The last two weeks have led to some interesting insights into consumer’s expectations of how they want to interact with brands.

From Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere, which reported that 4 in 5 bloggers write about their experiences – good or bad – with a company or product, to Cone’s report that an overwhelming majority of Americans (85%) active on blogs and other social media services expect to interact with companies through social media.

Continue reading "Social Expectations - Consumers are Looking for Better Interaction"

So… I’ve been busy my first month at Viget. As the new marketing services director, I’ve spent a lot of time learning from colleagues, meeting new people, redefining our marketing services, and working with a wide range of clients.  Like everyone else, I wish there were more hours in the day. There’s always someone else I could call, an email I could have sent, a blog post to write, or cool tool to check out.

One of the many things I’ve learned this past month is if you’ve got something to say, blog. So in talking with the team, we decided to continue sharing what we’re learning in a more regular format. It’s about giving other online marketers a peek at what’s working (and what’s not), and our take on "why." We’re calling it “Under The Hood” because, just like any well-maintained car, there’s a certain amount of maintenance required for true marketing success. And good marketers will tell you there’s always an opportunity for some fine tuning and performance enhancements.

Continue reading "Introducing Me and “Under the Hood”"

Lane Becker of Get Satisfaction delivered one of the best talks at this year’s Web 2.0 Expo in New York. (You can check out my full recap of the conference here.) 

His talk, Customer Service is the New Marketing, has important insights for how any company - startup or major corporation - promotes their product and builds loyalty from their customers. Becker made the case that the best way to market your company is through the customer experience itself. Drawing from the hospitality industry, Becker suggested that the role of a hotel concierge is the new model for meeting customer’s needs. As Brian Solis aplty wrote:

Marketing-savvy corporate executives are working with PR, Advertising, and Marcom teams to explore options and strategies on how to participate in relevant online conversations. This represents a shift in outbound marketing as it creates a direct channel between companies and customers, and ultimately people. It starts to look a lot less like marketing and a lot more like customer service.

Continue reading "Web 2.0 Expo: Customer Service is the New Marketing"

Our September Middle School Marketing group continued the tradition of discussing ways to bridge the gap between old and new school marketing. There were several new faces, but as always the conversation sparked some interesting debate. We initially set out to discuss three questions:

1. What are some examples of social media client case studies? How have mature companies used social media not just to experiment but to really have an impact (beyond just early-adopter “luck”)? How did they do it? (I guess that’s three righ there...oops)


2. What tools and metrics are companies using to measure and demonstrate success?


3. Is email marketing dying, morphing, or re-surging? How does it fit overall?

As usual, time was against us, and we only got to points one and two (mostly two)--leaving us plenty to talk about in October!

Here’s a quick recap:

The question "How do you measure social media?" is getting louder. It seems like everyone is asking, "How do you quantify?" "How do you measure?" or "What defines success?"

Nicholas kicked it off with a live demo of Radian6 capabilities.  Our review of this monitoring tool raised an interesting discussion about "measuring" vs. "monitoring." You "measure" goals, you "monitor" conversations. "Measuring" defines a goal and measures success in fulfilling that goal, while "monitoring" simply reports on what’s happening and does not fulfill a goal in and of itself (KD Paine has a good post on this and also check out Ryan’s post on how Mini Cooper linked buzz to sales). That being said, the two need to work in tandem. With all these monitoring tools it might be easier to keep track of your brand, but many companies struggle with analyzing data, measuring it against a goal, and, more importantly, acting.

Everyone agreed Radian6 seemed like a pretty solid tool, but there was also some talk of other options, including one of my favorite’s Yahoo! Pipes (which is free). Rather than go in-depth on each of these tools, check a few for yourself:

Continue reading "Middle School Marketing - Social Monitoring"

Steph and I just had an IM discussion about corporate blogs, and we thought we’d share it with you. Why? Because it is a frequent topic of conversation in the Viget Marketing Lab.

When a company decides to "get relevant" in the online space, a blog is usually the first thing they think of—which is understandable as the ubiquity of blogs engenders visions of attainability and low risk. The company may already have "News and Events" content, so it sort of makes sense to just transition that content into a blog, right?

Not exactly.

