When Does Social Media Really Work?

Posted on May 22, 2012 by marc meyer

The beauty of social media isn’t in the online connections. It’s not about the numbers, never has been. OK, maybe it is to marketers, but that’s because they operate from a different perspective. No the beauty of social media is in it’s potential. It’s potential to connect people from divergent backgrounds or in the same city or that have the same common interests. It can really connect people in infinite ways. That may seem somewhat preachy or full of green meadows, unicorns and rainbows but it’s true.

Recently in the Wall Street Journal, there was an article titled , Why Successful Branding Still Happens Offline. The article was good but it was really similar to a thousand other articles that I have read over the years about how brands need to do this or that in social in order to be successful. As I neared the end of the piece, I read the following:

The great social wave is an opportunity that no business can afford to ignore or look at myopically. It’s happening all around us – and to the continuing surprise of many, it’s mostly happening face-to-face

I’ve said the first part of that sentence, again, a thousand times about ignoring social at your own peril, blah, blah,blah. But the back half of the sentence struck a nerve. It’s mostly happening face to face. Basically where social takes off and takes on magical tones is when we get to associate a name with a physical face and voice and not an avatar. Going to a conference and meeting that person that you have had tens of twenty or hundreds of conversations with on Twitter or Facebook or blog comments. That’s the money shot.

Whether you do business with someone online or whatever it is you or your company might do with social, it’s always going to be or should be based on some type of interaction and then some type of result. Taking social offline should be the goal of every online social media encounter worth its weight.

On Social Media Tools, Noise, and Experience

Posted on April 12, 2012 by marc meyer

I was driving through the Florida Everglades last week when I thought, “How in the hell does someone survive and get around out here in this vast expanse of nothingness?” Which made me immediately draw a relation to the water that surrounds the glades being the internet so to speak, and the wispy reeds of sea grass or whatever the hell it is, being your customers or users of the internet. I then thought, “There’s a lot of noise out there now, was it, or is it now because of social media? Did social media create the noise?” Is social responsible for this?

The short answer is yes.

Remember Dr. Seuss’s, “Horton Hears a Who?” There’s a scene in the movie and in the book, where everyone in Whoville starts to shout in unison, “We are here, we are here”. They are trying to get Horton to hear them. Social media is like that. The plethora of platforms and devices has allowed everyone to have that voice, but the challenge for those with voices wanting to be heard, is the choices and platforms are multiplying like rabbits. For those businesses who want to bridge the gap and find those people with voices-it’s getting harder and harder to sift through the weeds and grass.

In the Everglades, you get around by airboat, which amazes me honestly. Why? Everything looks the same. If you look to your left or to your right, or forwards or backwards, it all looks exactly the same. So how does one get around? You have to have an experienced navigator. Someone who knows the lay of the land.

Here’s the correlation. I can use the best listening tools and platforms there are, but if I don’t know how to use them or I use them the wrong way, they are totally worthless to me. I’m going to airboat around the glades and find lots of nothing. If someone thinks they know how or knows what I want and they still get it wrong-Shame on me. Does that mean there’s too much noise and one cannot navigate through it? Does that mean there are no pockets of goodness in that vast landscape? Not at all. You just have to know someone who knows how to look and where to look.

A friend of mine, Mack Collier, earlier this month wrote a blog post on whether marketers should use social media personally before they use it professionally? I think we know the short answer again to that is yes. But I will end on this.

Just because you can get the boat in the water, start the engine and take off, doesn’t mean you know where you’re going or how to get there.

The Dawn of Social Mediocrity

Posted on February 24, 2012 by marc meyer

Let’s do a hypothetical. You like western saddles. You search for them every day on Google. Google gives you relevant results from a) your Google Plus peeps and then b) the most relevant, most SEO’d results. Let’s assume that your peeps straddle the lines of friends, family and business contacts, so the results or likelihood that there will be content from these people about western saddles may be 50/50.

You continue to search for info about saddles. I am a marketer that sells cowboy hats or western hats. I know that if I use the term “western saddles” as a key word, page title, hyper link, hashtag, splog site or blog post in some social networks or platforms, the likelihood of you finding or landing on my pages might be pretty high. Why? Every link that you will find will ultimately take you to my western hat pages. I may or may not have much on saddles, but the bottm line is that I sell hats not saddles. Will you buy from my site? Maybe not. Of course I will or may affiliate links on my pages that will get you to a site that sells saddles but…the “quick” search has now turned into an hour’s worth of chasing the long tail of a bullshit game of bait and switch.

Is that a good user experience? No, but it’s the reality of search and social.

The more content that is created, the more that you have to choose from. The more that you have to choose from, the more of a chance that the content is watered down and possibly gamed. The more that search and social become intertwined, the more that you may become the victim of a bait and switch. Clicking on a link in the hopes that it is the right link-has become more precarious these days than it ever has.

The more that search and social lines become further blurred by the notion that content drives the machine, the more the user will get played. Pretty soon it won’t be social media any longer, it will be social mediocrity.

