• Secondary strike action is banned in the UK. But what about in Second Life?

VNUnet is reporting that IBM has a Second Life strike on its hands. IBM has been active in Second Life for some time. A dispute with their Italian business office in real life has resulted in workers picketing the IBM offices in Second Life.

• CRM 2.0? So where does CRM go next?

Great post by Forrester Research on the rumoured value of Facebook. A silly amount? At first sight maybe but not if you look at how transactional data underpins that valuation it starts to make sense.

Nokia have recently started to move into social media by providing a 'mash-up' (user generated mix and match content) platform. Now it is looking for a 'customer communication' champion. Someone who blogs and interfaces with the community. With a claimed 2 million participants on its 'mash-up' platform it is not hard to see that this is a very important move.

If I was one of the big publishers or list managers I would be very worried now. What value is my contact lists if a company can build its own community or interface to the likes of Facebook and other social media networking sites?

Do you have to be an massive company like Nokia to do this? No. There are many micro brands that have very successfully used social media and community marketing to grow their businesses.

<a href="http://technorati.com/claim/nfwx3xcq4k" rel="me">Technorati Profile</a>

Adage in the US is reporting that Martha Stewart is looking at social media and online generally as a way of extending their already extensive life style brands which cover radio and TV shows, books, magazines and merchanise.

She already has a Facebook page and they have announced plans to move into wikis and explore other social media tools.

P&G have in the past been very focussed on using traditional media for advertising and promotion using the product brand. They have, like every other global brand, kept product R&D and market testing and research under tight control.

In the last year or so it has changed strategy and is now focussing on openly engaging with consumers directly and interactively rather than discreetly. Fastcompany.com have a brilliant report on what the giant has been up to.

You either get it or you don't I suppose.

While the Telegraph is reporting on how ‘more than 70% of (UK) businesses have barred’ social media sites like Facebook as they are a drain on employee productivity, others are actively encouraging employees to use them or are using social media themselves. This weeks HR Weekly Bulletin reports on recruitment company TMP conducting interviews in Second Life.

This is an extract from the HR Weekly:

"Recruitment consultancy TMP Worldwide is to conduct the first ever job interviews in virtual world Second Life. Interviews will be carried out for three clients - Yell, Royal Bank of Scotland and KPMG. TMP is using is (sic) Second Life Island for recruitment."

Slowly but surely the internet as a viable channel of quality content delivery is happening.

BBC Worldwide has just announced the availability of material by Michael Palin and Steve Coogan amongst others. No longer do you have to rely on YouTube to see such content. Traditional production companeis and broadcasters are realising many people now want content delivery via the internet either at home or when out and about.

A report by VNU says the Eden Project has put Web 2.0 and Social Media communications tools at the heart of a £50m funding submission to the the Big Lottery Fund's Living Landmarks programme.

The Eden Project is launching a web site next month to support its bid to create The Edge, a centre that will explore living with climate change.

The aim is for the web site to have rich media and provide interactivity with members of the public and interested groups.

The Eden Projects head of IT, Jon Curry was quoted in the VNU article as saying “It is all about using technology to get your message across to the public and capturing their interest.”

Sesame Street are starting to produce weekly 5 minute podcasts. They will be created from previous programming or specially produced. They are doing this as a result of feedback from parents who wanted mobile educational media content for their children to use at any time when out and about from the home. The first 26 episodes will focus on letters of the alphabet to help build children's literacy skills.

Business organisations would do well to look at the site as it is an excellent example of the use of personal video players and ‘smart’ phones as a very cost effective way of educating and informing a mobile sales force and other remote home workers.

It is not often you get to hear or watch a top EU official discuss what is happening with policy.

In an audio and video podcast Robert Madelin, Director General of DG SANCO was interviewed by Dr Josephine Wills of the European Food Information Council (EUFIC) on the EU Platfom for Action on Diet, Physical Activity and Health.

