Business Is Always About Connecting

I was reading a post over at SmartBlog on Social Media and it had a quote by the Mzinga CEO Barry Libert:

“GM never thought of themselves of being in the business of connecting people, which is why they’re going bankrupt,”

Pretty valid thought if you ask me. Should all businesses be involved in connecting people with each other? Better yet… should businesses search for that lofty goal of connecting people who use their services to people who do not?

My opinion… Yes they should.

Business has always been about connecting. If you look back into history there has always been some type of connection between two people that created a company…

whether it was a deal that was signed or an idea sparked out of thin air.

The Internet has given way to a landslide of communication. You now have the ability to connect with every demographic on the face of the earth. What is your company doing to connect?

I am not going to sit here and say that the demise of GM was based around their inability to connect… but it is a valid point.

What are you going to do tomorrow to make it easier for customers and potential customers to connect?

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Is Your Goal Growth? Empower your Employees with Social Media.

I mentioned in a previous post that I have been reading Seth Godin‘s book Free Prize Inside for a… I think… fourth time.  In the beginning of the book is a quote that I have underlined another four times: 

“If your goal is growth, marketing is all that matters–and everything you do is now part of marketing… Every product and every service can be made remarkable. And anyone in your organization can make it happen!” (pg.

This excerpt from the book hit me pretty hard when it comes to online marketing and using social media. The concept of EVERYTHING you possibly do in your company (both large and small) being connected to marketing is still an idea that is buried. I still have conversations with corporate employees or owners who are mistified that the PR side of a company doesn’t discuss anything with the marketing side or vice versa. Every service you create. Every phone call you take. Every PR release and marketing campaign you run. It is all connected to growing a brand… to growing your company.  If you want your employees to talk about it. If you want every piece of your business to be a marketing vehicle… doesn’t social media make sense as a communication platform? Zappos has perfected the use of Twitter as an employee communication model.. Why can’t you? It is time to stop being afraid of the massive force of online communication. It is time to stop putting firewalls up because your afraid your employees are not being productive. They are not being productive for a reason… and it’s not Facebook. If they love what they do… maybe it is time to allow them to communicate that fact.. and if they don’t.. You probably have more problems than communication. 

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Time Magazine Gets Owned by Social Media

And I thought I had seen it all… well… enough for my 24 years on this earth… apparently not.

I was reading an article at Mashable about the founder of a “legendary memebreeding forum” called 4Chan topping the Time’s 100 Most Influtential People Poll. I had to read the article twice. The person called “moot” is the founder of a website? A founder of a website beat out the likes of Rick Warren and Anwar Ibrahim? Say it ain’t so. 

What is hilarious is that the list was apparantly hacked by 4chan users in an attempt (successful attempt) to completely deface the Time 100 Poll. The surprising thing is not only did Moot win the poll but his followers also hacked away at the entire list. According to Mashable: 

“The vote is obviously hacked. Time’s attempts to fix the damage came too late, and the 4chan folks managed to put the encrypted message back into order (if you read the first letters of the first 21 names on the list, the message reads “Marblecake also the game”).”

The world is becoming smaller. One the most influential magazines in the world was infected by an anime/meme forum. Despite the fact that Time magazine built up defenses and put a captcha in place… it was too late to quell the amost 17 million votes for the 4chan founder. 

To be honest with you… the important lesson to be learned from all of this…

You can’t afford to ignore the Internet. It is NOW a part of life… our daily routine… for people, cultures, and clients. 

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Social Media Lab Developed to Help Interns and Biz

Thanks to my partner in crime at Brandswag, Brandon Coon, for sending me this article on a Social Media Lab in Oklahoma.

There is a company in Tulsa, OK that is taking the concept of marketing and education in social media and magnifying it by 1000%. Cubic , a creative marketing and advertising company, has developed a Social Media Lab that is dedicated to teaching young professionals and business owners the front and back of technology and social media.

Check out the article and read the background behind the idea from Cubic.

I like the idea of the Social Media Lab because we need (as a culture) to start helping the masses understand the concepts of social media technology and the Internet. It is important for the learning curve to start collapsing from all sides. I am glad that tech and new media companies are taking this upon their shoulders.

