If I was a Restaurant...How Would I Use Social Media?

A Social Service

One of the industries that was expected to be hit the hardest by the recession was the eating out/restaurant sector. There were fears that consumers would cut out eating out altogether, however although they failed to materialise the industry has been through some tough times.

• US Restaurant industry trends


• Brits choosing pubs over restaurants

There is a change in consumer behavior that has and will continue to affect how people communicate with brands, what they spend money on, who they trust and what they value. Ogilvy produced a great report which makes for some interesting reading called Eyes Wide Open, Wallet Half Shut (pdf). One of the underlying themes that fits to eating out is how important family and community have become.

Restaurants are local and have an opportunity to facilitate peoples social experiences and by doing this develop a loayl customer following.

It is about being passionate about creating a difference, being an experience and building a community around the business

The Balancing Act

Restaurants have had to balance offering value for money without falling into the trap of over-discounting. Generally restaurants are having to work harder to capture customers spend and that means gettting smarter at marketing.

Restaurants have to create a clear and distinct experience and use innovative ways to create customer experiences: marketing, menus, branding...and of course menus to excite them. Our recent blog focused on the idea of value: value = benefit - cost and the need to tip the balance by focusing on customer benefits rather than cost.

Restaurants can now use new and exciting  technologies as well as social networks to interact with and engage customers. By building a community they can develop more sustainable and loyal customer base - a tribe.

Some Case Studies

In the US restaurants have recognized the importance of social media and are now focusing on utlising in their marketing.

• Infographic - how social are US restaurants on Facebook


• 2011 Most Influential Restaurants in the US
  

Notable case studies:

• Flimé – The Cannibal Restaurant Case Study


• AJ Bombers and Foursquare


• How Social Media Drives New Business: Six Case Studies (4 are restaurant / food related)


• Why Buffalo Wild Wings Takes Geo-Social Seriously


• Restaurant using ipads as menus (MenuPad)

If I was a Restaurant How I Would Use Social Media

Learn

• Review how successful restaurants use social media and understand what Social Media ‘Tools they use and how


• Have a look at successful chefs/restaurants actively engage with their community with advice and resources e.g. Celebrity chef Rocco DiSpirito, Rick Bayless , La Casa , UnoChicagoGrill

I would listen to my customers/community

Look and listen first: who is talking about you and what is being said?

• 9 reasons why hotels and restaurants should monitor social media and customer reviews


• The Best Free Tools For Making A Social Monitoring Dashboard


• Best Social Media Monitoring Tools to Enhance Business

Match my brand to my target audience 

• I would develop my brand and understand what experience I was offering to my customers.


• Here is an excellent review of how restaurants need to focus their websites on simplicity of design (pdf).

Get my menu into high quality digital pictures

• use high quality for show on website


• Put menu items on Flickr to share easily

Setup my social sites

• Develop a Facebook page


• I could have a Gallery of recipes and get a table booking app used directly within your Facebook  page – why because it is easy for people to connect, book a table and develop word of mouth marketing (interested in this then contact us)


• Twitter – use some tantalizing photos of your menu as background. Tweet regularly but about trends in the community, other people, new menu items, seasonal changes, get feedback…not just about the restaurant. I would also use Twitter to engage with other influencers in the community and ask them questions listen to conversations (you can use Twellow for this)


• Integrate the social network sites with my website e.g. Facebook/Twitter


• Have an email capture on your website for people to subscribe to a newsletter. Create a monthly email-Newsletter with the latest happenings, announcements, new menu items, entertainment news, recipe of the month etc.

Blog

• I would develop a blog. As a start point I would identify a series of articles I could write about e.g. ideas on menus for my target client audience - e.g. I could focus on quick healthy and convenient ideas for moms.


• I would hold an event and invite some people in for lessons on new menu items/recipes. Take photos and blog about the experience, people locally will share and join in creating great word of mouth marketing.


• I would have an RSS feed on my blog that people could subscribe to

Local Guides

• Make sure your restaurant can be searched and reviewed through local business guides such as Yelp.com, Urbanspoon.com, TripAdvisor.com and FoodSpotting.

Be Mobile

• Increasingly people are using their mobiles to find out information and contact restaurants. If they come across a difficult to navigate website then the chances are they will click away. Remember that Google takes into account locality on mobile searches. Get a mobile website.


• Pizza Express recently launched a mobile app that allows customers to pay directly from their phone


• Capture peoples mobile numbers for mobile marketing campaigns by using competitions and prize draws

Location apps

• How diners are using smartphones


• Foursquare - run a promotion based on Foursquare that offers discounts for checking in. For example, any bill over £25 receives an automatic £5 discount if the customer checks into Foursquare.


• Facebook deals - Facebook deals allows users to check-in to receive special offers/promotions

Build relationships with your audience/followers:

• Respond promptly to people


• Ask questions


• Develop conversations


• Host Tweetups for your Twitter community and Meetups for those that gather around topics via meetup.com

• Use Video…build a story
  
  
  
  • Video is the most natural and friendly way to promote the personality of your business. People like to connect with the thoughts and ideas that are part of how you create your meals – it becomes a story and a narrative that they tell to others
  
  
  • Use video to show people some freshly made dishes but don't stop their get some footage of people taking their first taste - that can tell people so much more than a static picture
  
  
  
  

Make your menu sharable or even liked

• Blend offline and online
  
  
  
  • Use tools like Facebook events to promote any specials/promotional events you have. Write a short piece on launch of a new menu people might like to come/ and try it. Twitter the event. Key is to make it sharable.
  
