We need to be loved and reaffirmed

Social media, reflected Scott Leonard, the ex-360 brand director from Ogilvie and Mather, are the counters to the ‘unsocial media’ that interrupted our lives for half of the 20th century. Look at a film on any commercial channel and agree how desperately irritating advertising breaks really are.

The need to be loved has been served by social networks – Facebook feeds our need to connect, Twitter our need to show off to our friends and share news, Google+ our need to know, and LinkedIn who we are and what we’ve done and achieved. In a world without boundaries, social media provide the online social clubs a younger generation needs and do so with brilliance. Most comforting of all, there is a gather-round-that-campfire feel about them, which in a comforting way takes us back to the oral storytelling days of Beowulf. As Ed McCabe, legendary adman, said: ‘There’s nothing new under the sun, just a better way.’

The innovation of social media is a better way.

The social media landscape

Frank Joshi, founder of MVine and Knowledge Peers, observed that consumers were always three to five years ahead of corporates. So what is happening today on social media is an indicator of the marketing future.

• Facebook With a claimed 800 million users, Facebook is huge, but try selling in an old-fashioned way on Facebook and you may get killed. As a way of starting a conversation about your product or brand it may be useful. Just be aware you are on your own and then the global public takes over. Market on Facebook and you may lose control. But chances are nearly everyone you know is going to be there.
• Google+ Traffic to Google+ spiked 1,200 per cent in the first few days following its public launch in September 2011, but then plummeted by 60 per cent, according to a report from a data analytics company, Chitika. Google+ hit 25 million unique visitors in its first month of operation, making it one of the fastest-growing social networks of all time. But the most recent unofficial count pegged the number of Google+ users at 43 million. Google+ may not be convincing new users to stick around … time will tell. It has a more magazine feel to it – comments are longer and more thoughtful than newsy Twitter. Search is unsurprisingly good. Photos and videos are very good.
• Twitter With 100 million users Twitter is not much used by the very young but is the medium of choice for opinion-formers, businesses and celebrities. Its 140-character limit makes it easy to work and assimilate. It is the place to get the news first. David Cameron uses it (whilst Barack Obama has just embraced Four Square). The best advice I had on Twitter was from singer-songwriter Emily Baker, who described a late-night conversation about musical preferences with a group of knowledgeable insomniacs that led to a DJ playing her music. She said, ‘I could have asked him – that would have been too crass – but we were having an interesting conversation and it happened.’ Lesson: be interesting and things happen. Twitter has news of global brands (http://twitter.com/#!/scoblemedia/world-news-brands) – that’s useful.
• LinkedIn This is the world’s biggest business network with 100 million members. Kevin Eyres, its European MD, describes it as ‘one of the most exciting companies in the world’ to new employees, which sounds terrific and inspiring. It’s necessary to be on LinkedIn if you are serious about keeping in touch with old colleagues and it has useful groups you can link into and news on marketing issues.

Things are moving very fast

In the UK in 2010 Google was the second most influential brand, Facebook the fifth, Microsoft sixth and Twitter the tenth so the story is one of mighty, powerful brands fighting and scrambling for control.

When people like me start to take an interest in social media, maybe it’s time to move on. And move on is what a lot of people are doing. Growth has slowed in the past 12 months and in the USA all but stopped amongst 16–24-year-olds. Amongst the under-30s university-educated the decline is pronounced and this is a new trend. Activities that are all showing double-digit decline are messaging to friends, sending presents, joining groups and searching for new contacts (Source: GlobalWebIndex).

The word from many is that leaving Facebook, which has absorbed so much of their life and time with people who are not really friends but casual hangers-on, is incredibly liberating. But this brand is still phenomenal, even if it is showing signs of flat-lining into maturity with people spending time on what they want and experimenting with less zeal. The generational differences are interesting and Daryll Scott, creative director of Noggin, is very clear of the dangers commentators like us face:

‘For us who are a little older, we can engage in this medium but it’s not natural or effortless, it costs us energy so we don’t do it with the adequate level of frequency and immediacy – so as activity swells, we are not “on it” enough to capitalise on it so the fuse splutters out. We are Eddie the Eagle, we are getting in the game with boundless enthusiasm but we don’t stand a chance.’

