Best Gifts for Geeks: The Spiceworks List

Posted on December 22, 2011 by Paul

As part of my work with IBM Midsize Business, I monitor and contribute to an active IT community called Spiceworks. This collection of hard-core geeks (1.8 million as of this writing) loves to get down and dirty about the day-to-day issues of managing infrastructure at small and midsize businesses, but they also like to have fun like playing computer games in the best monitors we can find at sites like https://themonitormonitor.com/144hz-ips/. The Water Cooler group features an unending stream of discussion about everything from the Zombie apocalypse weapon of choice to clueless user stories. There’s a curious fascination with bacon.

Just for fun, I asked the members What’s the Perfect Geek Christmas Gift?, and they obliged with plenty of great ideas. Here are the highlights, just know that the wooden watches would always be the bet gift for anyone.

Superheroes

If you’re a fan of The Big Bang Theory, you know that techies love superheroes. UDReplicas sells full-blown costumes of most of the great characters (right). They’re gorgeous, but they aren’t cheap. Most cost more than $1,500 fully loaded. Still, for that special geek in your life, it’s an investment.

There are a few suppliers of bulk wrapping paper that will sell to the public. If you’re on a budget, consider satisfying the superhero within. Superherostuff.com sells wearable accessories for just about every superhero you can imagine. This includes pajamas and underwear for men and for women. Just please remember to do the laundry.

Just Geek Gifts

Save time hunting for geek gifts on Brookstone and Hammacher Schlemmer by heading directly to ThinkGeek.com. The people who put together this bountiful store clearly know their audience, because it was the most-mentioned e-commerce destination by the Spiceheads. Highlights include the Blade Runner-Style LED Umbrella ($19.99), the LED Binary Watch (which requires you to translate 10 LED lights into the time, $69.99), and the awesome Star Wars Jedi & Sith Bath Robes ($89.99).

Geeks are fascinated with time, as evidenced by several recommendations of clocks and timepieces. The Time Machine Ball Bearing Clock ($49.95) lifts a ball bearing onto “a durable concentric track at regular intervals. Here it moves with others on a slow downward course, both halted and propelled by ‘see-saws’ that tip when correctly weighted. Correct time can be read by observing the numerals that the balls are aligned with.” It sounds like a lot of effort to find out what time it is, but maybe not as much as reading the binary watch.

Burning down the house

In the category of Stuff That Has No Practical Value But Is Too Awesome Not to Own come products from WickedLasers.com. Many of this retailer’s products are simply super-bright flashlights, but a few might require FAA approval. In particular, the S3 Krypton Series and S3 Arctic Series ($299.95 each) both vie for the title of “brightest laser you can legally own.” Of the Krypton product, WickedLasers says, “Our Earth’s atmosphere ends at 62 miles, but the Krypton goes beyond as it breaks through our atmosphere, into outer space.” Who says the U.S. space program is dead?

The Arctic model is “currently being tested by Guinness World Records [as] the world’s most powerful handheld laser…The 1000 mW output power of the blue laser beam is able to burn through balloons, plastic, and much more.” If you don’t believe me, see the video below. Enjoy, but please stay away from my neighborhood.

Practical and Cool

Not everything on the geeks’ shopping list is pointless fun. There are Floppy Disk Sticky Notes ($9.99 for a pack of three) and my favorite: the Nest Learning Thermostat (available early next year for $249). This little marvel is a programmable thermostat with a brain. It learns from your behavior and over the course of a week or two automatically changes the temperature settings in your home to match your living pattern. “One-off temperature changes won’t confuse it, but change the temperature a couple of days in a row and Nest will catch on and adjust its schedule,” says the site. “Lower the temperature two Mondays in a row and Nest will remember for next week.” It has a lot of other bells and whistles, including a feature that tells you how much energy you’re saving. There are iPhone and Android apps, ‘natch.

Did I Mention Bacon?

Most geeks I’ve known drink sparingly, shun tobacco and avoid recreational drugs because they are afraid of becoming addicted and having the need of an Interventionist later on. If you think you need drug treatment already, experience Ibogaine clinics at experienceibogaine.com. But that doesn’t mean they’re complete health freaks, it just means they don’t want to become addicts and end up in rehab like the one here. One major weakness: bacon. The Cooking with Spice group on Spiceworks has dozens of discussions on the topic, and breakfast meat came up several times on the holiday wish list between cooking knives and other implements from sites as https://ivyandwilde.com/. For $9.75 Geek Cantina will sell you a thick slice of pork to hang on your Christmas tree. The bad news: It’s out of stock. But my favorite is Tactical Canned Bacon. That’s right, it’s bacon in a can. A 9 oz. container provides 18 servings of porcine pleasure that lasts more than 10 years on your shelf. I can’t say it better than ThinkGeek.com:

The zombies have fought long and hard, but the tide is seeming to finally turn.

