social-marketing-for-think-thursday-1228762580506492-8.ppt
TRANSCRIPT
Slide 1How to put social networking to work for you
Blogging your way to more business in 2009
The no-pain guide to joining communities
Monitoring the conversation
Resources and advice
About me
About me:
I am the team lead responsible for fostering a community around IBM Data Management solutions, such as DB2, Informix, IMS, U2, and InfoSphere solutions. In other words, how we can use social media to communicate with and interact with the people who care about IBM Data Management products.
Prior to this role, I served for over 8 years in a variety of marketing and strategy roles with the Lotus business unit, and spent the past 4 years as the offering manager of Lotus Sametime.
I have been blogging at www.adamgartenberg for over 2 years now, and have been involved as a reader in various online communities going back before that.
Page *
About buying a new camcorder
Since we all work on different solutions, different geographies, etc, I want to start by talking about something we can all likely relate to – buying a new camcorder. This is something I’ve had to do recently, so it’s fresh in my mind.
Page *
I need a new camcorder…. so I started by going to the Sony’s website. And lo and behold, they think they have *the best* camcorders out there.
But then I went to Canon’s websites, too, and guess what? THEY think THEY have the best camcorders, as well!
And guess what? Panasonic? Yup – wouldn’t you know it… According to Panasonic’s website, Panasonic CLEARLY makes the best camcorders out there.
Page *
So what did I do? Probably the same thing we all do… I went to look at reviews. And when I go to Amazon (or other places) I can see what real people thought of these products… 4 stars, #1 in category, vs. 3 stars and #4 in category.
Page *
…
I also asked my friends what they thought. Only I didn’t limit myself to the guys I see at poker night. I blogged about it. Which not only opened me up to a much wider variety of input, but it also means that my question – and their answers – are living out on the web forever, for anyone else to see going forward.
Page *
But we’re not really here to talk about camcorders, are we?
Page *
Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wishymom/566394520/
Page *
Social Marketing is not about sharing embarrassing middle school photos
Social Marketing is not about finding long-lost High School friends and sharing embarrassing 8th grade yearbook photos. (Although you certainly can do that… Can you spot me?)
Page *
Social Marketing is not about sharing embarrassing middle school photos
(In case you need it, here’s a reminder of what I look like nowadays.)
Page *
Social Marketing is a fundamental shift in the prominence and impact of community and word of mouth marketing
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cibergaita/94489102/
No, instead Social Marketing is about a new set of technology that represents a fundamental shift in the impact of word of mouth marketing and the ability to INFLUENCE decisions, bring ATTENTION to your company and your solutions, and RESPOND proactively to threats or to jump on new opportunities.
It’s about finding your biggest fans and turning them into advocates. Or actually, not even finding them as allowing them to find you. Can be much more effective than blind advertising hoping for a 2% conversion rate.
Page *
Social Marketing technology lets you monitor, contribute, and participate in the conversation
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/beingpeterkim/2909140600/
Social Marketing technology makes it very easy to monitor, contribute, and most importantly participate in the conversation.
Page *
Remember the moral of our story: People listen to the community, not the company
% of work-related purchases influenced by…
Source: "Driving Word of Mouth Advocacy Among Business Executives: The Experiential Marketing Connection,” conducted by the Keller Fay Group and sponsored by Jack Morton Worldwide.
53%
32%
26%
Source: "Driving Word of Mouth Advocacy Among Business Executives: The Experiential Marketing Connection,” conducted by the Keller Fay Group and sponsored by Jack Morton Worldwide.
http://www.jackmorton.com/commonPages/ondemand/default.aspx?intID=9&wp=true&ac=us
Remember the moral of our camcorder story? People listen to each other a lot more than what a company has to say themselves. And this isn’t just for consumer goods. This is a study of work-related purchases and what the biggest influencers are. And guess what? Colleagues or friends and word of mouth came out at the top of the list – almost twice as important as press coverage.
It’s the personal relationships that matter, it’s the direct feedback that matters, much more than even analyst reports, corporate Web sites, whitepapers, etc.
In the Communications 1.0 model, we controlled the message and the medium. But the old model no longer holds up.
