Archive for the ‘social media’ Category

No “Easy” Button When It Comes to Social Media

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010

by Tyra Haag

Each weekday, PRSA Issues and Trends, an online publication of the Public Relations Society of America, reports top industry news related to the field of PR along with current events, professional development opportunities and job resources — just to name a few. 

Since subscribing to this national e-newsletter listserv, I’ve noticed a clear trend—it seems more than 50 percent of the top industry news stories revolve around social media, its impact on the field, controversies surrounding it and best practices.

One such news story led me to Willis Wee’s recent blog post on 30 Social Media Business Case Studies. He compiled 30 business case studies (good and bad) during the past year and how each utilized social media platforms to achieve their goals.

For non-profits, social media platforms have the potential to increase not only brand awareness but also the bottom line if utilized strategically.

How Non-Profits are Using Social Media for Real Results details how non-profit leaders from around the country are using social media to achieve business objectives.

And who would’ve thought the folks at Harvard and Northeastern University would team up and research mood trends experienced throughout the day via Twitter? Researchers from these institutions recently published Pulse of the Nation: U.S. Mood Throughout the Day Inferred from Twitter. Within their site, you’ll find a time lapse video of actual Twitter mood variations, with the happiest tweets occurring during the early morning, late afternoon and weekend hours.

Although several businesses have jumped on the social media bandwagon, it’s important to keep in mind that there’s no such thing as an “easy” button when implementing these platforms. To achieve the most effective social media campaign goals, it takes a clear plan and supporting strategy, so that effort put into utilizing these tools is time well spent—not wasted.

If you have questions related to navigating the waters of online communications, I encourage you to visit Interactive Springboard.

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Governments Getting with Social Media Program

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010

By Mary Beth West, APR

It recent years, it’s not been uncommon for our clients in the governmental space to push back on the idea of using social media and interactive tools as part of recommended communications programs.

The “uncontrolled” aspect or potential of social media is an intimidating prospect for any organization – but much more so for governmental entities that largely exist by highly controlled regulations, processes and procedures.

More and more, though, it seems that managers working in the public sector are utilizing online communications to meet their objectives, particularly when engaging external audiences with very defined information needs.

For the past year, we’ve worked with a government-affiliated sciences program, and have navigated through the parameters of what their organization can and cannot do per federal guidelines.  It has been an interesting learning process for our team.  We’ve also been encouraged and impressed by the level of openness that this client has shown toward exploring interactive options.

Recently, I came across the website of the Federal Web Managers Council, “an interagency group of senior federal government web managers who collaborate to share common challenges, ideas, and best practices, and improve the online delivery of U.S. Government information and services.”

If you work in a government agency, you might want to check it out for ideas and guidance – particularly if your agency is just starting out with a program of using more interactive / two-way communications tools. 

We also welcome your questions if you need more specialized assistance.  Our collaboration as part of Interactive Springboard currently helps diverse clients in the public and private sectors with creating and managing effective online communications.

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Follow in these Facebook Footsteps

Tuesday, July 13th, 2010

By Tori Rose, Blue Media Boutique / Interactive Springboard

As Facebook continues to grow, more and more companies are setting up Facebook fan pages in an effort to engage customers, like-minded businesses, influencers, and champions of their brands. These pages give businesses a home on Facebook that allows their content to be shared with fans in the same information stream that pumps out friend updates and links. The trick for many is two-fold: 1) how to keep this audience engaged, and 2) how to continue growing the fan base.

In doing some research, you will find that there are hundreds of “expert” tips out there to follow. But, which ones really work? Our advice—follow in the footsteps of the brands that are doing it well.

DELL – 181,688 fans: Dell features a custom landing page that immediately communicates their brand and the four or five newsworthy items they want to advertise. They also direct fans to other Dell pages on Facebook.

HUBSPOT – 13,731 fans: HubSpot provides content that encourages people to comment. Comments show up in user’s profiles, which in turn are more likely to show up in fans’ information streams, thus extending the brand.

