The Strategic e-Blog

Whether or not it should be called a revolution, there’s definitely a marketing shift taking place thanks to social media.  As the video below says, social media brings products to consumers and turns on its head one of the primary ways in which we, as consumers, find products.  If your business hasn’t yet setup a social media account, or at least gotten started with a simple Facebook business page, you’re missing a vital connection with your customer base.

Social media will continue to grow.  Of course it may taper off here and there as one service wanes in popularity and another takes over, but the underlying model will be in place for several years (at least until something new comes along to replace it).   What is that underlying model?  It’s something akin to active rather than passive marketing.  While it may seem like putting an ad on TV or on the radio is an active way of reaching out to your customers and prospects, it’s actually pretty passive.   Besides commercials during the Super Bowl, most ads are just perceived as filler, a chance to get up and walk away from the TV during a program.  Toss DVRs and Tivo into the mix, and it’s even harder to reach a TV audience.

When it comes to radio, you’ve got something of a similar phenomenon going on.  As more and more cars get outfitted with direct audio inputs, iPods and other media players will continue to take an audience away from radio and more toward their own selections of music, audio books and podcasts.   If you want to reach these plugged-in listeners, you don’t have a lot of choices that let you piggyback on their audio choices.  Of course you can underwrite a podcast, but that might not give you the kind of reach you want to achieve – nor enough room to deliver the type of marketing message you want to put out there.

Which is where social media steps in.  Unlike radio or TV advertising, which a passive audience can simply ignore, social media lets you engage actively with active participants.

Let’s say you’re in the business of guide books.  You can use social media to search and indentify people that are into guidebooks and then develop a strategy for targeting them.  In Facebook, it could mean a pointed advertisement, while in Twitter, it could mean following some people and building up a relationship.  That’s the difference with social media, it’s not always an instant message that’s delivered – and, ironically, sometimes the active marketing approach takes a bit more time than the passive one.

In the active marketing world of social media, invasive ads don’t always get received well – especially through a service like Twitter.  With social media it’s more important than ever to show some patience in marketing, but also to make sure that you’re using your marketing opportunity to share compelling information with your audience.  It’s a lot like building your social media brand – but it’s even more about building your social media rapport, which means you have to make sure that once you start building your social media persona, you continue to interact with people that respond.  That’s where the real work comes in, and that’s where a disciplined strategy is of the essence – without it, you can end up with a nice-looking Facebook or Twitter page that nobody sees after the initial push.

As I’m writing this sentence, 729,349 people like Gap on Facebook.  That’s a sizeable number of fans for any product, so it’s no surprise to find that Gap turned to their Facebook wall to announce their decision to go back to their original logo.  Here is what Marka Hansen, President of Gap North America, said on Facebook:

Ok. We’ve heard loud and clear that you don’t like the new logo. We’ve learned a lot from the feedback. We only want what’s best for the brand and our customers. So instead of crowd sourcing, we’re bringing back the Blue Box tonight. http://bit.ly/9xvtvJ

The link takes you to the full press release on Gap.com, but even when you read that, it’s clear that Gap is not addressing the press or investors with this press release.  Rather, Gap’s press release is talking directly to the customer – to the online community of Facebook and Twitter – that immediately started to protest, complain and even spoof the logo as soon as the redesign was leaked.

Still, despite the quick, loud (in cyber terms) and direct response Gap received, it was still surprising this afternoon to hear Kai Rysdall mention the Gap’s move on Marketplace and suggest that very few people might even have noticed:

These final notes today. Gap has dumped it’s new logo. In other news, did anybody out there know Gap had a new logo? Apparently, the clothing chain swapped it out for a new one, online, a week ago without telling anybody.

As happens in this Internet age, though, somebody saw it, customers complained, the company caved… You know how it goes. Can’t say as I blame ‘em. That new one was uuuuuuuuugly.

Perhaps Rysdall/Marketplace continues to favor traditional marketing and press releases in order to assess the impact of a marketing or branding campaign.

