Social Media marketing « Direct Marketing Observations

Posts Tagged 'Social Media marketing'

Anger, Denial, Acceptance in a Digital Agency

Published March 11, 2010 social media 8 Comments
Tags: digital marketing, marc meyer, pr agency, social media, Social Media marketing

I’m so thematic. The flow of my blog posts have gone from one extreme to another. But for good reason… Anger at clients for parting ways with me. Denial of the fact that clients are not paying me and now acceptance. Acceptance that though I indeed love what I do and know how to do it well, it may be time to do it for someone else. Though having your own digital agency is cool and fun and certainly sexy, it also presents its own set of unique challenges.

In fact, there have been instances over the past 2 1/2 months or so where I have gone through every stage on this graphic.

It goes something like this:

Shock stage: Initial paralysis at hearing that one of my best clients is tightening it’s belt and will no longer be utilizing my skills.
Denial stage: Trying to avoid the inevitable, I angle to salvage the deal by offering an alternative service/skill and the client agrees but at a rate that is substantially less than what I was charging.
Anger stage: Frustrated outpouring of bottled-up emotion. I’m now pissed that it has come to this and want to take it out on something, so what do I do? I write a blog post about it.
Bargaining stage: Seeking in vain for a way out, I work doubly hard with my other clients to make sure that they are happy and look for new business. I realize that times are tough and everyone thinks they can do what we do.
Depression stage: My other large client has now missed 2 invoicing periods and now I have turned into a collection agency and have stopped work on their account. The final realization of the inevitable is starting to sink in. It might be the realization that maybe having a digital agency in Southwest Florida wasn’t such a good idea in such crappy economic times.. So to combat this bout of depression, I wrote a post about the situation. It seems to help some but offers little solace.
Testing stage: I call this the looking for answers or seeking solutions stage. I have decided to use my network to see what else is out there, determined to make the best of a bad situation. I know the timing is not exactly the best right? But sanity is important right now.
Acceptance stage: I’m realizing that it’s not only tough to run your own agency, but it’s also tough to do the majority of the work, job the rest out, manage it, find more clients, look for talented people, stay current, do proposals, write posts etc. etc., Knowing this and coming to grips with the situation has allowed me to finally find the way forward, and realize that yes, I still love social media so much that I blogged about it. but I can have more of an impact on a larger scale in another capacity. So though I will continue to consult in some capacity as I go forward, it’s time to see what else is out there as well.

Share this Post

15 reasons to love social media

Published March 9, 2010 social media 9 Comments
Tags: beth harte, blogging, DJ Waldow, geoff livingston, jason breed, jason falls, marc meyer, Marketing, PR, social media, Social Media marketing, social media today, Social Networks, todd defren

My last few posts have been about the darker side of social media and thus I wanted to clear something up. I am the biggest champion of social media that you will find and here’s why. I may get a little spicy sometimes, but that doesn’t diminish all the “good” things about this crazy space and all that it delivers to us daily. So get a gander at these 15 reasons and when you’re done reading them add your reason to the mix.

1) Today I have a very large network of close and semi-close contacts that I can reach out to at a moments notice. Chances are, you do too! 4 years ago, I did not have anything remotely close to this type of network.

2) If I need a really good PR firm for example, I can contact that person today and we’d know each other well enough to have a very nice conversation… without the usual vetting process. The confluence of PR and social media ain’t no coincidence.

3) If I wanted to have someone guest post on my blog and bring their incredible smartness and knowledge to the table, all I have to do is ask. Have you ever thought of asking someone? You should. There might be some really smart folks in your network and you might not even know they are following you!

4) If I have to refer a killer web design person to someone, I can do that in 5 seconds. I’m sure you know of someone too. I could come up with a list of 10 in no time.

5) Need a good email marketing company? I know one or two. In fact, I got to know someone from a pretty cool company just in the last 2 months, Thanks network.

6) How about a good social media monitoring company? I can help you, I know a few good people there. What’s great about this one particular company? They don’t push the product, they just act like normal people should act.

7) Want to know who you need to contact in regards to social media and non-profits? Here’s one for you. Thanks to social media, these people have a chance to influence us in a way that allows us and them to make a difference in this world. We need more of that.

8. Because of social media, my network, no matter how jaded or pissed I can get sometimes, allows me to get jaded and pissed… and they’re ok with that. They still like me in the morning.

