Commentary by business blog and social media consultant Josh Hallett on the use of blogs for public relations, marketing, media, communication & branding and from time-to-time the unsolicited opinion.
Earlier this week in my post about equivalencies in social media measurement I mentioned some of the core data we collect for basic tactical elements of social media programs. What does that look like? Below is an example of basic data available for the following scenario: A corporate blog post is announcing an event, in the post there are some photos and a video. Once posted, a link is shared via Twitter.
As you can see it's quite a bit of data and it needs to be collected from a number of different services. Then you can compound this with trending, that is collecting the data at different intervals during the day.
Of course, that's just the raw data. As I said previously, the value is in the analysis. More on that in the coming weeks.
At the recent PRSA T3 conference I sat on a panel discussing social media measurement and ROI with Shonali Burke. I presented some of the core things that Voce does for measurement as well as providing some real-world examples of what some of our clients look for in determining the success of a program.
One of the examples I gave was how we look at engagement with online video and compare that CPI with traditional media. During the Q&A I was asked if using the equivalency model to compare PR to advertising was the right model. Whether you like it or not you need to have some basis of comparison. With social media though, those comparisons are all over the place. You might compare elements of a program to advertising, or traditional PR, or even customer service. Going further down the rabbit hole, you look at things like: client acquisition, customer retention, employee retention, recruiting, to name just a few.
In any of the measures, the big focus is to determine which medium is performing more efficiently. It's also important to remember that all clients have different results that they value. Measurement is not a one-size-fits-all approach. However, the core data that you can track online is always the the same. It's how you analyze and compare that provides that measurement value.
Web users spend the majority of their time online NOT on your web site.
From a usability standpoint the convention was, don't do anything too 'out' there. If you break too far from the standards that users are familiar with, then you might confuse them. This applied to things like navigation and search-box locations on the page, link highlighting, information design, etc.
Now, let's apply this to social media strategies. With more users turning to each other for information via the multitude of services out there (Facebook, Twitter, etc) then the statement is also true for comms. Web users spend the majority of their time online NOT on your web site.
The graphic above illustrates the various tools available online and how an organization's web presence sits in the middle, disconnected in many ways. Sure, there are ways to integrate the traditional corporate web site with social networks and other platforms, but that's not always easy.
While it's important to reach beyond the traditional web presence, I think it's still important to have that 'home'. There are a number of reasons, but I want to focus on two that are related to relationships.
1. I Need to See Stability: While my impression of a brand may be influenced by how savvy they are with social media, I still want to see that they have a home base. I want to see their web site, is it professional or some fly-by-night operation. Think about this in real-world relationship terms. You meet a great guy/girl and you've been dating for a few weeks. Each time you say, "Let's go to your place" they change the subject. It dawns on you that you've never seen their home....and you don't even know if they have one. That doesn't exactly instill confidence in your relationship.
2. You Need a Home: How would you like to live out of a suitcase for a year, moving from location to location? If your 'home' online consisted of presences only on social networks, you might feel a bit disconnected. There's the term 'spreading yourself too thin'. It's also impossible to be everywhere at once. If you focus all your efforts on Facebook, then you're ignoring the MySpace crowd, or anybody else for that matter. Yes, I know it's hard to believe, but there are people that are not on Facebook.
As Mike argued, it's important to find that balance between communication strategies on your site, as well as off your site. The goal is to integrate the strategies and give folks a reason to come to your site. After all, your 'friends' just might want to come to your house every so often.
We're announcing some big things over at Voce today. First up is the news that we've hired the team from cnp_studio. Voce has been working with them for a while and they do some kick-ass work, so it's a no-brainer.
Second: The combined service team will be known as Voce Connect. Basically it's a team dedicated to building and running social media programs and web-based development.
Third: Over the past year, our social media team has been rocking. Today we can proudly say that we manage social media programs for clients such as Comcast, Disney, eBay, Fujitsu, Intel, Logitech, NetApp, PlayStation, VeriSign, Yahoo!, and many, many others.
