10 Social Media Lessons from 2011

I learned a lot in 2011, both about my life and my profession. Mostly, I’ve come to appreciate how work is more than just being satisfied with what you complete at the end of the day. It’s also about relationships, creative expression, stability, intellectual freedom, and yes, being satisfied with all you get done by 5 PM (or sometimes 6 PM).

I’ve also come to appreciate the sense of stability that has come back to our industry. It’s given our word of mouth team a chance to take all we’ve learned since social media transformed the scene a few years ago and change it into a formula, a practice, and a system that works for us. We’ve learned some great lessons throughout the year, some the hard way.

So we thought we’d share them all with you. After all, there’s no better way to kick off a new year than to look back on all you’ve learned in the previous year. Here’s 10 Social Media Lessons from 2011.

1. There’s no such thing as over-preparing. There IS such a thing as under-preparing and it’ll bite you in the butt.
2. Updating or tweeting every 5 seconds will not solidify your expertise. It will just annoy people.
3. There’s nothing worse than a huge block of text. Break it up! Bullet points, headers, and pics are good things.
4. Sometimes campaigns don’t go as well as planned. Do your best to fix the problem and then MOVE ON.
5. Don’t stress out over things you cannot control.
6. Think outside the Internet. Learn all there is to know about marketing.
7. Surround yourself with a team you trust. You can’t do it all by yourself.
8. Let your team be accountable for their own work. Mistakes made are lessons learned, and autonomy equals trust.
9. Sometimes you have to buck up and do that one thing you simply don’t want to do.
10. Sometimes the only thing people want to hear from a company is, “I’m Sorry.”

Blogger Outreach Done Right: Round 2

A few members of our Push-n-Pull team went to Social Fresh Baltimore – a social media conference – this week. Between networking and hearing some experts speak, the conference was a success. It also helped reinforce what we do here at The Cyphers Agency (and that we’re doing it right).

Specifically, Chris Barger spoke in depth about how to work with influencers (and more importantly, how to not piss them off), and since blogger outreach is something we implement on a regular basis, it was good to see we were following all of his rules. It also reminded us of how important it is to really build and sustain relationships with bloggers or influencers. It’s amazingly easy to be lazy (and bad) at communicating with this group of people, but really taking the time to invest in a long term relationship can be returned many times over. So while we’ve written about blogger outreach before, we thought we’d give you a little more insight into how we continue to do it successfully.

1. Do the “leg work” yourself. 

We rely only on ourselves to find the perfect bloggers. Sure, there are some tools that can help, but it didn’t take us very long to realize that we had to do the work ourselves to create a database of the types of bloggers we wanted. When we are ready to start communicating, we take our time to get to know them. After all, nothing turns a blogger off quicker than an impersonal pitch.

So how can you do this? Avoid form emails and take time to research the person you’re pitching. Read their blog beyond the first couple posts. Read their “about” section. Do they have kids? Are they married? Are they more formal or hang loose? Build a little profile of the person and use that to guide your communication. Pay attention to the details. Write the blog name how the blogger does, even if the spelling/capitalization/spacing is odd or technically incorrect. Make sure to pick little specific things out of a post to include in the email as a way of subtly demonstrating that you do, in fact, actually read their blog. This may sound like a lot of initial leg work, but in our experience it makes bloggers feel appreciated and catered to. It also helps us cut through all of the other clutter (or other pitch emails) they might be getting.

2. Don’t be overly promotional, for God’s sake!

Once you’ve gone through this initial step of communication, it’s important to establish and grow the relationship. One way to not do this is to ask for something right off the bat. Build the blogger up. Give them something that will benefit them. Provide information that will be important to their readers. Don’t just do this once, do this twice. Thrice even. Become a reliable acquaintance. They’ll be more willing to help you, when the time comes.

When you do ask for that help that you might need, or that article you want written, ask nicely. They’ll be much more willing to provide you with something of value if you’ve already been in communication a dozen times. Don’t just stop after you receive what you want, either. Be sure to say “thanks” – it goes a LONG way. Positively call them out on your social networks to give them a little more visibility. Follow up every few days or months, too. Shoot over more valuable information as you see fit. Really think of each communication as a step towards a long term relationship.