ERNST & YOUNG – 46,816 fans: Ernst & Young uses a Boxes tab to recruit new employees (students) with a variety of content. Information on this page is geared toward one slice of their larger fan base, putting pertinent information at their fingertips. User interface 101.

BEST BUY – 1,151,209 fans: Best Buy uses a series of custom tabs, turning their Facebook presence into a more robust web presence. Each tab promotes a new initiative, special, feature, etc. making the entire experience more immersive and interactive.

COCA-COLA – 7,208,007 fans: Coca-Cola uses its custom “Fan Downloads” tab to offer users online swag (wallpaper, screensavers, emoticons). Great brand extension. They also have a “Live Positively” tab that promotes their national and global outreach, like the Ocean Conservancy effort shown below.

HARLEY-DAVIDSON MOTOR COMPANY – 875,058 fans: Harley-Davidson is maximizing its Photo and Video tabs by continually publishing content and encouraging users to do the same. Their 37 photo albums and 78 videos, combined with 13,713 fan photos and 206 fan videos create make for some incredible, shareable content.

SECRET – 445,081 fans: Secret uses interactive games to lure fans closer to their brand. Their “Is He the One?” and “Be In Our Ad” tabs grab attention and then land users on a product page where they can “Buy Now” or “Explore Other Products.” Fun and unique.

Are there other Facebook pages that are connecting with fans in different and innovative ways? Let us know in the comments below.

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Freedom of Speech on Acid

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

By Mary Beth West, APR

Coming off the long Independence Day weekend, it’s appropriate that the Freedom Forum launched its “1 for All” campaign this month to spotlight our First Amendment freedoms. 

As cited in Editor & Publisher in referencing the need for the campaign, “Only 4% of Americans can name all the ‘five freedoms’ guaranteed in the Amendment, and the other 96% don’t appear embarrassed by their ignorance.” 

Even if they aren’t up on their civic lessons about the First Amendment’s direct role to ensure our freedoms of religion, speech, press, assembly and petition, everyone participating in the U.S.-based blogosphere and social media realm should count those blessings with tremendous gratitude and pride.

This month, “In the Profession” will focus on social media, with some observations on how the light-speed evolution of online communications tools, tactics and strategies are advancing public relations programs – all the while wreaking more than their fair share of havoc.

It’s that dichotomy of outcomes that makes social media such a parallel representation of the First Amendment itself.

Like social media, the doors that these freedoms open can let wondrous light shine in, but they can also unleash many ideas, opinions, sentiments and messages that are troubling, controversial, offensive, inaccurate, and, for lack of more to-the-point phrasing, can make for a big damn mess that people like me working in the public relations profession must ride herd on daily to clear up and clean up.  Such is our lot in life, but truthfully, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

As an American, I learned long ago that the exercise of First Amendment freedoms doesn’t come wrapped in some neat little contained package or encased within a D.C. museum under Plexiglas in a climate-controlled environment. 

To the contrary, our First Amendment freedoms’ strength, power and beauty are typified by the fact that they run amok all over the landscape, oftentimes making colossal, inconvenient spectacles that require us to have to stop, listen, consider, reconsider, and discuss with one another – even to the point of passionate wars of words – points of view that are not our own. 

Sometimes, the net result of those freedoms even goes so far as to change how we do things, both as individuals and as a society.  And we can argue yet some more as to whether those changes are good or bad.  The circle of First Amendment freedom therein continues.

Quite similarly, social media operates and produces outcomes in much the same way, only in faster and more dramatic fashion . . . a veritable freedom-of-speech on acid.  However unbridled, chaotic and maddening it can be, social media extends powers to the people that the Founding Fathers undoubtedly would have reveled in and embraced as a legacy to the Constitution’s spirit and intent. 