For many people, Twitter is replacing their RSS readers
I agree, both on a personal level and from the client perspective. Those of us that have worked in social media for a while all have very congested RSS readers. At times, opening up Google Reader is a chore and requires a block of time in the calendar.
For personal use, Twitter is becoming the new RSS because the links are typically coming from trusted sources, i.e. your friends, or in the case of corporations, they're companies that WANT to follow.
On the business-side of things, tracking that Twitter traffic is fun. First off it shows you how much of a die-hard fan base you have. You know, the folks that click on a link within a few seconds of it being tweeted. They WANT the information. It's also interesting to see the information is spread within existing Twitter networks, as in who is influencing who. And all of this happens in real time.
As I tweeted this morning, I'm working with the folks from CNP_Studio to help organize a WordCamp in Orlando. Yes, we know the details are still slim, but we had to get the date announced for a number of scheduling reasons. More to come soon!
The first free-standing Publix store is for sale. Located on Central Ave in Winter Haven this was actually the second store, but as I said before, it was the first free-standing store in the chain (here's the first store). For the longest time the church across the street has owned the building, but it's now up for sale. (Sorry for the old/bad photo, it's all I had)
I've said for a while that Publix should buy this and restore it to the original condition from opening day, all those years ago.
The final general session of the event dealt with the topic of Federal Trade Commission guidelines and what they mean to WOM. Leading the discussion were Paul Rand, President, Zocalo Group and Tony DiResta, Attorney, Reed Smith LLP.
The new FTC guidelines have the ability to tremendously impact WOMM programs. Tony provided some background on the new proposed rules.
The FTC is making changes to the guides related to testimonials and endorsements. There are a few key points:
1. Results may vary will be a thing of the past.
2. Bloggers can be held responsible, personally liable, for failing to disclose material information.
3. Advertisers and sellers can also be held liable for the actions of the bloggers.
Why?
- There is a new FTC Chair and is pro-cosumer and has voiced concerns with self-regulation.
- The current guide was developed 35 years ago and was last updated in 1980.
- Two FTC-commissioned studies had results that concerned the FTC about testimonials and endorsements.
What the new principles mean:
- Advertisers are subject to liability for false or unsubstantiated statements made through endorsements, or failing to disclose a material connection between themselves and their endorser.
- Endorsers may also be subject to laiablity for their statements.
- The communicator of the message must be transparent and honest.
- The FTC requires substantiation or an appropriate basis for claims being made.
How is WOMMA participating?
- WOMMA has asked the FTC to make clear who is subject liability.
- WOMMA has asked the FTC to make clear what a reasonable consumer is defined as.
- WOMMA asked the FTC to reconsider requiring bloggers to request substantiation before making recommendations.
- WOMMA asked the FTC to be more specific on the role of employer liability.
Paul then took the stage and talked about the relationship between WOMMA and the FTC and how the organization is working for the industry in this time of change.
Luckily, WOMMA is viewed as a leader by the FTC in the WOM and social media space. The past ethical guidelines that have been issued by WOMMA help set the standard to date.
But how do these guidelines evolve? WOMMA has a review process that is constantly updating the guidelines as new issues surface.
One of the common complaints about social media and WOM case studies is that they're mostly consumer focused. This session was design to address that topic. Kathryn Collins, Director, Corporate Communications, Texas Instrument talked about brining WOM to the business-to-business space. Kathryn was joined by Jeff Beringer, Senior Vice President, Digital Practice Lead, GolinHarris.
Yes B2B can benefit from WOM. In TI's case, they're a unique brand. They're an 80-year-old technology firm. How can you be old and hip at the same time?
Texas Instruments invented the integrated circuit and have continued to drive innovation. A recent well-known product is DLP, the power behind the latest projectors and theater systems.
They're trying to target design engineers. They're the folks that design the products we use. However, they need to get to the engineers early though, while they're doing the initial development work to make sure they use TI products.
TI has created an Engineer to Engineer (E2E) platform. But it was built on some standard foundations.
Listen: They need to listen like engineers though. This can be surveys, behavioral research, word processes and of course analyze online conversations about TI.
They have to base their process on the standard engineering process. Planning -> Design -> Prototyping & Testing -> Production.
