Continue reading »]]> I was inspired to do another post on social influence measurement after seeing klout get trashed on a few sites.  I understand why people argue against it, but I think it’s helpful to look at it from all sides.  The post ran long so I’m running in a series: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Starting with…

The Good

Before we get into it, let’s set up what we mean by “social influence”. I’m using the definition Forrester analyst Zack N. Hofer-Shall suggested:

“The power individuals have over your brand based on the size and quality of their networks.”

Of course social influence vendors don’t publish their algorithms, but klout does provide clues on how it derives its score:

klout score is comprised of: True Reach, Amplification, Network Influence

• True Reach = the number of people someone influences
• Amplification = how much you influence people
• Network Influence = the influence of the people in your True Reach

Intuitively, this equation feels right. Doesn’t it?

In general, measurement is good! Metrics provide transparency and allow for meaningful, quantitative analysis and discussion. Yes, numbers can be used to distort the truth, but I don’t believe the social

Believe it or not, Blondie (Clint's character) was "The Good"

influence vendors have an agenda other than to build a sustainable business model. (They aren’t trying to get anyone elected.) As long as the algorithms are applied evenly across social media, they provide useful data and insights.

Erica Ayotte (@inthekisser), a Social Media Manager at Constant Contact, pointed out that even if Marketers can agree on who is influential, what do you do with them after you’ve identified them? Well, klout has an answer for that too. Social influence measurement is about more than keeping score. For example, klout has a perks program that allows marketers to reach influencers and offer them exclusive packages with the intent of supporting a Word Of Mouth campaign.

See a list of current perks and claim those you qualify for <here>

Sure there is plenty not to like about these metrics, but social measurement vendors (klout, PeerIndex, Empire Avenue, etc) are still new and they continue to improve their services. For example, klout, who gets the lions share of attention, keeps adding services and features. klout uses its algorithm to measure influence on 12 social media networks. It currently has a new feature called “Topics” in beta. Topics provides users the ability to see the top ten influencers on a given topic.

Okay, social influence measure not perfect, but as Voltaire said “the perfect is the enemy of the good.”

The Bad

Let’s keep it simple, here are 4 things that are bad about measuring social influence:

1. A high influence score doesn’t necessarily mean this person is actually influential. A high klout score would indicate an individual has a larger audience of influential people that engage with the content being shared. But does this measured influence cause action? Does a high score mean that person can help a brand move more product? Not necessarily. There are other factors that come into place like product/service accessibility, location, suitability and personal taste.
2. Klout lacks context – you may have a klout score of 70, but that doesn’t mean you know jack about sewing, mountain bikes, grilling, scrap booking, etc. This leaves the scoring system pretty empty – you need other data to provide context be it (demographics, behaviors, etc.) However, klout is in beta with Topics. If it works the way one would hope, this will be a huge improvement in the system since it proves context. I may have a score of 70 on the Boston Bruins, but a score of 1 on dating Gisele Bunchen. For what it’s worth, PeerIndex also provides some context by measuring influence on eight industries.
3. Some people fault social measurement scoring because it can’t t measure offline influence. I think that’s a specious argument. If you’re already tracking offline influence good for you. Consider their digital score additive to your assessment. But admittedly, using the definition offered, the solutions available do not measuring online influence. That’s bad because marketers can become overly focused on a digital score and totally miss the point of social influence.
4. Vacation – if I go quiet for a week, my score drops ~5 points. Did I suddenly become less important?

I think this list may be too short, let me know why you think social influence measurement is bad in the comments.

The Ugly

I’m calling two things “ugly”:

1. What if influence doesn’t matter?
2. Data privacy

Influence doesn’t matter?

A Fast Company article, Is the Tipping Point Toast? explores the research of Duncan Watt.  Watt ran computer simulations to determine how things (viruses, ideas) are spread. It’s not that influence doesn’t matter, it’s that influence doesn’t matter as much as we think it does. Watt’s said:

All the clever (and lucrative!) targeted viral campaigning may ultimately be less effective than good old mass marketing.

