Social Media conundrum #714. Are relationships campaigns?

Posted on August 24, 2009 by marc meyer

Maybe some of you are missing the point.

I think some of you are thinking that social media is this:

If you build it…blah, blah, blah…

But if we look at the offline equivalent of online relationships, you wouldn’t do this.

Waiting for the phone to ring?

The same holds true online and in social media. Whether you are connecting or you are creating, or you are immersing yourself in culture. It takes work. It takes a leap of faith and it takes a belief that it’s all worth it. And once it starts, it doesn’t stop.

But decide right now. Whether you are a company or a small business owner or an individual. What is your commitment going to be? And, what do you want to get out of it? We all have a notion of what we want to get out of any engagement. Social media is no exception. Beth Harte has put together a wonderful Slideshare of this thought which she presented to a packed room at Social South this past week. Essentially saying, social media requires planning and measurement.

But couldn’t you say that about relationships? You don’t enter into a relationship blindly, and you certainly have expected or anticipated outcomes of your involvement and committment to that relationship. Right? Look at Slide #13 of Jason Falls presentation on The Marketing of Unmarketing and see if you can figure out what these people are referring to.

Once people get past the…

“You had me at hello”…

It’s time to roll up your sleeves and understand that social media and the realtionships YOU will create are not a campaign. But you knew that right?

Social Media Saturation Yes, Maturation No.

Posted on August 19, 2009 by marc meyer

Not another post about social media…Yes and no, but indulge me.

Yesterday Jason Breed of Neighborhood America and I were talking about elevating our game with hashtagsocialmedia in the same fashion that #Journchat tried to do Monday night on Twitter. Journchat, if you were not aware, hosted some live sessions in a number of cities that coincided with their regularly scheduled Monday night session. It worked to a certain a degree if not for the sake of trying. They get props for trying to raise their game.

Meanwhile, I had been expressing to Jason that I would like to see that eventually happen with Hashtag Social Media as well-namely some type of larger more event like type of setting for #socialmedia; and it was then that Jason brought up a seriously major point.

“What could we say or do that people have not already heard countless times?”

Which led me to pause, reflect and nod my head in agreement. I think he’s right. Has social media or the writing and talking about social media reached a level of saturation? In my opinion yes. But with a caveat. Yes, for those of us on the front lines and in the bubble. What more can we read and or write about that has not already been said? What power list have we not seen? What 10 sure fire ways to do something in social media have we not bookmarked, read or saved a half dozen times? How many blog posts about social media measurement have resonated with you? Whose Venn diagram have you saved and shared with your colleagues? How many slideshares about social media have you embedded?

Saturation yes. Maturation no.

After Jason and I agreed that though much has been said and repeated about social media, we both then agreed that there is still much, much more to learn, share, and expound upon. If we were to look at the Gartner Hype Cycle for example or even just your traditional bell curve, and we were to determine where social media, holistically speaking, was located on the curve, we would both say we had not even come close to critical mass.

Why?

Before you can run you have to walk. before you can walk you have to crawl. The history of social media is but a mere blip on the radar that is social computing, networks and clouds. Its a starting point that we have to get beyond. Let’s quit spinning our wheels about what it is and get to, “What it can do and how”.

We can all continue to write about things that we have all read countless times in different forms, and then we can slap each other’s backs and share it amongst ourselves. or we can step beyond that monotone and truly start to think about social media on business levels and use levels and not adoption levels. Am I wrong or am I just too close to the subject?

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The Humanity of Online Social Networks Offline.

Posted on August 17, 2009 by marc meyer

Call it the missing link, no pun intended, but after spending 2 days at Universal Studios in Orlando, and watching the mass of humanity at play, I was able to see a cross section of society that one is not afforded in the online world no matter how deep one is into it.

But one tends to think (or rather I start to think) how this crowd source spends its time online and in social networks-if at all. Yet, there were so many similarities between what occurs in an online social network and what I saw, that I just had to share 10 of them with you.

