Word of Mouth Marketing | Social Media, Search, Blog, and Viral Marketing

How to Arm Customers to Spread the Word

Up to this point, I have emphasized the Navel Model for creating a company worth talking about. It is critical that you do this piece first. As the great military strategist, Sun Tzu, once said, “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” Most literature in the marketing realm is about tactics. In social media, people go right to Twitter and Facebook. In advertising they go right to the 30 second spot or the full page print ad. However, in order to have successful tactics, the strategic pieces need to be in place first.

Once you have created an organization worth talking about, the next step is to arm your customers to spread the word. It doesn’t matter what the medium is, the process remains the same. The six steps below work especially well in social media, but also work in public relations, advertising, direct marketing, or any other medium. The six steps below are also not linear but are circular because they are not always done in order. By implementing the steps below, you can better find your target influencers, arm them with tools to spread the word, and amplify their efforts.

Publish – There is an argument in the social media space about whether content is king or conversation is king. The reality is that both are important for successful word-of-mouth. Content without conversation is advertising – it’s one way. Conversation with content is chatter. It is social media strictly for the social benefit. The first step is to publish great content. With all of the tools available today, there are many mediums you can use – it simply depends on your audience. If they have time to read and revisit often, then right a blog. If they are more inclined to download content and listen at a later date, then a podcast may be the best option. If they learn visually and your content is meant to be demonstrated, then produce a video series, or vidcast. For tools, check out WordPress, Libsyn, and YouTube. If you want to know what to write your content about, always think “educate and advocate.” Provide educational insights, how to’s, or insider information. When advocating, look to the cause you created in your Navel Model.
Syndicate – Now that you have produced great content, step 2 is to find all the places you can share that content. Obviously, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or other online communities are a natural fit, however, also consider how you can share this content in your advertising, PR, and direct marketing efforts. Link to it within your social communities. Use snippets in advertising. Use it to pitch editors to cover important topics about your company or industry.
Integrate – The amazing thing about where technology has come from in the recent past is that today, everything talks to each other. That means you can spend less time and get better results from your efforts. By integrating your blog utility with your social communities, every time a new post is created on the blog, it can automatically be posted to Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and more. Every time you Tweet it can update your status in Facebook, both your personal profile and your business pages. The key with integration is to amplify your efforts.
Converse – Referring back to the argument under “Publish”, once you have great content, the next step is to talk about it. Talk about your content. Talk about others’ content. Talk about a recent lesson you learned in your business. The key is to talk. Dare to be human; to be more than just a brand. The more personal you can be, the more others will grow in affinity for your brand and share it with others.
Help - This is the concept upon which social media was built – people helping people. The Golden Rule is as applicable in social media as anywhere else. The more that you help others, the more benefit you receive in return. This is where you solidify your customer evangelists. It can be something as simple as re-Tweeting their Tweets or something more complex, like writing a blog post about them. You can answer questions on LinkedIn (and syndicate by linking to your content) or you can comment on another person’s blog. These are all forms of help.
Monitor – Lastly, one of the most powerful aspects of social media is that it is infinitely searchable. I can monitor conversations going on almost anywhere in the social web and (politely) engage in the conversation. I can measure how much chatter there is online about a particular brand. I can even automate monitoring so that I am instantly notified when a conversation is taking place. The ability to monitor online conversations is one of the most important aspects of the social web and the reason it is one of the fastest growing marketing mediums today.

With the six steps above, you create great content, share it in as many places as you can, make your technologies talk to each other, engage with others, be helpful, and monitor conversations in order to start the cycle all over again. If you have done your previous work, such as creating a position, cause, culture, and message, you’ll know what to share and converse about. While you may go through the Navel Model only once in a while, the above steps will be a daily to do list.

With the six steps above, you can adequately arm your customers to quickly spread your message for you. Which do you do already and which could you improve upon?

September 24, 2009 at 7:19 pm bcritchfield 3 comments

And… We’re Back

Due to issues with WordPress, we were down for about a week. Now that those issues are resolved, we are back up and running.

