Hmmm. Looks like the pricing has changed radically on some of these products — especially Radian6. I’ll have to look into it. In the meantime, I use Jive/Filtrbox for my clients and socialmention for a quick and dirty snapshot…
An overwhelming majority (93 percent) of online Americans say companies should have a social-media presence, and 85 percent believe these companies also should be interacting with consumers through social media, according to research from Cone, writes MarketingCharts.
The 2008 Cone Business in Social Media Study also reveals the depth and breadth of social media interaction with companies. Some 60 percent of Americans interact with companies using social media, one in four interact more than once per week, and 56 percent feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they interact via social media.
Asked about specific types of interactions, respondents said:
Companies should use social networks to solve their problems (43 percent).
Companies should solicit feedback on their products and services (41 percent) via social media.
Companies should develop new ways for consumers to interact with their brand (37 percent) through social media.
Companies should market to consumers (25 percent) using social media.
“The news here is that Americans are eager to deepen their brand relationships through social media,” said Mike Hollywood, director of new media for Cone. “It isn’t an intrusion into their lives, but rather a welcome channel for discussion.”
Other findings:
Men are twice as likely than women interact frequently (one or more times per week) with companies via social media (33 percent vs. 17 percent).
One-third of younger, hard-to-reach consumers (age 18-34) believe that companies should actively market to them via social networks.
The wealthiest households (household income of $75K+) also believe that companies should seek to reach them via social media.
Two-thirds of the wealthiest households and the largest households ( those with three or more members) feel stronger connections to brands they interact with online.
“All of this is great news for marketers,” Hollywood said. “Men and younger consumers are traditionally the most challenging to reach, while the highest-income households are typically very desirable; here they are saying ‘come market to us and interact with us online.’ This is really a license to put more energy and resources into this medium and do it effectively.”
About the study: The 2008 Cone Business in Social Media Study was conducted online, September 11-12, 2008 by Opinion Research Corporation. It surveyed 1,092 adults comprising 525 men and 567 women 18 and older.
Social Media (or any other form of Marketing and Communications) won’t save a bad product, brand or service.
This may seem like an obvious statement out of the gates, but it is something that many brand managers don’t really wrap their heads around. If you love the TV show Mad Men (and who, in their right mind, doesn’t?) the subtext of the early days of advertising (and something that kept happening until very recently) was the ability for a brand to engage with a Madison Avenue type of advertising agency to help them turn a coal into a diamond. The germ of mass media advertising was about creating an allure or desire for products and over-selling them. Making them seem and feel bigger than they really were.
Social Media changed all of that… and more.
While advertising still works on creating this perceived desire, things do change when all voices (the brand, the advertising agency and the consumer) have an equalized platform. Any one individual with a gripe or with something nice to say can get to the top of the search engines or have their online social network share their story (in places like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc…) so brands, products and services have to be able to deliver. In fact, with customer reviews (or peer reviews) individuals can affect a sales outcome right there where the “buy now” button lives.
Ultimately, your brands, products and services have to hold up to this very simple adage: “it is what it is and it does what it does.”
It’s great if it can do more (but if it could do more, you would probably say so in all of your marketing and communications), but it really doesn’t have to. So, when you use words like, “better, brighter, faster, 20% more, 40% off, etc…” you can disguise the true realities of the marketing initiative in the small print. Social Media is forcing companies to do away with that fine print. Seth Godin wrote brilliantly about how brilliant brands are the only way to go in his seminal best-selling business book, Purple Cow. While being remarkable should be every brand’s lighthouse, the conversation around what it takes and those who have actually done it eludes the majority of companies. Most companies still do make regular products for regular people (in fact, if everyone was able to create a Purple Cow, how would we know? We would probably need a phrase for something that is more remarkable than a Purple Cow – Purple Panda anyone?). Seth’s right, we need to get there, but most brands are falling woefully short of those purple pastures.
Over at Search Engine Land, Hanan Lifshitz, CEO of local search provider Palore, asks: Do Small Businesses Need A Website? In his post, Hanan offers a case study showing how a New York cardiologist was able to make her way into Google’s 7-pack WITHOUT the benefit of a Web site. Instead, the cardiologist claimed her listings on sites like Yelp and used social media to gain search ranking. Does a small business need a Web site? The CEO ultimately says “probably, yes”, however, unless you read to the last two lines, that’s not really the message Hanan’s post gives off. It sounds like Yet Another Web Sites Are Dying post and he’s not the only one (intentionally or not) giving off that message.
The truth is, as social media continues its rise, there have been a rash of posts explaining how the shiny new marketing tactic can be used as a workaround to having your own site. Back in March, David Port wrote a similar piece for Entrepreneur.com, arguing that the need for a Web site is going away thanks to SMBs ability to create relationships through social media. I know we’ve had this discussion over here before, but it sounds like we need to have it again.
Building a social media presence without a Web site is like getting people hot and bothered over your product and then being too lazy to open the door when they attempt to come in. What was the point?
Dealing with detractors is perhaps one of the biggest pain points for companies just starting and even well entrenched in social media marketing. “What if someone says something bad about our company?” is often asked by brand managers, executives and more when opening their websites or even Facebook pages to conversations and interactions with consumers.
There are many examples of companies engaging detractors that can illustrate why you don’t have to be quite as worried about the complainers and combatants as you think. But only through experience can you develop your own tested processes of handling the various types of detractors.
Bright, shiny objects! 
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