As the EUFIC web site states

"This is the first time that a multi-stakeholder initiative has been endorsed by the College of Commissioners as a legitimate tool in the legislative toolbox....

Mr. Madelin hopes that the Commission’s decision will be endorsed by the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers later on this year. Furthermore, in the current era of “better regulation”, where such initiatives are being observed carefully, he hopes that the Platform concept will be adopted by colleagues both at national and European levels...."

(Disclosure: EUFIC are a podcast client of Focus Business Communications)

Spotted in the last few days....

Web 2.0 explained

A great video interview on Web 2.0 with Dan Faber, Editor-In-Chief of ZDNet. Dan defines Web 2.0 as a set of technologies that enables connection and collaboration. He could have added engagement and communication. If you want to know what Web 2.0 and how it can help with employee and customer engagement then check it out. It lasts just over 5 minutes.

Web 2.0 impacting on recruitment and career choices

Harvey Nash has reported that Web 2.0 is changing the way people are looking at career advice. They are using Social Media sites to seek input and advice.

Social Media software doubling in size

Social media and networking sites continue to grow. Nielsen/NetRatings' August stats for social network use in the US show continued strong growth for Facebook and business network LinkedIn. It reports that Facebook increased its number of users by 117% year-on-year (to 19.1m) while LinkedIn grew 163% (to 4.4m) 

Podcasting and its creative use in marketing 

The Irish Tourist board has used a US competition to get winners to record a ‘sounds of Ireland’ podcast of their holiday travels. They had over 10,000 entries to the competition. A great way to drive traffic to the site before and after as everyone who entered will want to know what the podcasts sounded like!

Online sales in July hit £4b according to a report in Computer Weekly. This is 15% of all retail sales.

The research showed that multi-channel outlets (Waitrose, Tesco etc) have grown to match pure online outlets (Amazon etc). The resport says the biggest challenge going forward is for competitors to differentiate themselves by offering a Web 2.0 social media experience and for the industry to address the security and identity theft issues that stops many consumers buying online.

This months e-newsletter from the IDM - IDM Insights contains two articles on social media marketing. Why they did not conduct a podcast interview with the social media expert rather than just a story I am not sure.

What should they have done:

• Taken extracts from the interview or artcle and summarised them for the newsletter
• Interviewed the expert either 'face-to-face' or via ISDN link like Skype and put the interview on the website as an ongoing resource
• Promoted the full interview availability in the newsletter
• Done a social media format press release with links back to the full interview
• Created a Forum on the subject and promoted in the article and the podcast
• Mentioned it and the Forum in a blog and allowed comments 

This would have really leveraged social media techniques.

Thanks to Digital Bulletin for the news that the Cadbury Gorilla ad had reached 500,000 views on YouTube. What I also noticed was that the campaign costs a cool £6.2m. I expect a large amount of that was spent on media (after Mr Collins took his share of course).

I personally did not know it had been on TV. A friend e-mailed me the YouTube link and I posted about it on my blog earlier. The cost of getting those 500,000 views on YouTube will have been virtually zero as it will mainly have been done by word-of-mouth. If I was the marketing director at Cadbury's I would be wondering about the budget spend on broadcast media versus what not spent on social media. Just what was the response to the TV spots? Without a direct response mechanism I guess they will never really know. If they do and brand recall surveys will they ignore any online media exposure.

Maybe in the big scheme of things it does not matter. Maybe integrating online and offline is best anyway. But a part of me would still want to know. Just like in the early days of direct and then e-mail it maybe prudent to take part of the budget to support social media activity.

If I was Cadbury's I would run a mash-up competition. This is what we did - now show us yours. I would also look at the releasing a 'making of the ad' showing make up, camara shots etc. (OK - showing my a/v geek side). What sort of casting process did they use? Did they ask the actors to bring their own gorilla suits? What were the auditions like? This could become a series. Bit late for viewers to vote on their favourite gorilla. Shame. This could run and run...

