Beginning 2010: The Year Of Integration

One of the most common questions asked by communicators is who should own social media? And, there are all sorts of answers.

Advertising. CRM. Marketing. Public Relations. Social Media Experts. Human Resources. Yadda. Yadda.

Social Media Requires Thinking Different.

I've long held the view that nobody owns social media. Or, perhaps more accurately, everyone does. It requires integrated communication.

The reason is simple enough. Social media represents people and technologies that exist in an online environment. The actions and conversations that take place in this online environment are not limited to traditional communication silos (departmentalized communication functions such as advertising, marketing, etc.).

If it was limited to traditional silos, social media programs would be easy. We could assign social media to a single silo and call it a day.

That's all fine and good until you realize that your copywriter is fielding media inquiries or your public relations professional is producing a video or your employees are irritated because answering customer complaints interferes with playing Farmville on Facebook at home. Or any number of other problems people have asked us to fix over the last few years.

While the graphic above is only a sketch, it demonstrates how strategically driven thinking can help reshape a social media program away from the common view, allowing advertising to produce presentations (videos, advertisements, platform design, creative campaigns, etc.), public relations to manage outreach (groups, media relations, public sentiment, etc. ), and social media consultants to engage consumers (via networks, analytics, forums, blogs, etc.). And even if different elements are assigned to different skill sets, we can probably conclude that there will be some overlap.

The real problem seems to be that nobody can honestly answer "who should own social media?" before the organization has answered "how does social media fit into our communication strategy?"

For example, the question should never be "which department will manage Twitter" as much as it ought to be "does Twitter fit within our strategy, how does it fit and what do we want to accomplish, and who is best suited to accomplish it?" Ask that series of questions and you'll likely draw different conclusion.

Who knows? Maybe you'll find that you have several accounts, some operated by individuals, one staffed by customer service, and one developing relationships with analysts, journalists, and bloggers. Or maybe you'll find that you don't need a Twitter account at all.

Over the next few weeks, we'll share a few organizational models for social media. That doesn't mean any of those models will work for everyone. The reality is that most organizations have very different traditional communication models so it stands to reason any social media program would be handled differently anyway.

In the meantime, take a look at David Fleet's The 2010 Social Media Marketing Ecosystem. I'm not fond of technology-driven flowcharts supplanting communication models nor do I think corporate Web sites need to be placed front and center.

However, Fleet is one of the very few who is moving in the right direction as we've found his type of flowchart is among the easiest for decision makers to understand. It also helps shift the conversation away from ownership and toward strategic development.

Talking Tacos: Christine Dougherty

"Over the years, we've heard stories from our customers who have lost weight by incorporating Fresco into their meal choices, and Christine had written Taco Bell a letter detailing her journey," Rob Poetsch, spokesman for Taco Bell to Adweek.

Taco Bell's new ad campaign by DraftFCB features a "real-life Taco Bell customer" who lost 54 pounds over a two-year period by replacing her usual fast-food lunch or dinner with an item from Taco Bell's Fresco menu. While consumer feedback is mixed and dietitians split, there is no debate that the campaign is a publicity win.

The Unique Selling Point

As laughable as it sounds, the Taco Bell "Drive-Thru Diet" is grounded in truth. According to an ABC affiliate, the Fresco menu that Dougherty dotes on features menu items with 20 to 100 fewer calories. In Dougherty's case, she dropped her calorie intake from 1750 calories per day to 1250 calories per day.

In fact, according to the dietician, the Taco Bell campaign is more honest than the Special K Challenge that suggests you can lose up to six pounds in two weeks. At six pounds per week, Dr. Lokken said the challenge is based on reducing calorie intake (whether or not you eat Special K) and borders on promoting malnutrition.

The Brand Disparity

The question for advertisers to ask isn't how to duplicate Taco Bell buzz. The question to ask is how do you introduce a unique selling point that is so far removed from the brand that people hate it.

Since launching the campaign, Taco Bell has scored on publicity and blog buzz, but consumer feedback is overwhelmingly negative. Before the campaign, Zeta Interactive noted that 73 percent of Taco Bell posts were positive, well ahead of Subway, Wendy's and Domino's. Following the campaign, the number of positive posts has dropped to 67 percent, dropping it below White Castle, Blimpie, and Arby's.

