Out-Smarts Social Media Marketing » Social media listening

Shut Up and Listen

mhairi — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 18:32:51 +0000

In December I read an article in the Vancouver Sun that inspired me. The article, called “How Social Media Have Globalized the Shopping Experience”, related how the writer, Gillian Shaw, simply had to Twitter about her choice for next car and lo and behold she got a response from a GM dealer offering her a test drive. Here’s an excerpt:

My Social Media Experiment

So, I decided to try this out for myself to see whether organisations using social media are actually doing a good job of listening and responding to customers and prospects.

Twitter

First stop Twitter where I decided I would use the tool to plan a ski trip. So I Twittered:

To date I haven’t had a response. I tried a different tact and sent a Tweet to Sun Peaks who were listening to direct messages and did, thankfully, respond:

A few days later I got stuck in an elevator: what a perfect opportunity to see if anyone was listening and could help me. So I posted my dilemma on Facebook and Twitter. Followers we’re listening – I got 2 responses from friends, both in Alberta, both in no position to help me escape!

Facebook

On to Facebook, where I commented on the Marks & Spencer Page about my frustration with their delivery service (more often than not gifts for my family in the UK arrive broken or damaged):

Here was an opportunity for M&S to respond to my concern and to correct it in the public forum, to enhance their customer loyalty but again I had no response. Very disappointing – this year I will find a more reliable supplier and M&S just lost a loyal customer of 20 odd years because they weren’t listening or were choosing to ignore my comments.

Shut Up and Listen

Whilst I might not have the following of a journalist like Gillian Shaw, I do have over 2000 Twitter followers and am very active online – I really expected to get more response to my social media comments.

What is my point here? I have two:

1) Shut Up – First of all companies should realize that we are living in a new world, one where they can and should interact with their customers in these forums to build loyalty and improve customer service. Your audience expects this and not doing so puts you at risk of negative exposure. This is no longer a push to market model where companies bombard their audience with one way messages but a two way street where they can build loyal and valuable relationships with customers and prospects and enhance brand value. Shut up about yourself already and focus instead on your audience and providing value for them.

2) Listen - the first step any company should take when approaching social media is to implement effective listening strategies. Listen to what online communities have to say about your products or services, company, industry and competitors. By doing so you will not only get a feel for what is appropriate (very useful when building your social media strategy) but you will also identify sales opportunities, chances to improve customer service and to build loyalty so that customers keep coming back. Our article Are You Listening? talks about tools you can use to do this effectively.

Conclusion

I look forward to the day when companies stop talking about themselves and start listening to and fulfilling the needs of their audience on social media. There is a vast source of information and opportunity about your company and your market online just waiting for you to tap into it. What are you waiting for? Shut up and listen!

Branding – Only for Cattle?

mhairi — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 21:37:33 +0000

I recently had the opportunity to attend a leadership round table headed up by Judy Bishop of Bishop and Associates. Judy has been a key player on the Vancouver business scene for 20 years and her discussion surrounded building your personal brand.

During the conversation Judy pointed out that “branding” is not a term that should be used in a business context and that it in fact should only relate to cattle or livestock. Its an interesting point and got me thinking about the process we go through as marketers trying to influence our audience. A mistake is often made in focusing on “us” (ie the company, product or service) and not “the audience”.

Taken literally as a verb, using -ing to form the progressive tense: branding, is grammatically correct. However, I think its not the grammar that Judy has a bone of contention with but the implication. Branding implies that we actively seek to make our mark on the audience when in actual fact its not marketers who are in control of our brands but the audience itself. Many marketers fail to recognize this and go about building their brand from the inside out without giving too much thought to the audience who is on the receiving end.

So what has all this got to do with social media I hear you ask. Well, since you asked, I think its vital. You shouldn’t go about using social media as a means “to burn your brand” into the minds of your audience. Social media users are particularly sensitive to manipulation. Rather, look on social media as a great tool for making contact with your audience, to understand them better (what makes them tick)and to allow you to build better products for them. Use it as a tool to build better relationships with them so that they, in turn, build a great perception of your company in their minds and are more likely to turn to you when in need. The best way to do this is to constantly be on the look out for ways that you can help your target audience and add value for them. The key point here is that it is all about them not all about you.

Unlike Judy, I may use the term branding from time to time to categorize the efforts we make as marketers to build awareness but I do see her point. Branding is something that is done to something else – the word implies a lack of respect. Building a brand is all about respect: understanding your audience and catering to their needs. By placing your customer front and centre and catering to their needs not yours, your marketing efforts will be more likely to succeed.

Branding – with Isabelle Mercier

And thanks Michelle for the great Highland Coo image!

Are You Listening?

mhairi — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 16:48:07 +0000

Social Media Listening Tools

Social media content is a great source of information for research, customer service and planning purposes. Its important to use tools to effectively listen to what is being said about: your company, its products services and representatives; your competitors and clients; your market niche as well as your target geography and other marketing considerations.

With millions of people on-line every day exchanging opinions, thoughts, feedback and other information – this data source shouldn’t be ignored.

But how to listen effectively, what to listen for and how to do so in a timely manner? As with any other market research initiative, it is important to have a social media listening strategy or plan that outlines what you are hoping to learn, the information you want to track and how you will analyze and use it.

There are thousands of social networks, millions of blogs, how do you sift through this information to find the gems that are relevant to your company and industry? It’s important in advance to know what you want to listen for. Identifying and listening for keywords pertaining to your company name and product or services names is a good start. This allows you to get going with something concise and manageable and get a feel for the type of information you will return.

There are a number of tools available to effectively listen some are free, the obvious one being Google and some charge. If you expect that you will use these tools extensively or if you hit the wall with free tools then you may want to consider the paid options as they provide structured and strategic solutions.

Here are some more specific services:

FREE

Google Alerts – this service sends e-mails outlining Google search result for your keyphrases.

There are a plethora of Twitter tools like Twitter Search, Monitter (my current favourite) and Tweetlater that allow you to monitor for keywords via email or online.

Pipl – great tool for assessing your personal brand online across multiple social networks

Backtype – search terms, follow conversations.

Facebook wall comments Lexicon.

Trendrr – social and digital media tracking

Technorati – blog monitoring

PAID

Radian6 – this is a paid service but word on the street is that it’s worth paying the price. Radian6 tools

Trackur – another tool for social media monitoring. Starting at $18 a month with a free trial.

Visible Technology’s Trucast – Social media and blog monitoring.