From SMASH to the Social Media Lab, education is going to be the leading focus of many social media and new media marketing firms in the near future.

What do you think about the Social Media Lab? Do you think it will work?

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NonProfit Organizations Love Social Media Too!

I had the pleasure of speaking at the Fundraising 2.0 conference on Friday and I wanted to make sure that everyone on the Internet knew that non-profit organizations get a bad name sometimes for hating on social media (the fear factor)… well sometimes. I recorded this video to show that people are getting excited for social media and the future of communication! Check it out.

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4 Tips to Successful Strategy in Social Media

I have been following the writings of Jon Gatrell of Spatially Relevant and I would recommend all of the people reading this post to subscribe to his blog. It has some great content. I was reading his post about the 2009 Mountain Social Media Summit. I found what they are focusing on to be really interesting. This is straight from the site:

The 2009 Mountain Social Media Summit focuses on the 4 P’s of Social Media: Personas, Problems, Projects and Profits.

Personas: Who leverages social media, what are the opportunities and why is social media important in a personal, professional and commercial context.

Problems: What challenges exist for social marketers? What problems does media address? What problems exist for social media. Understand the opportunities, obstacles and value social media can bring to your business or your personal growth.

Projects: Understanding use cases and case studies which highlight key lessons and themes which are important.

Profits: Where is the market opportunity, revenue channels and process improvements. Can social media increase customer acquisition, drive cost reduction and improve customer/market awareness?

Good stuff right!? What I found interesting is that anyone can relate the 4 Ps of Social Media to their own strategy. When you are building a social media strategy for your company or organization follow the Mountain Social Media Summit and focus on the 4 Ps.

Personas: Who are you trying to target with your social media strategy? Are there different sites online that cater to this specific demographic? Are you targeting Baby Boomers? Try Eons or the growing trend on Facebook. Focus on targeting the personas of your social media strategy first. The rest will come with ease.

Problems: There are three main problems that arise for businesses and organization when using social media: Time, ROI, and the Learning Curve.  The problems need to ad addressed before you can walk down the social media marketing route. Time management, metrics, and education are the answer to the social media problems… which in the long run will just lead to fear.

Projects: Learn and read what other people are doing in the social media. Track your competitors and constantly read about changes and trends in your industry. If you are still hesitant to use social media try a small project on the side and watch the results. You will be surprised!

Profits: Measure. Measure. Measure. Measure. Measure. You will only be able to relate success to social media if you measure the social media tools you are using.

Remember the 4Ps. Write them down if you have to or just attend the 2009 Moutain Social Media Summit.  Believe me, It will be worth every second and every penny.

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Next Time. Punch Fear in the Face.

What is it about fear that immobilizes an individual or an organization? The fear of failure… The fear of not understanding how to use a specific tool.. The fear of being left behind.

The problem with fear is that it paralyzes and damages the great things your company or organization can do in the future. At Brandswag we come across many individuals, companies and organizations that are simply afraid of jumping into the world of “the social web.”

It could be the fear of open conversation. It could be the fear of not knowing what to do. What is driving your company? What is the driving factor for not changing? What is keeping you from not adapting to the changing world of communication?

The simple fact…

You cannot let fear rule the way you run your business. The world is changing. People are controlling conversations, brands, and causes. Your brand is built by people. Why not use the tool most associated with communication?

You may not want to change for a variety of reasons… but you don’t really have the choice. Remember the term Evolve or Die. It applies here.

Here is what I want you to do… Next time you are sitting down and reviewing methods and procedures for the marketing of your product or service and that fear starts to rise in the back of your mind… you have two choices…

Ignore it or Embrace it.

Which one do you think is going to revolutionize your company or organization in the years to come?

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Forget Social Media Measurement. Get Back to the Basics.

There has been a lot of talk about measurement and return-on-investment in the world of social media. Where and what do we measure? Is there any type of return on investment we can micro manage down to the point of dollars and cents?

Richard Stacy asked a brilliant question on his Social Computing Journal post called Social Media Measurement – Are We STaring At Stones? Are we measuring/looking at the wrong thing? Are we missing the point when we use Web 1.0 measurement tools and try to squeeze them into a Web 2.0 – 3.0 world? I think so. I would guess that Richard would agree.