The internet has changed from a library to a social place. Engineers could find the information in the planning phase, but when it came to later phases, they needed interaction. Social media and WOMM now provides that platform.
Who do engineers listen to? Peers, industry media, TI employees, analysts and academia. This lets TI know who they need to influence and engage with.
Engineers are not communicators. How do you activate their own experts? TI has a conversation agent training program. They've created a cadre of on-call experts. However it's often an additional duty.
How do they use WOM? They used to do technical white papers, but that model is gone. It's more about conversation. TI looks to help shape dialogue, participate in existing conversation and drive new discussions.
To claim their place as an innovator, they often need to tell their own story. Their doing this with VOIP and power & energy. They're allowing their engineers to talk about the projects they're working on and new ideas they may have.
The next step is to find out where engineers are going and follow them there. Twitter is obviously an emerging channel. What's promising is to see their customers creating their own communities.
How do they measure success? Uptick in discussion volume about TI, accuracy of online discourse and organic search visibility.
After another amazing lunch, the general sessions picked back up with a look at Wal-Mart and their Elevenmoms program. Leading the session was John Andrews, former Emerging Media Senior Manager, Wal-Mart.
How do you get a group of moms to help evangelize Wal-Mart? John Andrews, kicked off the program with an overview of the Open Brand model. The common theme is that consumers own your brand, and the sooner you start to think about that the better.
One example he showed was the Kogi taco truck in LA. It's the epitome of a new media brand. Kogi is a start-up though. What about a larger established brand? Look at Nike, they're well known, but how do you energize a community around that brand? With their Nike + program they've done that.
Another major asset of social media is the ability to leverage social insights. The ability to mine the discussions and learn. What does your community really want? What should you build? When they started to develop the Elevenmoms program, they asked, "What should a savings community look like?"
For Wal-Mart they started with a plan, but then forget about it. Social media is very dynamic, so perhaps instead of a calculated plan, have a set of guidelines that help you down the path.
Another core component was to link all their media. However, they try to make their community the center of the traditional media elements.
Participation is also key, get as involved as you can. The large events are great, but sometimes the smaller events provide more value and engagement. It's key though to not only have the marketing folks there, but other members of their team.
Having a network of advocates are also an amazing early warning system for any issues that may flare-up online.
Finally, build a real relationship. This can take many paths, but it's important to be involved, perhaps beyond a standard business relationship.
John then turned it over to two of the moms to answer questions.
Q: What guidelines were given to you by Wal-Mart?
A: Both of the moms said there was no guidelines given to them. The only two rules they had was that any travel or product provided had to be disclosed and that they couldn't be disparaging about Wal-Mart. But to be clear, they wanted criticism, but it needed to be informative.
Q: Has the involvement with Elevenmoms brought you any celebrity or additional traffic to their blogs?
A: The moms said it has, but not in the way they expected. They're not seeing increased traffic, but it has lead to new opportunities. They did joke that their home stores don't even know who they are.
Q: How did they identify and approach the bloggers?
A. Twitter. They looked for keywords around frugality and savings. That helped them quickly identify who the leaders in the space though. They did this for three months, then started building relationships. They didn't look at the existing blogs or traffic from them.
Q: How are you identified as a part of the program on your blog?
A: There is a badge that most of them have their blog. It wasn't something that Wal-Mart did, the moms asked for it. On the other side, there is an aggregation site that collects all their content.
Q: How important is the aggregation?
A: John felt it wasn't that important. While they do try to send traffic to the mom's blogs, but it's not about traffic in that sense.
Q: Have you provided any training to the moms about transparency or how to use the social media tools?
A: None. All the moms selected had established blogs or Twitter profiles. They simply asked them to keep doing what they had been doing.
The second general session of Day 2 featured Duncan Wardle, Vice President, Global PR Integration & WDW PR, Disney Destinations talking about some recent campaigns that Disney has conducted.
Duncan started his presentation with a quick review of the changing media landscape and how the digitization of content is driving consumer choice. Mobile is another huge force, along with media snacking and social networking. All these things point to more power for consumers.
