Imagine for a moment Bizarro Social Media land. If the folks who dreamt up Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. had taken that alluring left turn instead of going straight on with their vision and concocted (or Cogcocted) something entirely different than the fertile playgrounds, erm – rather platforms, we’ve got today.
Under these horribly delicious and highly inconceivable conditions we might have ended up with sites like…
Finally, the ability to be two places at once! For a while, Hootsuite users have loved the ability to schedule tweets and now the new Tweetdeck is taking it one step further by including scheduled tweets and Foursquare check-ins. Correct me if I’m wrong, but how can we check-in via Foursquare if we’re not physically there? How do we engage conversation without being around to respond? Tweetdeck has given us the opportunity to have a social media clone ensuring our presence is still in our community without physically doing the work.
Last week during the #u30pro chat, hosted by Lauren Fernandez, David Spinks, and Scott Hale, the group discussed pros/cons to scheduled tweets and many users chimed in. Here are some reasons members dislike the feature: Continue reading
To maintain our social media accounts, and help our clients do the same, it seems that we, myself included, have become advocates of repurposing content. Taking a press releases and extracting an e-blast from it. Sending post-event photos to print media and uploading them to Facebook. Putting links to YouTube in our press releases and putting the videos on our website.
Sure, it all makes sense. Social media takes time and time is money. So why not stretch your content when and where you can? It ensures continuity of messaging, keeps all of your communication platforms looking fresh and increases touchpoints with your target audience. But at what point does repurposing become synonymous with diluting? Can you post a new spin <gosh I hate that word> on the same news too many times? Continue reading
Today’s coffee talk is with Chris Barger, director of global social media for General Motors. In March I had the opportunity to listen to Chris’s keynote speech at the 2010 Media Relations Best Practices Summit hosted by PRSA and Ragan’s PR Daily, and immediately knew he would be a great guest. In my opinion, because he was so candid and honest in how he presented that I still remember the information he shared today. He’s also quite funny which kept the attendees paying attention ;).
Like your typical PR professional he’s a fan of caffeine and is very specific with how he needs it. If you’re going to ask him to coffee remember to get him one of the following: Tim Horton’ english coffee cappuccino, Dunkin Donuts coconut coffee light and sweet, and Coffee Beanery’s crème brulee. So sit tight because this is a long one but I promise the golden nuggets of information make it completely worth the procrastination at work ;).
As director of global social media for General Motors’s, I’m going to assume you receive resistance but would you say it’s changed?
The resistance today is definitely different than it used to be before the crash last summer. Continue reading
By now most major brands have realized that they need to get involved in social media, even if it’s only in a small way. A year ago, only a handful of companies were willing to put their reputation on the line and experiment with establishing a social media presence. One of these leaders was Starbucks, one of America’s favorite coffee chains.
As early as 2006, Starbucks was developing ways for consumers to interact directly with its brand online and extending the experience beyond its thousands of retail locations. In this astoundingly early year, the company signed up for its first official Twitter account, which now boasts more than 887,000 followers. In an effort to take its social media activities even further, in 2008 it developed My Starbucks Idea, which ReadWriteWeb described as “a socially driven marketplace for Starbucks-related ideas that will help the company reinvent itself”. On MSI, which also has its own Twitter account, consumers can literally share their ideas for improvement with the company, giving them a virtually unprecedented say in the direction of the brand. Continue reading
One concern I continue to hear from folks across the board: How do I manage my social media time and resources?
“I’m already strapped for time. How do I fit this in?”
“How do I manage my accounts over the evening hours and on the weekends?”
“My senior management staff doesn’t have time for this stuff. But, they want us to be involved.”
Time management is a potential huge barrier for organizations looking to dive into social media and digital PR. In fact, with so many companies now adopting the tools, I tend to think it might be one of the top concerns right now. Continue reading
I had a conversation last week with some really bright folks who run a social media agency in New York that works with several Fortune 500 brands. We got to discussing crisis communications within a real-time setting, and how they could effectively use social media to almost instantly respond to a crisis and mitigate its effects.
Throughout the conversation, we kept coming back to the point that in order to properly handle any type of crisis in real time, no matter what the brand or situation, you need a proper plan in place well before the crisis even hits. Because no matter what type of media you are using to monitor and respond, you always need a plan in place that details exactly how, who and why you will respond and the type of response you will give to different audiences to ensure their concerns are addressed appropriately. Continue reading
Over the past year social media has taken up valuable real estate in the toolboxes of many a PR pro. However, many pros still face hurdles selling the utility of social media to their company or clients. Managers and clients want to know why it’s worth paying an employee to Tweet away all day. For the most part, there is a struggle to pull relevant numbers that reflect the value of social media.
There are many metrics that can be tracked to show success, but the total number of fans and followers is not one of them. The main reason is that any bot can attain large numbers of followers for a small amount of money. These followers are often other bots, not potential customers. Then what should you track? Continue reading
While most companies seeking to target the government market have established specific federal sector websites, more companies are enhancing their social media presence and developing additional digital assets such as interactive widgets, quizzes, and videos to effectively reach government decision makers. Firewalls and IT policies, however, may not allow the government audience to see your latest tools to promote your services, products or events. It’s a frustrating scenario for companies looking to engage with federal audiences.
Fortunately for federal sector marketers, the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) has made it simpler to understand what federal agencies can utilize to reach constituents online and therefore what government agencies should be able to see when it comes to online content. Continue reading
Recently I fell into a discussion about specific social media metrics (isn’t that so not like me?) and the concept of sentiment analysis was brought up. There have already been many discussions about the usefulness (or lack thereof) of automated sentiment analysis tools, and I won’t bore you with yet another discussion of whether automated sentiment is worth your while.
What I think is a more valid question: is the sentiment or the message more important to social media measurement? Continue reading