I jumped right online and ordered a e liquid uk 30 ml bottle. This just made my whole vaping experience reach an all time high.

We will survive this invasion…because we were smart enough to stock up on Tac Bac – Tactical Canned Bacon. That is why we are strong; that is why we’ll win.

Happy holidays.

Cool & Useful Sites for the Holidays

Posted on December 18, 2011 by Paul

The folks at the Webby Awards sent along a super-helpful list of Web resources to use over the holidays. They range from social shopping to gift recommendations to real-time TV and music sharing. While I was familiar with several of these sites, I hadn’t heard of gems like Yap.tv, Wantful and Trippy. Definitely bookmarkable. The descriptions below were provided by the Webby Awards.

1. Skype

Video chatting is now a standard activity for most Internet users – in fact, earlier this year, Skype reported that their users log 300 million minutes of video calls daily. Skype has recently added a new multi-party platform that allows up to 10 people to video chat with each other, which is a great way to get the family together, even if you’re all far away from each other.

2. Google+ Hangouts

Yet another way to connect groups of people over video chat – but Hangouts also enable the chat participants to share and enjoy digital content like YouTube videos in real time.

3. Crackle

Sony has brought together two of its popular platforms by creating virtual movie theaters on Playstation 3 that stream content from Crackle – and it’s planning to add more digital hangouts later this year.

4. Turntable.fm

Turntable.fm brings together the social experience of the Web and music. Users can create or join listening rooms for friends – or strangers – and DJ their favorite songs for each other.

5. YapTV

A great app that brings people together around their favorite TV shows – it shows every program on television at any moment and lets you socialize with other viewers. It pulls in tweets about the show and has a built-in chat functionality so you can talk while you watch. This is especially useful for every “Elf” re-run on TBS or if you’re sucked into another “A Christmas Story” 24-hour-marathon.

6. ShopWithYourFriends.com

Through sites like this, shopping online is no longer an isolated event. Shopping online is now social. These sites allow you converse with friends (through Skype and chat), compile lookbooks for your friends and family’s seal of approval, and most importantly, buy online.

7. SocialVest

SocialVest is an online retail platform that allows customers to buy and give at the same time. With SocialVest, you can make purchases at your favorite stores – like Target, Walmart, Bloomingdales, and more – and a percentage of all your purchases will go to a charity of your choice.

8. GiftaStranger.net

Make someone’s day brighter with this site that allows you to send a lucky person a gift of your choosing. All you need to submit is your first name, general location, and a picture of the gift you’re sending, and the site will generate a random address.

9. Wantful.com

The site suggests an array of thoughtful gifts based on information you provide about the recipient – everything from age and relationship status to how often the cook and their level of neatness.

10. HipMunk.com

With a well-designed, streamlined interface and smart use of filters, Hipmunk makes it easy to find the right flight or the best hotel. The site also has an app available for your phone or tablet device.

11. Trippy.com

It makes it easy for you to get recommendations and tips for what to do (whether you are heading home for the holidays or on a dream vacation and have a nice picnic and bring your cooler from Survival Cooking List of Best Coolers) from your friends who already know you and your interests and needs, helping you travel better.

12. Amazon.com

Whether it’s a 6-hour flight home or over-the-river-and-through-the-woods, every trip is a little shorter with good book. Now, Amazon allows you to share your favorite books with your friends. Each loan lasts 14 days and are automatically returned to your library at the end.

The Wisdom of ‘We’

Posted on November 8, 2011 by Paul

My column in BtoB magazine this month. Original here.

The manager of the Mansion on Peachtree hotel in Atlanta has it pretty good these days. The Mansion is the top-rated hotel in the city on TripAdvisor.com, with 163 reviews, nearly all of them five stars. The endorsement has enabled the Mansion to hold its premium prices and cut its acquisition costs. It’s also got the staff hopping to maintain the coveted top position.

“Social media is vital to our business today,” said Micarl Hill, the Mansion’s managing director. “But it also keeps us on our toes. People can tell everybody about a bad stay with the push of a button. What they say isn’t always fair, but we take it seriously.”

