June 2013

Social Equity: Reputation Management on Social Media

June 28, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Reputation management on social media is becoming more and more important, and engaging in the activity properly can add significant Social Equity to your brand.

Reputation management on social media can take many forms. There is not one single network where a brand can monitor and manage its reputation; it is an ongoing process that needs to be heavily intwined with a social media strategy. If, however, it is done properly, then the value of that brand stands to increase significantly.

There are two main areas where Social Equity is generated from reputation management on social media: effective reputation management creates brand loyalty and crises are handled effectively and in some cases staved off.

Though reputation management on social media also benefits brands in a number of other ways, these two aspects add the most value to a brand in both the short and long terms; brand loyalty and crisis management.

Brand Loyalty

Brands survive because of consumer loyalty. Brand evangelists and loyalists are very difficult to cultivate, but when your brand finds them, you have struck oil.

The benefit of brand loyalists is that they will advocate for your company in good times and in bad, but these gems only come about when you are treating your customers properly. And that means before, during and after the purchase has been made.

Properly managing your reputation online through engagement makes it easier to both acquire new brand loyalists and keep them happy over the course of their involvement with your company. Think about it: people might be talking about your company (in either good or bad lights) and if you are not monitoring your online reputation, you will never know about it.

Finding and engaging with your brand loyalists also relates closely to crisis management on social media.

Manage a Crisis

In the world of social media, a second can change the perception of your brand indefinitely. Now imagine if you let that second turn into minutes, then hours, then weeks. Eventually, your brand is known for nothing other than that second, and your reputation is damaged irreparably.

Properly managing your reputation means addressing these issues in real time with an active audience on social media. Before issues spiral out of control, you can get a handle on a situation and potentially resolve a crisis before it is out of your hands.

Crisis management on social media by proper reputation management can do wonders for building Social Equity for your business. The ability to prevent disasters before they happen means maintaining your brand’s sterling reputation, and allows the value of your brand to remain undamaged.

Reputation management is an important area for brands to focus on when it comes to social media. Not only does it help brands better understand their consumers, flaws and catch on to issues, but it also adds a considerable degree of value both in the short- and long-run.

Do you manage your reputation on social networks? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

Social Media Case Study: H&M

June 27, 2013/by Corey Padveen

How did H&M use Google+ to captivate and engage an audience?

There are several critics who claim that Google+ is not a place to engage an audience, and that it is a veritable ghost town in the social media world. Like any form or medium of marketing, it is not necessarily a question of where you are, but how you plan to use your surroundings to your advantage. That is fashion retail giant H&M’s approach to Google+, and they have managed to engage an audience of nearly a million users.

There are a few key features that make H&M an interesting case study for Google+. First, there is the close, personal attention H&M pays to its fans on the network along with the exclusive content they share. Second, H&M monitors their data closely and modifies their Google+ strategy. And third, H&M integrates several key add-ons that help the brand generate business from the network.

Engagement

The devotion H&M has shown to its fans on Google+ should be noted by any marketer looking to build brand loyalty. H&M fans on Google+ are encouraged to share content, which the brand then features on their page.

Conversations are also started by the brand, and visual content is shared on a regular basis in an effort to drive fans to landing pages. Furthermore, much of this content is exclusive to Google+.

It is important to reward your fans. We discussed this recently in an article about Cadbury’s big ‘Thank You’ to their fans. The difference with H&M, however, is that the fashion brand focuses on thanking their Google+ fans with exclusive content. This is an excellent way to engage an audience, and H&M has the numbers to prove it.

Data

The ‘Ripples’ feature on Google+ can be one of your most powerful weapons in developing a strong Google+ campaign – if you know how to use it.

H&M monitors the data in the backend of Google+ in order to understand how, where and when their content is being shared and make the necessary modifications to their strategy in order to ensure that their engagement and share rates remain high. Any marketer will tell you that data and reporting will make or break a campaign. It is important that whenever possible you examine the data you have, and ‘Ripples’ are a powerful feature on Google+.

Integration

Did we mention that Google+ is owned by Google? H&M realizes that and they integrated their AdWords campaigns with their Google+ efforts. The results? Only a 22% CTR (click-through rate) uplift. Not too shabby.