Also, the world headquarters of Navel Marketing have moved from Boise, Idaho to Phoenix Arizona. We have been a bit silent during the transition, however, never fear! There is great content, insight, and humorous quips on their way.

September 23, 2009 at 8:07 pm bcritchfield 1 comment

A Word About Tolerance on the Social Web

Tolerance may be one of the most misunderstood words in the English language. There are many using this term who simply manipulate it to fit their own purposes. True tolerance is something quite different than what is portrayed in the mainstream media. While this may have implications far beyond the social web, I wanted to discuss the importance of tolerance in building a brand online that is worth talking about.

Let’s start with the definition of tolerance. According to Dictionary.com, tolerance is, “interest in and concern for ideas, opinions, practices, etc., foreign to one’s own.” This means not only being open to opposing points of view, but actively seeking them out and showing interest for opinions that are different from our own. This is where it starts to come off the track. There are many, especially those with extreme points of view on either side, who believe that others should be tolerant of their viewpoint, but they are not will to listen to the other side. Tolerance is a two way street and it involves empathy, not sympathy. Empathy is your willingness to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes – to see it from their point of view. Sympathy means that you share their same views.

What does this have to do with building an online brand? Over a year ago, I wrote a blog post about how the web has become a collection of coffee shops where groups of people sit around chatting about anything and everything. However, while what happens in the coffee shop typically stays in the coffee shop (except for the gossipers in the group), what happens online is out there for everyone to see. Your political views, your religious practices, and even your favorite sports team can all be sticking points for a potential brand ambassador. While it would be wonderful if everyone were tolerant, this is simply not the case. Therefore, you have to be proactive about seeking out opposing views and being open to the discussion. a) You might learn something and b) You meet some very interesting people that way. If there is a topic you feel particularly strong about, maybe avoiding the topic is the best way to build relationships.

Social media has brought the world together more than any other technology to date. However, just because you hand someone a microphone does not mean they have something worthwhile to say. One of my favorite quotes is from Uncle Ben on Spiderman who said, “With great power comes great responsibility.” How do we make the most of our new found amplification of our freedom of speech? Seek out new opinions. Engage in meaningful and respectful dialogue online. Build on common ground. While it is our views and beliefs that make us who we are, it our tolerance that binds us together. There is enough of ignorance and hate in the social web. Whether you are building a corporate or personal brand online, engage everyone. If used correctly, not only will social media help you build a brand like never before, but it can become the greatest source for good in human history.

June 25, 2009 at 12:56 pm bcritchfield 4 comments

The Twitter Business Model

To many, that title seems to be a bit of an oxymoron. The question I am often asked is, “how does Twitter make money?” At the risk of writing yet another commentary on the popular micro-blogging network, I think a bit of an explanation behind how Twitter got to where it is today is in order. I think there is a valuable lesson to be learned in how Twitter, almost by accident, became one of the most powerful social media tools in existence today.

As I have explained previously, Twitter is a simple enough concept – 140 characters, follow people and they follow you, answer the question “What are you doing?”. So why did it grow almost 1400% last year? People already had ways to communicate with each other. Isn’t it a bit of instant messaging combined with e-mail? In my opinion, the answer to “why Twitter?” is simple.

The key is that Twitter would not be nearly as useful, nor successful, without the slew of 3rd party tools built for, and that interact with, the platform. If you ever listen to one of the founders of Twitter talk, you’ll hear that it started out, really, as a side project. It was something created so that developers could communicate with each other while working on another project. What they built was a simple communication platform with an open API (that’s geek talk for a “plug” where you can have the software you write talk with the existing software).

One of the first useful tools to pop up was a search engine that could search the entire “Twitterverse” and identify anytime a particular search term was “Tweeted”. Now you could not only talk with people in your immediate circle, but you could actively search out others talking about topics you were interested in. In business terms, this was the golden goose. Obviously, Twitter felt search was critical enough that it actually bought popular Twitter search provider, Summize, in the summer of 2008. You can now go to http://search.twitter.com and search for any topic you would like. In fact, Twitter has even integrated search into its new home page design.