Here is the IM conversation, and I close with a summary in case you want to skip straight to the bottom. Check it out (as a disclaimer I had to remove a few pieces that were client specific, and alter a few lines so it makes sense. And please excuse the grammar, and occasional inside joke):

Steph H: question

Josh C: talk to me

Continue reading "Corporate Blogging Tip"

The digital era has redefined what it means to create and sustain a brand, writes Bob Greenberg, CEO and chief creative officer of R/GA in AdWeek. The challenge is to create engaging experiences across multiple digital touchpoints that cultivate the company’s branding goals and respond to the user’s needs. 

For example, Greenberg notes the role that Nike’s  Ballers Network Facebook app has played in facilitating engagement between the Nike brand and its consumers. The team at Nike looked for opportunities to better serve basketball players, and found the role of facilitator to help connect players and find open courts. Similar to their work to connect runners, it’s a great move by Nike to identify opportunities to build engagement through facilitating connections with their core basketball audience.  

Continue reading "Cultivating Brands in a Digital World"

Ryan and I recently returned from ad:tech Chicago, and I thought I’d add my two cents to Ryan’s summation. As a warning, this post has two parts which, although related, could be completely separate posts. Accordingly, I’ll save you the pain of attempting to create a lame analogy in an effort to connect the two topics and just split it up.

Part 1) Clay Shirky Was Awesome.

Part 2) Case Studies.

Continue reading "“If It’s Being Discussed, It’s Marketing” & Case Studies from ad:tech"

With the Olympics in full swing, Nike has gone all out to promote their vast new lineup of products and the innovative technology behind them.

But rather than rely solely on classic Nike advertising with hardcore athletes doing their thing to a rocking soundtrack, they’ve rounded out their advertising strategy with an impressive, in-depth collection of conversations with the people behind the Nike magic - product designers, engineers and scientists in the Nike Lab.

Continue reading "Nike’s Branded Storytelling"

Nearly 60 percent of the respondents to a recent McKinsey global survey reported satisfaction with Web 2.0 initiatives and see them as a driver of competitive advantage. The McKinsey Global Survey Results on Building the Web 2.0 Enterprise (free with registration) also reported that these same companies expect to increase their efforts inleveraging these tools.

The report also highlights that this is bigger than just PR or marketing - companies are adapting their organizational structure and process to better take advantage of social tools.

This isn’t always an easy task for traditional companies; but some are recognizing that increasing their use of collaborative tools both internally and externally is a valuable endeavor.  Peter Kim puts it well: "Social technologies are bigger than just marketing and PR campaigns.  They’re helping to reinvent the organization.  Companies satisfied with their experience with Web 2.0 technologies are applying them within change management practices and organizational structures. Companies are using new tools to reconnect with customers for co-creation and collaboration. ‘Reconnecting,’ you ask?  Yes, the way businesses started and survived long before advertising as we hate it existed."

Digital marketing is at an unprecedented stage today. Never before has such a rich and immersive set of tools spanned across media to allow companies and consumers to interact. And where marketing was once segregated to individual media - print, television, radio - digital marketing has smashed these silos to allow a new kind of persuasive digital storytelling to emerge. 

This transition is not without it’s struggles, and for two days in Chicago last week, digital marketers from across the country gathered for the latest AdTech conference to discuss what’s working and what still needs to improve.

Continue reading "Blending Creativity and Technology in Digital Marketing at AdTech"

Another great thing about working at Viget is that we each get a conference budget of $100k every year. Kidding, it’s not $100k--but old man humor lives on.

Anyhow, Ryan and I will be using said conference budget to attend this year’s ad:tech in Chicago. And when it comes to digital marketing, it’s the only place to be, when you think about it. The conference begins next Tuesday, August 5 and lasts all the way until August 6 at ye olde Navy Pier.  The list of speakers looks great, and I’m really looking forward to cramming as much into my head as possible.

ad:tech seems to be past the "What is social media?" stage and instead—judging from the talk titles—it looks like the discussion will require at least a "New Media 101" prerequisite. I’m sure we will learn a lot!

If you’re going, let us know--or email Josh when you’re there, or feel free to follow all the conference goodness on Ryan’s Twitter stream, which will be on overdrive during the event. We’re looking forward to letting you know how it goes!

