Effectively Managing Online Community | #CMmeetup
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on February 9th, 2011
Last night I attended a panel discussion about Effectively Managing Online Communities hosted by Community Managers meetup (#CMmeetup) at the offices of CBRE at the Metlife Building. This event was part of Social Media Week and we really delved into how to manage our online communities and really humanize the experience of interacting online . If you aren’t already familiar with Community Managers Meetup, it is a group of social media managers (community managers, digital specialists..whatever the proper name is these days) who get together monthly and discuss social media trends and practices. Members include representatives from Bizzy, Real Simple Magazine, Etsy, Foursquare and so on (basically it’s a group of VERY talented and energetic individuals looking to meet one another, exchange experiences and learn from each other).
The event was moderated by Zach Seward, Outreach Editor at the Wall Street Journal, who did a great job of asking thought provoking questions on everything from how to approach negative commentary posted on social media sites to asking the panelists what they love about their jobs.
The event started with an introduction from Mark Coatney, Media Evangelist for Tumblr, giving us some background on how he went from a journalist at Newsweek to managing social media for Tumblr. He really drove the point home that “customer experiences online should be the same as the old legacy product.” The customers should feel like they are physically getting the newspaper when communicating with you online. He emphasized that Tumblr puts the community manager role on a peer to peer level as the audience where audience members feel like they are interacting with a reader rather than a brand. Community managers must set expectations with the atmosphere they want to create - make your [tumblr] page friendly if you want to create an open dialogue. Mark also talked about why he enjoys working at a company like Tumblr; Time from thought to action is shorter with startups so you can act on ideas in a quicker way.
Mark then handed the mics to the panelists to dive deeper into our talk about managing online communities. The panelists included;
Brian Simpson – Director of Digital Media at Vikram Chatwal Hotels (@bsimi)
Jenn Pedde - Community Manager for MSW @ USC (@jpedde)
David Brown – Social Media Specialist at Etsy (@holidaymatinee)
Chrysanthe Tenentes – Community Manager at Foursquare (@eqx1979)
The panelists gave us some insights on how they work and build/engage with their communities. Here are some key takeaways from the event:
Connecting with your Audience: All the panelists agreed that to truly connect with your audience, you have to humanize your brand and let your customers/fans know that there is a person speaking to them on their level. The aspect of taking the online experience offline was also discussed and Etsy does a great job of not only making their readers feel heard but also connecting with them beyond the dot com. David Brown will sometimes reply to messages on Etsy by creating crafts, taking photos of the craft response and then tweeting it back to the person who asked the original question. In other cases, he will actually ask for the customer’s address and physically mail them the craft that he has created by mail. As he says, create that type of experience for your customers and “that shit will go viral like gangbusters.”
Blogger Outreach: Jenn Pedde mentioned that there are tiers of bloggers and it’s all about picking where you want to go in your outreach. You can go for the higher tier blogs like the NY Times and WSJ or you can choose the smaller mom and pop blogs (yes, she used the phrase mom and pop blogs..makes me think of all the mom and pop shops that get gobbled up by big box retailers. Time will tell if that happens to the blogging community though the Huffington Post sale to AOL seems like a good example). The thing about the smaller blogs (maybe 1oo+ hits/day) is that even if they’re not the huge influencers, you still have that ability to reach out to target customers. Just go where your audience is spending time!
Social Media Metrics: The general consensus on social media metrics is that no one has cracked the social media ROI code – it’s the blind leading the blind, but that’s not a bad thing. David Brown from Etsy mentioned that he has tried a couple different platforms and it is all about experimentation and your personal preference. What I thought was very interesting is that he said choosing the right analytic platform really depends on your audience. It’s easy to get side tracked by what the most popular tracking tools are but we need to take a step back and figure out what we want/need to track vs what others may be tracking. Certain analytics for some brands may not be as important for your brand. I suggest creating a list of the most important factors you want to track and then back peddling from there to find the right analytics platform for your brand.