Here are Watt’s reasons:

1. No one can clearly explain how an influencer actually influences. Is it one discussion? Several discussions? A mix of activities? Is an influencer so influential that they mobilize the influenced to
   

   Duncan Watt

   also be a strong brand advocate?

2. Societal readiness is the determinate factor regarding whether or not an idea spreads. He uses the example of forest fires. There are thousands of forest fires a year, but only a few become roaring monsters. A specific mix of environmental factors are required for a hugeforest fire: dry woods, lack of rain, distant fire departments, etc. Intuitively, this makes sense. Cultural factors play a part in how “right” ideas are for a community.
3. Marketers like the idea of influence because it exudes a measure of control. (and that control can be sold to clients.)

Data Privacy

I’m a cup is half-full type of guy coupled with some good old conspiracy theorist. When I learned of klout, it could only measure two or three social networks: twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Now that klout has scoring on twelve platforms it starts to feel less like influence management and more like data collection.  Let’s be real. Just as on Facebook, you’re not the customer, you’re the product.

You’re not the customer, you’re the product.

I’ve reviewed klout’s Privacy Policy <here> but it deals with the information you share directly with klout, not the information you later give klout access to when you connect klout to social networks such as Facebook.  For example, when you connect klout to Flickr you see this warning:

"including private content"

It seems that I’m granting klout access to information that is kept private on Flickr. I asked klout Marketing Manager, Megan Berry (@meganberry) about this. (For the record, Megan has always been a real straight-shooter with me in my brief exchanges with her.)

Regarding the Flickr example, Megan replied:

On flickr: Your private photos will definitely stay private. We are
asking for the lowest level of permissions flickr allows which is
read-only access and does include private photos (we can’t change
that). However, we NEVER use your auth to display photos, or look at
them or share them. Instead, our algorithm looks at the response your
photos are getting — i.e. are people commenting, favoriting them etc.
We will never access or use your private information.

On privacy in general:

Klout collects data from your networks in order
to discover your influence. We do not share any of your private data
or email address with 3rd parties. We do not access your Twitter DMs,
private Facebook messages, private Flickr content or any other private
communication.

I want to believe Megan, I have a lot of respect for Joe and the whole team, yet unless I’m misunderstanding the privacy policy, what Megan shared is not in their stated klout privacy policy. Why not spell it out further?

My advice is for users to be aware of what they are agreeing to be connecting your social networks on Empire Avenue, PeerIndex and klout. Don’t take your privacy for granted. If your concerned, don’t link your accounts. Some measure (a little? a lot?) of the scoring comes from the public view of your web 2.0 life. Perhaps that’s enough for you.

Feature photo credit Rusus Gefangenen

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Photo Credit: Jamie Quinn who likes to make fun of how well I shred in Rock Band

Most think of LinkedIn as a way to promote yourself, but actually it’s a flexible tool that also allows you to promote your brand or company too. In this Double LP set (ahem – two post series), I’ll show how you can use LinkedIn “apps” and “sections” to do just that.

So Let’s Rock it! First up, LinkedIn Apps…

LinkedIn Applications

Apps are a powerful way to connect your content and engage with your fans. LinkedIn provides applications that plug-in directly to your profile. I’m focusing on how these apps can help you:

1. Stay social with your fans
2. Show off your best content
3. Aggregate your full collection of content.

Social Outreach

Social Outreach is simply making a purposeful human connection with your audience. LinkedIn provides two apps that foster social connections:

• Polls (LinkedIn) – Conduct regular (monthly/weekly) polls to judge audience sentiment, get feedback on recent changes or gauge interest in new features.  You’re giving everyone a chance to vote and shape new ideas.  Still not sure what kind of polls to conduct? Look at the news headlines and make a connection to your products/services.  Once the poll is created anyone can include it in their LinkedIn profile.
• Events (LinkedIn) – Going on tour? Is your company sponsoring a seminar? Let those visiting your LinkedIn profile know about it!  Add the Events app to your profile and add or create in events. See who else is attending the events and start connecting!