Recommendation engines like TripAdvisor, TravelPod, Google Places and Yelp are transforming the hospitality industry, and they’re coming to your town.

Mark Snider, owner of the Winnetu Oceanside Resort in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., personally contacts every single customer who posts a complaint about his hotel on an online review site. Fortunately, it’s not a big job. Winnetu’s No. 1 rating on TripAdvisor drives so much business that Snider slashed his marketing budget this year.

If you think this trend is confined to consumer markets and small electronics, think again. Consider Spiceworks, a thriving community for IT professionals, where members have posted thousands of reviews of everything from computer servers to computer consultants. “When I’m looking at a vendor, I don’t Google it; I Spiceworks it,” wrote one forum member.

At Glassdoor.com, employees rate the companies they work for, review executive performances and swap salary information. How do you think the recruiting business will be changed by this?

And we’re still in the very early going. It’s only a matter of time before review sites pop up in every category of business, including B2B. Facebook and LinkedIn already make polling easy, and Quora is awash with questions about recommended vendors.

This is going to change the rules of marketing. People stopped listening to pitches some time ago, but they didn’t stop listening to each other. What you say about yourself now matters a lot less than what others say about you.

Marketers need to be tuned into these conversations 24/7, spot detractors and quickly try to turn them around. They also need to provide incentives for people to tell others about their positive experiences.

Start by discarding the “see no evil” mindset. Customers will share their opinions whether you want them to or not. You might as well be open about it. Southwest Airlines and Dell Computer encourage customers to lodge complaints on their company Facebook pages and address nearly every one. That’s called responsiveness, and it’s always been a good business practice. Today’s it’s life or death.

Facebook Tips for Midsize Businesses

Posted on October 19, 2011 by Paul

With Facebook presenting a tempting target of 800 million potential customers, small businesses are flocking to social network as a fast and easy way to generate business. But many SMB’s don’t take full advantage of the Facebook platform because they’re intimidated by the learning curve and the technical knowledge that Facebook applications demand.

Against the GrainThis is one in a series of posts that explore people and technologies that are enabling small companies to innovate. The series is underwritten by IBM Midsize Business, but the content is entirely my own.

That doesn’t have to be the case, says David Brody, Managing Partner at North Social, a software as a service company that specializes in serving small and medium businesses (SMBs) with a suite of Facebook apps that they can quickly integrate into their Facebook presence. I talked to Brody about tips for SMBs that want to optimize their Facebook presence.

It’s not about the likes. Research has shown that few people who “like” a Facebook page ever return to it. That means that getting a like is a means to an end, but not a goal.

“This is a test-measure-modify world,” Brody says. In other words, experiment with different offers and incentives to build fans and then measure those that deliver engagement and return visits. Remember, this isn’t direct mail, and your cost of trying something new is basically zero. On the flipside, simply getting someone to click a button is not enough. “‘Excite, Educate, Motivate’ has replaced ‘Awareness, Trial, Purchase,'” Brody says.

Match the offer to the business. Those ubiquitous iPad giveaways may not be doing much more than delivering business to Apple. Brody tells of one business owner in Atlanta whose offer of a flat-screen TV as contest prize yielded only 60 new likes. Maybe the problem was that the company is in the heating/ventilation/air conditioning business. An offer of offer of free or discounted air conditioning equipment might have played pretty well in Atlanta during the summer.

Capture and communicate. Facebook pages and apps offer easy ways to collect e-mail addresses. This creates a permission-based vehicle to continue a conversation. E-mail and news feeds can be used to deliver an ongoing stream of information that reminds people of who you are. Clif Bar asks first-time visitors to like its page in order to sign up for a newsletter, while Moosejaw Mountaineering touts giveaways, rewards points and tips..

This doesn’t mean e-mail is obsolete, but with inboxes mail clogged and people spending an hour a day on Facebook, the newsfeed has become an attractive alternative channel.

Use Facebook for sampling. Conventional wisdom holds that product samples need to be distributed on the street or unsolicited to the mail. It turns out Facebook can be an even better channel. One North Social customer that makes pretzels distributed 10,000 samples in less than 24 hours by sending them to people who liked its page. People who have opted in for a sample are more likely to be buyers than passersby in a supermarket. Audience quality more than compensates for the higher cost of distribution.

