your expertise and professionalism in context. 8. Few LinkedIn members participate in the Forums. 9. Lack of strategy or purpose; the most effective profiles have an organizing principle that supports a goal, which is the spine, and everything else branches off from it. 10. Omitting personal interests. Boomers were taught that "work" was separate from "home." No longer, so include your passions under "Additional Information" to enable people to connect with you that way, too.
The Lowdown on LinkedIn

A Bakers Dozen Smart Ways to Use LinkedIn
Adapted from Guy Kawasaki
MarketingSavant: Social Media

Social Networking consulting, coaching and training by an awardwinning blogger and experienced online networker. Social Media marketing expert, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides social networking consulting to professionals corporations, nonprofits and educational institutions. MarketingSavant will consult with you or your business on how it should blog, what to put on your LinkedIn or Facebook profiles, what other tools to use and how to best join the conversation in social media.
Most people use LinkedIn to get to someone in order to make a sale, form a partnership, or get a job. It works well for this because it is an online network of more than 35 million experienced professionals from around the world representing 170 industries. However, it is a tool that is underutilized, so here is a list of ways to increase the value of LinkedIn. 1. Increase your visibility. By adding connections, you increase the likelihood that people will see your profile first when theyre searching for someone to hire or do business with. In addition to appearing at the top of search results. 2. Improve your connectability. Most new users put only their current company in their profile. By doing so, they severely limit their ability to connect with people. You should fill out your profile like its an executive bio, so include past companies, education, affiliations, and activities. You can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature. 3. Improve your Google PageRank. LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. Since LinkedIn profiles receive a fairly high PageRank in Google, this is a good way to influence what people see when they search for you. To do this, create a public profile and select Full View. Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profiles URL to be your actual name. 4. Enhance your search engine results. In addition to your name, you can also promote your blog or website to search engines like Google and Yahoo! Your LinkedIn profile allows you to publicize websites. There are a few pre-selected categories like My Website, My Company, etc.To make this work, be sure your public profile setting is set to Full View. 5. Perform blind, reverse, and company reference checks. LinkedIns reference check tool to input a company name and the years the person worked at the company to search for references. Your search will find the people who worked at the company during the same time period. Since references provided by a candidate will generally be glowing, this is a good way to get more balanced data. 6. Increase the relevancy of your job search. Use LinkedIns advanced search to find people with educational and work experience like yours to see where they work. 7. Make your interview go smoother. You can use LinkedIn to find the people that youre meeting. 8. Gauge the health of a company. Perform an advanced search for company name and uncheck the Current Companies Only box. This will enable you to scrutinize the rate of turnover and whether key people are abandoning ship. 9. Gauge the health of an industry. If youre thinking of investing or working in a sector, use LinkedIn to find people who worked for competitorsor even better, companies who failed. 10. Track startups. You can see people in your network who are initiating new startups by doing an advanced search for a range of keywords such as stealth or new startup. 11. Ask for advice. LinkedIn Answers , aims to enable this online. The product allows you to broadcast your business-related questions to both your network and the greater LinkedIn network. 12. Integrate into a new job. When people start a new job, ordinarily their roots arent that deep in the new company. However, with Linkedin, new employees can study fellow employees profiles and therefore help them get to know more people faster in a new company. 13. Scope out the competition, customers, partners, etc. This seems like its a no-brainer, but you can use LinkedIn to scope out the competitions team as well as the team of customers and partners.
Contact us:
www.marketingsavant.com 888-989-7771 dana@marketingsavant.com
Connect with us:
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin. com/in/danavandenheuvel Twitter: www.twitter.com/danavan Blog: www.marketingsavant.com Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/ danavan
Join our email newsletter:
www.marketingsavant.com/ newsletter
Facebook: Not just for college students

What exactly is Facebook?
Facebook is a free-access social networking website that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. Users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people.
http://www.insidefacebook.com/2009/02/14/facebook-surpasses-175-million-users-continuing-to-grow-by-600k-usersday/
Is Facebook Relevant for Business?