9) Social media has allowed me to contribute to one book and create a rough draft for another. It’s allowed me to present at conferences, write articles in magazines and speak on the radio and create projects that connect some very dynamic people together.

10) Without social media none of us would be allowed to share the cool things we are doing 24/7/365. That doesn’t mean we always care about all of it, but you have a channel to express yourself now that you didn’t have before.

11) If I need help, all I have to do is ask. Need proof? Check out the 50 people that have hosted Hashtagsocialmedia. I asked and they said yes.

12) If I’m asked to help or assist on something, and because I generally know who is doing the asking, I don’t hesitate, thanks to social media.

13) Because of social media, when I meet someone for the first time, like a Jason Falls for example, I generally am “not meeting” them for the first time. We already know each other.

14) Because of social media, we have something to talk and write about every day.

15) If I didn’t know you before and now I do, chances are it’s because of social media.

At the end of the day, it’s still all about the relationships, the connections, and the conversations. For that, I’m thankful.

Social Media Marketing:Do you know enough to know where to begin?

Published February 11, 2010 Social Media marketing 2 Comments
Tags: beth harte, chris kieff, jason falls, maggie fox, marc meyer, Olivier Blanchard, Social Media marketing, Social Networks

Good question right? What’s the simple answer? Maybe not. If you are a marketer thinking about social media marketing then there is a good chance, if you have not done anything yet, that its because you just don’t have enough information yet.

On Monday in Tampa, I attended and spoke at a conference titled Social Fresh, at that conference, during Maggie Fox’s keynote, she nonchalantly asked the audience how many of them were marketers. Surprisingly, more than 80% raised their hands.

Clearly, 2 things became evident: One, there is a need for more social media conferences down in the belly of the state of Florida(that in and of itself is worth another blog post) and two, marketers were indeed starved or looking for answers/solutions to the primary social media marketing puzzle/question. The How To. Implementation. Why haven’t they done it yet?

In this post I want to address those issues so that you can get started with social media marketing.

According to Equation research, one of the primary barriers for social media marketing adoption for brands or agencies is that they just don’t know enough about social media to know where to begin.

But why? Why is it taking this long for marketers, agencies, brands and businesses to learn about social media? For some of us, we have been talking about and writing about social media for almost 4 years. Is it fear of social media? Do we have so much on our plates that we don’t have time to check social media out?

Maybe.

Is it because your falling back on the excuse that you can’t measure social media? Please tell me that’s not the reason. If so, then please have a look at Olivier Blanchard‘s deck on the basics of social media ROI. Once you have rolled through it, I think and hope your fears on the ROI issue can be put to rest.

Another valid reason that may be preventing you from adopting social media may be budgetary. That can certainly affect any and all social media marketing efforts, as well as marketing efforts in general. If you got no money, then you go no money. However, I do want to point out that the barriers for entry into social media are relatively low. In fact your only costs when first starting out will be or could be design and labor.

So know this, getting into “it” is easy. In fact Chris Kieff suggests just listening for the first 6 months before you do anything else. It’s quick to set up and easy to do. I’m not adverse to that strategy, but think that maybe 2-3 months might be just as effective. But the point is, by listening for a bit, that gives you a feel for how things work in social networks and how brands, conversations, posts, links and search results all evolve because of social media.

Managing it takes a little bit more skill. My friend Jason Falls who writes a great blog on all things social media marketing related, has a post on managing social media marketing. Though it’s from 2008, it’s still relevant and valuable even today. There are some great tips contained in the post.

So you might say you don’t have enough time. Hey just like everything else in life, it’s all about time management and being efficient with your usage of time. Social media marketing is no different. I have often said that social media marketing can be an incredible time suck, but the way to work thru that, is to make sure you have a plan every day that applies to your social media marketing strategy and speaks to your social media tactics. Above all stick to it. This includes your personal social media interactions. You have to know how much you allow yourself each day to engage on your own social networks.

Another issue that prevents marketers from even starting and which might be completely out of their hands, is there could be legal constraints. I can tell you from first hand experience how difficult it can be sometimes when any copy or any site designs that you create have to then pass the litmus test of legal. It seemed that everything we did was always not with the customer in mind, but always under the auspices of, “I hope legal is cool with this…”

Beyond that, you may have corporate policies that may prevent your marketing department from engaging in social media, if so, it’s up to you to try and get corporate to look at the bigger picture of social media marketing and its effectiveness. Help them create a social media policy both internally and externally that allows you to use social media in your marketing efforts! Work with them, because there could be a very high likelihood that they have no clue of social media and thus they will err on the side of caution and completely lock down your efforts and attempts at social media marketing.