Dealing with Negative Social Media Commentary: Brian Simpson took the lead on this discussion and since he is in the hospitality industry he has come across these scenarios in the past. He believes the best practice (in many situations) is for companies to respond publicly and move offline to resolve the issue. Brian once had a hotel guest post a negative comment on a Facebook page he administered about a New Year’s Party she planned at the hotel getting cancelled last minute. Brian responded online with his contact information, they took the discussion offline and were able to resolve the issue. He asked her, “if we didn’t have social, would you have called us” to complain with as much vigor as your comment on Facebook and she said “no, I would have just told all my friends that you sucked.” So, Brian didn’t lose this customer and was able to turn a sticky situation around. Luckily for Brian, this issue wasn’t as magnified as Kenneth Cole’s social media gone wrong debacle.
And on to some Foursquare chat..Chrysanthe Tententes, the Community Manager at Foursquare, talked to us about their first ever newsletter in two years and how they went from 200k users a year ago to over 6m users now. Chrysanthe (her name is pronounced Kris-an-theeee in case you were wondering) came up with the subject line of “check out the new hotness” for their newsletter and it was a HIT. Apparently email newsletter with the words “check out the” in the subject gets the most clicks according to Mail Chimp. There’s something I did not know before! Did you?
Thanks again to the organizers (Katy Zack from Sapient Nitro, Zach Seward from WSJ and Lea Marino from Bizzy) of the event for putting it together. It was eye opening and fun to meet other community managers.
Did you attend the #CMMeetup? Would love to hear your thoughts on the event and what key takeaway for you was.
Victoria’s Secret Makes Gifting Easy on Facebook
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on November 30th, 2010
With the anticipation of the Annual Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show tonight where the “Angels” strut the runway, I decided to log on to the VS Facebook page and see how they have been marketing the show through this social media account. In addition to sneak peek videos posted to their wall to get their viewers excited about the show, they will also be holding a live Angel chat at 9pm EST (show started at 10pm) on Facebook with models Alessandra Ambrosio, Candice Swanepoel and Chanel Iman to make the waiting that much easier on us viewers. However, the custom app that really caught my attention is the Gift Cards tab where you can buy a gift card for friends directly on Facebook and have the recipient redeem the gift certificate either online or in stores. This takes e-commerce on Facebook to another level, making it easy to send gifts to friends/family online in a straightforward and fun way. Ever wanted to get a gift card for a friend but wanted to split with other senders so you can send a larger spending amount? No problem. VS even allows you to invite friends to go in on a group gift card. The simplicity is making me want to buy one right now..if only I could figure out who I still need to cross off my list. For the moment I am all shopped out from Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Have you seen some great custom apps on Facebook that make gifting easier for customers? Let me know in the comments if you have and why you found them to be effective.
Will the Social Inbox Turn Facebook into a Business Communication Platform?
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on November 24th, 2010
This is a guest blog post by Jay Feitlinger, founder of StringCan Interactive, a strategic online marketing and social media agency based out of Phoenix, Arizona. Jay is also the co-founder of ShopTab, the 1st Facebook App that showcases an eCommerce store on Facebook through a data feed. Connect with Jay on LinkedIn or Twitter.
Last week I attended a Facebook video conference where Facebook announced its new Social Inbox where they are going to give all users that want one a @facebook.com email address.
As with all recent Facebook updates the Facebook Messaging announcement set off a massive amount of press about the battle between Google and Facebook and privacy concerns.
Keep in mind that this announcement is not simply Facebook giving out an email address, although for some that is cool, but instead a way to both communicate the way YOU want through email, chat or SMS and then prioritize what you want to read.
I am not a big believer in talking about a topic without testing it out for myself and after the conference I visited the Facebook Messages sign up area to test it out. Unfortunately, I have not seen a response yet from Facebook so for now going to assume with over 500 million members, Facebook may be rolling this out over a period of time. If you are interested in signing up visit Facebook Messages but for now I will comment on how I think this may change the way people use Facebook today – not just for personal but also for business reasons. Here is a video that highlights what Facebook messaging is to form your own opinions:
Personally just 1 year ago Facebook was a place where I connected with friends and family but now 80% of the people I add to my Facebook friends list are business contacts. Sorry LinkedIn, I have found a new friend!