Be creative with promotions. You don’t have to incur manufacturing or mailing costs to distribute incentives with value. Think of a digital asset you can create that has zero marginal expense. Dentoola consulting gives away reports on how to apply social media in the dentistry profession. The Animal Print Shop gives away desktop wallpaper. You can exchange a like for a customized press release at Hunter PR.

Having healthy teeth and a great-looking smile takes some effort, but the results are well worth it. And having a dentist on your side every step of the way is an important part of that journey. Visit San Diego cosmetic dentist for more information.

Buy ads against pages of competitors or similar products. The great appeal of Facebook ads is their narrow targeting. Davids can ride on the backs of Goliaths by targeting ads to fans of much bigger brands. “If your product is candy, buy ads on the Skittles page,” Brody says. It’s the fastest way to find candy lovers online.

Keep the message simple and change it often. Don’t flatter yourself by thinking people will spend a minute on your page trying to figure out your message or offer. “Facebook is the equivalent of an out-of-home billboard,” Brody says. “You only have a few seconds to make an impression. Keep your message to a few words and make it compelling.” Remember the earlier point: You can always change the offer and test something new.

Get people involved. Brody is no fan of the automated tools that enable page owners to auto-post content across multiple social platforms. “No one wants to be friends with a robot,” he says. “Motivate your alpha evangelists.” Games, quizzes and giveaways work well, particularly if they challenge the audience to be creative.

One midsize business that Brody thinks does a lot of things well on Facebook is footwear maker Sanuk. From its provocative “like” message to its offbeat video to an online store that juxtaposes user comments with product shots, it provokes conversation at every turn. North Social’s examples page has plenty more.

Social Marketing Wisdom from the Insurance Industry – Really

Posted on August 26, 2011 by Paul

I was privileged to be on a panel with some outstanding social media practitioners from the insurance industry at the 2011 Social Media Conference for Financial Services put on by LOMA LIMRA this morning. Financial services firms – and insurance companies in general – are often seen as boring, but what these companies are doing within the confines of a heavily regulated business is anything but that. Farmers Insurance for example, hasn’t accumulated 2.3 million Facebook likes by boring people. Another example is One Sure Insurance which is one of my favorite ones. Car insurance is very important, but if you need business insurance then go to RhinoSure.co.uk.

I actually think insurance is a fascinating business, I even have the best motor trade insurance available for my car. It involves taking calculated risks about the unexpected. Insurance companies need to know a lot about the world around us, because their business deals with so many variables, from accidents to earthquakes to the chance of being hit by a meteor. This morning’s audience of about 100 social media practitioners truly believe in the value of new platforms to reach their customers, although they have understandable concerns about the many regulations that govern what they can say.

Here are some notes I took away from the three speakers on my panel.

Gregg Weiss (@greggweiss) of New York Life says the company’s social media content strategy is driven by constantly asking, “What can we do that isn’t about life insurance?” This was a theme that was borne out in every presentation: It’s not about the company but about what motivates customers.

A sampling of what New York Life has done:

Partnered with the NFL on a “protection index” of pro football teams;
Created the New York Life Game of Life in partnership with Hasbro. The goal was to get people talking about financial stability and have a chance to win the popular board game;
Hosted a Twitter chat about Halloween safety.

New York Life has carefully cultivated more than 100,000 likes on Facebook. “We believe 60% of our Facebook fans are prospects,” Weiss said.

His best story actually had nothing to do with insurance but everything to do with using social marketing to build loyalty and word-of-mouth awareness.

He told of buying a coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts: milk, no sugar. But when he got to the office, he found the beverage was loaded with sugar. “I couldn’t drink it.” He tweeted his dissatisfaction. Within two minutes he had a reply tweet from the head of corporate communications at Dunkin’. She asked for a phone call, during which she apologized and offered a gift card, which arrived in the mail two days later. “I tweeted about Dunkin’ Donuts’ great response,” he said. “It was a huge win for them. “

His advice to social media marketers: “Think big. Everyone in this room has the power to change things at your company. That’s incredibly empowering.”

Quotable: “The VP of Social Media at New York Life is the hundreds of thousands of people who have online relationships with us.”

And finally, “Seek a higher purpose. I hope someday to hear a story of a kid who got to go to college because a parent bought a life insurance policy from us.”

Kelly Thul (@kellythul), State Farm.

