Logic+Emotion

Six Near-term Trends Influencing The Business of Marketing

If you’ve come here looking for the latest thinking on virtual reality, drones and autonomous driving—you’ve come to the wrong place. Marketers are an interesting bunch—we pride ourselves on “being in the know”, with some good reason… Part of our jobs are to stay one step ahead of the game so we are better prepared for the changes that inevitably effect the business of our industry. But in the pursuit of staying ahead of future trends—we often overlook massive shifts that need to be operationalized over the next five years, if not decade. In the pursuit of keeping our eye on the ball—I’ve identified six near term trends influencing the business of marketing:

From Media Channels To Media Ecosystem 
Blame Digital. Just when we were getting used to shifting efforts and dollars to reflect not only print, television, radio and the internet—the internet itself has fragmented into a million tiny little pieces which blur the lines between paid, owned, earned and even social when it comes to dollar spend—and that’s not even getting into how it all get’s measured. Case in point—in the past year, MTV has seen it’s traditional television viewership of the Video Music Awards decline 34%. However if you look closely at the numbers, digital views including Facebook Live Streaming increased 70%. The problem here? MTV has yet to monetize the ever fragmented and complex digital media ecosystem and still relies on traditional TV advertisers to make money.

This makes the jobs of the media creators, buyers, sellers and strategists, well—complicated. Marketers are reluctant to embrace this complexity in their need to reach the largest and most targeted audiences they can. But in the near term—this complexity must be dealt with by diving deeper into digital and re-defining how, where and when dollars are spent within the complete media ecosystem vs. the easiest parts of it to put spend against.

From Text That Tells To Visuals That Show
The entire Web is being re-built for visual and video content. Before you dismiss this as “obvious”—we must take into account that the previous and dominant version of the Internet became mainstream with the advent of Google’s search engine and search was and to some extent still is a game of text, meta tags, keywords and text based organic content popularity. Now let’s look at demographics: Boomers, and GenX grew up on traditional literacy in the written word. Millennials and GenZ are growing up on what I call “visual literacy” which is accentuated by platforms such as Snapchat, Instagram and YouTube which are video and visual dominated as opposed to text driven.

It is this visual literacy combined with the changing face of how we not only search for but receive content which is changing before our very eyes. marketers have spent years perfecting their Keywords and then finding ways to get text based links to their written content shared on social media but increasingly it’s video that gets shared directly through a multitude of apps that is becoming the dominant social currency. Brands have yet to master modern forms of video and visual storytelling as even the rules are changing in this space. Snapchat for example favors short, compelling vertical video formats which tend to perform well. For marketers—many who built their craft on taglines or standard 30 second television commercials—these forms of video content (not ads) are foreign and still largely untapped. Marketers will need to re-think video, visual storytelling and the production of these things from the ground up in this new world if they are to remain relevant.

From Mobile Last To Mobile First
We take for granted that Facebook is one of the most popular apps in the world and most of us access it from our mobile devices. But in the early days of Facebook—there was a time that they found themselves on the defense when it came to mobile and believe it or not—they actually didn’t get it. In less than a year—they transformed themselves into a “mobile first” company from the top down and had some of the most talented developers in the world at their disposal to see this transformation through. Unfortunately, even the world’s biggest and most resourceful brands and agencies do not have these resources nor the imperative to re-invent their organizations to think, act, and operate within the same context as their mobile consumers, customers and employees.

Thanks to Google, marketers have good reason to prioritize mobile development as their way forward since Google actually dings Websites that they deem are not responsive or functional in the mobile environment. But the shift to mobile is much more than making our Websites mobile friendly. It means we need to intimately understand how our audiences want to consume, create, share and interact with our brands. It’s one of the leading reasons we’ve seen customers shift to expressing their dissatisfaction about a brand experience or service publicly—they have a megaphone in their pocket at all times. We’ve done a disservice to our industry by treating mobile as a “duh”—it requires a complete transformation in many ways due to its impact on our daily behaviors. Facebook had it right—brands and agencies should do the same.

From Reliance On Media Companies To Being Your Own Media Company
“Publishing Is The New Marketing”. Sounds good—easier said than done. But the reality is that thanks to social media—most marketers are already in the business of publishing whether they know it or not. Got a brand presence on Facebook or YouTube? Congratulations, you’re in the content business. The problem however is that most content isn’t very good and so marketers find themselves solving the wrong problem.

It’s not about creating content as much as it is about cultivating targeted and high quality audiences who want to hear from you again and again.

In the pursuit of cultivating quality audiences who not only are willing to consume a brand’s content but want to share and potentially co-create with the brand, marketers must understand how to engage with audiences not only during their “tentpole” campaigns but daily, weekly. monthly and quarterly. This is where the dynamics of marketing and publishing mix and brands are still scrambling to figure out how to do this.

From Ad-Hoc Influencer Engagement To Integrated Influence Marketing 
When CBS 60 Minutes does a feature on Influencer Marketing—you know it’s not fleeting trend anymore. However this space as familiar as it seems is new territory for marketers. Unlike traditional celebrities—most of these cultural influencers such as social media stars and Youtubers are creators who have built their OWN audiences using their OWN channels. So to protect their reputations with their audience—their preference is to collaborate and co-create with brands as opposed to endorse and act as spokespeople the way traditional celebrities have always done.

In addition—most brands are currently treating these kinds of partnerships as one-offs or ad-hoc engagements vs. re-thinking how they interface not only with cultural influencers but ALL influencers who often play off each other when it comes to reaching mass audiences often times through our peers. It will take years for marketers to fully evolve and build the process to support this in a much more integrated and scalable fashion beyond one off campaigns and programs. This entire space is still in its infancy.

From Brand Value Proposition To Brand Values
Lock yourself in a room with the most seasoned and senior marketing executives and they will nod their heads when presented with research that reflects the purchase habits of millennials, especially one key shift—millennials are often influenced not only by the products, services and “value proposition” of the brands they buy from—they are also curious and care about how the brand acts, how it participates and what it “stands for” in a societal context. If they feel like the brand is aligned with some or all of their own personal values—these influence behaviors from purchase through to loyalty. My Employer (Edelman) produced research that most consumers are “involved” with brands but are open to “commitment”. And in many cases, being committed goes beyond traditional value proposition attributes such as quality, convenience and price.

The premise seems deceptively simple. Many brands understand this and in response have gone out of their way to show how they are “going green” or “doing good”—often through corporate channels that are responsible for these kinds of messages. But this shift goes beyond messages and block and tackle corporate communications. Marketers have mastered the art and science of building brands in the hearts and minds of consumers by balancing their emotional and rational needs. Products had to show they would actually work but the most successful brands went further and endeared themselves to consumers through appealing to their emotions (Think Nike—Just Do It)

Thanks largely to millennials—this is no longer enough. Marketers need to re-examine their value proposition and ask themselves if their brand’s “values” are clearly articulated and if their actions, marketing and every touchpoint with a consumer and customer backs this up. It goes beyond satisfying rational and emotional needs but adding the third dimension of “societal” but above all else—all three dimensions need to be true to the brand and supported by proof points. This becomes not only the job of the chief communications officer and CEO but the CEO, CMO and CEO working in tandem. Few brands have been able to successfully “stand for something” because it takes a village to pull this off right and in line with the brand values. But whether it’s #Optoutside or #LikeAGirl—when done authentically, it resonates.

If you’ve gotten this far, than you’re probably thinking that none of the above is new to you. And that’s the point—it isn’t. But the marketing industry has yet to fully make the needed shifts in most or nearly all of the above trends based on my observations and in working directly with clients. These trends each bring with them great opportunities but require companies whether brands or agencies to evolve priorities, re-evaluate staff and agency mix and place bets in areas that are still developing or require extra effort to measure. They may not be as sexy as virtual reality or cars which drive themselves—but in the next five or so years, it is how well we operationalize against these trends that may benefit marketers most in the near future.

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Societal: The Third Dimension Of Modern Day Brand Building

I started writing this blog back in 2006 and the namesake was completely intentional. "Logic+Emotion" symbolizes the way we've been building brands for the past sixty plus years. Marketers have always known that they have to reach people emotionally in order to capture their attention. We're emotional beings by design and often times make decisions based on how we feel. Our emotions serve as clues that explain our behaviors. We buy clothes because we need them—but the styles and brands we choose have more to do with our psycology than the basic need we must fill. 

In the same breath we have brains, not just hearts. There is always a voice telling us that we need to check some boxes before making a decision. Features, benefits, specs—these are all reasons to believe the decisions we are making are right. Together, rational and emotional were the yin and yang of building brands and differentiating from competitors. 

Edelman's 2014 Brandshare study, however begins to validate what many of us have already begun suspecting over the past few years—that brands aren't only built but they are preserved and must evolve along with highly empowered consumers who now make decisions with not only their hearts and brains but also their conscience. We discovered that meeting consumers rational and emotional needs are a good start—but there's a third dimension we need to now consider, and we are calling it "societal". 

In fact, we looked at meeting consumers needs based across five key KPIs (Purchase, Recommend, Defend, Share Personal Info & Share Brand Content) and "Societal" actually corresponded more strongly with "Share Personal Info and Share Brand Content"—two KPIs that we think are becoming increasingly important for brands and the marketers who seek to obtain data from consumers while hoping they become a human distribution network via social, e-mail and other peer to peer channels. 

Last week while discussing Brandshare findings, I could not help but recall how I myself shared a news story about how *Microsoft was sharing its cloud infrastructure as part of the effort to combat the Ebola Virus. I was doing exactly what the data above shows—sharing a brand's story that was meaningfully attaching itself to a societal issue. The same week Microsoft reported stronger than expected earnings as well. A brand that operates in the societal dimension does not equate to a brand that doesn't profit. As we've stated in Brandshare, the value exchange brands and consumers ideally have is based on mutual benefit and gain. 

But our assessment is to not focus on one of the three need states over the other. When consumers needs are met rationally, emotionally and societally—a brand has the most chance of seeing a "lift" in how meeting those needs correlates to the KPIs we outline in the report. We think this is significant and if the trend continues, brands will have to take a second look at their values built meeting on emotional and rational needs and discern if and how societal fits into the core of the brand's DNA.

 

 

*Microsoft is an Edelman client

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Why It's Time To Re-Think Real-Time

We can do better. 

Recently, I attended an industry roundtable alongside a variety of marketers from different industries, all on the brand side. These are smart and accomplished individuals who gathered together to discuss real time marketing and what it means for their organizations. When asked what their favorite example of real time marketing was—most deferred to the obvious answer: Oreo's "dunk in the dark!" With much respect to the brand that got the real time conversation started—it's time to move on.


From Real Time Marketing to Building Responsive Brands
Real-time marketing is indeed a real thing, but we're going to have to stop chasing our own version of the Oreo moment if we're going to make progress in this area. First we have to really get our heads wrapped around the foundation to understand what we're actually trying to do—and what we're trying to do is build brands differently. We essentially have two tools at our disposal: content and engagement. This is where many of us miss the mark. We underestimate how difficult it is to use these tools. A recent article featuring Coke's content efforts underscores how arduous a task it is for a brand and organization to create, curate and publish a regular stream of valuable content. In the race to real-time, we've over simplified this. Secondly—when, how, why and how often a brand engages has become an art and science. The NYPD learned this lesson the hard way when they wanted to simply promote their cause. 

Re-Thinking Our Core Teams
Before we go any further down the rabbit hole of real time marketing, we must take into account that the core team needed to actually take on the role of planning & producing content as well as partnering with third parties and coordinating media purchases looks a little differently than the traditional core teams whether it's an advertising model or other. Editorial sensibilities must be combined with creative instincts and craft. Social aptitude must be core to engagement strategies and tactics. Media spend is increasingly becoming difficult to separate out as it becomes part of the content strategy and analytics must be more agile than ever. 


Enter The Content Strategist
Content strategy or content marketing for that matter isn't new—but there aren't exactly thousands of content strategists with years of experience under their belts sitting around waiting to take their rightful position as key member of today's responsive brand building team. Content strategists will also look differently from how they may have operated in the past with a holistic view of the way content can live, breath and flow across paid, owned, earned and shared properties and media. They will need to partner closely with media counterparts and be intimately involved in the connections planning. 

Having put this thinking forward—there's much to be said about in regards to culture, talent and pure ingenuity. When it was my turn to say what my favorite example of "real time marketing was", I gave a recent client example because I was close to it. If I had the chance to answer again—I would have said Honey Maid. Take a look—now that's a responsive brand. 

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Social Business Isn't Dead—It's Just Connected

Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. 
~Mark Twain.

This isn't a post about social business—it's about doing business in a connected age, and this is an important distinction. Let me take a step back for a moment. In April 2009, exactly five years ago I took a chance and joined a start up that didn't have a name at the time and only a handful of employees. That start-up ended up being called Dachis Group, which was recently acquired by SaaS platform Sprinklr. There was a single reason I joined the emerging organization in pre-infancy. Jeff Dachis, who co-founded Razorfish—one of the original digital agencies said the following sequence of words which I had never heard before, and deeply resonated with me. 

Social Business Design

While my time with the start-up was brief, I never wavered from the belief that was core to what social business stood for. Everything had changed, and while we were a handful of true believers at the time, we all instinctively knew that the way business functioned was going to be impacted for the years to come. Now fast-forward five years later...

I touch a lot of clients and initiatives and our engagements can range from producing a regular and relevant stream of content for our client's brands to working side by side with them to figure out the infrastructure needed to support different forms of engagement with a variety of stakeholders. I had been spending some time recently on our beta version of "Dairy Hub"—one of the latest manifestations of evolution we've undertaken with our willing parters of the US dairy industry and it dawned upon me this is just scratching the surface of what we used to call social business. And looking forward, it's simply how all business will operate in one way or another (many are well on their way). 

However, the "Dairy Hub" alone isn't social business—it's one of many initiatives which were driven by a strategy and vision to bring the industry together and create value for a variety of stakeholders. The real story behind the the evolution had more to do with how we collaborated with the CEO of DMI and his team and aligning their efforts as well as ours over the years. It's the heavy lifting stuff you don't always hear about but is always necessary for real change to occur. It takes years. 

More on Dairy another time—back to doing business in a connected age. Below are a few areas which are highly relevant to how business needs to continue to change moving forward. They are how...

The Cloud Connects Us
Cloud technologies are eliminating the need for consumers and enterprises to store massive amounts of data by themselves through offering up an infrastructure which allows businesses to set up shop virtually overnight and empowers data sharing like we've never seen before. It's also potentially a security nightmare. 

Content Connects Us
As advertising becomes gradually easier to ignore or skip—brands are under pressure to leverage all forms of content which either educate, inform or entertain us. Never have brands had to work so hard to get their target audience to pay attention to them. 

Mobility Connects Us
Pay close attention to Facebook's strategy of unbundling the Facebook experience into an ecosystem of mobile first experiences. Mobility is on it's way to becoming the dominant way people interact with technology. Facebook understands this, having learned the hard way originally putting the desktop experience before mobile.

Sharing Connects Us
It's been described as the sharing or collaborative economy, but it's yet another way that connecting is changing the face of how we want to exchange goods and services. E-commerce allowed us to buy new or used—now we can connect to those who can help us get our needs met perhaps without actually buying anything. 
 
The thing that's driving massive change in organizations today is the fact that we've become connected in a number of ways that haven't existed in the past. It's bigger than social. It's bigger than mobile. It's bigger than wearables. And it will take years to work through as connections empower individuals across the board. 

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Content as Currency and Other Thoughts From #Snowcial

I'm in Lake Tahoe this week combining some business and down-time and recently spoke at "Snowcial"—billed as "SXSW for the snow sports and hospitality industry, it attracts a really cool cross section of people who span marketing, technology and even journalism. If you love skiing or snowboarding and marketing/technology, it's worth considering for your event calendar. I kicked off day one yesterday with a short talk about content, convergence and connectivity. Below are a few themes from my talk: 

Content As Currency 

There's a good reason everyone is talking about the role of *content these days but you have to understand the psychology of it all. Thanks to social networks, people share interesting, entertaining or even informative content because it makes them look good. There's a reason why the word "meme" has "me" in it. So it's not enough just to produce content—your content has to be designed for sharing. I like to think of content in today's hyper connected world as being "snackable"—sending out bits and bites of content which can be digested and shared rapidly. The reason why we're seeing a revolution in visual content which is designed for social newsfeeds and mobile is based on this core understanding of why people like, share and engage around content. 

Everyone Can And Will Publish

I shared a recent experience I had with Jeep where I tweeted for help and was not only responded to but had my issue resolved through their customer care service which was facilitated through my initial interactions on Twitter. This is by no means a new model, but clearly Jeep had a process in place and was able to close the loop with me efficiently. This is an area brands will continue to grapple with as people move from traditional ways to initiate contact with brands and go directly to public forums. The obvious follow up question is how does this scale? My answer is figure it out because it's not going away. And yes, my car is working just fine now. 

Insights > Influence

 

For all the hype around influence—we've still largely got it wrong. We should be looking at analyzing who and what are driving conversations in the same context as we might run a focus group. Technologies that allow us to analyze conversations and how they spread and who influences them can provide great insights if we know what we are looking for. For example in working with the association that represents US dairy farmers—we analyzed conversations in forums and found these emerging. As we audited the content the organization was producing—we identified opportunities make future content initiatives more relevant to what people were talking about. 

You Don't Not Need An App For That

There's no doubt that we are living in an App economy, but it's time to step back and ask ourselves if we need an app for every idea. Unless that idea involves significant functionality, it might not need to be developed as a stand alone app creating yet another format to maintain. My team has been developing content solutions using responsive design techniques so the design reacts to the format it's being viewed it. It's not a perfect solution for every development issue, but worth tapping where it makes sense. 

It's All Converging

Lastly I talked about the convergence of media models and marketing tactics. First from a broad perspective inspired by Altimeter's model of converged media, but also ad it applies to new digital advertising formats which blur hard lines. Facebook sponsored posts are a perfect example of how paid, earned, and owned dynamics all come together. You can read more about that on the unofficial All Facebook blog who covered my talk. 

Looking forward to hitting the slopes again before I leave!