#1 What recession? With waits ranging from 2 hours to 15 minutes, The 2 theme parks we attended were not hurting for customers. $12 dollars to park and no less than $60-$75 per person to get in. Think of Universal Studios as this massive social network, and in a sense it is. But no walls and no silos. The point being- If people want it, they will pay for it and they will wait for it, they will walk miles for it, and they will suffer in the heat for it.

#2 People of all ethnic backgrounds, shapes, sizes, ages and color can some and be welcomed without judgment. Truly a melting pot, both literally and figuratively. A social network where anyone could come in and be themselves with others…Hmmm…

#3 People like to show their individuality, their uniqueness and their affinity to products, teams, people, brands, looks and passions. Their “niche” was in attendance and the park was their platform. This included tattoos, team jerseys, devotion to designers, bands and brands from head to toe, and everything in between. I could have easily segmented everyone there into specific groups, all with healthy memberships.

#4 Everyone was in a fishbowl. I watched, they watched, we watched. From people eating like pigs, parents shouting at children, couples young and old making out, people in wheelchairs, people in scooters, people who didn’t need to be in scooters, folks trying to scam to the front of lines, people not understanding directions, rules or each other, people helping each other with pictures, others letting others in front of them in lines, extreme acts of kindness and of course mean people. What’s my point? Everything and anything was there to be seen. I didn’t have to look too hard. Sound familiar?

#5 I saw zero tie in anywhere with any type of current social network-which led me to wondering…

#6 How much of this demographic was engaged online via a social network? My initial thought was less than 30% of the total attendees. They just didn’t seem to be the types. Maybe I am way off on this. I did see the potential, just based on the number of digital cameras present, that photo sharing would seem to make the most sense in tying in the activities within the theme parks into sites like Flickr or Facebook. Kodak are you reading this?

#7 Zero tie in with SMS-This was glaring and seemed to have a huge upside as well as potential for either integrating with buying food or a Fast Pass or perhaps park, ride, wait, and show information. 95% of the people there had mobile devices. How was that leveraged?

#8 Tremendous potential to make the experience better for its most important asset, the people that shell out hundreds of dollars per day to attend. It can be even better but I think a certain aspect of smugness permeates the overall park experience for the sake of printing money. In other words, “We have a hot property, so though the experience could be better, we don’t need to really worry about it…”

#9 Some attractions had zero intuitiveness and thus getting lost even with the map was an issue. Directions were an issue. Assumptions in the capabilities of the attendees were perhaps over estimated. Hard to change? hard to upgrade? Hard to improve upon?

#10 Technology played a part in the design of each and every ride there to enhance the experience and the destination, but technology could be used even more effectively to enhance the journey all along the way.

My thoughts are this. What makes online social networks work is the individuality, yet the common thread that all people possess. This is obviously the key, or can be the key offline too. The struggle in both scenarios for marketers is trying to tap into that. The struggle for managers is how to deftly address the wants, needs and desires of every segment. The key might be right in the middle of the crowd. The crowd…It’ s in the crowd.

Note* Perhaps one way for us to reduce healthcare costs might be for Universal Studios to quit serving up the Western Diet to so many who obviously indulge in this far too often. More than 40% if not more who were at the park, were overweight..

Does the tail wag the dog?

Posted on August 13, 2009 by marc meyer

I often wonder who calls the shots. Some how the older I get the more important that is to me. I like leadership. I also believe in followers too. There’s nothing wrong with people following. Thought leadership? I like that term too. People that push the envelope of thinking in marketing, social media and technology are leaders.

I love “what if” questions too.

But in social media, though leadership is needed and is important, except that it’s the crowd that steers the ship. The mob dictates. Viral determines. On Youtube, sensationalism seems to rule. Humor dominates. Getting hurt drives traffic. Perez Hilton is a must read. Jason Calacanis and Michael Arrington shift the tide. Why is that? No longer does big media/ mass media call the shots. The fourth estate is and was the dog and yet it no longer wags its own tail. The user calls the shots. The tail wags the dog.