State Farm got started in social media when it set up a blog to find New Orleans-area employees and agents who couldn’t be located after Hurricane Katrina. “Within 24 hours, that blog was key to our locating ever agent and employee,” Thul said. Today, State Farm is all over Facebook, with pages for the corporation, careers, Latino customers, the Bayou Classic football event and an innovative youth-oriented forum called State Farm Nation (right), where people can “discuss life’s challenges and opportunities, connect with others facing life-shaping decisions [and] find helpful tips and information.” With 1.3 million likes, it’s doing pretty well.

The insurance company’s YouTube channel has had more than five million views, many for its TV commercials. The ads have spawned parodies, but Thul says the company is pretty sanguine about them. “If people care enough to have a bit of fun with you, that’s OK, as long as it isn’t brutal,” he said.

State Farm evaluates social media opportunities using four criteria:

Relevance to business strategy;
Role clarity: who is responsible for talking and responding;
Measurement criteria;
Activating platforms.

These four criteria provide a framework for making a rapid and relevant decision about new platforms and opportunities like Google Plus.

Words of wisdom: “People want to be heard. If they believe you’re listening to them, they’ll like you a little more.”

Theresa Kaskey (@TheresaKaskey), Director of Brand Management and Strategy at the John Hancock Financial Network, joined the company without any plans to get involved in social media. John Hancock had no social media strategy at time. Today, it’s 80% of what she does. There’s been a long education and adoption process, but company management is buying in, she said. John Hancock recently launched its first blog, Build4Success, and it’s posted nearly 40 videos on YouTube. Unlike the other two speakers on the panel, who speak primarily to consumers, John Hancock Financial Network’s audience is financial advisers.

YouTube has been one of its early successes. “We created more than 80% of our launch content in one day,” Kaskey said. “We had a meeting of our advisers and brought them into a room one by one to talk about how they delight their customers.” It’s been a low-cost, high-return recruiting success.

Words of widom: A key element of successful social media programs is “It’s not about us.”

What a Hotel Manager Taught Me About the Future of Business

Posted on August 19, 2011 by Paul

Scott Wright is the general manager of the Wyndham Wingate Hotel in Erlanger, KY, and in a 15-minute ride to the airport yesterday morning he taught me something about the future of business.

The fact that the manager of the hotel was driving me to the airport was unusual in the first place, but Wright makes it part of his routine. “I try to get out of the office at least a couple of times a week and connect with the customers,” he said. “I don’t ever want to be stuck in a back room shuffling papers.”

Wright’s attitude is one of the reasons the Wyndham Wingate has a 91% positive rating on TripAdvisor. He ticks of the two factors that most influence customer loyalty: “Cleanliness is number one by far. Customer service is number two. But you’d be surprised how forgiving people can be about customer service if the room is clean,” he says.

Scott Wright has no choice but to know what makes customers happy. Ratings on TripAdvisor and dozens of other evaluation sites have transformed the hospitality industry. The impact of open, online customer feedback on his business “is huge,” Wright says over his shoulder. The hotel’s policy is to contact online critics directly within 72 hours to address their complaints.

Many times those problems are more a matter of misunderstanding than mistake. One traveler recently posted a scathing review of the Wyndham because charges had appeared on her credit card despite the fact that she paid cash for her stay. Wright patiently explained that the practice was standard operating procedure for cash customers in the hospitality industry and that the charges were routinely reversed within a few hours. Another complained that the hotel wouldn’t let him cancel a reservation. Wright had to explain that the discount deal the customer had booked was clearly marked as nonrefundable.

These outreach sessions don’t fix the damage done by a negative rating. Few consumer feedback sites permit bad reviews to be reversed by anyone, so hotel managers are limited to posting responses, which Wright dutifully does. More importantly, though, the constant feedback cycle is driving he and others like him to become laser-focused on the customer experience. The terms of competition in that already brutally competitive industry have come down to one factor: quality.

Look at the ratings of these two Cincinnati hotels on TripAdvisor. Scan the excerpted customer comments. If you’re the owner of the Howard Johnson Inn, how do you solve this problem? Certainly not with advertising. No, there are three options the owner of the Howard Johnson Inn has:

Cut prices and compete for low-margin budget travelers;
Invest what it takes to fix the problem;
Hang out a sign that says, “Under new management.”

None is very appealing, but a customer-driven market doesn’t permit the luxury of spending your way out of trouble.

Conversely, the owner of the Best Western Premier Marlemont can cut the advertising and direct mail budget because customers are doing a better job of promoting the hotel than any marketing could do. The owner can also raise prices because business travelers are less sensitive to cost than they are to a pleasant place to stay.