*ConAgra is an Edelman Digital client 

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Every Brand Will Need A Content Strategy

Somewhere in the debate to define what was hot or not as a worthy "real-time marketing" example during the Oscars, we lost sight of the bigger picture. We're not really talking about the benefits of marketing in a timely fashion as much as we are talking about the birthright of an organization or brand to produce, circulate and curate conversations around valuable content. 

I had to take a pause recently to remind myself of the bigger picture and consider other activations we have in play like working with the organization who represents the US Dairy industry. In this approach, we've gotten to point where we staff an onsite newsroom who is focused on producing content and engaging with the industry. Before any of this happend, we had to begin with a strategic approach—a content strategy. 

Planned & Responsive Content 

A good content strategy starts with the basics—which are built upon developing content narratives around planned activities which are either ongoing (like a drumbeat) or are responsive (in reaction to current events). Both have their place and they can and should work together. Content strategy often is the starting point before getting into the nuts and bolts activities which support it, like developing a content calendar, putting an editorial process in place or supporting content production with writers producers and creative talent. While newsrooms and war rooms can serve as places content activation happens in concentrated form—these tactics are not the strategy. 

A war room setting enables teams to centralize content production and operations

These are still early days for organizations who are building their audiences directly via social channels, or partnering with media companies to circulate or co-produce their stories. There are some great examples where brands have already begun regularly producing their content (Intel IQ, Coke Journey, AMEX Open Forum). In each of these programs and the ones to come—whether it be formal or not, there is strategic thought being applied to content development and distribution.

Brands WILL become media. 

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How The Marketing Community Lost Last Night #OscarsRTM

I'm not surprised, but that doesn't mean I'm not concerned. I witnessed something sad last night, while the Oscars were going down. As I anticipated, there was a great deal of activity by brands and their partners who took a shot at producing content connected to the Academy Awards. Some of the content was just OK. Some wasn't. And to be honest, some of it was pretty good even if not earth shattering. 

Because I had a feeling there would be a great deal of activity going on—I set up a simple hash tag, because I wanted a way to organize what brands would be doing. So, I set up #OscarsRTM (Real Time Marketing) on my own as a way to keep track. And I invited others to help. And perhaps discuss. 

What happened next astounded me. First—the "marketing community" debated the term real-time marketing back and forth. At least this was somewhat intellectually stimulating. Then what came next was something not unexpected but still astounding in it's intensity. A constant stream of snark, dismissal, critique and a never ending barrage of "not impressed."

Really? When did it come to this? Take the below image posted on a Tumblr created for the sole purpose of trashing the efforts from brands last night.


It's the "newsroom" US Cellular set up and was using as their mission control for branded content which they published throughout the evening. I watched most of their content and I enjoyed a few of the posts. And frankly, my first thought was that this particular organization is ahead of many because they are TRYING to provide relevant content vs. just doing straightforward advertising. Does your company have a newsroom ready to go? Do you have staff and partners coordinating and working together to produce content? Are you experimenting AT ALL?

According to the genius who took liberties with the above picture, the team at US Cellular should be fearing for their jobs. And this—this is why I am so concerned. If the marketing "community" is successful at tearing itself down in the pursuit of building up the profiles of individuals too fickle to be bothered, then we all lose.

Nobody tries. Nobody fails. Nobody wins.

Yes, my team was working with a brand last night as well (Kellogg's), but even if we weren't and if I had created the hash tag just to perform objective research, I would still be concerned. And despite that, I have a prediction for you. Brands will eventually figure this stuff out. They will get better and it will become integrated (JC Penney did a nice job of that). It will just become part of how brands build equity (through content). And no level of sarcasm will be able to stop it.

This train has already left the station—so we now choose to get on and guide it to the right destination, or we can sit on the sidelines and wait for the next one, hoping it comes soon. I'll choose the former while others debate the latter. And trying will only make it better.   

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Real-Time Content Marketing: Fact or Fad?

The above video documents some of our recent work with the Cars.com team where we planned (in advance) to support a new campaign that launched during the Superbowl. With the Oscars right around the corner—you can bet that the topic of real-time marketing is going to come up again as brands seek to remain relevant during periods of time where everyone seems to be talking about one thing. Recently, the Harvard Business Review featured an article stating that "advertisers should act more like newsrooms"—in it, this stood out for me:

"The traditional campaign model is rigid. Ad units are created at a point in time and don't generally adapt to emerging themes in culture. In contrast, the newsroom metaphor suggests that content has to be produced and delivered in a continuous stream rather than through a ponderous, slow-moving process of months of campaign development." 

It makes a point salient point that's worth digesting—traditionally advertising has been planned well in advance and that planning doesn't often leave room for improvisation. But don't mistake improvisation for lack of planning. If you watch the video above, you see the team working together in the "command center" which required advanced planning. It was no easy feat to mobilize a centralized group working with multiple teams offsite to upload content, respond, track and measure results and engage in real-time. It is well planned improvisation. Below is a sample from the planning process that went on behind the scenes:

To pull it off requires forward thinking organization (we had this with Cars.com) and alignment with multiple partners (other agencies). It requires the ability (and permission) to improvise once the planning is in place. It requires both flexibility and a focus on staying on brand. While "Real-Time" and "Content Marketing" seem like buzzword overload, it is simply an evolution of marketing triggered by modern day behaviors. In other words, not a fad—In my opinion. 

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It's Time to Re-Invent Public Relations

I didn't pick PR—PR picked me. 

Let me take a step back. 

Thinking about my own career path since the beginning, I realized there's a pattern. I've always been drawn to industries in the midst of change and disruption. I landed my first job as a graphic designer because I had entered the workforce with a valuable skill at the time—I had learned the essentials of desktop publishing and the company I went to work for was in the process of overhauling how they produced their marketing materials (migrating from traditional tools to digital). It was a huge change and for those who were resistant to converting their skills to digital desktop publishing—they faced early retirement.

Next, I spent about a year working in cable news—but it was an intense year as I worked with the Fox News Channel team helping launch the 24 hour cable news network. Fast forward over fifteen years later and that network is thriving, having tapped consumer demand in cable news and niche media coverage. I've worked at the Chicago Tribune in digital news media and witnessed first hand the differences in how the "digital" team and the veteran employees viewed their work. I spent nearly six years working for one of the original digital agencies which back then was expected to transform the agency space and now doesn't exist anymore (agency.com)—the remains have been swallowed up by corporate entities.

It was at the tail end of my experience there that I discovered "social", first through the blogosphere and then Twitter and Facebook and I did stints at other digital firms and even a start up—hoping these organizations would lead the way in the transformation from traditional digital to a more connected form of digital communications. Eventually in 2009, I found a home with Edelman because it seemed the culture prioritized and valued everything that was changing because of the emergence and disruptive nature of social media. Back then, it was the PR firms that seemed to understand best what was changing. Today, it's not the same story. 

I believe search, social and mobile are the three most disruptive forces in modern communications and they are working together to wreak havoc on organizations and their agency partners. Because I work for a public relations firm—I feel a sense of urgency to start here and lay out what must evolve. The people (stakeholders) we want to reach move effortlessly across a media landscape often times making no distinction. Increasingly they spend time on mobile devices skimming content in "streams or feeds". The average consumer of media has the attention span of a squirrel on ritalin and getting them to pause to read anything more than paragraph is becoming increasingly difficult. The media industry has been disrupted and thereby public relations is an industry in the midst of change. Here are a few areas I believe PR must aggressively embrace and do differently. 

Creative
Most PR firms will say they have creative talent, but we have to ask ourselves if it's the right creative talent. Can we produce apps that live in Facebook or mobile? Are we working on the next Nike Fuel or are we in position to just do the media outreach for it? My most recent hire is a digital veteran who has spent most of his career at advertising and digital agencies. We aren't going to just get people talking about things—we are going to create the things they talk about.  

Analytics
Analytics in Public Relations has to move beyond just counting "placements" similar to the act of pulling together traditional media clippings. Analytics in public relations has to integrate with the other measurement functions of an organization (like connecting earned to owned properties). It also needs to go beyond measuring and move into data collection and analysis. And analysis needs to evolve beyond merely analyzing into deriving core insights to inform decisions like how to spend media dollars and what the tone of messages should be. I'm currently hiring a senior analytics lead for my team and I describe the ideal candidate as part measurement wonk and part digital planner.    

Converged Media
Public relations was built on the notion of "earned media" which differentiated it from advertising. Today, it's all just content as part of the vast quantity we are able to digest on a given day thanks to the deluge we are subjected to. It was Google that began infusing ways to "pay" to help raise visibility with the search engine. It is Facebook that has introduced to the mainstream a convergence of media through things like the promoted post—and it is the media itself that is offering more ways than ever to make advertising feel like it's a part of the editorial universe. This convergence defies both traditional advertising, marketing and public relations constructs—yet poses great opportunity for any of the disciplines who are nimble enough to master. 

This brings us to today and tomorrow. Here's what I am seeing in the industry: PR got a head start on social but it's been rapidly eroding. Companies who value customer service have moved beyond how many PR professionals think about social and are gradually evolving how they service customers. The advertising industry which has always held "creative" in high regard no longer sees social, digital or mobile as add ons but rather core to their business. They are bent on not just talking about the digital world but rather they want to help build it—and they also understand how to leverage creative communication to get people's attention. The partners who handle media transactions do so in bulk, but increasingly it will need to be done in real time. In short, it is the marketing and communications industry that is being disrupted and for those of us on the "PR" side—we must act quickly and decisively to re-invent ourselves in a way that looks more like the future and less like the past. 

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Facebook Is Just Getting Started

About the author: Ekaterina Walter is a social media innovator at Intel, a speaker, and an author of the book “Think Like Zuck: The Five Business Secrets of Facebook's Improbably Brilliant CEO Mark Zuckerberg”. Walter was named among 25 Women Who Rock Social Media in 2012. She sits on a Board of Directors of Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA). You can find her on Twitter: @Ekaterina and her blog www.ekaterinawalter.com. 

With over one billion users, Facebook is the king of social networking. But it was a slow starter: MySpace and Friendster were already established when Facebook was still a twinkle in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye. How did Facebook leapfrog the competition to become a daily habit for more than half its users? What led Mark Zuckerberg to such unprecedented success? And what’s next for the web giant?

I discuss the answers to these questions in my new book “Think Like Zuck: The Five Business Secrets of Facebook's Improbably Brilliant CEO Mark Zuckerberg.” I reveal the simple five-part formula the upstart Facebook CEO used to change the world-and how any business leader can apply it to his/her own company: Passion, Purpose, People, Product, Partnerships. In this post, however, I would like to take a quick look at Facebook’s journey and where it might be going. 

Early innovations

Right from the start, Facebook proved that it was different from other social networks. While MySpace allowed multiple accounts and anonymous usernames, Facebook has always strived for dependability, deleting phony profiles and duplicate accounts. “Having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of integrity,” Zuck believes. Zuck’s passion for openness and transparency is at the root of this, and it has given Facebook a sense of genuineness that proved popular with users looking for a communication tool rather than a popularity contest.

Striding ahead

Zuckerberg’s passion for connectivity pushed some of Facebook’s most radical – and initially unpopular – innovations. The Newsfeed, introduced in 2006, was a controversial feature when it launched. People were unnerved to see their updates amalgamated into one location visible to their network, but once they were used to the idea it became second nature to log in to see a summary of friends’ activity. Membership soared, and soon checking your Newsfeed became a daily habit for millions of people.

It was the introduction of photo tagging that really set Facebook apart from the competition, even specialist photo sharing websites. Facebook was becoming more than just a utility; it was becoming people’s social graph. “Watching the growth of tagging,” said Matt Cohler, Facebook’s former Vice President of Product “was the first ‘aha’ for us about how the social graph could be used as a distribution system. The mechanism of distribution was the relationships between people.”

Web integration

More than any other social network, Facebook has become part of our wider web experience. A recent study by website monitoring service Pingdom found that almost 25% of the top 10,000 websites in the world now have some form of official Facebook integration on their homepage, and almost 50% have regular links to Facebook. Facebook’s social login feature means that we can use our Facebook identity on the wider web to stay logged in to sites and share information easily across profiles. It has become natural to share photos, videos, news articles, and even purchasing information effortlessly with our networks.

For the first time in history brands are building global communities on Facebook on a scale never heard of before. Coke, Starbucks, Red Bull and many others are getting more visibility and engagement within their Facebook communities than they were ever able to harness on their other forums. Intel’s community around the world, for example, exceeds 23 million fans spanning over 50 countries, and it is a privilege to touch so many of our consumers every day.

The future

Zuckerberg has always been passionate about openness on the web. At one time on his personal Facebook page, he listed his personal interest as “openness, making things that help people connect and share what’s important to them, revolutions, information flow, minimalism.” He has achieved all of those things and more, and as more and more sites activate their sites socially that flow of information is only going to increase. Facebook has led the way in the way we share and connect with our networks; what was unthinkable only a few years ago is now natural for hundreds of millions of people on a daily basis. The future holds an even greater level of openness and sharing as Zuckerberg and his team continue to revolutionize the way we connect with each other and the wider web.

Everything about Facebook’s incredible eight-year journey tells us one thing: not to second-guess Mark Zuckerberg. His passion for his product, his long term vision and his apparent lack of interest in a quick buck are good signs for users. Facebook have introduced unexpected features before and while some have quickly disappeared, others have only made the site more popular. The teams behind Facebook are smart and dedicated. They have a wealth of social data available to them and are capable of coming up with innovative solutions to increase profits without ruining the user experience.

But as Facebook marches forward, the company will definitely face some challenges. Some of them are: expansion into mobile, striking a fine balance between user satisfaction and integration of new types of ads, appealing to generation Z and their digital habits. Facebook will also have to achieve a reasonable balance between its constantly changing product features and brand’s expectations as they are building their large communities on the network. Achieving smooth strategic partnerships with brands has never been company’s strongest suit.

There are things to work on, but I don’t see the company slowing down any time soon. There is a speculation about Facebook achieving its peak in 2012. I don’t believe that’s the case. But as company grows and expands there is a danger of stagnation. Now more than ever Facebook will have to rely on its hacker culture to keep them moving and the vision of its leader to keep them innovating and evolving.

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2013: The Year Everything Converged

From a media perspective—marketers like to align strategies and tactics along the lines of how things are done at scale. The popular framework goes something like: Paid (advertising), Earned (Word of Mouth), Owned (Corporate) and everything else falls in a somewhat more grey area and from my perspective this is where the action will be for 2013 and beyond. As outlined above, Altimeter calls this area of overlap "converged media" because it's a convergence of different media dynamics coming together. If you ask me—from a marketing perspective this is the future of what, to this point we've called "social".

You see an image in your Facebook news-feed shared by a friend. The image was generated by a brand. You saw it because your friend shared it. They shared it because they liked it. They liked it because the content resonated (and they saw it). They saw it because the brand paid Facebook to promote it.

Paid?
Earned?
Owned? 

All of the above. A social platform merely powers the engine and the above could have all been done in a mobile context. I'm doing a lot of thinking in this area as I build out my team because I don't believe that anyone has the "converged" part completely figured out yet. From a talent perspective I've already begun importing folks from the ad agency side of the house who get both social, digital and content. Mentally, I've been thinking about the dynamics of how different teams function:

Traditional:


A television centric marketing approach is still fueled primarily by the dynamic duo of a creative team composed of an art director and copywriter supported by an infrastructure of scale which fuels the teams with insights and has a small army of media service individuals who determine how the money gets spent so that the campaign oriented marketing message is seen and heard.

Digital

Similar to the traditional team but digital teams often "build" things (apps, sites, platforms) which add an experiential layer to the marketing initiative. Copy for the digital team is somewhat more complex as the things they build can often contain much more than what can translate through offline marketing tactics and so a comprehensive approach to content is required. 

Social-Digital

The newcomer to the mix. Many brands are now taking the nuts and bolts of social in house—but the above model whether in house or agency side (or blended) is designed to merge the basics of good marketing (valuable content) with the more real time nature of social news-feeds (timely relevant bursts of communication supported with dialogue). Again, looking at teams from a media perspective—a core social-digital team that targets the converged media space must bring creative, community management and a newsroom-like sense of editorial savvy together. 

I think 2013 is going to be the year that things feel like they are all blurring into each other more than ever and is going to create a lot of challenges for both brands and their agency partners as they work together to figure out how to address the overlaps. In addition to bolstering our creative, strategic and measurement capabilities—I've also put someone from my team in charge of thinking about the overlaps between paid, owned and earned and how this all evolves for our clients (a director of converged media services). I think that especially for digital, this is going to be where the action is.  

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Five Considerations For Branded Content During Sensitive Times

Like many of you reading this, I am horrified by the events which unfolded at Sandy Hook and as a parent—especially affected by the thought of parents who will be grieving during a season when they should be celebrated. The tragedy is incomprehensible on so many levels and it makes my heart heavy. But I am also more than a parent and as a professional who spends so much of my time working with companies who are grappling with new dynamics in marketing, communications and doing business in a real time connected environment, I can't help but think about how much this creates the need for organizations (and people) to be sensitive (and responsible) especially during times like this. If we are really moving toward a "content economy" as I've recently outlined, and all brands and organizations can now directly manage their own media—then they are going to have to do it responsibly. Here are five suggestions for managing branded content during sensitive times.  

1. Call a Meeting Between Staff & Partners

Most organizations now have staffers such as community/social media managers and agency partners who are running their social and owned properties (Facebook, Twitter, Wordpress etc.). When a sensitive story breaks which dominates the news cycle or at minimum their industry—they must themselves act like a news organization and huddle together the teams responsible for putting out content. Call an "all hands" meeting to discuss impact of story and devise a real time strategy for immediate steps moving forward. 

2. Determine Appropriateness of a Response

Once a sensitive situation is in play, your organization is now faced with a question: do you stay silent or speak out? I recently advised an organization on this telling them that it's always best to "do the right thing" however, if they acknowledge what's going on (in this case with Sandy Hook) they had to be prepared to steward any conversation good or bad that came along with it. When determining if it makes sense to make a statement during a sensitive situation, it's best to do the right thing but be prepared for what may follow. If you're not prepared, then your organization has a bigger issue. 

