Video Monday 11: SM/PR for promotion

Once more with feeling.

Video Monday 7: Viewer Questions!

Watch!

Video Monday 6: Who's Your Target?

Howdy!

Does tweeting lead to more action or less?

So at last night's Third Wednesday we discussed social media for social activism. Or, more accurately, if doing things like joining Facebook groups or tweeting about a cause even counts as activism.

The discussion was kicked off by some great points by Allison. She suggested that, well, tweeting is lazy and it doesn't really accomplish much by itself, but it's better than nothing.

The discussion was fairly animated, with lots of different points and points of view.

Here's where I stand, and I'd love to hear what you think:

Ala Clay Shirky's points about social media and action, I think that the more people you make aware, the more people you'll have actually do something. This is because you're always only ever going to have a small percentage of people willing to get off their asses. But, if you make tons and tons and tons of people aware (like, by tweeting) that small percentage will amount to a fairly large number of people. So, if only 1% of people who are aware will take action, it's better if there are tons and tons of people aware. So, in that sense, tweeting can help.

BUT: '"Announcing your plans to others satisfies your self-identity just enough that you’re less motivated to do the hard work needed," writes Derek Sivers, the founder of CD Baby. "Once you’ve told people of your intentions, it gives you a 'premature sense of completeness.'"' Link.

So, does tweeting count as doing something or talking about something? Does this mean that some or many of the people who tweet about a cause have made themselves less likely to actually do something, because now they feel like they already have?

But wouldn't people who are likely to get off their asses feel that tweeting isn't enough even if they do send out a couple just to tell other people?

I think I'd still suggest that more awareness could likely lead to more action. Yes, talking about something might make some people less likely to do something, but it would probably make a larger group more interested in taking action. Yes, I just used the words, think, likely, might, and probably.

What do you think?

Image from flickr user Petteri Sulonen

My first video post

I'm not going to apologize for how crappy this video is.

My interview about unfriending and unfollowing

I was interviewed earlier today over at Haligonia.ca about unfriending, unfollowing, and managing your social network contacts. Please check out the video here.

Thanks for having me on the show, Giles!

Conversation is the real king -- a continuation

Last week Marc on twitter said that "conversation is the equivalent of a saw...it processes/transforms content but with out the wood the saw is not needed."

I really can't agree. It feels to me like a underestimation of what conversation is and how it relates to marketing especially. The content is the wood, the conversation is the building it makes. The building materials aren't king, the building itself is.

I'd posted a quote from Cory Doctorow stating that content isn't king, conversation is. I suggested that this applied to marketing because content should be created with a view to inspiring and participating in conversation, making the conversation the king.

This was met with some strong disagreement. Some very spirited, uh, conversation.

The content I created was only a couple paragraphs long, but the conversation it sparked continued for days, and in fact is still a subject of some discussion here at the office.

Such little content, such a huge conversation. The conversation has taken on a life of its own, has become so much more important than the content ever was.

To suggest that the content is the "king" here, the important bit, is to totally misunderstand the power and expansiveness of conversation. Carman reminded me yesterday that my little bit of content was my contribution into a much larger conversation about content (Cory had already written about it, and people talk about content being king all the time), and it sparked even more conversation on the subject.

The content itself served only to encourage more conversation. The conversation was the point, it was the goal, and the content was written merely to help it along. It served a larger beast. It wasn't king at all.

So how does this apply to marketing? Well, let's take the swine flu, shall we? Marc suggested that the difficulty in getting people to stop calling it that (and refer to it instead as H1N1) is due to the power of that "content."

But the content is a mere two words. The conversation surrounding how we talk about pigs, the conversations we have at work reinforcing the naming, the jokes we make about how weird the name sounds, etc etc, hold the real power. To change that is to change massive conversation, to reverse the effects of millions of discussions.

The content started it, but it holds no power. The conversation changes minds.

But not all content is created to spark conversation, right? It's just meant to teach, or change minds, or inform. Well, you might have written it for that purpose, but what you've done is created content that's by definition unremarkable. If nobody wants to talk about your content it isn't very good. So sure, you might make content like that, but why would you? If you're creating content to teach or inform and nobody uses that content to teach someone else, or contribute to a conversation about it, or use it in future discussions, you've created useless content.