Content Outpost

Content Outposts are the bread crumbs that lead prospects to you – you know like the flyers you put up around town just before your next gig.  LinkedIn provides several ways to include these outposts into your profile.

• Portfolio Display (Behance) – Great way for creatives and artists to show off their portfolio.
• Slideshare Presentations (Slideshare) – I suggest doing more summarized presentations on Slideshare with the call to action of driving viewers to your website or microsite for the full content.  Depending on the value of the content, there is a potential to use this as a lead generator.
• Google Presentation (Google) – Similar to, but probably less popular than (?), Slideshare.

Content Aggregator

If your company has content on social networks, LinkedIn provides an easy way to aggregate that content into your individual profile.  Remember, we’re using individual profiles to represent the brand.  These apps are a great way to present your thought leadership (thought leadership is kind of like your guitar solo – it’s what you do better than anybody else), so let’s get to it:

• Tweets (LinkedIn) – If your company has a twitter account you can pull that content into your LinkedIn profile.
• WordPress (WordPress) – If your company is using a WordPress blog this is your go to app.  It allows you granular controls over which posts are visible in your LinkedIn profile.
• Blog Link (SixApart) – like the WordPress app, but also supports Moveable Type, Blogger, LiveJournal, etc.

Continue reading »]]> Where does Digital & Traditional Marketing intersect?

Probably one of the biggest areas of confusion for marketers working to understand digital marketing is “how does digital marketing fit in with traditional marketing?“  Actually the questions don’t come that way they sound more like:

1. Do we need a Facebook page?
2. Does social media mean we should spend less on our website?
3. What if someone says something we don’t like, can we delete it?
4. Shouldn’t we build a iPhone app?

Traditional Marketing vs Digital Marketing

The figures below show the difference between the old world (traditional marketing techniques) and the new world (traditional marketing enhanced by digital marketing).

The noticeable difference is the addition of a “Social Outreach” circle.  But before we go into that, let’s go over how the traditional elements are recast in their digital world.

“New” Core

The core are your owned media properties – your company and product websites.  To address the early concern of “do we still need a website”, yes.  Never abandon your owned media. The various social media networks have varying policies regarding who owns what when you post on their networks.  For that reason alone you want to maintain your main web presence.

As hinted, the content of your website must change.  Posting 20 page whitepapers is becoming rather staid. Your main content needs to be updated to be more interactive and interesting.  You’re not just competing with your typical product and service competitors, you’re competing with everything that may steal the attention of your audience.  Make sure website visitors have their questions answered and the interest piqued. Further, your new core needs to allow your customers/prospects interact with the content.  This may be accomplished by allowing thought leaders to maintain blogs and allow readers comments. [A word of caution, the more anonymity commenters are able to have the more likely the comments will be ugly]

“New” Amplifiers

Traditional amplifiers include TV, radio, print and display.  To that equation we add technical amplifiers like Search Engine Marketing, mobile, RSS feeds and email registration.  These Digital Marketing techniques improve your ability to get the word out.  The name of the game is “Lead Generation.”

Social Outreach

So what’s new? Social Outreach.

Let’s review some examples of social outreach:

• Using LinkedIn groups for feedback, idea generation and updates
• Organizing formal or informal Meetups (or tweetups)
• Active social listening and responding to customer complaints
• Engaging with passionate customer segments seeking product advice

Admittedly, social outreach is a fuzzy idea, but the difference with social outreach is the purposefully human connection.  This is hand-to-hand marketing, getting out there and interacting with your customers on a personal, individual level.