Fifteen years ago, America’s most-admired brands were those with the biggest marketing budgets: GE, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Microsoft. Today, the brands everyone wants to emulate are Apple, BMW, Southwest Airlines and Harley-Davidson. There are two things these brands all have in common: Neither has dominant market share and all are fanatically devoted to delivering delightful customer experiences. In the future, every successful brand will have to operate the same way.

For Scott Wright and others like him, the rules have changed, but his industry isn’t alone. It’s just a leading indicator of forces that will sweep through nearly every market as customers learn to organize and apply the new powers of influence. These forces will affect B2B and B2C businesses, nonprofits and government agencies. Businesses will have to serve customers better because there will be no choice. All our managers will drive the shuttle to the airport.

I’ve been telling audiences about how customer ratings are reshaping the hospitality industry for more than a year, but no one made that impact more real to me than Scott Wright. As I stepped out of the shuttle, I reached into my wallet and handed him a few dollars.

“Oh, not necessary,” he said, waving his hand.

“Take it,” I said. “It’s a consulting fee.”

Awareness E-Book Raises the Bar on Social Measurement

Posted on July 29, 2011 by Paul

The question of how to measure social media performance, particularly in a marketing context, continues to be one of the industry’s hottest topics. Although many people are aware that traditional metrics like page views, visitors, followers and likes are poor indicators of success, the vast majority of marketers I speak to still focus on these overly simplistic criteria. These numbers may be of little value, but at least they’re understandable.

The more sophisticated practitioners are turning toward metrics that indicate engagement. Examples include comments, retweets, shares and subscriptions. Now Awareness Networks has contributed some important new thinking to this topic with a free e-book entitled “The Social Marketing Funnel: Driving Business Value with Social Marketing.” (Full disclosure: I am quoted in the book but did not contribute meaningfully to the methodology and received no compensation.)

Awareness outlines five priorities that companies should define in becoming a best-in-class social marketer:

Measure and Grow Social Reach
Monitor Social Conversations
Manage Social Content
Practice SEO
Measure and Analyze Social Activity

Not surprisingly, the company has tools that help in many of these areas, but that’s one reason its research is so useful: The recommendations are based upon the experiences of more than 100 customers.

The most successful of those are reporting direct correlations between social media marketing and sales, and they have certain practices in common. Most use at least three major social media channels, compared to less than two for the average company. They also have multiple presences within each channel, such as product-specific pages on Facebook. And they measure like crazy.

Nearly 80% of the companies Awareness surveyed use social media channels to identify and respond to customer service issues and two-thirds use them for prospecting. Remarkably, only 18% said they have “formal tracking process in place to manage processes and better understand success criteria.” In other words, a lot of social media is still being done with seat-of-the-pants justification.

That’s going to change as more sophisticated metrics emerge, however, and here’s where this report has particular value. It describes four measures of content effectiveness that take into account multi-channel activity: Content-to-Contact Ratio, Comments-to-Content Ratio, Comments-to-Profile Ratio and Content-to-Share Ratio. I won’t describe these metrics in detail – you can find that in the e-book – but each speaks directly to the value of engagement.

As businesses spread their wings across increasing numbers of social communities, they need to get a better handle on what’s working and what isn’t. The cost of maintaining an effective presence is only going to go up as the market gets crowded, and it won’t be acceptable for only one in five companies to have meaningful measurements in place.

As I have noted elsewhere, our current obsession with counting fans and followers is an artifact of old media thinking. Online marketing provides much richer options for understanding how people interact with our content. Awareness’ e-book is an important attempt to try to nudge marketers toward realizing the potential of the information they gather.

The Other Social Network

Posted on March 10, 2011 by Paul

Have you checked out LinkedIn lately? If you thought the world’s largest professional network was little more than a place to post your resume, you owe yourself another visit. LinkedIn is set to eclipse the 100 million member mark sometime this spring, and it is quickly becoming the social network of choice for B2B professionals.

LinkedIn gets none of the buzz of Facebook, and no one’s going to make a movie about it. Its format is austere, it has few third-party applications and it doesn’t support chat, photo libraries or videos. What it does have is lots of members who talk about serious professional issues, and some of its groups are becoming massive in scale. For business pros in industries like communications, manufacturing, retailing, financial services and even construction, LinkedIn groups are becoming vertical social networks in their own right.

