goodness in sharing…

(This post sneaks out from behind my agency’s blogwall)

The latest article from Adweek Magazine, Is Social Media Killing the Campaign Microsite?, questions the death of the Campaign Microsite. Adweek likens this to the death of the 30-sec spot discussion from several years (or wait, months ago?), but instead of media fragmentation killing the :30, its social media killing the microsite.

Now, lets step aside the B.S.O.S hysteria (bright and shinny object syndrome, see slide #10) for just a second and get into the guts of the article. This is still about media fragmentation and consumers wanting control…just in the online space. Consumer go and find and use content, including brand content, how they want. So trying to create a site and just drive them there…may not be the answer. As Carol Kruse, vp of global interactive marketing at Coca-Cola points out in the article “fish where the fish are” - if you consumers are into social media, get there…which means, widgets, Facebook, etc. So this isn’t about killing the microsite, but understanding the functionality of content for consumers. We need to focus on creating brand that consumers can use increasing the functionality and experiencability, less about driving consumers (people) to a place.

And it’s not just the Adweek article that is discussing this idea. From the latest ad:tech conference the panel ‘Appointment Marketing, Consumers Check In‘ discuss emerging audiences and how to follow them. A couple of interesting points came out of the panel.

First - that consumers are choosing where and when to engage online (media fragmentation), so when need to start understanding what roles of engagement a brand should play.

Second - start thinking about a better understanding of what to deliver to for the consumer will help with both engagement and ROI. Both types of ROI - Return on Investment and Return on Involvement (this gets into a larger discussion on audience back planning…will save that for another day).

Third - maybe, just maybe what media fragmentation has done is forced a new/better/return to a different understanding of advertising and brand/branding; what is the function on the brand idea.

While the Adweek article doesn’t specifically touch on this…it does start to elude to it. That it really is about the consumer experience, what the consumer takes away - which some would argue equals brand. So it is about the brand idea reaching people, with out the worries of the specific media (media fragmentation…again). The adliterate even goes one step further and throws out the idea that branding may be shackling advertising, because advertising is built on specific forms of communication ideas (traditionally) and that the digital space removes those binding forms and allows for the brand idea to engage in any way it wants…helping kill the idea that everything should just be about the microsite.

Now, in all fairness - the microsite doesn’t completely go away. The key is understanding what function consumers want with content and how the brand idea enhances their experience. How a microsite could help pull all of that together.

Your two cents? Add a comment…

In brief: Likemind group asks global question. Complied answers from around the world shows that we (global humans) are feeling more similar about our cities than we realize. NYT article challenges that all of us ‘young online folks’ (people without gray hair) are not participating enough in today’s politics to make a difference. But maybe we are bonding, developing on a different level in a different way…and that our potential for change is brewing.

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The quote from above is from some play I was loosely involved with in college. Supposedly it is an old Eastern European saying that in order to catch something it is best to move quietly. I’m not sure if it is an Eastern European saying…but I’ve always liked it.

For the last 6-8 months I’ve been co-hosting a group called Likemind with the wonderful Sarah Saline from Fallon. This group gets together every 3rd Friday to have a little coffee chat. In the beginning there was no agenda to the chats. Just show up, have a cup of coffee and talk about whatever. Because most of us were of the Likemind from the ad world the conversations usually centered around trends, social media, ad talk. But in the last meeting the global Likemind tried an experiment. All the Likemind groups around the world would ask the same question to their respective groups and then we would compile all the answers together. Kind of a giant focus group.

The question from last was:

“If you were to rebuild your city from scratch, how would you build it differently and what would you keep the same?”

Here is a slide show from the global complied answers. To read Minneapolis summary of the questions, jump here.

Hopefully embed slideshare to come shortly (hint, hint).

What I take away from it is that…we, a global sample, are feeling very similar to how we should construct our cities. Less cars, more people interaction. Let neighborhoods develop. Forced commerce creates artificial cityscape which in the long run kills a city. We need to grow green.

After reading it I really felt like we were of, well, likemind. Then I stumbled across this NYT article over at the Dailykos about how we are ‘Generation Q - Generation Quiet‘. A quote from the article:

“It’s for all these reasons that I’ve been calling them “Generation Q” — the Quiet Americans, in the best sense of that term, quietly pursuing their idealism, at home and abroad.

But Generation Q may be too quiet, too online, for its own good, and for the country’s own good. “

Now the Dailykos does a good job picking a part this article and its narrow view of what is going on. And I’m not going to asking that likemind becomes a political force for change. But we did tackle an interesting global problem problem. And we did have a decent global sample… I mean brands have validated billion dollar ad campaigns on less attend, less focused, and a lot less active participation in the focus group than what the likemind focus group accomplished. And I think we have some solid answers.

So now what?

Will we do anything with the with the thoughts and ideas gathered? Were we meant to? I don’t know.

While I do agree with the idea that maybe we could use a little more profile to help nudge some of our thoughts along. It was because we came together without motive but to participate, without judgment, or without an agenda to gain that we have some solid ideas on how to help cities - from the human point of view. I find it interesting how we have quietly come together through the intergalactic social networks (offline/online networks to all show up for likemind). And that others are doing the same. That maybe through the humility of openly expressing ourselves across the networks that we are finding solutions before beating our chests. That sharing across the internet forces you to listen as much as talk.

And maybe one of these days some of us will rise up to orchestrate the quietness that is swelling. That the foundation that is being built is one of human interaction for humans, not a dollar amount.

I don’t know, maybe I just drank my preachy freedom coffee this morning instead of normal. Still, gives me hope.