The criticism is especially harsh from women, ages 18-34, with negative sentiment from this segment climbing steadily. It's climbing fast enough that the Taco Bell campaign could feasibly face a boycott.

In contrast, when fast food chains like Wendy's and McDonald's launched healthier menu items, they received a surprisingly amount of praise. The difference is subtle, but underscores the fragile brand theory: Consumers equate cereal with healthy choices and fast food with fat. It's a difficult association to break, even when it's true.

The reason Wendy's and McDonald's didn't face as much push back is that both offered non-fast food menu items. Taco Bell, on the other hand, is marketing items that still fall well within the fast food category, despite lower calorie and fat counts. Add in the timing of the campaign, when people are most sensitive to fitness, and combining "diet" with "drive thru," and the result is a campaign that wins on attention, but falls flat on public sentiment.

Setting The Pace: Present Tense

"How did I do, you know, last year?"

Although my son didn't know it, his question followed a common conversation trend. Most people were (and still are) mulling over last year.

AdAge called it the year the marketing world will happily put behind it. Politico recapped the top media blunders. Andy Carvin at NPR posted a word cloud expressing the responses of more than 500 people about last year. And so on and so forth.

"It's the wrong question," I told him.

You might ask how you are doing instead. Then you might find out "how you did" is irrelevant by comparison.

"How am I doing?" he asked.

"That's my question for you," I laughed. "How are you doing?"

Last Thursday, he didn't feel like he was doing all that well. He had a math paper to redo, 300 pages in his AR book to read, and felt rundown after taking a break from tae kwon do during the holidays. He didn't feel like he could get it all done.

This morning, four days later, he feels differently. Because after our conversation, he stopped focusing on how he did and started focusing on what he was doing.

So when I asked him today, he said was doing great. He had finished his math on Thursday, read 100 pages in his book every day to complete it, and began an exercise program with an investment of 30 minutes a day. Today — with all of his holiday homework complete, readiness to test on an AR book, and feeling positive about the future — he really is doing great.

In fact, he said, meeting all of his pace-setting objectives for 2010 wasn't even difficult. He still had time to visit his grandparents, work on a beginner electronics project with me, play with his younger sister, and enjoy free time on Club Penguin. We took in a movie too.

What can you learn from a ten-year-old?

By changing his focus from what he "had done" to what he "is doing," we were able to put his ideas into actions and his actions into results. Results tend to motivate people to move forward. And maybe they can for your team too.

Five steps to jump start internal communication.

• Plan to take action based on current employee assessments.
• Provide a clear direction to help them move forward today.
• Discuss and implement pace-setting actions that can start immediately.
• Practice reflective listening, using it to help overcome doubt or fear.
• Promote mutual trust by asking them how they "are doing."

By the end of the day (or throughout the week), ask them how they are doing. If they answer with enthusiasm, it's working. If they answer with anything other than, find out why and help them prioritize in order to achieve those early pace-setting goals.

It might seem overly simple, but my son wasn't the only beneficiary to setting the right pace for a new year. Within four days, we sent one business proposal out for review, added two new clients, and completed three major projects. We're doing great.

Putting in a few weekend hours on my part didn't dampen my spirits either. I still had time to tackle a few household chores, start a training program, and work in plenty of free time. So I'm doing great too. How about you?

How are you doing?

You don't have to answer right away. Give yourself a moment to adjust. Take until the end of the day (or end of the week if you really have to). And then let me know if the present tense feels better than the past tense for you, your family, or your team.

Recognizing Reader Picks: Top Posts Of 2009

With the new year upon us tomorrow, we would like to say goodbye to 2009 with a recap of this blog's five most popular communication-related posts, based on the frequency and the immediacy of reader views after posting.

"What Would You Do If You Weren't Afraid?"

It is probably no surprise that our call for business leaders and government officials to change their communication struck a chord with consumers and communicators. After all, if we were to pick one word to summarize a common theme in 2009, it would be fear.

The message behind the post, which was part of a three-post series, was simple: if you want real change, you need hope over helplessness. And since most "leaders" seemed to struggle with the concept, we advised our friends and readers to ignore them and set out to find their own cheese. We're glad some people did because our government continues to push fear.

