Portland Social Media

Earlier this week, when Mark Zuckerberg announced Facebook was buying Instagram, people balked. Market analysts publicized the $1 billion price tag; bloggers questioned the motives; and most others were just furious about the conglomeration. Twitter exploded with people declaring they’d just deleted their Instagram accounts. Facebook comparisons ranged from a monopoly to an imperialist force to the Borg. Calmer voices like The New Yorker theorized the move was nothing more than a power play, and the fact that The New Yorker weighed in so quickly (or at all) seemed to strike no one as strange.

Facebook is, after all, just a social network, but we don’t need another blog analyzing its power and influence. Zuckerberg himself has said he wants Facebook to be a site where all online needs are met. Already users can read articles, stream music and videos, and e-mail friends. Over 483 million people use the site daily. It’s the most popular online destination in the world, which is why some people fear it like a fascist regime. The social network possesses immense power, but people forget that despite his lofty ambitions Zuckerberg isn’t a fascist. Even if he was, other e-mail, video, and news platforms are individually more popular. Facebook is still a diversion at best, a business at worst.

From an economic standpoint, the acquisition makes sense. Instagram is all about sharing photos, which has arguably always been the main allure of Facebook. Grandmothers create profiles to see family pictures; disinterested users keep their accounts to access old photos. TheFacebook.com was first created to browse others’ portraits. Instagram works under the same premise. They’re both social networks that share images; of course the larger network would acquire the other. The most interesting element in all of this was the cost—something Jon Stewart pointed out (see below) as seemingly absurd. Facebook paid $33/Instagram user. Whether Zuckerberg saw the app as that worrisome of a competitor or that complimentary of a platform depends on whom you ask. But it needs to be asked in business terms, not hyperbole.

This deal isn’t, as some people claim, a conspiracy. The people who rail against Facebook are descendants of the people who railed against e-mail, television, and the telephone in decades past. It isn’t the Matrix or Skynet. It’s a business, and its purchase of Instagram had nothing to do with world domination. Not everyone likes Facebook, but most people use it, and those who don’t miss out on events, social updates, and news generated by friends and brands. The public outcry about Instagram will fade, and people will keep using the app, happily or not.

The only real reason this deal caused a hullabaloo is Facebook’s immense popularity. Commercially, politically, and culturally, the site has become an engrained part of our society. This is an age where the Secretary of State submits memes and Internet tycoons are featured in celebrity magazines. Of course Facebook’s acquisition of an app will make headlines. Everything Facebook does will face scrutiny. It isn’t an apocalyptic sentient being, but it is a powerful social and economic force, and every billion-dollar ripple it makes will create cultural tidal waves.

If you’ve had a Facebook page for one year or more, you’ve probably noticed that getting exposure is much harder than it used to be.

Aside from being massively more crowded than years prior, Facebook’s EdgeRank (the algorithm that determines what an individual sees in their news feed) has become more complicated and specific to the tastes of individuals that it’s nearly impossible to leverage the tool if you don’t have a relevant fan base who loves to interact with and share your content.

Despite the fact that Facebook remains very secretive about their algorithm, Argle Social’s webinar last week provided answers to several key questions for marketers and gave new insight into how we should behave in regards to EdgeRank.

Three Variables That Determine EdgeRank

Facebook’s EdgeRank is determined by three variables: Affinity, Weight, & Time Decay.

1. Affinity is the relationship Facebook thinks you have with a given piece of content, according to actions you have taken in the past. In other words, the more you share, comment, ‘like’, and click on different objects, the higher it will (eventually) appear in your news feed.

2. Weight is the importance Facebook assigns to actions people take and different types of content distributed by people and companies.

Objects (content distributed):

1. Video
2. Photo
3. Link
4. Status (copy w/no video, photo, or link)

“Time decay” refers to how recent or “old” the item is. Simply put, newer items are more likely to appear in the news feed than older items. This is why posting content at times when your audience is logged in to Facebook is crucial in increasing exposure.