The new e-mail capabilities, combined with the integration of Microsoft Office Web Apps could make Facebook a more complete business tool. Imagine you decide you want to collaborate with a Facebook Friend on an event-planning schedule and budget in Excel. With Microsoft Office Web apps you will be able to do that – on Facebook.
The other big idea behind Facebook Messages is prioritization where you have two Social inboxes. One containing messages from people that you are close to and the second from, well ,everyone else. This is personalized email on steroids.
Facebook already knows who are you close friends based on affinity score. The people you more often comment on status updates, tag in photos, message with are those that Facebook knows you consider more important than those you less frequently engage with. If the trend continues where people start to use Facebook as a way to develop business relationships, Facebook Messaging can quickly become a great customer relationship management (CRM) system.
What I LOVE about this idea is you end up with “seamless messaging,” a system that blurs the conventional lines between methods of communication. Users who prefer to communicate via e-mail can still do so, but, if you’re logged into Facebook with Chat open, an incoming e-mail will pop up in an IM window, so that you can quickly read it. Your quick response will automatically be sent back as an e-mail. If you step away from your Macbook, and your business contact continues the conversation, the message will then get pushed to your phone via the Facebook iPhone app.
Instead of e-mail threads and separate chat logs, all communication via Facebook is contained into a single conversation history. Think of this as an amazing business archive tool. Today, I very much dislike trying to remember where I last had a conversation with a business contact or friend. Was it email, text, chat, etc.? As I get older the memory is starting to get worse so this 1 feature is of great interest, where all my Facebook Messaging history will be in one place. Will this convert all my email to Facebook? Probably not but it will make it a little easier knowing that my conversations are being stored for later review.
Where this concept will fail is if Facebook does not offer advanced filter features. Being the founder of a digital marketing agency, you can imagine the amount of calls I get from people trying to sell me stuff. I don’t want to get into the privacy debate as suggested earlier; however, it would not be very hard for people to guess my Facebook email address and start spamming me. In addition, today I have certain business contacts in 1 list and others in a different list. I would hope Facebook would leverage my lists to determine how to prioritize what I see and don’t see.
As a marketer and let’s please again avoid the privacy debate, I imagine Facebook will be smart and leverage the data contained in the upgraded Facebook Messaging system. I am not saying I want Facebook to start reading all my emails; however, if there was a way to leverage this data and provide me even more personalized messaging (aka advertisements) I would be quite intrigued, and a little scared too of course. Imagine my wife emailed me asking what Mexican restaurant we should take the kids to for dinner and while reading it an ad for a new Mexican restaurant in Scottsdale was displayed. Yes, cool but scary at same time!
So what are your thoughts? Will you sign up for Facebook Messaging? Do you think Facebook could become the next business platform?
Promotion Rules: Making Sure Facebook Doesn’t Crash Your Party
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on November 5th, 2010
I continued my guest blog post series for StringCan Interactive with an article focused on Facebook promotion tabs. This is the second post in a four part series that discusses how to leverage custom tabs to effectively connect with fans. In the article I take a look at the rules of Facebook promotions, the proper ways to launch giveaways/promotions and tips on running a successful promotion. You want to make sure to read the guidelines and this post to make sure Facebook doesn’t crash your party and shut it down!
Here is a sneak peek at some of the case studies featured in the post as well as the 3 key concepts a company should keep in mind when looking to run a successful Facebook promotion. Click through to the post titled “Promotion Rules: Making Sure Facebook Doesn’t Crash Your Party” for the full view.
1. Ease of Entry (Keep It Simple, Stupid – aka KISS)
2. Definitive Incentive
3. Incorporate Sharing
Welcoming 500 Million People Into Your Home: Welcome Tabs Uncovered
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog, Social Media on October 28th, 2010
I wrote a guest blog post for a social media marketing agency, StringCan Interactive, about the key features a company or individual should have on the Welcome tab for their Facebook fan page. I took a look at some case studies as well and went into detail about how you can maximize custom FBML tabs to help welcome new visitors to your brands’ page.