Two important reports were released today with enlightening perspectives on social networking and online communities. Jeremiah Owyang of Forrester Research released their Best and Worst of Social Networking, 2008, and Deloitte release the 2008 Tribalization of Business Survey, where the WSJ reports on the study’s findings of why most online communities fail.

The Forrester report has some of the more interesting results, with a great report card of notable case studies:

Forrester applied its Social Network Marketing Review methodology to programs run by 16 firms in four industries: automotive, media, technology, and consumer products. Only the BMW Series 1 received a passing grade, and half of the firms scored a zero or lower. But even with these dismal overall results, we found examples of specific best practices: The Dell/Microsoft (Red) program provided a rich media theme that was easily sharable, Sony’s BMG page for Alicia Keys was personable and interactive, and Kraft’s DiGiorno Pizza delivered a unique interactive experience with its members. To improve social network marketing, brands must develop community-centered content and activities, measure success based on new criteria, and be prepared to participate.

Continue reading "Reporting on the Best and Worst of Online Communities"

If it’s an 8am meeting with eager conversations about Twitter and measuring ROI, it must mean the Middle School Marketing crew was back in action yesterday morning at the Lab.

We gathered again this month to continue our conversation about bridging traditional best practices in online marketing with the latest trends in social media marketing.  As so many marketing conversations do lately, ours quickly focused in on Twitter (proud new owners of the local startup Summize). When it comes to the bottom line, one person asked if it is worth investing the time and energy into Twitter. (And for that matter, what about the rest of the social media utility world?) While the group had various perspectives on how they used Twitter, without a doubt it’s biggest value was in providing a radically improved tool to help companies do a better job of listening. Nicholas was even kind enough to put together a spreadhseet of helpful services.

Continue reading "Middle School Marketing Talks Twitter, Strategy and Twin Tech"

What do you do if you want to track how often a link on your site is clicked? How do you see those links in Google Analytics (GA)? What filters and profiles should you create to accurately track this information? Hopefully, I can accurately answer these questions—some of them in this post, some in the future. *Warning* if you don’t care about web analytics, reading this post may produce seizures and a strong desire to fall asleep on the job.

First, why in the world would you want to track internal links? Isn’t that stupid idea?

• If I click the “go here now” link on my site, and it takes me to another page on my site ( www.example/go_here_now.html ), why do I need to track the link? Wouldn’t I just check the navigation path report for /go_here_now.html? Yes, you could do that. But what if you have multiple links on Page 1 that link to Page 2? How do you know what links brought someone from Page 1 to Page 2? Was it the blue link? Or the green button? The navigation path simply tells you what page people came from and to, it doesn’t tell you exactly how they got from page to page

Second, which method of link tagging should you use? _trackPageview or utm? 

Continue reading "How To Track Internal Links in Google Analytics"

This is my first time referencing, and being referenced by, an Inspire blog post. Cross-pollination delight. Frankly, I’m honored. Hopefully the designers will let me sit at their lunch table now.

In case you didn’t know, Adobe & Google have teamed up to make Flash content SEO friendly. For as long as I can remember anyone interested in SEO has steered clear of Flash – which in my mind is unfortunate as Flash can provide a web experience that non-Flash sites cannot replicate. Erik covered everything really well, so I’ll just throw in a few additional thoughts.

Yahoo! Too: First, it’s worth noting that Adobe also passed along their technology to Yahoo! and while Yahoo! has not yet implemented the technology, Yahoo! said , “Yahoo! is committed to supporting webmaster needs with plans to support searchable SWF and is working with Adobe to determine the best possible implementation.”

Meta data and cache: As Erik mentioned, this step forward is still only indexing any text and links within a Flash piece, it won’t be indexing photos (even if they are ALT tagged) or other non-textual content.

The same goes for meta data. These algorithms (I just pushed my glasses up) will not index meta data nor will Google cache the indexed information. I know there are debates on whether meta data even matters anymore; but when your site is Flash and needs all the help it can get – meta data could be helpful. But, moot point. Also, the lack of cache means we won’t be able to discover what exactly Google has indexed.

Fail, Google.

But that’s not all folks. I have, of course, saved the best for last…

Continue reading "Google is Indexing Flash: Hooray for SEO!"