Facebook recognizes that engaging with businesses and buying things are a part of everyday life. With that in mind, it has created a system where ads are more relevant and actually enhance, instead of interrupt, the user experience. This is achieved, in part, through a feature called the News Feed, which enables peer recommendations and activity to be subtly branded and spread from one person to all of his or her friends, to all of their friends, and so on. Dozens of organizations have also tapped Facebook Fan Pages, Groups and social ads. With Facebooks array of options for businesses to connect with customers, it is quickly moving from a nice to have to a must have element in your business outreach strategy.
Best Practices for Marketing in Facebook

Based on our experience and the experiences of organizations marketing in Facebook like Dell and conversations with small- and medium-size business owners, weve identified several best practices for using Facebook, such as: Assign a specific person to create and manage your companys Facebook Page. Its important to post new information, photos and videos regularly to keep it fresh. Respond to messages and questions left on your Pages discussion board and Wall within 24 hours. Post all of your events, videos and relevant photos to Facebook. Consistent activity and active sharing are critical to Facebook success. Dont fall victim to the mentality: If I build it, they will come. Its important to develop a strategy to attract fans, which may involve both paid and unpaid approaches. Promote your Facebook Page outside of Facebook to attract more fans. This can be as simple as adding a line to your current marketing or PR materials, such as Find us on Facebook to learn more. Be sure to review Facebooks guidelines for external promotion. Facebook also offers a Share button that you can add to your Web site to make it easier for your content to be shared on Facebook. Dont think of Facebook as a marketing channel to push company messages. Think of it as a community where you can participate and add genuine value.
How Big is Facebook?

Facebook has 175,000,000 active users as of 2/14/09 Facebook grows by well over 600,000 users per day If Facebook were a country, it would now be the 6th most populous in the world. 45% of Facebooks US audience is now 26 years old or older. The fastest growing segment in the US: Women over 55, up 175.3% in the last 120 days. Facebook growing faster with women than men in almost every age group.
Facebook: Not just for college students

MarketingSavant Social Networking

Social Networking consulting, coaching and training by an award-winning blogger and experienced online networker. Social Media marketing expert, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides social networking consulting to professionals corporations, nonprofits and educational institutions. MarketingSavant will consult with you or your business on how it should blog, what to put on your LinkedIn or Facebook profiles, what other tools to use and how to best join the conversation in social media.
Source:www.insidefacebook.com
Facebook offers many ways to get the word out and bring the people in. Heres how to get started. I. Tools for Guerilla Marketers
1. Profile Page 2. Groups 3. Pages 4. Events 5. Notes and Photos 6. Messages 7. Marketplace 8. Share / Posted Items 9. Networks 10. Mini Feed and News Feed
Contact us:
Connect with us:
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin. com/in/danavandenheuvel Twitter: www.twitter.com/danavan Blog: www.marketingsavant.com Friendfeed: http://friendfeed. com/danavan
11. Social Ads 12. Integrated Opportunities 13. Beacon 14. Polls 15. Facebook Platform Ad Networks 16. Facebook Platform Application Sponsorships 17. Sponsored Facebook Groups
II. Tools for Advertisers
local Facebook Example

The Top Five Things You Need to Do in Facebook
1. Use a current profile picture: A clear, well-lit picture of you will help you to put your best foot forward. 2. Invite Your Actual Friends (and Family): It's true the 'weak ties' are often the most valuable. It pays to stay connected! 3. Don't just add random friends: Trust me, it's not all about the friend count. 4. Keep your status current: Use a service like ping.fm to update Twitter and LinkedIn while you're at it. 5. Make sure to use the privacy settings : Facebook allows you to control who sees what. Put limitations on who is, and who is not, able to view different parts of your profile.
24 Ways to Market You, Your Company or Your Cause in Facebook
Kavarna, the coffee house on Broadway, has built a substantial following in Facebook and uses the platform to dialogue with fans and alert regulars about new events and musical acts.
III. Tools for Application Developers

18. Profile Box 19. Mini Feed 20. News Feed 21. Invitations 22. Facebook Notifications 23. Email Notifications 24. Application Directory
How blogs can help to build your business

What is a Blog?
A blog is simply a website. A blog can be private, as in most cases, or it can be for business purposes. Blogs, either used internally to enhance the communication and culture in a corporation or externally for marketing, branding or public relations purposes are called corporate blogs.
How big is blogging?