Related Labels: Psychology, Economy, Leadership

The Candy Gamble That Didn't Pay Off

For all the buzz-up Skittles earned in early March, nobody is really talking about the rainbow colored candies anymore. After the initial drunken rush of excitement generated by a Skittles experiment that turned its Web site into a collection of social media streams written by consumers, most people woke up with a hangover.

Within 48 hours, 44 percent of the public was left with a negative impression of the candy for trying too hard to be "cool" and eventually demonstrating it and the agency behind it were really clueless about social media. Effective branding, marketing, and social media require much more work than simply "turning over" a brand to consumers.

Related Labels: Skittles, Social Media

Communication Measurement For A Return On Investment

With so many conversations revolving around about how to measure a return on investment for social media and communication in general, we decided to share a formula that we've put into practice in order to measure a return on communication.

[(B • I) (m+s • r)/d] / [O/(b + t + e)] = ROC

Since January, more than 10,000 people downloaded the abstract from our Web site. And, after the initial post, the ROC series that followed remains one of the most popular published here.

Related Labels: ROC, Strategic Communication

Peanut Corporation of America Poisons Public Relations

The Peanut Corporation of America's handling of public relations after causing a salmonella outbreak will forever be remembered as one of the worst crisis communication scenarios in history. For almost three months, the Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) tried to spin its way out of any responsibility for contaminating as many as 2,100 peanut butter products.

The crisis eventually ended with the company filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, after the FDA and several investigations finally concluded that the PCA acted with gross negligence and was responsible for sickening over 600 people in 44 states and Canada. The contaminants were also linked to nine deaths.

Related Labels: PCA, Crisis Communication

How Publicity, Public Relations, Social Media, Marketing, And Advertising View Publics

Published in two parts, we presented a model of how publicity, public relations, and social media and then marketing and advertising tend to view their publics. Both posts seemed to hit a home run in pinpointing why there are varied views on how to approach social media.

We remain vigilant in our belief that social media is best viewed as a new environment that deserves an integrated methodology incorporating all means of communication. From our viewpoint, integrated communication seems to be the best source to develop effective methodologies.

Related Labels: Social Media, Public Relations, Advertising

Five additional topics that came close in 2009

• Where Edleman PR sometimes misses on the finer points.
• How spontaneous online debates can sometimes trip up experts.
• A satirical view covering everything silly in social media.
• The ugly truth about some online consumer reviews.
• How to demonstrate authenticity without actually saying it.

When I first started this blog in 2005, I used to lament that the biggest mistakes always seemed to overshadow the best practices. That seemed to change in 2008 as we accomplished a healthy mix of both. This year, communication models and theories have helped provide a better blend of communication-related topics. It makes 2010 seem even more promising.

In closing out 2009, I would like to extend a very special thanks to everyone who joined the conversation on this blog or across any number of social networks where the discussion tends to take place more frequently than in the comment section.

If you are one of the 3,500 subscribers or someone who visits on an occasional basis, I cannot thank you enough for making 2009 one of the best yet. It makes a difference to me, it's appreciated, and I'm grateful for having crossed paths with so many people online and in person.

Walling Up Content: Good, Bad, And Ugly

"We fundamentally believe that the readers should pay one price and get all or any of our content. If you don't pay, you don't get anything." — Neil Stiles, president of Variety Group.

And so it begins. Newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters have more or less collectively decided that the time for consumers to pay for news and entertainment is 2010.

The Good. When we covered the outcry for popular television shows like Veronica Mars and Jericho, fans of these shows overwhelmingly supported funding their favorite programs over leaving them to the fate of ratings or advertisers.

Would it have been possible? Maybe, except broadcasters are likely to want consumers to purchase all the duds along with a few gems and watch advertisements too. Unless the price point is right, consumers won't do it.

The Bad. That brings us to the bad. The average cable bill is about $85 per month, up 21 percent from two years ago, according to the Federal Communications Commission. Some people pay as much as $180 per month for the privilege of having access to more content than they can or want to consume.

With Fox and others asking for more fees, those rates will likely climb higher whether consumers watch those channels or not. As prices rise, more consumers may opt out entirely, increasing the burden on subscribers who remain while reducing the size of a marketable audience.

It seems likely that cable providers will eventually have to move to a pay-per-channel model rather than sacrifice their business. The same is happening with what used to be print. Consumers on tight budgets will narrow the number of content providers they are willing to pay for and that means plenty of content providers will disappear in 2010.