In no particular chronological order, some of the other tools that made Twitter what it is today are:

Desktop Managers: Much the way Microsoft’s Outlook or Apple’s Mail make e-mail so much more accessible, organized, and useful, a desktop manager makes Twitter so much more useful. No longer do I have to use the limited funtionality of my Twitter web page (though it is improving). I can have my Twitter stream divided into columns so I can see all of the people I follow, my replies, and my direct messages in a single glance. In addition, a good desktop manager will fully integrate search so you can automate your conversation monitoring. My two favorite desktop managers are TweetDeck and Seesmic Desktop. TweetDeck is great for most, however, Seesmic has many added tools for the power user, such as multiple accounts and the ability to automate many different search terms. Both also integrate Facebook status updates. However, I really enjoy Twitscoop integrated into Tweetdeck so I can see the trending topics in the Twitterverse.

Auto Feeders: This allows you to take any RSS feed and automatically shoot it over to your Twitter account with a link. The king of the heap is Twitterfeed, which allows you to now automatically post things like blog posts to Twitter. This can also be extremely powerful when intergrated with a social tagging service. With the addition of this one simple tool, Twitter has become the most powerful content aggregator in existence.

Follower Tracking: Now you can manage who you follow and who follows you with tools such as Friend or Follow. This allows you to quickly see who you are following that is not following you back. In addition, you can see who is following you but you are not following back. You can get a quick idea of who the Spammers are on Twitter and the ones trying to game the system.If you really want a blow to you self-esteem, you can even sign up for Qwitter, which will send you an e-mail when someone stops following you and the last Tweet you sent so you can see if something you say rubs someone the wrong way.

Automated Monitoring: Closely tied to the search functionality, you can use a service such as TweetBeep or TweetLater to automatically e-mail you whenever someone Tweets about a particular search term. It makes conversation monitoring automatic. In addition, with TweetLater, you can automatically follow or unfollow someone when they follow or unfollow you and can schedule Tweets to go out at a later date.

There are literally hundreds of 3rd party applications built on the Twitter platform, and I use that term for a reason. Twitter has really become the backbone communication vehicle. It is up to you to come up with your own cocktail of tools to make it the most useful to you.

The question, then, always come back to how Twitter makes money. The short answer is – they don’t. However, as noted author and smart guy, Don Peppers, says, “what’s more important today, capital or customers?” The answer is obviously customers. If I have customers, I can get capital, yet it is always the capital that we are measured by, isn’t it?

With 32 million unique visitors last month, which was 13 million more than the previous month, Twitter definitely has the customer base. The fact that there is a feeding frenzy from the biggest brands in technology, such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Apple, and more throwing 10 figure numbers at Twitter goes to show that where there are customers, there will be money. However, now there are a myriad of ways to monetize a customer base of that size. You can:

Monetize with the old standard of display advertising (though I wouldn’t recommend it)
Take the Google approach and go with contextual advertising
Charge 3rd party software vendors to “plug” into Twitter
Charge commercial users for added value
Sell the data to big brands on the back end for focus-group-type purposes
Charge companies to add increased functionality to their home pages
Or any one of a plethora of revenue models

Simply put, the possibilities are endless. So the answer is that Twitter may not make money right now, but it possess something much more valuable – the hearts and minds of passionate consumers worldwide.

What about you? What are some of your favorite 3rd party Twitter applications? What are some of the ways you think Twitter might be able to monetize its customer base?