3. Temporarily Disable Automated Posts

Auto posts (scheduling content and posting later) are now a reality for how brands communicate at scale and the technique isn't going away any time soon. However during a sensitive situation there is no way to better damage your brand's equity and reputation than allowing auto posts to continue as if nothing is happening. There's a simple solution: direct your content team to temporarily disable them until further notice. It's ok to take a break and back to point no. 2, it's the right thing to do. 

4. Review Content Calendar

Many brands and businesses now run content calendars to help them plan in advance for posts, marketing, communications etc. If your organization does this—check your content calendar to see if there are any scheduled communications that could come off as tone deaf or inappropriate due to the situation at hand. Reschedule evergreen content for another time and remove "at risk" content. In short, proactively manage your calendar or it will manage you. 

4. Edit/Remove/Reschedule Sensitive Content

No matter how vigilant you try to be, there will always be situations where a communication is already out in public for whatever reason, maybe the publisher wasn't aware of the news. This is where the public can be your best ally, by alerting you to the issue and as long as you are listening, you'll have the opportunity to correct the mistake. Do it transparently and over-communicate over-communicate. If you end up deleting an offending piece of content which was not intended to offend—be sure to explain the steps you are taking. 

One could question the timing of this post and my intentions. As I've stated, I'm both a parent and a professional, and while I have trouble wrapping my mind around recent events, I feel called to share whatever I can to get us all thinking about how we can manage direct communication channels responsibly. Brands are now built in real time and they can be unbuilt just as quickly. 

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Brand As Facilitator

Friends With Benefits: Employees Are Social Too

Several months ago, I had the pleasure of moderating a panel at the Pivot conference in New York City. With me on the panel was Chris Heuer from Deloitte (and Social Media Club) and Phoebe Venkat, head of social at ADT. We discussed a less explored conversation when it comes to all things social—but every company has them:

Employees.

The reality is that while places of work want to separate employees and the work they do from their personal lives, they have really become intertwined, and technology usage even supports this (how many of us have used a personal device for work, or vice versa)? We discussed the phenomenon of a social workforce through the following lens:

Internal to internal (employees using social technologies behind the firewall)
Internal to external (employees talking about their work/companies out in the open)
External to external (employees engaging with multiple stakeholders externally—outside of the company walls). The folks in Edelman's Employee Engagement practice take a similar view:

Chris mentioned some interesting findings from Deloitte which found that high performing employees who leverage social technologies for work, stay with the company longer and continue to perform. Phoebe made the case that social activity at the employee level behind the firewall can make companies feel more like "families". And we collectively discussed the potential for companies to leverage the power of employees and their social networks by thinking of them as "diplomats" or "ambassadors" instead of a highly connected liability. 

If you have 20 minutes to spare—give the video a once over. This was a great panel from my perspective and a refreshing take on a topic that receives less attention in general but can impact a business both in reputation and the bottom line.

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Brands Will Become Media: Here's How

If your company doesn’t have the above model in place a year from now, you may regret it.

You’ve probably felt it for some time, but now the roadmap is becoming clear—companies must build their own media empires. And if they don’t, they risk missing a window of opportunity that provides myriad benefits, whether it’s telling their own stories or becoming more efficient with the media dollars they spend.

Trends in media consumption point to the convergence of savvy marketing tactics combined with a real-time newsroom approach for brands to be seen and heard in a collectively social, digital and mobile world.

Facebook: Engagement Isn’t Enough

First, let’s start with Facebook which, thanks to an alleged algorithm change, has been at the center of controversy in the marketing world. Though it’s cited as the reason brands have noticed their content reaching a lower volume of Facebook users, the caveat is that there is much a company can do to increase the odds of being seen and heard on Facebook. But, it relies on a brand doing a few things really well.

For starters, it’s not enough to solely engage on Facebook. A company now has to provide a steady flow of high-quality content, which then relies  not only on organic content sharing from Facebook users but also on subsequent media purchases with Facebook in order for that message to spread.

Sound familiar? It’s how advertising has been done in the past, only with a big difference. Much of the content that tends to do best is oftentimes associated with current news or highly relevant social issues. Take for example whatOreo has done with its Daily Twist initiative, where in honor of the cookie’s 100^th anniversary, agency teams get together daily to decide how to riff off of relevant, often newsworthy, subjects that, by day’s end, produce a new piece of clever, highly shareable visual content that’s sent out into the digital ecosystem. This type of approach makes clear what most pundits miss when challenging the notion of “ROI” in social media—the reason a company wants to amass followers in social media is to build their own marketing/communications network, which bypasses the middle man and goes right to the source.

The end game in social media won’t be accumulation of fans but rather your ability to reach them and potentially inspire action.

Marketing Meets the Newsroom

The middleman in question could conceivably be media agencies. Why spend millions on media purchases when you can consolidate some of that spending with Facebook? This is where it’s going to get really interesting because most big companies like to clearly divide their needs with partners who handle tasks at scale. Creative agencies do creative and media agencies do media. The problem with this model is that a real-time newsroom-meets-marketing model requires community managers who understand not only how to manage a Facebook page but also know when to put a dollar behind high quality and timely content that will spread. This model jumbles up what was once a clear divide between content, media purchase and engagement.

Becoming media companies may not be optional for brands. Felix Baumgartner didn’t do his stratos jump alone—he had the backing of a major brand (Red Bull), a team of ex-NASA scientists and Red Bull’s media team who covered the event, creating an infinite amount of media coverage that generated a nonstop wave of publicity. I’m not even sure how to estimate the value of this type of coverage, but suffice it to say that it’s significant and leaves a mark on a Google-friendly Web.

And how does all this media spread? This is where players such as Pulse come in.

Whether you are mobile or on the Web, Pulse allows you to have all of the media you can digest and share at your fingertips, served in a usable experience. And much like other media models, some content is promoted organically due to popularity and some can be bought for featured placement.

It’s all going to come down to this: content, quality, frequency and relevancy. If companies are to become media, they must master the art and science of merging marketing with a real-time news cycle. The content a company produces must be compelling and built for an audience with an itchy “like” finger.

And it’s going to take time. Most companies don’t have full-time editors and newsrooms that work hand-in-hand with their marketing department and partners, but in a few years they might.

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Technology Will Only Solve 1/3 of Your Social Business Problem

I'm behind on writing a bit as I've just returned from Norway and before that, Dreamforce in San Francisco. It was my first time attending and speaking at Dreamforce and to be honest, I was completely taken back by the extravagance of it all. With Keynotes from heavy hitters such as Sir Richard Branson, Jeff Imelt and even Colin Powell, not to mention entertainment provided by the Red Hot Chili Peppers—I can only estimate that the event cost tens of millions to produce.

Salesforce also made good on what many observers were already suspecting—it has begun to package and consolidate acquisitions of social platforms Radian 6 and Buddy Media into what's now known as "Marketing Cloud" moving forward. Shel Israel shrewdly views this as a pivot to catering to CMOs as part of the strategy to convert an enterprise to "social enterprise" and in short follow the money trail as companies grapple with how to integrate social at scale. 

But amid enjoying some of my favorite tunes belted out by the Peppers in an outdoor venue filled with well over thirty thousand people complete with free beer and wine I couldn't help but think this:

"all this money—and companies will only be solving one third of their social business problem" 

The problem with social technology solutions—even really great technology is that it's incomplete. It's no wonder why Salesforce is making a killing, because I've seen first hand how a business will freely invest in a technology platform thinking that they have purchased a turnkey solution only to realize shortly after that they've possibly invested in the wrong solution and most definitely underestimated the other two areas which require investment (people and process). 

The Three P's of Social Business 
People, Process, and Tech Platforms. Each is equally important and yet so many businesses are putting all their eggs in the platform basket because it seems like the most obvious solution. But it's short sighted and even emphasizes the need for the other two. The most common issue I see from working with large organizations is that once an enterprise social technology solution has been implemented it immediately raises questions about who will operate it, integrate it, adopt it and derive value from the investment. The dirty little secret in the technology world is that technology, even really good technology looks automated but in reality requires people to make it work.  

Life After The Big Buy
Assuming that you've been part of the professional population who have invested in the most obvious "P" helping to fuel the enterprise tech economy, you should be asking yourself what comes next. A social CMS (Content Management System) is nothing without content and teams/partners to manage it. The best listening platform is nothing without the ability to filter signal from noise and make sense of it. And even internally, a social collaboration system falls flat without the right culture to sustain it. 

Right now is a great time to pause and think about the other two "P"s of social business—your people and processes. It's not nearly as sexy as technology, but you need all three to complete the math. Technology alone will only solve one third of your social business problem and while critical, it's only part of the equation. 

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Social Business for Complex Organizations

Several years ago, your CMO or maybe the corporate head of communications shot you an e-mail with a call to action around doing something with “social”. Since then, you’ve launched numerous Facebook, Twitter, YouTube initiatives and yes, you even have a company Pinterest page. Now comes the hard part. As an organization with a national if not global footprint, you find yourself in a chaotic situation as regions scramble to “do their own thing” at the local level. You find this out only after you’ve seen yet another unsanctioned social property launch. Integration becomes a massive headache. You have several websites and mobile apps with poor or misguided attempts at social integration. Employee social usage becomes a black hole–your employees are all over social media, but mainly you just don’t want them saying the wrong thing. Vendor management has become a nightmare–your organization is using every new technology vendor under the Sun and losing efficiency and dollars in the process. In short, you operate in a complex organization and there is nothing simple about integrating social, mobile, and the latest iteration of digital into your legacy systems.

These are the types of challenges we’ve been tackling over the past few years with clients–many who are large, complex organizations. If you can relate to these pain points you are not alone. The good news is that you can address them if you shift your mindset from social media (tactical) to social business (strategic) and look at problems and opportunities more holistically.

Here are a few considerations for those of us tasked with integrating social into a complex and sometimes complicated business environment:

 

Perform Stakeholder Interviews

Partner up with an objective third party and interview the critical stakeholders across your organization who will feel the impact of social integration. The interview guide should be designed to extract nuggets of insights which can prove to be immensely helpful if articulated correctly in a summary. Often themes tend to emerge when you talk to a variety of individuals.

Establish a Center of Excellence

Companies like Adobe* and Intel are well known for their social centers of excellence , but this construct is not limited to tech companies. When an emerging business trend hits the mainstream, a center of excellence becomes mandatory, not optional. When set up correctly, they can help guide a complex organization as it grows and scale efforts around the emerging opportunity.

Organize for Integration

You may not like it, but there is no way a complex organization can deal with change without changing itself. Organization design around social business challenges is becoming more commonplace amongst companies who are doing more than lip service when it comes to social integration. We’re not talking about “social media gurus,” we’re talking about roles, responsibilities and formal job descriptions with social woven into them.

Design New Processes

Does your organization have a process for launching a new social property? Maybe it should. No initiative can scale or be repeated without some degree of process. A true social business will always be flexible enough to launch pilots, but it also has to have enough process in place to ensure that programs can be executed with a certain degree of rigor.

Formalize Governance

Who approves what and what groups need to be in the know? Governance is painful, messy, difficult to construct and see through to fruition, but it also sets a foundation that will deter chaos from taking hold of your initiatives. 

Expand Globally

Whether your organization is national or global, if it’s big then you need to able to scale efforts around a methodology. Figure out what methodology works for your organization and roll it out globally.

Define a Role for Employees

Social media guidelines for employees are really a fancy way for a complex organization to “C-Y-A”. A social business understands that not all employees are created equally, and yet some of them are not only connected to multiple social networks, but they are actually great representatives of the organization itself. These companies match up employees with opportunities in social both internally and externally.

Social Business for Complex Organizations from Edelman Digital

Establish a Communications Protocol

There are literally millions of conversations in play thanks to social technologies and the desire of individuals to share and connect. These conversations happen inside your organization and of course out in the open. Having an established communications protocol provides helpful guidelines for how social interactions for business should go down.

Collaborate In Real Time

For the social business, e-mail has its limits. Working groups form “clusters” around project initiatives and often need more connected ways of sharing files, knowledge and project updates. And it’s not just about Chatter, Yammer, Jive or a host of other enterprise collaboration platforms, for example at Edelman multiple Facebook Groups started by employees have been popping up around topics such as trends, community management and even Pinterest. Instead of an e-mail alias, these groups allow employees from around the globe to gather around a more connected virtual water cooler to share tips, links and exchange knowledge.

Launch a Command Center

A “command center” does not have to be a physical space but should be the system a complex organization has in place to monitor and potentially respond to a host of scenarios generated by social media. A social command center is also a great way to make sense out of social data. Edelman’s SICC is designed not only to monitor and analyze social data but to craft content informed by social signals, not unlike how a newsroom operates.

Establish a Measurement Framework

How does a complex organization measure what it does in social, digital and even mobile? The starting point is to combine data points from across multiple digital properties and initiatives and align what gets measured to business KPI’s. A measurement framework can also integrate traditional Web metrics with emerging social metrics and set the foundation for creating standards across multiple brands and business units.

With business trends moving toward connectivity and adaptability, complex organizations may find dealing with change more challenging than ever–but it needs to be done. The above initiatives represent a sample of the types of programs organizations will need to undertake as they make the journey from operating as a business built on the legacy models of yesterday toward becoming the fully integrated social business of tomorrow.

*Adobe is an Edelman client

This post was compiled in conjunction with Edelman Consulting.

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From Islands To Ecosystem: Connecting Social, Digital + Mobile

From Web And Desktop To Anytime, Anywhere.
In the early stages of digital, businesses first dipped their toe on the Web by launching brochure like Websites which had to be located initially through a browser "URL" (WWW) followed quickly by search engines which organized the Web. Today, the Web and the digital landscape looks dramatically different compared to the Internet's frontier years. For starters, the Web has become mobile, with 1.2 billion of the world's population accessing the Web through a mobile browser. In addition, the internet is increasingly being accessed by tablet or mobile apps and aggregators such as Flipboard and Pulse. To add even more complexity to today's fragmented digital environment, social networks such as Facebook and Twitter have proven that a business must extend it's digital ecosystem into social spheres in order to remain relevant. Today’s digital ecosystem is composed of the following increasingly overlapping areas:

Owned:
These are the Websites, corporate blogs, intranets and extranets your business has full control over.

Paid:
These are media properties your business “purchases” in order to drive traffic and raise awareness.

Earned:
Properties which drive traffic/raise awareness but rely on organic distributions.

Social Networks:
Platforms where a business can build a social “embassy” (combines paid and earned tactics) that it partially controls.

Search Engines:
Primarily Google, Bing and regional search engines used to find information on the Web (Siri for mobile meets Ai).

Mobile:
Technology such as phones, tablets and the mobile social-digital behaviors they foster. 

In short, the Web era which was dominated primarily by stand alone slow moving Websites is gradually though systematically becoming a thing of the past,(this is why Facebook must master mobile). Today, a business must approach the Web from the standpoint of connecting its external and internal "digital ecosystem" which brings together "owned properties" such as websites and mobile apps with social "embassies" as well as a fleet of new platforms from third party providers such as customer reviews or popular social networks. Many businesses will face huge challenges in this area as their large global Website structures were built with dated legacy systems and not architected for the future state of digital ecosystems which the industry is moving toward.

Five Ways To Go From Digital Islands To Integrated Ecosystem
Ensuring that your business is building a digital ecosystem vs. disconnected "islands" means fixing the foundation while moving forward in areas where your business needs to be relevant (social and mobile). Media companies like The New York Times have begun to show the way here as they've had no choice but to optimize their content for a mobile, social, digital world. Professional organizations, brands and corporations are the next in line. The steps below are meant to provide high level guidance and is not comprehensive but designed to provide general guidance:

Perform A Digital Footprint Audit
A digital footprint audit takes stock of all digital, social, and mobile assets (both external and internal) and evaluates them against a set of criterion which is customized for your business and industry. Digital properties should be looked at critically. Are their properties which are outdated or not optimized for search or mobile? Are there properties with unrealized potential? Are some properties being kept on life support when they should be put down? A digital footprint audit takes a wide look at everything your business has out on the digital space  and identifies gaps, issues and opportunities.

Implement A Content Strategy
A comprehensive content audit should be performed to determine what content is valuable vs. what's not optimized for a social, mobile Web. A content audit compliments the digital footprint analysis and provides the roadmap for what content stays, what needs to be re-located and identifies gaps. From this, a content strategy should be developed aimed at producing optimized content for search, social sharing and mobile interactions.

Assess Signals Derived From Search And Social
A digital ecosystem is only as effective as it's ability to be found and it's relevancy to current conversations. A conversation assessment looks at what's being said about your business and relevant topics across the digital landscape. It also looks at how effective your digital ecosystem is in sending signals which are being shared across multiple social platforms. On the other side of the fence, a search audit looks to see if your properties are being found in search engines specifically guided by relevant terms critical to the business. Both exercises will provide clues to the question: "is my digital ecosystem both findable and shareable"?

Re-Assess Your Infrastructure
Large complex sites are never easy to maintain, update or evolve but this doesn't take away from the fact that they will need to become more effective at handling change faster. A comprehensive audit from an unbiased and qualified third party may uncover legacy issues rooted in IT which need to be addressed. Some issues may involve updating existing infrastructure and others could require a gradual overhaul of not only existing systems but also partners and vendors. In either scenario an exhaustive audit here would likely be the place to start. Without it, root issues will likely never be addressed no matter the quality of your digital strategy. 

Evaluate Current Resources & Processes
Moving from digital islands to a connected ecosystem means taking a look at your existing organizational design. A modern ecosystem requires staff and resources which can manage social properties, develop for mobile and produce valuable content which travels effortlessly across that ecosystem. An organizational process design exercise can be useful in documenting current state and visualizing future state providing a roadmap for how to navigate the changes needed in order to optimize the organization.

Ecosystems Take Time
Planning, building, maintaining and ensuring that you've grown a healthy and integrated digital ecosystem will not happen overnight. Be prepared for it to take time, resources and the stomach to deal with multiple stakeholders from marketing to IT to customer service. The above activities are more likely to be effective if approached globally but executed against with local and regional execution. Digital ecosystems for large businesses will also require the cooperation and coordination of multiple partners in order to realize the potential. The burden of this coordination will fall largely upon the organization driving the initiatives and it's key partners. 

