SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2012 - TRENDS + PREDICTIONS

Note:  These predictions are by Freddie Laker, Director of Digital Strategy at SapientNitro.


SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2012 - Ultimately, share of voice, point of view and community influence will be more important than brand ownership — and marketers will need to get over it if they want to stay relevant in 2012.

1. Privacy expectations will (have to) change

There will be a cultural shift, whereby people will begin to find it increasingly more acceptable to expose more and more of their personal details on different forms of social media. Sharing your likes, dislikes, opinions, photos, videos and other forms of personal information will be the norm and people will become more accepting of personalized experiences, both corporate and personal, that are reacting to this dearth of personal information.

2. Complete decentralization of social networks

The concept of a friend network will be a portable experience. You’ll find most digital experiences will be able to leverage the power of your social networks in a way that leverages your readily available personal information and the relationships you’ve established. We’re already seeing the beginnings of this with Facebook Connect and Google’s FriendConnect.

3. Our interaction with search engines will be different

Real-time information in Google search, e.g. from Twitter, blog results and user reviews, will be more prominent. Google’s Social Search will change the way we interact with search engines by pushing relevant content from our personal networks to the front of search results, making them more personalized. The importance of digital-influencer marketing will increase significantly.

4. Rise of the content aggregators

The amount of content online is growing at an exponential rate, and most online users have at least three online profiles from social networks to micro-blogging to social news sites. Our ability to manage this influx is challenging, and content aggregators will be the new demi-gods, bringing method to madness (and make a killing). Filtering and managing content will be big business for those who can get it right and provide easy-to-use services.

5. Social media augmented reality

Openly accessible information from the social-media space will be used to enhance everyday experiences. For example: the contacts book in your phone links to Facebook and Twitter to show real-time updates on what the contact is doing before you put in the call, real-time reviews from friends and associates will appear in GPS-based mapping services as a standard feature, and socially enabled CRM will change the way companies manage business relationships forever.

6. Influencer marketing will be redefined

As social media continues to permeate more and more aspects of not only the way we interact with digital media but also other channels such as digital outdoor, commerce or online TV, we will see the significance of influencer marketing grow dramatically. As a basic example, the inclusion of Twitter in Google search results or Google’s soon-to-be-released Social Search will permeate search results with content that will not be managed by Google’s infamous PageRank but by social influence and relevance to your social network. Discovering people that can help you to reach your desired consumer will become exponentially more effective and important.

7. Ratings everywhere

In today’s world, having a commerce site that doesn’t have user ratings could actually prove to be a detriment to sales. In the near future, brands and businesses will more frequently place user ratings and accept open feedback on their actual websites. User ratings will become so common that marketers should expect to find them woven into most digital experiences.

- - - 

Note: There is also a complete Slideshare narrated presentation available.

See the full article at AdvertisingAge

Additional source: http://takemetoyourleader.com/2010/04/01/social-media-2012-presentation/

The Cult of “ME” - Narcissism and Social Media

Freud and others believed a reasonable amount of healthy narcissism allowed an individual's perception of his needs to be balanced in relation to others.  Marked by the rise of celebrity culture, the destruction of tradition, the devaluation of ordinary skills and families in our modern society - advertisers today know that consumers (i.e. “YOU”) obsessively focus on “the realization of the self".  

This cult of “me” is ironically fueled by "personalization." Web 2.0 personalizes culture so that it reflects ourselves rather than the world around us. Blogs personalize media content so that all we read are our own thoughts. Online stores personalize our preferences, thus feeding back to us our own taste.  Google personalizes searches so that all we see are advertisements for products and services we already use.  Whether Yahoo’s "It's y!ou", to “mySAP” to the “iPad” to T-Mobile’s “myTouch’s - 100% you," --it seems like you’re getting "you-ed" everywhere today. 

The shear irony therefore in multiple advertisers attempting to target millions of people with messages about their individuality, makes you realize just how uninspired we all must be.   Society itself seems to have used up its store of constructive ideas.  Moreover, we seem to have lost both the capacity and the will to
confront the difficulties that threaten to overwhelm us.  Today we are commentators and pedestrians in a state of somnambulism – seemingly oblivious to the fact that we have become both politically and intellectually bankrupt.

Isn’t it time we rediscovered our sense of civic obligation?  

SOCIAL MEDIA ADOPTION - YOU CAN’T GET A LITTLE BIT PREGNANT

We get the same question over and over again from clients and prospects alike.  "What if we get involved in Social Media and people say bad things about us?"  For those brands or companies not yet engaging with customers using social media tools, this is a worst-case scenario.