That isn’t such a bad thing except…

Our thirst and their thirst too, is now satiated by the envelope that was once here and now is here…

Which begs the question, “Where will this put us in 5 years?” I’m not afraid of the tech aspect of that question. That is exciting. I’m just wondering where the standards and where our ethics, morals and norms will be in that time. The more that UGC( user generated content) explodes on the scene and continues to permeate every pore of our online being, the more desensitized we become, which means, we’ll want more. Our expectations and our needs become greater. Almost to the extent that even governing bodies might start letting down their guard.

Face it, we’re becoming UGC users and junkies; and where our fix comes from next (the technology) is not as important as how strong the next fix will need to be just to function or satisfy our demand.

There’s not a thing we can do about it either.

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17 things that a social media consultant, agency or customer can’t do for you.

Posted on August 12, 2009 by marc meyer

This started as a post that was born out of frustration. After about 4 rewrites, I have softened it enough that it now speaks as a document that the client, the consultant and the agency can speak to when they begin talking to each other. I have not even covered strategy, objectives, scope or expectations, but at least we have a starting point.

This is not meant to be snarky, ok maybe a little, but it is meant to be somewhat of a cautionary post as well. Part of it being that I have made most of the mistakes myself. I’ve learned from them and yet, I still make them, because what I am still learning is that no two clients are alike. The dynamics are not called the dynamics for nothing! Feel free to add to them as well.

A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to “do a blog”.-Just because they want you to do it, doesn’t mean you can. It’s not right for every business but let’s say it is. You just might not have been built for it. That’s not a bad thing, it’s just that the assumption can’t be made that everyone is capable of writing a compelling blog with compelling content.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to do “social media”. You don’t do social media. If you’re an SMB or department head and you hear that, look at your phone and say you have to take this call..
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to write for SEO, the User, AND for Social. It’s not easy, it’s time intensive, and not for the faint of heart and probably not in their DNA. Though it is a great quality to possess. If they are asking or expecting you to, be afraid, be very afraid.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to understand the relationship between search and social. Why? It’s an art as much as it is science and to be honest, why should they? It’s not what they do! Should you take the time to at least understand the dynamics? Yes.
A social media consultant or agency can’t, won’t, or might not teach you to understand when it’s appropriate to not to do something with social media. Why? It’s not in their best interests. What you might not hear is that some aspects of social media are just not right for every business. Let’s not jam round pegs into square holes just for the sake of getting the business. As a decision maker always ask why. It’s you’re right. Which leads to #6.
A social media consultant or agency won’t teach you to understand the why. Why? Because they don’t really care about theory, they might not get it, nor do they want to spend time educating you. You need to take the time yourself to understand the why. Preferably before they come calling. Make them squirm. Dazzle them with your knowledge.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to know when not to pimp your stuff. Why? Because if you think it’s the right thing to do and you’re a traditional marketer, chances are, you’re going to do it anyway. Like the analogy of the actor who thinks he always has to be “on” when he’s in public. You don’t always have to pimp your stuff.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to be yourself. They can tell you, they just can’t teach you. You will figure out that being authentic goes a lot further than #7.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to have real conversations. You know the difference, really…you do! You have them at the dinner table every night. That’s real.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to have real online conversations that result in business. Slightly different from #7 but no less impactful or important. The gist being that you can’t force the action.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to not be disingenuous. You’ll find out real quick how this one works. It’s generally when you learn what the word flame means in the online world and the only voice you hear is youw own.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to not be overt and blatant with your marketing message. Why? You’ll think that it’s the right thing to do to, until you see otherwise. See #10
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to have your “ah-ha” moment, you’ll know when it happens. You will have it. Though they may have the skills to set up a moment for you, they’re more fun when you have them on your own time.
Agencies can’t teach patience and perseverance- they don’t care. That’s not their business model. Though that is a cornerstone element of social media.
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to want it- if you don’t want it, then you won’t want it…this speaks to #17
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you to write FBML why? Because chances are they don’t know what it is. They will just outsource it
A social media consultant or agency can’t teach you how to “be social”…You just have to try.

Hopefully you can’t take these nuggets for what they are-lessons learned.