May 22, 2009 at 3:23 pm bcritchfield 8 comments

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn…Oh My

I recently wrote an article in Eagle Magazine on social media and the 3 major networks. This covers the basics of social media and the reason behind the phenomenon. I have reprinted the article below. Enjoy:

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn… Oh My: Social networking isn’t limited to coffee shops and cocktail parties anymore

There is an analogy I often use in my seminars to describe how social media has not only shaped the evolution of the Internet, it has changed how we interact as a society. When you go to any coffee shop in town, you will find small tribes of people gathered around tables and comfortable couches, favorite beverage in hand, simply chatting about everything from relationships to what was on TV last night. These bands of socialites have simply moved their discussion from a face to face interaction to what can only be described as the “Virtual Coffee Shop”.

The web has become simply one giant coffee shop, with groups huddled around computer monitors discussing everything from green living to cancer to cars. As these conversation technologies evolve and new tools emerge, the need to discuss important topics in our lives any time of the day or night becomes even more compelling. Social media technologies are just an extension of our daily interactions with those in our lives.

Take Twitter for instance. Three years ago this 10 million strong (and growing) social network was merely a gleam in some programmer’s eye. Today it is the fastest growing social network on the planet. According to Mashable.com, the social web’s source for news, Twitter grew 1382% in year-over-year growth as of February 20091. The media is replete with mentions of Twitter. Jimmy Fallon uses Twitter to solicit questions for guests on his new late night talk show. Shaquille O’neal uses Twitter to interact with fans and give away tickets to games. Major brands are searching the “Twitterverse” to monitor conversations about their brands in order to contribute to the discussion.

What is Twitter you ask? It was built on the notion that anyone could describe what he or she was doing at any moment in 140 characters or less. In practice, it has become a valuable tool for building deeper relationships through much more frequent contact and for aggregating content from many other sources on the web. Twitter can turn you into a mini “rock star” by creating your very own media channel to which anyone can subscribe.

Another network experiencing exponential growth right now is Facebook. A mere 5 years old, Facebook currently has 200 million users and is growing at a pace of approximately 1 million users per week. To put it into perspective, if Facebook were a country, it would be the 6th largest in the word based on population. When my 59 year old mother communicates with me regularly on Facebook, you know it has leapt from the land of geeks and bleeding-heart teens to mainstream.

While Twitter is like being in a busy coffee shop trying to hear your friend over many different conversations going on at once, Facebook takes a more segmented approach to online conversation. First of all, your home page is a news feed that shows only the changes that have been made to the profiles of those in your network. Second of all, you can join groups, become a fan of your favorite business or artist, and even play interactive games with those in your network. It can be both a time waster as well as a valuable business tool. In fact, most people will tell you it has even become one giant high school reunion for them.

Twitter and Facebook serve as that unique intersection between your social and professional lives. They can be valuable business tools or simply a way to stay in touch with family and friends. LinkedIn, however, is all business. In its simplest form, LinkedIn is an interactive resume and Rolodex. In practice, however, it is the online version of the business cocktail party, without the constraints of time or space. You can make introductions, provide a recommendation for those you have worked with in the past, and even ask for help from your network on a pressing question you may have. If you are a professional, own a business, or work in an field you would consider a “career” you should be on LinkedIn.

While the networks may come and go (MySpace is on the decline, for instance) one thing is true. Social media has brought the world together. No longer are we limited by time or space, but we can stay in constant contact with those that matter most to us. If you haven’t yet made the plunge, there is no better time to jump on the social media bandwagon. There is plenty of company.

May 5, 2009 at 9:09 am bcritchfield 8 comments

Why I STILL Love My iPhone

Lest we get into a tussle over who’s phone is better (mine is, of course), this post is less about a cool toy (OK, WAY cool) and more of an illustration of a company that has created a phenomenal customer experience. Admittedly, I am a bit of a gadget geek. I have been using smart phones since the last millennium and I have an insatiable appetite for the latest new gadget. From the Palm VII to the Samsung I300 to Windows Mobile devices to the Blackberry in all its forms; I have used them all. On the technology adoption curve, I most definitely fall into the innovator category.