  
  • Invite local bloggers to your events
  
  
  
  


• Keywords and Hashtags
  
  
  
  • Identify keywords relvant to your target customer and restaurant
  
  
  • Use hashtags in Tweets
  
  
  
  

The Personality

Food is a social experience and the more you help and facilitate others experiences the more you will be remembered by your customers. There is a lot more I could cover but I hope this gives your a flavour (pun intended!) for what can be achieved. Of course it is important to tie it together and ensure that you do not attempt too much, spread yourself too thinly and miss out on building the relationships. Co-ordinating and developing your strategy first is time well spent.

 

Time saving tips for the working mum

An Oversubscribed Life!

You will notice the late entry of my blog this week, this is primarily down to my oversubscribed life and it got me thinking about time saving. I would imagine that lack of time is a concern for every working mother who is trying to juggle the various demands of life. Now I don’t want to raise your levels of expectation here and make you think I have discovered a magic formula, I haven’t, but I have been looking into some mechanisms that can help save a few precious minutes of time and that might even allow you to put your feet up once in a while.

This has been a testing week on the parenting front for me, there have been all the usual morning rants, “brush your teeth”, “get your shoes on”, “eat your breakfast” and as any parent knows these instructions have to be given at least 15 times each to have any impact at all. There are the numerous questions that require carefully considered responses “are all the people who live in Hungary, hungry?” and “but why can’t I marry my sister, she is a girl?” In addition to this I have started to feel like I am losing my powers of negotiation, only when it comes to the children of course.  If I’m honest I’m not sure I was up there with ????? in the first place but more recently I  noticed myself giving into their every demand just to enable me to carry on working.

This can’t be right I thought to myself, there must be another way!

Getting Organised

And so I have discovered   Tweetdeck and Hootsuite,  what are they you may ask?  HootSuite and TweetDeck are both social media dashboards. They allow the user to access multiple social networks on one screen. This way the user can manage multiple accounts in one setting. Logging in and out of each social network is eliminated and users can choose to update the same information on multiple accounts if it is necessary. Although both are social media dashboards and both are tools to help manage multiple social networks at once they are different in their own individual ways. I am currently using tweetdeck and I have to say that this does meet my needs at the current time, but my colleagues all use Hootsuite and say it is far better. You will have to make up your own mind,  here are some clips that might help you get started on these dashboards.

Hootsuite

Tweetdeck

Here is a quick overview of TweetDeck:



an here is a full list of tutorials that take you through how to use Tweet Deck stage by stage.

http://support.tweetdeck.com/forums/126043-desktop-video-tutorials

Some Tips

I am still quite new to these dashboards but it has completly revolutionalised the way I plan my tweets and posts across all the social media channels. This simple tool means that I can spend an hour in the morning planning what I want to go out on my social media platforms, schedule them all in and leave it for the rest of the day. Previously I would have been tied to the laptop panicking about the lack of communication with my followers. This really is a fantastic time saving tip.

I know what your thinking, it's not just social media that eats into my time it is also the day to day aspects of my business so before I sign off  I thougth I would leave you with my top 7 time saving tips outside of the social media forum!

7 simple time saving tips

1. Plan your next day the night before.,


2. Prioritize my list and do the most important tasks


3. Always stick to the list and tick off the item as you go


4. Take a break from working and going to the gym or just out for a walk.


5. Procrastination is the biggest time consumer, just get on and do it!


6. Outsourcing things like writing content and updating your social media profiles


7. Ask your self a simple question – “Is what I do now helping to get more visitors to my site?”

Social Media: Value equals Benefit minus Cost

What is Value?

Often on blogs, in marketing spiel and in conversations we hear people talking about value. IT becomes one of those words we simply accept without question that we are all on the same page with it. In particular social media relies on producing content that is relevant and adds value to your customers. But how do we know and prioritize what is of value to our customers?

Have a look at the presentation below by Laurent Francois who tackles this brilliantly in his presentation.

 

Although it is a complex proposition let's just simplify it to illustrate some points:



The common ground is saving money and time. So why not investigate what are ways that you can create value for your customers. If you don't want to be perceived as discounting then look for the value of saving people time.

Two examples of organisations using Twitter to add 'value':

• BtoB - Caterpillar uses Twitter to connecting with current and potential customers, and addressing service issues.


• BtoC - Zappos uses Twitter to keep customers informed of relevant company and product information, events and promotional offers

Value = Benefits - Cost

To your customers ask yourself why they should invest their time (Cost) in coming to your website, Facebook page, Linkedin Group, Twitter...if you haven't identified the value proposition and content strategy then you are unlikely to succeed.

Take a look at what your are doing: What content is most popular with your target audience? Is the content you share via social media resonating with your target audience or a random audience?

Understand your Target Audience

As we often mention to our clients it all starts with understanding the customer and NOT assuming that you know their needs. Research even done simply is better than none at all and will provide you with some ways to be relevant to them.

Here is a some articles on social monitoring and management tools that can help you do this:

• 8 Methods + Lots of Tools for Getting to Know Your Audience


• 5 New Social Media Management Platforms


• 20 free, awesome social media monitoring tools

Alternatively select some clients or customers to free lunch, prepare some questions and get their views.

