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The Marketing Edge, one of the longest running marketing and public relations podcasts.
Host Albert Maruggi weaves his 25 years of marketing and PR experience across business, technology and national public affairs in interviews with newsmakers, authors and business leaders.
Maruggi is a frequent speaker and conducts workshop sessions on new media. For more information or to discuss your business challenges and goals, e-mail him.
Plenty of attention is given to participating in blogs, join the conversation, be open, be authentic, yada yada yada. The early adopters have tested the social media space with ample case studies for dozens of new books and information for panel discussions.
The hidden winners in the blogosphere who get a fraction of the fanfare are market researchers. This podcast is dedicated to the corporate executives who are skeptics of joining the conversation, but as you’ll hear here, have considerable reason to at least listen to it, it being first the podcast and then the thousands of conversations taking place on the web daily.
Look at just one segment of commentary and social media, www.tripadvisor.com, they have more than 10 million reviews of hotels. Forrester research shows that 36 percent of travelers look at reviews and of them, 73 percent report the reviews affect their choices. More from an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer – It’s just the tip of the iceberg known as the blogosphere, but in reality is a bunch of people talking just like they do at parties, conference rooms, or ball games. The only difference is online, you can listen in on them.
This podcast is the second and concluding episode of a conversation with Umbria founder Howard Kaushansky. Umbria, at www.umbrialistens.com is one of a handful of companies that provide detailed insights into what people are taking about in blogs, and reviewers’ comments on the web and to a great extent who is saying it.
The bottom line is this
1) There are millions of comments being made on the web about nearly every industry or profession.
2) Even if your company has no intention of starting a blog, the comments that exist can provide significant insight into your company, your competitors, and your market.
3) Blogs and social media is not just a playground of the younger generation, middle age baby boomers use social media, blogs, and travel sites just as much as the 18 -24 year old set.
On another note, Marketing Edge listener Alison Coffey is the winner of the Join the Conversation book drawing. Our next book is Paul Gillin’s The New Influencers. To throw your name in the drawing send me an email at marketingedge@providentpartners.net with the words New Influencers in the subject line.
Jeremiah Owyang, senior analyst for Forrester and author of the well-read Web Strategist blog, is our guest on the Marketing Edge. You know, as of this posting, he is at the top of the Tweeterboard, a ranking of influencers using the microblogging platform Twitter.
In this podcast, we touch upon his big three trends to look for in 2008 and the following items:
-Social media is like jazz: don’t ask, just listen. He explains it better than I can write about it.
-The corporate structure needs to become more flexible if social media is to gain greater status. Owyang believes 2008 will see a rise in the job function of community manager in large companies.
With more than 3,000 followers and friends on Twitter and Facebook, do you wonder how he juggles his day? First rule: Get up early.
We also get into one of my key themes about social media: It’s making companies incorporate some of the best practices of political and grassroots organizations. Listen, be responsive, be sensitive, seek consensus, build your base — those are just a few. Platforms like Twitter help facilitate the movement of people and opinions that give life to ideas. This is the essence of the political democratic process.
As corporations seek a greater understanding of social media, the social graph will play an important role. This is another Owyang prediction for 2008.
Wouldn’t it be great if you didn’t have to invite all your friends to join you on some other social network? Owyang predicts the expansion of widget networks and with it the expansion of the use of social media in 2008.
Lastly, I promised Jeremiah I’d post a link to one of my favorite places in San Francisco, the Buena Vista, home of the Irish Coffee.
Share your comments on this post. For each comment posted, Provident Partners gives a food item to a St. Paul food shelter.
Last call for the drawing of the book “Join the Conversation” by Joseph Jaffe. Send an e-mail to marketingedge@providentpartners.net and we will include you in the drawing. The winner gets a copy of the book with my comments in the margins; it’s our way of continuing the conversation. Get your e-mail in by midnight on Dec. 19.
The following is a conversation between Al Social and Darrin Marketer, their names have been changed to protect the innocent; they are both avid Twitter users with two very different perspectives on the platform. We invite you to interrupt them with your comments.
Al Social – Twitter has done so much to enrich my life.
Darrin Marketer – yeah me too
Al Social – This summer I kept in touch with the family while kayaking the Fjords of Norway, imagine that texting from my phone to post to a blog, website and mobile while in the water.
Darrin Marketer – Yeah, I saved 20% off a computer on Dell outlet
Darrin Marketer – it’s the greatest freakin’ opt-in Ad server on the planet, these people are agreeing to follow companies just to get essentially ads pushed at them. I’ve got plenty of clients using twitter to hawk their stuff and getting people to agree to get it.