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Five Considerations for Social Command Centers

Originally posted on Edelman Digital

It’s no secret that business has shifted to a real-time environment and social media tools are trying to keep up. As a result, organizations and brands must act in real-time. Some organizations have responded by building out what’s becoming known as “social command centers” in order to respond to this shift. Having built and operated our own command center (we call it the Social Intelligence Command Center or SICC), we’ve compiled five considerations for creating a similar space.

1. Start With a Purpose

Organizations can have various goals when looking to set up a “SICC” including event management (such as the Pop-up Conrad* Concierge at the Tribeca Film Festival or the Super Bowl), real-time reactive engagement and content creation (such as the American Red Cross), or gauging consumer sentiment in real-time around a given subject. Another possible objective for a SICC is to have a space for community management, analytics, strategy and content creation to occur simultaneously across a team. Once you’ve defined your purpose, you can begin envisioning the space.

2. Envision the Space

The term “space” is used broadly here because a SICC can be in a room, a pod of desks, a mobile technology configuration, and the list continues. But a space is only as strong as the processes that allow it to work seamlessly. Following the identification of a purpose, a process is created to achieve success. Components of the process include roles (analyst, community manager, content producer, traffic director, editor, etc.), workflow (approvals, escalation protocols, crisis plans), KPIs (what does success look like, how do we show it?), schedules (did you know social media doesn’t sleep? Will the SICC sleep?) and a handful of other components.

When envisioning the space, the components listed above will dictate the design of the space and how it functions. This isn’t just about a room with big screens and a nice logo – it is about planning, coordinating, training, designating and executing in a room designed with a purpose.

3. Build Your Team

The team involved in a SICC is scalable in number, but must function as a unit cohesively. Depending on the objectives of the SICC, your team could include multiple analysts providing direction on what is working and what isn’t, community managers and strategists guiding content based on the analyst’s insights, content creators with a wide breadth of talent (video editing one day, infographics the next) and a traffic director that keeps the process moving. Whether the agency is executing the SICC or it lives within a company, both parties play a vital role. Freedom to innovate and execute is an equally important role – without it, the insights and opportunities, the nimbleness of a SICC, is lost while waiting for approvals.

The team should have a firm grasp on the communication goals, tools, social technologies, the brand and the community. A brand’s social community is at the heart of any Social Intelligence Command Center. Without community, the SICC is like an airport – mission control, pilots, planes, security protocol, everything – without passengers.

4. Know Your Technology

SICCs are flexible and inclusive of many platforms at any given time. Prior to making a recommendation on a tool, we test it and others to ensure the best possible recommendation. From a physical technology perspective, we’ve found SICCs should have television for real-time events and news, large screens so teams can work together and as many white boards as possible. Dual-screens help team members use the numerous tech tools together and conference lines should be setup to facilitate communication with people in the room and others around the world.

5. Go Beyond Listening

The shift from social listening to social intelligence means using insights to inform engagement, drive content creation, build a community of advocates and, at the end of the day, cultivate meaningful relationships. Command centers are an evolution of call centers with a direct line to change the way business is conducted through customer feedback. Innovation in product development and customer service, increase in sales, decrease in call center volume, creation of efficiencies in supply chains; the intelligence from a command center is infinite, as long as you know how to use it.

As we execute programs leveraging Edelman’s own social media listening capability, there are core take-aways we apply to future activations. As we write this, we are actively working on a plan for a global SICC network to scale initiatives across geographies. In short, a social command center may not only be how a brand innovates in communications, but how it effectively integrates the old and new in a real-time and connected business environment.

 

Edelman's Social Intelligence Command Center (SICC)

View more presentations from Edelman Digital

Five (Intuitive) Reasons To Bet on Facebook

There's no shortage of commentary around Facebook as the smoke literally builds around it's engine while the social media rocket prepares for IPO liftoff. This piece won't be full of rational analysis but rather gut intuition. Here are a few things to chew on as you think about the global future with or without Facebook. 

Zuckerberg Isn't Steve Jobs, But He's Jobs-Like
Mark Zuckerberg gets social like Steve Jobs got design. Furthermore, both share a core foundational value which is irrationally committed to making products and experiences which please their own sensibilities first and the market second. Does this guarantee Facebook's success? No, but it does guarantee that there will always be a vison and if you look up Facebook's corporate governance structure, you'll realize that it's a company being set up to be purpose and vision led. Bottom line, you're not betting on or against Facebook, but really Mark Zuckerberg. 

Facebook Is Today's Telephone, E-mail & Internet For Many
Think about how you use Facebook, how your children use it (if you have them and they are old enough) and how your parents use it. It's already moving past "social network" status and moving toward something which looks more like a lifeline to the outside world. In conventional wars of the past, communication lines such as telephone would be cut so the enemy could not communicate. If conventional war broke out today—generals would plan to take the Internet out because of platforms like Facebook. Think about that. 

Ecosystems Trump Products
Facebook was never a product from day one—it started as a social network and it's been steadily building up an ecosystem ever since. It's on our mobile devices, it connects with our Websites, it offers it's own line of credit, it has apps and developer communities built around it and it's spawned hundreds of start ups that employ thousands of people who would not be in their line of work if it were not for Facebook. The company has already gotten to this point with a significant advantage in that it looks more like an octopus than it does a shark gobbling up everything in it's path. 

Big Business Is Built On Addictive Behaviors
Facebook is extremely addictive and one can find themselves spending a good chunk on their day there either working, playing or doing a combination of the two. Gambling became big business because of this. Drug trafficking, while illegal in most cases is big business and so are food industries built on menus with addictive items. As long as Facebook remains addictive to use, it will find a way to build business around it. 

Global & Local Are The Future
While Facebook is still working on markets like Russia and China—there's no dispute that it's well into the process of being a global phenomenon and in addition, it can be especially relevant in local markets. Any local business which is self sustaining or part of a larger company can have a presence and run it with the local knowledge of their own markets. It is this combination which positions Facebook as something of a "virus" with the ability for it to "infect" markets through the people who use it. 

Personally, I would not bet against Facebook. Even GM which announced this week that they were pulling out of Facebook advertising spending concedes that they are committed to other ways of integrating it (via content etc.). GM isn't betting against Facebook as much as deciding display ads weren't working for them. Of course, I could be wrong on all of the above—but intuitively my instincts are telling me, "don't bet against Mark Zuckerberg". 

Social Business: Where It's Been & Where It's Going

"Chasing the past, I stumbled into the future". - T A Sachs

I've always been a firm believer that in order to look to the future, we must look back to and fully grasp the past (and the present). Having had several recent engaging conversations with smart people who I respect, I've picked up a hint of exhaustion around usage of the word "social". Could it be that some who saw the "change" coming years ago are weary of having carried that torch for so many years as we move into the heavy lifting? It's natural to want to move to the next thing—but I'm convinced that today we are largely still talking about the "social media" era. The best of "social business" is yet to come in my opinion and we have a lot of work to do in between. Let's take a look back before we begin to look forward. 

Digital: The Interactive Revolution
When I entered the workplace—the world was already in the process of going digital. E-mail was just being introduced and I had gotten a job immediately largely because I entered the business world with a valuable skill—I was taught desktop publishing (ie computer aided design) in addition to design fundamentals. The digital revolution initially begun by replacing the analogue world. Things like music converted into digital formats and computers offered an interactive medium to produce upon. Digital began seeping into personal and professional lives and organizations, businesses and industries had to evolve along with it. Most did and the ones that didn't were outperformed. 

Digital Media: Information Goes Online
The second wave of the digital revolution began to gain steam as the internet became move pervasive. The "Web" became first accessible through browsers and then it became the search engines which organized what we then called "the information highway". A new digital economy was born as companies rushed to stake their claim online. The "corporate" Website was born—essentially a glorified brochure for your organization however the business world began to wake up to the fact that not being on the Web was perhaps risking being irrelevant. This sentiment is important to take into account as we currently wrestle with the current state of social media. Looking back to the "Digital Media" era provides some insights as we look at how social media has evolved. 

Digital Business: The Transactional Era
As the Internet, fueled by digital media and a wealth of information became more pervasive, the Internet evolved yet again creating new ecosystems resulting in new companies (Amazon, *eBay etc.) and creating opportunities for existing companies to extend their business models. Banks introduced online banking. Insurance companies supported online quotes. Cars could be customized and even purchased online. Large organizations grappled with back end integration as infrastructure was re-engineered. Digital had become not only interactive and informational, but it became transactional—offering organizations new ways to connect with customers or even employees (intranets). In short, digital became business and the flurry of activity in the form of mergers, acquisitions and the growth of system integrators reflected this.  

Social: The Human Web
With digital now established as transformational business tool—the Internet and the world began to evolve again. Early incarnations of a "social Web" such as message boards and forums gave rise to early social networks and the "blogosphere". Networks such as My Space or Friendster introduced the concept of managing a social profile on the Web while blogs began to disrupt the media landscape by empowering anyone to act like a journalist or publisher. The 'Digital Media" era was largely powered by technological connections—computers being connected to a global network. The Social era was powered by people connecting to each other forming a "human web". The word social becomes key during this era, because we begin to shift behavior during this phase. No longer are we just interfacing with digital systems (human to computer) but we begin to interface directly with each other (human to human). 

Social Media: Global, Local, Mobile Connectivity At Scale
Today, we live and interact with a digital world which is not only about finding information but is about being "connected". These connections are no longer limited to the personal computer, the primary vehicle which allowed for the original digital revolution to take hold years before. Mobile technology and an "always on" mindset for many individuals now blurs the line between the real world and digital—we no longer "log in" at our desks from nine to five but we are part of a digital and human "power grid". For many organizations, local Facebook pages show high levels of activity vs. global corporate Websites and organizations find their employees asking why internal tools can't be social and mobile. Networks now drive much of the Web's traffic as billions of people share links and opinions about the world around them. As a result of all of this activity—huge amounts of data or "social data" is currently flooding the current global digital ecosystem. This sets the stage for an era that's already begun, but is still in it's infancy (social business). 

Social Business: Connected, Adaptive & Intelligent
Despite much of the chatter around "social business", the reality is that most organizations are currently dealing with the realities of social media and only a few truly recognize the potential of social business. Not unlike how digital media evolved into digital business—social business takes the foundation of social media and begins to build new economic models on top of it. Proof points include models such as Kickstarter which disrupts old economic models by empowering any venture to become a funded venture. Existing business models however, are also presented with new opportunities (and threats). Business models where new connections are formed to the benefit of both the business, customer and even employee and shareholders are a core tenet of "social business". One could make the argument that Apple, while infamous for it's secret culture acted as a social business when they chose to connect to would be developers instead of trying (in vain) to design apps themselves. It is this kind of connected ecosystem which is linked to the idea of social business as well as the ability to adapt to conditions based on the intelligence a business can interpret. In the immediate years to come, the amount of data available to the average business will be infinite, however the data will be meaningless without the ability to interpret and act upon it. 

Winners & Losers: Navigating Today And Tomorrow's World
Having lived and worked during the "Digital Media" and "Digital Business" era, I think we're scratching the surface as we straddle the worlds between social media and social business today. While there are many similarities to the past, there are also several key differences. Today, digital has become embedded into the lives of millions of people and a generation who has never known life before it pours into our workforce and gradually rises in the ranks. Also, it's worth noting that the above chart doesn't suggest that any of the eras replace each other—rather they build upon one another. We are now in a social-digital environment where things increasingly move in real time. Tomorrow's business models must not only be able to adapt to change, they must help drive that change. These are a few thoughts I've had percolating for some time. As a follow up to this post, I'm going to do a review of a very promising book by former colleague Peter Kim and co-author Dion Hinchcliffe (Social Business by Design). From what I've seen of it so far—it shows a lot of promise in terms of how a business should be thinking about these kinds of things. (below graphic pulled from the book). Would love to hear your thoughts as well.  


*eBay is an Edelman client

Thoughts on the Future of Social-Digital Agency Services

*The above does not reflect actual or estimated market share

Now is as good a time as any to be thinking about the future of digital (and social) as defined by those of us who provide services or even products around these. If you work for any agency or consultancy—this article is relevant for you. If you're on the "client side" consider it relevant as well as ultimately it is your business model and needs which dictate the market conditions that affect your partners, vendors and professional service providers. I'm writing this piece from the perspective of having worked at several digital agencies—some of which are still taking market share and others which have slowly faded away or been digested into other formations.

Today, I work for a large privately held company (Edelman) with a "practice" consisting of roughly 600 individuals globally who offer services in the "social-digital" space (Edelman Digital). Given that the word "innovation" is in my title, I am always thinking about how we service the market today vs. how will will need to service it tomorrow. I obsess a little about things like comoditization and have seen it happen in other places I've worked at during my career. Below are some things which have been keeping me up at night, with a few ideas around how to address them. They are specific to the "digital-social" space largely, but can be more broadly applied as well.

Talent Importing & Exporting
The ground war starts here. If you work for an agency or professional services firm which operates deeply on the digital and social side of things, you are competing with everyone for talent. From start-ups to brands to the big three (Facebook, Google & Twitter)—it is essential to "import" the best talent while they are still emerging and "export" them into different opportunities across your firm to ensure retention. I am convinced that the Darwinism which happens regularly in this business is connected to acquisition and retention of talent who not only possess the right skills but deeply understand "the culture of service"—an art in and of itself which is critical for any client relationship. In addition to service culture, talent must be able to speak "the language of business", especially when it comes to understanding how our clients build theirs.  

Adaptation of Skillsets
Our world is changing daily. One of my recent tasks was to co-write a detailed point of view on how Facebook's latest changes affects the skillsets of the people who provide the services we make money from. For example, featured posts essentially converts brand page administrators into media buyers and real time analytics means community managers must become junior analytics consultants as well. There's no training course in the world designed to prepare your firm for the pace which our space runs at—you must have passionate, adaptable teams who are constantly challenging themselves to grow supported by leadership infrastructure which demands and rewards this. Simply put, we adapt or die.

Supply & Demand: The Keys To The Castle
As I mentioned earlier I think a lot about the services needed (as well as the ones which will be needed). For agencies specifically looking to gain market share in "social"—the "keys to the castle" so to speak are linked to how deeply we can embed ourselves in the platforms both internally and externally of our client partners. Translation—if you don't have direct access to a client's social properties and/or work closely with their teams, you are in trouble. The digital shops who both survived and are still thriving learned this lesson and are still here as a result. It's difficult to replace a partner who has helped create and maintain your infrastructure. The services we provide today must match market demand and be conducted flawlessly—for example if market demand suggests a need to run global social properties at scale, then you should be better at that than anyone else. Meet today's market demand and execute flawlessly while working on tomorrow's services today.

Ecosystem Development: Establish Your Alliances
Today's digital ecosystem is even more complex than yesterday's with new players emerging who attach themselves to the dominant platforms. From social CMS providers like Buddy Media, to data and analytic platforms such as Crimson Hexigon, Sysomos or Radian Six. Relationships with key partners (emphasis on plural) is critical to leveraging each other's strengths relationships and complimentary services. Should a digital or social agency develop their own ecosystems? The answer depends on the objective as well as the execution. Many "back end" platforms can be customized leveraging the API's of third parties. Today, build vs. assemble is a significant decision. Either way, I am convinced that for social and digital firms or those who wish to grow market share here—relationships built now will lead to success or failure later.

Integration: Multiple Roads
I could probably write more and perhaps I will at a later time, but this is a good start. While I haven't dwelled much on "integration"—It's also key, however there is more than one road which leads to that particular Rome. Ultimately integration of services (and agency partners) is linked to client business structure. Some are more hands-on, managing integration tightly and look for multiple partners while others seek to consolidate and empower certain partners to lead integration. But, while integration is complex and messy—I believe it's less critical than results. Websites that don't work, apps which aren't used and social execution which ends up in the media (in a bad way) are more significant indicators of success or the lack of, than having an agency structure which looks neat and tidy. In the end, it always has and will come down to execution and results.

Thoughts On Altimeter's Digital Influence Report

Altimeter's most recent report titled "The Rise of Digital Influence" revolves around the theory and practice of "digital influence". A trend that will not die despite the industry's counter movement against platforms such as Klout and the scores of imitators which have subsequently followed. (Full disclosure, I was interviewed in depth for the report). Altimeter rightfully begins the analysis of "digital influence" by calling out the distinction from how we view influence traditionally and offering a brief definition:

"Traditional influence is defined as the act, power, or capacity of causing an effect in indirect or intangible ways. For the purpose of this report, we will use the following as the definition for Digital Influence: The ability to cause effect, change behavior, and drive measurable outcomes online."

The last line is really important as it gets to the crux of the complexity and controversy of looking at digital influence: the difference between measuring the potential to influence action and the actual outcomes of that potential—connecting the two is where the rubber meets the road.

Pillars of Influence

Altimeter does a nice job of articulating "Pillars of Influence"—a similar construct to one I had worked on last year, but I really like how they've fleshed out a way of looking at the building blocks of how you build upon the potential to influence decision and actions. They are:

Pillar 1 — Reach: Relationships form the union of the social graph and define how far information can travel across the social graph and communities at large. Reach is a measure of popularity, affinity, and potential impact.

Pillar 2 — Relevance: Topical relevance is the glue of the interest graph and the communities of focus. Individuals aligned through subject matter create a series of linked relationships that send information along communities of focus.

Pillar 3 — Resonance: The culmination of reach and relevance serve as the foundation for “the score.” Here, resonance is the measurement of the duration, rate, and level of interactivity around content, a topic, or conversations. High resonance ensures that more people will see each post or update. In theory, this number determines the reach of activity and how long it can stay alive in the social streams of online consumers.

Notice that there is no mention of tools in these pillars. This is because, tools and platforms do not dictate what the pillars are and are only helpful in supporting the intent of an outcome. Measuring influence in the digital realm is always a means to an end and never and and itself. 