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10 social sites I bookmarked last week and why.

Posted on August 10, 2009 by marc meyer

Yes there are lots of websites and blogs to read; and for that reason a lot of times I bookmark them and hope to get back to them later. There’s a method to my bookmarking and it usually revolves around learning. I’m an infofreak and my thoughts are that I need to share more of this these bookmarks. So here goe…

Disclaimer* None of these companies paid me to do this and these are not in any kind of order.

1) Objectivemarketer seemed like an interesting site, though the description was ambigiuous but certainly worth trying out.

2) Evernote– Ive been meaning to check this out I just haven’t pulled the trigger on it. Anything that simplifies, I’m all for.

3) Lazyfeed– this seems pretty cool and is exactly what you might think. It’s a real time feed of topics that Lazfeed finds, sortable, searchable, findable, realtime monitoring. I believe its in beta, follow them On Twitter for a reg. code.

4) The Spinks Blog Not that David needs any help but he has an interesting read here and glad I finally went over to see what he had to say.

5) Eventful Find share and promote events- This could be a useful site. The jury is still out though.

6) Hubpages Still checking this one out too-Publish online with easy to use, non-techie tools

7) The ultimate list of basic SEO resources– This is pretty self explanatory no?

8) What the fuck is social media one year later- this slide deck is a follow up by Marta Kagan from her immensely popular first deck on the same subject. Great to read and share, lots of useful stats.

9) The Ultimate list of Twitter tools Ignore the annoying popup and check this list. You never know what you might not know.

10) Why social media marketing fails This is really good, listen to the audio podcast featuring Peter Kim , Jeremiah Owyang and Charlene Li.

I love The filter aspect of Twitter and believe it or not, a lot of these originated from tweets. I just amassed them into an uber tweet for you 🙂

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Don’t be a Social Media Dick…

Posted on August 6, 2009 by marc meyer

Wanna know something great about social media? If you’re a dick (in the slang sense), eventually people will know it. Why? Because of the transparent nature of the platforms and its associated tools. You see, if you hang yourself out there far enough, your personality starts to show. Take Twitter for example. If you Tweet long enough, patterns start to form. Just like in grade school, high school and college and at your work. You start to see the personalities of the people that you “hang with” every day.

I used to say and still do, that you can determine the true personality of someone by how they carry themselves in sports. Be it on the basketball court, the golf course, a pick up game, anything. If you act like a jerk, then it will show. If you bust your ass, people notice. if you’re a team first type of person, people notice. If you’re a dick, people notice. Well guess what? The same holds true in social media.

Here’s the thing though. In this uber networked world we now live in. You really don’t want the tag of being “the dick”, or even “that bitch”, for that matter. No one wants to work with those types of people, no one wants to hang with those types of people and no one certainly wants to hire or refer that kind of person.

For those that might be the aformentioned, It’s not about trying not to please everyone either; and it’s not about being hard or cool or contrarian. Or trying to have this badass persona. You don’t have to. it’s boring and childish. It’s about being real. and being a realist. Look, we’re all scratching and clawing for the same things here, but if I felt the need to write this, well then you can pretty much figure out that something must be awry.

There’s a term that we should all strive for and one that I think is the ultimate compliment that can be given to someone. If someone says that you are “good people”, consider it the equivalent of being knighted. For someone to say that you are “good people” means that you treat people fairly, you’re generally nice to everyone, and everyone is on equal footing with you and vice versa. It doesn’t get any better than that. It doesn’t mean that you can’t have your moments, we all have them. But for the most part, you’re a solid citizen. In this case, the offline world can and should mirror the online world.

In social media, you can tell pretty quickly and pretty easily who the good people are. Even more so, you can eventually tell who the dicks are. Don’t be one.

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When the social media relationship ends…

Posted on August 4, 2009 by marc meyer

In my previous post about nurturing relationships, I was skewered a bit for not really pinning down the how’s and why’s as much as I was alluding to going out and just doing it. Ok, I get that. perhaps another post is in order in which I suggest specific tools on how to nurture a relationship via social networking. But in the meantime, I wanted to tell you a quick and true story about what happens when the relationship goes bad in social networks.

