Connections, Content and Community
Training workshop, 31 March 2010
One: Social media - problems and potential
Case study examples
| Potential | Problem |
|
ASOS Life community #asos on Twitter |
Nestle Facebook page (palm oil issue) #nestle on Twitter |
|
"first direct" on Twiter |
Innocent drinks Facebook page (Coca-Cola issue) "innocent drinks" on Twitter |
|
My Starbucks Idea (co-creation) |
Rentokil: PR news and how not to use Twitter |
| Best Buy case study | Anonymity: Problem with Amazon reviews |
| Dippin' Dots case study | Election gaffes: Facebook; Twitter |
“I think social media is a natural extension of our brand because we want to do things that are unexpected, and to speak to all sorts of people who are engaged with social media. It’s tough to measure but there is an incremental benefit to sales.” Howard Schultz, Starbucks CEO
Mashable: Why banning social media often backfires
Two: Key concepts in marketing, media and PR
Through the eyes of a 'digital native'
An undergraduate student, born say in 1990, has
- Known Google all their life (born 1998);
- Used mobile and text messages all their life;
- Still loves entertainment TV (eg XFactor) but is comfortable with multitasking;
- Listens to music, but is reluctant to pay for it
- Values live performance (eg Glastonbury)
- Expects to research essays online (eg Wikipedia) rather than in a library
- Finds books too long and linear (boring)
- Rarely reads newspapers; never pays for them
- Has a short attention span and low boredom threshold
- Has a blurred sense of what's public and what's private
| Digital natives | Digital immigrants |
| Grew up with Google | Older than the web |
| Multitasking, hypertext | Linear processes |
| Parallel | Sequential |
| Crave interactivity | Prefer to concentrate |
| Learn through computer games | Learn through reading |
| Twitch-speed | Discussion of issues, trends |
| Graphics before text | Text before graphics |
"Anyone in his or her 20s living in an economically developed community has never known life without instant communication everywhere. Twenty-somethings communicate with friends on the go, in real time—no waiting for snail mail. They get the latest news as it happens, with a live feed from where it’s happening—no waiting for the scheduled news on TV or radio. Whenever they need to dig out information about virtually anything, it’s there, in abundance; there’s no need to dig around in books.
"One of the great paradoxes of borderless, global real-time technology is the way it reinforces local connections.
As adept users of real-time technology, 20-somethings are able to live locally more intensely."
Sources:
Marc Prensky, 'Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants' (part one; part two)
Stephen Davies: Ten trends of twenty-somethings
Bill Sledzik: Dear Millennials: Your parents lied to you
Evolution of the media
| Mass media | Masses of media | Me media |
| Newspapers, broadcast | Digital channels, web | Blogs, personal publishing |
| 1870s-1980s | 1990s- | 2000s- |
Source: Richard Bailey
Two models of web publishing
| Web 1.0 | Web 2.0 |
| Publishing | Participation |
| Stickiness | Syndication |
| Brochureware | Blogs |
| Content management systems | Wikis |
| Britannica Online | Wikipedia |
| Directories | Tagging |
| Domain name speculation | Search engine optimisation |
| Netscape |
Source: Tim O'Reilly What is Web 2.0?
'Markets are conversations'
The Cluetrain Manifesto (2000)
But markets are also: transactions and relationships (The Cluetrain Manifesto, Tenth Anniversary Edition, 2009)
'Publish then filter'
Then: Filter then publish
Now: Publish then filter
Example: 20 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. How do you ever find out what's there?
Who's online and what are they doing there?
90-9-1 rule (Jakob Nielsen)
Social Technographics Ladder
'Hub and spoke' strategy
Steve Rubel video and Posterous blog post
Eight Cs of social media
"Public communication practices are characterised by:
- connectivity,
- communication,
- community,
- creativity and
- co-creativity,
- collaboration exploiting…
- collective intelligence and
- conversation."
Jim Macnamara (2010) The 21st Century Media (R)EVOLUTION: Emergent Communication Practices, Peter Lang
PR Newser: Conversation Manager v Community Manager
Three: tools and techniques
Search and SEO
-
Recent arrivals at my PR Studies blog typed:
-
Two-way communication Grunig (Finland)
Help with search strategy
-
Wolfstar blog: The Long Tail
Blogging
-
Example: Clare Siobhan Callery: PR Student
Wikis and Wikipedia
-
Wikipedia's five pillars (including 'neutral point of view')
Newsfeeds and subscriptions
- Google Reader
Social networks
Photo and video sharing
Social bookmarking / news sharing sites
- What is social bookmarking?
- Delicious
- Digg, reddit, StumbleUpon
Four: developing an action plan
- Guidelines
- Central activities
- Local activities
- Good incentives / prizes
- Amazon tokens
- Flip video camera £100 (black; pink)
- iPod Touch 8Gb £140
- iPod Nano with camera £102
- Samsung ES15 10 Megapixel digital camera £57
- Western Digital 500Gb USB backup drive £68
Five: Questions and challenges
Reputational risk
- Edelman, Wal-Mart 'flogging' campaign
Social media guidelines
- 16 social media guidelines used by real companies, Econsultancy
- Coca-Cola: Online social media principles
- CIPR Social Media Guidelines
- Yahoo! employee blog guidelines
- IBM blogging policy and guidelines (pdf file)
- Edelman Managing employee bloggers (pdf file)
- WOMMA code of ethics
Monitoring, measurement and evaluation
- Katie Paine: How to measure social media relations