Look at
Other statistics:
More than 75% users trust “word of mouth” recommendations over other advertising
- Nielsen Company, April 2007
A word of mouth dialogue is 1,000 times more powerful than a standard ad impression
- The Word of Mouth Manual, Volume II
Page *
People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it. The good news is that it’s now easier than ever to listen, contribute, and participate in that conversation.
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
IDS? Is that still around?
But if you think about it, this isn’t really anything new. People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it!
Page *
People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it. The good news is that it’s now easier than ever to listen, contribute, and participate in that conversation.
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
IDS? Is that still around?
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
Go for it. IDS Rocks!
We’ve been using IDS for years. Let me know if you have any questions.
I’m with IBM. Can I help you with anything?
What’s changed – and this is good news – is that now it’s easier than ever to listen, contribute and participate in that conversation.
Page *
Blogging your way to more business in 2009
One of the biggest ways to see an impact from social marketing is to start a blog
I’m going to assert that if you really want to have an impact on your business via community involvement, your best bet is to just jump in and start a blog. (But if you’re not sure if that’s right for you (or right for you right now), I’ll talk about some other ways to get involved in just a few minutes).
For those of you not familiar, what is a blog? How easy is it to get started? What resources do we have?
Page *
Cartoon © Hugh Macloud – www.gapingvoid.com
Free advertising
Thought leadership
Proof of you knowledge in your field
Proof of your experience in your field
Show, not tell (e.g., expand on announcements in ways you can’t do on an official website or in a formal press release)
Build connections with your customers and the community
Direct and free feedback (before the fact, not after the fact)
Turn customers into advocates
…not worthy of a press release
…hard to find on corporate website
…more detailed than we would post on corp. website
…shared more timely than on corp. website
It allows you to tell a story, not just the news
Helps you do your job better:
Share news and detailed information
Clear up misconceptions in the market
Understand the needs of our customers and constituents
Refine key messages and selling points
It puts a human face on your company
It helps you place better in search results
It allows you to link to other community sites
It is proof that there is an active, vibrant community around your company or products
Page *
Cartoon © Hugh Macloud – www.gapingvoid.com
Establish personal brand
Page *
But is anyone going to read my blog?
One question that always comes up is “Is anyone going to read my blog?”
Good news - Google loves blogs. And while you may think that your topic is focused and narrow, people will still come to read it.
I spent two years writing about essentially a “marketing blog” about an admittedly esoteric topic in the grand scheme of the World Wide Web (Lotus Sametime), and still had over 80,000 unique visitors come to my blog during that time period.
What should you write about?
Product announcements
An analyst report that ranks us highly
An analyst report that ranks us low
Your thoughts on an interesting article about database compression you just read
Dropping your kids off at summer camp
The customer visit you’re flying back from
A debate the product team is having on whether to include feature A or feature B
The 100,000 download milestone you just reached on your product trial
The planning for the upcoming conference
…
Anything that can only be shared under NDA
Revenue or sales figures other than what is officially reported by your company
Disclosing customer information if they have not agreed to be a reference
Making commitments about product futures
Anything that goes against your company’s social computing guidelines or business conduct guidelines
Anything that you would not want to see reprinted on the front page of the Wall Street Journal.
Page *
No, really – people read this stuff?
Source: Josh Bernoff, Forrester Research
http://www.emersonprocessxperts.com/
Along similar lines, the number one pushback I hear when I bring up blogging to people is “well, I don’t really have anything that interesting to say, anyway.”
Hopefully this story, from the book Groundswell, will change your mind.
Emerson Process Management sells factory automation systems. Blog full of war stories about the product and factory automation in general. Has 30,000 visitors a month to the blog. Gets 5-7 leads a week off of the blog. Each lead could be $0.5-1M in sales.
What if you could do something for free that would bring in 5-7 new leads a week?
And if you think that you’re customers aren’t online yet, they probably are (and if not, will soon be). In Forrester Research’s study of online participation, the number of people in the “inactive” category fell dramatically from their 2007 to 2008 study, and it was primarily the >35 and >45 age groups driving that change.