EdgeRank Best Practices

More generally, you should consider a few things when thinking about EdgeRank:

1. Give your brand personality. You have to be interesting to get exposure on Facbeook. Everything you put into the news feed must be compelling, entertaining, informative, or nurture the community in some way. Share exclusive content. Include lots of photos and videos. Start your own traditions. You are no longer competing against other advertisers – you are competing against people’s friends, families, dogs & cats. They have personalities, so you must too.

2. Use separate campaigns and contests. Campaigns allow you to determine what content is best and see the big picture of things in a very tactical medium. Run a 3-month campaign (no shorter) to gain new perspectives on different types of content.

3. Include calls to action. Click ‘like’ if you agree. Comment with YOUR favorite color. Share this get well graphic with a friend of yours who is sick. Be careful not to use these too often, but throwing them in every so often can give you a nice boost in interactions. What could be easier than telling them exactly what to do?

4. “Stir the hornet’s nest”, as it was referred to in the webinar. This is my personal favorite and one that can drive massive results. Pinning your fans against each other with borderline controversial content, “bubble” events, and content that pushes their buttons (a little) is one of the best ways to get people talking. Don’t make the mistake of getting political, challenging moral beliefs, or being offensive here – just don’t be afraid to put something out there that people might disagree with.

Now it’s your turn:

What EdgeRank best practices do you have to share?

This post was written by Bonfire’s Chief Strategist, Garrett Ira.

Company: Beaverton Auto Group

Social Media Team: Ryan Lewis, President, Bonfire Social Media; Garrett Ira, Community Manager, Bonfire Social Media

Campaign Length: Nine Months

Result: Facebook interactions increased 1,021%, Facebook fans increased 172%, and Facebook cost-per-fan decreased 38.2% (averages)

The Challenge

Beaverton Auto Group consists of three auto dealerships: Beaverton Nissan, Beaverton Hyundai, and Damerow Ford. A locally owned and operated company, Beaverton Auto Group was quick to realize and understand the dramatic shift to social media in an industry that has relied heavily on traditional mediums.

Each of the three brands at hand have experienced their own significant challenges during the recession and natural disasters in Japan, which caused difficulty in maintaining a consistent supply of inventory. Bonfire was appointed to launch the company into the social space to build brand awareness, increase web traffic, nurture their communities, and ultimately drive sales.

The Customer Experience

Auto dealerships aren’t exactly known for fantastic customer service, and many customers dread stepping onto the lot. So instead of simply telling everyone how great their customer service is, we showed them by displaying photos of happy customers next to their brand new cars. Not only did this provide an avenue to build trust among potential customers, but it also helped us grow a relevant fan base—one filled with existing customers and not random visitors who want nothing to do with the product. The pictures quickly became a hit, with customers often asking for their pictures to be taken before the conclusion of the sale and showing gratitude in the comments.

We also provided exceptional customer service via social channels, further contributing to our highly interactive communities.

Incentives

One of the most significant shifts in social media in 2011 was the expectation of the consumer to be rewarded for connecting with brands online. Knowing this was a key to success, we wanted to do something fun to reward our fan base but also add value and generate business for our client.

We achieved this in several ways throughout the campaign, the first of which was exclusive service specials for Facebook fans. To make this process ultra-convenient for the customer, we enabled them to download and print the coupons right from Facebook vs. making them click through to another site. We also ran an iPad 2 Giveaway as part of our “fan giveaway” value proposition.

Facebook Advertising

Most auto dealerships use their Facebook pages exclusively to advertise. Not our clients.

We advertise where it was meant to be—using Facebook ads. They allowed us to extend our campaign reach significantly while allocating our budget only to our target demographics. Throughout the campaign, the ads were the highest generator of new fan growth than any other medium.