The Ugly. And that brings us to the ugly. Not all content providers produce content worth reading or watching and, given a choice, consumers will skip them all together.

Newsday, which was one of the first to move back to a paid subscription model, is steadily losing readers. At $5 per week, it's too much when other news sources are available.

When cable operators are eventually forced to move to a pay-per-channel model, imagine what would happen when a content provider like CNN loses more than 30 percent of its audience like it did this year. A reduction in subscribers will mean a reduction in revenue. A 30 percent cut in one year may not be survivable.

The Reality. I believe that content creators need to be compensated. They deserve to be.

However, the reality is that most of them were too slow to develop a working advertiser-supported online model five years ago only because they wanted the best of both worlds — two distinct revenue streams, online and offline. And now, because that did not work out, they want consumers (and advertisers) to pay for the mistake.

Meanwhile, there are an increasing number of free content providers — news, entertainment, analysis, advice, etc. — providing increasingly competitive content. And while they might not be multi-million dollar conglomerates, some will eventually give mainstream a run for their money, with a better value for advertisers as they reach more people with searchable content.

"Good programing is expensive. It can no longer be supported solely by advertising revenues." — Rupert Murdoch, News Corp.

Right on. Except nowadays, good programming is not enough. It has to be "better than" programming. Assuming consumers have a discretionary income of $100 per month for news and entertainment, that means they can afford approximately 10 to 20 channels/publishers at an average of $5 to $10 per piece in a tremendously competitive industry where local publishers/news outlets are competing with national publishers/news outlets as well as an abundance of free consumer-generated content, expert-generated content, and marketer-produced content. Hmmm ... good luck with that.

Having Conversations: Online/Offline Works Together

When John Moore, chief evangelist for The Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA), shared a slide from his presentation deck that places online conversations at 10 percent and offline conversations at 90 percent of all word of mouth conversations, some people mistook the statement as somehow diminishing online conversations. It doesn't.

Even Ed Keller has tempered his firm's research. The only reason word of mouth online is so small with 43 million brand impressions created through word of mouth conversation on blogs, in chat rooms, and on social networks is because the offline measure is so big, with more than three billion word of mouth conversations taking place offline.

However, even this temperance creates misunderstanding, especially when coupled with the Harris Poll (June 2009) cited by Keller. It's problematic because conversations that occur in social media do not happen in a vacuum.

Online And Offline Conversations Are Interdependent

Misinterpreting data has become all too commonplace in regard to social media. And the most common misunderstandings always seem to hinge on someone isolating data in support of or in order to distract from social media. It makes no sense, but it happens nonetheless.

What marketers need to know is that online conversations spill into offline word of mouth conversations and offline conversations have a tendency to become word of mouth conversations online. In some cases, online conversations provide marketers with a reflection of what is being said about their brand offline, e.g., if nobody mentions your product or service online, chances are nobody is talking about your product or service offline.

For some companies, that might be fine, I suppose. There are plenty of businesses that succeed on a small stable of customers or can confine their marketing to a specific proximity around a brick and mortar shop. (My company did for years and years.)

But for most companies, word of mouth means something. And while the reflective nature of social media is sometimes distorted, making something appear more important online than it is offline (or less important for that matter), it's interdependent nonetheless.

Even social media consultants know this to be true. There are several paths to boost awareness online and offline, and not all of them are exclusively online.

• Attending conferences attracts blog readers and social network connections.
• Being involved in associations and organizations attracts blog readers and social network connections.
• Speaking engagements attract blog readers and social network connections.
• Appearing on news programs, being interviewed by the media, and writing guest columns increases awareness.
• Publishing a book, even those that are nothing more than big business cards, drive online readership.
• And so on and so forth.

Conversely, the opposite is true too. A well-read blog or reasonably well-connected social network can elevate the awareness of someone (or a company) so they are more likely to be invited to speak, be quoted, etc.

I've talked with enough very visible social media consultants to know. While many of them credit social media as driving their success, social media represents a surprisingly low percentage of their daily activities (maybe even as low as 10 percent).

Ironically, this conversation isn't new. It has been going on for years and years with different players — direct mail vs. television, public relations vs. advertising, and so on and so forth. None of it is really accurate. Marketing and public relations work best when integrated, reaching people across multiple communication channels online, offline, et al.