Page *
You’re not in this alone…
I’d like to blog, but where do I even start?
1st Thursday
2nd Thursday
3rd Thursday
See www.adamgartenberg.com for details
I’m going to be running Blogging 101, 201 and 301 sessions the first, second and Thursday of each month. See my blog at www.adamgartenberg.com for more details.
Page *
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tellumo/146631887/
Even if you’re not ready for blogging just yet, there is still a lot you can do to participate and be involved in the community.
Page *
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/305716815/
Page *
Find a public or dedicated community site and join on in
Channeldb2.com
Bleedyellow.com
PlanetIDS.com
Planetdb2.com
You can find dedicated community sites like Channel DB2 (for DB2) or BleedYellow (for Lotus). There are numerous groups and fan pages on Facebook and LinkedIn. There are blog aggregators like PlanetDB2, PlanetIDS (for Informix), PlanetLotus. Chances are there’s one (or many) for the communities important for your work. And if there isn’t, it’s easy enough nowadays to start one up yourself!
These communities allow you to stay up to date on what’s happening with the products you care about, make it easy to find stories you want to comment on or new opportunities, and are an easy way to ease your self into a community if you’re not ready to start contributing yet.
http://www.channeldb2.com
http://www.facebook.com
http://www.linkedin.com
http://www.planetdb2.com
http://www.planetids.com
http://www.bleedyellow.com
Page *
Sign up for LinkedIn, Facebook, Orkut, Xing (or your local favorite)
Did you know…
…Well over half of Facebook users are over college age?
If you haven’t already joined LInkedIn, Facebook (or Orkut, Xing, or whichever network is most popular in your country or circle of colleagues), go do so. Facebook isn’t just for your teenagers any more. In fact, well over half of Facebook users are over college age. (Today, around 60% of Facebook users in the US are over 21 years old, and that group represents the fastest growing demographic.)
So, YES, your customers and prospects are on there. (And if they’re not yet, they soon will be.) Or, to think about it another way, do you want to be the last one to the party?
Page *
How can you use social marketing?
So, how can you put social marketing to use for you? Here are just a few examples.
We’re running a contest right now called the XML Challenge. It’s aimed at both students and professionals. There’s a Facebook group that was set up a year or two ago for university students interested in DB2 called “DB2 on Campus” We’re using that site to help promote the contest. We also linked to some “viral” videos that we posted on YouTube, as well.
Again – think free advertising. Let the people interested in you come and find you, opt in to be contacted by you. You’ll get a lot further reaching out and turning your fans into advocates than trying to go out and convert people not even aware of you into prospects and customers.
Page *
Page *
At the very minimum, you need to be monitoring the conversation
Page *
Monitor what’s being said about your solutions and company
Go set up a Google alert now.
I’ll wait….
At a minimum, you should be monitoring what is being said about your company, your products, or other key words in your field. It’s as simple as going to www.google.com/alerts and entering the search terms you want to be alerted on and your e-mail address. That’s it. Go do it now. Really – right now. I’ll wait….
Page *
www.technorati.com
www.google.com/blogsearch
Especially if you’re just now setting up a Google alert, take a minute and head over to Technorati (http://www.technorati.com) or Google Blog search (www.google.com/blogsearch) and see what is being said about your products or topics of interest. If you see something recent, go post a comment, or link back it from your own blog.
Page *
"Groundswell" by Charlene Li, Josh Bernoff
Where do we go from here?
You can help drive the conversation, or you can be left out of the conversation
Blogging can return a sizable return
Even if blogging’s not for you, you can still join the conversation
Don’t be afraid to ask for help
In summary…
Remember – there’s a lot going on online. And it’s going to happen with or without you.
You can help drive the conversation, or you can be left out.
Blogging can return a big impact on the investment in resources (virtually nil) and time.
Even if blogging’s not for you, though, you can still join the conversation. At a minimum, you NEED to start by monitoring what is being said online.
Page *
Thank you again for your time. As a reminder, please head over to my blog for details on the blogging 101, 201, 301 sessions, and you can always drop me an e-mail directly or find me on Twitter at twitter.com/agberg.