Lastly, I will say this. Given that search results can return articles and blog posts that rank high on the how to’s of social media and social media marketing, I think it’s important to trust one’s peers and their associated networks. What I’m saying is that if you have questions, go to Twitter and ask a trusted and valued resource. I rely on my network. Rely on yours and get started. it’s not too late.

Social Media for B2B-10 links for the week that was in Social Media

Published January 26, 2010 SEO/SEM 3 Comments
Tags: b2b, b2c, marc meyer, social media, Social Media marketing

Last week seemed to be the week to talk about social media and B2B. And rightly so. You see, THAT is the niche that all marketers and consultants need to be focusing on right now. Why? Because B2B is focusing on social media. The impact of social media on B2C is obvious, but B2B is starved for information, case studies, consultants that know what they are doing and knowledge. Most don’t know in what direction to head, or where they should start.

My word to you, point your efforts towards B2B. In the meantime, here are some links that may make you better at what you do, four of which are about…social media and B2b.

1) First up is a fun site. This site is so chock full of wisdom its not even funny, well actually it is, but check out Tweeteorites

2) I couldn’t have said it better than this: Using Balsamiq Mockups feels like you are drawing, but it’s digital, so you can tweak and rearrange controls easily, and the end result is much cleaner. Teams can come up with a design and iterate over it in real-time in the course of a meeting. IMHO, this is bloody simple and easy to use.

3) We cannot stress enough how important it is to engage but here is a post that stresses how important it is to, yep you guessed it, engage and also. how to win. How to Fail at B2B Social Media

4) Speaking of B2B, forget what you just read and read this. Forget Facebook and Twitter, For B2B, it’s all about Linkedin. How many of you currently use Linkedin in your social media marketing/marketing efforts?

5) In my humble opinion, some really smart women get the short end of the stick in our business. However. thanks to Lee Odden, they are getting some nice recognition in this post of 25 women who rock social media. I’m happy to say that I know 3/4 of those mentioned on this list.

6) Ever heard of Shamable, the no BS social media guide? Me neither until last week. Some good content/writing here.

7) Remember when I told you to forget about Facebook? I lied. Again. New Study Reveals Facebook Better Than Twitter for Marketers So another question to you: Are you using Facebook as a marketing tool? If so, in what way? How are you measuring?

8. Buzzom has some nice analytics tools and some cool graphics. Don’t worry it’s free.

9) So all of that B2B stuff probably has you confused on what you should do right? Stop, go, tweak, advance slowly, what is it? Well maybe you should read this Forrester post on Social Media’s impact on B2B marketing budgets.

10) Lastly, I Love the concept of Twitterfall but the interface sucks.

Take all of these posts and share them. Learn from them and then do your thing. Lastly, make sure you have fun doing it. Peace.

The sea change in Twitter sentiment

Published January 20, 2010 Twitter 16 Comments
Tags: david binkowski, hubspot, marc meyer, Marketing, microblogging, social media, Social Media marketing, todd defren, Twitter

I thought it was just me and thus I wrote about the rise of the transactional conversation of Twitter on Monday. Then yesterday David Binkowski threw a post up on Shamable about gaming social media. At the same time Hubspot put out it’s 3rd state of The Twittersphere report. And Todd Defren lastly writes about moving the needle on Twitter. All of these posts and reports and what have you, alluded to something that may be occuring before our very eyes and that’s this:

Conversations on Twitter have deteriorated into flat out unadulterated pimping of one’s wares, or the company they work for.

As new marketers and companies flock to Twitter, their predisposed notions of how to use Twitter have been fueled not only by us subconsciously, but also by other marketers and individuals who “think” that the best way to use Twitter is as a one to many broadcast mechanism.

Subconsciously, we have become a party to and have embraced traditional marketing on Twitter.

The conversations have eroded into flat out pimping, so has the spirit of what all of us celebrated no less than a year ago. The conversation and ensuing relationship. But not, for some of us, we’ve become jaded, and wary of what it it that you want. For some of us, the quality of the conversations are few and far between and it’s our fault.