It goes like this

About 4 years ago I had created an online community to support the sales and marketing efforts of a CPG. Why did I create it? Initially I thought it just made sense to put up a KB with some bells and whistles, but it quickly became evident that something larger was needed just because of the amount of emails and feedback we were getting. I’d like to claim it was some great epiphany but no, it just made sense. So the community was born. 5000 members strong.

Mistakes are made

I decided to manage it. You’ll be pleased to know that I was not transparent and I hid behind a cleverly stupid name. Mistake #1.

Mistake #2, though we had created a rules and regulations, TOS, policies page, I did not adhere to enforcing them. I would capitulate time and time again in my efforts to make everyone happy. Lesson #1/Mistake #2, You cannot possibly make everyone happy as a community manager.

As I kept my distance from the community and only appeared on an as needed basis, my stature took on the persona of something that resembled the all powerful and mighty Oz. I would come in periodically, settle a dispute swiftly, siding with the person who I didn’t want to piss off and away I would go. Further alienating people as I went. Mistake #3 Not abiding by the TOS, having little or no affinity to the members of the community, and essentially being completely out of touch with the nuances of the community.

To alleviate this headache, I appointed 3 moderators to buffer the criticism. The problem was I gave them too much power and they instituted their own brand of vigilante justice. Mistake #4 I was now playing favorites and siding with the moderators who may not have had the best interests of the community at hand, since they were not being paid and were merely the “appointed” brand champions of the community.

Mistake #5 Instead of reasoning and understanding and trying to empathize with the passionate members of the community, I would throw down the swift hand of justice. I would warn members and then subsequently kick them out. Some got second and third chances, others did not.

When the social network relationship goes really bad.

Instance #1 The person I kicked out, did a blog post on how he would like to kick my ass and kill me. Now this person did have some issues but instead of me trying to reason with this person, who was by the way, a brand champion- I kicked them out. This person was a very very popular member of the group and once gone, weakened the core group of passionate users and brand champions. Mistake #6 I didn’t realize how important this person was until they were gone.

Instance #2 Another brand champion was just a bit too busy on the site. Always emailing me, IM’ing me with suggestions, how to’s, criticism, you name it. I took it all in stride but he was always seeing how far he could push things in regards to what he would do for the sake of the group and to his page within the site. I found myself always having to check his page, his comments, his posts, and his avatar to see if he was behaving. I was also periodically geting complaints about him from other members, as well as the mods. Which then meant that I had to talk to him and tell him to chill. It was getting old.

I had warned him on numerous occasions and he would comply and behave for a bit, but not for long. The last straw was him dropping some code on some of his pages which locked down the site for quite some time. That was it. He had to go. So I kicked him out.

From bad to worse

Did he go quietly? No.In short order he did the following: He found every social site that I was a part of and did everything in his power to make my life miserable. He either trashed me, the site, or the product. When he wasn’t doing that, he was creating multiple and I mean multiple personas, and coming back into the community, and proceeding to again, trash me, the product, the company and anything else he could think of to disrupt the site. It was a community nightmare to the nth degree.

So what did I do? I tried to follow behind him and clean the mess up, but that proved virtually impossible. So I did the only thing I could do. I reached out to him and brought back into the community, back into the fold. Why? Because it was easier to “manage him” within the community rather than outside of it. It was a very unpopular decision. Mistake #7 The best move turned out to be the worst moved followed by an even worse move.

By now, most people had had enough and to be honest, at this point, things were starting to die down. The brand champions were moving on, the passion was waning, and there was nothing really happening at the corporate level-that was keeping people involved and engaged in the community.

Lessons learned

So yes, in a sense, the moderators and the administrators certainly didn’t help things. Nor did we learn from our mistakes or adapt from them. But on a larger level, the community life-cycle, the people that made the community thrive, and the site as a whole, were diminishing, either by my actions or just the natural progression of things. Could it have been prevented? Hard to say. The easy answer is yes, but how long would that have prolonged the shelf life? Relationships begin and end and begin again, all the time. In some cases it just wasn’t meant to be and in others it is. In this one, there are valuable lessons everywhere, you just have to know how to look, and not necessarily where.