3. Don’t get too big for your britches (and know the consequences of your actions).

A lot of folks get stuck in the old-school mentality of public relations when approaching bloggers, and that’s a big mistake. While traditional media often relies on their established relationships with PR pros and marketers for both timely content and advertising dollars, bloggers don’t. As Chris Barger said, they built their audience without you. While we think our clients have plenty of value to offer bloggers and their audience, we keep a healthy sense of humility and realize that bloggers hold plenty of cards in this game. Like we said earlier, showing some respect for a blogger and their work can go a long way. And you don’t need to go far to find examples of just how wrong it can go when you don’t take a blogger and their power seriously – like this example [beware, there's some salty language!].

Blogger outreach can do so many things for a company or brand, but it’s bigger than just a pitch email. Know your bloggers, help them out, and realize their importance (they have the Internet as their soapbox, after all). Once you do realize these things, you can start to patch together a strong blogger outreach program.

Relationships Accept No Formulas

I saw an interesting tweet pass through my feed the other day. It was from Patrick Rhone of Minimal Mac fame and said:

Weird thought: Nuance is the numbers between 0 and 1 (i.e. the reason that social relationships are difficult to program).

It got me thinking about this is whole how-to-do-social-media thing. There is a lot of information out there about social media. In fact, according to Google Keyword Tool, “how to social media” gets 2,240,000 monthly searches. I believe that talking and learning about how to do social media well is important, why else would we have this blog?

However, sometimes we start to look at word of mouth as a science that we can program, as Patrick puts it. If we tweet the right amount about the right things on the right days, voilà you have quality engagement with your consumers. Whaaaaat are we thinking? There are no formulas for relationships! No logic, no cheats, only chaos! I jest slightly, but we need keep in mind that on the other end of these social networks are actually real people. Instead of consulting a How-to guide, we should spend time listening to what our users are saying.

Asking for Stories

This post is based off the Digital Campfires talk that the ever insightful Frank Chimero gave at Webstock 2011. I’ve taken some of his main ideas and put them in the context of social media because, well, this is a social media blog.

Tell me a story

I wrote last month about how brands should frame the content they share as a story to make it warmer and more relatable. This is only one half of the battle though. To get interaction online, you can’t just tell stories yourself, you gotta get your users to tells stories as well. How do you get them to do that? Ask them to.

Frank Chimero argues that every form on the internet is a question asking for some kind of response. As in much of life, a good question begets a good response. A bad question begets a bad response. As brands and marketers looking to get our users talking, we need to learn how to ask good questions.

Bad Questions

Bad questions are questions that don’t give the user a direction. One example is also one of the most common questions we see in social media: Tell me about yourself. This is also known as the “Bio” question. How do you even begin to answer that question? It’s not easy to boil your entire existence into a paragraph. To overcome this people usually fill the box with a list. “I’m a father, husband, photographer, shark wrestler and all around imaginary person.” That is a good list of what the person does, but it doesn’t really tell you about who the person is. Bad questions are vague and open-ended, making it hard to get people to tell their stories.

Good Questions

Most of our stories are based on our experiences, so we want people to tell us about their experiences. Good questions encourage that by being specific or capturing someone’s immediate thoughts. “Tell me a story about something that happened to you,” is an overwhelming question, it’s too vague. “Tell me about that delicious cheese burger you’re eating,” is a question that is going to capture that persons immediate experience. This is how we want to approach questions for the brands we work with. Remember the Facebook status from Ford that I talked about last time, about Mandy and how her three dogs love to go for a ride? They followed that with this questions:

Ford fans, how often do you bring your pet along for the ride? Which seats do they like the best?

This is a great question. It’s specific and brings to mind memories of man’s best friend and his floppy-eared antics. The status has 65 responses of people telling stories about their dogs… and their Fords. Ford asked a good question and got good responses and engagement.