The Results

A well-executed strategy, optimized tactics, and a focus on valuable content yielded phenomenal results over our nine month period from February–October 2011. In fact, Beaverton Hyundai now has more Facebook fans than any Hyundai dealership in the nation.

Beaverton Nissan

Facebook Fans: +183.2%

Facebook Interactions: +668.4%

Facebook Advertising Cost-Per-Fan: -53.7%

Beaverton Hyundai

Facebook Fans: +260.5%

Facebook Interactions: +1,480.6%

Facebook Advertising Cost-Per-Fan: -62.4%

Damerow Ford

Facebook Fans: +73.4%

Facebook Interactions: +914.8%

Facebook Advertising Cost-Per-Fan: +1.4%

–By Justin Albano, Director of Business Development at Bonfire Social Media–

B2B marketers and business owners often ask me if the benefits of social media only exist in the B2C realm. The answer is a resounding no. The core concepts of social media: establishing your brand as an industry influencer, engaging with your customers, leveraging brand advocates, and nurturing leads along a sales cycle are just as powerful in connecting with companies as they are with consumers. In fact, B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads per month than those who do not [1], and 57% of B2B companies have acquired a customer through LinkedIn [2]. However, just like any other marketing tools, here are some best practices that will get you started in the right direction.

1) Know Your Objectives

What do you want? More customers? A better relationship with your customers? Both? As a biz dev guy I love “to do lists,” strategies, and most of all accomplishing objectives. Often, companies that I talk with are either focused on driving more leads or improving their brand’s perception and share of voice. Dependent upon your company’s objectives, you need to understand which, or both, of these categories your company falls into. Without defining your objectives, you stand no chance of measuring success or understanding the effect of your actions.

Action Items:

• Start macro and go micro. What do you really want out of your business? Do you want to grow a secure company that can be passed on to your kids? Do you have a quick profitable exit in mind? Start with your vision and let it set the framework for your strategies in every business facet. Then develop your bottom up action items, i.e. what will it actually take to get there?
• Set success metrics and milestones and review your progress regularly, not just at the end of the year.

2) Understand Your Demographics

It may seem obvious, but it never ceases to amaze me how few companies actually understand who their demographic is, what their buying cycle looks like, what motivating factors/events cause them to take action or where they get information on products and services.

Action Items:

• Create customer profiles that allow you to examine your demographics in a more intimate way. For example, Suzie is a mother of two who works full time, loves to play tennis and hike, cares about the environment, and prefers to watch movies rather than TV. Setting up these profiles gives you a great demographic snapshot and helps to focus your marketing efforts.
• Once you understand your demographic’s buying cycle, what info, education or resources can you provide to make their buying decision easier? This is not only important for brand awareness and brand perception, but should be the driving force behind your lead nurturing cycle.
• It is crucial for you to understand your industry’s keyword landscape. Which keywords are your demographic using to search for the products/services you offer or information related to your offering? Which keywords are obtainable? How do you currently rank for those keywords? Google provides some free tools for the Do-it-Yourselfers, but any digital marketing shop should help you build the list and give you the analytic insights that will enable you to make sense of it all.
• Discover which social platforms your demographics are already engaged with and focus your efforts there. Currently, there are over 800 million users on Facebook, 300 million users on Twitter, 116 million users on LinkedIn and only 60 million users on Google+ [3]. If you currently have an email database, run it through some social networks to discover who is already using which networks. This could save you mountains of time in the long run and allow you to target your unique demographics.
• Listen via social networks like Twitter, Facebook, blogs, and forums, as well as online news sites. Once you know your demographic’s hangouts and keywords, you can listen to social conversations via CMS platforms like HootSuite/TweetDeck and by setting up Google Alerts that monitor articles, blogs and forums that are currently talking about your keywords.

3) Create Value Based Relationships

Social media is not the place for old-school messaging tactics, and the concept of protecting your secret sauce is dead. Company decision makers typically go to your website, not social networks, to learn the benefits of your products or services. Companies and consumers alike are actively searching for value-based content that makes their lives and their buying decisions easier.