Your customers are already talking about you. So why not get involved in the conversation? People are increasingly using social media websites and tools to vent their anger about products or receiving poor service, according to a survey.  Anyone upset enough to go to your Facebook page for example and tell you what they don't like is upset enough to tell their friends and followers in your absence.   Staying off social media doesn't stop the problem; it merely removes the discomfort of having to deal with it. Being on social media at least gives you the chance to respond. Social Media will therefore impact your business and decision making whether you like it or not.

As to how about engaging with your constituents and building credibility – we offer the following.  Always act with integrity and don’t try and be something you’re not. Integrity is about being consistent and living up to the brand promise.  Where companies typically get in trouble is when they pretend to be something they're not.   Also, admit your mistakes - you’re only human like the rest of us, so if you make a mistake, admit it quickly and take any/all steps necessary to correct the situation.  Then move on. 

Still not sold?  Find out more about how Social Media Affects Buying Behavior.

TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR BRAND ON TWITTER

Digital Agency Razorfish has developed recommendation’s to help marketers take control of their brands on Twitter and establish a successful social presence:

1. Become familiar with Twitter by reviewing, or following, the activities of successful brands such as Dell (dell.com/twitter), Zappos (twitter.com/zappos) and Comcast (twitter.com/comcastcares).
2. Listen to what is already being said on Twitter about your brand.
3. Identify initial objectives for using Twitter, including what would qualify as a Twitter success story for your brand.
4. Look into competitive activities and potential legal considerations, especially if there is already a Twitter account that uses your brand’s name or other intellectual property associated with it.
5. Use the findings to decide on the appropriate opportunity — such as offers or community building, tone of voice and method of engagement — that may be right for your brand.
6. Since Twitter is an ongoing activity — even if your company is only listening in — dedicate a resource to monitor the conversations and competitors.
7. Map out a plan for the content you will share, including valuable initial content to pique user interest.
8. Integrate your Twitter account throughout your marketing experience, by embedding it as a feed on the company Web site, including its URL in communications and so forth.
9. Maintain momentum by following everyone who follows you, responding to queries and joining in conversations without being too marketing oriented.
10. Provide ongoing direct value through your tweets by continuing to listen, learn and fine- tune your Twitter activities.

The importance of points five, six and seven cannot be stressed enough. Brands that create an account but do not respond to followers’ posts have found their reputation tarnished for not using Twitter in the 
best way.  On the flip side, brands that have entered into Twitter with the right attitude are reaping the
rewards. For example, Dell used one of its Twitter feeds to promote discounts and generated more than 
$2 million from Twitter followers.

Facebook versus the United States: A study in Demographics

View larger Version

Nestle’s “Jesus” Kit-Kat: Viral Magic

Multiple “Jesus” sightings (in inanimate objects) had occurred in rapid succession in the Netherlands with growing coverage in the news.  

To capitalize on this buzz, on the Friday before Easter, Nestle’s agency in Amsterdam (UbachsWisbrun/JWT) seeded fake news content (with pictures) to the country’s largest news websites. 

The story identified that a Dutchman had found the image of none other then Jesus Christ in his Kit-Kat bar.  Kit Kat wanted to play on its 'Have a break, have a Kit Kat' tagline within this context. Have a break in the Netherlands means "give me a break" or "enough is enough". Instead of creating an ad, they created a sighting of Jesus in a Kit Kat. 

A credible fake email was created and sent from a person who had apparently just taken a bite out a Kit Kat and found, to his utter disbelief, an image of Jesus.   Within four days the Jesus Kit-Kat was on more then 100,000 websites around the world.  

Watch the Case Study

Greenpeace stages planned attack on Nestle's Facebook Page

Another brand crisis is making headlines. First Tiger Woods, then Seaworld, and now a favorite snack-food maker, Nestle.


This time, the assault on the brand was an organized effort started by Greenpeace on their website, blog and through Facebook and Twitter. The protest was not centered on one new story in the news but instead stems from a long-standing criticism of Nestle's use of palm oil and the effects on rainforests and the habitat of orangutans. 



Through a concerted effort, protesters began to flood the Nestle Facebook Fan page with negative comments and to send tweets about the company and its practices.

What has helped this story gain traction is the extremely poor response from Nestle itself. When "fans" started using altered Nestle logos as their profile pictures, Nestle posted a reply which added fuel to the fire. "To repeat: we welcome your comments, but please don't post using an altered version of any of our logos as your profile pic--they will be deleted." This led to comments about Big Brother and stifling of dissent. The wording of Nestle's reaction was childish, rude and unprofessional.