The numbers vary but all agree that blogs are here to stay: Blogs: 77.7 million unique visitors in the US Facebook: 41.0 million | MySpace 75.1 million 94.1 million US blog readers in 2007 (50% of Internet users) 184 million WW have started a blog | 26.4 US 77% of active Internet users read blogs
Rules of the Road for Blogging:

Blog Rule #1: Strategic blog management begins with setting clear objectives. In other words, why does your organization want to blog? Blog Rule #2: Business blogs are not necessary or appropriate for every organization. Evaluate the benefits and assess the risks before leaping into the blogosphere. Blog Rule #3: Savvy business owners and executives must learn how to strategically and successfully manage the blogosphere todayor risk potentially unpleasant and expensive consequences tomorrow. Blog Rule #4: Its the casual, conversational, anything-goes nature of the blog that makes it both so appealing to blog writers and readersand so potentially dangerous to business. Blog Rule #5: An organization without an external blog program may risk losing position, market share, reputation, and sales to techsavvy competitors who have already recognizedand tapped intothe power of the blogosphere. Blog Rule #6: The blog is an electronic communications powerhouse that is likely to have greater impact on business communications and corporate reputations than e-mail, instant messaging, and traditional marketing-oriented websites combined.
Questions to Ask About Blogging:

1) Who in our community do we most want to engage in reading and commenting on a blog? Are they online? 2) What kind of community conversation do we most want to have or is most needed in our community e.g., theme, tone, style? 3) What kind of information or ideas would our community most likely coalesce around and engage in thinking about and talking about online? 4) What are we already actively learning about that we could also blog about that would expand the possibilities for connections and wider learning? 5) Who else do we know is blogging on our topic that we could connect with and crosspost ideas, insights and information? 6) Who has time and interest in taking the lead for our blog? E.g., reading, writing, recruiting authors, coordinating, etc. 7) Who could I/we recruit to initially read and respond with feedback to our blog as we get started? 8) In what ways can we rethink what we do everyday to make blogging a thread in what we do rather than a sticky note (add on)? 9) What is our intention and purpose in hosting a blog conversation in our community? 10) Given your responses and provided you are ready to get started -- what will you title your blog?
The making of a successful blog

Authentic voice is essential Transparency Write to inform, not to sell Full Disclosure Content is king Creative writing is key Frequent updates attract following Content-appropriateness can become issue Monitoring is important Linked to strategic objectives or goals
How much time/money does this take?

Most businesses can implement a blog for very little money; however, the best blogs that generate leads and revenue are launched in conjunction with professional help and can cost a few hundred to several thousand dollars.
How blogs can help to build your business

Promoting your blog

Look at other industry blogs; see how they are engaging their readers. See what response they are receiving. Where possible, participate and become a welcome part of those conversations. Comments Use other blogs to leave a footprint back to your own blog. Quality on-topic and knowledgeable comments will engage readers to enquire more on the writer. If a post on another blog inspires you to a particularly long comment, feel free to post a related piece on your own blog, citing the blog that inspired your post. Build a blogroll linking to other bloggers in your industry Trackbacks - Linking to other blogs gives you a trackback on many in their comments. Blog directories Use them, get your blog listed in the right places Use traditional printed media letter heads, business cards, etc Import the RSS Feed into your social network profiles such as Facebook Linking and feeds from primary site Using newsletters, promote engagement from newsletters Offer articles to other blogs, your articles would feature a link back to your own blog Blog as yourself separately and link this to your work blog. Send personal emails to any notable commenter to thank them and engage them further to bring them back. Mention your blog in E-mail footers and signatures
MarketingSavant: Blogging Services

Blog consulting and coaching by an awardwinning blogger Award-winning blogger and internet marketing expert, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides business blog consulting to corporations, non-profits and education. MarketingSavant will consult with your business on how it should blog, what tools to use and how to best join what is commonly known as the blogosphere. Blog consulting services include: Blog setup, training and coaching to ensure that your blogging efforts are successful and profitable. Helping your company understand its target audience and what information should and should not be included on your company blog. On-call to answer any of your blogging questions. What is RSS? How do I attract the attention of A-list bloggers? How do I control comment spam? Show you ways to increase readership, attract the attention of journalists, improve search engine traffic and get your message across to your audience.
What about negativity?