Al Social – no dude, it’s not about ads it’s about idea exchange. You are just gaming the system. It’s all about the collective of people to advance change.
Darrin Marketer – yeah right, ok I got an idea, let’s get people to follow some company that pushes the latest super bargains for that week, what’s wrong with that? It’s all about me baby, all about me.
Al Social – No no, it’s a snapshot at people’s life is not a bazaar.
Darrin Marketer – that’s where you are wrong my friend, life is a bazaar, and everyone is trying to scrap a piece of turf, a piece of attention. Twitter is just another way to pull the spotlight over to you and there is nothing wrong with that. Oh and your boy Santa Cause, he’s helping promote business, so my friend you just proved my point.
Al Social – Well you are surely not being creative, you’re slapping an old model over a new way of connecting. That’s going to ruin it.
What do you think? Is twitter an opt-in ad server, a social hang out, or both?
I have to comment about Twitter, the micro-blogging tool at www.twitter.com. It is like instant messaging to those whom you are following and who follow you, plus your messages post to your page on the Twitter Web site. You can follow hundreds of people you’ve never met. It’s possible to share a subset of followers with others, but it is unlikely two people will have the exact same set of followers. The messages are usually fast and furious and can be disjointed because not every one has the exact same circle of followers.
Twitter’s prompt for your input is “What are you doing now?” The reason I detail this is to underscore the socialness in this particular platform. Twitter has two unique attributes:
1) it is about the now – quick flashes of ideas, reactions, questions and statements, and
2) it can have a very diverse group of people following each other – it’s less about groups of like-minded “friends” and more about sampling the snapshots of individuals’ lives.
This weekend a well-respected blogger, Marc Orchant, passed away. I read this as I was working and occasionally catching Twitter messages (known as “tweets”). At first I was taken by surprise because this harsh dose of reality is not something you’d expect to see. Then others who where among the people I follow paid their respects to Marc I was aware of Marc’s work on Blognation, but did not know him. I read that he and I were of the same generation. . I said a prayer for his family and friends. That’s when I started to think about “What are you doing now?”
This news caught my attention as I learned Marc has a family, and I reflected about when my mother died. I was 12; she was 41. Another tweet appeared. It was someone going to a party. Another tweet about some social media report, then another tweet about Orchant, and another about some new video platform.
Here I sat, observing exactly what micro-blogging and “What are you doing now?” is truly all about. These unique characteristics of Twitter give a snapshot of life, with a bit more detail in the image. It was like looking out of my grandmother’s apartment building in the Bronx when I was growing up right after my mother died. All around me, regular stuff was going on, just like you can overhear the conversations – a guy buys a newspaper, someone is yelling at the driver of a double-parked car, the elevated train rattles the windows – and for me at that pivotal moment in time, nothing was regular.
This was my first experience online with real-life stuff, not just a discussion of blogging or using video or some conference. It hit home that this forum, Twitter, and other forms of social media are different than most communications media that have come before.
This is not some place to hoist a billboard and pitch your wares. It is a place of ideas, for sure, but equally of emotions. It is a place of lives and, now I can see, a place of memories. Social media is first a people place. Marc, your leadership in this special place will be remembered.
The marketing buzz word in 2007 is community. Marketers are trying to plug into, tap into or leverage these social network communities for their companies’ benefit. Not quite sure that’s the right approach here. Communities can’t be leveraged (one step away from manipulated in my dictionary) to your advantage, that’s old model selling in an environment that essentially rejects being sold to.
Chris Brogan makes a good point about power and the social media tools available for the individual to increase their personal power. http://chrisbrogan.com/social-media-as-personal-power/. I believe marketers should view the growth in these powers not as a function of tapping into, but as an environment to participate in. The verbs I used above, tap, plug, and leverage all involve in varying degrees to take from. It’s best to approach this as something to engage in, join, and contribute to. Subtle difference that will enhance the participation for any marketer evaluating what social media means to their company. I also commented to Brogan’s post.
The technology dilemma: New technologies are developed quickly and less costly today than even 10 years ago. New technology implementation requires the precise work of three groups: path finders, bridge builders and commoditizers.
1) Path finders: They forge a wild river. They develop for the joy of a challenge and/or the dream of wealth. Many times they traverse to unknown places. They prudently cut a path with precision moving toward a desired destination. They may not know exactly where they are going, but they are learning and discovering with every step.