Social Capital: The Soul of Digital Influence

Probably my favorite part of the report and what Brian and I spent a good deal talking about was the concept of "social capital" and it's correlation to an effect. When looking at programs which are fueled by tapping digital influence, it comes down to the social currency of individuals which is much more critical than network size. A large group of individuals who have built up social capital over time can be just as influential as a small highly connected group with similar capital built up. Combine these dynamics with the size and quality of their social graphs and you have the basic chemistry to create an effect. When we raised nearly 17 thousand dollars for a family in need (effect) I observed that it was less about the size of people's networks (it took large and small ones to move the needle) and more about the quality of them.
 

Influence Metrics: Measuring Impact

Surprisingly or perhaps less so, Altimeter's report lays out a set of high level metrics which can be used as a starting point when building your own measurement framework against programs which involve digital influence. What I noticed most is that nearly all of the below metrics are consistent with many external social programs, and even more broadly consistent with traditional metrics which have always resided within either public relations or marketing business functions. The biggest take away here is that while digital influence tools and techniques may have evolved at the core it's being embraced as an upgrade to both traditional marketing and public relations. Altimeter's metrics include:

•    Brand Lift/Awareness — Benchmark where the company is today in social networks, and set goals and KPIs to improve brand awareness and reach.
•    Brand Resonance — How often is your business discussed in the social web today? Define how resonance will keep your business top of mind and to what extent can be driven through influence programs.
•    Reach Through Advocacy and WOM — Existing advocacy and WOM initiatives can be designed to influence customer behavior and decisions.
•    Sales/Referrals — Through special offers and promotions or exclusive incentives for engagement, brands can drive leads, sales, and referrals.
•    Sentiment/Shift — Negative or indifferent perception can be shaped toward positive or favorable views.
•    Thought Leadership/Authority — Tapping into the communities of expert individuals can help your brand tap its social capital to contribute to the stature within the community you hope to earn.
•    Demand — Invest in demand creation through exclusive programs and intentional outcomes.
•    Trends — Changing behavior is possible once you understand what it is today, how you see it evolving, and identifying the right people and value to help you get there.
•    Audience — Investing in the size of your community and its quality is a function of design and purpose, and its value grows through strategic alignment and engagement.

Why It Matters: People Don't Change, But Digital Behaviors Do

The report is worth reading not only for it's concise constructs, but also for it's collection of real world case studies as well as it's overview of tools. (Disclaimer: Tweetlevel is an Edelman platform and I am on the advisory board for Appinions). However the report is timely as it underscores a reality—while the basics of communication and interactions remain the same, our digital behaviors are constantly evolving whether it be the newly empowered consumer class or the ability for individuals who have never met in person to weave powerful and influential online networks. Understanding, measuring and tapping digital networks is fast becoming the equivalent grassroots efforts meets rewards programs. As individuals continue to build up their networks earning and spending social capital, businesses will seek to align themselves with the most relevant and connected groups.

A full version of the report can be found on Slideshare: (below).

The Rise of Digital Influence

View more documents from Altimeter Group Network on SlideShare

Visual Notes From The Social Business Summit @ SXSW

Rather than write down some notes I thought I'd share a couple of pages from my notebook after the AM session from the Social Business Summit at SXSW. No more updates for a whie as my schedule is packed with business meetings, dinners, events and in person networking. Great summit though.

Weaving The Social Layer Across Your Organization

Next week I am joining thousands of innovators, digital pioneers and social strategists for the interactive portion of SXSW. A highlight of the trip will be joining my former colleagues from social business consultancy Dachis Group who are organizing their third installment of the Social Business Summit—a global series of events which kicks off in Austin. I'll be speaking along side folks like Clarah Shih author of the Facebook Era and who now serves on *Starbuck's board dedicating to navigating social. Other notable speakers include Sandy Carter who has taken the lead on IBM's push for social business integration, Bonin Bough who recently departed *PepsiCo to lead social efforts at Kraft and of course Jeremiah Owyang who has helped define this space.

We Are Here: The Novelty Is Over
I'm starting my premise with the fact that many organizations (especially those who have led in social initiatives) are now past the "experimentation" phase of social disruption. Some are even beginning to take a step back to evaluate what they've done in the past—what worked and didn't and how things need to more forward at scale. For many organizations who have gotten past the unrealistic expectations first experienced when social got traction in their organization, they now understand that the changes needed to take place will be long term, gradual and not exactly glamorous. That said, we have a long way to go, and my take is that social business is really only getting started.

From Silos To Layer: Weaving Social Into Your Organization's DNA
Despite the progress that many organizations, businesses and brands have made over the past few years—the reality is that for many, social integration isn't integrated. It's happening, but typically within silos and some are moving faster than others. Take for example the most recent changes announced by Facebook last week which affect business pages. Some companies responded to the changes immediately while others are still grappling with what they need to do and how they need to do it. Even in the cases where an organization has high proficiency using social in one silo (like marketing and communications) they are grappling with how to apply it to others. There are few examples emerging however which illustrate some convergence—Dominos Pizza for example has recently integrated product development with social marketing in their "Think Oven" initiative which invites customers to submit ideas or predefined participate in projects all via a Facebook app which is built into their business page. What Dominos is doing may be the tip of the iceberg, but getting your customers to work with you for mutual gain is a core value of what social business is supposed to be about.

Weaving The Social Layer Will Take Time
Still, the Dominos example isn't a success story as much as it is a mere signpost on the very long and winding road that is social business. Even with the ability to mine ideas from enthusiastic customers via social networks which are part of their lives, there are still operational challenges which include coordinating activities between the marketing department, agency partners, product development, and even legal. Right now, most organizations are making progress in pockets vs. the whole and it's going to take significant time for social to be woven into the fabric, culture and operations of any company. And, it's likely to not happen to all, but will definitely happen to some. The next ten years will be critical for a business in how it handles these disruptions and opportunities. We've now entered the threshold where the "weaving" of social into the fabric of an organization will take vision, time, resource, money, dedication and most importantly—patience.

*Starbucks and PepsiCo are Edelman clients

Social Business In Action: Field Notes

I just finished up participating in one of our events for Social Media Week, a global conference taking place in several major cities around the world. Our panel moderated by colleague Robin Hamman included Euen Semple who previously ran social efforts at the BBC and Vincent Boon from Giff Gaff, while it's still fresh on my mind, I wanted to jot down a few key thoughts:

Social Business Is About Applying Purpose & Intent At Scale
The above diagram is something I started off with and an attempt to describe social business in one visual. At it's core, it's about connecting stakeholders who are critical to the success of your business. And as I've stressed before—it's about executing initiatives leveraging the "3 P's"—People, Process & Platforms. I stressed starting with people.

Social From The Inside Out
Euen said the following:
"There's no point aspiring to be 2.0 outside the firewall when you are still operating at 1.0"
While I would not go as far as to say there's no point, (an organization can learn from external initiatives) I concede that Euen's point is well taken as so many organizations don't internalize social behaviors externally. If you can't walk the walk, how can you talk the talk?

Members Only
Vincent stressed that Giff Gaff customers are viewed as "members" and I simply loved this perspective. It is exactly in line with how "social" has altered our behaviors. Marketing departments always viewed their target as "consumers" but thinking of them as members and co-creators is a really nice way to acknowledge how empowered they are and how this can benefit themselves as well as the business.

Shiny Objects Be Damned
As I write this, I'm looking at a leaderboard created for Social Media Week London which uses Kred to rank "movers & shakers" AKA individuals creating noise this week at the events. It's clever but also a distraction. I referenced some of the efforts Verizon takes to include feedback into their services via forums—as well as levering experts who actively produce content and engage. Often times a social business is one that doesn't attract the most attention, but generates results. Beware the bright and shiny objects that capture attention but don't deliver long term value.

 

Below is a short video of the panel before it started just to give you an idea of what we covered.

Will The Real Social Business Experts Please Stand Up?

 

Stop what you're doing and check out this thread (on Google Plus of all places) started by Francine Hardaway. She started it off with a simple question.

"Who are the best experts in social business?"

What followed was a robust discussion on what social business is, isn't and who's driving the agenda forward in the space both in thought and action. If you're interested in the emerging definition of social business (aka the convergence of enterprise 2.0 and social media) I highly recommend you taking a look. Some of my favorite thoughts:

"the thread that social business is not the same as social media, or social media marketing. Social business is about BEING social, inside and outside the organization. Social media is about DOING communication differently. The former is holistic (ideally). The latter is decidedly less so, but that doesn't make it unimportant."
Jay Baer

"I think we're getting a little cute with the wording or definitions; I think that most of the people who've earned respect in this business have long been advocating that the smartest application of social platforms is to integrate them across the organization, including employees and the entire supplier and partner chain. I agree with everything in the definitions of "social business," I just don't think it's that big of a departure from what serious social practitioners have been up to for a while."
Christopher Barger

"The value that social interactions bring here are on several separate levels. In the most basic form it adds value by capturing all that unstructured knowledge that we still try to manage (classical knowledge management); then comes value from inter-collaboration and relationship networks; then comes value by applying analytics to those collaborations and knowledge capture; and finally the transformation and dynamic/flexibility to managing what used to be very fixed processes"
Rawn Shah

"I think to do social media right, you have to know customer service, human behavior, trends, business (finance, forecasting, marketing, high level strategy, departments, inter-department working, crm) and then you need to understand how people use and receive social channels tools. You have to be able to sit on top of a perch and then connect it all to the rest of a company. Not a lot of people do this."
Alex Beauchamp

As for me, I do see some distinction between social media and social business. Social media is communications focused. Social business is communications, r&d, legal, sales, customer support, operations, collaboration etc. All at enterprise scale. Internal and external. It's applying a social layer across an organization. Who are the experts here? That's not the real question. The real question is who is ready and willing to do the hard work over the next ten years. That's about how long I think it will take most large organizations to fully integrate "social" even if, by then we are calling it a different name. 

Launching a Social Command Center (Without The Center)

"Social command centers" are all the rage today and it's not without some merit. Many organizations now find themselves in a real-time business environment where news travels faster than sound, and information is set free. As a result, some forward thinking companies have put "monitoring" in place either in-house or in combination with partners. This isn't enough. And to make matters worse, I've seen companies make the classic mistake of buying a tool BEFORE putting any thought into the design that goes into effective monitoring and response, forgetting the 3P's (People, Process, Platforms). Tech platforms are only one third of the problem.

The media hasn't helped. "Social Command Centers" as physical spaces ripped from the playbook of NASA have been documented via Dell, Gatorade and most recently, the Super Bowl. Now, to be clear—a physical space can make listening, engaging and responding in real time effective—but it's not a requirement. In fact, for the organization who wishes to be able to function in real time for the long haul, it's the wrong place to focus on. So, how does any organization who wishes to be better equipped for real-time business move forward? Based on some of the work I've been doing with our analytics teams at Edelman Digital—below are some high level recommendations for setting up your social command center, without the center.

 

1: Set Up The Infrastructure
If your organization is not currently equipped to take in large amounts of social signals and process that data in real time—it's imperative to start with the three P's:

People
Most organizations forget that any initiative is dependent on people no matter how effective the tool and they forget to start here. Don't make that mistake. First, decide how much your organization can invest in terms of training people to both use the tools and have "listening" become either part of their job or the job itself. Go to the organizational design drawing board and begin to map it out. See who has done it before and if you don't know who has—find help here. Many organizations will find out that they need assistance in the form of professional service providers. Even here, work on the org design to determine how resources, both internal and "outsourced" work together for maximum integration.

Process
Another area where many "command center" initiatives fail is that they gather the signals, but don't have the internal process in place to share the insights and intelligence. If your organization has spent money on tools or even people but haven't figured out how to effectively communicate (internally) what you're hearing, it's wasted investment. A process must be designed which connects multiple stakeholders together who can quickly get information and perhaps more importantly be able to connect with others on intepreting what it means. Internal social networks which act as collaboration hubs, can play a role here—but again, without a process (and the right culture) in place, the tools won't matter. A system must be designed here which can quickly get information out to key stakeholders across multiple silos, but those groups must commit resources and leadership to support the process.

Platforms
Not all tools are created equal and some perform better functions than others. There's no shortage of tools which started as listening and are moving into the CRM (Customer Relationship Management) space, or social publishing platforms that are extending into the monitoring and response category. There are tools which will work with existing enterprise platforms and those which claim to be end to end. There are also technology platforms who will offer services around their tools and those who don't. The golden rule when choosing a platform is to remember that a technology company at the end of the day always views their technology as the best solution. We typically recommend comprehensive audits here—as well as bringing together both internal decision makers and key partners together before pulling the trigger on a technology solution. It's also recommended that SOME thought be put into both people and process before making a decision on tools. The most common scenario I've seen is the reverse—which leads to more cost and less efficiency, retrofitting people and process to work with a tool which may have not been the best pick in the first place.

2: Analyze For Meaning
Data. It means nothing without analysis. In order to even get to any kind of meaningful analysis, you mist first set up the right filters and taxonomies. Your company for example may have a product name which also comes up in other industry conversations in total unrelated context. Once the right taxonomies and filters are in place, it requires brains to detect patterns and extract any kind of meaningful insight from the data. These brains are not just the data analysts but also people across your organization who should be pulled into the "command center" and tapped for their area of expertise. Individuals from R&D, customer care and even HR can be relevant here.

3: Optimize Content & Engagement Tactics
There are really only two immediate actions any organization can take from having a command center infrastructure in place. The first is to optimize any form of communication asset which goes out. The second is to optimize any form of engagement (example, talking to anyone in a forum, social network, or commenting on a publication). Both content and engagement tactics are informed by the social intelligence captured, disseminated and digested by the designated individuals who are part of the command center ecosystem. Content and engagement tactics can happen across a number of digital and real world properties. Traditional media, (mainstream), Hybrid (blogoshphere), Social, (networks and forums) and Owned (apps and corporate sites).

4: Monitor & Measure New Signals
If you're going to invest in a social command center (without the center), you'll need to be able to measure and report progress, not only intelligence. Every piece of content and every interaction should be designed to create a ripple effect or reverberate a signal which your command center should be able to pick up and track back to the source. The source should be connected to your efforts whether ranging from correcting inaccurate information, to levering social channels to rectify a bad customer experience. Everything we do in the digital space sends a signal. Some are faint and some get picked up. As part of a command center construct, an organization should design it so it can not only trace signals back to their origin, but connect them to business objectives.

It's worth noting that as with everything else attached to the word "social"—a command center construct is not a magic bullet nor a solution for your business problems. However, it can be an effective move your organization makes in calibrating it for real-time scenarios which is becoming all too frequent as a result of social technologies and the behavior it influences. Today, your customers, employees and competitors can send signals in real time. My hypothesis here is that within the next 5-10 years, nearly every organization will have some kind of system like this in place which works to their benefit.

The Year of the Change Agent

We've always lived and worked in a state of flux but one can make the argument that recent developments in technology, society and business seem to have accelerated the pace of change we have to contend with. Our mobile devices would have been considered fairly high powered computers not that long ago. We live in a hyper-connected state of existence, constantly sending out signals to friends, family, work associates, peers , etc. If this year belongs to anyone, it is the change agent. 

You may be thinking—"that's exactly what I am," but chances are, if you aren't frustrated or feeling like you are constantly hitting wall after wall, you may not be the change agent you think you are. It's a thankless job, but a necessary one, now more than ever. Change agents aren't sprinters, they run marathons—and this will be their year whether they know it or not. But in order to do the job (and really, it's everyone's job if you're interested in innovation) there are a few key areas where the seeds of change will need to take root.

Thoughts 
Change cannot happen without first influencing the thought process—the way we think about ourselves, our jobs our business and most importantly our missions. Change starts with the core of how we think about everything before we ever take action. It is thoughts which drives strategy and strategy which drives execution (when done right). Change can begin with a whisper—often times as a thought formed in our minds. 

Behaviors
If thought is the seed then the living organism which springs from it is the behaviors which take root upon them. Without action, thoughts and ideas serve little purpose other than to inspire—which can ignite change, but not sustain it. A change in behavior can range from a shift in daily ritual, to the adoption of new technologies to reacting to environments in new and unexpected ways. When what we do is aligned with what we think, anything is possible. 

Perception
When we realize that we are more in control of the way we are perceived than we think—change is possible. Sometimes altering the perception of ourselves whether we be individual or organization acts as a catalyst to influence thoughts and behaviors and other times it is a result—but either way we change when they way we are perceived is altered. 

Outcome
Without a meaningful outcome which indicates the measure of change that has either occurred (or not) there cannot be change. An outcome can be an attitude—or it can be financial, but it's tangible. Not so long ago, the world thought Apple computer was dead. Having owned my share of overpriced and underperforming beige machines—I lived through that sentiment. Then change took root—thoughts, behaviors and perception of the company shifted and one of the indisputable outcomes is reflected in valuation of the company. Ask Apple's shareholders what they think of change. 

2012 belongs to the change agents. But real change takes a complex formula of vision, perseverance and stubbornness to pull off.

Here's to all of the above.  

Six Social Media Trends for 2012

Originally posted on Harvard Business Review

Each year at this time, I look forward and predict trends in social media for the coming year. But first, I look back at my predictions from last year. How'd I do? Not bad.

Social media continues to move forward toward business integration, a trend that I identified last year. In a joint study from Booz & Company and social platform developer Buddy Media, 57 percent of businesses surveyed plan to increase social media spending, while 38 percent of CEO's label social as a high priority.

I was also partially accurate in predicting that Google would "strike back" in 2011. They did, with Google Plus, a formidable initiative that acts as Google's "social layer" to the Web. Part social network and part social search, Google Plus has industry observers scratching their heads, wondering if Facebook will be given a run for their money or if the service evolves into something complimentary in a highly social Web.

I had one big swing-and-miss on Facebook's intrusion in the location-based services war. While Facebook still supports location tracking in a number of ways, it has not put Foursquare out of business. Foursquare still enjoys a niche audience of highly active participants who enjoy telling the world where they are and post pictures to prove it. It is however worth noting that Facebook recently acquired location based network Gowalla, so continue to watch this space.

So what can we expect in 2012 in a world that seems to grow ever connected by the hour? Here are six predictions to ponder, in no particular order:

Convergence Emergence. For a glimpse into how social will further integrate with "real life," we can look at what Coca Cola experimented with all the way back in 2010. Coke created an amusement park where participants could "swipe" their RFID-equipped wristbands at kiosks, which posted to their Facebook account what they were doing and where. Also, as part of a marketing campaign, Domino's Pizza posted feedback — unfiltered feedback — on a large billboard in Times Square, bringing together real opinions from real people pulled from a digital source and displayed in the real world. These types of "trans-media" experiences are likely to define "social" in the year to come.

