Thinking Out Loud

3 months ago I walked into a classroom, put down my school bag and sat front and centre, eager to learn what this e-marketing class would entail. Oh how different my thinking is now compared to back then.

Then:

• Online marketing meant figuring out which websites were popular with your target audience and paying for ads on that site so they saw them.
• Social media marketing was creating a Facebook page and getting as many people as possible to like it, so that when you posted, lots of people saw it.
• All companies should do as much as they possibly can online (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, Youtube, etc.) because the more they do the stronger online presence the will have
• The more money you paid Google, the higher up you showed on their search results.

Now:

• Online marketing, while requiring strategy and labour hours, does not require a lot of money to be successful
• Social media is for building relationships and having conversations with people…it is not for broadcasting.
• Different companies will use some online platforms, and not use others, depending on their target audience and where they “hang out”.
• Companies can do a lot to improve the quality score and optimize the search engine results of their website, without paying a cent.
• Anything online can be monitored to track success…it just requires a lot of analytical thinking, strategy and preparation.

In 23 classes I learned far more than the points mentioned, but these are the 5 main insights I will take away from this course. Things that I didn’t know before, things I found interesting, and things I know I can apply to whatever job I take after graduation.

One of the most exciting things about being a part of my generation is the new innovations and technical inventions we get to witness. Every day there is something brand new in the online and tech space revolutionizing the every day processes we seem to have  accepted as the norm. Square is one of those revolutions.

This is one of those business ideas that provides a win-win situation; no persuading required. Business’s want it for it’s low cost and simplicity and customers are happy with it too because it makes payment even easier.

Now businesses can use mobile strategies to increase their sales! Street vendors that previously could only accept cash payments, and fundraisers that previously had to spend $150 per credit/debit machine to rent them for a night can now better achieve their business goals.

Square is using mobile marketing in a completely different way. When a business uses Square it isn’t using mobile marketing to send customers promotions, it isn’t changing the price with coupons, it isn’t offering a new place for customers to purchase from and it isn’t providing a new or improved product. Square focuses on a 5th marketing “P”…the process. It’s simple, when the purchase process and experience is easy for customers, they are more likely to return.

2 separate articles on AdAge today? I guess I should look into this whole Social TV thing. According to good old Wikipedia Social TV is a “general term for technology that supports communication and social interaction in the context of watching television”. Basically, since the early 2000s tech companies and television networks have been exploring ways for people, while watching television, to interact through social networking with other people also interested in that show.

It makes sense. According to research 86% of Americans use their phones while watching TV, and 33% use mobile apps. With multiple televisions around the house, plus computers and tablets, television viewing is losing its traditional social nature as more people watch it on their own.

So why are tech companies and television networks so eager to design these new social TV platforms for viewers to interact with each other about their favourite shows? Advertising of course! It is clear that television advertising is drastically taking a dive so TV networks need to think of a different way to target viewers.  In their minds Social TV platforms may provide that opportunity.

But will it work? Will Social TV gain enough buy-in that it just becomes the norm to participate in social networking while watching any kind of television show? I don’t think so. I guess it all depends on the platform, its features and the benefits, but I know that I personally would not want to be on my iPhone talking to strangers about a show I’m watching. I watch television to turn-off from the thinking and exhausting social interactions of the day…I cuddle up on the couch with tea and and just relax. But then again I am a late adopter to technology and social media, and I am sure no one thought people would be interested in the successful social networks that have ended up taking over the internet, so who knows?

Social TV is definitely something to look out for though. There are a lot of big players out there who want it to be successful.

Elijah Burns, a 16 year old boy from Surrey BC, seems to have figured out social media marketing better than most large corporations. Eli loves to sing and he is amazing at it so like most aspiring performers creates and posts videos of himself on facebook.

Eli recently posted on his facebook page “70 likes for a video of me singing. You guys choose the song”. Within 3 hours he was at 100 likes, and with only 900 facebook friends that’s an 11% engagement rate. If we look at large corporations like L’oreal Paris Canada, they are only at an average of 0.05% and Chevrolet is at 0.1%. So what did Eli do that was so different from the big players?

1. Involved the audience – Eli could easily have just made a video and posted it. But instead he first posted a status with a clear call to action, generating interest and excitement as well as engaging the audience by letting them choose the song. All 100 people that liked that status were then waiting for Eli to post the video and eager to see which song he chose. Obviously companies can’t do this before every piece of content they post, but instead of just broadcasting content they think their customers would like, they should ask more questions and allow their audience to participate in what they are doing.
2. Scarcity – Although Eli talks about his singing a lot, he rarely ever makes a video or performs. When all of his school friends saw he would post a video if they clicked “like”, they became intrigued and excited to actually hear how he sounded. Many companies think the more content they post, the more engaged they will keep their audience. Maybe they should try the scarcity approach and post less…or maybe they should try talking about a specific piece of content a lot before actually releasing it.

I mentioned it in my last blog post but corporations need to start thinking like regular human beings when they participate in social media. What if they started thinking like an average 16 year old boy trying to engage his facebook friends in what he loves to do? The most interesting part is that I doubt Eli even realized how smart and strategic he was being with that post.