My point is this. All of our social relationships right now are thriving in one way or another but for how long? The natural progression of things dictates that most of them will flame out. At that point what is left? What do we have for the effort? Your takeaway? Understand the value of purpose before the relationship begins in earnest knowing that there is the distinct possibility that the relationship will end.

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How to nurture conversations in social media

Posted on August 3, 2009 by marc meyer

In social media, social networking and in this web 2.0 world, there is one thing that is and must remain consistent. That is the art of conversation. In order for it to “work”. Conversations have to ensue, they have to abound, and they have to be maintained. Beyond “just” having a conversation, there has to be a beginning, a middle and an end. Or a purpose, right? What social media has really done has created the means to have conversations in ways that 10 years ago we could only imagine. But beyond the means, you now know so much more about the person you are now having a conversation with. And if you don’t know that much about that person, you now have the ability to find out, rather quickly too.

There’s the old school version of communicating

And there’s the new school.

But neither works if you don’t adopt the mode of give and take or… serve, receive, and volley..

Sorta like…

In social media, you can serve and hit against the backboard all you want, but you will never get anything out of that except becoming adept at repetition. In other words, you can create social network profiles on all of the hot social networks, and you can write really great blog posts, but if you don’t take the time to go out and share you, your personality and your content with people that have similar interests and tastes, it will die on the vine. Learn how to share your content. Social Poster is a great place to start, but beyond that you need to decide where you and your interests fit in.

Here’s the best example I can think of.

When you first go into Facebook it’s just one big funnel. But eventually most of you find your way, your groups, your peeps, or your tribes. But once you do, joining doesn’t guarantee anything.

Here’s another example.

Penn Station in New York to the outsider can seem incredibly confusing. But really, it’s pretty efficient. What it does is that it funnels and routes people from the suburbs into the city and back again. Like Facebook, each person from their distinct city, town, and neighborhood at the beginning and end of the day can find their way out of town and back home and vice-versa again at Penn station. With a little research, some directions, some effort, and some help, someone can walk off the street and get to the neighborhood, town, suburb or city that they need to get to in the surrounding New York/New Jersey area.

With a little research, some directions, some effort, and some help…you can get where you need or want to go.

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10 Blended Social Media Marketing Strategies A Company Might Want To Consider

Posted on July 29, 2009 by marc meyer

We have been talking a lot lately about… talking. When we should be doing a lot more… doing. So the thought for this post, interestingly enough, bubbled up from a client request, that I should supply a document that mapped out the ways that you can blend social media into your marketing mix. So what I’ve done is supplied the tool or the platform, how I used it, what was the time suck and what were the results. Hopefully this will shed a little light on what the heck we’re doing and why we talk about it so much. Keep in mind one thing though- I do not get into the number of hours I put into meetings, documents, strategy docs, client objectives, client objections, proposals, pitches, the number of clients I pitched, the number of proposals rejected, the number of times I’ve been told that it doesn’t work, the number of times there is no response and the number of times I’ve educated the client and then have had them put into action on their own, what I have told them they need to do and why they should use us…So this is also for them. If you’re going to do it, at least do it with some knowledge of what you’re doing!

1) Twitter. You’ve heard of Twitter but why use it? Twitter helps you monitor conversations about anything that might be relevant to you and your company. You don’t even have to actively participate to monitor it.

Time suck rating: Depending on how much you want to monitor and participate. Give it a rating of 5/10

Use case: Created structured conversations around hashtag to create community, market under the radar, build credibility and lead source. Monitor clients,products,industry,city,state,region. Ex: hashtagsocialmedia.com

2) Search is not going away soon. Universal search is looming larger and larger by the day. Universal search blends listings from news, video, images, local and book search engines as well as social media elements compiled from Twitter, LinkedIn, Flickr, and YouTube. By understanding the value of Search and it how it plays into the overall strategy of your company and it’s goals and objectives, the better you will understand the importance of having more than just a “cup of coffee” type of presence with each of the above listed elements and sites. There is such a direct correlation between search and everything that people do on a day to day basis that to underestimate or devalue it is a grave mistake.