Colleagues/Friends
Blogging your way to more business in 2009
The no-pain guide to joining communities
Monitoring the conversation
Resources and advice
About me
About me:
I am the team lead responsible for fostering a community around IBM Data Management solutions, such as DB2, Informix, IMS, U2, and InfoSphere solutions. In other words, how we can use social media to communicate with and interact with the people who care about IBM Data Management products.
Prior to this role, I served for over 8 years in a variety of marketing and strategy roles with the Lotus business unit, and spent the past 4 years as the offering manager of Lotus Sametime.
I have been blogging at www.adamgartenberg for over 2 years now, and have been involved as a reader in various online communities going back before that.
Page *
About buying a new camcorder
Since we all work on different solutions, different geographies, etc, I want to start by talking about something we can all likely relate to – buying a new camcorder. This is something I’ve had to do recently, so it’s fresh in my mind.
Page *
I need a new camcorder…. so I started by going to the Sony’s website. And lo and behold, they think they have *the best* camcorders out there.
But then I went to Canon’s websites, too, and guess what? THEY think THEY have the best camcorders, as well!
And guess what? Panasonic? Yup – wouldn’t you know it… According to Panasonic’s website, Panasonic CLEARLY makes the best camcorders out there.
Page *
So what did I do? Probably the same thing we all do… I went to look at reviews. And when I go to Amazon (or other places) I can see what real people thought of these products… 4 stars, #1 in category, vs. 3 stars and #4 in category.
Page *
…
I also asked my friends what they thought. Only I didn’t limit myself to the guys I see at poker night. I blogged about it. Which not only opened me up to a much wider variety of input, but it also means that my question – and their answers – are living out on the web forever, for anyone else to see going forward.
Page *
But we’re not really here to talk about camcorders, are we?
Page *
Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wishymom/566394520/
Page *
Social Marketing is not about sharing embarrassing middle school photos
Social Marketing is not about finding long-lost High School friends and sharing embarrassing 8th grade yearbook photos. (Although you certainly can do that… Can you spot me?)
Page *
Social Marketing is not about sharing embarrassing middle school photos
(In case you need it, here’s a reminder of what I look like nowadays.)
Page *
Social Marketing is a fundamental shift in the prominence and impact of community and word of mouth marketing
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cibergaita/94489102/
No, instead Social Marketing is about a new set of technology that represents a fundamental shift in the impact of word of mouth marketing and the ability to INFLUENCE decisions, bring ATTENTION to your company and your solutions, and RESPOND proactively to threats or to jump on new opportunities.
It’s about finding your biggest fans and turning them into advocates. Or actually, not even finding them as allowing them to find you. Can be much more effective than blind advertising hoping for a 2% conversion rate.
Page *
Social Marketing technology lets you monitor, contribute, and participate in the conversation
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/beingpeterkim/2909140600/
Social Marketing technology makes it very easy to monitor, contribute, and most importantly participate in the conversation.
Page *
Remember the moral of our story: People listen to the community, not the company
% of work-related purchases influenced by…
Source: "Driving Word of Mouth Advocacy Among Business Executives: The Experiential Marketing Connection,” conducted by the Keller Fay Group and sponsored by Jack Morton Worldwide.
53%
32%
26%
Source: "Driving Word of Mouth Advocacy Among Business Executives: The Experiential Marketing Connection,” conducted by the Keller Fay Group and sponsored by Jack Morton Worldwide.
http://www.jackmorton.com/commonPages/ondemand/default.aspx?intID=9&wp=true&ac=us
Remember the moral of our camcorder story? People listen to each other a lot more than what a company has to say themselves. And this isn’t just for consumer goods. This is a study of work-related purchases and what the biggest influencers are. And guess what? Colleagues or friends and word of mouth came out at the top of the list – almost twice as important as press coverage.
It’s the personal relationships that matter, it’s the direct feedback that matters, much more than even analyst reports, corporate Web sites, whitepapers, etc.
In the Communications 1.0 model, we controlled the message and the medium. But the old model no longer holds up.