To that point, I think those visionary forbearers would have insisted that social media and online communications exist as an unregulated, unfettered platform for our society’s advancement – both domestically and globally.  And they would have credited us with enough intelligence to utilize it in such a way that the First Amendment would not only continue to survive, but thrive. 

So to that end, let’s exercise those freedoms, and that intelligence, in such a way that would make them proud.

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Yikes. If you thought you were having a bad week at the office . . .

Tuesday, March 30th, 2010

By Mary Beth West, APR

I’m counting my blessings this week that I’m not in the shoes of Nestle’s MarCom Department.  With that said, however, I’m in the public relations business.  And if you’re not an avid student of real-world case studies for guidance on how to handle your own next “really bad week” at the office, then you don’t belong in this profession.  So I’m paying attention here, because this one’s a doozy.

As you can read from The Wall Street Journal piece, Nestle is getting swarmed on the social media front by Greenpeace and Greenpeace wannabes over the candy company’s selection of palm oil vendors (of which the greens are no fans, quite apparently – read for yourself the details). 

With Nestle now counting 95,000 fans on its Facebook fan page – “now mostly protesters,” as the WSJ reports – the question has to be asked:  With “friends” like these, who needs enemies?

Note to self: add to client crisis management plans without fail a Plan B, C and D for when activist groups hijack your client’s fan page.

The WSJ article closes by saying “Marketing experts are split as to whether the company should simply shut down its Facebook page,” citing a few sources on either side of the argument, with one saying that doing so would “cut off all lines of communication” (to which I disagree, since Facebook is a great tool, but come on – it’s not the alpha and the omega of all public contact as we know it); another source saying “The damage has been so done, it might not be a bad idea to shut down the page and start over” (to which I ask the obvious follow-up question – what’s going to keep activists from simply doing the same thing all over again on the new fan page or wherever else?). 

So this is our world, and very few folks in even the highest levels of corporate marketing are used to it yet. 

In this world, the corporation has limited control of messages pertaining to their own entities in the good times and, seemingly, very little to no control in the bad times.  Social media platforms are a shared stage with the rest of the world, and everybody gets a backstage pass, regardless of whether they’re groupies or stalkers.  But you know what?  It ain’t going away. 

To Nestle’s credit, I truly think they are fighting the good fight here, trying to use some restraint and navigate this highly public, ugly situation with some class.  As their spokeswoman was quoted, the company wants to show “we are listening, which we obviously are, while not getting involved in a shouting match.”  Amen to that.  It’s a slippery slope between a level-headed, well-balanced response to criticism and suddenly realizing you’re in a place you don’t want to be – particularly when you’re operating from a supposition of corporate niceness and you’re dealing with a freewheeling, black-ops type of communications insurgency that delights in shock-value.

My final take-away from the temporary sanctuary of the sidelines is that these horror stories don’t give any of us a pass from deepening our engagement in social media – using the judgment of true professionals in how to take the high road, particularly in the face of fringe elements and tactical offensives.  After all, if there’s a battle being fought out there – and there always is – you can’t win it if you don’t show up.

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East Tennessee Firms Launch Interactive Springboard

Monday, February 15th, 2010

Interactive Agency and PR Firm Start Joint Venture

Knoxville and Maryville, Tenn. — Blue Media Boutique, a web development and interactive agency, and Mary Beth West Consulting, a public relations and reputation management consulting firm, announced today the launch of Interactive Springboard, a joint venture that provides an integrated, research-based approach to social media that supports client marketing communications.

The firms, led by Tori Rose of Blue Media Boutique and Mary Beth West, have partnered successfully on several diverse client projects since 2008 involving web strategy and social media and are now formalizing their collaboration under the Interactive Springboard name.

“Our work model is unique to this market in both its collaborative approach between two highly specialized firms and its focus on utilizing market research,” West said.  “Many current social media programs suffer two missing links: the effective use of audience research and a content-development process that drives dynamic relationship-building.  Our team is prepared to meet those client needs for better online engagement.”