Time suck rating: Extensive. 9/10

Use case: Created reputation management program built on all elements of search using Flickr micro-websites, robust white hat SEO tactics and product specific blog sites. Results were reduction in negative websites and mentions. Increase in traffic and visibility.

3) Social Bookmarking– In recent years, social bookmarking has become more sophisticated, somewhat diminished and yet no less important. Important to what? Social bookmarking adds a great deal of efficiency to your searches-That’s right, SEARCH, for useful information on the web. That information will be about you and your company. Not only are resources easier to find, but your company is easier to find as well. This means additional promotional opportunities for you and your brand by being able to better target people who will be interested in what your company is about. Example sites of Social bookmarking are Digg and StumbleUpon and Delcio.us

Time suck rating: Not bad 3/10

Use case: Created corporate profiles on the top social bookmarking sites, seeded each site every day with a new blog post or link revolving around relevant product, service, company, or industry. Resulting in hundreds of links, tags and bookmarks relating back to corporate and product. Results were seen in less than 6 months in the SERPS.

4) YouTube-Video is permeating our lives. It had been for awhile, but we just didn’t call it video, we called it TV or we called it,”the movies”. Today we call it online video. You don’t have to look farther than YouTube, and Hulu to see the value of it. But did you know how much video is tied into search? That’s right we’re back to search again. As another channel to push out content you’ve created, which search engines love, to tag that content, which search engines devour, and to find ways for others to take your content and embed it on their sites perhaps, means that video is a perfect vehicle to take your message further than any other content that you might have, short of a widget. What does it require? A $30 webcam and some creativity. The payoff? The chance that your content can go viral. Example: Musician hoping to get a million views in one year of his music video appeal to United airlines about his damaged guitar-gets 4.5 million in less than a month.

Time suck rating: Pretty easy 4.5/10

Use case: Created and embedded Youtube videos on client site and blog with relevant tags and keywords resulting in continuous and steady traffic every day to blog site. Blog site links back to product site resulting in sales growth of 11% directly attributable to video.

5) Flickr– We all have cameras embedded in our phones now right? Digital cameras are dirt cheap and you have products, employees, conferences, meetings and content just waiting to be tagged and… searched upon. Understand this, “every digitized element that you have in house, now has the potential to be searched upon”!. What makes that point more important and relevant, is that there are now more social sites than ever before to accommodate and house those elements. For what it’s worth, and or until the top SE’s change their algorithm, there is a very strong tie between search and social networks. Which means that your Flickr photos and their associated tags, will show up in image searches as well in some standard searches. What does this mean to you? A chance to push out more content about you and your company…Again. Requirements? Your ability to understand the upload function of social sites and how to manipulate and tag your pics.

Time suck rating: Nominal 5/10

Use Case: Created Flickr product accounts for CPG’s with relevant tags and keywords all pointing back to product/e-commerce page as well as to customer forum; and additionally corp. blog site. Results were direct and indirect traffic, as well as image sharing requests with requisite track backs to product and growth in the SERP’s.

6) Facebook– Facebook cannot be ignored. Does this mean that it becomes the primary focus of your organization? Not necessarily. But Facebook fan pages are a great way to market to people that are not registered with Facebook. Which means that fan pages are indexable. i.e. show up in search! The difference between fan pages and group pages are that with fan pages they are, for the most part, better for a long-term engagement with your fans, brand champions, and customers because the barrier for entry is low and the ability to push out information is real time and quick and easy to manage. Group pages are generally better for attracting quick attention but can be tough to sustain, though group members have the potential to become recruiters of the group site and can take it viral quick.. The requirements? Some type of comfort level of the tools, bells, whistles and apps available for the administrators; as well as and this important to note: The Privacy settings. FYI read them and understand them.