Image via Wikipedia

As a side effect of my obsessive compulsive disorder, however, my attention span for a new device typically lasts anywhere from 8 months to a year. That is when I start eying other devices and dreaming of how cool my life would be if I only had them. It is not that my current device doesn’t serve my needs, it is just that, well… the grass is always greener elsewhere, right?

The other day I was reflecting on the fact that I am now going on almost 2 years with my iPhone and still haven’t felt the itch. It was as much a shock to me as anyone, but then it led me to the next question – Why? While I believe it is true that every moral lesson in life can be taught using a sports analogy, I also believe that every great marketing lesson can be learned from the products and services we use every day.

In my Navel Model, step number 6, “Experience”, always seems to be the least understood. I believe this is because the term “customer experience” has reached the level of cliche. People think customer experience means selling things in a nicer way. They have simply replaced “customer service” with “customer experience” when in reality, brands who deliver an experience have superseded simply selling a product. Starbucks‘ success came from moving away from selling coffee to creating an environment for meeting, relaxing, and thinking… that also sells coffee.

What are the ingredients of an amazing experience? Let’s use the iPhone as an illustration of what I call the “3 C’s of a superb customer experience”:

Customized: Every customer wants to feel like they are the only customer. Every customer wants an experience that is uniquely theirs. The first step in creating an amazing experience is to customize it to each individual customer. While the iPhone is a single device, I would venture to say that no two iPhones are the same. You can not only add whatever applications that you want from the App Store, you can rearrange the icons on your screen in whatever order you want. There is a strip of 4 applications along the bottom of your screen that stay the same no matter what page of icons you are on. Even those can be customized to be whatever applications you want. Every iPhone is personalized with accessories, ring tones, movies, music, web bookmarks, and more. Rarely do two iPhone owners use it in exactly the same way.

Not only are the phone and its accessories customized to the user, even the service and support are. Obviously, you can select your plan, but when you call in for support, my experience has been that every support technician makes you feel like your problem is the only thing he or she has to work on all day. I posted a blog about an issue I had previously and not only did the support tech walk me through it without giggling at my stupidity, he sent me a follow-up e-mail with some additional information and his personal contact info. I truly feel ownership of not only my iPhone, but of the entire Apple experience.

Consistent: At first glance, it may seem that a consistent experience is at odds with a customized experience. However, there is nothing that can kill a brand faster than a great experience the first time and a horrible one the next. In order to truly create an experience, it has to be consistent both with each customer interaction and at each location. Sometimes this is accomplished through technology, sometimes through training, and sometimes through an established process. In the case of the iPhone, I have come to expect phenomenal service, amazing technology, and simple-to-use interfaces with each contact I have had with the Apple and iPhone brands.

Constant Improvement: The beautiful thing about the free market is that if you are doing something right, inevitably your competitors will copy you. Take the Starbucks example I gave earlier. Today, Starbucks is not quite the star that it used to be. It is being attacked on all sides by competitors, most of them local brands offering something unique. They are currently going through a re-invention phase and cutting back stores. It is not because their product quality has suffered. In fact, by most accounts they still have the best coffee in town. No, it is because they stopped innovating when it came to their experience.

This is probably the area where the iPhone has excelled more than any other. While it’s true that Team Jobs makes an unbelievably cool product, they aren’t simply happy with the status quo. I have seen the evolution occur before my very eyes. I was ecstatic when I first bought my iPhone and could carry one device that was a phone, e-mail, music, video, and Internet device. Then came version 2.0 of the software that allowed me to add ring tones from my songs, move my applications around, and add new applications from the App Store. Just today, I have finally been able to add Skype to my iPhone in its native format and can now access all of my social networks and utilities right from my iPhone. With each new application comes a new and improved experience.

As always, Mr. Jobs has a habit of re-inventing industries and has done it again with the App Store as much as he has with the iPhone itself. Just as the iPod was created to sell songs through iTunes, the same holds true with the iPhone and the App Store. He has been able to do what no other carrier or device manufacturer has been able to figure out, and that is how to sell ancillary services beyond voice and data to consumers.