This is the ideal B2B environment. There’s very little waste because members are there to seek professional opportunities, ask and answer questions and network with their peers. Spamming isn’t a problem, particularly in the moderated groups, and there’s none of the frat boy histrionics that you find on Facebook. It’s not surprising that in research conducted by B2B magazine last spring, marketers picked LinkedIn as their social network of choice by a substantial margin over Facebook.

LinkedIn has evolved far beyond its roots as a professional networking service. It hosts active groups for finance managers, telecom professionals, people in the construction industry, real estate pros, HR managers, pharmaceutical workers and film professionals. And those are just the ones with more than 40,000 members. If you’re in the hospitality industry, there are nearly 1,000 members in The Hospitality Forum. These pain management boynton beach doctors have some of the best medical staff available. Stephanie Sammons posted some great tips on Social Media Examiner early this year about how to make the most of LinkedIn groups.

And they’re busy. Someone asked the Sales Best Practices group a couple of months ago “What is YOUR Best Sales Advice — 20 words or less.” It has 532 responses. A recent discussion in the Cloud Computing, VMware, Virtualization and Enterprise 2.0 Group about whether IT organizations will start discarding their assets has more than 460 responses. Some LinkedIn members answer 300 or more questions every week.

It’s not about the numbers, though. In fact, many LinkedIn groups are kept intentionally small by administrators who want to maintain member quality. Just try to get into CIO Forum. Unless you’re an IT manager, you probably can’t. Facebook is about mass, but LinkedIn is about focus, which is one reason it rocks for B2B.

Here are a few ways B2B companies can leverage LinkedIn for prospecting and promotion:

Ask and Answer. Many of the questions posed within groups and in LinkedIn’s busy Answers section concern requests for expertise. You can subscribe to questions in your domain using an RSS reader, which ensures that you will never miss one that matters to you. If the technical gurus in your organization are intimidated by the prospect of blogging, urge them to instead answer five questions per week. As they grow their profile in the community, people will start seeking them out for business. That’s the reason Vico Software expects its sales reps to become active in construction-related groups in each of their territories. They’ll find out first about new construction opportunities in the forums.

Choose Open Groups. LinkedIn recently gave group owners the option of making their content public so that all activity from that point on would be visible to search engines. This is a good way to make your groups more visible. Also, if you plan to post regularly to groups in your field or industry, consider choosing open groups so that you get the additional Google love.

Promote in Groups. Cross-post new entries from the company blog or new presentations on SlideShare to appropriate groups of which you’re a member. Summarize your content and ask a question. Use a unique URL so you can track activity. You’ll often be surprised at the volume of response.

Use Company Profiles for Prospecting. LinkedIn has a unique approach to company profiles. They’re organized by the people who work there. Salespeople who are having trouble finding the right contacts in an organization can use these profiles as a virtual back door. LinkedIn shows you who works at the company and whether you have direct or indirect ways of contacting them. You might be able to do the same thing on Facebook, but it’s a lot more difficult.

Find People. One of LinkedIn’s great strengths is the choices it gives you for selecting members. You can filter by title, geography, group membership, company size and even years of experience. Some members reveal remarkably detailed public profiles of themselves. You can use this information to prepare for a meeting, find skills or identify prospects within a region. When I need to recruit speakers for a panel in Atlanta, for example, the first place I go is my LinkedIn contact list because I can so quickly identify prospects in the area.

Use LinkedIn Signal. One of LinkedIn’s little-known gems is Signal, a real-time search engine that’s listed as “Updates” on the search menu. Use it to monitor what people are saying about any topic. You can also filter by connection, date, company and industry. A search for “Chicago Marketing Jobs” returns 20 opportunities posted in the last 72 hours. You can also get updates on people and groups that interest you.

LinkedIn has recently revealed some visually cool and potentially very useful stuff coming out of its labs. Swarm is a different take on tag clouds that builds on recent company and title searches, jobs posted, blog entries and shared articles. InMaps lets you visualize your connection network. It’s still early-stage but shows promise.

What’s your favorite LinkedIn feature? Do you have a success story to share? Post it here.

CareOne Cashes In On Community

Posted on February 7, 2011 by Paul

CareOne Debt Relief Services contends with a business climate that few of us (thankfully) have to face: Its industry has a terrible reputation.