According to West and Rose, the best web development and social media strategies demand client-specific audience research as the foundation.  Without that research, companies risk taking a “shotgun” approach and failing to realize the benefits of social and online community-building to their true potential. 

In some cases, companies get in over their heads and launch social media applications that they are unable to support with consistent and relevant content for their online audiences, resulting in a loss of credibility with customers and the public alike, Rose said.

“Great social media execution is the ultimate moving target today,” Rose said.  “With the constant changes taking place in social media technology development and use by consumers and businesses worldwide, it’s critical for clients to know their own customer base first-hand and how their media-use behaviors are trending.” 

Both firms comprising Interactive Springboard offer diverse team backgrounds and have their own histories of extensive work partnering with other third-party agencies and teams, both in the Knoxville market and beyond.

Blue Media Boutique’s design, programming and animation professionals are based across the continent and include a collective 50-plus years of interactive and web development experience.   

Rose’s background is extensive and diverse, spanning several marketing disciplines over a period of 16 years at companies in the United States and Canada. Most recently, as vice president, creative director of RIVR Media Interactive (RMI), Rose was responsible for RMI’s creative vision, design, and interactive projects for a wide variety of clients, including PricewaterhouseCoopers, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Shell, Gibbes Museum of Art, and Duke University. In addition to launching RMI’s first property, Needled.com, Rose developed three award-winning pieces for the Duke University Talent Identification Program (TIP) and won a PRSA and IABC award for two Morrison Management Specialists projects.

Prior to RIVR, Rose served as creative director of Edison Schools in New York, Chris Whittle’s entrepreneurial initiative to change public education in America. Rose was a key player in the design and development of Edison’s distance learning initiative—using live video, animation and Internet resources to deliver a K-12 curriculum program and professional development training to the classroom. She holds a master’s degree in media from The New School University and a bachelor of arts degree from Wake Forest University.

The team at Mary Beth West Consulting includes a collective 75-plus years of marketing communications and public relations experience working in-house with such companies as General Motors, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Blue Cross/Blue Shield Association, Eastman Kodak, Corrections Corporation of America and Champion Products.

Accredited in public relations, Mary Beth West’s own 16-year career has included award-winning work producing national media relations campaigns, employee communications programs and crisis preparedness systems in the energy, financial services and corporate sectors.

West has served two appointments on the national board of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), the world’s largest organization of public relations professionals, and is a past president of the Knoxville-based PRSA Volunteer Chapter.  She serves on the UT College of Communication and Information Board of Visitors.

Interactive Springboard can be found on Facebook and Twitter.

About Blue Media Boutique
Based in Knoxville, Tenn., Blue Media Boutique provides creative, technology and marketing services, including design, development, animation, video, illustration, branding, print, e-commerce, database, CMS, search optimization, copywriting, promotions, events and campaigns.

About Mary Beth West Consulting, LLC
Based in Maryville, Tenn., Mary Beth West Consulting advances clients’ communications, relationships and reputations to meet business and organizational objectives.  The firm’s services include research strategy, integrated marketing communications campaigns; media, community and employee relations programs; interactive media strategy and program management; crisis preparedness; and special events.

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Get Your 2010 Social Media Strategy Developed

Tuesday, November 17th, 2009

By Tori Rose, principal / founder of Blue Media Boutique and social media collaborator with Mary Beth West Consulting

If you have spent much of 2009 worrying about how to create a Facebook page for your company or when to open up the Twitter floodgates, you’ve probably put too much emphasis on the tools and not enough emphasis on the strategy behind those tools.

In any other business initiative, you’d begin by first looking at what you want to accomplish. The same type of planning needs to be applied to social media. They’re not just tools to launch because “everyone else is doing it.” They’re tools that can effectively work for you once you have a plan in place to guide your way.