Balance all of these changes with authenticity, that is what consumers want/expect from brands. Since October this has come to the front with the recent financial crisis. People don't trust brands.
Brands talk about engagement, but what is it really? Duncan believes that the brands that will succeed will be those that work with their consumers to build products and services together. It's the standard role of talking with not talking to.
Duncan then moved into a few case studies from the past few years. First up was the Disney Dream Jobs program. Disney partnered with CareerBuilder.com to allow consumers to upload a video to apply for a 'dream' job.
For Disney it was a totally new arena. They had no idea how many videos they would receive and what the videos would could contain. The big step was of course letting go.
Disney was overwhelmed with the number of video applications they received. Duncan and the team watched all of them, eventually narrowing it down to five finalists. The finalists were posted online and consumers were allowed to vote, resulting in millions of votes. The finalists built their own marketing campaigns, driving even more traffic to the campaign. A side benefit was the number of regular job applications that Disney received. Because of this, it was the most successful recruitment effort to date.
The next project was the Walt Disney World Mom's Panel. They launched a search for some of the most passionate Disney moms. Once again the response overwhelming. They received 10,000 applications over the weekend, but turned away over 30,000 applicants. That was the one major mistake they made.
As the program evolved, the internal issue was once again giving up control of the marketing messaging. But the moms are an amazing resource. They currently can't handle the volume of questions they receive, but that's a good problem to have.
The mom's panel has helped them overcome the two largest barriers they've faced, affordability and age. That is, what is the appropriate age for a child to first visit the theme parks. The honest, open advice of the mom's helped break down this barrier.
The women that did not make the Mom's Panel became part of the Mickey Moms Club. One major step was allowing the club to select their own logo. Once again, for Disney to allow somebody outside the brand to do design and select a logo was a huge leap of faith. But, it worked.
Their work with the moms made them look at how they consume media. To help promote the new What Will You Celebrate? campaign they created a viral video campaign. The program allows consumers to create a uniquely branded video to 'celebrate' an event such as a birthday or an anniversary. These videos can then be sent to friends and relatives. This builds the standard pass-along/viral effect, spreading the video even more.
The videos has had an 85% click-thru rate and paid for itself in just over 18 hours from launch and has gone on to blow past all expectations for views and revenue.
What are Duncan's take-away questions:
Reach: How will you reach new consumers?
Control: How do you balance letting go?
Advocates: How will you leverage your biggest asset?
Content: How will content be shared?
Measurement: Is it impressions or engagement?
Success: What will success look like?
Jeben Berg, Creative Director of Cross Platforms Solutions, YouTube, Google led the next general session on how to effectively use the platforms to connect with customers.
Jeben's first point is that YouTube is not TV, so you need to think differently about it.
How big is YouTube? 81.6 million unique US visitors, over 300 million when you include international audiences. There are 15 minutes of video uploaded every 60 seconds.
YouTube's audience mirrors the online population. In other words anybody that can get online, will go to YouTube.
There are two types of videos, user and partner. User videos account for 91% of all video uploads. The remaining videos are partner videos.
The big question is how do you stay on top and stand out in such a large sea of content? Jeben says there is no single formula for success.
One of the questions that always comes up is responding to negative comments, it's about controlling the flow and interacting. The recent Dominos Pizza crisis was resolved when Dominos responded via YouTube.
Another concept is buoyancy, that is keeping your content afloat, and rising to the surface. It's a difficult task. Nike has always been very progressive with online advertising. They opened their YouTube account in 2005, and started posting right away. Now, they continue to feed the channel and cross-link their content.
Search hierarchy is this: Title, Description and the Tags.
Your content should be self contained. It should be able to live on its own. If I need to search outside the initial video to learn more or get context, then the moment is lost.
BlendTec does a great job with this. Each video tells a story in a simple, self contained way. If you stumble upon a video on another site, the story can stand by itself.
Next, be who you are. Snuggie learned this recently. They also went along with the criticism they received. By participating they continued to drive interest in their product.
Brands also need to be thick skinned. Take the criticisms and roll with them. In the end it keeps the content relevant and on top.
