Despite research that ‘proves’ “local pages perform much better than global ones”, the reality is that the performance of any social media presence depends entirely on what you are trying to achieve.
There’s also the critical issue of whether you can afford to set up presences in each of your brand’s locations.
My advice is always to do what’s best for youraudience, in the context of your brand and its objectives.
Doing so requires a solid understanding of what that audience uses social media for, what they hope to gain from a relationship with your brand, and how they’d like to get it.
That requires some careful strategic planning.
This presentation asks many of the important questions that will help you start that strategy, and offers some examples of different approaches to implementing it too.
It’s widely known in marketing circles that Coca-Cola’s Facebook page was originally created by two ardent fans who had no official ties to the company.
I was always impressed that Coke brought these fans in to help them run the page, rather than simply taking control of the property and relieving the creators of their legacy.
However, on a chance visit to the brand’s Facebook page yesterday, I noticed that the brand has decided to tell the whole world that story too – and they’ve done a really good job of it too.
Apart from the fact that the tab is a great example of how to design a Facebook tab – a simple, appealing layout with a variety of content types – there are a number of things that make this an excellent case study in social marketing.
Firstly, the tab celebrates fans.
This is central to any successful branded community, but Coca-Cola have taken this to a whole new level.
Its real magic is in the message it sends – we celebrate fans who share their love of Coca-Cola.
It’s the perfect incentive for other fans to go out and create pages and communities of their own, furthering the brand’s impact and deepening its social resonance.
Marketers often over-think social media, but the basic stuff can sometimes be the most successful.
The approach is quite straightforward: find out what your audience likes, and then create (simple) content around that topic for people to share or engage with.
Here’s an example: I posted this very simple picture on eski last night, but look at the responses it received within just a few hours:
It’s similar to the approach used at rock concerts: the classic “Hello [City]! How you all feeling?” seems to work every time, even if it’s not very original.
So, if your audience loves something, just feed their love.
It offers plenty of food for thought – unsurprising considering that Armano “curated” it with fellow Edelman heavyweight Steve Rubel – but, ironically, the slide I found most inspiring probably wasn’t intended to be a cornerstone of the presentation:
The source of the chart seems to be Edelman’s Trust Barometer, so I’m confident that a significant amount of quality research informed the findings.
However, instinctively, it feels like the number of times we need to repeat something depends on what we’re actually saying (or doing); some ‘messages’ will be easier to grasp than others, and some will be more easily forgotten, even if they are initially easily understood.
The whole conversation hinges on something we discussed a few months back: effective communication is about what the receiverunderstands, not what the sender says.
I shared the remainder of this post as a comment on David’s blog, but I’d like to extend the conversation here; it has such far-reaching implications that I believe it would benefit from as many minds as possible. That includes yours, so please do share your thoughts in the comments section below.
Social channels offer more effective ways for us to establish a shared understanding with our audiences, so they have the potential to revolutionise how we approach brand communications, not just refine the existing model.
For example, if people are struggling to grasp something, we have two options: either repeat the same message over and over again until it sticks, or keep refining the ‘message’ until people understand it.
The first option is the most practical approach in a purely broadcast communication model, because the costs involved in constantly measuring and refining a mass-media message are prohibitive. Within that model, brands often struggle to gauge whether people have understood their communications. Furthermore, by the time they find out, they’ve usually used up the entire budget and it’s infeasible to refine anything.
However, social channels offer brands a practical and cost-efficient way to share multiple messages, and determine whether people understand them – all in real-time. They allow us to communicate in a context that is more akin to face-to-face conversation: we can constantly refine and tweak our ‘message’ until we’re sure it has sunk in. More excitingly, such conversations can help us to identify whether our communications are even addressing our audience’s most important issues. When it comes to communication, what we hear is often more valuable than what we say.
In this second model, our communications challenge shifts from trying to identify an optimum number of repetitions of just one message, to identifying better ways of sharing what matters to people.
That may sound like stating the obvious, but I get the sense that many marketers still see social channels from a broadcast perspective – we are trying to adapt them to our existing model, rather than adapting the model to the take advantage of these new opportunities.
What do you think? Do social channels really allow brands to engage in dynamic conversation? Will repetition still play a key role in this new approach to brand communications? Share your thoughts here.
It’s an initiative for the Fondation pour l’alphabétisation – an NGO that aims to promote higher levels of literacy amongst the French-speaking population in Canada.
The fundamental premise is very simple: by ‘buying’ words – either from vending machines like the one in the picture above, or from the “words depot” website – people can make donations to the Foundation that will fund literacy programs for the 800,000 Québécois who are hindered by low levels of literacy.
I particularly admire the facility to buy the words in your Facebook status update for 10¢ each, which the site then posts to your Facebook page with a link back to the initiative:
Developed by Montréal-based agency Bleublancrouge, it’s a beautifully simple, yet incredibly powerful way to make giving to charity more personal and resonant.
“Imaginez tout le plaisir qu’il peut y avoir à posséder un mot qui nous plaît ou auquel nous nous identifions. Car tout est possible lorsque nous achetons un mot. Avec un peu d’imagination, ce n’est plus « royaume » que nous achetons, mais un royaume. Ce n’est pas « amour » que nous offrons, mais de l’amour. Alors, redonnons aux gens leur attachement aux mots, redonnons-leur le plaisir de jouer avec ceux-ci.”
Loosely translated, this means:
“Imagine the great joy of owning a word you like, or with which you identify. Everything is possible when you buy a word. With a bit of imagination, you’re not just buying “kingdom”, but a kingdom. It’s not just “love” you’re buying, but love you’re giving. So let’s help people rebuild a relationship with words; let’s help them enjoy the pleasure of playing with them again.”
By taking the benefit beyond simply relieving people’s conscience, this activity makes donating fun.
Various forms of technology that once existed solely on the desktop are becoming increasingly interwoven into the broader spectrum of everyday activities.
They bring extra layers of detail, interaction, or entertainment to analogue experiences, allowing technology to come to us, instead of the other way round.
Meanwhile, apps like foursquare and Gowalla are taking social network into real-world interactions.
But the possibilities of augmented reality (AR) are the ones I find most exciting.
If we look beyond the novelty that characterised much early AR, and explore instead the ways in which normal, everyday objects can become interfaces that trigger a ‘fifth dimension’ of reality, things get very interesting.
Suddenly, everything can become so much more than it already is.
This has massive potential for every brand in every category around the world – from the simplest to the most complex.
Ever the pioneer, Adidas has been exploring what that might mean for its shoes.
Not content to limit itself to producing hugely popular fashion items, the brand has recognised that its products can deliver even more value through this fifth dimension:
Watch out for an explosion of activity like this from other brands in the coming months.
Many thanks again to Alexander and the whole Cultural Fuel team for sharing yet another gem.
eskimon 