More importantly, however, I still love my iPhone because I love the experience. It is MY iPhone, unlike any other. I get the same experience everytime I interact with it. It keeps getting better all the time. My guess is, I’ll be an iPhone user for a long time, especially since I hear talk that the next version may have video (but that brings us back to my obsession).

What brands do you see that have created a superb experience based on the 3 C’s?

March 31, 2009 at 6:59 pm bcritchfield 2 comments

What They Don’t Teach You In School… About Marketing

Over the last couple of weeks, I have lectured in 3 different college marketing classes (I have 2 more scheduled) and judged a high school marketing competition. Based on these encounters with mushy young minds, I was able to make a few general observations about the status of our educational system as it relates to marketing. Some of the observations were good, and some not so good. However, I walked away with a general frustration at a lack of the solid marketing principles upon which brands are built today in our educational system.

Don’t get me wrong, while there are some great teachers out there who pour their heart and soul into helping students learn and apply the right knowledge, I think some are a little farther removed from the real world of marketing. In fact, I think it is changing so quickly, it may have passed them by entirely.

Based on my experiences over the last few weeks, here are a few key principles that I don’t feel like teachers spend enough time on in school:

Positioning - It seems common sense that a class on marketing would start with “what makes you different than everyone else?” I believe that teachers spend WAY too much time on the 4 P’s (Product, Price, Place, Promotion). While these are the basic building blocks of marketing, you first have to understand where to build. I believe that any beginning class on marketing should be 80/20: 80% positioning and 20% 4 P’s. Most of the high school marketers built their plans around the 4 P’s but with no thought to differentiation. In my opinion (or IMO for you short hand freaks), positioning is the blood that runs through the veins of marketing. Thank you to the Godfathers of positioning, Al Ries and Jack Trout, for blessing us with this morsel of wisdom almost 40 years ago.
Focused Segmentation - Again, this is another component that receives cursory attention in school, but is critical to the success of any marketing effort. The more focused your target market, the easier your job becomes as a marketer. Start with demographics, narrow your focus with psychographics, then pinpoint with buying emotions. As the ole’ cliche goes in marketing, “the more you narrow your focus, the more you broaden your appeal.” In my view, marketing is a very simple concept. Identify what truly makes you unique (positioning), find out who cares about it (segmentation), and figure out how they get their information. That leads me to the next point.
Marketing is About Conversations - This was one of my greatest frustrations, with both high school and college students. Whenever they developed their marketing mix, they went right to TV, Radio, Billboard, Print, oh.. and some Internet stuff. Why? Because that is the way their parents and their parents’ parents did it. This is where the previous 2 pieces come into play. If you do any sort of of research, people are skipping TV commercials or watching it online, buying satellite radio or iPods so they don’t have to listen to radio commercials, and getting their news and information online rather than from the printed newspaper or magazine. Not that these can’t still be effective, but stop and think about where the target gets its information from first. Second, think about how you can talk WITH them, not AT them. The reason social media has exploded is because consumers want transparency, not carefully crafted marketing spin.
The Cause - This is a theme I talk quite a bit about in my interactions with clients as well as students. In order for any brand to become outrageously successful, it has to create customer evangelists. However, most marketing efforts are focused on “speeds and feeds”, if you will. Customers buy products, and will buy your competitors’ products whenever they are cheaper or more convenient, but evangelists buy causes, or buy into causes. Evangelists have to be passionate about something in order to be evangelists. Who get’s passionate about a “good quality product” or “good customer service”? What is the higher, holier calling to what you do? What is the altruistic meaning behind why you are in business? And don’t start into your “mission statement” because that ain’t it either. What is the real reason people buy your product? That is your cause.
Social Media - To the credit of the college professors, this is the topic they wanted me to come and talk to their classes about. However, most of them were clueless about how to integrate it into marketing efforts. They knew it was a powerful medium, they just didn’t know how to use it. I remember giving seminars 5 years ago about what a blog or a podcast was and now people come to me hungry for information on how to use social media tools. It is a nice change, but those who educate our nation’s youth need to be up to speed on what social media means to 21st century brands. They need to integrate case studies into their classes and, most importantly, need to be users of social media themselves. (As a side note, I was shocked with how few students knew about Twitter, but were avid Facebook users)
The Simple, Repeatable Message - Unfortunately, most would insert the word “tagline” here but a simple, repeatable message is not a tagline. It is a one line answer to the question, “what is it that you do?”. Too much of marketing today is what Bill Bernbach called “irrelevant brilliance”. It is all about snarky quips and provacative phrases. They miss the simple answer to “why should I buy from you?” Creatives often step over (or on) the simple, repeatable message in favor of some mythical creature called “the big idea”. Don’t get me wrong, your marketing efforts should be wrapped around a consistent, compelling theme but you don’t need to create complex out of simple.