• Focus Group research


• DIY: Research on a shoestring budget

This is reinforced by some research into why people 'Like' brands:

A study of 1,500 Facebook users, ExactTarget concluded that 38% of online U.S. consumers “Like” (formerly “Fan”) a brand on the social networking site.

• 40% to receive discounts and promotions


• 39% to show my support for the company to others


• 36% to get a “freebie”


• 34% to stay informed about the activities of the company

Conversely we can also see that different channels will require different strategies for brands and businesses:

• Plain and simple - Social Media: Top 10 Reasons Why Your Audience Doesn’t Like You


• Top Reasons Why Consumers Unsubscribe Via E-Mail, Facebook & Twitter (Mashable)


• Reasons people ‘Unfollow’ Brands on Twitter

Key takeouts:

• It is important to attract and gain new customers (as well as reward loyal customers) develop a clear integrated strategy that includes how you can use social media to promote your products or services strategy


• 'Freebies' can create a lot of word of mouth and provide added value to potential and existing customers. This could be information that saves people time or you could provide a mobile app e.g. in BtoB a utlity app or for a consumer brand an app that people find entertaining. This develops your brand awareness as well as provide valuable interaction and data.


• Consistently producing content that focuses on your customers needs and is relevant. In your strategy vary the reasons so that you are not repetitive in how you add value or your content strategy. Social monitoring and customer research is not a one off event - it needs to be embedded into your marketing processes and used to adapt your strategy.


• Be obsessive about understanding your customers and you will create competitive advantage. If you understand your customers better than your competition and then act on this by producing content that is right for them and adds value (promotions, articles, blogs, posts...) you will gain market share.

Some interesting reports

In the spirit of this post I have read some interesting reports lately and they are listed below for you to take a look at and download:

A report by HootSuite on social media measurement

The Global Social Media and CSR Report by Wolfstar

If you come across any good reports about marketing in the digital age and/or social media then let us know

 

 

 

Social Media - The Story of the Three Little Pigs

The Story So Far

We have all grown up with the famous story of the three little pigs (although I like the alternative 3 little wolfs variation as well). The moral of the story is obvious people who work hard, work smart, save money, think ahead, and help other people, will come out on top.

In marketing you wouldn't recommend a business to build their marketing solely on social media - it is just not good advice. Social media is just one part of the marketing mix.

Likewise the idea of solely being digital is not right for every business, it is important to recognise and use offline marketing (if it fits to your target customers). Again as a stand alone focus it will deliver results but be limited. Like the 3 little pigs using the right materials are vital to a solid marketing strategy.

Jeff Bullas wrote a good piece Social Media Marketing’s Biggest Myth that quite rightly argues the need to focus on being relevant and informative:

"The reality is that “social media” is based on self-interest. People on social sites are looking for materials which are useful to them.

Content defines the value to your customer - why people will either ignore it or share it. Content strategy is then a defining part of any online strategy. Here is a great presentation that drums home the importance of content for online marketing.

Content Strategy: The Future of Marketing

Mixing the Bricks and Mortar and Working Together

So if we return to the three little pigs story - our marketing should consist of mixing our marketing to produce a solid foundation and the people we invite to help us are our customers; because if they help you (and more importantly want to) you may develop a community.

We can't cover everything so I have focused on email - some people see email as an enemy of social media i.e. email vs. social media. The truth is, done well they should compliment each other (but it also depends on market/customers...).

Email Facts

• 72% of companies rate email as 'excellent' or 'good' for return on investment (EConsultancy)


• Email adoption high but lacking in best practice - the relevance, context and targetting (download pdf - Forrester) also support by MarketingSherpa 2011 Email Marketing Benchmark Report (download here)

Email is getting Social

• 6 Smart & Effective Email Marketing Tactics (Mashable)


• 7 Steps to Improve Your Email Marketing (Practical Commerce)


• Integrating the Facebook like Button into Mailchimp campaigns (Mailchimp)

Both Constant Contact and ExactTarget acquired businesses in the social arena, namely, NutshellMail and CoTweet. Why - well they recognise the value of social data and are looking to use this to build more precise targeting methods based on social data.

Putting the Story back into Marketing

So what is the role of social media within the marketing mix? Again this is big subject but here are a few reasons why it is an important part of any business now:

• people trust people (Source Nielsen) and therefore we look for what are friends or others say about brands/products and services


• brand communities can provide an ongoing development of a relationship with brand as opposed to a start stop approach (see blog post by Olivier Blanchard)


• brands can understand (and quickly) what their customers are saying - a dynamic feedback loop providing ways to improve your product or service


• researching customers (you can understand their online/offline behaviours and refine your marketing and provide value to them (this comes back then, to your content strategy)


• using tools to linkin with Facebooks open graph you can use the data to understand your 'followers'


• it is where you customers are spending their time online and hence where you can help them e.g. customer service

This is by no means an exhaustive list, it just meant to illustrate the opportunities and relevance of being social. In todays world we want the human connection as well. We can never underestimate the power of the human story, the connection we feel with it and the emotions that they evoke. Look at some of the highest ranked video's onYouTube and you will understand what I mean. When done well, social media builds as the brands facilitate the story of others as well as solving problems, communicating relevant messages and adding value it can also tell the stories of its people.