That industry is debt relief, a field that many people associate with fast talking pitchmen on late-night infomercials. But there’s nothing underhanded about CareOne, a nine-year-old company with 700 employees and a philosophy that “There’s no reason to be ashamed of being in debt,” according to Social Media Director Nichole Kelly (right).
Do you know that people who are in debt have higher probability that they end up in drug or alcohol addiction? And if this is you or you know someone who have alcohol addiction then I recommend to check out this website and their alcohol addiction program.

A busy online community has been a remarkably effective engine of growth. By enabling customers to freely exchange experiences, CareOne helps shatter suspicions that dissuade people in debt from seeking professional help. In fact, the conversion rate of prospects who have signed in to the CareOne Community is a remarkable seven times higher than that of non-members.

That claim, which is one of several ROI metrics cited in a summary of the company’s social media successes, sounded so extreme that I gave Kelly a chance to qualify the numbers when I spoke to her recently.

She would do no such thing. CareOne actually takes a disciplined approach to figuring ROI, she said, using control groups and thousand of data points. Not only do community members convert at dramatically higher rates, but the boost in sign-ups is only one of several business benefits CareOne has realized from its customer community. But more on that in a minute.

Happy Accident

The 1.4 million member community was actually an accident. It was created five years ago as a way for CareOne employees to share advice about their own debt issues. A few outsiders stumbled upon the site and joined the conversation. It turned out that they were a prime source of prospects.
Debt is a touchy subject. Most people don’t like to admit to financial problems, but they crave solutions, often desperately. CareOne discovered that customers who engaged online were far more likely to seek professional help than cold-called candidates. “It’s real customers telling each other that the program works,” Kelly said.

CareOne’s approach is a good example of soft-sell marketing. The site features numerous articles, worksheets and video tutorials about debt reduction. A recently launched video series called Financially Fit TV interviews personal finance experts. About 30% of visitors who register and tap into the free advice never become customers and “That’s fine,” Kelly said. “If they can get out of debt on their own, we’re happy to help.”

But more than 60% of members aren’t customers, making them a lucrative prospect base. Word-of-mouth recommendations help drive inbound inquiries, and the presence of so much helpful information in the community lowers the barrier to conversion. It’s clear to casual visitors that CareOne is no fly-by-night operation.

Not that managing a community is easy. The number of active participants – or those who regularly contribute content – is in the sub-1% range. That’s not surprising for a topic that few people like to discuss publicly. However, lurkers invest a healthy five to 10 minutes per session and return frequently, indicating that the audience is engaged.

CareOne has invested time and money to encourage the minority who interact. Its busy Ask the Expert forums have certified credit counselors responding to inquiries. The experts are compensated for their time. A full-time four-person social media team manages the community and other social media programs, responding to questions, correcting misstatements and encouraging lurkers to come forth.

Active members are promoted and applauded. As in most online communities, a very small percentage of members contribute most of the content, but those people can become heroes to their peers. One popular blog, My Journey out of Debt, is written entirely by customers.

The Insight Dividend

In addition to the remarkable conversion rates for community members, CareOne has realized other benefits. For example, last year it detected a shift among its upper-income customers away from debt management concerns and toward debt settlement plans and adjusted its resource commitments accordingly.

Recently, “We noticed that a lot of our customers were one car breakdown or one illness away from bankruptcy,” Kelly said. “That changed the content we were delivering. We reduced our focus on frugality and began creating more content about dealing with life events.”

One of the more impressive aspects of the whole effort is the company’s focus on ROI metrics. Kelly ticks off her favorites: cost per conversion, cost per acquisition, customer value, customer profitability and retention rate. Nothing about hits, followers or comments. Those aren’t financial metrics.

CareOne is focusing on the right stuff. The section headlined “CareOne + Social Media: The Measurement” on the successes page devotes substantial attention to five challenges of measuring social media ROI. In all cases, it focuses on bottom-line drivers. Speaking of drivers, if you are looking for a car of your own, then check out these Used Cars.

Customer communities aren’t for everyone, and in the age of Facebook and LinkedIn, you actually need a compelling reason to start your own. The ability to build detailed audience profiles, customize services for individuals and maintain a level of confidentiality were good reasons for CareOne to choose the path it did. The company clearly cares about bottom-line return, and by being able to track individual visitors through their various interactions with the company, it has shown some impressive results.

Jason Falls posted a profile of CareOne Community on Social Media Explorer at almost the same moment this post went live. He has a good deal of background on how the community came about and more extensive ROI data than I do.

You can also find a case study on Social Fresh.