It is important to streamline your processes wherever possible. If the whole machine is functioning together, you stand to produce far better results than if every part is trying to work on its own.

Do you actively use Google+ to engage an audience? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

Instagram Video or Vine? Which Social Video Tool is Better for Business?

June 26, 2013/by Corey Padveen

To Instagram or to Vine? That is the question. Which social video tool is better for business?

The newest video feature on Instagram is one of the hottest topics in the world of social media, and rightfully so. This newly integrated social video tool means that Facebook (which owns Instagram) has taken yet another step further in controlling the social world.

A few months ago, Twitter introduced their social video tool, Vine. This was a big deal then and now everyone wants to know: which of these two platforms has more advantages for business?

Though they both possess some strong characteristics, when it comes to business, Instagram video has the edge. Below is a comparative justification for the advantages of Instagram for business.

Quality

One word: Cinema. This is the feature on Instagram’s video service that allows users to stabilize videos. This may not seem like much, but for businesses, it means the ability to create videos that appear somewhat more professional. Users can also edit videos on Instagram instead of scrapping them entirely and having to start over (which is a downside to Vine).

Second, as with it’s pictures, Instagram Video allows users to apply over a dozen filters to videos whereas Vine is a what-you-see-is-what-you-get platform (for now).

Length

You can do a lot of creative stuff on Vine in only six seconds, but imagine what you could do with twice that much (and a little bit more).

Videos made with Instagram can be up to 15 seconds long, lending businesses the opportunity to convey their message with a little more clarity. It also allows for a call-to-action to appear for an extra second or two. And in the online world, a second or two is a lifetime.

Embedding

Vine certainly has the edge here, and it is a big one.

Videos on Vine can be easily embedded while Instagram still has yet to include this feature. That’s a big plus for Vine, because it allows businesses to share their videos on different platforms, including their WordPress blog with the plugin, Embedly.

This is not unexpected. Facebook has been notoriously streamlining all of their efforts in order to, as we mentioned earlier, take over the Internet. Although it should not be long before we see some version of embedding capable with Instagram videos.

The same cannot be said for sharing, however.

Sharing

Videos on Instagram can be shared to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Foursquare, Flickr and via email. With Vine, your videos can only go as far as Facebook and Twitter.

Audience

Finally, the biggest difference of them all: the audience.

Vine currently has about 13 million users. Instagram’s user-base is ten times that! With such a vast audience on Instagram, you have to wonder if Vine is still a relevant and viable option for businesses on social media.

Vine is an intriguing tool, and can be a lot of fun. (Just look at comedian Will Sasso’s Lemon Compilation on Vine.) But when it comes to the benefits of a social video tool for business, Instagram certainly has the edge.

Have you used Instagram Video or Vine for business? Which one do you think is more beneficial? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

4 Features Every Blog Post Should Have

June 25, 2013/by Corey Padveen

There are certain features every blog post should have in order to both be seen as a quality article by your audience and work to help build your readership.

There are some elements that put certain blogs in a category above the rest. While some of the better blogs out there are very different from one another, each post has certain features that every blog post should have. These features are what add to the overall high quality of the blog, and for yours to reach that same level, you should be incorporating these features that every blog post should have.

Though there are certain elements unique to one post or another, the four elements below should always find their way into each of your posts.

Shareability

You want your content to reach as many people as possible, right? Well then you should include means through which your audience can share it!

Adding share buttons to your blog should be one of the first things you do once you get started. The easier it is to share your great content, the faster your audience and reader loyalty will grow!

Images

Sure, images look great and add a visual aspect to your posts, but including an image with the proper alt tags is an excellent way to get found. It is important to optimize your blog for search engines in every way possible, and properly tagged images are one way to do that.

The presence of an image or two also means that Pinterest now becomes a player in the social sharing game. Recently, the photo pinning network surpassed Twitter as one of the top sources for social referral traffic and it shows no signs of stopping. So add images to your blog posts – they are far more valuable than you might think.