In blogging, you need to Take the Good with the Bad. It is likely that negative comments will be made about your company or its products at some point. This could occur on that companys blog or on another. It is important to address these dissenting opinions tactfully. Dont suppress negative comments. Rather, use the blog to engage detractors in conversation and determine if there is an opportunity to improve your product. Customers will appreciate the openness and willingness to listen, especially those within the blogosphere.
Tools to Use
Blogging Tools:
www.wordpress.com www.sixapart.com www.blogger.com
Contact us:
Connect with us:
Blog Monitoring:
Sign up for an RSS reader account at www.google. com/reader Google Alerts: www.google.com/alerts Twitter: www.summize.com Technorati Blog Search: www.technorati.com
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/danavandenheuvel Twitter: www.twitter.com/danavan Blog: www.marketingsavant.com Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/danavan
www.marketingsavant.com/newsletter
Search Engine Marketing

Search Engine Dos
Have quality text content (150 words a the bare minimum, 250+ is better) Have quality links to support placement Use tools to identify best metatags for each marketable page of the web site. Unique Meta Title, Description and Keywords for all marketable web site pages. Have anchor text links that support your title tags. Have your programmer use H1, H2, H3 tags appropriately Have a Site Map or at least a link from each page to every other page of the site
The Purpose of Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of designing a website to enhance its chances of being ranked highly when a person uses a search engine to find related content. The handout will give you what you need to know about the fundamentals of SEO and provide tactics to improve you websites ranking in the listings of natural (unpaid) search results returned by the many popular search engines.
Source: Bruce Clay -www.bruceclay.com/web_rank.htm]
Google is at the center of the search universe

Although many search engines are available, Google dominates the industry landscape with a 63 percent share of all searches as of January 2009. Given the Google-centric nature of search today, this handout focuses primarily on techniques for optimizing a website for Google.
Source: UWEBC
Search Engine Donts

Frame a site Be part of a link farm Dont over stuff your keywords in your text Dont over populate your Metas (title, description, keywords, etc.) Dont use hidden or slightly off color text to fool the search engines. Dont search engine market more than 1 URL to your web site. Dont provide more than 100 links on any one page. Dont create a web site that replaces text with FLASH imagery. Dont use a splash entry page but if you ABSOLUTELY MUST and cant live without one, dont create it without using additional text on the splash page for the search engines to use to index the page.
Monitoring Search Engine Marketing Success

For most businesses, its as simple as is our website making the phone ring? However, there are a number of elements that you should track to ensure that your website and thus your search engine marketing strategy are effective.
Page Views (by Hour, Day, Week, Month and Year) Unique Visitors (by Hour, Day, Week, Month and Year) Traffic Origination Keywords Used by Search Engine Frequented Pages Visitor Information (Including Web Browser,
How Much Time and Money Does This Take?

Search engine marketing, optimization and advertising can take a great deal of time and a fair amount of money (campaigns start in the hundreds, search professionals can cost a few to several thousand) and large organizations spend millions on the search engine marketing budgets. Nevertheless, search engine marketing delivers an acceptable rate of return in most companies.
Operating System, Country and Language) Traffic by Time of Day Navigation Paths Defined Events (Orders, Registrations, Password Changes, Your Custom Event)
Search Engine Marketing

Best Practices for Search Engine Marketing
It all comes down to descriptions & keywords