Here is a sneak peek at some of the companies featured in the post as well as the 5 components that should be included in a Welcome tab. Click through to the post titled “Welcoming 500 Million People Into Your Home: Welcome Tabs Uncovered” for the full view.
1. Brand Introduction
2. Share Your Knowledge
3. Calls to Action
4. Fan-Only Content
5. Interactivity/Invite Customers to Experience Your Brand
Community Managers Meetup Recap (#CMMeetup)
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on October 21st, 2010
This Tuesday I attended a Community Managers meetup at the Meetup Headquarters in Soho. The meetup was created so that community builders (and other social media professionals) could connect and learn from each other. The event last night was structured so that there was a presentation from several companies and then the organizers had us break out into groups to talk about how we are reaching out and engaging with our community. This is by far one of the most insightful (and fun) networking events I have attended within the industry. I was surrounded with influential members of the social media community who were very open to learning from each other and sharing their successes and failures. There were representatives from a variety of companies ranging from startups like How About We and Bizzy to big news organizations like NBC and ABC. To view all the people who attended the event, check out this list that I put together using TweepML.
The two companies that presented at the event were NBC and How About We, a new dating site that puts a fresh spin on online dating. They gave us some tips on how they have built (and continue to build) their online communities and what strategies are key to connecting in an authentic way.
Presentations:
1. NBC
Ryan Osborn, the Director of Social Media at NBC, opened up the conversation by telling the audience that all communities start internally and that everyone at your company needs to be on the same page before you push out a social media plan. Companies have to bring their editorial (or content producers) and marketing teams together to achieve ultimate success. Ryan also stressed that social media is about the people, not the technology and that you have to put the people in your community first to build meaningful relationships.
It is interesting to note that Ryan had brought the idea of social media integration to his bosses at The TODAY Show years before they actually agreed to move forward with it. Ryan started with a page for the TODAY show and eventually expanded to additional pages once NBC saw the success of that one page. Although it’s hard to realize when I am in a room filled with tech/social media enthusiasts, there are still many high level executives that don’t understand the point of social media. If you are working at a company and are having trouble getting the green light to integrate social media into your marketing platform, take a look at this post on 5 Tips to Convince Your Boss to Engage in Social Media. Ryan also said that he thinks followers as a metric is a joke. You can have just as big an impact with 10 followers. I tend to agree given that social media is about quality (and engagement) not quantity.
2. How About We..
Brian Schechter (Co-Founder) and Michelle Dozois (Community Manager) from How About We gave us some background information on the concept behind the social dating site. Instead of looking strictly at profiles, the site lets users post suggestions for dates and if you see a date that interests you then you can respond to that user. Each date suggestion starts with the tag line “How About We.” An example that Michelle says is a popular suggestion (that she has used herself) is “How About We…grab a famous Elvis sandwich at Peanut Butter & Co and then have a picnic in Washington Square Park.
Brian discussed user engagement and acquisition strategies. One way they engage with their existing users is by providing date suggestions and creating partnerships with restaurants, movie theatres, etc. They partnered up with IFC Theatres for a screening of a french film and had How About We members “like” the idea in order to get tickets. The first X (I can’t remember the number) amount of people to “like” it would get tickets to the screening. Michelle told us that she expected it to reach the target “likes” within 2-3 days but it hit the target amount within minutes. It’s proof that if you listen to your customers and give them what they want (fun dates in this case), the response will be positive.
How About We also launched a contest for the best date and the winner would get 10 dates for free paid for by the company. They took this campaign to the streets with How About We posters positioned in front of date spots such as the Brooklyn Flea. The top ten finalists were then made aware that they were in the running and to win they had to get their friends and family to vote for them. The winner had one of the longest date suggestions I’ve ever seen that suggested a night cap at 3am. I hope she enjoys her date (which she hasn’t gone on yet). I’d have to really like the guy to hang out with him til 3am on a first date! This campaign increased awareness of the social dating site and got users engaged while voting for the winner.