Questions

Get the conversation started and engage your audience every time you post. End your article with a question, or ask your audience for their thoughts. You might have a group of readers that want to take part in the conversation but still need that extra push to get involved, so give it to them!

Succinctness

You are not writing a novel. The poetics and imagery are not nearly as important as the substance. (Unless of course you are writing a blog about poetics and imagery.)

Online attention spans are not very long – only a few seconds, actually. You need to grab your audience’s attention fast and share what you need to quickly. Filling an article with fluff will mean a higher bounce rate. But if you are clear and concise you can surely expect reader to come back for more.

These are just a few features every blog post should have. There are certainly more, but these are among the most important – no matter what type of blog you are writing.

What other features have you found to be important when it comes to successful blogging? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

The Perfect Post on Social Media [INFOGRAPHIC]

June 24, 2013/by Corey Padveen

What makes the perfect post on social media?

To qualify something as ‘perfect’ is rather extreme. Everyone has different tastes, and people are going to appreciate and react to your content in different ways. To say that one specific post is the ‘perfect post on social media’ might be a little farfetched. However, the folks at mycleveragency have put together an infographic detailing what makes the data-supported ‘perfect’ post on a number of social networks.

The data is taken from a number of studies and surveys and is derived from one common element: what makes the majority tick? How are you supposed to draft content that generates engagement, clicks and conversions on each social network? Sharing the same content across every network is not going to work – people on Google+ will not necessarily react to content the same way as people on Pinterest.

The infographic also shares some interesting information regarding the best and worst times to post on different social networks. A little while back, we posted an article that detailed some similar information, and it would appear as though some new evidence shows that user behaviour has changed in some areas and remained the same in others. Interesting stuff!

Take a look at this infographic and try modifying your content according to the tips highlighted here. Let us know if you agree with these tips or if you have found another version of your perfect post on social media! Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

Social Equity: Targeted Campaigns on Social Media

June 21, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Targeted campaigns on social media provide certain unique benefits that can add significant value to your business.

There was a time when a few carefully placed television ads would reach 80% of your targeted audience. Those days, however, are long gone, and to reach those same numbers today you would, in most cases, need to spend far more than your budget.

Targeted campaigns on social media, however, provide similar capabilities at a fraction of the cost, and generate a significant degree of Social Equity.

Targeted campaigns generate Social Equity for your business in two distinct ways. First, while your reach may not be extremely broad, it is far more specific than with conventional campaigns and therefore generates higher conversion rates. Second, targeted campaigns on social media are far more cost effective than other types of marketing and advertising that generate similar results – and those are few and far between.

Value Added

As noted above, the ability to target a very specific audience leads to higher conversion rates. When you are able to tailor an ad specifically for the audience that it is reaching, you can expect that the engagement levels will be significantly higher than a case where a generic ad is shared to a mass audience.

Of course, marketers and advertisers try to do this on other media as well. Using the available data, campaigns are launched to specific audiences wherever possible. However, on social media the ability to narrow down your targeted audience is far easier and the results of a well-executed campaign will be much higher.

One example of this is a social media case study we looked at recently about Vestas, a wind energy provider. Vestas put together a very targeted campaign and sent it to 50 companies. For each executive or employee that came into contact with the campaign, Vestas had created a version of the campaign targeted specifically towards that company. The results were high engagement, significant conversion and the campaign was an overall success.

Costs Saved

The second area in which Social Equity is derived from targeted campaigns is in the costs that are saved from engaging in this type of campaign on social networks.

As noted at the beginning of this article, reaching 80% of your desired audience was easy at the dawn of television, but today the cost is far too prohibitive. On social media, however, you can still reach your targeted audience at a fraction of the cost.

The ability to launch targeted campaigns geared towards engaging your desired audience for a relatively low cost (compared to reaching the same audience with other media) is a big value. Increasing your exposure and growing your business at rates comparable to those that involve significant ad spending will benefit your business significantly in the long-run.

Often, Social Equity is as much about how much you are saving as it is about how much you are making.

Have you executed any targeted campaigns on social media? Tell us about them in the comments below or on Twitter!