But the content came first and it sparked the whole discussion, so it's king, right? It's the important bit? That's like saying that because the plane got you to the Caribbean and it started the whole thing that it's "king", it matters most. Of course that's not true. The plane isn't the point, it's not the goal, it just gets you on the right track. It serves a higher power -- a vacation. And the value in vacations is, oh right, the conversation.

Tell me in the comments why I'm wrong and I'll write another post.

Content isn't king

Cory Doctorow once wrote, "Content isn't king. If I sent you to a desert island and gave you the choice of taking your friends or your movies, you'd choose your friends -- if you chose the movies, we'd call you a sociopath. Conversation is king. Content is just something to talk about."

This applies so strongly to your marketing strategy. Is your ad just content, just a message telling people to buy what you're selling? That assumes that convincing people that your product is best is enough. But it's not.

Content isn't king, it's not the point. It's the conversation that surrounds your content that's important.

"But nobody's talking about my content," you say.

Well, that's bad. You should probably do something about it.

Recent Speaking Engagements

Just trying to keep a list that I can link to of speaking engagements I've done over the last year. Gives me a post I can update as I do more.

"Using Social Media for Social Change" - Session hosted at Mobile Tech 4 Social Change Halifax about how to use social media to gain awareness (and raise money) for your charity or non-profit.

"Going Social" - (Atlantic Internet Marketing conference) How to make your marketing more effective by giving people something worth talking about, and helping to facilitate that conversation

Interview on Haligonia.ca about unfriending on Facebook and managing your social network contacts.

"Unfriend Someone Today" - (Podcamp Halifax) Presentation on managing your social network contacts

While an employee of Cossette Atlantic I gave presentations on social media and web 2.0 to:
Atlantic Canada Tourism Partnership
Bell Aliant
Workers' Compensation Board of Nova Scotia

Everybody needs an elephant

So I spoke at the AIM Conference in Halifax this week about how businesses can make their marketing more social. You know, giving people something worth talking about, and helping facilitate the conversation. I thought I'd write about one of my favourite points in the talk.
Everybody needs an elephant.

Well, something like that. This came to me while having a conversation with a friend a couple weeks back. The inevitable and obvious question of "What's new?" got asked, and neither of us had anything particularly interesting to say.

So he suggested that he should just buy an elephant. That way, there would always be something to answer that question with.

"Just trying to figure out if I'm going with an Indian or African elephant."

"Oh, I'm still haggling with the owner."

"Would you believe it? Damn thing's caught up in customs."

You could go on and on about how the paddock construction is going. How much food you have to buy, and on and on. Actually, the thing never really has to arrive.

It's just something to talk about.

And everyone's looking for something to talk about.

People will go to extraordinary lengths to have something new to talk about. Hell, we'll even pay tons of money on a vacation just to have the subject of new conversations.

Does your business do anything that might give me something to talk about? Are you at all helping me buy my elephant? Are you so interesting that you can replace the elephant?

Does your business have a blog that's regularly updating with things I can bring up with coworkers? Does your packaging include funny or fascinating takes on the industry you're in?

If you make cutlery, why doesn't your packaging say how many forks are made worldwide in a day? Why don't you tell me a bit about the history of modern cutlery? When company comes over, I'll have something to talk about.

If not, I guess I have to keep trying to buy that elephant. And that's a bit of a pain. Too bad you couldn't help.

New Landlord Lou! (Shameless Work-related Plug)

Plug for work stuff:
We just launched the new Landlord Lou site and videos for Killam Properties. It's really funny, I promise: Book Now or Live in a Dump!

My previous favourite Landlord Lou campaign, "Blockbusters," is here: http://www.landlordlou.ca/blockbuster/

My Hiring Announcement

I don't normally talk about my day job here specifically, but I thought this would be cool to show you.