The Cult of Influence. In much the same way that Google has defined a system that rewards those who produce findable content, there is a race on to develop a system that will reward those who wield the most social influence. One particular player has emerged, Klout, determined to establish their platform as the authority of digital influence. Klout's attempt to convert digital influence into business value underscores a much bigger movement which we'll continue to see play out in the next year. To some degree everyone now has some digital influence (not just celebrities, academics, policy makers or those who sway public opinion). But for the next year, the cult of influence becomes less about consumer plays like Klout and more about the tools and techniques professionals use to "score" digital influence and actually harness, scale and measure the results of it.

Gamification Nation. No we're not taking about video games. Rather, game-like qualities are emerging within a number of social apps in your browser or mobile device. From levels, to leaderboards, to badges or points, rewards for participation abound. It's likely that the trend will have to evolve given how competition for our time and attention this gaming creates. Primarily, gamification has been used in consumer settings, but look for it in other areas from HR, to government, healthcare and even business management. Perhaps negotiating your next raise will be tied to your position on the company's digital leaderboard.

Social Sharing. Ideas, opinions, media, status updates are all part of what makes social media a powerful and often disruptive force. The media industry was one of the first to understand this, adding sharing options to content, which led to more page views and better status in search results. What comes next in social sharing is more closely aligned with e-commerce or web transactions. For example, Sears allows a user to share a product or review with their networks directly from the site. Sharing that vacation you just booked, or recommending a product, or service from any site to a social network is where sharing goes next. We probably don't know what we are willing to share until we see the option to do it.

Social Television. For many of us, watching television is already a social act, whether it's talking to the person next to you, or texting, tweeting, and calling friends about what you're watching. But television is about to become a social experience in a bigger and broader sense. The X Factor now allows voting via Twitter and highlights other social promotions, which encourages viewers to tap social networks while they watch. Another way media consumption is becoming social comes from a network called Get Glue which acts as something of a Foursquare for media. Participants can "check-in" to their favorite shows (or other forms of media) and collect stickers to tell the world what programs they love. Watch for more of this this year as ratings rise for socially integrated shows.

The Micro Economy. Lastly as we roll into 2012, watch for a more social approach to solving business problems through a sort of micro-economy. Kickstarter gives anyone with a project, the opportunity to get that initiative funded by those who choose to (and patrons receive something in return). A crowdsourcing platform for would be inventors called Quirky lets the best product ideas rise to the top and then helps them get produced and sold while the "inventor" takes a cut. Air BnB turns homes into hotels and travelers into guests, providing both parties with an opportunity to make and save money. These examples may point to a new future reality where economic value is directly negotiated and exchanged between individuals over institutions.

These are a few emerging trends which come to mind. As with anything, looking to the past often gives us clues for what may come in the future. Please weigh in with your thoughts: where do you see "social" going in 2012?

Social Business Planning in 2012

Originally posted on Edelman Digital

Today marks my two-year anniversary at Edelman, or what we affectionately like to refer to as an “Edelversary”. So much has changed in the industry since joining the team here—we are truly working in a real-time business environment. We’ve seen “social” move from an item to be checked off the list from major brands to something they are genuinely grappling with in terms of integrating at scale across the enterprise. At Edelman Digital, we’ve always approached social a bit differently from others—focusing on the fact that much if it revolves around human-to-human interactions (we now call this community management), but if social is to scale—it must begin to spill out of the marketing silo and truly influence how we do business. We believe a connected business is better positioned for the future than a business, which remains disconnected and non adaptive.

Today, we’re announcing a partnership with Edelman Consulting led by Mike Kuczowski, in which we are actively elevating our services around social business to meet what we believe will be the opportunity in the years to come. In order for a business to truly extract value from social initiatives, we must consider not only marketing but how it impacts research and development, human resources, innovation, business intelligence and other facets of an organization which help drive a business forward. Michael’s team has deep experience solving complex business challenges while our digital team possesses incredible savvy and a global perspective for how social-digital operates at scale (folks like Michael Brito, Zena Weist, Robin Hamman, Dave Fleet, & Chuck Hemann to name a few).

Social Business Planning

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Together, we’re looking forward to elevating the game for companies who truly wish to push their social initiatives beyond acquiring fans and followers. As an initial gesture, we are openly putting our approach out on the social web, which outlines not only our joint philosophy on social business planning but also, the methodology we use when working with clients. We believe that over the next ten years, most businesses will move past the ROI question of social—and get to work on doing business in a connected age. This will require gradual if not steady change and a commitment to evolving business practices.  We’re looking forward to partnering with likeminded organizations and individuals who see the world in a similar fashion.

You can read more information on this initiative here.  We’re excited to play our part in moving the discussion of social business from philosophy to action.

Forrester's "Three Social Thunderstorms" At LeWeb

I didn't attend LeWeb this year, but judging by the chatter, one of the more discussed talks was given by Forrester's CEO, George Colony who outlined three "thunderstorms" approaching the tech & business world. I just finished watching his talk, and thought it would be interesting to outline portions of his talk with my take layered on it:

Thunderstorm 1:  The Death of The Web
You'll have to watch the video (above) to grasp the full intricacies of what George is putting forth, but essentially he's making a call that app economies which have the potential to tap both processing power and the cloud, will change the Web and move it away from a network/browser model to something which leverages devices, apps and the cloud in a more powerful way.

My Take: Scale & Sustainability vs. Experience
I get what George is saying and claiming the death of anything gets headlines, but really what this will likely come down to is user experience vs. sustainability and scale. Apps already show promise of providing better experiences than browser/network, but a question remains how scalable it is for enterprises vs. consumers. While HTML 5 is already working on a more stable browser experience, apps are often dependent on OS systems. What's more probable is that the Web as we know it doesn't die—but loses dominance in the consumer area specifically. For businesses specifically, the demand will be formed around what model scales and can be sustained globally over time. 

Thunderstorm 2:  Social Saturation
Social is running out of hours and people meaning there is finite demand to meet the current glut of social start-ups and networks competing for our attention, usage and loyalty. As a result, we are moving into a "post social" world in which we see the demise of platforms like Foursquare which don't offer enough value to survive. The post social web will see new or evolved players who offer efficiency and value.

My Take: Value Is In The Eye of The Beholder
I think George is right on the bubble assessment but claiming that social platforms will move away from the Foursquare's of the world to platforms which offer concrete effiiencies and value is debatable. Both Twitter and Facebook emerged and evolved as different tools from which they started. Essentially the free market will demand what happens here, but it is likely that the ones who succeed will look more like a Kickstarter over yet another photo/location sharing network.

Thunderstorm 3: The Enterprise
George cited that 72 percent of enterprises are either interested in or already implementing social technologies as part of how their business operates. He cited a number of players in the enterprise space such as Salesforce, IBM and Microsoft and hinted that these could evolve and new players could emerge as well. He also noted that one of the core reasons enterprises are interested in social has a lot to do with their customers (the primary focus of enterprise social as he puts it).

My Take: Social Business
George isn't just talking about the internal social enterprise, he's talking about extracting business value from social, like more efficient employees, better business decisions made from data and data analysis, and improved products and services informed by customers to give a few examples. Most organizations are in their infancy of figuring out how to get real value from a newly connected environment and I agree that it's going to take a changing of the guard over time but there are massive opportunities. He's essentially describing social business, which over the next 10 years will need to be executed upon.

Great talk overall, highly recommend viewing it.

What's On The Horizon For Social Business?

I was recently invited to our Toronto office to talk about social business—both what it is and what's in store for organizations who seek to integrate social as part of how they do business. This is probably the best way to define social business vs. media. While many organizations seek to leverage social media as part of communications, (such as marketing) social business seeks to extract value from doing business in a more social way. When we talk about social business planning, our focus shifts from merely thinking about the media universe to adding purpose and intent behind how we harness "social" for business purposes. And all of this is still the tip of the Iceburg. We'll be talking more about social business planning in depth in the months to come.

Making Business Decisions Through Data

Co-produced with Chuck Hemann on Edelman Digital

What’s the next big thing after “listening”? It has something to do with data—but more importantly the decisions a business makes after sifting through the data and understanding what impact it can have. The social-digital sphere as it turns out is full of data. Some of it is conversational data, some of it is search related, but all of it leaves a digital trail of clues for us to follow, only it’s up to us to decipher those clues. (hint, Facebook loves your data.)

As social media has made its way into almost every communications program, we have also seen the need for more advanced approaches to monitoring intensify. In fact, monitoring as a discipline is being replaced by listening. What’s the difference? The term monitoring implies a passive action. If we’re monitoring, we watch for mentions of our brand for the purposes of acting in case our reputation is threatened. If we’re listening, we’re using that data for more aggressive action either in terms of real-time content development or the eventual use in the communications planning process.

Lets explore both of those models for a second…

Listening for Program Planning

The most common model for listening is using the data for program planning. It’s a very linear process, and typically takes several weeks to fully execute. With this model we gather data on our brand, competitors and category, and develop insights that inform a strategy and tactics. It’s important to keep in mind that insights derived from social conversations have application well beyond social. Those key learnings can be applied to hybrid media, owned media and traditional media properties. After we’ve used the data for program planning we execute and then measure.

Listening for Real-Time Content Development

With this model, our goal is to use information we’re gathering from social media conversations about our brand, competitors and category to inform the development of content in real-time. The additional layer with this model is that we’re listening to social conversations with the intention of spreading the insights we’ve gleaned to other parts of the organization. It’s our belief that social conversation data has application across several different parts of the organization, including product planning, CRM, strategic planning and human resources. After we’ve determined where the information should be sent within the organization, we determine where and how we communicate. When that piece of communication has been issued, a new signal has also been created for us to analyze and measure. This cycle is much more condensed than the previous model – typically spanning days instead of weeks to months.

Which of these models is best for you? The answer is you probably need a combination of both, especially if you’re engaging your community in real-time. The key to both is insights that help the entire organization. If we’re mining consumer conversation data, we need to be thinking about the organization more holistically. If we see a conversation that our product planning team could benefit from, we need to be looping them into the data mining process.

While we are focusing on looking at and deciphering data (signals) in the communications space, It’s our view that listening is going to continue to evolve and that we’re already starting to see the beginnings of true social intelligence systems within larger companies. That means we’re listening to conversations in real-time, and making business decisions based on the insights we can glean from the data. Walmart Labs for example is experimenting with analyzing conversations and trends on Twitter to impact how they stock their shelves. This experiment gives us a glimpse into the future of integrating social data into business intelligence.

Are you leveraging either of the above models? Do you think social data has a role both within and outside of the communications realm? We’d love to hear your thoughts.

*Walmart is an Edelman client.

Who Influenced Blogworld?

Last week I spoke at Blogworld in LA and today came across this post done by Radian 6 who leverged their platform to provide some analysis of the conversations generated by the event. The graph above reflects the following accoring to Radian 6:

"The top influencers driving conversations Saturday are shown in the graph below. With the exception of the BlogWorld handles, these were conversations that were driven by reactions to the presenters and their panels."

Now, I'm flattered that I somehow ended in good standing here, but it's worth noting that what we're looking at is volume of digital conversation and not digital influence, though one could say that volume of conversation is an indicator of digital influence when it comes to measurement. Metrics aside, I thought I'd offer some insights as to what put me in this spot since I was involved.

Attendees Were Hyper Connected & Hyper Engaged
I didn't have the largest session at the event, but looking at the crowd who attended—I noticed that many of them were practitioners in the industry with high quality followings even if they were not the size of a Robert Scoble or Chris Brogan type network. Also, the attendees of my session were hyper-engaged and they displayed this by tweeting up a storm.

Soundbites & Mental Models Stick
My presentation was full of short, sticky phrases and frameworks—designed for tweets and social note taking. This is no accident—I would not be worth my weight as a communicator if I were not able to break down communications into memorable bits worth sharing.

Style & Substance = Conversation
Being the event was a blogger heavy conference, I felt that I had to entertain a bit in addition to providing enough detail and meat to make it worth the time, attention and digital conversation of the attendees. I started off the presentation with a few provoking and even humorous slides, played a mini inflatable guitar and then dove into a series of detailed concepts followed by examples and case studies.

For whatever reason, I had the right mix of content, audience, timing and most importantly—people who were more than willing to talk about whatever it was that I was talking about. It's worth noting that as much as I would have liked to leverage my own social networks of 70+ thousand friends and followers that I couldn't because I was up there talking. In short, driving conversation online takes two things: something worth talking about and a distribution network. In an event crammed with many great speakers, I was fortunate to have both that day.

Social by Design: Design Thinking & Business

Social by Design: Design Thinking & Business

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From a recent Keynote I delivered at the Constellation Connected Enterprise. "Design" is more important than ever, but greatly misunderstood as a business tool. In addition to the numerous business process design models in the deck—I used Facebook's browser experience as an example of a design problem. Facebook is in the "feature-itis" stage of their ecosystem design and I suspect they know this and will work to fix it before the experience becomes too complex for participants to tolerate.  Enjoy the slides—a collection of work and other examples to illustrate how design and business strategy work together.

"Share-ability" By Design

Can you design things to be shared? Of course you can. While "sharing" is ultimately up to the end participant, it's up to the "designer" of the "thing" (this could be content, a platform, a product) to build the option and ability for sharing to occur. The media industry had no choice but to innovate in this space as my colleague Steve Rubel likes to refer to as "the war for page views". As, I've written recently—there are still untapped opportunities to enable and even kick-start social sharing behaviors.

Klout, Kred and the Ugly Truth About Social Influence Measurement

The following is a guest post from Jennifer Leggio, a Forbes social media blogger and raconteur. Find more about Jennifer here: http://about.me/mediaphyter

I'll be the first to admit that I once called out social influence measurement to be, as they scientifically say, a bunch of hooey. After the deluge of self-proclaimed social media "gurus" in 2007-2008, I couldn't help but be skeptical. These influence measurement tools started as simple lists of users by network size and eventually grew to services like HubSpot's fun yet vapid TweetGrader. So, it's not surprising that when Klout was first introduced, I met it with the same eye-rolling skepticism that I gave to the others. "This is likely fun," I said to myself. "But probably not much more."

I feared what a lot of other cynics feared - yet another "popularity" tool for the social media “guru” squads to tout their own awesomeness. Over several months I watched people take advantage of the perks and post about their scores until curiosity got the best of me. Sure, I'll admit that it was fun to go in and see how my score would shift based on how often (or not) I used a social network. And, I did enjoy my mockery of Klout's ill-fitted influence topics (for example, Klout currently believes I am influential about oatmeal. I'm awaiting an offer from Quaker any day now, but I digress…). However, that does not mean that influence measurement tools are without merit, especially in today’s booming social business landscape. So, the question becomes: Was I wrong to be cynical or was I right to want them to do more? The answer is an ambiguous “yes.”

Remember the whole ROI and social media debacle? Sure you do, it’s still going. Companies were clamoring for proof of ROI for their social business investment, while the same merry band of social media “gurus” screamed, "What? Can't hear you! Social media is intangible!" 

What does this have to do with influence measurement? Just hang in a bit longer. The foundation underneath both the influence and ROI debates is fear. In the ROI debate, people who truly didn't understand social business were trying to justify their existences. A common thread might be, "You can't measure this, but look at how many LIKES we got today?" and then, immediately cue the knees knocking and the teeth chattering. With influence measurement, you have the same fear. A common thread here might be, "You can't measure influence. Klout says my score is only 30, but really, I am way more popular because I go to tweet-ups." Narcissism notwithstanding, remove the fear and we can shine a spotlight on an activity that's not only growing in popularity because people can get free stuff, but because companies are starting to demand it, much like they started to demand social media ROI.

Because so many companies want to see results for their output and the right kind of influenced action, social media marketers who ignore influence measurement will do so at their own peril. The days of “we got 100 random retweets!” as a milestone are, thankfully, gone. Don’t agree? I liken this to a good public relations strategy. In the olden days of PR, any news coverage could be considered helpful. If Bob’s News Magazine Weekly Times Post ran a direct duplicate of a press release, some PR folks might’ve cheered. PR agencies would pack clip books full of these types of posts. The days of “we got 100 random stories!” are gone. Companies want targeted, meaningful, third party discussions of their wares in the media. The same goes for social. And unlike publications where circulation and readership (though sometimes debatable metrics in their own right) dictate reach, influencers don’t come with their own numbers. Services like Klout and Sulia and others exist to help make sense of all of the madness.

All of this said, there are some critical considerations:  

1) Topical Influence – There is no “general” influencer. While measurement is helpful to companies, not any ol’ influencer will do. If Quaker is going to push a new flavor of oatmeal then, according to Klout, I am their gal. While my overall score might be decent and I am influential on breakfast choices, this doesn’t mean that I should be targeted for holiday gift guides (pet peeve alert). Just as you would with a reporter, target the ones who have the audience that give a hoot about what you’re selling.

2) Immature Market – The influence measurement market is still bouncing around in its jumper swing. Much like any market in its infancy, it needs time to grow and improve. Klout and Sulia are moving quickly toward more accurate topical influence but they aren’t there yet. And, that doesn’t mean they can’t be undone by a newcomer with a better, or even simply better marketed, offering (case-in-point: Groupon). For example, Kred has recently popped up, and they tout the ability to determine where you fit into a range of communities (aka topical influence). The challenge here is that they base a lot of this on Twitter bios (mine says hockey, but I am not influential there) and they also share how scores were determined, so the bumbling group of social media “gurus” could try to game it. Is Kred the company to knock Klout from its pedestal? I have no idea. However, we need to give Klout, Kred, Sulia and others time to mature this market the way that we gave social networks time to grow into business vehicles.

3. Influencers Are a Rascally Bunch - They vary by industry and preference. It’s important to note that an influencer doesn’t need to be the most popular kid at camp. He or she only needs to be influential to a focused audience (aka topical influencers). And, right or wrong, influencers can be bought. Algorithms can’t always determine what is, for example, a sponsored tweet versus a heartfelt one. These can work in certain situations, but this is a critical consideration when weighing influence targets for promotions or outreach.