Social Media Case Study: Vestas

June 20, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Vestas – a multi-billion dollar wind energy pioneer – used LinkedIn to combat rising competition.

Late in 2011, Vestas, a Danish manufacturer and provider of wind-based energy systems, was faced with a global recession, increased competition and an unpredictable regulatory body. The result was a decline in revenues and the burden of bringing the company back to its usual standards fell on the branding and marketing departments.

When one thinks of a social media case study, multinational energy providers are not necessarily the first companies to come to mind. What Vestas showed, however, was that social media marketing can deliver results for companies in all sorts of industries, even those where you might least expect to see an impact.

The Campaign

The Vestas campaign was among the most impressive ever put together on LinkedIn. It encompassed several parts and was tailored, effectively, to each of the 400,000 people who were reached. The campaign, titled Energy Transparency, aimed to accomplish a very specific goal, according to Morten Kamp Jørgensen, Director Brand Management, Group MarCom and Customer Insight, Vestas:

“The goal of the campaign was to start a discussion and education process for carbon conscious corporations to directly invest in wind energy rather than just buying Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs). Many corporations are already investing directly in renewable energy and we wanted to encourage this and engage corporations who have sustainability targets that make them more likely to invest in wind.”

To do this, Vestas launched an InMail campaign to 622 targeted executives at 50 energy-conscious companies, created customized LinkedIn banner ads for the 400,000 employees of said companies, partnered with Businessweek for a special offer for the InMail participants and created custom landing pages for each of the 50 companies’ executives and employees.

The results were outstanding. (You would hope so with that much work!) And while this is a huge campaign – one that not every company would need or be capable of executing – there is a lot to learn for marketers.

The Lessons

Do Your Research

Vestas did not succeed because they blindly launched a campaign on LinkedIn – far from it. Months of careful planning went into this campaign, starting with research into the companies most likely to respond. Again, the 50 companies selected were chosen based on specific criteria that made them excellent candidates.

When putting together a marketing campaign – social media or otherwise – you will only succeed if your campaign is built on a solid foundation of research and data to back up your decisions.

Customize Your Campaign

The banners, the landing pages, the InMail – everything about the Vestas LinkedIn campaign was customized and tailored to fit the individual seeing the content. Adding a personal touch keeps your audience invested.

Sharing generic content leads to fewer click-throughs and, subsequently, a lower conversion. If you personalize the different features of a campaign, you stand to generate a much higher success rate than if you do not.

In with the New, But Not Out with the Old

Vestas took several marketing styles and created a huge campaign that blurred the lines between conventional marketing and new marketing. From LinkedIn, to banner ads, to magazine spreads – they covered all their bases and, more importantly, they connected every aspect of the campaign together.

It is important for marketers to remember that social media is not the end all be all of marketing. While it does present some great new opportunities, it should be looked at in unison with your conventional marketing efforts. Vestas realized that and the numbers prove that they got it right.

Which lesson do you think is most important to pull from this campaign? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

4 Tips to Help You Manage Your Online Reputation

June 19, 2013/by Corey Padveen

It is crucial now more than ever that you properly manage your online reputation – everyone can see everything.

With the advent of social media in the business world, it has never been more important to keep an eye on and properly manage your online reputation. 140 characters may seem short, but that is all it takes to start a PR crisis that quickly spirals out of control.

Not long ago, we posted an infographic with plenty of information on the importance of monitoring and managing your online reputation. There were some important stats in the infographic. Most crucial was the fact that 70% of consumers trust brand recommendations from their friends and family, and a whopping 92% of consumers trust reviews they read online from former customers. That’s a substantial majority.

So how can you manage your online reputation and build your business? The four tips below should always be kept in mind when it comes to online reputation management.

Engage in Conversations

When people are talking about your brand, talk with them. Don’t let the conversations take place about you without showing your engaged audience that you are listening. This will accomplish two things: it will show those conversing that you care and show the same to onlookers.

Handle Every Crisis

As we noted above, one 140-character message can mean a major dent in your business. You don’t want to let anything get out of control, because in the world of social media, it is much harder to deal with the ripple effect than to deal with the one disgruntled customer.