12 things I thought I knew About Social Media in 2011

Posted on December 19, 2011 by marc meyer

As 2011 winds down, it’s time for me to reflect on the state of my social media world in 2011.

Things that I thought I knew about social media in 2011:

1) That I knew what I was talking about

Just because I might know more about social media than the average person, it didn’t preclude most corporate heads to assume that they knew just as much about social, if not more, than I did. Can you say bite your tongue?

2) That the whole ROI thing would have sorted itself out by now

We’re getting closer, more and more corporations seem to now understand that you need to associate some type of KPI to a social initiative, which is a start in the direction of measurement; but you still had the camps of “you can’t make money from social media” to “let’s just grow our audiences across all social platforms and call it a win”. Ugh!

3) People would trust what I know and do as I advise

I found out in 2011 that although people would nod their heads in agreement when we’re in the conference room, once I was gone- the silos reemerged, the battle lines were redrawn, the skeptics reappeared and the notion that a consultant was not necessary reared its ugly head-and thus the follow up discussions were slow to evolve. Can you say self doubt?

4) We had gotten over being enamored with the quantity of friends, followers, fans and likes

Some have and some have not and we’ll leave it at that. It’s a blog post in and of itself.

5) Corporations were ready to be transparent in 2011

They’re ready as long as they have their social media policies in place. Even then, after the policies are in place, there’s transparency and then there’s “their” definition of being transparent-on their terms, and not the terms of the masses. It’s actually a start.

6) That the “new guard” would be saying something different

New social media faces and new social media names talking and preaching about things we talked about 4 years ago. Where is the disconnect? Is the customer not getting it? Or is the consultant not listening? Or are we still not there yet? Do we want them to repeat what we have been preaching? Maybe so.

7) That the “old guard” would have evolved

Old faces and familiar names talking about the same things we talked about 4 years ago. Is nothing new? Or do people just not get it? Or is it uncorrelated wisdom? Do we need to start teaching SM 201 and 301?

8) That FB would get to 1billion users in 2011

This is going to happen but I am starting to see little tiny micro-cracks in the Facebook brand. Can you say Facebook Burnout, Blowback or Billion?

9) That Twitter would be making money by now

Well they sorta are making money and they are rolling out custom pages for brands. Does that count as truly making money? No. The problem? Would you pay 5 bucks a month to use Twitter? No. Would you pay to advertise on Twitter? No. That’s my point. I think I might have predicted in 2009 that Twitter would be making money by now as well…Le Sigh

10) That 2011 would be the year that corporations would be ready to adopt social media both internally and externally

Ha! Just because I got in to the boardroom and we were talking about it, didn’t mean it was going to be happening anytime soon. Of course I thought 2010 was going to be the year as well. Can you say mad silos?

11) Brands knew what they were doing on Twitter.

Last time I checked, brands are still using Twitter as a push style vehicle for marketing and selling product. Some have gotten creative, but most are of the Tweet with a link with no conversation camp….Does it work? Let’s ask them? Oh wait we can’t because all they do is tweet links and sales. Is there an alternative? Sure there is, don’t do it in 2012.

12) Google Buzz would be around.

Silly me to think that Google Buzz was viable. Actually it wasn’t. Neither was Sidewiki or Wave either. What’s the over/under on Google Plus survival? 2 years?

How do my “things I thought I knew compare with yours? Let’s share.

The Top 5 Challenges for Digital Brands in 2012

Posted on December 14, 2011 by marc meyer

Last week in a very thought provoking Tweetchat hosted by Lisa Petrilli, the discussion, though swirling around how an introvert uses social media, somehow segued into driving website traffic. So my first thought was a poll was in order. But then I started to think about 2012 and the challenges that most brands will face and thus the basis for this post was born: The challenges for a digital marketer or a digital brand in 2012. What are they specifically as it pertains to the web?

1) Driving traffic– The challenge in 2011 is the same in 2012. In order for people to know that you are open for business you have to get them to your website, your blog, your Twitter account or your Facebook page, right? Whether you’re a click and mortar or a web based only company, either or requires more than just a cursory amount of effort revolved around driving traffic. So you have to think about things like:

Site design that incorporates SEO
SEM to artificially drive traffic
Some type of lead generation
Social site design geared towards your target audience
Content creation

All with the premise of driving traffic. Eyeballs.

2) Engaging that traffic-You’ve got them to your site(s) now what are doing with them? In 2011, it was all about doing “something” with someone once they had visited your site, your blog or your Facebook page. Well that hasn’t changed. In 2012, it’s imperative that we determine what engagement looks like. What does it feel like, what does it smell like? Is it conversational? Interactive? Is it wrapped around gaming? You have to test, you have to experiment and you have to understand that you have about 20 seconds to get it right.