4. Size is Not Everything - It’s been debunked over and over, but I’ll say it again. A network size does not always indicate the right level of influence. Influence inspires a new type of action, and that action is harder to measure beyond the initial click. Relationships are much more critical to influence measurement than actual network size. Influence measurement needs become more dynamic and contextual to truly help us get past this “more followers equals more amazing!” mindset. Again, it’s a young market, and in time size will become less relevant, and context will become more critical.

Here’s where I tell you in a few sentences what I just rambled about above: influence measurement, in all of its grand imperfection, is not going anywhere. It will improve, it will become more critical, and your clients or executives are soon going to demand it. Rather than laughing it off or denying it based on fear, start playing around with it, determine the good pieces and how you can take those bits and feed them into a true social business strategy. If not, the merry band of social media “gurus” awaits, and I hear that their membership requirements aren’t discerning at all. 

Please Steal This Idea

Not long ago, I found myself talking with several clients about a trend I felt would truly impact their business. Social Sharing. There's no brilliance to identifying this as a meaningful trend, we see social sharing everywhere. In the real world and most recently on networks as people not only share what they are doing, but what they are reading, listening to, and even purchasing.

I've made suggestions multiple times to whoever would listen that they should take another look at their Website and integrate social sharing (beyond content and more toward commerce). For example if you are even considering buying a product, you should be able to tell your friends about it. If you booked a vacation or a hotel room with a view—same thing. If you recommend a product or service you should be able to broadcast that across your entire social network (and not just one) directly from the site.

Social networks have turned people into bragging machines. It's not the most appealing human trait, but spend time on them and this is a significant portion of how people share. We want others to know when we do something that makes us feel good. So why don't we see more of this integration in transactional Web experiences? See Sears for example:


In this example, Sears allows a participant to share products they are interested on Facebook. They can also do reviews of products and share those. The benefit for Sears is a very potent form of "social marketing" in that they get their product right into the main feed of a user and their friends/connections are likely to see it. It's more word of mouth than it is advertising.

So why aren't there more examples like this across the Web from major brands? It takes several "departments" to make something like this happen. Here are a few:

Legal
IT
Marketing
Social

It also takes the commitment of a senior leader within an organization to say "go make this happen". In nearly every conversation I find myself in with professionals in the industry, the struggle to define "social ROI" (return on investment) becomes a roadblock to innovation.

If you really want to connect the dots between social integration and purchase intent then please steal this idea and integrate social sharing to your products and services on your sites. Figure out how to do it and make it happen. And figure out how to track the links back to your site. You'll be one step closer to solving the "ROI" question in social media social business integration. Have you seen any great examples from big brands here? Share in the comments.

Is Your Social Business Prepared? Readiness Levels Vary Amongst Organizations.

For further proof that "social business" is coming of age, Altimeter recently conducted some research (both quantitative and qualitative) of enterprise grade organizations (1000 or more employees). The report focuses on readiness for crisis scenarios, but includes several best practices and findings which illustrate how organizations need to structure themselves for social business. Below is a breakdown of a few findings which stood out to me (noted in italics), along with some thoughts as to what this could potentially mean for you and your organization:

Finding: Baseline governance and reinforcement enables employees to professionally participate.
"Of the 144 companies we surveyed, all 18 Advanced companies allow rank-and-file employees to use social media professionally (Figure 1.2). However, Advanced companies also educate and provide guardrails so that employees know how to participate in a safe and consistent manner."

Implications
If you consider your organization to be advanced in leveraging social media for business but have not provided education, guidelines or rules of engagement for your employees, then you may not be as advanced as you think. Guidance for a broader employee base can come in the form of training, or establishing recommended rules of engagement and of course a policy. These are only some of the basics and serve different purposes. For example, the rules of engagement scenario map (below) outlines recommended actions against specific scenarios and is not the same thing as an enterprise wide policy. Organizations with less experience in scaling social are likely following a more ad hoc approach.

Example: Scenario map outlining rules of engagement for community management

Finding: Enterprise-wide response processes provide rapid customer engagement.
"Companies are struggling to keep up with a growing volume of conversations – we found that enterprise-class corporations already average 178 corporate-owned social media accounts. As workflow across the enterprise becomes more complicated, consistency and efficiency decrease, while risks increase."

Implications
For large organizations who wish to increase their proficiency in leveraging social media for business, this translates to having not only actionable response plans in place but also the listening structure and workflow. Implications here include putting some sort of "social business intelligence" system in place which allows the right people in your organization to detect and distribute intelligence to the right people so it can be acted upon. (see below)

Finding: A dedicated and shared central hub, often named the “Center of Excellence,” provides leadership.
"Increased consumer adoption and low technological barriers encourage corporate stakeholders to deploy social media on their own, with or without formal approval. In our survey, we found that as many as 13 different business units across the enterprise engage in customer-facing social media efforts"

Implications
Increasingly, large organizations are adopting a coordinated approach to managing social efforts (Altimeter's report cites Adobe as an example, *Edelman client) however, COE's must be assembled with care. Personal experience working with organizations that implement a Center of Excellence highlights the tension between regional autonomy and corporate desire for more consistency. A "COE" must be carefully planned and attached to the right committees and regional representatives in order for them to reach their full potential. 

Altimeter's report does an excellent job of highlighting a more macro trend—that social media is increasingly integrating into organizations and in the process presents numerous challenges and opportunities. It also highlights the fact that large organizations display a spectrum when it comes to levels of readiness The report goes on to highlight some of those specific challenges and opportunities in the area of crisis management. I highly recommend reviewing it in detail. (Note: Edelman Digital colleague Michael Brito was sourced in the study).

Social Readiness: How Advanced Companies Prepare

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The Social Layer: Six Thoughts On Where Google Plus Is Going

I've been deeply immersed in Google Plus for the last week or so, not only following what's being said about the service but actually using it, kicking the tires and making observations along the way. For what it's worth, I think Google Plus has an incredible amount of potential for a number of reasons. Here's a few thoughts or more accurately opinions. Everyone has a take, so the only thing can offer here is that I've had these thoughts in my head while using the service but wanted to give it some time before putting it into writing.

1. Google Plus Isn't A Social Network, It's A Social Layer
Google Plus looks like a social network and feels like a social network but I don't think that's where all of this is going. What Google has been successful in doing is creating the beginnings of what I think will become a social layer across the Google/Web ecosystem. The brilliance of their strategy is that the experience is good and seems designed for users craving a solution that takes aspects from Twitter, Tumblr and adds some of the familiarity of Facebook resulting in a promising social experience which lets users broadcast in public or share and connect selectively. If Google can scale and refine what's making G+ appealing to early adopters, they will be well on their way to showing the rest of the world what a social layer looks like (and I'm looking forward to watching this unfold).

2. Google Plus Isn't A Facebook Killer And Doesn't Need To Be
The media and pundits will continue to ask the question of Google taking Facebook out. I am fairly confident that average social "consumers" (think your mom or non industry friends) will not be leaving Facebook any time soon. However, this doesn't mean G+ will not become a significant force in media and other areas--I believe it will because it offers enough compelling connectivity, social features and content to siphon attention away from multiple networks/communication platforms including Twitter, Foursquare, Tumblr, Posterous, E-mail etc. As my colleague Steve Rubel points out, time and attention are finite. The more time and attention G+ gets from users and publishers, the more it takes away from all others. In my opinion, Google plus will take away enough time and attention for other networks to feel its effect and influence.

3. Journalists, Public Relations Professionals & The Media Will Eventually Flock To G+
Facebook knows that they need to appeal to journalists and media professionals in order to become an even more influential network. Currently, journalists favor Twitter over Facebook due to it's real time and open nature. Google Plus combines these aspects of Twitter with a way to organize "sources" and information organically. I believe this is where Facebook will feel Google plus most as media entities begin to incorporate the service into their routines. I don't see Facebook being structured as well for things like scanning headlines and leveraging journalists as personalities.

4. Businesses With Employee "Ambassador" Models Will Activate & Deploy Them
Call them community managers, evangelists, or corporate ambassadors, many business models leverage employees as public agents to educate, engage and activate advocacy amongst their customers. Google Plus has come out swinging strong with features such as circles which makes managing multiple groups of connections effective (something Facebook or Twitter doesn't do well). For example, a community manager who only wants to communicate or give their best content or news away to a their most engaged or high value members can customize different content to different groups.  Naturally, many company "ambassadors" will organically begin cultivating their network, but the real opportunity lies with a coordinated deployment.

5. Big And Small Business Gets A Second Chance With Google+
Google Plus offers not only users, but business and brands a second chance at getting in while the infrastructure is still being put in place. Though Google has not rolled out brand pages (or pages for non human entities), companies of all shapes and sizes who may have fumbled their efforts on Facebook, Twitter etc for a variety of reasons will have a second chance at setting up their "embassies" on Google Plus with some planning in place and a host of learnings to draw from efforts on previous networks.

6. Google Will Bring Search & Social Together
Nobody knows how exactly, but Google+ is likely going to bring the worlds of search and social even closer together. Already, they remain linked—(for example, the more your content is shared via social media, the more it does better in organic search results). However, Google+ itself it not yet search-able (officially) while in other cases Google has offered ways for content producers to attach their identities to search results. If someone is going to figure out how these two worlds connect more interdependently it will be Google.

Google Plus is no Empire Avenue or Quora—it’s the company’s arguably successful attempt at a social layer, which will likely integrate across other verticals and intersect with search.  Personally, I think it could be a serious game changer for the reasons I’ve listed in this piece. Challenges for both individuals and brands will remain investment, risk, strategy and getting up to speed on this ecosystem in real time. My advice is to get the right people in your organization focused on determining if this space will affect your industry. At minimal, pay close attention to it. On the other end of the spectrum, if you want to break new ground—consider investing in all things Google as they weave their social layer across their considerable ecosystem.

Why Social Media Will Evolve Into Social Business

  

Originally posted on Harvard Business Review.

For a clue to social media's future, we need not look much further than Washington. On the one hand, you have "Weinergate," former NY Senator Anthony Weiner's Twitter fiasco, which was essentially user error. He failed to negotiate the thin line between digital communication and social communication, between private and public.

On the other hand you have President Obama's announcement that he will do his own Tweeting. I'm fairly confident that while Obama may be the one that hits the "Tweet" button, it's highly unlikely that his tweets will go out into the wild without planning and, for the lack of a better word, design. He's no Anthony Weiner.

These two events signal the shift that's coming. The age of social media as something spontaneous that reflects how we behave in the real world (the Weiner approach) is coming to an end. We are entering an age of social business: a purposeful, planned, orchestrated, and integrated way of doing business in a social context which may feel personal to the outside world but combine complexities internally within organizations that will need navigating. As further evidence to the shift, one can look to technology for yet another clue.

Over the past several years, forward-thinking companies have begun to understand the value of monitoring conversations, so they have purchased software licenses from platforms like Radian 6. Recently, Enterprise software behemoth Salesforce acquired the startup, sending the signal that listening to social conversations is only one slice of the bigger pie for business. The true opportunity lies in scaling and operationalizing "social". If the next phase of social media is operating as a scalable social organization or business, then expect to see an explosion of activity in the following areas:

Organizational Design: While social media is focused on parts of an organization or business where communications and marketing demand social media tactics, a social business is redesigned as it moves through key phases of its evolution. All business functions have to undergo several iterations of change. Looking at your organization from a social business lens means looking at it more holistically. For further proof here, we can look to Facebook, where business and brand pages deal not only with customer "likes" but also with complaints and attacks from activist groups such as Greenpeace. Corporate Facebook pages are great examples of the need for marketing, PR, customer service, and even HR to all figure out how to work together because users on Facebook don't make the distinction behind which department is running what. To them, a company page represents all departments.

Social Business Intelligence: The rise of social media led to a gold rush in technology solutions, which allowed organizations to eavesdrop on conversations happening across multiple social ecosystems and digital public spaces such as the blogosphere, message boards, and Facebook. Organizations that have become accustomed to listening in on conversations are now positioned to take the next step and convert listening into organization-wide business intelligence. Dell, for example, has a "social command center", a baby step in the emerging area of social intelligence. Socially intelligent organizations will not only be able to adapt to conditions in their environment, but they will eventually be able to predict and plan for future scenarios.

Cultures of Collaboration, Co-Creation & Shared Value: Perhaps the most significant recent business case, which illustrates the business side of social, comes from a notoriously anti-social brand. When Apple first designed the iPhone, it did not plan for phones to be jailbroken and applications to be developed ad hoc, but that's what happened. The App Store was born by an early understanding that certain aspects were out of Apple's control and therefore a system needed to be planned and designed if Apple were to extract value in the long run. The end result is what's commonly known in the business world as an ecosystem in which value is entered into it and extracted by multiple stakeholders for mutual gain. An ecosystem, by definition, is sustainable.

The tenuous relationship between social media and social business represents a chasm that must be bridged. On one hand, the public desires authentic interactions in social spaces from real people. There is now an expectation for real-time response. On the other, a business or organization requires a system to be in place that coordinates activities. In short, it means knowing that Obama is pressing the Tweet button at times, but making sure he's not Tweeting anything inappropriate. The shift to come is moving from a focus on external media consumption to the internalization and business integration of what it means to become social or connected. Organizations that integrate social into how they do business will embrace social as a layer that's woven into the fabric of each business function over time. In the era of social business, external media will always play a role, but it will be the tip of the iceberg.

Google Figures Out Humans

I finally found time to cash in on one of my Google+ invites after taking a much needed vacation. My initial assessment? Google has actually figured out how humans work, so mark Google+ as one to watch and ignore the pundits that are telling you it's no threat to Facebook. The real threat from Google is they have finally shown evidence that they understand social and human beings by association. The whole Google+ experience while far from perfect offers proof of this—specifically with its "circles" feature. Much like the diagram above I did several years ago, Google+ offers participants to the network "circles" where they can categorize their connections ranging from friends, to family, acquaintances, public etc.

To many users of various social networks, this comes as welcome addition to those managing multiple spheres of connections and wish to interact with them differently vs. using a broad brush for everything. Google+ has tons of potential despite the saturation of social networks out there for one reason. They're Google. And search is complimentary to social. When they connect these two pieces together (and they will) look out.

Google+ is one to watch because they've demonstrated that they are beginning to understand social and human drivers. Stay tuned for more...

Do You Believe In Life After Likes? Measuring Social Business.

 
Colleague Steve Rubel and I were recently invited to participate in a very cool initiative coordinated by Eloqua‘s Joe Chernov and Jess3 – a social media playbook for industry professionals dubbed the “Social Media ProBook.” In it, you’ll find valuable perspectives from a variety of practitioners ranging from Ford’s Scott Monty, to Citi’s Frank Eliason, and HP’s Liz Philips among many others (disclaimer, HP is an Edelman client). My contribution was on a topic I feel will be of increasing importance to those of us deep in the trenches of social business integration and measuring results. Below is the full contribution, and I highly recommend that you browse through the ProBook and share it with others. It’s got some great, timely information on how to take social business to the next level within your organization.

Do You Believe In Life After Likes? Measuring Social Business.

Anyone telling you that they have the measurement and ROI (Return On Investment) issue solved in regards to social media is exaggerating at best. While I don’t have enough space here to dive as deeply into this topic as I could, there are a few specific points I would like to emphasize. But first, let’s do some level-setting — conversations around measuring results must move beyond fixating on single metrics such as “likes” fueled by the Facebook ecosystem. While they may be a desirable indicator of success, “likes” are one of many metrics, and social business leaders must take a step back to look at the big picture before putting all your social eggs into one big integrated basket. A great starting point when digging into measurement is to organize your efforts into one of the following outcomes: behavioral change and economic impact.

Behavior Change

Behavior change can be looked at from multiple perspectives. For example, if a large enterprise has determined that X amount of dollars can be saved annually if employees shift their behavior from A to B, then success can be measured by the percentage of shifts in the behavior from undesirable to desirable (over time). Likewise, on the public front, if a business finds itself in a crisis scenario and needs to “stop the bleeding,” it needs to trigger a shift in actions (such as fewer negative postings in public and more neutral or positive expressions, often referred to as “sentiment”) to help reverse opinions. From a marketing perspective, prompting desirable behaviors is also linked to influencing thought and opinion. Ratings, reviews and recommendations of products / services all serve as significant purchase indicators. Apply a social lens to these behavioral indicators (for example, sharing an opinion via a social network) and you can begin to frame up outcomes, which involve thought and action.

Economic Impact

Economic impact attaches a value — revenue generated or money saved — on a business initiative. It should not be confused with metrics. Returning to the crisis scenario, a business that has successfully averted or subdued a crisis (leveraging social media) can reference benchmarks from similar situations faced by other companies or their own estimations to evaluate how much money the business saved through taking appropriate action. Sales is of course the obvious financial outcome, however even if tracking sales via social activities is elevated to a science, companies must also consider how much more or less it might have taken to achieve similar results using other methods (such as traditional media purchasing). In areas such as human resources, economic impact can be measured in quality and efficiencies (such as recruiting better candidates in less time leveraging social networks). In customer service, it could spending less on call centers because customer advocates are helping others before they ever have a chance to pick up the phone. Simply put, economic impact is money the organization saves or makes integrating social initiatives into the business.

Construct A Measurement Framework

Measuring social business success begins with constructing a measurement framework, which maps to your objectives to the appropriate strategy. A measurement framework aligns KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators) with criteria to measure against. For example, if your KPI is “visibility,” your framework should be structured around relevant, measurable metrics, such as page rank in search engines or designated networks. “Acquisition” could also be another KPI, which can be measured by fans and followers. A desired outcome can be ownership of a conversation or subject matter. In this case measuring against a KPI such as “authority” could include metrics like shares, media mentions, links, likes, embeds, traffic, and comments. Some of these metrics can be aggregated into things such as “share of voice” or the approximation of how relevant you may be to conversations. A measurement framework based on applicable KPI’s can be applied to different facets of social business — for example separate ones can be developed for customer service, marketing, sales, R&D, etc. There are metrics which can be shared across all of these functions, but a framework should go deep in identifying what needs to be measured and where (what social properties). The framework also should be flexible enough to change as new data is introduced.