Notice that the article refers to 200+ people on Gorilla Facebook group but look at the comments and you will see someone says it is nearer 9,000. Wow!

Great post by Brian Solis on Facebook and its powerful use in as a personal brand.

I got an invitation to join from a friend so did and now find it has become an integral part of my business day. So what have I achieved in the last 2 months.

• Two old school chums have found me and got in touch. One is in the same line of business as myself so it is brilliant to have a fellow traveller to talk to.
• Five old work mates have got in touch and one we are starting a collaberative project with. The others are within organisations we would one day love to work with so aprt from the socialising element there is business networking
• Three prospective clients have contact me. We already have a costed proposal in with one and the other two we are to meet. 
• I have joined a number of special interest groups on social media and podcasting and attended some meetings which has been good socially but also professionally
• I have been bitten twice by vampires but obviously not so bad that I felt the urge to become one myself and bite people
• A relative found me and it is really nice to see what she is upto with her new born son. We exchange FaceBook messages but I would never have thought of phoning her or writing.
• I have had a sheep thrown at me, been hugged and had drinks bought for me and was once 'bitch slapped'. I am still trying to understand if this is the online equivalent of office banter and ribbing.
• I have had three instances of people seeing where I am have suggested meeting for coffee as they are local to me and in one case we found we were actually both on courses at the same place. Without Facebook how would I have known.

The whole process of keeping track with people means I will never have the send them the Christmas card with the note - 'we must meet up soon' standard message. They can see what I am upto and where I am (businesswise) and contact me or comment as relevant.

I have personal information on my profile. No harm in people knowing what music, books and films I like. Who knows what similar interests some of my new and old 'business friends' will find we have and vice versa? A case of Alan Partridge - 'Knowing me. Knowing you' but in a business context.

So far I have found Facebook a great business and business socialising tool. I love it.

   Not me but Henry Jenkins

If you are at all interested in Web 2.0 and Social Media you should take a look at the work of Henry Jenkins of MIT (Wikipedia entry). This is his page at MIT.

Henry does academic work into the world of games, traditional media and new media to see how it is impacting society. His work on the Comparative Media Studies programme at MIT is fascinating as it goes to the heart of social media and active audience engagement.

Relevance for business people?  Think - engaged customers and engaged employees.

I come from the pre-digital world but my kids have never known a time without PCs, mobile phones and satellite TV. They have different attitudes and behaviours to me as a result. Should we care?

Yes.

At a societal level youth attitudes and behaviour are important. Politicians, policy makers and educationalists have to understand what motivates them. Equally what motivates older members of the audience to get engaged in social media? What prompted my late Father at 78 to get himself trained to use the internet and then get my Mother to use it?

Equally if we are in marketing or HR the youth group could be critical for the future success of your organisation.

Marketing need to understand and communicate with an important group of prospective customers.

HR need to engage with future employees and managers of tomorrow and motivate them.

Click here to listen to a podcast interview with Henry.

Barclays International are starting to use podcasts to provide information targeted at business people moving to and from the UK. They have a well designed site and are promoting future planned podcasts on it which is a nice touch to help generate and maintain an audience. They are providing audio and video versions.

Three improvements I would suggest.

• Thumb nail picture of the presenter and a link to their bio. (We have found people like to see who is speaking and know what is their experience and background. Strange when you can see a video of them anyway but always helps improve click-through especially on audio only podcasts)
• An RSS feed on the site so people can subscribe (I may have missed it but I couldn't see it and will help generate an audience)
• Put a note on how long the podcast will be (they are perfect at about 5 minutes - but people like to know before they download or start playing)

Thanks to Richard Sambrook (head of BBC News) for his blog post with this link on news about Facebooks privacy statement. Does make you think....

This one will win an award and you should check up how many mash-ups exist on YouTube already....

Viral marketing at its best.

GM Europe has established a social media 'press room'. With information online in the form of text, images, video and photos it also has suitable RSS feeds. It is simple but effective.