Step 1: Research your audience. Who are they? Where are they online? Understand how your target audience (as defined by gender, age, and geography) uses social media. If your audience skews younger, consider Facebook and contests or sweepstakes. If your audience skews older – business executives, for example – consider ratings and reviews instead.

While secondary research may help inform what general direction you should go in, there is no substitute for primary research. Surveys, focus groups and other services will give you an analysis of what your current audience is doing online. Direct observation is also imperative. Are there already Facebook fan pages and/or groups talking about your industry or brand? Who are the key bloggers writing about your topic area? Listening to what is already going on is an essential first step in developing a social media strategy.

Step 2: What type of relationship, if any, do you already have with your audience? Are they aware of your brand? Are they loyal customers and brand enthusiasts or have they really only made a transaction or two with you? Pick one side of the scale and stick with it. Social media is not about reaching a mass audience. Instead, it is about reaching the influencers, developing relationships, having a conversation, and getting insights.

Step 3: What is your objective? Are you launching a tool to communicate with your customers? Are you trying to incite them to talk about your company with others? Is this an awareness initiative where you’re increasing your visibility and are actively interacting on many different levels? Are you trying to get your audience to generate content that you can then use in product development? Is this an effort to improve your reputation and manage communications? It is very important to decide on the objective before you decide on the technology to be used.

Step 4: Content, content, content. Start with your pitch. What is it? Describe what your company does in 120 characters or less. Better yet, define it in one word. Volvo = Safety, for example. Develop an editorial calendar and allocate resources to implement it. Do you have the capacity internally to handle the workload or do you need to hire an external resource to do the work? And keep in mind, social media that exists and is generated in a silo is never a good idea. It needs to be owned by the entire organization. The person/people put in charge of the content should be comfortable with the tools and be passionate about your organization.

Step 5: How are you going to humanize your company? Social media is about people and conversations. It’s not about logos and corporate-speak. How will you get down to that level online? Transparency and honesty are key. Will you allow employees to engage in the social media efforts? How will you deal with negative comments to turn them into positive situations? All of these items need to be considered before launching a program.

Step 6: How will you measure success? Determine your key metrics before you get started. Pick the right metrics that will help you track your objectives. Look at trend movements and changes over time, not just numbers. It is also important not to look at a single metric, but rather to evaluate your strategy performance from multiple dimensions.

Once all of these factors are carefully considered, you’ll be able to pick the right tools and social media tactics. Start small. Be willing to make mistakes and learn from them. Modify, evaluate, and grow.

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Tap into traditional and online social media

Thursday, November 12th, 2009

By Tyra Haag

Out with the old, in with new, eh?  Not so fast.  Although social media is here to stay, traditional media is still an effective way to get your public relations plan in sync with your 2010 business objectives.

In order to develop and implement creative, engaging content, businesses must be willing to wear both traditional and social media hats. 

Among the benefits that businesses will realize from social media are increased brand awareness and enhanced reputation.  Not to mention the fact that social media outreach is a cost-effective and efficient strategy – something especially worthy of taking advantage of in a weak economy.

But where does one begin? With just weeks left in 2009, now is an excellent time to begin planning how to maintain already established traditional media outreach (via TV, print and radio), yet enhance social media outreach efforts (via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube, etc.) 

This fall, our media relations team had the privilege to have one-on-one face time with several local media personnel to discuss this very topic.  Each of them told us the same thing.  In order to generate positive, informative media coverage, businesses must not forsake traditional media efforts, but must engage in online social media tools as well.

The statistics speak for themselves.  Facebook boasts more than 250 million active users.  Executives from all Fortune 500 companies are LinkedIn members.  Twitter claims an average of 17,000 tweets per minute.  Don’t believe us?  TwitterVision3D is a Web site that shows tweets from around the world in real time.

We’ve enjoyed working with our clients to integrate social media tools into their 2010 business objectives alongside their traditional media outreach and look forward to seeing how quickly those efforts pay off.

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