2) Bridge builders: These are the ones who help the masses on the populated side of the river come across. They painstakingly educate those fearful of going over the bridge and in some cases hope they don’t loose sight of the path finders.
3) Commoditizers come along with the masses and build different uses for technologies that have become common. They help drive the price down, expand usage and, with it, less risk in implementing that technology in a typical business.
The issue that Jeremiah Owyang of the Web Strategist Blog raises in his Utterz post from Nov. 29 is whether the technologists are moving too fast. In my parlance, are the path finders rushing ahead so fast that they are in danger of being alone in the wild?
The pace of what technologists can do is outracing how significant portions of the population can use it or can pay for it. The question technologists and consumers should answer jointly is: Can the new technologies be applied to provide sufficient value that it is worth changing from what we do now?
Social media and different issues than the 90s:
A more fragmented market, which could mean less total revenue per technology
Less costs, which potentially mean higher profits per technology
Insanely short product life-cycles, putting all technologies in danger of being overtaken
Potentially misunderstood brand power of technology, when the real asset is the communities
The Bar Syndrome
What would make me the most nervous as an investor? Understanding exactly what the asset is and how will that asset sustain itself and grow. I believe a good metaphor is that many of these social media technologies are like investing in a bar or restaurant. If that establishment can be replicated to attract enough people, then you’ve got a winning franchise. If, however, the people are fickle or a new bar opens down the street with better looking, livelier people, then what is left?
The accessories
We are to the point of application accessories; widgets is the accepted term. The issue is how these accessories are going to be paid for. An interesting question formed in the negative, just to make it more painful: What two technologies can you give up today?
A typical business with an abundance of meetings, limited budgets and cautious management needs time just to understand how these technologies are going to add value to the company. Patience is a virtue. Will the marketplace reward patience?
I worked at a venture capital firm in the 90s. There were companies working on 360-degree images of shopping malls, med-tech applications for desktop radiological reading, and video-on-the-Web capabilities. It was just a question of timing more than applications. Those ideas are well in place today and profitable.
History does help predict the future; we just need the patience for the future to catch up with us.
The first stop for marketers who are attempting to determine how to approach social media is to listen to the conversations taking place on the web. Most executives are going to ask, what are people saying about our company or our industry? Who are they and does it matter to us?
While the numbers for social networking are mind boggling, an estimated 60 million users on Facebook alone, the perplexing issue for marketers that have must justify their spending is what is the impact to the company, will it grow sales, brand, influence? Or conversely, will not being there hurt us in some way?
In this podcast we highlight one company that can help answer those questions. Umbria, who can be found at www.umbrialistens.com. There tools search blogs, product review comments, and other social media sites looking for company mentions and more importantly context. For example, it is not good enough to learn that Starbucks was mentioned, but that a woman having a bad day found a moment of peace over an egg nog latte at Starbucks. Now that is listening. Umbria industry reports include healthcare, consumer electronics, and other industries
For those into the viral marketing concept, whether Umbria or a strategy that includes alerts and watches from Google, Technorati, Digg and others, the key is having a process that puts your ear to the ground – sorry had to use a cliché somewhere in this piece. Other tools include Sentiment Metrics and Cymfony, there are plenty of choices. Ths issue is with growing numbers of participants in social media, this tactic should be on your 2008 coporate marketing budget.
Do you have a strategy for listening to social media? What tactics do you find helpful?
Join the Conversation Giveaway
Joseph Jaffe’s book Join the Conversation is a good one. Well worth the read. We are giving away a copy with my comments included in the margins. It’s my way of joining the conversation – email me at marketingedge@providentpartners.net with Conversation in the subject line. We’ll have a drawing for the winner on December 19.
Giving Back
Every comment and email we get Provident Partners donates a food item to a St. Paul food shelter. Last month 24 items were donated. Thanks for sharing.
The old maxim “you don’t argue with the guy who buys ink by the barrel” isn’t as accurate as it once was. The combination of blogs, new online publishers like TechCrunch and the Huffington Post, and social media sites are creating new opportunities for professional and unpaid journalism.
The key to social media’s success is voices. The dilemma for social media is finding and determining the valuable content of those voices for you. Helium.com is a Web site designed for long-form written content and has an interesting way of sorting out what’s valuable. The site attracts those who have a desire to write, and its 90,000 members rate the articles on the site, giving all readers some guidance on the quality of the content.
This community grading apparatus rewards objective, accurate articles and banishes self-promoters to the valley of propaganda. (There really is no such place on Helium.com. That was my editorial license to say that garbage articles are ranked at the bottom.)
It’s a combination social media community, wiki (kind of ), blog and content provider. There is also a way for other publishers of Web sites and print publications to post requests for articles. Writers then submit articles for that particular topic for the publisher to potentially purchase. It is like a job board that matches buyers of articles to providers of content. Hey, it might not be enough money to quit your day job, but it is a way to fulfill a passion, share knowledge, and build your expertise and writing portfolio.
Helium.com also allows for contributions to non-profit groups, including Teachers Without Borders and Collegiate Society of America, as articles are purchased. It’s the concept of giving back to the community for writers as well as tapping into those non-profits as sources of quality articles.
Communicators should review this site as another step in determining the social media strategy. These are the interesting attributes of Helium.com:
Source for industry trends across tens of thousands of topics
Venue for your ideas and passion
Potential revenue if articles are purchased
Establish greater credibility as a writer
Give exposure to issues that are not being covered in the mainstream media
Plant the seeds of debate that others nurture -– that, after all, is the essence of social media
2. Join the Conversation book giveaway contest: Joseph Jaffe’s latest book is the talk of the Amazon charts, and we will give a copy away on Dec. 19, with an added bonus. In the spirit of joining the conversation, I have included written commentary in many of the chapters. It’s the ultimate form of keeping the conversation going. Send me an e-mail with “Conversation” in the subject line and you’ll be included in the random drawing.
3. Movie trivia in this podcast episode: Listen toward the end of the podcast for a sound clip from a movie. Tell me what movie you think it came from and we’ll give one person who provides the correct answer a $10 Subway gift card. Hint: It’s a classic! Either send me an e-mail or submit your answer in the comment section.
NOTE: Provident Partners donates a food item for every comment (on the blog or by e-mail) we get. Our monthly budget for this community program is $100/month.
A word about trust on in the blogosphere and social media in general:
There is considerable discussion about how businesses can tap into these conversations. Another angle is the practice of paying bloggers, which some say is no different than paying ghostwriters of a book.
All of the above will be tested during the next couple of years as society continues to use social networks and other sites that have “word of mouth”-like components. A key to figuring out how business can use social media is to understand why social media is different than any other media.
Social media is a movement. Social media is a people place, not a market place.
The blogosphere has had millions participate because of a need to be recognized, even by just one other person. Social media has taken hold in equal numbers because of the need to be a part of a group, the need to connect. These are basic human needs, not driven by economics.
There is also a cynicism in the U.S. that I believe has contributed to the rejection of most forms of advertising, a growing distrust of corporations and a political system viewed as destined to be at odds for the foreseeable future.
The major structures of our society — financial, legal, and political — have their roots deep in the last century of ridged, industrial growth and are not yet capable of appreciating or assimilating a more open discussion created by social media.
If you are a marketer, a business, and look at social media from the perspective of it being a movement, it will change the way you approach social media. You will be a participant rather than a party-crasher, a thoughtful listener rather than a loud bore, and a valuable contributor rather than a self-serving taker.
Blogs that contributed to my thinking on this were:
What’s your take? Make a choice: Is social media more movement or marketplace? Remember, every comment we get we will contribute a food item to a St. Paul food shelter.
The undercurrent at BlogWorld is churned by the sudden absence of noted bloggers and a lack of blogging on the part of some CEOs whose companies depend on bloggers.
OK, no worries, sports fans, because there are plenty more of us here and out there. Now, that’s the power of social media. This post is not to recount the reasons why these new media, this new industry — whatever you’d like to call it — needs to be more mature. Jeremiah Owyang and Chris Brogan, among others, have done a good job of that.
This slant is to underscore what Leo Laporte said in the keynote: Paraphrasing, the medium is about everyone, not limited by format, money, subscribers, nothing. A new blog hero can rise to fill the shoes of someone that has lost interest. Mark Cuban’s, a replacement keynoter, a pretty good hero to have. Go Mavs.
What corporate types should watch for from this conference speed bump is how quickly the community dialogues, supports and gives voice to those who might be in the shadows today and the spotlight tomorrow. Yes, dialogues. And this same reaction can happen to any brand, product, and issue, at any time, even our own. Perhaps the next one will be yours.
What’s your take? Is this blogging world really information anarchy or the somewhat unpredictable result of when people of various opinions disagree?
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