For companies unsure how to best use social media it demonstrates that it is possible to use simple and effective materials already available. Actually many members of the press do not want an over-complicated, marketing 'spun' site but rather simple information and the ability to engage in conversation withe senior management. 

Interesting blog post by Jonathan Schwartz, CEO of Sun on how they are using social media tools to increase audience reach and reduce costs at the same time. 

As he puts it in his post...

“...we did some simple math on launch events at Sun - we spent a ton of money, got 500 - 1000 invited guests into the audience, and missed most of the planet. By definition, our marketplace can't fit into a single room. So we began streaming our launch events via the web.

Lo and behold, when we counted our web audience, the numbers were staggering - we were reaching 100,000's of people. So we took the money we were otherwise spending on launch events in luxury hotels, and moved it to improve the global web experience - the chandeliers weren't quite as fancy, but we wanted the audience focused on content, not crystal.”

What he could have added was ‘and helped reduce the amount of travel CO2 omissions by Sun people traveling to events all over the world '. What a package....save money, reduce logistics and management time, get a bigger audience and help save the planet!

Does this mean the end of launch events? Of course not. As members of the human race we enjoy other peoples company. Business networking and conversations are enhanced when ‘face-to-face’. Technology is great but human interaction works too.  

What I recommend to our clients is that they look at a core event somewhere but arrange to video that and establish feedback Q&A sessions and Forums to engage with customers who have questions and participate in the resultant conversation in the blogosphere. This can be live streamed or recorded for later podcasting.

Apple last week announced a price cut of $200 on the iPhone only a few weeks after its initial introduction. Many of those customers who had queued overnight to be the first in town to buy one were understandably upset. They contacted Apple and commented on various Forums as to their displeasure.

Whilst there are many angles to this story. Are sales so poor Apple are slashing prices? Do they fear competitors enetering? Is another model on its way for Christmas? Maybe. Maybe not. The real story for me is the speed of response. Most companies when they make a 'mistake' use delaying tactics to either give them time to decide how to respond or hope it will all blow over.

Commendably Apple did not. They reacted and although the apology was couched with self justification, there is a $100 rebate (see open letter from Steve Jobs on Apples site). Will this be enough? Probably. Apple customers are very loyal.

I have an unusual way of measuring how much I have liked a business book. I mark interesting passages as I am reading them with ‘Post-It’ sticky notes and make comments or notes in the margins.

I recently re-read a business book because I enjoyed it so much that I had used over 70 ‘sticky notes’ in its 223 pages. That’s a record.

The book was ‘The New Influencers – a Marketer’s Guide to the New Social Media’ by Paul Gillin. Although it includes blogging this book is much wider in scope covering the phenomena of those who are influential and how they use social media tools to communicate to others. Packed full with practical examples and case studies I have been recommending it to clients.

I decided it would be great to interview Paul for a podcast and ask him about his book and his latest thoughts. Even though the book was published earlier this year Paul’s research was in mid to late 2006. A year is a long time in social media terms. I wanted to ask him for examples of companies he feels now are effectively using social media for marketing and in what ways.

I hope you enjoy the podcast

I have been a fan of Fredrick Reichheld  since the early 1990’s and my days in the IT industry helping to set up Tektronix’s colour printer division in Europe.

For me the key to Tek’s success in a business then dominated by players with bigger budgets was to focus on channel and customer loyalty. Now Fred and his team have taken loyalty to the next level with the Net Promoter Score. This is being taken up by large corporations but I thought I would share with you an experience which embodies many of the NPS key principles but applied to a smaller business.

A couple of years ago I was asked by the local region of a UK wide business membership organisation to help them with a problem of declining recruitment and retention. They had tried all sorts of marketing and promotional activity and proudly announced they have over 30 services they could offer members.

My first action was to identify all the internal stakeholders. I initially based that upon management input but I quickly discovered that there were a few employees who were running or involved with membership service programmes and so had valuable input. (Note: As to be expect management did not know everything that happened at the ‘coal face’ but when making strategic decisions such a situation can be dangerous!)

