Wind down your Wednesday, and wind up your Word of Mouth Marketing knowledge!

Join your fellow big-brand leaders across West Michigan as we welcome – for the first time in Grand Rapids – Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) Executive Director Kristen Smith.

Kristen will talk about how word of mouth programs are influencing today’s communications strategies and highlight WOMMA’s recommendations and education programs in response to the Federal Trade Commission’s new guidelines for word of mouth marketing.

Timely topics, and a good time!  And, the event is entirely free, thanks to local sponsors Steketee & Greiner and Co. and Amway.

Space is limited, so register today!

Where: Bistro Bella Vita
When: Wed. March 24, 5-7 pm

RSVP: Sue_Vanderlaan@amway.com

Global Brand – We are trying to understand how we can leverage your platform to create a consistent brand experience for our customers. How can we do this?

FB – Well we have a lot of great ideas cooking around unique brand experiences and here is an agency that we are working with who can help you create one.

Global Brand – Okay.. Agency, we’re not so much interested in creative however we are interested in designing a system that enables us to easily publish content across a myriad of markets in multiple languages. Have you done this before?

Agency – Well, we have a content publishing tool that we designed that enables us to “work around” the FB system design however we have never done this for more than 8 markets or have any language translation capabilities…

Me – FB / Agency, can you elaborate on your long range tech plans for addressing the issues around multiple countries and multiple languages?

Agency – We design future functionality around what our customers ask for (my interpretation – we don’t have any plans to develop a translation engine until we have a customer that wants one)…

FB – Our goal is to create a compelling user experience for the end user and we have developed an advertising model that enables you to “micro-target” consumers. The architecture and design work is being left up to our agencies…

Agency – Yes, this is where we come in…

Global Brand – Agency, do you have experience integrated your platform with our social media platforms (i.e. Orkut, Bebo…) or across YouTube and Twitter…

Agency – Yes we have worked with Twitter and can integrate this into the content publishing tool. No to the rest….

As I’m sure we can all agree, Facebook is an extremely compelling playground for brands. With over 300MM users spanning the globe it’s clear that it is not only the dominant player in the space but that it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

This area is truly still a “white canvas” for Brands willing to take a risk and do something unique. With that being said, there are only a handful of agencies out there that have experience with it. When looking to evaluate an agency to launch your Facebook social strategy, make sure to consider the following questions.

1. How many brands have you launched FB initiatives with?

2. Do you currently have IP in the space? If so, what makes your IP (and solution) unqiue and compelling?

3. What experience do you have working across multiple Geos and multiple languages?

4. Do you have a content generation platform? If YES

5. Does your platform manage multiple permissions from multiple administrators?

6. Can it flag in-appropriate content?

7. What experience does your team have with cross integration of other US based and overseas based platforms?

8. Can you show me a functioning application that is more than a “hot link” to an outside URL?

9. Can you provide reporting and trends analysis beyond fan, friend, and links growth? How should my growth compare to other companies/competitors in my industry? What are the benchmarks?

10. Do you have a direct relationship with the social media platform? How is your development team structured?

11. After you install my solution, how much additional customization and support will be required for me to activate a campaign?

12. What business model are you working off of? If this is a license deal, what value is your technology providing me?

13. Can I get the same functionality through a free platform or another provider?

14. What makes your solution truly unique?

15. Who are your competitors?

Global Brands, like those before you who have charted new territory, have perseverance and patience.  Vet your agency partners carefully as you embark on creating a consistent brand experience across borders and languages.

Brian

It seems pretty clear the executive mandate of 2009 is “we must get into social marketing”. It doesn’t matter whether you are a Fortune 500 brand or a HVAC distribution company, the people have seen the future and everyone is trying to figure out how to get on. So when is social right? Let’s first take a minute and look at the definitions of social marketing as spelled out on Wikipedia :

Social marketing is the systematic application of marketing along with other concepts and techniques to achieve specific behavioral goals for a …
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_marketing

Use of marketing techniques to improve social well-being by changing attitudes and behavior in regard to a specific product or concept.
www.rho.org/html/glossary.html

Marketing and advertising that reaches potential consumers via social networking website, such as MySpace, Facebook and Bebo. They appear at the edges of users’ profiles and can be targeted based on keywords in their profiles to match their stated interests or recent activities.
www.mediasmart.org.uk/parents-media-glossary.php

A marketing message designed to promote a social concern or political idea as well as a product.
www.glencoe.com/sec/busadmin/marketing/dp/ad_serv/gloss.shtml

What’s important to note is that Social Marketing does not necessarily have to include Facebook, or Twitter by that matter. It’s about how we connect amongst our peers, family, and brands. Sometimes that great tool of Facebook can be a launchpad. But consider this… Would you become a fan of your local pool supply store? Yes that is correct. I recently passed a billboard in front of our local pool store advertising the great opportunity to “fan” the pool store and stay tuned for deals. This I believe is a mistake and an in-appropriate use of a social platform. Sorry Mr. Pool store man if your out there reading this – It was a novel effort.

Social networks really haven’t changed over the years. The advent of the digital version of social networks has though. It has created a great platform to get engaged and have a voice out there. If used properly – it can make a difference. We’ve seen this both in the B-B and B-C space. However a lot of those examples didn’t and do not include “Facebook”… Start thinking outside of the norm. Forums, influential blogs, and other relevant trade and audience specific sites can be fertile ground for getting your message out. Especially if you need to communicate to specific target audiences. Use them properly and don’t “get in” just for the sake of “getting in”…

There’s a lot of value to be had by getting online and going social. However this always needs to be taken in the context of the rest of your marketing mix. Keep it cohesive and remember… You have limited control of your message once it’s out there….

Think, do your homework, and make sure to clearly understand what you want to get out of “getting into social” before you get started.

Brian