The Skinny

Getting your followers engaging is what social media is all about. Telling stories is how we relate to one another, how we share our lives and how we describe who we are. Stories are the key to successful social media. As marketers we need to frame our content as a story to make it relatable. If not, we sound like robots spewing updates like we’re solving math problems. That’s only the first step though. Once we get people interested in what we’re saying we need to get them talking. Asking specific and personal questions will prompt users to share their experiences. Stories are how we relate and now your users are relating to your brand.

Telling Stories

This post is based off the Digtial Campfires talk that the ever insightful Frank Chimero gave at Webstock 2011. I’ve taken some of his main ideas and put them in the context of social media because, well, this is a social media blog.

Cold Content

Social media is a revolution and brands know it. You’d be hard-pressed to find one that doesn’t have a social media presence. There is a ton of information about “How to do Social Media Right” or “What Social Media Can do for Your Business.” Tips, tricks, pointers. What I think we need to talk a little more about is: What’s the goal? Too many brands these days jump into social media because they think they should, with out any real idea of what they’re trying to do. Now, I don’t want to talk about how social fits into your overall brand strategy. We’ve written about that before. I want to talk about, once you’ve decided it’s time to dive into social, what are you trying to accomplish? Get lots of followers? Sell stuff? The proper social media answer is, “We want to get people to relate to our brand and start having a conversation.” That sounds great! How?

Brands know they want interaction, but have no idea how to get it. Most brands, no matter how big they are, can’t just throw up a Facebook page and start having good interaction with their consumers. Brands have to start the conversation. This usually comes in the form of content. Links, deals, recipes, news, updates. Stuff for their followers to talk about. Here is where the biggest problem lies. Content is, by definition, cold. It describes what something is, but not how we relate to it or how we feel about it. Brands can post content to their page all day and no one may care. We have to give our followers a reason to care. Help them to relate to us and our brand. How do we do this? By telling a story.

Telling a Story

Stories are the base of much of our interpersonal communication. We tell stories about our day, our life, about the things we love and the things we hate. Stories help us explain to others, and to ourselves, who we are and how we’ve changed. If I hand you a self-help book are you more likely to read it if I just say it’s good, or if I tell you about how it helped me? When you’re going to share something to your followers, don’t just throw it out there and hope it sticks. Frame it in a way that helps people relate to it or makes them feel something about it. This is advertising 101, but for some reason we seem to have forgotten with social media. We sound like robots, firing off updates and deals and content.

Let’s See It

The Red Cross shared a story from one of their employees on their Facebook page:

so after my shift at the Red Cross, i went to eat some sushi at a restaurant nearby.
as i was about to leave, i thanked the waitress by my side.
she then looked at my badge, smiled and said “Thanks for your work.”
and so my heart smiled.
and that walk back home in the pouring rain did not bother me at all =)

The post garnered 100+ likes and a slew of comments. Even better, it spurred multiple people to share their own stories right there in the comments. I found a post on Ford Motor Company’s Facebook page that showed a picture of three dogs in the back of a fan’s Ford SUV. Instead of just saying how cute it was, they said, “This week’s Featured Fan Photo was uploaded by Mandy Barlett-Troncale, who’s three friends look like they’re ready for an adventure.” They framed it as a story, three dogs ready for an adventure! The comments are full of other people telling stories about their dogs in their Fords.

Stories are key to communication and social media is no exception. Think of ways to frame your content as a story. Move your content from being cold and robotic to warm and meaningful. Show people why they should care and they will. This is only one half of the picture though. Well told, relatable content is a great way to gain followers, but that’s not what social media is about, remember? We need to get those followers talking, telling their stories. How do we get people to tell stories? We’ll talk about that next week in part two.

Doing It Right: Morton’s Steakhouse

We’ve been fond of praising those who do word of mouth marketing the right way, from musicians to the Four Seasons. And we’ve even brought to light some occasions where WOM can be detrimental to a company (remember United Breaks Guitars?). Looks like Morton’s Steak House falls under the “social media success” category. They’ve recently impressed a certain Peter Shankman, a self-proclaimed social media entrepreneur with just over 109,000 Twitter followers.