My first task was to make sure the stakeholder team had a clear understanding of the issues and reason for action. As to be expected some were more supportive than others but at least everyone knew what was going on and why. In any change management project communication is critical. The first three questions I asked the stakeholder team at our first project meeting were:

·         What were the membership benefits?

·         How do the members rank them in terms of value to them?

·         What programmes do we have to enable members to introduce or recruit a friend?

The first question provoked some discussion as there was not one ‘master’ document readily available that summarised everything. At the meeting we thrashed out a single sheet which listed them all. For the second question there was no agreed definitive answer. So I asked which services were most used and least used. Whilst this may not be 100% accurate because members may not be aware of all the services it is a reasonable benchmark. A few answers were forthcoming but there was no general agreement. To the third question the answer was ‘nothing’. The company had fallen into the ‘business as usual’ trap. People were working really hard focussing on the ‘day-to-day’ job as declining membership, falling recruitment and ‘budget reduction by a thousand cuts’ had become a regular pattern.  

I put a proposal to the board. Let’s ask the members what they value via an online survey and ‘face-to-face’ meetings. We prepared a micro-site where we listed all the services provided with a questionnaire which asked people to feed back on why they joined, what they valued, what services we should drop and what extra we should offer and a space for any other comments. We also asked how many would recommend membership to other business people. We offered a bottle of champagne to the name of a person participating that we pulled out the hat (no big budgets for prizes and to be honest most people participated because they wanted to not because of a prize). Out of 3.5k members we had over 350 responses. Of those 20% (70) had made suggestions on what we could do to re-engage with them and other members. Most simply felt unloved and neglected except at annual renewal time. They felt that added insult to injury in many ways. The truth was that 15 people (just over 4% of all responding) said they would recommend membership. 70 said they would not (20%) and the rest did not answer. We responded to everyone and promised to keep them updated on our progress and plans.

We then held a series of breakfast and lunch roundtables in multiple locations so that we met directly almost 100 members. Busy business people were willing to take the time out of their diaries to share issues and concerns with us. The feedback was direct – sometimes painfully so as it reflected a lot of frustration and some anger. A few said they would be leaving membership anyway and ‘broadsided’ us. It was all valuable information. Many following the programme and meeting were going to give the organisation one more chance to improve and  see what would happened after the meetings. I cannot remember meeting anyone directly who would recommend any friends to join. In Fred’s Net Promoter Score methodology it was a disaster!

Now came the tough part. The organisation was offering services that were not wanted and also failing to provide others that were being asked for. Change is never easy but with hard work over the next six months a set of service programmes were put in place that met most of the members concerns. Those least popular services were phased out after careful consultation with those members who were using them. This gave the organisation the budget and time to enhance and launch new services meeting membership needs. What was important was to ensure a few fast track programmes were rolled out and that the members – especially those who participated in the survey and meetings – were kept updated at all times.

So what was the result? The survey was embedded in to the organisations ongoing communication and consultation programmes. Three years later the organisation membership retention rates have been reduced by over 80%. Recruitment is at its highest levels for many years. They also have an active and successful ‘Introduce a friend’ programme. There are still issues to be worked through but the basis for long term business success is there. The icing on the cake is that the organisation was the number 1 region in the UK last year thanks to all the ongoing hard work of the team.

So what was the learning?

• Listen to your customers. Give them a way to talk and they will. You may not like what you hear but that is part of the process
• Ensure the stakeholder team is inclusive and has authority to make decisions
• Act on the feedback you get
• Look for some quick wins and keep working on longer term changes too
• Ensure you keep customers/members updated on progress – don’t initially engage and then go quiet. Keep the contact and momentum up

Today I would be using social media tools to help me create and maintain a membership community. I would put the questionaire online and let everyone openly comment if they wanted and share with others in the community.