Look at
Other statistics:
More than 75% users trust “word of mouth” recommendations over other advertising
- Nielsen Company, April 2007
A word of mouth dialogue is 1,000 times more powerful than a standard ad impression
- The Word of Mouth Manual, Volume II
Page *
People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it. The good news is that it’s now easier than ever to listen, contribute, and participate in that conversation.
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
IDS? Is that still around?
But if you think about it, this isn’t really anything new. People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it!
Page *
People have always talked about your solutions – you just usually didn’t know about it. The good news is that it’s now easier than ever to listen, contribute, and participate in that conversation.
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
IDS? Is that still around?
I’m thinking about going with IDS for our new project
Go for it. IDS Rocks!
We’ve been using IDS for years. Let me know if you have any questions.
I’m with IBM. Can I help you with anything?
What’s changed – and this is good news – is that now it’s easier than ever to listen, contribute and participate in that conversation.
Page *
Blogging your way to more business in 2009
One of the biggest ways to see an impact from social marketing is to start a blog
I’m going to assert that if you really want to have an impact on your business via community involvement, your best bet is to just jump in and start a blog. (But if you’re not sure if that’s right for you (or right for you right now), I’ll talk about some other ways to get involved in just a few minutes).
For those of you not familiar, what is a blog? How easy is it to get started? What resources do we have?
Page *
Cartoon © Hugh Macloud – www.gapingvoid.com
Free advertising
Thought leadership
Proof of you knowledge in your field
Proof of your experience in your field
Show, not tell (e.g., expand on announcements in ways you can’t do on an official website or in a formal press release)
Build connections with your customers and the community
Direct and free feedback (before the fact, not after the fact)
Turn customers into advocates
…not worthy of a press release
…hard to find on corporate website
…more detailed than we would post on corp. website
…shared more timely than on corp. website
It allows you to tell a story, not just the news
Helps you do your job better:
Share news and detailed information
Clear up misconceptions in the market
Understand the needs of our customers and constituents
Refine key messages and selling points
It puts a human face on your company
It helps you place better in search results
It allows you to link to other community sites
It is proof that there is an active, vibrant community around your company or products
Page *
Cartoon © Hugh Macloud – www.gapingvoid.com
Establish personal brand
Page *
But is anyone going to read my blog?
One question that always comes up is “Is anyone going to read my blog?”
Good news - Google loves blogs. And while you may think that your topic is focused and narrow, people will still come to read it.
I spent two years writing about essentially a “marketing blog” about an admittedly esoteric topic in the grand scheme of the World Wide Web (Lotus Sametime), and still had over 80,000 unique visitors come to my blog during that time period.
What should you write about?
Product announcements
An analyst report that ranks us highly
An analyst report that ranks us low
Your thoughts on an interesting article about database compression you just read
Dropping your kids off at summer camp
The customer visit you’re flying back from
A debate the product team is having on whether to include feature A or feature B
The 100,000 download milestone you just reached on your product trial
The planning for the upcoming conference
…
Anything that can only be shared under NDA
Revenue or sales figures other than what is officially reported by your company
Disclosing customer information if they have not agreed to be a reference
Making commitments about product futures
Anything that goes against your company’s social computing guidelines or business conduct guidelines
Anything that you would not want to see reprinted on the front page of the Wall Street Journal.
Page *
No, really – people read this stuff?
Source: Josh Bernoff, Forrester Research
http://www.emersonprocessxperts.com/
Along similar lines, the number one pushback I hear when I bring up blogging to people is “well, I don’t really have anything that interesting to say, anyway.”
Hopefully this story, from the book Groundswell, will change your mind.
Emerson Process Management sells factory automation systems. Blog full of war stories about the product and factory automation in general. Has 30,000 visitors a month to the blog. Gets 5-7 leads a week off of the blog. Each lead could be $0.5-1M in sales.
What if you could do something for free that would bring in 5-7 new leads a week?
And if you think that you’re customers aren’t online yet, they probably are (and if not, will soon be). In Forrester Research’s study of online participation, the number of people in the “inactive” category fell dramatically from their 2007 to 2008 study, and it was primarily the >35 and >45 age groups driving that change.