Choice is not an option, people expect choice. Street Fighter has been using annotations to link one video to another. A single video leads to many interactions.
One of the hottest things on YouTube is competition. By our nature we all compete, they will quickly create there own sports and events, just to achieve status.
Episodic innovation is also very successful, once you have an interested audience, continue to build upon it.
Memes are also a very powerful tool, be prepared to embrace them. A number of trends started by the Obama campaign, spilled over to pop-culture and to brands. Once again, roll with it.
The most valuable pieces of real estate are free. There are a number of YouTube users that have huge audiences, build relationships with them.
Up next is the last general session of the day followed by more breakout sessions.
After a great lunch, WOMM-U returned to the action with a general session led by David Churbuck, Vice-President of Global Web Marketing, Lenovo and John Bell.
The 2008 Bejing Olympics offered Lenovo a unique opportunity to partner with athletes to use social media to tell their stories and their experiences at the games. As a primary sponsor of the Olympics Lenovo had the right to provide gear to athletes.
Lenovo is the home team in China, so everything had to go perfectly. They were very concerned about the perception of the brand.
There were some internal objections to doing anything social at all. Once again it was the fear of losing control.
Another issue was the IOC. In the eyes of the IOC, once the torch was lit, the athletes were there to compete, not to blog. If they were blogging then they were a member of the media. Eventually these internal barriers were overcome. Lenovo then looked to work with athletes to blog from the Olympics.
Lenovo soon realized that they needed help recruiting and training athletes. Ogilvy was brought in to help with this task. They tapped their existing networks to recruit and train the athletes all over the world.
They looked to find athletes that had blogs, they were free to say what they want to. They also looked to find athletes that would not normally be in the spotlight.
Lenovo did ask athletes to include a badge identifying them as a member of the network. This allowed them to track traffic to the individual blogs.
The next step was to build an aggregation tool that pooled together content from all the athlete's blogs. This landing page was the focus of all of Lenovo's advertising efforts.
The project was in constant beta. They had the ability to quickly change technical aspects of the project without a lengthy approval process.
There were a number of roadblocks. The IOC was very strict in making sure that athletes did not post photos or video footage from the venues. There seemed to be some daily issue related this.
The blogging provided an alternative content channel for the games. Readers could follow the behind-the-scenes story from before the games to after it. As is often said with blogs and other social media tools, the humanization of the content is what makes it compelling.
One of the main lessons learned is to reach out to writers with existing blogs and aggregate the content, don't look to re-create the wheel.
After a great first general session WOMM-U moved on to NBC. Matt Allen, Senior Executive Director of Marketing, NBC.com and Sarah Hofstetter, Emerging Media & Client Strategy, 360i spoke about the holistic approach to social media. The process of getting the organization on-board, but for the right reasons.
Yes we know conversations are important, they're also messy, vibrant, measurable and sometimes can be monetized.
Don't fall into the checklist trap. We need a Facebook page, we need a Twitter program, etc. What is the broader strategy? What is the ROI? The other trap is the Bright Shiny Object Syndrome.
Matt and Sarah then went into a case study from NBC on their approach. NBC has seen great success from their digital word of mouth initiatives.
Widgets are a major part of their strategy, widgets allow people to spread NBC's content to other locations, while maintaining the NBC brand and user experience.
The widgets are also trackable, NBC can see where they're being used. They can also be monetized. NBC can provide advertising via standard ads or pre-roll on video.
There are so many platforms, but so little time. Does the platform provide value to the marketing objectives.
- Does it meet your marketing objectives?
- Does it leverage your social media arsenal?
- Does it follow best practices?
- Does it provide value to the consumer?
For NBC the major objectives were: A preferred player, site traffic and advocacy. NBC has great assets with programs like SNL. However the majority of users were going to other sites such as YouTube to watch/comment.
NBC created a unique video player and a digital word of mouth strategy to capture back this traffic and conversation.
The first step was the find their advocates. However, just because somebody is writing about a subject doesn't mean they want to be approached. With those that do want to be approached they built unique relationships with them. The process is very manual. You need a combination of PR and WOM best practices.