Video Marketing - Why Haven't You Got It Yet?

The Growth of Video Marketing

Are you doing any videos? Do you know that a YouTube channel is the equivalent of a Facebook profile? Do you know that online video, yes video can help with your SEO? In addition, as opposed to TV ads, online videos are trackable and can be viewed repeatedly attracting the “long-tail” viewers while allowing you to measure the exact impact of the video and participate around it in the comments section or on blogs.



 

Some of the Trends

Advertisers Using Online Video

Advertisers are becoming more confident in using online video advertising, due to factors such as standardisation of ad formats, online video advertising is going from strength to strength. A recent study from ComScore, found that just over 45% of users in America viewed at least one video ad over a month. You can watch a more detailed video here Comscore - The State of Online Video.

What is surprising is that only average 30% of Youtube ads are skipped, this came from a conference in Manchester, Bruce Daisley, sales director at Youtube & Google.

Streaming Films on the Up

In a huge coup for Netflix, a recent study found that 20% of peak time donwstream internet traffic was streaming video from their site. This is great news for Netflix, and perhaps not so great news for the DVD market.

 

Bigger Screens Promote Video

Resulting from what previous Nielsen analysis identifies as the iPad’s larger screen, iPad users show substantially higher download rates for video content than iPhone users. One-third (33%) of iPad users regularly access TV shows, three times the 11% of iPhone users who do so. And the 32% of iPad users who regularly access movies is virtually three times the 12% of iPhone users who regularly access movies.

Mobile Using Video On the Rise

This is probably quite obvious but the people over at Nielsen recently reported that mobile video is on the rise. As more people start using smartphones e.g. iPhone, Blackberries) this is only set to accelerate even faster. The main thing is, we now have clear idea on how big and fast video consumption is growing. According to their recent State of the Media report Americans consumed more video than any quarter prior on mobile devices.

 

Live Streaming Growth at Over 650%

Comscore announced that the amount of time American audiences spent watching video on live video channels (Justin.tv, Ustream, Livestream, LiveVideo, and Stickam) has grown 648% to more than 1.4 billion minutes. This phenomenal growth compares to a 68% increase in video views on Youtube.

Although this is still a small proportion of  the online video market, live streaming is growing in popularity and use. Many organisations are now enbracing this as way to extend their reach and engagement with employees. As people become more accustomed to this form of content growth will continue.

UStream are the dominant players in this, but Facebook is quickly developing its capabilities – recently introducing LiveStream integration with Facebook pages. This has the potential to hugely increase the live stream video market and see it really reach the mainstream.

Ways to Use Video for Your Business

Video is a powerful tool for marketing your business. If done well you can reach a large audience through a viral effect otherwise known as buzz marketing. Video can be distributed across multiple online platforms easily both as ads or for consumption across social channels. Video enhances response rates for other forms of marketing e.g. email, SEO, PPC…

Some ways video can be used for marketing:

• Product demonstrations


• Service testimonials


• Promotions


• Product launches


• Product training

Other ways you can use Video for your organisation:

• Business news


• Events/Keynote speeches


• Health and Safety


• Human resources (training/induction)

Some Tips

Social is just a label, the real challenge is figuring out how to deliver optimal customer experience that builds meaningful relationships between you and your customers and employees.

1. Move beyond using Twitter and Facebook - many businesses still only focus on these channels. Simple to add in a button to your website so that people can also find your YouTube channel.


2. Make sure you tag your videos with keywords that are relevant to the video but also are the ones you use for your SEO strategy


3. Make your YouTube channel a destination add it to your website as well as your Twitter and Facebook buttons. Name your YouTube Channel but put some thought into the name of your channel just as you would for the domain of a blog or website.


4. Take advantage of YouTube's advertising.  There are two types of advertising
   
   
   
   1. YouTube Search. They're the number two search engine out there. You can bid on the keywords people use when searching on YouTube just as you do on Google adwords (PPC). Instead of a text ad coming up on the right-hand side as it does on Google, you get a video and a thumbnail of a video. The cost is relatively low compared to Facebook or Google.
   
   
   2. Promoted Videos. This is just as the name says where you can promote a video you have uploaded. Once you have your video submitted as a Promoted Video, it then has the opportunity to run what are called 'CTA' ads. 'CTA' stands for 'call to action.'
   
   
   
   

A successful video marketing strategy focuses on attracting the right audience with a topic or theme that’s video-worthy and can be compelling! Get that right and you could dramatically increase your results.

 

Social Media Statistics - Seriously How Big is Social Media?

Socialnomics

Socialnomics by Erik Qualman has had a refresh and some new material added in which is well worth watching. The original version has had over 2.8M views, the 2nd video over 1.6M and doubtless that this one will achieve a significant number

Idea: many people have in there own business/market or vertical amazing figures that are often not pulled together or are not even known. If you want to to create something interesting for your industry why not explore this type of infomercial video for your industry. I appreciate in many cases it might not work but in some I imagine if done well it would spark a lot of interest.


 

Some more resources for social media facts and figures:

The BtoB Guide to Social Media guide have put together a massive list of facts and they are continually updating this as well. They have categorized the list so fairly easy to explore figures for any blog or article you are writing.

The BtoB guide to social media have put together over 1000 social media facts and statistics.