Offer Social Care

Social Care is the new concept of offering customer service on social media channels. Currently, according to a study by Nielsen and NM Incite, one-third of online adults prefer Social Care to conventional approaches (i.e. phone). That may sound like a minority, but that’s a huge group of people!

By offering an additional service that helps your customers, you will gain an edge over your competitors, and it will certainly help build up your reputation. Just be sure to answer customers when they reach out to you!

Follow Your Brand

There are free listening tools like SocialMention and BackTweets, and high-end, highly technical, highly pricey listening tools like Crimson Hexagon and Sysomos that you should be using to listen for brand mentions. You’d be surprised at where your brand is being discussed, and you want to be abreast of what’s going on.

Using listening tools always provides you with the added option of dealing with issues that you may not have known about (i.e. extensions to your Social Care model) and can also provide you with valuable insights as to what your customers want and how you can improve your business and services.

There are several ways to go about monitoring and managing your online reputation. Putting these tips into practice is great way to start.

Do you engage in some for of online reputation management? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

5 Ways to Improve Your EdgeRank Score

June 18, 2013/by Corey Padveen

The Facebook EdgeRank algorithm is crucial when it comes to your exposure on the social network, and these tips will help you greatly improve your EdgeRank score.

The Facebook EdgeRank algorithm is one of the few ranking algorithms out there that is well understood. We recently posted an article that outlined the Facebook Edgerank algorithm, and embracing some of these tips will help you improve your EdgeRank score.

The common theme in these tips? Engagement. The common motif in the algorithm is user engagement levels, and each of these five tips is designed to improve your EdgeRank score by increasing engagement on your page.

Ask a Question

Comments are one of the most vital forms of engagement when it comes to EdgeRank. Asking a question at the end of a post or in relation to an article you shared is a great way to incite fan participation. If you start the discussion, you are much more likely to see others join in.

Run a Poll

A poll is simple, effective and a great way to encourage engagement on your page. Asking a fun question with simple answers to choose from takes the first tip above to a whole new level.

Furthermore, the added benefit of a poll is that it not only helps improve your EdgeRank score, but it also provides you with some detailed information about your fans. With that in mind, try and make the question something that is not only fun for your fans to answer, but provides you with useful information.

Fill-in-the-______

People love sharing their creativity, and fillin-in-the-blank posts are a great way to do that. Keep them light, because affinity weighs heavily in the EdgeRank algorithm (i.e. the sentiment of comments left on your content) so avoid hot button issues (unless, of course, that’s your page’s theme).

Share Photos

According to HubSpot, photos shared on Facebook generate 53% more ‘Likes’ than the average post. One of your goals should always be to share content that drives higher levels of engagement. On Facebook, that happens to be visual media (i.e. photos and short videos) and sharing this content above other types will surely help boost your EdgeRank score.

Keep the Conversation Going

The first tip above suggests that you ask questions to incite engagement with your content. Organic engagement, however, will only last so long. To really increase your page’s exposure with EdgeRank, you will need to actively take part in as many conversations as you can.

Actions as small as a ‘Like’ on someone’s post shows that you, as a company, care. Developing that personality for your brand is crucial to increase engagement levels in the future.

As noted, the central theme with these tips is engagement. Essentially, that is one of the focal points of the EdgeRank algorithm, and sharing content that increases those levels of engagement is a great way to improve your EdgeRank score.

What types of content have you used to generate higher engagement levels? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

How to Properly Promote Your Blog [INFOGRAPHIC]

June 17, 2013/by Corey Padveen

What steps are necessary to properly promote your blog and increase your exposure?

Blogs are a great way to drive traffic, build your credibility and generate leads. The problem, however, is that you are competing with billions of other pages for the attention of a niche market. That said, a HubSpot study found that companies that blog generate 55% more trafic and 70% more leads than companies that do not.

So, how do you properly promote your blog to reap some of these benefits? There are a few steps that are crucial to increasing the success of your blog and the business you generate from it. The infographic below provides an excellent checklist that you should run through every time you put together a new post until it becomes second nature.

Go through the checklist and tell us which of the steps described you think is the most important to help promote your blog. Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

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