I know, some of you are going to fire back and say “What conversations?” You’ll say, “Twitter is not a platform for conversations and never was.” You’ll say,” Who can have conversations in a 140 charcaters or less?”

The interuptive interaction?

And maybe that is what the true evolution of what Twitter is or what it should be?… A way for brands and individuals to pimp themelves and try an extract something from the engagement.

Instead of learning more and developing a relationship with the people you follow and that follow you, Twitter now just might be turning into one big drive in theater to make out in now. Who needs conversation?

Coca-Cola knows how to work the crowd on Facebook

Published December 3, 2009 branding , Marketing , social media 3 Comments
Tags: branding, coca cola, Facebook, marc meyer, Social Media marketing, Social Networks

As I was reading through The Big Money Facebook 50: Companies making social media work.article yesterday, I saw that Coca-Cola was the number one brand on the list. I wanted to see why so I decided to check it out. When I got to their page I was greeted with this.

Which prompted me to ask or question on Twitter the following:

The answers came fast and furious. Surprisingly or not, they were mixed and I can see why. As social media marketers and brand execs struggle with the best way to have conversations wrapped around their brand, they always run the risk of reverting back to a push style method of marketing. And that’s the rub.

What if consumers prefer that method? Or just don’t care? They just want whatever the brand is willing to give them for free, and they don’t care. So with that being said, giving up all of my contact information, profile information and my friends information for what might be behind the welcome screen doesn’t matter. Apparently not. Or the promise of what might be behind the curtain is compelling enough for me. Given Coke’s status as the number one brand on Facebook according to this list, I think we know the answer.

So what’s my point? Yes the conversations are important but sometimes customers don’t want to talk with brands, they just want what the brands are willing to give them provided the customer is willing to give up its privacy. Do you really think that Coca-Cola is that sexy of a brand to be worshiped all the way into the #1 spot on Facebook? No. It’s the allure of what might be.

Is the social web the answer to our ailing economy?

Published November 2, 2009 social media 3 Comments
Tags: digital response marketing group, marc meyer, social media, Social Media marketing, Web 2.0

I’m going to guess that for a majority of the people out there, the answers that they seek are not in social media. Nor is social media the answer for a lot of businesses that have fallen on hard times. But damned if they are not looking.

They lift up the hood and they see this

Yet the number of searches going on for the term “social media” per month hover close to half a million. So for most, when they get those search results, and try to make heads or tails of them, it looks like this:

Yet people are wanting to know what it is and how they can make it work for their business. They’re searching for the answer. And the answers they find come from people who have never done it.

They are social media virgins

What social media has done for a lot of small businesses and large ones as well, is it has provided hope at a time when there is not a whole lot of good news to hang your hat on these days.

Hope is not a bad thing because it’s closely aligned with dreams, and right now for a lot of people, that’s all they can bank on. It’s why they wake up every day. Except hoping social media is going to change your business, it’s culture, and the people using it, and ultimately save it, is crazy. You’re looking for a quick fix and sadly, social media is not a quick fix. That doesn’t mean however, that it doesn’t work, because it does.

But there are people out there claiming that they can make social media work for your company and save your company quickly. Be wary. be very wary.

Social media is not the solution to what is ailing you. In fact, there is a strong likelihood that what is ailing you, is completely out of your control. But you are looking for ways to break out, to try something, anything that will turn the tide in your favor. So you’re looking at social media, looking at it hard.

The ripple effect of a bad economy if you will, causes you to look at everything in a different light. Including social media.

Yes, Social media is transformational, it just doesn’t happen over night. I wish it did, but it doesn’t. Chances are, the more you can wrap your arms around what social media can’t do and what it’s not, the better off you will be.

« Previous Page — Next Page »

Latest tweet

To me summer starts on June 1at and ends on September 30th. Sp guess what? 17 hours ago
Twitter is great for when your waiting for people in a bar and you don't know a soul. 18 hours ago
What an odd but good retrospective on Latrell Spreewell from @newyorker newyorker.com/online/blogs/c… 19 hours ago
It's Bubbleboy-Video Analysis of Bubble Wrap Jumps-Does he survive? wired.com/wiredscience/2… 20 hours ago
This is funny but good: Klout Is Evil, But It Can Be Saved newyorker.com/online/blogs/c… #klout #influence 20 hours ago