The story? Shankman tweeted at Morton’s right before a flight, jokingly requesting that they meet him at his destination with a porterhouse steak. Two hours and a grumbling stomach later, he walked off the flight and towards his rental car. Along the way, he was met by a man in a Tuxedo carrying a Morton’s bag. Shankman said…

Alex, from Morton’s Hackensack walks up to me, introduces himself, and hands me a bag. He proceeds to tell me that he’d heard I was hungry, and inside is a 24 oz. Porterhouse steak, an order of  Colossal Shrimp, a side of potatoes, one of Morton’s famous round things of bread, two napkins, and silverware.

He hands me the bag.

I. Was. Floored.

He, like the rest of us in the social media sphere would have done, tweeted about it right away. He even snapped a picture.

The take away? Morton’s did it right. First and foremost, they appreciate their consumers before ever pulling stunts like the one above. Shankman describes in his blog post that the steakhouse has a very awesome Customer Relations Management system. Morton’s know that he is a steak lover. They know that he is a frequent customer. They know who he is when he calls. That is powerful in and of itself, and this system probably encouraged Morton’s social media team to know that Shankman would be the right guy for the surprise steak.

Secondly, Morton’s took the extra step - one that most companies never take – that can help solidify brand loyalty and created the ultimate experience for Shankman. Think of the amount effort in comparison to the pay off. Huge, right? If a company has the means to make a person feel like a their most important customer, why shouldn’t they jump at the chance?

Third, they picked the right dude. With Shankman’s huge following on Twitter, combined with his blog and online influence, the experience they created for him has been magnified to the tenth degree. All they needed was for him to tweet about it or share it on his blog, which he most certainly did. They took a seemingly small window of opportunity – a humorous and far reaching tweet – and blew the doors wide open. Word of mouth to the max!

So think of your company next time you get a tweet like Shankman’s. Do you have the means to make big things happen? Are you willing to take some risks for a big potential pay off?

The Social Media Revolution #3

The power of WOM. It’s why we do what we do. It’s why we try to convince you to do it, too. It’s why we take part in it beyond the professional realm: we are users, consumers, and social networkers – just like your audience – who want to interact with the brands we use every day. We’ve seen it bring people together, solve real problems, and magnify positive (and negative) experiences. And this, my friends, is why we believe that this stuff works.

Watch and be convinced.

The #AskObama Town Hall: A Lesson In Social Web Basics

Today was a kind of a big deal on the Internet. First, Mark Zuckerberg and his folks announced some big changes over in Facebook land. Then, right on the heels of Zuck, President Obama hosted the first live-tweeted presidential town hall ever. There’s no rest for us web-minded folks!

As I kept up with #AskObama, @townhall and @whitehouse, I found myself thinking – This is social media at its very best. Day in and day out, I listen to chatter about how to leverage the social web. Every Tom, Dick and Jane bill themselves as “social media gurus” with extra special tips and tricks for success with social.

But the real power of using platforms like Twitter is pure and simple. Use it to have authentic, meaningful conversations you might not have had otherwise. Take the opportunity those conversations present to make a good impression, just like you would if you were able to talk to them in person.

Here’s an example from the presidential townhall: Robin Marty tweeted #AskObama with a question about the housing climate this morning. Obama answered her question via live video stream, and his staff tweeted a summary from @WhiteHouse. Another Twitter user, @Shnaps, tweeted back, challenging Obama’s answer, to which Obama responded in real time.

This kind of back-and-forth conversation between the President and various regular citizens from all over the country is a first. Even when Obama has hosted YouTube townhalls, the questions are submitted and selected far in advance, not tweeted live, and the format was strictly Q-and-A, not conversational. Certainly there were strict controls in place today, but ultimately the event at least conveyed a new kind of openness and access to the President.

The capabilities of the social web – Twitter in this case – are what made this possible. To me, that ability to connect beyond what was previously logistically possible is the real heart of social media. Stick close to that when using it to spread your message, and the tips and tricks will just be icing on the cake.

It’s All In How You Say It: Blogger Outreach Edition

Today we had a blogger outreach success story. Our team pitched a client’s product to an influential blogger in hopes that they might want to try the free sample we wanted to send. Ideally, the blogger would accept our offer, try the sample, fall in love with it, and tell their readers (and random people on the streets) how much they simply loved the product. But that wasn’t the case.