In a case like SNL, they need rapid, relevant outreach. NBC wants coverage on Sunday morning. If they wait, then users will upload their own clips to other services. Once again the goal is to drive the video traffic, discussion and coverage back to NBC.
Obviously a key focus is measurement. They want to measure what people are watching, when they're watching and where they are watching. The data mined allows them to make other strategic decisions. If users are engaged on a site and watching embedded video, does it make sense to advertise or build a stronger relationship.
Popularity in social media dominates PageShare on Google. In 2006, if you searched for SNL on Google, NBC wasn't even on the first page, now it's the first result.
At numerous points they map back to their four primary questions. If they're not answering those questions, they need to adjust strategy.
What are their key DWOM (Digital Word of Mouth) tactics:
- Always be transparent
- Never spam
- Authenticity is key
- Give them something to talk about
Now for a quick coffee break, before we come back to the WOMM-U action.
The first general session of WOMM-U 2009 featured Geoff Donaker, COO of Yelp. Geoff gave the audience a brief overview of what Yelp is. One on side it's a consumer search site. You're looking for a restaurant a plumber, etc. On the other side, it's a business tool. You're a restaurant owner or a plumber and you need customers. Yelp meets these needs in the middle.
Yelp currently has six million reviews, many of those in the past year. Restaurants are 31% of reviews submitted. People think of Yelp as a restaurant review site, but only 1/3 of reviews are restaurants, the rest are spread across all manner of businesses. Why are they known as a restaurant site? Because most people eat out more than they may have their car fixed.
How do they make money? Local search ads.
Obviously people are going online to do research before making a decision. This trend is accelerating.
What they're finding by analyzing the site traffic is that no reviews = no traffic. The more reviews a business has, the more traffic they get online. Major retailers are now realizing that they need to be part of this ecosystem.
What have they learned about WOM?
Geoff recently had a situation with his car, it needed repairs and at first he didn't use his own product. It resulted in a bad situation, but by going to Yelp and doing a little research, he found a mechanic that worked out perfectly. By listening to the opinions of others, Geoff found the quality service he wanted.
We all have a love/hate relationships with reviews. A carpet cleaner told Geoff some interesting stories. First, he removed all the logos from his vans since he didn't want to accidently cut off somebody in traffic, and then get a negative review.
The small business operators want such control over their personal brand. The concept of putting control in the hands of their customers is terrifying to them. In the past this carpet cleaner would spend $50,000-$100,000 in Yellow Page advertising, now he spends $0. Because of Yelp and other sites he has more business than ever. However the money he's saving from advertising, he's spending on improving customer service.
For Geoff, it's great to see consumers winning and businesses that are providing excellent service winning.
Nothing sells better than great WOM. The stories that customers provide about products and services sell much better than advertising. As a result many of the organizations that excel on Yelp are focussing more efforts on WOM and service.
WOM does require think skin though. Negative reviews sting. Yelp recently entered into their first national advertising deal with Starwood Hotels. However, in the lead-up to the deal, a Yelp user posted a scathing review of a W Hotel in Arizona. Starwood asked for it to be removed, but Yelp left it up. Geoff wondered if that would scuttle the deal, but in the end Starwood realized that the positive and negative reviews were what made Yelp the resource that it is.
With online review sites the temptation to spam is very strong. Sadly there are people that will attempt to game the system. Some do this without knowing it's wrong, while others specifically
The manufactured reputation usually backfires. A pet sitter recently asked customers to write five-star reviews on Yelp and receive a $20 discount. From Yelp's perspective this violates their terms of service. It also brings out the vigilantes. People who attempt to protect the sanctity of the system. Sometimes that retaliation
However, negative WOM can be good for business. A local coffee shop that was VERY serious about their product received a 1-star rating. The reviewer felt the coffee shop was a bit too serious about the product. The coffee shop took that review and ran with it. It became a focal point of their marketing efforts. Yes they were serious about coffee and proud of it. That negative review was quickly turned to a positive.
It's worth engaging your vocal critics. Geoff showed a clip from a local wine shop owner. He said that whenever he contacts a negative reviewer and interacts with them, the review changes from negative to positive. Some of his best customers now are individuals that once left negative reviews.
