Social MediaSocial Media and Marketing
On the internet there are 2 types of content:
Mediated Content
Mediated content autocratic, top down provided by large organisations traditional media such as BBC.com, CNN.com and NYTimes.com
User Generated Content
UGC is democratic bottom up produced in places such as Myspace Facebook WeeWorld.com and all the other social networks, Flickr, millions of blogs and of course Twitter. According to ComScore Facebook saw 369 Million Unique Visitors in July 2009 and Twitter 51M Unique Visitors many more if you include people using apps such as TweetDeck of Tweetie on mobile devices such as the iPhone. The ratio of user generated to mediated content published everyday on the internet is 5:1 and growing
Social Media as Bonfire
User generated content is influential so should not be ignored. Today’s tech savvy internet users have become distrustful of the mainstream media and are increasingly relying on their social networks to access information. Thinking of booking a holiday users are increasingly likely to ask for advice from their social network - ask a question on Twitter or turn to sites such as tripadvisor.com before making a buying decision. Looking for plumber then you can read genuine reviews of tradesmen on sites such as yelp.com.
How is this important to marketers - I saw a quote the other day that likened marketing to a firework and social media to a bonfire. Marketing gets attention with lots of loud bangs and pretty colours but social media quietly burns away creating the real heat. Out there on the internet somewhere may be influential people blogging about your products or services. How many of us now who these people are or how to engage with them. Yet the technology also works in the marketers favour too. You can do a bit of internet buzz analysis and find out the opinion leaders in your market and work out clever ways to engage with them.
5 Ways to engage social media:
1. Start a company blog but keep it real find your genuine company voice and blog about things about your company as well as general topics of relevance to your sector. And leave comments on other similar blogs.
2. Set up a company Twitter account using a branded background with links back to your company website. Identify colleagues how already use twitter and get them to tweet when there is something genuine to say. Search for users tweeting about your company, set up an RSS feed on Twitter and engage with these people. many companies find twitter more cost effective than email campaigns
3. Set up a YouTube channel and upload some video of your products or services it all helps with your prominence on Google’s increasingly blended search engine results pages. And if people are searching for videos of your products it better they find your professionally produce content than the amateur stuff ot there.
4. Start a Flickr account and upload product pictures remembering to link back to the company website which will be good for your search engine optimisation.
5. Finally once you have identified your influencers out there engage with them. If your a vineyard send them some of your latest vintage to review. Launching a new restaurant get the local foodie bloggers in on the opening night - it will almost certainly create some internet buzz.
But always be genuine - if you pretend to be something your not you will be find out as L'Oreal found out with their less than genuine blog Journal de ma peau blog
More information:
How to make Money from Twitter - Presentation by Nation1
The Twitter Book By Tim O'Reilly, Sarah Milstein