More than the actual reason for the protest, Nestle's repsonse is evidently what hurt them most.  A later comment from a protestor said it best: "Hey PR moron. Thanks you are doing a far better job than we could ever achieve in destroying your brand." 

But what is a company to do when faced with such an organized attack via social media?

• Have a clear social media plan in place before jumping into the water. A good plan includes more than how often to send out messages, what those messages will be, and how to measure the public's response. A good, complete plan also involves setting and publishing clear policies for both the corporate representative and consumers in expected behavior (such as the rights to use logos, and a ban of inflammatory or offensive language) and having the right resources in place to deal with social media issues.

• Have a social media staff of experienced managers. Because social media is such a new practice, most companies make the mistake of assigning the work to interns or Gen Y staff fresh out of college. The idea is that people of that age are more in-tune with how social media works. That is a dangerous practice, as shown by the Nestle staffer's response. A manager with several years' experience dealing with marketing and PR issues, crisis management, or branding should always be involved in the company's response to any criticism online.

• Understand that your social media pages are not truly owned by you. Yes, with the capacity to shut off comments or even take down an entire page, you can somewhat control the content. But that will only push your criticizers to another site that is completely out of your control. Just as your brand identity is a combination of how you would like the public to see you and how they really do, your social media persona is also a mixture of what you present and the words of the community.

• Plan for the worst, even if you never have a crisis. Clearly, Nestle and its social media employee was not prepared for the onslaught of negative comments. After the childish responses, the company followed with more than 60 hours of silence before putting a more appropriately worded response on their corporate site. 

• Remember: The first rule of business should be to never insult the public. The second should be to always have a calm response to criticism, even if it is something as simple as "Thank you for your comments. We are looking into X and will release a statement by Y." And the third rule would be to then deliver on that promise. Respond when you say you will and be sure the response addresses the actual complaint and is not just a PR or marketing spin.

If Nestle had listened to consumer complaints years ago, they could have potentially avoided this entire brew-ha-ha (and had true fans leaving positive feedback on their Fan page today.) 

Read Original Article

COMCAST TOWN -Equal parts Second Life and Social Gaming with a dash of product placement.

Comcast Town is Goodby’s fun Sims-style (isometric view) game experience that allows users to choose a neighborhood and build their own space using the capabilities of (Comcasts) “Triple Play” bundle feature (TV, phone, internet).  Subtle.

Comcast Town allows users to express their identity visually using avatars, rather than just through written words. It also leverages social networks like Facebook and makes great use of Facebook Connect integration for a fluid user-experience. 

View Recent Comcast Town TV “Future Hopping” Ad

Visit Comcast Town

by Goodby Silverstein and Partners, working together with Nexus Productions and Unit9.

CASE STUDY: STARBUCKS SOCIAL MEDIA SUCCESS

CHICAGO (AdAge.com) -- Let's get this straight right away: Return on investment in social media is not measured in how many friends you have on Facebook or how many followers you have on Twitter. It's not calculated in trending topics or YouTube comments. It should, in fact, be held to the same criteria other marketing channels are: Did it move your business?

It's done just that at Starbucks, which is a digital marketer worth watching. No one would have guessed at that turn of events during the chain's dark days of early 2008. Sales and traffic had begun to slip for the first time in its history as a public company. Founder Howard Schultz, returning to handle day-to-day management, even admitted that Starbucks had lost its soul.

As part of Mr. Schultz's multifaceted turnaround plan, the chain launched MyStarbucksIdea.com in July 2008 as a forum for consumers to make suggestions, ask questions and, in some cases, vent their frustrations. The website now has 180,000 registered users. Some 80,000 ideas have been submitted, 50 of which have been implemented in-store.

Chris Bruzzo, Starbucks' VP-brand content and online, said amassing Starbucks' 5.7 million Facebook fans and 775,000 Twitter followers could be tougher for a dental-floss brand. "Maybe we have an unfair advantage because in so many ways Starbucks and the store experience is like the original social network," he said. 

Consumers "come in, hang out and talk to our store partners. They sort of got to know us as a brand in a very social way." But he's quick to point out that Starbucks' advantage could easily have been squandered. "If we had approached it not from 'what you know and love about Starbucks' but as a marketing channel, we would have taken this down a path that would have been very different," he said. "This was not [built as a] marketing channel, but as a consumer relationship-building environment." More important than the number of fans, however, is that the coffee chain is beginning to see sales lifts following social-media promotions.

Results


Starbucks posted its first U.S. same-store sales gain in two years for the last quarter during a time when the company relied on digital and social-media promotions instead of what had become an annual TV blitz. The chain partnered with Pandora to sponsor holiday playlists, staged a Facebook sing-a-long and leveraged its partnership with Project RED to drive traffic to a dedicated microsite -- and its stores, offering a free CD with a $15 purchase.