Infographics

Data can be pretty tough to get your head around especially if you like to see information more visually. However, infographics can take data and present it in visually stunning ways. It has become a captivating way of explaining often complex data in a brilliant and creative way. The daily infographic has some good and easy to view categories for you to search. Importantly infographics can be a key hook and provide traffic and buzz.

• The Daily Infographic


• Flowtown


• Flowing Data


• Visual complexity

Supplement you blog or an article with a good infographic it will help illustrate your article and break up the text.

Facebook

So much news and focus in social media is around Facebook. The growth of Facebook has been phenomenal and it continues to dominate the social networks not only for the size of the user base but because they are still evolving and changing. Brands and businesses are switching budgets to focus more on developing their brand communities on Facebook and it is no wonder when you look at how many followers some brands have.

• All Facebook


• FameCount

The Reports

Some of the best figures come from the research and reports that are generated by the specialist consultancies. Many are more of a generalist research consultancy such as Forrester and Gartner who produce industry and market reports that many organisations buy. However, often the data or at least some of the graphs filter through and can be picked up for free. Hubspot produces some excellent reports and most are free to download in return for signing up to their subscription.

On the flip side consultancies like Econsultancy through their blog release some great insights and reports. Other noteworthy consultancies are Borrell Associates and

Add to this blog

If you have any other resources or websites that you think are good and are worth adding to this list let us know and we will update it with your information and of course credit you with any links you provide.

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Mobile - Be Where Your Customers Are

The Growth of Mobile

As businesses wake up to the growing momentum behind the mobile revolution it is worth reviewing the scale of change and growth forecasted in this market. Although in its infancy the mobile undoubtedly will present some of the greatest opportunities for marketing.

Why? - because it links together the time and place of marketing; it is the on demand / real time delivery of information and the blending of online and offline that creates amazing ways to engage customers.

• Worldwide Smartphone Market Expected to Grow 55% in 2011 and Approach Shipments of One Billion in 2015


• Mobile media use up 600% as unlimited plans tune out
  


• Econsultancy have a great infographic on the Mobile Ecosystem and lots of links to facts and figures


• and your guessed it Facebook has a focus on mobile using html5


• Facebook’s iPad Plans, Mobile Platform Strategy, and Traffic Growth

 

The smartphone is driving a new set of behaviours as people rather than switching on their mobile are consuming more and more media through their phones. Of course accessing social networks (Twitter, Facebook) drives a lot of the viewing but it is also the use of apps as well as the imediacy of being able to access the internet - Google for instance that makes it so useful. Interesting but not surprising is the use of mobiles during other media consumption and activities such as watching TV.

Where the Eyes Are?

Just as there has been a shift in how we consume media,  comes a subsequent shift in the move to increase mobile marketing spend. Borrell Associates forecast that by 2015, the mobile share will have grown to almost two of every three online marketing dollars spent will go to a mobile campaign. Other information - 53% of mobile users would share their location to receive more relevant ads (source: Mashable) and mobile coupon redemption is 10x that of traditional coupons (source: Borrell Associates).

This year more brands will experiment and explore how to use mobile to push the boundaries of user experiences.

Be Where Your Customers Are

When you search for a restaurant or takeaway on your smartphone using Google it will take into account your location (if you opt out of the location-based features). This local element is a vital ingredient in the search results. However, if a user then clicks through to a website that is not easy to navigate and find the information they are looking for e.g. your contact number, then users will simply click away.

Shopping habits are changing. Next time you are in a shop have a look around and see how many people are using there phones whilst in the store to look up products/reviews... There are now even apps that allow you to scan products whilst in the store and they will compare prices with other stores (often locally) there and then.

• ShopSavvy


• Twenga


• Red laser

The opportunities s to engage your customers on the mobile are expanding. QR codes for instance provide a rich and local context to blending the offline with the online world. A QR code can simply be used to connect to a website, Facebook page, mobile site...the opportunities are both incredible. See our feature on Scoopit for more examples and information.

• QR Code Marketing

This and more trends are explored in this presentation by Space150.

Mobile Trends - June 2011

View more presentations from space150

Key Takeouts

If the forecast is even remotely accurate to how real life plays out, harnessing mobile marketing will help you be where your customers are. It is important to have your digital touchpoints aligned so that whether a customer looks for you on their mobile, laptop, social networks....you branding and communications are easy to understand and relevant to your target audience.

With mobile you are putting your brand into the palm of your target audience’s hand. Mobile is overtaking the PC for how and when we access information, communicate, connect and share. Facilitate experiences for your customers and you will business will benefit:

• Whether you are a sole trader, SMB or large organisation you need to have a mobile website
  
  
  
  • (over 80% of brands do not have a optimised mobile website)
  
  
  • More than 90% of SMB's do not have a mobile website
  
  
  
  


• Research how your customers use mobile to connect


• Build your database of customers mobile numbers with an opt in campaign


• Provide relevant and timely information to them


• Use mobile advertising to reach your target customers

For larger organisations developing an app for your customers could well provide you with a unique way to provide value to your customers and develop a competitive advantage. In our next blog on mobile we will talk about developing a mobile strategy for your business and what you need to consider.

Social Business - Where do we start?

Where to start

For many organisations we talk to the question of how to use social technologies to benefit their business beyond the use of marketing has finally arrived at the board room table. Many have made taken their first steps in using social tools and started to listen, learn and integrate their marketing. The broader issues of where and who is responsible for the social business plan brings into focus the many different areas of the business impacted by the use of social business tools.