Descriptions (Maximum limit 255 characters) When you search for a website in a search engines, a list of web page titles will appear with descriptions following them. The description gives searchers an idea of what your page is about. Having keywords in your description is critical; some search engines will only use a sites title and description in its ranking criteria. Sites will be ranked higher if the keywords appear in the description. Form a brief sentence using as many keywords as possible. For example: Manufacturer of keyword, keyword, keyword Specializing in keyword, keyword, keyword DO NOT use your company name, phone number or founding date in the description. Avoid using slogans, catch phrases and persuasive adjectives. Character counts include spaces & punctuation. Keep descriptions under 255 characters. To keep track of character counts, type descriptions in Microsoft Word. (Go to to Tools > Word Count. Characters (with spaces) is the accurate count.) Keywords (Maximum limit 30 keywords per page) Keywords tell search engines about the content of your page. Search engines will look at the keywords listed in your Meta Tags and compare them to the text found on the page. If a keyword is not found in the text of your page, it is unlikely you will be found for that keyword. While most major search engines no longer use keywords in their ranking criteria, they are still used by us to place your website in appropriate categories within directories. Look at the text on your web pages. Good keywords appear in the text of a site. Start with the words your site contains when you develop your keyword list. Keywords can be key phrases as well. If using a phrase as a keyword (like internet marketing), 3 or less words per phrase is preferred. DO NOT repeat a word more than 8 times! For example, a company that sells 20 types of oils can list the keywords as oils, motor, lubricating, marine... A search engine can then combine the words marine and oils to make the phrase marine oils. Do not include competitors names and products in your list. General terms are acceptable (soda), but avoid registered product names (Pepsi) unless your company is authorized to use such terms. Proper names may be included, though capitalization is not necessary. List the keywords in order of importance. Many search engines only read through a limited number of words on your pages. Search engines do treat singular and plural forms of a word as separate instances. You may list both forms, but remember to not repeat a word more than 8 times! You may list commonly misspelled product or company names in your keywords list. For example, Klein can be misspelled as Klien or Kline.
The Beginner's Checklist for SEO

Adapted from www.seomoz.com
Internet marketing consulting and coaching by an award-winning blogger and experienced marketer
Internet marketing veteran, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides internet marketing assistance to corporations, non-profits and educational institutions. MarketingSavant will consult with your business on how it should market itself on the internet, what tools to use and how to make the most of the internet for your business.
MarketingSavant: SEO Services
Contact us:
Research Many people believe this is the most important step in the SEO process. No skipping! Write down your goal Brainstorm - What words might people use to look for your company Use Google Adwords and learn how to use the keyword tool to research your chosen keywords Using what you learned, record what you believe to be the best keywords Analyze the current Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) for your keywords Create a list of your competition Use Yahoo Site Explorer to find the sources of your competitor's links Onsite Sign up and verify with Google Analytics, Google Webmaster Tools, and Live Search Webmaster Center Let Google Analytics run for two weeks before doing any SEO Evaluate the visual design of your site Check compatibility between browsers Optimize all of the SEO related tags - Here are a few things to keep in mind: - Keyword in title tag (unique for each page, include keywords), keyword in text, optimize URL architecture, include keywords in alt tags and in filenames for images, Decide if you need a meta description Add company address and phone number Offsite Add your business and website to the major search engine's local listings: -Yahoo Local, Google Local, Live Local, CitySearch, Yelp Add your website to industry specific directories Try to get the links your competition already has gotten Get more links - A good place to start is to use the Juicy Link Finder. You should also consider your local chamber of commerce, local networking groups, and local complimentary businesses. Decide if utilizing social media sites is advantageous Create and submit sitemaps. Optimize your site from Google's side - Use Googles Webmaster Tools. Track and Improve Track progress Create and maintain a spreadsheet of your rankings Continue to make changes, build links, and record your results
Connect with us:
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/danavandenheuvel Twitter: www.twitter.com/danavan Blog: www.marketingsavant.com Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/danavan
www.marketingsavant.com/newsletter
Free Search Engine Marketing Tools