Colour, my new employer (yes, the website is a single page of Flash... I know.) has announced my hiring and @pirie's appointment to Vice President, Social Media using a social media news release. Traditional press releases are difficult to parse if you're just looking for some quick facts or quotes or pictures, are annoying to post to social networks (as they're so often just PDFs), and are typically lenghty reads when you're just trying to find out what the main point is.

So Colour is now doing all their news releases as social media releases. Check out the latest, "Social Media Growth at Colour Leads to Promotion and New Hire."

Social media IS NOT its networks

So stop saying it, please.

Your social media strategy is not to start using Flickr and Facebook to spread your message, okay?

First, a tactic is not a strategy.

Social media strategy is about figuring out, first of all, why people should care. It's what Mark Earls calls the "What For?" of a business:

"Put really simply, the Purpose-Idea is the "What For?" of a business, or any kind of community. What exists to change (or protect) in the world, why employees get out of bed in the morning, what difference the business seeks to make on behalf of customers and employees and everyone else? BTW this is not "mission, vision, values" territory - it's about real drives, passions and beliefs. The stuff that men in suits tend to get embarrassed about because it's personal. But it's the stuff that makes the difference between success and failure, because this kind of stuff brings folk together in all aspects of human life." - gapingvoid.com

So that's how a strategy begins. Now, if you can understand that, and still think that executing a strategy just has to be about using social or peer networks, you've still got a problem.

In the phrase Social Media, "social" is the keyword.

The media is interchangeable.

Social media can take place on the good old sneakernet.

The reason that social networks are used in social media is because they enable people to connect to so many people so quickly. But it's their usefulness that makes them so widely used for social media campaigns, not because the terminology or strategy necessarily demands it.

So please, stop writing what you think is your "social media strategy" by starting off with a list of websites you need to post your content on, as if the media will create the society. It won't.

Communities create networks, not the other way around.

Social media and tourism

How long do vacations last? A week? Two?

How long does the memory last? Years, likely. If it's a particularly interesting vacation, the memory can last a lifetime.

So which did you pay for, where is the real value? The experience, or the memory?

Neither.

You paid for the conversation.

You paid to be able to talk to all your friends and family and coworkers about the trip you're planning, you paid to get to email your friends from some exotic locale and make them jealous, and you paid to be able to force everyone you know to look at your photos when you got back.

That's the lasting value, that's what you paid for.

So if you're marketing a tourist destination, are you focused on making it a one-off experience, unsharable and proprietary? Or do you facilitate sharing the memories, do you help your customers tell everyone they know about the great trip they had, or the great B&B they stayed in?

Do you have free wi-fi and cheap post cards at your hotel? Do you allow and encourage people to take pictures at your attraction? Do you market yourselves as conversation pieces, or as a single experience?

Hugh talks a lot about social objects, and about the need to identify what your social object is that you're selling. If you can't figure out what it is about your tourist attraction or accommodation that will start people talking, that will get people to share the memory with their friends, you're in trouble.

And which is more valuable? Tons of ads, or a few people telling everyone they know about how great their trip was? Which one will get more people interested?

Which one are you focusing your marketing budget on?

Third Wednesday Meet Up Tomorrow!

The Third Wednesday Social and New Media Meet Up is tomorrow at 5pm.

Come out and chat with people passionate about social and new media, internet marketing, and all things wonderful.

At around 5:40 our speakers will talk to us about the upcoming Podcamp Halifax, our city’s very own unconference.

Free registration here.

Location:
Foggy Goggle
1667 Argyle Street
Halifax
Canada
5-7pm

What is social media?

I've recently heard social media defined as a websites like Facebook, Reddit, Digg, Stumble Upon, and the like, as a method of simply driving traffic to your website.

But that's ridiculous.

That’s like saying the definition of transportation is “vehicle.”

Social media is not its tools. Social media is a space and a mind-set, not a list of social networks.

The goal of social media should not be to “drive traffic."

It should be to increase sales/conversions/awareness/your real, end goal. While there may often be a causal relationship between them, simply increasing traffic isn’t the end goal. Sending qualified, interested people to your site will probably lead to you realizing your real goal, but it’s not the goal in itself.