Geoff's closing thoughts: The genie is out of the bottle, you're better off joining the conversation than not, choose your ambassador(s) carefully.
No break between the first two sessions, we're on to the next presentation.
Tomorrow afternoon I head down to Miami, specifically South Beach for the latest edition of WOMM-U. For the acronym-challenged, that's Word of Mouth Marketing University.
I'll be doing some blogging and some picture taking. Are you going to be there?
The newbies to the social media world love to talk, even if they have nothing to talk about. They tweet all day, go to tweet-ups and then talk and tweet some more. They love to tell you all about what they're doing, and sometimes all the things they're doing for their clients or at work.
Recently I was at an event and ran into one of these folks. I knew they worked for a competitive interest, they didn't really know who I was, and never bothered to ask, they wanted to do all the talking. I asked, "So what are you working on that's interesting?" This person then spelled out in some detail exactly what they were working on, great intel for me.
Like I said, they really didn't care who I was and never asked who I worked for (or with). They were just happy to be able to talk and show off their 'social media savvy'.
I understand we're all proud about what we do, and sometimes we can't wait to tell the world, but remember folks sharing isn't always the best idea. Especially at events where you don't know the people.
We always talk about the value of listening, but it's just as important to know who is listening to us.
A few large projects I've been working on recently have involved quite a bit of documentation and what's usually referred to as 'process'. A number of years ago when I was doing solo-consulting work on social media I'd look at process and say, ack....forget process, just do it. However, when working with large brands, process becomes part of the daily routine. I'm still a firm believer in learn-by-doing, but sometime process is necessary, and a good idea.
The documentation and process I'm referring to goes well beyond your standard strategy document. It's the strategy, the playbook, the scenarios and the rules all wrapped into one.
If you're a small company and you control the shots, then sure, go ahead and do what you want, when you want...and perhaps think about measurement later on. In large organizations when a social media program spans business units and countries you need to have process in place. Why? Well here are a few basic reasons:
Internal Education: Yep, it's the standard line of, 'making sure everybody's on the same page'. It seems that weekly a new division within an organization says they want to start up a social aspect to their pr/marketing/customer service, etc. They all want to know the same thing, "How are you currently doing it?" They want documentation, best practices, cheat sheets. By documenting all aspects of the existing programs it allows you to quickly hand that off. Otherwise you'll be on countless calls each week reviewing this information verbally, and losing focus on your current programs.
Management Education: This is related to the first one. Basically, one day management a few rungs above you calls down and says, "Hey, what are you doing?" Being able to quickly send off that detailed documentation lets management know you're on it, and once again allows you to quickly get back to work.
Internal Detractors: In any corporation there are always people that don't think the organization should be involved with social media. Typically they have one or two objections, it might be legal, it might be image, it could be cost. Having documentation on how you specifically plan to address these issues helps to diffuse those discussions.
Consistent Experience: As users visit the various forums and blogs run by your organization are things like the sign-in and account admin process uniform? Do they need a separate login or avatar for each site or can they use a single-sign-on? Are the moderation guidelines consistent? For example is one blog a bit more lax in banning certain language than another? If so, you'll find the trolls gravitating there.
Measurement: This is usually one of the first questions management that is outside your program will ask. Don't stumble on this answer, simply say you've thought that through and provide all the methodology on how you'll measure the program and provide some sample reports. You can also look to established processes for measurement to integrate into your program, or provide a baseline for comparison.
Enforcement: An employee is doing something improper on a social network. What? You name it: Tweeting sensitive information, pretending to be somebody else, etc. They need to be disciplined in some way, but why and how? Does the organization have a social networking policy for employees? Besides the piece of paper, have they been trained on what is right and what is wrong? In the majority of cases I've seen, employees aren't doing things out of malice, they simply didn't know that what they were doing was wrong. In any large organization if you mention discipline or termination to any HR department the first things they'll ask for is the rules or policies that have been broken and then documentation of the offenses. Do you have that?
These are just a few major reasons, but there are others.