Action Items:

• Offer value-based content. If you help companies streamline their processes, don’t just talk about how you do it; offer them free templates or How-To whitepapers that teach them how to be more efficient. Providing this type of value will convert prospects in to fans of your company and customers in to loyal brand advocates.
• Understand the difference between relevant content (e.g. interesting articles, company update s, etc.) and compelling content that provides value and motivates visitors to take action (either by providing contact information or requesting a demo).
• Monitor conversations within social communities, like LinkedIn discussion threads, and offer advice or input wherever possible.
• Don’t be afraid to give away the secret sauce. As we all know, understanding how to do something and actually doing it are two very different things. Some of Bonfire’s best clients are those who tried to do it themselves first and quickly realized that their time and resources are much more effectively spent doing the things that they already excel at rather than learning how to develop custom Facebook tabs, constantly managing social networks, writing blogs or producing webinars.

4) Leverage Your Current Marketing Mix

A common and dangerous myth is that social media replaces traditional and costly marketing channels with free messaging. This is simply not true. Social media is at its best when it is amplifying other marketing efforts or when integrated in to a well thought-out campaign.

Action Items:

• Install social plug-ins throughout your site. These allow visitors to share your content on their preferred social network quickly and with a minimum of effort.
• Utilize landing pages to capture leads and initiate your lead nurturing cycle.
• 59% of B2B purchase decision makers have used their smartphone to research products and services when they are considering purchases [4], so optimize your content and landing pages for the increasing number of mobile users.
• Include QR codes on in-print advertising and articles with compelling calls to action.

This is not rocket science and it’s not revolutionary. Instead, this is a new application of what the heart and soul of American business was when companies took the time to connect with their communities and develop relationships with their customers. As a B2B marketer your audience might be smaller than your B2C counterparts, but that means you can be much more targeted and strategic with your marketing. While a B2C marketer may segment their demographics down to niche communities, you can target specific decision makers within your target companies and develop a value-based relationship that not only nurtures the current sales cycle but also sets a positive framework for a long and supportive business relationship.

—-
Stat Citations
[1] Source: Hubspot, State of Inbound Marketing Lead Generation Report, 2010
[2] Source: http://www.hubspot.com/social-media-monitoring-in-10-minutes-ebook/?source=hspd-affiliate-PID-3701805-txt-ad-social-media-10-min-day-ebook-20110819&AID=10933127&PID=3701805&SID=skim1024X498223X8a5f920e568fa93e07c8561649950bf2
[3] Source: http://www.business2community.com/social-media/b2b-social-media-marketing-statistics-to-ponder-099980
[4] Source: http://socialmediab2b.com/2011/09/b2b-decision-makers-smartphones/#ixzz1jmUIeJul

There is a race happening you might not be aware of. The race is for how your business controls and manages your social media. With some major players getting involved and some serious money changing hands this could prove to be a sector to watch. In this post, I’ll try to quickly summarize the most relevant platforms and what kind of businesses they are best suited for. Most only focus on Facebook, but all platforms listed have aspirations to work with other platforms.

Involver was one of the first Facebook application developers and continues to push out compelling products for companies. Bonfire has worked with Involver in past and overall they create a good product. They have jumped into the platform management ring with their “Enterprise” and “Business” solutions. They are very similar with Enterprise giving users every feature and product they make. I’ll focus on the features from Enterprise. If you want to read more about the “Business” product, click here. Below are Enterprise’s capabilities:

• 24 available “pre-made” white label Facebook applications
• Publishing on a claimed 40 media outlets. Most notable: Facebook, Twitter, WordPress
• Post scheduling on Media outlets
• Bit.ly analytic integration
• Social monitoring for keyword alerts
• Message Sentiment Measurement
• Message workflow management
• Internal analytic dashboard
• Up to 10 users

Price: Starting at $2,749 per month.