Different people will have different views on where to start. Some may argue that the focus needs to be on an integrating strategy while others may work on a priority basis and use pilot projects to prove the business case. There is of course the complexity of knitting social into the often siloed activities of an organisational structure. So where and how can organisations start to tackle some of these problems?

Looking at the Business of Being Social

There is both the opportunity to internally and externally harness the social capabilities to help organizations solve business problems. But it is context of how culture and technology need to be integrated that we understand the implications on strategy and how important it is to embrace change management.

Initially organisations need to understand their own capabilities and audit there current position:

• understand who in their business is currently using social media in relation to the business e.g. active in Linkedin forums...


• understand employee activities on social media - this is often useful and helpful to determine who could be recruited to help on projects


• benchmark you brands/products and services on social networks


• benchmark your competitors

In much the same way as you would put together your information sets to build a business plan and strategy you need to understand your current position for developing a social business capability.

Set clear goals and measures e.g.

• % increase in coverage of PR per £XX spend


• Sales could be a % Increase in Sales Leads


• Customer Service could be % reduction in response times or % reduction in number of customer service queries

Moving Quickly

We often see that many organisations end up with analysis paralysis. As we talked about in our last blog prioritizing how you intend to use social business is critical.

In today's fast paced world it is about being agile:

• Flexible and responsive resources (internal and through partner network)


• Rapidly assimilating changes in your business environment


• Focusing on information that can quickly be acted upon


• Harnessing influencers for change (internal and external)

The changes in technology and business are not incremental they are a major shift to a new form of technology and operations orientation. It is how the organisation responds to a new internal employee engagement model and also respond to a social customer across multiple channels. As consumer adoption of new technologies and behaviours change, the challenge is for organisations to reconfigure resources and capabilities to meet those changes.

 

Key Take Outs

• Benchmark your business and capabilities


• Research and benchmark your competitors


• Understand your customers/listen to where they are/what is being said/channels


• Research your network and find out who are influencers and potential social champions


• Aim to develop a centre of excellence for social business that is cross divisional/departmental


• Recognize that mistakes are going to be made - that is why we call it learning


• Remember to be adaptive/respond top changes


• Build pilots that can be scaled quickly

Social Business = technology, culture and behaviours

What is a social business?

There are probably many different definitions and variations on what a social business is. I don't want to get bogged down in semantics. What I am passionate about is the way people can can come together to share, learn, collaborate and benefit from embracing the principles of social business. It is the transformative impact it can have both culturally as well as operationally.

When I listen to people and views on the net there are people that talk about changing behaviors - focusing on how people's habits have changed, how they interact, where and how they spend their time, that people are sharing information socially, how they buy, who they trust, how they find information, how they interact...Others seem to focus on how the technology is changing people's behaviors enabling new ways to interact, collaborate, communicate, share, connect...and a few even mention culture.

We need to recognize that Social business is about people, technology and culture and one without the other doesn't work. Organisations that just embrace the technology of an enterprise 2.0 vendor selling them a community platform will not work. Neither will someone developing a strategy for cultural change without the guidance on how to implement and manage the change process. Equally overlaying a social business strategy on a culture of fear and hierarchical management control will fail.

Some articles that reinforce these are:

• 7 Ways That Social Business Advice is Wrong for Your Organization


• Workers not as loyal as companies think


• Social Business Strategy: The CIO Shortlist

Learning to Change

The idea of having to adapt and change is as old as business itself but the need to change rapidly is now a necessity and a source of competitive advantage. Customers are changing and new business models are emerging thanks to flexible and social and scalable technology solutions.

Organisations are now tackling how to integrate social technologies into their business beyond the use of marketing or customer service. However transitioning to new working practices is not easy for many as they move from old legacy systems to new (often requiring intermediary stages),  aligning goals and objectives, aligning roles and responsibilities, changing processes as well as leading the change.

We can look at how Dell and other organisations have focused there efforts on taking small digestible steps, piloting projects, developing champions and building on their learning.

Keynote from Social Business Forum 2011  

One aspect though is consistent it is the pace and need to change and learn, to adapt to become flexible to the dynamics of a new and emerging era.

Focus on the application

Organisations who want to adopt a social business approach need to focus on the application and relevance to the business. There are a multitude of ways applying social solutions improve a business. However, each business is different and how and what is a priority will depend on the organisations strategy, goals, objectives, market position...What is important is to identify the opportunities prioritise them and start.



I call this the age on your imagination because you are main limitation in coming up with business ideas and solutions is no longer the technology.



 

Key take outs

• Research your market and identify how your market, customers, competitors and business models are being affected or could benefit from social business


• Identify some tangible projects


• Research your employee capabilities


• Bring together relevant stakeholders


• Scope your projects and enable your team to make decisions


• Communicate, communicate and communicate - be open

 

Co-creation the Engine of Enterprise Innovation

The Social Business Case

I started TribalCafe with the idea that we could help businesses change and adopt social media, not just for marketing to their customers, but to transform how they harnessed the power of their people; to create a shift in the way people worked together to innovate.We are still working towards that goal but thought we would share some of our thoughts and learning.