If a client told me their goal was just to “increase traffic” then I could say, “Okay, let’s start spamming some people. Let’s try to trick as many people as possible into stumbling upon your site as we can."

Of course that sort of thing would get me fired. Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Optimization should be focused on getting the right people engaged with your product/brand. Not just about getting eyeballs on the page. That’s a terrible goal.

But we interact with and use social media solely through things like the above-mentioned websites, right?

Apple zealots spreading the gospel of Jobs to their coworkers are participating in social media. And that doesn’t require Facebook.

If I asked you to define how transportation worked you wouldn’t start by saying, “well, the internal combustion engine…” Social media is bigger than its tools, and defining it by only listing the tools that facilitate it doesn’t make sense to me.

There's something like a venn diagram out there, where digital tools like YouTube and Facebook exist as facilitators of social media on one side. But then there are social nodal points like "I'm a Mac" commercials that get people talking. And then there are guerrilla marketing tactics that get people using social networking websites, and get people talking at the office.

All of these are methods of participating in social media, but none of them completely define it.

Halifax Podcamp 2009 -- January 25th

@Greebie over at The Other Librarian has a great post announcing Halifax Podcamp 2009.

The what:

A podcamp, specifically is an unconference about blogs, wikis, podcasts, vidcasts and other social or “new” media. The idea was first introduced by Chris Brogan. The unique thing about a podcamp is that all the information is podcasted and released under a creative commons license afterwards.

The why:

why not a podcamp in Halifax, Nova Scotia?

we never had a podcamp in Halifax before.

based on what I see and hear out in the world, I think there is an opportunity for a New Media Rennaissance in Halifax. A podcamp could spark that IMHO.

it’s an opportunity to meet other people who are interested/curious/enthusiastic about New Media. How could you not be interested?

Oh yeah. There will be refreshments too.

Head over to The Other Librarian to read the rest of the post about Halifax Podcamp 2009.

Third Wednesday Meet Up Update

As the meet up date quickly approaches, I thought I'd give everyone a quick update on how things are shaping up.

First, Stacey Jones-Oxner from Communications Nova Scotia has said she'll be in attendance, which is a wonderful opportunity for the social media community to learn about the province's usage of new and innovative media. And of course hopefully she'll speak for a few minutes about Pomegranate Phone and the campaign's goals and results.

And then Issmat A. M. Al-Akhlai from Your World Today will talk to us about the importance of social media in business and politics.

This is looking like it will be an incredibly interesting and informative meet up and, as always, tons of fun.

So spread the word, come on out, and bring your friends!

Third Wednesday Meet Up!

Online Event Registration - Powered by www.eventbrite.com

Come on out for the Third Wednesday Social and New Media Meet Up on October 15th! We've consolidated several of the local meet ups into this single event, so we're expecting a solid turn out and some great conversations.

So if you're at all interested in social media, internet marketing, or just want to see what all the fuss is about, please come out!

Oh, and if you're interested in speaking for 5-10 minutes about how you or your company have used social or new media, please email thirdwednesday@gmail.com.

Hope to see you there.

What do you wish big brands knew about the web?

This is a total cop-out of a blog post, I know, but I'm genuinely looking for some advice here.

I've been going around to some of our clients and, well, explaining the present and future web to them, and how it relates to marketing. And also, more importantly, how their audience expects to interact with their brands.

On Tuesday I'll be at one of our major clients and, at this point, I'm a little at a loss of what direction I'll take the presentation. Likely I'm suffering from an embarrassment of riches when it comes to things I could help them with, and that may be precisely the problem. Large companies seem especially likely to misuse or misunderstand this whole interwebernet thing, and it's tough to find a good way to get a lot across without just coming in with a million bullet points (not on slides, because bullet points on slides are awful and you should never use them) of what could be done better and just overwhelm them and myself with information.

So, take a large company, particularly in this market, and tell me what they're doing wrong with the internet. Be it their advertising, their website, or the way they're handling (or, more likely, simply ignoring) social media.

Please...?

You'll be my total BFF if you help me out.