**If you want to try out How About We, you can get a month FREE with this code: CMMeetup. (Thank you Brian and Michelle for letting me share this with my readers).
Breakout Discussions:
After the presentations we took a quick break before breaking out into groups to talk about the questions below. The groups didn’t get to answer all the questions but we touched on some key tips and tricks of engaging with your community and some of the tools you can use to do so.
CMMeetup Questions
Discussion Points:
- Use some free tools such as Hootsuite, Google Alerts and Hubspot grader to manage your brand and track your competition. Ex: You can use Hubspot’s Blog Grader to see how you are measuring up to your competition. Another cool tip: Add a + to the end of a bit.ly link to view the analytics for that link. This allows you to view all the analytics for competitor links if they use bit.ly.
- Offer incentives to your community: Giveaways, exclusive content, trivia questions. Ex: Julie Miller, editor of Seventeen Magazine, talked about how they made their @seventeenmag Twitter account private for one day where only followers would get the link to an exclusive photo of Justin Beiber.
- Bring the Experience Offline: Use Meetups to engage with your community. Bringing the online experience offline is the future. Ex: Dave from Etsy said they do some thing called the “Love Bomb” where they take Twitter questions and write the answers on physical notes and then send it to the user by mail (they DM them asking for their mailing address).
**Best line of the night was made by Brian Smipson (@Bsimi), Director of Social Media for the Roger Smith Hotel (@RSHotel). He said “An audience will watch you die in a fight; a community will jump in to help you win it.” Lesson learned? – Build your community first and the audience will follow.
Here is a great video that was made by Loren Appin from Pixable with photos taken by Anthony Quintano to recap the CMMeetup. Appropriate music and captures the spirit of the event. If you aren’t familiar with Pixable, it is a great site which aggregates and prints photos from social-media sites like Facebook and Flickr
Thanks again to all the organizers ( Vadim Lavrusik, Lea Marino, Katy Zack, Zach Seward, Stacy Green) of the event for making it happen. Thank you to Andres Glusman and the team at Meetup HQ for hosting the event and giving us a tour of the office – love the nap room although I wonder how many people actually use it). Looking forward to seeing you all again at the next meetup.
8 Questions for Srinivas Rao, Editor of Flightster
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on October 6th, 2010
Srinivas is the Editor in Chief of the Flightster Travel Blog. He’s an avid surfer and personal development blogger at The Skool of Life. He’s also the host and co-founder of BlogcastFM, a podcast for bloggers. You can find him on Twitter at @skooloflife or @FlightsterBlog.
1. You recently wrote a guest post for Social @ Blogging Tracker called “Case Study: How a New Blog Achieved 100% Growth in 2 Months” which is how I heard about Flightster. You were able to launch the blog on a small budget and got bloggers & readers engaged in helping you find an additional writer for your staff. What other engagement campaigns since then have you implemented that you have found to be successful?
To be honest this was our first campaign. It was actually a test run for some of the things we want to do going forward. As I had mentioned in the case study on social blogging tracker, our site will eventually be a flight booking engine. Prior to the launch of the blog I spent about 5 months researching different social media campaigns and looking at what worked and what didn’t. Because our main focus is really the flight booking engine, we have actually held off on any other campaigns for the time being. That being said, we try to stay active on twitter and connect with the travel bloggin community.
2. You had a pretty exciting summer with the blog launch and attracting new writers to your team. I know you used connections that you made on your personal blog to staff up but what would you suggest to someone starting from scratch without that established network? As you mentioned in the case study, not many bloggers responded and the one that did said they already had an exclusive agreement with another popular travel blog.
If someone is starting from scratch without a personal network there’s a few things you could do. You could spend a small fortune looking for writers. I don’t recommend that. I think that anybody who is in a social media role at any company should have a personal blog. My knowledge is honestly a summation of everything I’ve learned from close to 100 interviews I’ve conducted with bloggers and all the blogs I read. A personal blog also gives you an opportunity to get out of the box you put yourself in when you are only writing about your industry, thereby increasing the potential to expand your network. What’s incredible is that most of the writers in my personal network are not even travel bloggers. So my advice would be start a personal blog.