Analyze For Meaning

The less frequently discussed aspect of social measurement is effort, or the time it takes to derive meaning from numbers, data and fluctuations in metrics. A “measurement dashboard” satisfies the need for program architects to view all types of information at a glance, but while it offers up valuable information on that “what,” a dashboard seldom tells us “why.” Human intervention is needed to determine why there might be an increase in re-tweets around one form of communication vs. another. Dashboards can tell us what times of the day users may be more and less active, but the insights we derive from them requires processing that transcends the display of information

Measure What Matters

Measurement initiatives must begin with serious consideration of the desired outcomes. On the behavioral front, raising awareness on an issue or a successful adoption rate of a platform can be sought after outcomes. Advocacy can be another powerful outcome for any organization. On the economic impact front the outcomes should be focused on determining if money was actually made or saved. The metrics you then choose to analyze and report against align against these outcomes from the beginning. Tracking irrelevant metrics is like playing a game with numbers instead of meeting your business objectives. Start your measurement initiatives with your goals, objectives and outcomes and work your way backwards toward what should be measured. Take a holistic approach and avoid the temptation to focus solely on metrics that demonstrate only short-term gain. Be prepared to update your approach and framework as your social business objectives evolve. And, most importantly, get ready for life after likes —because it’s coming soon to a business near you.

 

The Social Media ProBook

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Human Business Is Social Business

David Armano - Edelman Digital from Seismonaut on Vimeo.

Last week I had the honor of performing the opening Keynote at Community Conference 2011 hosted in Copenhagen Denmark. A delightful, high quality event with attendees coming from all parts of Scandinavia and Europe, it also featured talks from Dell's Bill Johnston and Good Magazine's Max Schorr. The full video from my talk (above) captured the theme I went with for the event. I made the case that changes in business, technology, society and media can only be met by a business which is able to embrace and scale it's "human side". And humans are social creatures, so by that logic a human business is naturally a social business. Here are a few visual highlights:

And this strikes at the heart of the matter. With all of this change, many businesses are slow to adapt or face significant challenges in the pursuit of tapping opportunities presented by the upheaval. But there is also disruption—as Wikileaks demonstrates it's becoming increasingly difficult to control the flow of information. For many organizations, there is nowhere to hide. Shortly after outlining the challenges, I offered up a brief definition of social business planning—what we consider to be the critical step in beginning to address these challenges. In short, it is this:

Make sense? Social business means doing business in a more connected, participatory and socially responsible fashion. If done correctly, it benefits multiple stakeholders: your customers, employees, advocates, partners, etc. But the bigger the business, the less human and less social in nature it is—so in short we all have a long way to go, but all signs point to connecting vs. disconnecting as the way business will be done in the not so distant future.

Serious Play: The Business of Social Currency

Originally featured on Harvard Business Review

I've just spent my first week on the social network/game called Empire Avenue, a new kind of site. If Twitter encourages us to tell the world what we are doing, and Foursquare tempts us to tell the world where we are doing it, then Empire Avenue asks us to determine what we think our friends and brands we like are worth. The network is partially a fantasy stock market which allows you to "buy and sell" profiles, whether they are profiles of friends or companies. It uses it's own currency system called "eaves."

Empire Avenue highlights a pervasive trend that will likely influence the business world in the long term. Like many other platforms, including popular networks such as Facebook, Empire Avenue caters to human psychological factors and uses game techniques to reward participation and encourage a participant to willingly "give up" what is truly valuable in business--data. So why would someone want to give up data? Facebook knows the answer to this question: social currency.

Social currency is shared information that encourages further social encounters. It's not a new concept, but the social web increases its prevalence. In the web-based collaboration software platform called Rypple, a simple act of thanking someone on a team and using a badge as a way to show your gratitude is a form of social currency. A platform called Badgeville promises to add virtual rewards to your digital media property through leaderboards and virtual "badges" that act as reinforcements to reward certain behaviors and encourage others. As someone who has taken a deep dive in several social networks (I joined Twitter in 2007) and observes both the gaming and currency aspects of them, I do believe these dynamics will influence the business world as it becomes more connected. In this "social reward" economy, here are a few things you may want to consider as you manage teams and work to build the brand(s) of your organization.

Competition. Not everyone enjoys competition, but competitive environments often generate more participation, and friendly competition can lead to positive results. In the case of internal collaboration, for example, having teams "compete" can motivate them to perform better. I was once invited by Procter & Gamble to "compete" in a fundraiser using our social networks to sell T-shirts for a cause. A real time "leaderboard" let every team know what their status was. It generated a friendly sense of competition and motivated the teams to turn up the heat.

Play. Features that encourage participants to play are often effective ways to increase participation and engagement. When Twitter acquired the popular Tweetie application, it included a "slot machine" in the user interface to help communicate the pending acquisition. It made a fun feature in the app even more enjoyable.

Rewards. A system that keeps count of your accomplishments typically acts as the primary reward for an individual who chooses to continue to participate. Businesses have made a science out of loyalty programs already; in the emerging connected economy, points may be more subjective. An online platform called Klout acts as a new type of loyalty program by partnering with brands and offering deals to members who have relatively high scores.

Status. If you're of a certain age, you might recall walking up to an arcade game and seeing the top users display ranked by the score of their game with their initials. Excellent players whose initials dominated the screen gained a certain--at least at that particular game in that particular arcade. A relatively new platform called Socmetrics (disclosure: an Edelman partner) dives deep into topics and scores individuals or companies against those topics indicating a status tied to influence in a specific topic or category. For businesses, this can be valuable in knowing who's who in regards to the topics you care about.

These examples represent just a small sample of the ways business is being gamefied. It's worth noting that there is a downside to all of this--as with any game, opportunities exist to cheat it or rig it. However, your customers, employees, and even business partners are likely spending scores of hours on their social network of choice trading in some type of social currency, even if they don't know it. Technology doesn't replace human behavior as much as it can amplify it, and this is one trend that more of us will likely feel the impact over time.

Learning To Fly: The Four Stages of Social Business

Time to talk about social business planning again. My mother always told me, you have to "walk before you run" and as it turns out, the same is true for organizations looking to move from social media as a set of un-connected, chaotic collection of skunk work initiatives to a coordinated and purposeful initiative that works through the entire organization. Of course, this will take time—years most likely. But it's inevitable in my estimation. As I've said before—the end game is integration. The above chart is generic—it can be applied to some organizations (especially large ones with a global footprint). If your company wants to learn to fly and integrate a social "layer" into everything you do here are a few thoughts as you plot your own roadmap:

Crawling: People, Process, Procedure
In the initial stage of the evolving your business into one that not only leverages "social media" in one function (such as marketing), an organization must come to the point where it realizes it "has a problem". Then the first stage can begin on the right footing. "Crawling" involves putting in the right infrastructure which includes some organizational re-design. This is when the center of excellence should be formed and where education, standardization and active listening is put in place.

Walking: Managing Your Properties
With some basic infrastructure in place, an organization must now "take stock" of all the social properties which either exist or need to and devise the appropriate strategy to get these properties moving in the right direction. In this stage assets like content are especially important as it's lower risk than really diving in deeply and over-engaging. However, this is also the stage where an organization really defines its engagement strategy across multiple business functions, from employee to customer care to outward marketing and more.

Running: Ecosystem Engagement At Scale
At this stage, an organization has put in the internal and external designs in place and are running multiple social initiatives at a global scale with an established degree of efficiency. Most importantly an organization has evolved into one that can engage with multiple stakeholders to the level that works for its business (regulated industries will have unique challenges here). At the running stage, multiple ecosystems are also connected—for example the process and tools for managing scores of social networks have been formalized.

Flying: Social Innovation & Organizational Integration
Organizations at this stage have not only integrated "social" ito most everything they do—they are using the intelligence to improve their business, create new products and services and can digest data in ways that predict potential future outcomes. Organizations which "fly" have embedded a social mindset into much of what they do and have re-tooled entire business functions. For example, an organization which has completely overhauled its customer service function to work as effectively as it does in channels such as a call center (at scale) are at the flying stage in some degree.

From my experience talking and working with large global brands—very few are even close to flying but most seem to have a desire to get there at some point, understanding that the process will be a long and winding road. I've found this model resonates both at the CMO, CEO and senior management levels. Where do you fall on the spectrum?

The ROI of Your Mother

From Chris Brogan's blog

"Gary was talking about a person in the board room who was hounding him, “What’s the ROI of social media? What’s the ROI? What’s the ROI?” Gary’s answer, when he’d finally had enough? “What’s the ROI of your mother?”

Cue the laughter and give Gary Vaynerchuck a high five. Saying something like "what's the ROI of your mother?" is bold, human and funny. Several years ago I watched as Ford's Scott Monty delivered a talk in Paris and he also asked "what's the ROI of putting your pants on in the morning?". Also a great way to work a crowd and get you thinking. But keynotes and meetings in boardrooms with executives are two different things. I bet Scott digs into things like metrics a bit deeper as he plans multiple marketing campaigns which integrate social strategy and implementation. So to be clear, Gary is great, Scott is great—now let's talk metrics, behaviors and financials. In fact, let's get specific on an example for illustration. Many of you who know me, may remember that we raised nearly 17k for a family in need (12k in less than 24 hours) a few years ago. We used nothing but social networks to do this. Let's break this case down to see if the above model holds:

Metrics: Things you can measure
There were so many metrics that I was able to look at during that initiative and they meant different things. Here were a few that I noticed:

-Re-tweets: The number of re-tweets from my Twitter updates was something I kept track of for a while. It Was one of the main indicators that the messages I was sending out was indeed getting amplification.

-Page views/traffic: Traffic to my blog was over 10x normal traffic. This gave me an indicator that the message was not only being amplified but that it was driving traffic the the right destination at a rapid rate.

-Clicks, Diggs, Referrals: Back in 2009, Digg was still kind of a big deal in terms of routing traffic to a destination. Today, shares, likes, and any type of measurement which tracks sharing across networks mean your content is being routed.

-Google Page Rank: The word "Daniela" ended up being the 8th most popular result out of 42 million. In this case, not hugely relevant. However, to go back to Scott Monty for example, I'm confident his teams are tracking Google page ranks of words such as "Focus" and what they can do to improve Ford's ranking.

Behaviors: Targeted actions and desirable outcomes
There are lots of actions which lead to micro metrics, for example influencing the behavior to share a link or click on something. These are hard metrics. Then There are soft metrics. During our experience with the Daniela effort—I was caught off guard at the fact that it drew criticism. This was due to fact that it got amplified so quickly and drew so much attention. There were certain things that I did intentionally to help influence a certain behavior; Advocacy. As some of the criticism was documented, a small percentage of "nodes" in the network became activated and advocated on our behalf. Advocacy was the desired behavior. The desired outcome included things like Twitter being pressured to shut down an account which was impersonating me. That was a favorable outcome. Behaviors lead to outcomes—don't forget that.

Financials: Cost savings or earnings
Typepad costs me under two hundred dollars a year. Twitter costs nothing. However I spent hundreds of hours of my personal time in putting effort into informing the stakeholders of this initiative, blogging, setting up the payment infrastructure etc. In addition to that, there was the thousands of hours spent actually building up the network. But, ultimately there was a number reached which we could point to: $16, 880.60 to be exact. There was also a percentage we could point to—we had exceeded a targeted goal by 337%.

The bottom line: Business likes tangible results
There were a lot of intangible results I could go which relate to this example. It was the catalyst for many interactions which have benefitted others as well as myself. All soft "ROI" indicators but valid nevertheless. This side of the equation speaks to the "what's the ROI of your mother" part. Or you could just say we did the right thing, and it paid off for all parties. However, for most CEOs, CMO's and business execs—doing the right thing isn't often enough. And it's why we need to measure and analyze and report. The ROI of my mother is common sense—I would not be here today without her. I just don't expect the CMO of a global organization value that as much as I do. We're in the "doing" stage now of all of this and like it or not—we need to move business conversations beyond putting our pants on and invoking our moms.

Moving From Social Media Tactics To Your Social Business Plan

Over a year ago, I put a presentation out in public titled "Social Media Is Dead. Long Live Common Sense". Admittedly, it was a little ahead of it's time. Most companies back then were not ready to think about social media outside of anything that looked like viral marketing at most and at the least, a place to monitor conversations. Today is different—many organizations find themselves in either the "crawling" or "walking" phase of social business integration and desire to rapidly move toward running and flying even if they are nowhere close to it.

In short, organizations are beginning to realize that "social" needs to be integrated into how they do business and because of it's disruptive nature and the fact that "social" refuses to be silo-ed in a single department. The future of all things "social" is integration—this is inevitable. But in the present, the here and now—many companies are struggling to scale their social experimentation into something that they can point to as a success. This piece is meant to illustrate the way to do this which takes into account the three parallel paths needed to work in tandem to accomplish this:

Social Business Planning & Integration
For organizations who have set up a steering committee and a center of excellence, a social business plan which is coordinated from the center, charts the roadmap for the organization across multiple brands and/or business functions. Social business planning is the holistic view and sets the agenda, outlines what infrastructure is needed and shares knowledge and best practices across the company. Without a social business plan in place which manifests itself as a roadmap—efforts end up as one off or ad hoc initiatives without orchestration.

Social Business Strategy
Strategic initiatives are formed at the brand or business function and are channel related but also somewhat channel agnostic. For example, a brand may look at how it approaches content or customer service or engagement with customers and determine what strategy they should pursue to evolve these functions into something that aligns with the way customers or other stakeholders expect to interact with the brand. Instead of a "Twitter strategy", or "Facebook strategy" for example, brands must look at strategies against things like crisis, communications, marketing, customer service, product development, and form strategies for how they make these activities more connected.

Pilots
Once an organization determines what strategies it should pursue against a business function which can integrate social into it, manageable pilots should should be identified to pursue to the point of implementation. Pilots generate data and insights which then need to be analyzed and fed back into the social business plan and roadmap. This is where the system becomes a giant feedback loop for the organization—instead of being a top down approach, initiating a comprehensive plan puts a foundation in place and pilots serve as small validation or invalidation points which help inform the broader direction. A pilot can be a promotion, blog, a Facebook page, Twitter account, social intranet or the types of interactions, content and community management applied to them. What's critical is that they are doable and result in a tangible "thing" where outcomes can be measured.

Most organizations who were the pioneers tapping social media for business launched pilots as the first salvos before engaging in broader initiatives (think Dell's Idea Storm or GM's Fast Lane blog). Today, pilot programs must feed back into a broader social business plan and the organizations who become the first to integrate or "fly" as a social business will manage efforts in these streams simultaneously. What's your social business plan? Do you have one?

Seven Indicators of Twitter Influence

Originally posted at Social Fresh

The NY Times recently reported what regular users of Twitter already know. Follower counts are an indicator of influence but not a very good one. And yes, followers can be and are gamed frequently with the assistance of shady web services. Here are a few more critical Twitter influence indicators:

1. Lists
Being included on lists gives us two clues. One: Being included on thousands or more signals that you are visible. Two: The categories people use to classify you tells you something about the topics you have influence in: This is known as “topical influence” and it’s really what counts in influence.

2. Retweets
These tell you something about how willing people are to amplify your messages and help them spread. A retweet essentially says “this is something I want my network to see”. It’s Twitter’s version of viral loops.

3. @Replies
These signal how much others want to talk to you or intentionally tag you, and also serves as an indicator for how willing you are to engage and tag others. Less replies signals less social interactions and more broadcast.

4. Follower Ratio
Generally, if a user on Twitter follows a disproportionate amount of users than follow them, it signals their desire to accumulate followers. Not always, but often. A 50/50 ratio translates to someone following back anyone who follows them, which includes spammers. Twitter users who follow significantly less than are followed indicate some selection process.

5. Tweet volume
This simply indicates how prolific a user is. Those with high volumes who retain high levels of engagement, list counts, retweets, and a healthy ratio are likely providing some type of value. High volume Twitter accounts with suspect ratios, low engagement, etc may have a high noise to signal ratio

6. Favorites
Getting favorited frequently does mean something, though because Twitter users leverage Favorites so differently, it’s nearly impossible to discern exactly what, other than you triggered a behavior (the action to Favorite) for some reason.

7. Quality of connections
The most difficult to quantify and probably THE most important indicator is the quality and RELEVANCE of who follows you on Twitter and who you follow back. Targeting the right audience and earning their attention (and Trust) is ultimately the best (and softest metric). Follower counts (and ratios) are an indicator, but only one of several and one of the easiest to game.

The Proposition of Automation

I don't follow everyone back on Twitter. This is an intentional act. I don't follow everyone back because there are too many spammers to deal with and frankly, If I do follow you back, it's a very intentional act—I follow you for a reason. Tomorrow, somebody can send me an e-mail and say—"we've solved your problem by inventing a service which only follows back real people, no spammers".

That would be useful.

But I still wouldn't use the service. Because it's my opinion that being selective about who I follow makes it more valuable to the people I do follow, and that means something. And as an added benefit, while it's still unrealistic to follow back thousands of people watching their every move, it's not unrealistic to jump into the general stream now and then and spark up a conversation with the people I chose to follow.

I followed someone recently who I met in person. In response, I got a generic direct message back—the same one that gets sent to no doubt hundreds and thousands of other followers. I got a chance to talk to the individual after getting the automated message and asked him why he does it. He explained that he used to thank people for a follow manually and as he gets hundreds of followers back, this became unsustainable. So he decided to scale. And the result was an automated message.

To be fair, he says that this generates many follow up conversations which he engages in. Maybe he's on to something. But for me, I felt like a number. I expect automated messages from the electric and gas company, but not someone I've met in the flesh.

The choice to automate is ours to make. Perhaps, it's better for efficiency and makes scaling a human being possible. Perhaps, a single human being seems less human when they scale this way. I haven't scaled well. I don't respond to every e-mail, or direct message. I don't reply to every tweet. My human limitations are extremely visible. But somehow, I think the imperfection is understood. The deal is this: If I provide enough value, you will accept my inability to scale and respect the choice to take a pass on automation. In other words, automation is a choice—and with it, we gain something, and we lose something else.