3) Keeping the traffic-The segue from the last sentence in #2 says it all. You have 20 seconds. For some of my friends, when they are telling me a long story and I start to lose interest, I tell them to quit circling the airport, land the plane and get to the point. Marketers and brands will need to land the plane in 2012. Remember when websites were stuffed with content because marketers and webmasters thought that’s what we wanted? Guess what? The challenge now is to do more with less and strike the balance of keeping your users happy, engaged and delivering exactly what it is that they are looking for. Keep your users focused in 2012. Be iconic, keep it simple.

4) Converting the traffic-This is the holy grail of web marketing and sales. Doing something with the people that have come to your site(s). From the dawn of the internet, the goal has always been to convert the people that come to your site into either a lead or a prospect or a sale-Either for your company or your partners. This has not changed. The challenge in 2012 will be to further understand how to utilize the social tools, sites and platforms that now exist in order to convert the passive visitor into something other than a mistaken click, a browser or a passerby. In 2012 social will continue to help deliver customers to websites, but it still falls back on you to deliver on the promise of a good customer experience. The biggest issue? Brands and marketers doing everything to get to the prom but not getting the kiss at the end of the night. Why? It will always be about the customer experience. Don’t discount the importance of search in this equation.

5) Getting the traffic to return-Repeat business, Word of mouth and increased sales, this is what it’s all about. It’s why people go into business, it’s why companies sell stuff. What’s better? The one off or the repeat customer? Why will people keep coming back to a website? Because of the initial experience. How many people give a crappy website a second chance? None. They come back to good sites that are easy to navigate, easy to understand, simple to use, that are safe, secure and trusted and they can find and get exactly what they want without much more than 2 or 3 clicks. Put yourself in the place of your customer. Search for your own product or company the way they do. Do you/they find what they are looking for? Can you be found through search and social? What is your perception of the branded web experience? What are your competitors doing? What are your favorite sites? What brands do you follow on Twitter and Facebook? There’s a reason you follow them. You need to take that mentality into 2012 when it comes to marketing and branding your web presence.

Meet your own expectations as a consumer and flip them into those of your customers.

Why Do Organizations Still Fear Social Media?

Posted on December 1, 2011 by marc meyer

You don’t know what you don’t know

Before organizations can begin to think about having or being a social brand or a social business, they have to back up and temper their opinions or notions of what they think they know. Invariably what I see when I walk into the largest of the large or the smallest of small companies, are companies struggling with 2 schools of thought: (1) That they must corral the social employee and (2) How do they control the social customer. Usually they don’t know where to focus their efforts first.

This struggle is perpetuated by fear. Why? Companies fear what they can’t control. They fear an employee that waxes on about their company in a negative manner off hours on Twitter or Facebook, or they fear the customer that complains about their company or number (2a) they fear the competition doing more with social media than they are.

Let’s take social out of the equation and think about fear for a second and how it motivates companies. Better yet, let’s think about how fear motivates us. If we’re an athlete, we train or work out to get stronger and faster in fear that we might lose. If we work for someone, we work longer hours for fear of losing our jobs. In school we study harder in fear of getting bad grades. In the food service industry we deliver faster, fresher, food in fear of not getting customers or… the customer complaining.

Stronger. Faster. Longer. Harder. Superlatives motivate us.

In life, our fears motivate us into striving above and beyond what is expected. In business, specifically social media, our fear of it is motivated by the unexpected. What’s the difference? One spurs action and the other may spur inaction. But why can’t organizations just move forward with social media? Why can’t businesses just get it going? Is it really fear? No, it’s not fear per se, it’s more about the unexpected or the unknown.

We know what the general expected outcomes are going to be if you or I work harder, or study longer or train harder. We win, we’re successful. The problem with social media is that it’s still in the stage where the majority of business leaders still don’t know what A+B+C equals. It keeps changing, it keeps getting refined and redefined. They still can’t associate a bottom line, quantitative value to it. Qualitative yes, quantitative no. Essentially, companies are still struggling with what the value of a like is and are still trying to determine what the impact of the rogue social employee might be to an organizations bottom line.

Internally, companies can incrementally become a social business, which in and of itself may be the easiest jumping off point. Baby steps that can be controlled, if you will. They should be commended for becoming or attempting to become a social brand or business, replete with that level of uncertainty. It’s OK, uncertainty exists when rolling out anything new, right?

What do companies that choose to wait and see do?

So what should these noobie freaked out, paranoid, wannabe social companies do? It’s easy. Start with creating a basic set of easy to understand and comply with social media policies. Set the bar on what the expectations will be internally for your social employees both on the clock and off the clock. Create an internal accountability plan. From that, companies can start to build a base and a foundation to create baby step, measurable social initiatives.

Keep in mind that each “social” company will be different from the next. Until these companies have use cases that uniquely apply to each of them, every instance of anything internally social, will be a precedent of some sort. In other words, you will learn from your mistakes and you will build from that.

We’re a lot further along than we were say, 5 years ago, but the fact of the matter is that because of the amoebic like nature of the social web, we can’t with certainty, predict what the outcomes will be of even the best, most thought out, best funded, social initiatives. There is just not enough data yet. So is the fear well founded? Absolutely. Should it spur us into a state of inaction? Absolutely not.