Are we staring at the finish line without starting the race?

We are focused so intently on understanding the measurement model of social media that we fail to recognize the tool itself.  We fail to realize that a complete understanding of social media (as a tool) has yet to be accomplished. We need to back up and refocus. As a company, we are just as guilty.

It is hard for me to swallow the concepts of using traditional and web 1.0 measurements tools (traffic, click-throughs) to social media tools like Twitter.  What is the answer? Ad agencies are falling over themselves to gain as many viewers as possible to online videos. We can have 2 million views on a YouTube video but does that measure to actual growth in sales? It is hard to tell and becoming increasingly harder (Google aquisition of YouTube).

I don’t have the answer. Every interactive marketing firm on the planet is trying to measure this phenomenal new medium of communication… We all have case studies but there hasn’t been a proven formula for measurement.

Maybe we need to go back to the basics… refocus on completely understanding a new medium  that is changing our entire communication formula.

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Put My Money on Myspace not Facebook

Ahh… welcome back to the Myspace and Facebook debate. I love talking about the business models of social networks across the Internet.

I was reading a post from Edmund Lee at theBigMoney called Why Facebook Can’t Succeed (via alisa at socialized) and I found myself agreeing with Edmund on some of the community versus business aspects of his post. I have always been under the assumption that we were approaching another net explosion (circa 1999) because of the value of companies being placed on growth instead of revenue. It seems ridiculous to me and completely backward.

It is easy for the social media nerds of the world to bash the social networks (Myspace) that tend to be a little more “whoring” of their advertising. The truth of the matter is that users of Myspace tend to spend more time on the site compared to Facebook.

“According to comScore Media Metrix, MySpace users spend an average of 234 minutes on the site each month, as opposed to Facebook’s 169 minute per user average. Furthermore, MySpace has a bigger cut of the U.S. audience, the most lucrative, at 75 million unique visitors for January, outpacing Facebook’s 57 million.” (Edmund Lee via comScore)

I might not be using Myspace as an individual but we cannot ignore the fact that they focus more on profitability than user growth. There is something to say about Myspace still appealing to users and the overall revenue growth of the company. Facebook may have a faster growth trend than Myspace but Myspace is the smarter social network of the two. The users are still hitting the site and using the tool…that is what matters to the growth of business in social media.

We are all still waiting for the brains of Facebook to present a viable revenue model for the site (Lexicon?) but until that time… I would invest in Myspace over Facebook.. any day of the week.

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Get 30,000 Followers on Twitter. What is it Worth?

I search constantly on the web for writers and thinkers who display a chip on their shoulder. They are brilliant thinkers but they have a sarcasm about them that keeps my days interesting. One of my favorite writer is Alexander van Elsas. There are times when I completely agree with Alexander and also times when I completely disagree… there really is not a middle ground.

He has a post talking about the real value of Twitter ‘s suggest user feature which was made a little more valuable after Jason Calacanis offered $500K. Congratulation Jason and Alexander, you have pushed me to a crossroad on the purpose of quality over quantity.

We talked about the purpose of quality over quantity all the time on the web.

“I would rather have 200 devout followers than 20,000 kind-of listeners.”

There is a reason we do this. We are the social-renegades of the marketing world. What? You think we should send out mass mailings? Buy an email list? AHH. I am dying from heart failure.

The truth of the matter is this… I haven’t come to any conclusions yet on the value of quality over quantity. Jason Calacanis shows the absolute value of driving traffic from Twitter to his start-up, Mahalo. He was willing to pony up $250,000 to drive two-million visits a month to his site. I would do it too.

And yet, Alexander talks about the quality of the followers being below zero. I also agree with him when he says:

“It makes the reach you have on Twitter as good as any spammer that hijacked millions of e-mail addresses. There is always a sucker that falls for it. The real-time effect is pretty much worthless when put into comparison to the nr of followers and the spam being produced. To me the only benefit, if you can call it a benefit, would be that the audience that follows you remains persistent.”

So what is the answer? You can always give the quality over quantity speech but does that drive revenue? In the world of business there is absolute value to use social media but what is the strategy? Quality over Quantity?

What are 10,000, 20,000, 30,000 Twitter followers worth to you?

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