So far, I’m liking this idea. You get to “create” you own message (mine is below) and then send it to a friends. But they didn’t stop there. Instead of just sending you message they give you embed code for blogs, Myspace and Facebook application.

Engaging the consumer and giving it a chance to spread… social media done right.

A couple of weekends ago I was back home on the family farm. The farm I grew up on…you could say was an early adopter farm (not surprising). My father was one of the first farmers to use no-til style crop management. And for as long as I can remember, we’ve always raised pretty much organic beef. Beef that is corn/grass/hay fed with no drugs, hormones, antibiotics etc. - clean meat. We’ve sold this beef to family and friends over the years. And now for the first time, with the help of my brother, the farm is branching out to sell our beef to more than just family/friends. In doing so, they now take Sawyer Beef to the local farmer’s markets every Wednesday evening and Saturday morning. So while I was home, I went to market. I put on the Sawyer Beef shirt and with sold meat from our trailer (which has working freezers).

And this is where I experienced the market…the conversation. The distinction between what social media is and conversational marketing. The bear bones of selling a product you believe to passing customers. And I think this is something we all need to do, as advertisers etc., is to get out from behind our big budgets, millions of people marketing and get down to the street level where it all happens.

I plan on updating this post…because I’m still reflecting on exactly the experience I had at the market.

A couple of posts from around the blogossphere have started to raise the question…ok, so just how do we get our clients to do social media/interactive/conversational media? I think this is a natural evolution of social media (which I’m moderating a panel on the topic in September in Chicago, shameless plug) as we see that budgets are starting to swing toward implanting more social media programs.

It was Sean’s (twofortyeight.com) post that got me thinking about the idea, as he was thinking about how to work the client into the idea of the ‘Fan Loop’. But in his post, an interesting leadership bi-polarization comes out of his post. The examples he gives references how it was the “client” not the agency that pushed for new ideas, yet the agencies he mentions as leaders in this space are recognized and known to have lead their clients to do interactive brand ideas. And agencies should be leaders, pushing clients. As an agency, we should be in the best position to understand what brand experiences the brand can provide and the experiences the consumer is desiring. While we can be successful when clients push us, agencies need to start becoming the leaders in this discussion. This demonstrates that we understand how to lead the conversation with consumers.

That’s what we want to do, but how do we do it?

Jeremiah (Web Strategy by Jeremiah) has a good post on how to create a social media plan. But as I commented, I think his post left out one major sticking point, that social media (or conversational media) works best when it has content or purpose (or “story) to share with the consumer which activates the consumer to participate in the brand experience, this giving them a reason to become a ‘fan’. (some may call this ‘designed experience’)

Which moves us, the client and agency, out of the tactical discussion and to the achieve (strategy) discussion. What is it that we want to lead consumers to say/do? But as Matt (Techno//Marketer) points out, while that’s ideal, what happens when the client shows up with a tactic already well ingrained in their mind?

Going back to Sean’s examples, the BMW films shared that brand experience of…you rev that engine, take that turn and yes, in a BMW you do have just a little bit of a ’spy’ like feeling. Something of and ego stroke, something of power…(given I’m taking many liberties here) but the films where able to share that. The HD Google gadget shared one of the main HD brand DNA’s (which I don’t think this is a surprise to anyone) that the HD brand has a community experience. Looking in at Sturgis is exactly what brand/consumers what to be a part of, that experience which gives the consumers a story to tell.

So in talking with your clients about doing interactive ideas, it is our job to lead the discussion to help the client understand that the conversation is happening, it is a good idea to create brand fans, and the tactical ideas should come out of sharing a designed brand experience that the brand has to offer to help enhance, or give ’story’, to consumers. We should emphasis tapping into what the brand has to offer. Then we should look at a larger picture, are there other brand properties or media content opportunities that the social media plan/conversational plan can be integrated with? Could we find was to help enable consumers to spread their story that we are giving them?

And I’m sure, this is all easier said than done.

I unplugged over the weekend (at brother’s wedding on the farm). Doing so I was able to reflect on on I dip into the social media pool. I realized a couple of things.

1 - I am a horrible writer.

2 - I don’t actively participate in social media.

In regards to (1), that will just take time and the forgiveness of the blogosphere till I get my writing skills up to speed.

Number (2) though was a larger…ah ha moment for myself. I read tons of blogs but I don’t comment. I don’t put myself out there even though I know the value of doing so. So, starting today every blog article I read (not scan, actually read) I am going to drop a comment in. I’ll be part of the conversation which I’ve been only listening to for the last couple of years.

With the ‘Age of Conversation‘ coming of…well..age, brands have been asking - how do we [brands, brand communication] engage in consumer’s conversations? I’ve always believed in a couple simple rules of thumb in engaging consumers with brand conversational/social media communications;

1 - give consumers something to talk about
2 - give consumers a place to talk

One of the best conversational bits you can give consumers to talk about is a brand experience. Let them get involved in the essence or what makes the brand what the brand is. Now, given, that is not always the easiest thing to do. But one client at my current agency has taken some giant steps lately to sharing it’s brand and the experience that comes with the brand with consumers.

The team that is working on doing this has done a great job letting consumer peek into the Harley-Davidson world and the DNA that makes up the brand. They created a live feed google gadget/widget and banner from Sturgis. For those who don’t know, thousands of Harley-Davidson riders descend upon the city of Sturgis once a year to gather and be a part of all things Harley-Davidson. The live gadget lets consumers from all over the world lets them see just what this event is, what this gathering of Harley-Davidson community is all about. This is a great step to giving the consumers something to experience, something to talk about.