These are just a few of the things that I wish they taught more of, or better, in school. It would sure make what our youth are paying for their educations worth the price.

As a side note, I somewhat broke the rules in the high school marketing competition, but I did it consistently. I took the time with each team to enlighten them as to the principles above. Hopefully they walked away from our interaction with a little more clarity as to what marketing is all about. I thought that was much more important than how many points they received.

What about you? What nugget of marketing wisdom have you learned that you wish they taught you in school?

March 31, 2009 at 3:18 pm bcritchfield 6 comments

Why Should I Use Twitter?

I get this question a lot, so in an effort to answer the question once and for all, I thought I would write a blog post about it. To start out, I have to admit, I had the same question. I made fun of Twitter for a year before I started using it. Like I always say, I don’t even find myself mildly interesting let alone believe anyone else will. I am going to echo something that you often hear when people refer to Twitter – “you don’t understand it until you try it.”

First of all, I don’t like the way Twitter explains itself. They say it is a network of people answering the question, “What are you doing right now?” However, the people who only do that have few followers since nobody wants to read “I am eating a sandwich” 10 times a day.

The best description for Twitter is that it is THE aggregation tool. It is one of the best tools available for short snippets of content along with links to rest of the content. It is a phenomenal tool for blog promotion. It is a great tool for finding and sharing great content with others. I read all of my news and blogs on Twitter. It is the portal to all great content.

From a marketing perspective, Twitter is like having your own TV or radio station. You have a group of people raising their hand saying they want to receive your content. It is the ultimate in permission marketing. People can choose to follow or unfollow based on much they like your content.

But don’t take my word for it. I threw the question out on Twitter and Facebook and asked, “Why do you use Twitter?” Here are some of the answers:

Norris Kreuger said: “3 reasons: #1: Missed too much that’s not posted elsewhere, #2: Another way to connect with out of town folks, #3 Need a new addiction”

Brandy said: “I’ve got to have SOME outlet for these random thoughts! It iniates conversations between friends that may not normally happen.”

Richard Paul said: “To expand my circle of influence, connect with people interested in my subject matter, and create new friendships.”

Sharon Fisher said, “1. To get and give pointers to information. 2. To keep up with my friends, news, and people in Idaho.”

Tobin Rogers said: “It’s so quick to connect with people within your industry for networking. You can see what other local professionals are working on. It’s just another great tool.”

Jen Harris said: “Because those are the people I REALLY want to be around.”

Tony Courtwright said: “Simple and real-time communication with industry experts.”

Mark Brummett said: “I follow celebs. (none of my friends have it) But I like knowing what people are up to in real time.”

Dave Bourff said: “‘Cause I can.”

Edward Dunn said: “Socializing, networking, sharing business ideas, learning new ideas, letting everyone know what I had for lunch. Cuz who wouldn’t want to know that?!:-)”

Christopher Barger said: “Because audiences are there.”

No matter what your reason for using it, there is value in Twitter for many different purposes. The only thing I can say is try it. I’ll be your first follower.

How do you use Twitter?