Despite the barriers we can learn from companies that have integrated social ways of collaborating and working such as Zappos. But there are plenty of other evidence. For more case studies and information visit the 2.0 Adoption Council, IBM (in association with MIT Center for Digital Business and the Dachis Group) who have published a series of case studies demonstrating integrated social business.

What we can take out from these case studies is:

• They inspire and provide evidence of what is possible and both in terms of capabilities and results


• Provide ideas, best practice and mistakes that can be shared and that people can reuse


• New thinking on existing similar issues that others may face


• Building blocks - knowledge and experience that others can use and add to

Inspiring insights

What we find today that whilst many businesses have taken their first steps towards using social media for external communications few have strategically aligned themselves towards a  social business. This is despite mounting evidence from reports like McKinsey's Web 2.0 in business results reported in December, 2010. McKinsey's analysis of companies found that “Market share gains reported by respondents were significantly correlated with fully networked and externally networked organisations. This, we believe, is statistically significant evidence that technology-enabled collaboration with external stakeholders helps organisations gain market share from the competition..”

Deloitte has also released a new study on using social software for improved business performance. The social business study has made clear how business leaders of today need to harness social business for the “unique capabilities to address current operating challenges and improve operating metrics”.

So now we are starting to see a picture emerge of a new way of working a new enterprise ecosystem that fosters ideas, builds and supports co-creation processes and then resources some of these to effectively innovate. It is important that organisations effectively set a clear path for taking commercial ideas to fruition; if they do not they will fail to harvest the fruits of encouraging co-creation.

The Relationship Culture

Whether it is friendship, partners or marriage; good relationships involve  reciprocation, good communication, consideration...if organisations want employees to give up ideas, foster collaboration, devote additional energy and hours when needed and advocate the benefits of the business...they need to think of developing a relationship with their people. This moves a business beyond a transactional exchange of money and benefits for goals and objectives to be achieved; it becomes a relationship culture. If knowledge and ideas are the new oil of commerce this becomes a necessity; but transformation needs to be considered, planned and developed in line with the broader organisational strategy it needs shareholder buy-in and the commitment to the long term.


“Culture is to organizations what personality is to people.” Edgar Schein.

Some of the Barriers that Enterprises Face

New Business Models

We are in a era where ideas can be transform industries, where new business models can forged through the combination of imagination and technology. The flexibility and adaptability of technology now invites people to break through traditional models, re-invent how we think of business; and for brands it is flattening the value chain - it is providing direct links to the end customer or consumer.

But many businesses as yet are not digitally literate and do not have an understanding of emerging technology and the possibilities it can offer. There is often a limited understanding of how enterprise social media can strategically benefit the business. Consequently it is hard for those unfamiliar with the tools and approaches of social business to extrapolate ideas to benefits and opportunities. The hardest part about social business is changing your thinking.

Analysis Paralysis

Some businesses are not taking action despite the level of data, market trends, case studies and other relevant supporting information. This analysis paralysis and aversion to change and risk is at a time when markets are moving faster than before - the risk therefore of not taking action is often not considered within this mix.

Meanwhile competitive businesses test, pilot and scale gaining learning, results today. They develop capability and discover how to create value through their people. It is not about prematurely launching some initiative though based on an ill formulated goal. It is about setting a course and strategy that is company wide, building resources and capabilities and incremental change based on strategic projects, shared learning and targeted parts of the business. Sharing knowledge and lessons learned on how a social business.

However,scoping projects, scoring capabilities and objectives, allocating budget and resources are vital to take the first steps

Tools and Technology Blindness

Many organisations are used to large scale deployments of software and systems. Yet the agility of todays technology involves much easier integration, adaptation and scaling. Organisations are facing competing vendor advice, internal positioning of technology needs and as a result get wrapped up in the tools not the business objectives. They get caught in the what can't be done rather than what is the idea and how can it be achieved.

It is important to establish a social business strategy that considers social business behaviours and supports the adoption of technologies that create a continuous flow of knowledge, information and value exchange. Enterprises cannot build a social business culture on tools and technologies alone.

Organisation Structure and Responsibilities

A social business has many facets and touches upon the core disciplines within the business. Executives are used to formalized structures and responsibilities, yet social business transcends this. HR, Marketing, Customer Service, Internal Communications, PR or IT are all affected. There is the obvious need to create a new position for this yet in the initial stages it needs to be carefully chaired and guided by a group to ensure consistency in the development of the process.

Co-creation the Engine of Enterprise Innovation

What does the social business look like:

Flexibility: people will have a more fluid role based on a far greater demand for project based work; where people are more identifiable as facilitators, specific experts or technicians, project managers...

Adaptable: Cost of fuel is increasingly making home working more effective, locality will increasingly become important and hours will be determined by a work life balance. Multiple projects become the basis for tuning hours vs. pay and benefits

Skills and Learning: If the pace of change is increasing then aligning skills to market needs will be enhance value both for the individual and the organisation. More businesses will attract and work with people to develop their skills - even contracted partners.

Open and transparent: Management practices will be transparent (mindful of course of peoples confidentiality). The familiar 360 process will extended to partners and customers but rather than staged annually it will be more dynamic.

Brand and Service: The brand, the culture and the people will increasing become intertwined affecting talent acquisition, customer perceptions and value proposition.

Cisco uses a social business strategy to improve brand positioning and create awareness, but the process of doing this has driven an output internal Enterprise 2.0 efficiency and a new social business culture. Co-creating value should not not only be through internal people; it is needs to be part of a broader market community where customers are included and opportunities to harness and shape new value models. The prize is available to those that start the journey.