Mr. Bruzzo said that the company is benefitting from a trend "toward this intersection between digital and physical." "We're seeing the beginning of that," he said. "The experiences you have online can translate to rich offline experiences."

The first time Mr. Bruzzo noticed this intersection was on Starbucks' "Free Pastry Day" last summer, when consumers could visit the company website or its Facebook page and download a voucher for a free pastry. Mr. Bruzzo, who visited multiple stores that day, said he was amazed at the number of people standing in line holding coupons they'd printed out. He said the impetus for free pastries was the volume of faithful online followers asking to be included on new products or other company news.

The secret to Starbucks' social-media success is, at least in part, the fact that it plays it cool. "It's not like we started our Facebook community, got to a million people and started pushing offers at them," he said. "We built up a community of people who enjoy engaging with our photo albums from our trip to Rwanda, who loved to have these shared moments around their favorite drinks." Then, fans started asking the company what was going on, and how they could be included.

'Straight scoop’ An added benefit of Starbucks' social-media progress has been the ability to quickly manage rumors that could have dogged the company for days. Last January, a story spread that Starbucks was donating its profits in Israel to fund the country's army -- even though Starbucks doesn't have any cafés in Israel. These days, Mr. Bruzzo said, when misinformation gets out, it's easier to nip it in the bud.

Internally, it's called the "embassy strategy." Starbucks strives to make MyStarbucksIdea and its Facebook and Twitter pages places that "when you go there you know you're going to get the straight scoop," he said.

After ceding its usual first-to-market status to competitors, Starbucks launched two iPhone apps in September, one for general café purposes, with store locators, details about specific blends and nutrition information, and the other to support its loyalty card. Moving forward, Mr. Bruzzo said the company will be looking for ways that consumers can connect with each other from inside the apps.

In the meantime, Starbucks is testing functionality that allows loyalty-card holders to pay with their phones. Starbucks' agencies are BBDO, PHD and Blast Radius.

Starbucks tweeter in chief

Unlike many marketers, Starbucks doesn't run its Twitter feed out of its PR department. The chain's voice on Twitter is Brad Nelson, 28, a former barista who rose through its IT ranks.  When the company was looking for ideas to re-engage with its core customer in 2008, Mr. Nelson suggested that he begin a Twitter handle for the brand, and it now has 775,000 followers. The brand relies on the 28-year old to translate the Starbucks experience for the online community, search out confused or disgruntled consumers, chat about store offerings and even crack jokes.

Chris Bruzzo, VP-brand, content and online, said that Starbucks was beginning to institute its turnaround plan in early 2008 when Mr. Nelson announced he was ready for something new and wanted to get involved in the chain's online efforts.

"I sent him away and said 'Fine, sure,'" Mr. Bruzzo said. But about two weeks later, Mr. Nelson gave him a presentation about Twitter and the opportunity to communicate directly with consumers as questions arise. Mr. Nelson sweetened his pitch by adding, "It's a lot like being a barista on the internet." Mr. Bruzzo recalls greenlighting the project, and after a period of working with Mr. Nelson, let him loose on Twitter.

Mr. Bruzzo gives credit to Mr. Nelson and his "willingness to take smart risks," but shares some of the kudos for Starbucks. "I guess you have to have a brand like this and an environment that's open to innovation and someone like Brad with the passion and personality."

Now Starbucks is finding more ways to use Mr. Nelson. He took a weeklong cross-country drive last fall with comedienne Erin Foley and an Edelman entourage to help launch Via. The group made stops for a web series along the way, passing out product samples.

Read original article.

BIG-ASS MESSAGE GENERATOR GOES VIRAL

Not that we ever tire of covering the most lavishly integrated campaigns spread across multiple touch points, it's just that sometimes, it's nice to be dealt an unbranded distraction.  It was therefore with disproportionate glee, that we began playing with bigassmessage.com - a glorious waste of time. 

Check out www.bigassmessage.com

By visiting the site, users can input their own 48-character message, which is then made 'big-ass' with its own URL for sharing with friends/victims/loved ones. There are four different display themes to choose from: Basic, Magic (the magic being that the flashing screen will trigger a seizure if you stare at it for too long), Pepsi (in which certain letters are substituted for the brand's infamously revised logo) and Jeopardy (think the typeface used in the iconic gameshow). 

Props to Björn Johansson (formerly of farfar, Stockholm and now at Ogilvy, New York) who created the site. Be sure to head over to the homepage of creative collective Bjernie's Fast Food to check out more of his deviant side projects.  

Read Original Article