The blogger, although friendly, declined our offer. She was honest in saying that it wasn’t up her alley and she only accepted a small niche of products. Fair enough – sometimes we are just thankful for a response. But it didn’t stop there. She shared the names of two of her blogger friends who were more likely to be interested. She thanked us for our kind words about her blog, thanked us for our pitch, and wished us luck.

There will be times when bloggers will accept our products and tell their readers. That is all great, but sometimes its the last of the communication. But here, we’ve made a meaningful connection with a real person. And although she might not use our product this time, the exposure will bring our client’s name to mind when she is out shopping. She also shared with us two blogger friends of hers, and when we contact them, we can mention her as a reference. Trust will then be automatically built in and our chances of success are better. Hopefully it will be two for the price of one, and that is where the success kicks in.

Getting results like these isn’t always easy. It is time consuming and back end heavy. We work to reach out to bloggers in a genuine and authentic way. We don’t “research” them, we get to know them. We read their posts, look at their pictures, and laugh at their jokes. We follow what their readers enjoy. We learn what type of posts they create. We learn what their lifestyle is like so that when can be sure to provide them with products or brands that they will actually use. And after all this, when it comes time to talk to them, we can speak open and honestly about how we feel about their blog and make a real connection. Then they’re more likely to trust our messages and our suggestions because they’ll feel like we know them. Because we do know them.

So when you are trying to reach out to influencers, don’t just worry about your end of it. Bopping them over the head with an offer, even if its a great one, without first taking the time to get to know them probably won’t be successful. Be truthful, genuine, give real compliments, and try to find ways that your products can serve the blogger in a meaningful way. It isn’t about what you say, it’s all in how you say it.

Where Have All the Remarkable Products Gone?

An ideal marketing situation: each product or brand commands its own niche market. Consumers would buy products for the same benefits that marketers push. In turn, companies would spend every last cent on making their product the very best they possible could. Each and every last thing on the shelf would be nothing short of remarkable.

The truth is that we are far from an environment where consumers buy XYZ product because it is just the best damned product out there. As days, months, years go by, more and more products look alike and perform the exact same way. Unfortunately for both companies and marketers, making a product remarkable is harder, and more expensive, than ever.

So what do we do in situations like this? With more choices than ever haunting our consumers, not every product can be the best or the cheapest option. Marketers have to create a way to get consumers to act, and ultimately to talk, about their products. That is where the “free prize” comes in.

A little extra pizzaz.

Seth Godin (god of all things amazing) wrote about this idea years and years ago. He describes a “free prize” is an attribute associated with a product that gives it a little something extra: a bonus if you will. It could be buying an iPod instead of any ol’ MP3 player, simply becuase of the sleek aesthetic or seamless functionality. It could be buying dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets instead of regular ones, simply becuase they are more fun to eat. What about buying that $10 box of cereal for your kids, just because there is a toy inside? Consumers gladly buy products if there some added value that comes along with, even if that added value doesn’t benefit the functionality or performance of a product. It is about the experience. It is about brands creating fun for the consumer.

What’s online got to do with it?

With the emergence of social media as a powerful marketing tool, we have the opportunity to continue that bonus, that little extra something. Now more than ever, brands have the opportunity to interact with consumers. That interaction is the online free prize. Imagine the feeling that a consumer gets when they tweet at their favorite company, say, Starbucks, and less than five minutes later, Starbucks responds. Think of how a customer would feel if they “liked” a Facebook page and received a coupon for 10% off their next purchase? Picture the joy that a person would get to find an entire online community of people who love dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets just as much as they do?

Online is the perfect place to add that little something extra. It is low risk, costs a whole heck of a lot less than big ol’ ads, and provides an open environment to build relationships with consumers. These are our charges day in and out. So how are your products remarkable? What bonuses are you providing for your consumers? Are you taking those bonuses online?

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Many thanks to Seth Godin – always an inspiration, but a clear provider of the idea behind this blog post. Go read “Free Prize Inside” and do it now.