I have only touched upon some aspects of social business and would welcome other ideas, experiences, case studies and examples.

 

 

 

6 Ways to Improve your BtoB Blog

When talking to businesses they often have difficulty in understanding the value of having a blog. Many just feel obliged to have one because their competitors do or they were advised to by their web developer. Yet used well blogs can significantly improve your social business presence, SEO (providing fresh content and relevant SEO keywords) as well as being a powerful marketing tool.

However, many businesses are making some common mistakes that could simply be avoided. In a tough and competitive market it is important to focus on marketing your business and to do it better than your competition. A blog is ideal for BtoB and integrated well into your social business strategy can yield great results. Here are the 6 ways to improve:

1. Writing a blog that focuses on your target audience


2. Starting your blog (or post) by conducting some research


3. Identify how you can add value to your customers


4. Use a good layout to make it visually appealing


5. Use a variety of media and material (not all yours)


6. Harness your people to help develop your blogging

1 – Writing a blog that focuses on your audience

Can you explain to someone who your target client is? Segmenting your customer is important to identify the types of customer you are trying to reach and will help when you think about your strategy. Different markets will have different issues, topics of interests, news...

• Identify and segment your customer(s)


• Imagine you are them and write down a profile of them their likes, responsibilities, issues...


• Decide on your strategy - what is the purpose of your Blog, how do you want to be seen, what value will you add to your customers


• Use keywords: not only for SEO so that you will be found by customers but also to help you focus on your writing and research

2 – Starting your blog (or post) by conducting research

Many of your existing or potential customers may be blogging as well as some of your competitors. So it is worth spending some time researching and getting familiar with what has already been written about and what you competitors are focusing on. It  is very important that you’re not just repeating what someone else already said. To research and find blogs here are some useful links:

• Use Google Blog search


• Technorati


• Digg

After reading a few you will also see what is topical, popular and being shared. Make notes and come up with your own ideas for how you can contribute to subjects in your industry.

3 – Identify how you can add value to your clients

Add value to your customers:

• demonstrate an authority within industry e.g. demonstrate analysis or evaluation of market


• add value to your customers – help them with useful information


• contribute to thought leadership with any topical news in your industry – opinion piece


• provide insights into their market that can help them e.g. summary of market reports and key actions they should take, your own market research...

Some ideas:

• Organise a focus group meeting with customers to discuss issues in the market and what difficulties they are facing


• Listen to the customer conversations on forums, social channels e.g. Twitter and identify those that have high rates of interaction - what subjects are your customers interested in


• Ask questions using Linkedin Answers or try searching using Linkedin Signal


• Produce a short list of topics and then rank them in order of how your business can add value to those issues through the knowledge, ideas and experience of the people in your business

4. Use a good layout to make it visually appealing

When I started to write I hesitated over the title, why? – most people’s first thought is probably to use the word write but I think a good blog is a  production.

Blogs are increasingly a collage of media pulled together to help readers connect with the narrative as well as make it easier to illustrate your points. We know that a picture can paint a thousand words and well a video (or animation) can help us understand a lot more.

• avoid filling a page with text only


• use images in a blog to help explain pieces add humour or illustrate a point


• add interactive media - research to see if there are any good slides on the subject on SlideShare (not competitors) or use your own in the blog and/or add a relevant YouTube video


• simple but structured layout - structure, visually appealing, illustrate points

5. Use a variety of media and material

Don’t just write about your business. But your blog shouldn’t just be all about your business, not if you want people to keep coming back. You’re writing for an audience. Incorporate their questions, their concerns, their issues and those of the market.

• Refer to experts - reinforce points by referencing other people blog posts from your market


• Refer to articles in the press or market media e.g. magazines, news items...


• Refer to customers - if you think a valued customer has a good point to make phone them: tell them you are writing a blog and you would value their input and if they are OK for you to quote them (you will make them feel valued)

Aggegage: B2b blogging-trends-in-2011

View more presentations from Marketingfacts

6. Harness your people You have the opportunity to post more frequently, harness more experts and provide a varied and more interesting range of content, if you use your people to blog.

The Evolution and State of Social Media through Cisco Case Studies

View more presentations from Petra Neiger

• Ask people to write a blog - initially select a few people in your business to help with writing a blog - by sharing this you will be able to blog more frequently and provide different views and perspectives on your industry


• Be individual - everybody is different and has their own take on things, language and so each person may appeal to different audiences. Let people be themselves and don't exert too much editorial pressure.


• Become an editor - different people will have different ideas so you will have to place some guidelines on blogging, provide some structure to the process (schedule, meeting dates, submission dates, topics) and meet as a group to evolve and improve


• Measure - put in place some clear objectives as a team and measure them regularly; build into your marketing plans and review as a team.

It can be extremely motivating and personally rewarding for people to contribute to blogging. Be patient and share mistakes and learnings. If you are recruiting and people can see that you are openly letting people have their own voice and using social business tools it will allow people to understand your business and be inspired to join.

The last and obvious point is to ask your audience for feedback and this is where I would love to hear from people if they are in a BtoB business:

• have had success with blogging (please share so others can learn)


• have problems and want any advice (I will reply to everyone that comments)


• want to comment on any points