Wildfire started as a small FBfund (Facebook’s investing arm) company “way back” in January 2010. They initially created apps for pages that were simple to deploy and required no long term contracts.

As of June 2011 they have 120 team members and thousands of customers (we have used several of their products in the past). They have big aspirations to become not just an app developer for Facebook, but a fully functional social management system. In June of this year, Wildfire launched their Suite product. Here are their Suite’s capabilities:

• Drag and drop Facebook Tab creator: This feature requires no coding knowledge and can be updated frequently.
• Content Manager: The Wildfire content manager will allow for social media workflow simplicity and allow community managers to schedule and assign content posting on Facebook. This feature is very useful for companies with large teams or publish content with a high frequency.
• Promotion Builder: This allows companies to construct giveaways using a straightforward interface — drag and drop the text fields you’d like to require during the sign up, tweak the banners, then enter the official rules and you’re good to go.
• Dashboard: Facebook analytics can be difficult, but Wildfire’s dashboard can simply success metrics. Their dashboard shows analytics that are more detailed than Facebook’s standard Insights and you can even chart your progress against a competitor’s.

Price: Custom pricing. In a statement they say “low hundreds” to “low thousands”

Buddy Media is the gold standard when it comes to social media management. I mean gold as in both expensive and the best. They have every feature you could ever want in a platform and are fluent in all major languages. This is very important if you are a multinational brand that wants to segment your social media community. They currently service some of the largest companies in the world such as Starwood Hotels, Sony, Southwest Airlines, American Express and Ford. In addition to their impressive client list, they also recently received an additional $54 million in funding to grow out their infrastructure. Buddy Media can do everything Involver and Wildfire can and more. I’ll focus on the “and more” for the sake of time.

• Drag and Drop Facebook page development
• Multiple language support
• Real time analytics
• Scheduling and posting on multiple social platforms
• Large team workflow management

Price: Customized pricing. Most plans start at $5,000 per month.

I hope you have found this information helpful with any decision making in the future. If you have any you would add that I missed, please comment below.

Videos can quickly grab a customer’s attention and stay in their mind longer than a photo or even the written word. But how can you make your videos more interactive? Allow users to not only view your videos, but become immersed with them.

Annotations are a trusted, but under-utilized YouTube tool that can boost both page views and subscribers for a channel. A video’s power can be enhanced by using this simple (and free) tool.

Two examples of annotation creativity:

Interactive Promotions/Games

Annotations can be a fun way to promote products. Instead of a video showcasing a new line of toys, Hot Wheels used annotations and turned their YouTube videos into an online game. Users can choose both the type of car and add-ons to race. While it takes a lot of planning and video production, the end product is a seamless use of YouTube Annotations.

‘Choose Your Own Adventure’

Many adults remember growing up with ‘choose your own adventure’ stories. The digital versions of these use YouTube annotations to create a fun story. Fun and interactive, they can be a nice way to promote products or services in story-form.  And, unlike their hard-copy predecessor, you can’t skip ahead and change your mind!

More Practical Uses
While creativity is key to utilizing annotations, this tool can also be used to increase the number of subscribers.

• Subscribers: By using the Subscribe link type, your video can have a great call-out for viewers to subscribe to your channel, allowing for more video views and greater channel reach.
• Linking : If your channel has a lot of content, annotations can link these videos together. It not only keeps viewers on your channel longer, but also allows for a deeper understanding of your services, products or mission.
• Promoting Other Channels: Does your company have more than one YouTube channel? Annotations can help link these by promoting another channel in a relevant video. This can help to promote smaller channels from a large, central channel.

Where to begin?
Start by mapping out your annotations. Whether they are simple links to other videos, words of wisdom, or interactive elements, planning is key. Try to create a virtual path where users will be compelled to spend more time on your channel.