Page *
You’re not in this alone…
I’d like to blog, but where do I even start?
1st Thursday
2nd Thursday
3rd Thursday
See www.adamgartenberg.com for details
I’m going to be running Blogging 101, 201 and 301 sessions the first, second and Thursday of each month. See my blog at www.adamgartenberg.com for more details.
Page *
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tellumo/146631887/
Even if you’re not ready for blogging just yet, there is still a lot you can do to participate and be involved in the community.
Page *
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/305716815/
Page *
Find a public or dedicated community site and join on in
Channeldb2.com
Bleedyellow.com
PlanetIDS.com
Planetdb2.com
You can find dedicated community sites like Channel DB2 (for DB2) or BleedYellow (for Lotus). There are numerous groups and fan pages on Facebook and LinkedIn. There are blog aggregators like PlanetDB2, PlanetIDS (for Informix), PlanetLotus. Chances are there’s one (or many) for the communities important for your work. And if there isn’t, it’s easy enough nowadays to start one up yourself!
These communities allow you to stay up to date on what’s happening with the products you care about, make it easy to find stories you want to comment on or new opportunities, and are an easy way to ease your self into a community if you’re not ready to start contributing yet.
http://www.channeldb2.com
http://www.facebook.com
http://www.linkedin.com
http://www.planetdb2.com
http://www.planetids.com
http://www.bleedyellow.com
Page *
Sign up for LinkedIn, Facebook, Orkut, Xing (or your local favorite)
Did you know…
…Well over half of Facebook users are over college age?
If you haven’t already joined LInkedIn, Facebook (or Orkut, Xing, or whichever network is most popular in your country or circle of colleagues), go do so. Facebook isn’t just for your teenagers any more. In fact, well over half of Facebook users are over college age. (Today, around 60% of Facebook users in the US are over 21 years old, and that group represents the fastest growing demographic.)
So, YES, your customers and prospects are on there. (And if they’re not yet, they soon will be.) Or, to think about it another way, do you want to be the last one to the party?
Page *
How can you use social marketing?
So, how can you put social marketing to use for you? Here are just a few examples.
We’re running a contest right now called the XML Challenge. It’s aimed at both students and professionals. There’s a Facebook group that was set up a year or two ago for university students interested in DB2 called “DB2 on Campus” We’re using that site to help promote the contest. We also linked to some “viral” videos that we posted on YouTube, as well.
Again – think free advertising. Let the people interested in you come and find you, opt in to be contacted by you. You’ll get a lot further reaching out and turning your fans into advocates than trying to go out and convert people not even aware of you into prospects and customers.
Page *
Page *
At the very minimum, you need to be monitoring the conversation
Page *
Monitor what’s being said about your solutions and company
Go set up a Google alert now.
I’ll wait….
At a minimum, you should be monitoring what is being said about your company, your products, or other key words in your field. It’s as simple as going to www.google.com/alerts and entering the search terms you want to be alerted on and your e-mail address. That’s it. Go do it now. Really – right now. I’ll wait….
Page *
www.technorati.com
www.google.com/blogsearch
Especially if you’re just now setting up a Google alert, take a minute and head over to Technorati (http://www.technorati.com) or Google Blog search (www.google.com/blogsearch) and see what is being said about your products or topics of interest. If you see something recent, go post a comment, or link back it from your own blog.
Page *
"Groundswell" by Charlene Li, Josh Bernoff
Where do we go from here?
You can help drive the conversation, or you can be left out of the conversation
Blogging can return a sizable return
Even if blogging’s not for you, you can still join the conversation
Don’t be afraid to ask for help
In summary…
Remember – there’s a lot going on online. And it’s going to happen with or without you.
You can help drive the conversation, or you can be left out.
Blogging can return a big impact on the investment in resources (virtually nil) and time.
Even if blogging’s not for you, though, you can still join the conversation. At a minimum, you NEED to start by monitoring what is being said online.
Page *
Thank you again for your time. As a reminder, please head over to my blog for details on the blogging 101, 201, 301 sessions, and you can always drop me an e-mail directly or find me on Twitter at twitter.com/agberg.
Colleagues/Friends