And because I talked a lot about Eli’s video without actually showing it…and now you are really wanting to meet this guy and hear him sing…here it is: 

Every company with an online strategy wants to create content that will be shared. But what?

Think to yourself: my customer is a human being, I am a human being, when I am on social media for personal use what engages me? What do I like to share?

Last month I published a post called Unique and Awesome. It talked about how to make a video go viral…by making it unique and awesome! Well this evening I discovered another video that at the moment only has 301 views but at the rate it is spreading on my facebook feed it won’t be long before that number shoots up.

This is a piece of user generated content for Coca Cola. 2 guys made it…not Coca Cola’s marketing department. The reason it is spreading so fast though has nothing to do with Coca Cola. It is spreading because

1. It is specific to Vancouver. People in Vancouver want to watch it to see if there is anything they recognize or can relate to.
2. It is executed extremely well
3. It is unique and awesome!

If Coca Cola’s online monitoring procedure is effective they should pick up on this…and just think of the potential!! They could contact these guys and give them an incentive to make a Sampled Toronto, a Sampled Calgary, a Sampled Winnipeg…the opportunities are endless. Each video would spread in each city and Coca Cola would be a part of it.

It’s virality, user generated content and online monitoring all rolled into one!

I just finished reading a very interesting article about DDB New York’s latest ad campaign; they have taken tweets with the #FirstWorldProblems hashtag and filmed Haitians reading the “problems”.

As a marketing student and a missionary I have 2 things to say about this:

1. As a marketing student — I love the idea of taking online content to create offline content. I have seen many occasions where offline marketing strategies have been transferred to the online space in the form of television ads going on a youtube channel, or a print ad being used for online advertising purposes as well. And, of course, even more occasions where online content is used to create more online content like blogs. But I am trying hard to think of another campaign that brings the online offline; I am sure they exist but none that easily come to mind.

2. As a missionary — it was only recently that I was having a conversation about what I thought of the “First World Problems” phrase. DDB and the ad specifically puts the phrase in a very negative light, pointing out that these ‘problems’ really aren’t problems at all and everyone using the phrase are spoilt whiners. I disagree though and really like the phrase when it is used for the right purposes.

After 3 trips to a rural village in Uganda, I see this hashtag being used as a way for people to acknowledge that the ‘problem’ they are facing is nothing compared to the problems around the world. If someone else makes a trivial complaint, instead of the guilt-tripping, mood-killing, conversation-stopper “think of the children in Africa” (now rarely used for those reasons), people are responding with “first world problems” as a more acceptable way of communicating ‘stop whining because you have it great compared to some’ and consciously thinking about the two very different worlds.

Debates over twitter hashtags #firstworldproblems

Quite a few years ago online marketers realized the power and potential of facebook users doing the marketing work for them. They created various different contests in which the person with the most “likes” won. It was a win-win situation in that the competitor walked away with a sweet prize and the company increased their brand awareness and number of facebook page ‘likes’ by hundreds if not thousands. And, as with all new, different, great ideas, it worked really really well at first.

But, 2 years ago, I was involved in one of these contests and my opinion of them quickly changed. Facebook likes were just a component of a much bigger, 3 round competition and during the first round it was great. My team publicized it all over facebook, posted on our walls, messaged our friends, posted on our friends’ walls…and we won with over 1000 likes. But then round 2 came along and by round 3 of the competition we realized that our friends were sick and tired of us spamming their facebook trying to get them to ‘like’ the content.

A ‘like’ took not even 1 second of their time but by this point in the competition we had people so annoyed that they were unliking content they previously had liked. We as competitors understood this and sympathized with our friends…but the company for some reason didn’t. They did’t realize that these facebook contests that were suppose to increase brand awareness were actually destroying their brand reputation.

Now, quite a few years after the first contest launched, companies need to realize that the “like” contest fad is dying down fast and attempting to launch one now could prove far more harmful to the brand than beneficial.

Someone came up with this idea…anyone can come up with a new one!

A recent emarketer article stated it really well, that we as website users are tired of creating a different login account for everything we purchase or sign up for. I feel as if I have so many different usernames and passwords for so many different things that I either have to write them all down (not exactly the safest option) or click “forgot password” every time I need to login.

The article also says, however, that social logins are a great solution to that; using your facebook, twitter, google login etc to access many different sites. I totally understand the convenience of it, so why, even when I hate having so many login accounts, do I still choose to create a new login in rather than use my facebook?

Simple. I am scared. Regardless of what facebook and the website guarantees won’t happen, I am scared the website will gain access to my facebook details and start contacting me in some way. I am scared that even if I don’t ‘like’ anything on the website, that somehow my visit is going to show up on my newsfeed. There are so many facebook scams out there now that I don’t trust signing in with my facebook login to any other site but facebook itself.

So, assuming there are others that feel the same way as me, I see there is a massive opportunity for a platform that lets you use the same login for everything, yet is not associated with any social networking sites.