The actual creation of new annotations is relatively easy. Be sure to keep in mind both the placement and type of annotation.

Like anything, however, annotations can get out of hand. It is important to remember what makes videos great is the actual viewing experience. Annotations should be used to enhance and not detract from the experience. By having timely call-outs it can help increase the amount of time users both spend on your channel as well as the amount they share your content with others.

Learn More

Here are a few great resources for getting started on a YouTube annotations project:

How To: Use Annotations to Promote Your Brand on YouTube – A great step-by-step guide on YouTube annotations.

YouTube Help Guide - A simplified guide that can be used as a resource when getting started.

There have been a bevy of instant Facebook tab creators to hit the market lately. After wasting quite a bit of time fumbling around with some that weren’t effective, I thought I might as well document my findings to save others from making the same mistakes.

The tools I have outlined below are the best ones I have found that don’t cost an arm and a leg. Frankly, many of the new tools that have been created since the addition of iFrames to Facebook are on a ‘Freemium’ model and rival other tools that had cost thousands of dollars per month.

If you are among those looking for more comprehensive options, Social Fresh has started a shared spreadsheet that anyone can contribute to. There are also other options listed there.

Here are my top pics listed in order of how much I like them. continue

As both a Portland Timbers season ticket holder and a social media professional, I thought it would be a great idea to celebrate the Portland Timbers’ social media success.

As the Portland Timbers made the move up to Major League Soccer this season, the club faced a situation of how to market itself to not just soccer supporters, but Oregonian sports fans as a whole. Unlike the Trail Blazers, soccer (or football) is still considered by most mainstream sports fans as a niche competition. By integrating their large grass roots following with an innovative social media campaign, the team has been able to win over new fans while keeping their loyal fanbase engaged when they’re not chanting during the games.

Almost half-way into its inaugural MLS campaign, the team finds itself having won over many hometown supporters in terms of both their play and social media marketing activities. Out of the 18 MLS teams, the Timbers Facebook Fan Page currently rank 7th in terms of Facebook ‘likers’ which shows the support of the Rose City!

Integrating Traditional Media
Driving around the Rose City prior to the new season, Portlanders could see a number of Portland Timbers billboards. Portraying a wide variety of Timbers fans, the billboards were a huge success. The Timbers were able to make the billboards ‘social’ by creating a contest in which every fan could get their photo taken with the famous Timbers axe. These were then posted online and the online community voted for their favorite. This type of promotion shows how social media and traditional forms of marketing can be integrated for optimum results. continue

I LOVE Gowalla! But I wasn’t born that way. I started off using Foursquare, gobbling up all my mayorships before that platform had hit critical mass. Just as my quick love affair with the square hit a plateau, I was forced to sign-up with Gowalla as research for my article on LBS deals. I was skeptical and resentful that I had to spend time on yet another platform. On top of that, Gowalla had the smallest user base (just under 500K) – so from a marketers perspective, my thoughts were ‘why bother?’ Well, that initial research was almost 6 months ago and I have been avidly using Gowalla ever since.

Questions to Consider Before You Commit

There are some great reasons to try Gowalla for yourself and I have them outlined below. But before I dive into why Gowalla works for me, I’d like to review what to consider before committing to a check-in platform. The idea for this post actually originated from a discussion at a recent May 5th shindig. A digital marketing student asked me which check-in platform she should be using. She wanted to make sure to choose the “right one,” in order to prevent managing multiple check-in accounts. A lively discussion ensued with most participants falling into 2 camps: Gowalla and Foursquare.

My take-away from that encounter is that each platform meets different needs. Understanding what you want to get out of the tool and the reasons you want to engage are key to determining the right tool for you. Some questions to ask yourself before making the commitment:

• Are you only looking for discounts, deals and promotions?
• Which platform are your close friends using?
• Are you interested in discovering new locations?
• Do you want to be actively marketed to while using the application? continue