3. What social network have you found to be the most useful in promoting the Flightster blog and reaching out to your target audience? How about for promoting your personal blog?
This is a great question. When I first started my blog I hated Twitter. I thought that it was just people telling me what they ate for lunch. Twitter becomes more useful the more you use it in my opinion. It’s quite confusing at first, but once you get it, it’s truly amazing. I think that as we move towards the booking engine and are trying to connect with our customers more, Facebook will play a larger role. But given that our target audience to start has been bloggers across all niches, Twitter is where it’s at. I will say that if I wasn’t a blogger, I’m not quite sure how useful twitter would be.
4. When do you expect to go live with the full flight booking engine for Flightster? How will it be different from other sites such as other popular flight booking sites such as Kayak, Cheaptickets, Priceline and Orbitz?
The hope is that we’ll go live by December, or January at the latest. Our development team has been hard at work on the project. In terms of differentation, there’s a few things. Our goal is to cater to more to advanced travelers by showing more details in flight options, and build many features around the needs of heavy travelers. Another thing I think that really differentiates the approach we’re taking is our target customer. The digital nomads and tech savvy travelers are who we hope to cater to. Our industry is generally based on price wars so we think this will be a really different way to approach launching a new site. Finally, sites like Kayak serve only as a search tool, whereas our site will handle the booking as well.
5. Any campaigns you want to discuss and promote? I’d love to hear about your future plans to attract more readers and how you will be promoting the launch of the flight booking engine part of the site when it goes live. How much will you be using traditional marketing channels vs social media to promote the site?
I have about 30 ideas for campaigns sitting in a file that I’ve created during the 8 months I’ve been here at Flightster. While I don’t have any specifics, I will say that we hope to partner with brands that already have a more established presence in social media and leverage their audiences. One example would be to partner with a hotel for a social media campaign since it’s a complementary industry. I think many industries are missing the boat when they don’t see this since it’s huge and can really help with social media campaigns.
6. What people/companies focused on social media and traveling do you follow and would recommend to people reading this interview?
As I said above I spent a good amount of time reading blogs across the industry. I found most company blogs to be incredibly boring. But there was one that stood out and we modeled many of our ideas off of them. The V-travelled blog which is part of Virgin Atlantic is absolutely stellar. They did a great campaign to get bloggers involved with their brand. Their content is also stellar and the design is beautiful. I tend read more social media focused blogs which are more theoretical and general, and I take the ideas I read and map them against our industry. I read Social Media Examiner, Mashable, and a few others.
7. As host and co-founder of Blogcast FM, you have had the chance to interview some great people. Who was your favorite and why? What was the key takeaway from your interview with that person?
This seems to be everybodys favorite question lately. After over 100 interviews, it’s really hard to say. The people who have stood out have been Scott Stratten and Dave Navarro. Ashley Ambirge is probably one of my favorite people in the blogosphere just because she’s got such a unique voice. She runs a site called the Middle Finger Project which is one of my favorites. Each one of these people had some great takeways. Scott Stratten taught me about using twitter as a tool for conversation more than a tool for sharing. Dave Navarro taught me about the importance of focusing on making my first $100 online. Ashley has pretty much been an inspiration to give all conventional wisdom the finger. I think that blogging gives you a great opportunity to define your life on your own terms since it’s truly a tool of self exploration.
8. In a recent blog post, David Meerman Scott, blogger at Web Ink Now and author of The New Rules of Marketing and PR, talked about the negativity that sometimes surrounds the word “social media” and how people can benefit from calling it real-time marketing. As a strong believer in “real-time marketing” where do you see it going in 5 years? What aspect of it do you see gaining importance and what aspect do you see falling to the sidelines?