Update: I just saw a great presentation on Twitter by one of its founders, Evan Williams, at the TED Conference. Twitter evolved from what they had initially thought it was going to be and this 8 minute talk does a great job of giving you the history of the evolution. Watch the video here.

March 4, 2009 at 12:09 am bcritchfield 9 comments

Top 25 Social Networks

Recently, Compete.com posted new statistics on the Top 25 Social Networks ranked by monthly visits. While many social networks like to tout their number of users, monthly visits is a true measurement of usage. In other words, which social networks are getting used? The numbers are below:

(Credit Compete.com)

As you can see from the numbers, Facebook has taken over the top spot from MySpace and previously little known Twitter has climbed to the third spot after the two behemoths. In fact, if you read the original blog post on Compete.com, you will see a few other graphs that show MySpace’s numbers falling while Facebook and Twitter continue meteoric rises.

What’s even more fascinating is that, according to the CNET News blog, these numbers only represent web browser traffic in the U.S. According to writer Caroline McCarthy, “That means that you won’t be pulling in any international numbers, where most of Facebook’s users are now, or data from widgets or third-party applications, which are how many avid Twitter users access the service. That means that it’s likely that Twitter’s reach is bigger than the numbers indicate.”

How does this apply to you? I have often told people in conversation that I am an early adpoter when it comes to social media, which means I am not the innovator who jumps on every new technology in its infant stages but wait for a certain mass before it has business value. I follow many innovators (such as my friend Tac Anderson or Joseph Jaffe) in order to keep my finger on the pulse of what is the latest and greatest, but look for networks or technologies that can really add value for clients. If you want to know whether a social networks would add value to your business, the 25 networks above are a safe bet.

That being said, I have always held true to the notion that focus is better than mass. If there is a small social community out there that is extremely targeted to your core audience, then you need to be an active participant. Sometimes, these social communities are housed within existing networks, such as the 25 above, and sometimes they are separate. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, the web is a collection of coffee shops with people around a table chatting. You need to find the coffee shop that best fits your audience and get involved.

As an old economics professor of mine used to say, “there are lies, damn lies, and then there are statistics”. While one thing that blogs are great for is spewing the latest statistics to prove a point, one thing is true. With numbers even close to these, businesses can no longer argue with the value of social media in facilitating and participating in conversations.

February 24, 2009 at 12:59 pm bcritchfield 6 comments

Be Your Own Media – Hollywood Style

We created the term “Be Your Own Media” when I was at BlueLine Marketing. We even hosted two well attended conferences entitled “Be Your Own Media. But what does it mean?

Simply put, it means that you no longer have to rely on traditional media to be the gatekeeper for your information. You no longer have to rely on “prayed” media to get your message out. With the tools available to you through social media, you can become your own media outlet. You now have the opportunity to speak directly to customers, fans, and shareholders.

Recently, I was impressed with a powerful example of Being Your Own Media. While Twitter has become a great place to stay in touch and build relationships, it has also become an excellent place to build your own media channel. You are no longer limited to paying for time on TV or radio, but you now can build your own channel of communication.

If you do some surfing around Twitter, you can find some of Hollywood, music, and professional sports’ biggest stars. For some examples, check out the Twitter pages for Diddy, Ewan McGregor, Ashton Kutcher, Maria Shriver, John Mayer, Gerard Butler, Shaquille O’Neal, and more. Why would so many superstars become active users of such a casual conversation technology?

One reason – to be their own media. As my buddy Ashton Kutcher said, “We are taking over our own tabloid media.”

When you have been hounded for so long by paparazzi and tabloid journalists, the ability to tell your own story can be incredibly liberating. Rather than being rendered helpless to fight the tabloids only in the court systems, they can now fight in the court of public opinion?

In my opinion, this marks the beginning of the end for yet another form of media – the tabloids. In addition, you now have the chance to get to know these celebrities on a much more personal level. Is it just more noise or is it a win for transparency? You be the judge.