http://www.marketleap.com http://toolbar.google.com http://tools.seobook.com/ http://www.webconfs.com/ http://www.google.com/webmasters/ http://www.bruceclay.com/web_rank. htm http://www.selfseo.com/ https://adwords.google.com/select/ KeywordToolExternal http://www.google.com/analytics http://www.the-escape.co.uk/tools/
Digital Marketing 101
What do we mean by Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing goes beyond the Internet. Digital Marketing is the practice of promoting products and services using digital distribution channels to reach consumers in a timely, relevant, personal and cost-effective manner. Whilst digital marketing does include many of the techniques and practices contained within the category of Internet Marketing, it extends beyond this by including other channels with which to reach people that do not require the use of The Internet. The field of digital marketing includes a whole host of elements such as mobile phones, sms/ mms, display / banner ads and digital outdoor advertising.
The digital marketing universe is made up of dozens of possible marketing tools.
Digital marketing 101

Why Companies Like Yours Use Digital & Internet Marketing

For most organizations, a variety of factors make digital a different sort of media challenge for brands:
1) Media fragmentation has splintered audiences and dramatically increased the complexity of effectively reaching most audiences. 2) The two-way nature of IP-based media (Internet, Mobile, etc.) necessitate that brands stop think as broadcasters and adopt a more collaborative and consultative approach to brand development. 6) User generated content and citizen journalism have driven a massive shift in how we receive information about products and services, and what sorts of info we trust. 7) Increasingly, people prefer grass roots sources of information and recommendations to the so-called professional sources of mainstream media outlets. 8) From a practical standpoint, many brands are seeing diminishing effectiveness from traditional analog media.
MarketingSavant Digital Marketing

Social media consulting and coaching by an award-winning blogger. Award-winning blogger and internet marketing expert, Dana VanDen Heuvel, provides social media education and consulting to corporations, non-profits and educational institutions. Our training and content consulting services are the product of more than five years years of intensive study, training, writing and practice in the area of social and new media. MarketingSavant can save you months of learning and prepare you to enter the global online conversation with a strategy, and voice that stands out from your competitors. Our training and custom consulting services address these key business priorities: 1. Understanding social medias growing importance in the changing media landscape; 2. Tools and tactics for tracking online conversations; 3. Turning online feedback into actionable information; 4. Overcoming internal obstacles to social media initiatives; 5. Selecting tools and metrics to match business objectives; and 6. Building and sustaining effective online communities. Services begin with the strategic education phase and proceed through strategy and implementation.
3) Practically everyone is using digital media. 194 million US consumers are using the Internet. Most of these Example Questions consumers are spending Stage large amounts of their What is the digital usage profile of our customers? What is the most productive digital segmentation approach? time with digital media. 4) Digital media are playing an increasingly large role in all purchase decisions. 5) Certain target audiences are becoming increasingly difficult to reach WITHOUT digital. For example, Men 18-24 now spend so much time gaming, online, and with their mobile phones that it is increasingly difficult to effectively deliver against this target without digital vehicles.
Key Learnings
Objectives Strategies
Contact us:
Tactics

What is the state of the discussion about the brand in digital media? What are the digital marketing goals of key stakeholders in the organization? How effective are current digital marketing efforts, if any? In what sort of digital activities are key competitors engaged? What are category digital "best practices" What overall brand objectives is it reasonable to expect digital to impact? What will be the priority brand business objectives for digital marketing in the next year? What digital tools and approaches align with the agreed to objectives? Are there strategies that can address more than one objective? Taken as a whole, do the draft strategies address ALL of the objectives outlined in the process? Taking into consideration the strategies outlined in the previous stage, what are the reasonable tactics that can help deliver against those strategies? What planning costs can we assume with each tactic? What is the expected result of the tactic in measurable, accountable terms? What is the level of certainty that a particular tactic will work? What is the Return/Cost ration of each tactic, taking into account its likelihood of success? Based upon this analysis, what are the recommended tactics, results and contingencies that make sense for this planning cycle?

Social Media Toolkit

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Social Media Toolkit

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Social Media Toolkit

Social Media: Get Started Here

do you need a social media sherpa?

Social Media Deep Dive: Tools, Tactics and Ideas

Policy + Hiring: The Social Enterprise at Work

Social Media Strategy Guide

mapping the diagnostics of effective social media

mindmaps and more

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS