Time 21:34

The second part of the three part conversation with Laura Fitton aka @pistachio from Hubspothttp://www.hubspot.com/pistachio/. Digital content is the ingredient for all types of digital marketing, online or off. For example, a video case study can be edited into separate clips that address a focused issue. This clip can be on YouTube, included in a sales presentation, or embeded in a blog post.

The conversation that Laura and I have centers on the best ways to integrate original content and curate content from other sources. Hubspot, a developer of marketing software platform, has a methodology to rate a company’s website on the criteria of whether its content will attract, interest, and convert readers to some action. The Marketing Grader tool provides excellent guidance on content, and its ability to be discovered and shared.

In many situations it’s a reminder to do the fundamental blocking and tackling to provide regular content that is useful to audiences with an easy way for them to share it with their networks. Your New Year’s resolution to be more disciplined is as good a reason as any to run a Marketing Grader report this month so you start 2012 off right.

Here are a couple of tactics that I found useful integrating information from a single video interview with a client’s customer customer

1) Video interview – used cover video to spice up sales presentations

2) Edited short segments from interviews that focused on single, narrow topics related to prospects’ interests. Sales used in individual emails to their contacts.

3) Used short comments on Twitter and linked back to longer video

4) Created blog posts with pull out quotes from video interview

5) Used soundbites in podcast during roundtable discussion with subject matter experts from software company.

6) Video used in waiting area in the company’s lobby

I’m not suggesting every company undertake every media and tactic, I am however, highlighting how a single event to capture content, e.g. the video interview with the customer, can be multi-purposed across a company each with a clear objective.

Below is an example of a video case study that can be repurposed for a number of objectives.

Time 22:10

I usually don’t budge on surveys, most of them are a dime a dozen and an often used way to get a little PR. This Social Media Marketing survey from Social Media Examiner caught my eye because of the sample size of 3300 marketers across the spectrum of business sizes and types. It’s the Social Media Examiner Social Marketing Report and in today’s Marketing Edge podcast we speak with Assistant Director of the Social Media Examiner Phil Mershon about the report. One of the trends different from last year is the increased interest in Facebook over Twitter. Facebook’s improvements such as, adding places, and making their business pages easier to engage the audience are, I believe, among the reasons for this change.

Phil and I get into some great examples of Facebook “Liker” engagement practices that work for big and small companies. In the survey, there were three major benefits for those using social media for marketing, and there was a correlation between the amount of time spent with social media communities and the benefit derived from them. This was encouraging for me because there is an attraction for some to look for the quick hit in social. You know the big discount or insanely creative promotion to create that initial spike and then no follow through. The connection between time and benefit potentially shows more attention to content and relationship.

Benefits of Social Media

– my comments in ( maruggi says…)

1. Stand out in Noisy Market (this will diminish as social media gets noiser ) 

2. Improved Search Engine Results (content is king, and social allows you to expand your digital footprint) 

3. Direct connection to qualified leads (it’s public permission marketing – thank’s Seth Godin)

Social Media marketing vets with 3 years or more are enhancing their communications with other formats. For example, nearly all those social marketers surveyed who have participated in social media marketing for 3 year or more are major proponents of video. This trend is likely because of item number 1 above, also as I reference in the Marketing Edge Podcast episode, there are new technologies in video that will make that rich-media format more engaging.

Seventy-seven percent of marketers with more than three years experience in social media will spend more time with video and that number increases when you segment just the respondents with more than 1000 employees. This is exactly the issue I’ve raised about making your PR and marketing department more like a news organization. It’s a mindset that will be extremely beneficial for an organization with plenty to talk about that is beyond their products and services.

Time is key as the survey indicates, the more time you put in the more you get out. However, I submit part of the time element is coming up with the right content, not just pounding away at a keyboard.

The Social Media Examiner has it’s annual Social Media Success Summit a unique series of webcasts spread over the month of May. The speakers include Guy Kawasaki, Jeremiah Owyang, and Frank Eliason. April 14 is the last Early Bird rate, take a look and take advantage.

Maruggi’s Take

The social media road is littered with spammers, in-active accounts, and disappointment due to lack of research about whether your specific audience is “active” in social media, notwithstanding the results of this survey.

Take the time to clearly identify the quantity of your qualified audience. 

It is easier to leapfrog than catch up. Ok so you take great pride in being a follower. You joined Twitter in 2010, the leaders were there in 2007 and earlier. But that’s OK. You don’t have to be a follower all your life. Life moves fast as Ferris Bueller says. Now that you have your feet wet, move quicker to experiment with what’s next.

Establish an emerging tactics swat team and do quick deep dives on early adopter ideas like the use of video, QR codes, augmented reality, and the semantic web.

What’s on your social media marketing agenda next? Video, audio, mobile marketing?

It’s a classic a case of hip-notic marketing. Be the carrier of valued (entertaining) content, then the subject of the piece is the premium product you now desire and can purchase. Brilliant!

This is not a plug or some third party affiliate cheer. I’m not one for the making money on the Internet crowd because those that scream that the loudest are old century thinkers in a new century world. Boo Hiss.

I just signed up for The Third Tribe at the early adopter rate because I view many of the individuals behind the program as rethinking the role of economics in an information society. My first peak under the members’ hood on The Third Tribe does reveal some aspects of making money online. Affiliate marketing is part of this I realize and perhaps I need to have a different perspective on it. However, the greater value of the information, seminars and forums of The Third Tribe is the new perspective of how economics are changing. It’s the hands on version of the Free Economy with substance, innovation, and creativity. In fact, in the first audio conversation, Sonia Simone and Johnny B Truant take on the “Internet Hawkers” and the world of make believe money. That’s the kind of candor that I enjoy about the substantive people on The Third Tribe and many of the other people I follow on Twitter et. al.

Other contributors to The Third Tribe I respect for their work, Darren Rowse of Problogger, Brian Clark of Copyblogger, and Hugh MacLeod among others which is another reason I want to see what’s going on in this Tribe. Their views about how communities are formed, how new tools are helping companies become social and not just use social tactics, and how value is established in a world with instant access to information and millions of content contributors instead of dozens of information gate keepers.

I also became a member because some of these ideas may have application to clients. It might not be applicable to me, but from what I’m listening to now regarding SEO and search tactics, this is something anyone in the consulting business needs to be aware of to address client challenges. It’s also another network of function experts to potentially be a member of an ad hoc project team.

Lastly, it’s a monthly pricing model that you can cancel at anytime. Today’s the last day for the “early adopters” pricing, $27/month. The way I look at it, the producers of The Third Tribe including Chris Brogan have given the community, our community, years of free information, this is a maturing of our value economy where we acknowledge valuable information with a form of currency beyond the Retweet.