In terms of customer segments, I see social outreach as focusing on your existing customers.  Social outreach allows you to:

• Maintain relevance and top of mind
• Deal with customer problems while they are still relatively small problems
• Obtain referrals because your customers know you and like you
• Build “earned media” by leveraging your customers to drive “Word of Mouth”

Let’s revisit the questions mentioned

Now that we’ve covered of Digital Marketing supports Traditional Marketing, let’s revisit the common questions mention earlier:

1. Do we need a Facebook page? Maybe you need a presence on Facebook (is that where your audience is?)
2. Does social media mean we should spend less on our website? Your website is as important as ever but it can’t be the only place for your content (use content bread crumbs the sites your customers visit)
3. What if someone says something we don’t like, can we delete it? You can’t delete what someone says about you (you don’t have control over your customers)
4. Shouldn’t we build a iPhone app? Mobile is an important part of your strategy (but consider the content and the customers interaction with it on a mobile phone)

Drive Ideas Out. Draw Audiences In.

To recap, how does Digital Marketing interact Traditional Marketing?  It helps drive ideas out and draw audiences in. Digital Marketing doesn’t supplant traditional methods, although it may change them a bit. Marketers have new tools in their toolbox to get their message out.  Rather than just relying on broadcast messaging there are new mediums available to find and connect with customers and prospects.

A recent tweet from Laura Fitton said it best:

I happily credit Nate Elliot and Forrester research for planting the seed in my head with Nate’s research The Interactive Brand Ecosystem.

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Obtaining a decent twitter username is becoming harder and harder as twitter grows in popularity.  All the good names are gone right? As a result you may find that your brand being represented by less than stellar Twitter handle.  Don’t despair.

Put down the gun. We can get through this.

I’ve identified 7 elements that impact your twitter brand.  These in concert can help make up for a somewhat craptastic twitter username.

7 Ways to brand your twitter profile

1. Username
2. Name
3. Bio
4. Location
5. Website
6. Background
7. Picture

1. Username

This is your twitter handle, the part next to the @.  Other than killer, consistent, contextually relevant content, getting a good twitter handle is the best thing you can do for your twitter brand.  Here are two tools I use to social check a username:

• Namechk
• Brandchecker

Someone brand jacking you? Here’s what you can do about it.

2. Name

Pretty self explanatory right?  But presenting your business name in your Twitter profile is invaluable brand touch point if you get stuck with a crappy twitter username.  Using your proper name fills in the gaps where your username might have left off. For some reason, and I’m a bit baffled, twitter only provides you 20 characters for your full name.  A 20 character limit for a business (and many individuals) is entirely unacceptable.  But hey, twitter is a free service, what can you do? Credit to Svein-Magnus Sorensen for finding a hack – too bad it didn’t stick.

3. Bio

Tell your brand story here. But you only have 160 characters so tell it quickly!  You can decide to describe your company, your value proposition or maybe something else.  Remember that this is social networking – it’s not just about your brand.  As you craft the bio consider what your customer will connect to.  What’s relevant to them?

4. Location

Feel free to think out of the box on this.  You can be precise or a bit flighty.  Consider this a chance to really support your brand.  Here are some examples provided for illustration.

• Music band: “On Tour” or “In the studio”
• Life brand: “a better state of mind”
• Retail: “53rd & 2nd”
• Hockey goalie: “in the crease”

5.  Website

Pretty simple really.  You want to send customers to one of the following:

• main page
• campaign page
• product page
• bio page (e.g. about.me or LinkedIn)

6. Background and colors

Just be brand consistent.

7. Picture

If you want to play is safe use a brand logo.  Simple. Clean.  However, visual expressions are the best way to capture emotion and therefore brand affinity.  The big question for brand managers is what to use.  There are arguments for the humanity of using a face and consistency of using a logo.

My current favorite brand logo is Schroders.  They are an investment firm, but they’re not afraid to add a bit of punch by putting headphones on their statue guy.

Although not a brand, I personally love Jamie Punshill’s previous picture.  It made me want to down tequila shots and it provided a window into his personality.

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So you good?  Not quite yet.  Run your twitter account through Hubspot’s twitter grader to make sure you didn’t miss anything.

Feature image from Sarah Korf