What we can take away from Gap’s logo gaffe is that connecting with the online community is far more important than even the largest companies in the world seem to recognize.  A decade into this new century we can safely say that marketing isn’t just about the message companies deliver, but also about the interaction of the company – and of the message – with their community.  It’s a funny word to use with a business, but that’s what we have now, isn’t it?  Online communities of followers, fans, friends, people who like, link and retweet?

Ignoring the value of that collective voice, however irrational it might seem at times, can cost a company its own closely guarded image – and also cost a company the chance to connect with their community and allow that community to feel important – to feel like they are part of the product they support with every purchase and with ever click of a Like button on a web page.

Just in case you missed the logo debate, here are the failed, new and the beloved, old logos:

KNOW YOUR LIMITS

Before you can write an effective Tweet, you’ve got to know the basics:  Twitter gives you just 140 characters to get your message across.  That’s characters, not letters, so the limit includes spaces, hashtags (#) and links to your website, your blog, or an online article, etc.  Getting an entire message into that space can be challenging and in this blog we’ll focus on what it takes to write an effective Tweet.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
First of all, know your audience, your material and your goal.  If you want to announce a special deal, make sure that you include enough information in that initial Tweet to let your followers know the value of that deal.  Don’t oversell, and don’t try to make it sound better than it is.  Just stay to the point, be accurate and write in a way that gets your followers to lift their eyebrows and say, hey, what’s this about – and then click on your link.  One of the ways to make sure you’re striking the right note with your audience is to read a lot of Tweets yourself.  Take note of which Tweets get your attention, which Tweets motivate you to click on a link and which Tweets you just ignore.

AVOID ABBREVIATIONS AND THE URGE TO SOUND HIP
While it’s a matter of preference, when writing a Tweet for your business, avoid the use of Twitter speak (stuff like “2b” instead of “to be” or “2gether” rather than “together”),  and don’t try to hard to sound hip, current or cool (such as when politicians try to Tweet in a vernacular).

BE TRUSTWORTHY
Instead compose Tweets that let your readers know that they can trust your opinion and that you’ve given some thought to your words, even if it’s just a quick Tweet about a new product you’ll release in a month or two.

LEARN ABOUT HASHTAGS AND USE THEM
The use of hashtags (#) , while necessary, can also be kind of messy.  If you’re posting directly from Twitter to Facebook, the hash tags will look terrible and interfere with the message, which is why it’s often the better choice to take that extra step and write a second post for Facebook.  When you do use hashtags, do not overwhelm the message with them and make sure that you still leave enough room so that if someone retweets your message there is  room for your Twitter name.  Part of having that room means that you get in the habit of writing sentences that avoid unnecessary lengthy words and protracted phrases.  Be pithy.  You should also get to know which hash tags are common for your business or industry, including their abbreviated forms.

WHAT TO TWEET ABOUT
What sort of stuff you Tweet about is up to you, but keep in mind that Twitter can be a great way for you to participate in a conversation about a topic that affects your business.  If you find a great article online, you can introduce it by asking your followers what they think or you can offer your own view on that article, just don’t forget to include the link.  While it’s nice to tweet about non-business related things sometimes, don’t get caught up in the ease of tweeting.  Before you’re about to post your tweet, take a moment to ask yourself if it’s relevant or compelling.  If it’s not, you may want to revise it and start over.  Twitter is your opportunity to convey who you are and to build up your brand image with potential customers, clients and peers, use Twitter to give them a sense of who you are, what you do, and how you do it.

Let’s sum it up:

• Don’t use all 140 characters for your tweet, leave room for your name to be included in a retweet.
• Be honest, useful and trustworthy.
• Use short, direct active verbs.
• Get to know the hash tags for your industry and use them wisely for Twitter but avoid them in Facebook.
• Read more tweets and take note of what grabs you.
• Be pithy.

For information about marketing through Twitter, check out the articles on our eApproach page.