What are social media and why should you use them?

I am indebted to Emily Conradi for what follows, which is an idiot’s guide to social media and as such very useful.

‘It ain’t what you do, it’s the way that you do it …’

And the old Sy Oliver and ‘Trummy’ Young calypso then goes on ‘and that’s what brings results …’

The good news is that using social media is mostly to do with common sense, a touch of human sensitivity, persistence and the way that you do it. Yet most brands use Twitter accounts as business updates. There’s no conversation, no attempt at relationship-building. It’s just another post–traditional-one-way style of thinking.

Brands have to be careful on social media. Don’t broadcast, don’t hector, but do be quietly conversational. Logos come last, niceties come first. People matter more than brands in conversation. Some businesses often forget why they’re even online. Often it’s because their competitors are or because they’ve been told that anyone without a social-media strategy is doing the marketing equivalent of wearing drainpipe trousers. If there is no clear link to your business aims then it’s a waste of time and money. As so often in life, this is more about how you do things rather than what you do. And there’s one other thing that is very human about social media. They’re spontaneous. They’re fast and they’re now. They shouldn’t be overly crafted.

Revolution and authority

What happened in Tahrir Square in Cairo, in Tripoli, in Edmonton and in Liberty Square NYC was helped, given momentum and shaped by social media.

This communist joke is an example of how the red ink of instant communication has changed our societies and the potential of our world:

‘A guy was sent from East Germany to work in Siberia. He knew his mail would be read by censors. So he told his friends: “Let’s establish a code. If the letter you get from me is written in blue ink it is true what I said. If it is written in red ink, it is false.” After a month his friends get a first letter. Everything is in blue. It says, this letter: “Everything is wonderful here. Stores are full of good food. Movie theatres show good films from the West. Apartments are large and luxurious. The only thing you cannot buy is red ink.”’

Have you got a spare hour a day?

The hollow laugh says everything … of course you haven’t. But you can’t embark on a social media programme without being engaged.

As a small business these sites represent your best, virtually free way of building awareness of the sort of business you are, the sort of person you are and interesting things you’ve discovered. They allow you to have casual conversations with the sort of people you really want to meet. It is not a medium for elevator pitches; it is a medium for showing you are a person worth listening to.

But the sites are only virtually free. Because they will take your time. To be on the map with the new market of consumers you have little choice but to be involved. And chances are you’ll begin to find you enjoy it. Just don’t suppose nothing else matters now. It’s a medium, not the message in its own right.

Key points to consider

1. Linking up these tools as part of a larger strategy. Most of these platforms have widgets that make it easy to set up linking across various platforms – i.e. when you submit a new blog post it can automatically be fed to your Twitter/Facebook newsfeeds. Make sure you link everything to/from your web site and keep brand identity the same. You can also use various services to stay on top of what is published by the people/organisations you are interested in following, e.g. through the use of RSS feeds.
2. Stay focused. There are a lot of interesting tools and 1001 ways to deliver information. Always try to bear in mind whom you are trying to target and what you hope to achieve.
3. Engagement. There is no real value in using any of these tools if you don’t have the time to properly engage with them. Social networking needs to be two-way. If you just want to put up information and that’s it – that is what a web site is for. You need to engage with users or you won’t get anything out of it (imagine it like a conversation). For further tips on this go to: http://www.techipedia.com/2011/social-media-dating/
4. How will you assess value? You may want to consider what ROI you will use to track the success of various social media initiatives.
5. Identity management. Who are you? The person behind the company often makes it a more personalised and less formal interaction, but you need to be mindful of the other information on your profile and whether you want this shared or to represent your brand (e.g. the photos you already have on Flickr).
6. Lurking. You can set up profiles to most of these tools and don’t have to actually use them until you are ready. It’s a good way to gain familiarity, understand the options and see what others are doing with the tools before you come up with your final social-networking strategy.