Time suck rating: Above average 6.5/10

Use case: Created fan page and group page sites for CPG, and Twitter site, which resulted in ongoing growing list of targeted brand champions, evangelists and new customers, as well as placeholder for announcements, offers and polling and 2-way messaging.

7) LinkedIn– Personally speaking, not only should each person within yours or any organization have a Linkedin profile, but even from a professional standpoint as well. What can you do with Linkedin? You can, in short order, join thousands of groups and associations, ask and answer questions associated with you and what your company does, create your own group or organization, find people and groups that do what you and your company do, and link to them and research the people or company that you are getting ready to hire or work with. If they are not on Linkedin. It is now an immediate red flag. The requirements: A little time to set up.

Time suck rating: Below average 3/10

Use case: Created interactive Q and A series resulting in corporate branding exposure, development of database of contacts, companies and potential partners. Also created Linkedin group resulting in over 300+ contacts.

8) Blogs– Don’t think their importance is diminishing just because of the advent of micro-blogs. They are still very relevant, very link friendly and can be integral to the success of some organizations. As well, they are not just place holders for the written word. They can now hold video, audio, podcasts, images, widgets and more.

Time suck rating: Blogging can be somewhat time intensive if the intent is to create another relevant, visible, and valuable vehicle for your message: 7/10

Use case: Created multiple corporate blogs to create 2 way conversation between customers and company, push down negative press and improve a tarnished corporate image as well as criticism stemming from negative public sentiment. Also created CPG blog to support product launches, latest consumer information as well as provide tips, links and resources to consumers and tire kickers.

9) Microsite development– Developing small relevant websites that revolve around your products, your company and your keywords is a great way to drive links, push out content and otherwise add to the search results for your product or company. They don’t need to be robust. They can be text heavy, link heavy or even video heavy, but creating content laden sites is a way to not only you’re your main site, but also as a way to amplify your message. If you are adept at HTML or if you prefer to use a CMS to fire up your micro-sites, either way is effective.

Time suck rating: Fairly laborious on the front end 7/10

Use case: Able to create multiple micro-sites for multiple clients resulting in positive search results, reputation management success and increased product and customer awareness as well as positive SERP results.

Note: Short of coining a new phrase I decided to call this blurb “macroblogging.” Twitter is called microblogging and the next step up would be these next 2 sites. Tumblr and Posterous. These 2 platforms are redefining what it means to blog. What these 2 sites/platforms are providing is a more, if that is possible, streamlined way to push out content to the masses in lieu of using a traditional blogging platform like wordpress or typepad. The upside? You guess it, search. They are simple to fire up and easy to Market, share and build. I have not yet used them extensively to provide a use case.

10) Community development- A number of years ago I started an online community to support a very popular consumer product at the time. To me it just made sense from a communication standpoint. It also made sense because we had a built in sounding board for new product releases, customer support and polls. Not only was the community an immediate success, it gave us insight into our typical customer’s mindset. We were able to test and float ideas before we took products to market. For the people of the community, all who were very passionate about the product, it gave them a place to hang out and bond. I’m not saying all products have that potential but there are numerous ways to create online communities around your brand champions and evangelists and customer service initiatives. They can be done via Facebook groups, Ning, Groupsite, Google groups and half a dozen template based sites.

Time suck rating: Can get labor intensive 8.5/10

Use case: Built, managed and recruited online community to support CPG. At its peak, it had 5,000 members contributing hundreds of posts and comments per day.

So as you can see from this list, these are only 10 scenarios of what has worked for me. There are other smaller examples that I have employed with a minor degree of marketing and branding success from podcasting, creating a nationally recognized personal blog, co-authoring a book, creating successful email campaigns, and personally building close to a 100 web sites. But let me reiterate This is what has worked and works for me when working with clients. I am comfortable with these 10 activities and their associated tools. I know there are more, and I’m learning more as I go, but I thought I should share what has worked for me so that others might learn as well. If you want to specifically explain how to do it, let me know and we’ll go from there!

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