This is something I spend a good amount of time thinking about. After watching The Social Network this weekend, I realized that Facebook is just the beginning of ideas that will spread. We’re going to see many more cycles of innovation. We’re entering a creative revolution in my opinion. As the technology, information, and the platforms become easier to use, you’ll see some of the most creative ideas you’ve ever seen. Multimedia content is in its infancy in my opinion. As the bandwidth limitations go away you’re going to see more people using video and even creating their own TV shows. The major aspect that is falling to the sidelines is the idea of relationships. I think individuals (people who run personal blogs) really get it, while companies haven’t quite figured out yet. It’s not that they’re bad it. It’ just that individuals are better at it.
Another thing that’s going to happen is the transitioning of online relationships into the real world. The more we bridge that gap, the more powerful all of this technology will become. Today I can land in practically any major city, put out a tweet and there will be other people who want to meet me in person. That’s incredible. In my mind there’s got be a few hundred ideas on that concept alone that are going to make somebody rich (hopefully me).
Srinivas, thanks again for the opportunity to interview you and good luck on the launch of Flightster’s booking engine.
Social Media for Restaurants Recap – Social Media Week LA
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on September 23rd, 2010
Since it is Social Media Week in Los Angeles right now and I am in town I decided to attend the Social Media for Restaurants panel discussion last night which was at Citizen Smith in Hollywood (great spot for drinks). The event was hosted by Postling, Urbanspoon and Citysearch (all of which had a representative on the panel) and they discussed how restaurants, foodtrucks, cafes and bisros can use social media to increase their customer base and the tools necessary to do so effectively. In this post I will highlight some of the key points made by the panel and welcome additional thoughts in the comment section.
Panel:
Jen Rubio, Community Strategist - Postling (@Jennifer & @Postling)
Gretchen Fowler, Director of Sales - Urban Spoon (@UrbanSpoon)
Michael Francesconi, Director of Content & Community – CitySearch (@michaelfran & @CitySearchLA)
Lesley Balla, Food Blogger – Chow Balla (formerly the editor Eater LA and Tasting Table LA) (@LesleyLA)
Engagement & Time Management:
Many of the people attending the event wanted to know some key strategies in using social media within the restaurant industry and how to manage their time. Although not many creative strategies were mentioned, the key takeaway was to be genuine and transperant while using the appropriate social networking channels to attract your target customers. Ideas that people in the audience brought up included managing daily giveaways by having people retweet posts on Twitter or sending updates on your daily specials. Social media is seen as a free loyal communication channel and you want to engage with your followers as well, not just promote your restaurant. Make sure your restaurant shows its personality through the use of social media and create your own story to tell. If you don’t have that much time to be active with social media, pick a single day each week when you interact with customers online – and let them know which day that is. Threadless does this on Facebook every Thursday (it is called Threadles Thursdays) and it has been a very successful way for them to connect with their customers effectively.
A great tip for restaurants that the panelists brought up is to use the Advanced Search function on Twitter to find people looking for specific items that your restaurant may serve. Ex: Search “where can I find [insert item]” with the location set to the city your restaurant is in. So if someone is craving apple pie and that is your specialty you can respond to them by telling them to stop by your restaurant to quench their craving. “Where should I go for [insert item]” is another key phrase you can search.
Reputation Management
The panel also discussed the fear restaurant owners have in joining social media networks due to negative reviews they may receive. The truth is that people will talk about you whether or not you are on social media sites so you might as well be a part of the conversation. Just the fact that you are listening and respond to someone can be enough in certain instances. While many restaurant owners have started responding to people on sites such as Facebook or Twitter, they also need to keep track of the reviews they get on Yelp, Citysearch, etc. A great tool to monitor your brand is by using Postling - they have a tracking system that will notify you everytime your business gets a new review and then you can respond directly to that review through the Postling dashboard. Negative reviews are often times a good balance to have for your restaurant since it gives customers a more neutral and well rounded perspective about the restaurant. Contrary to popular belief, 5 stars is not always great – people want to see variety in opinions. Ultimately, responding to the negative reviews can further help your online reputation.
The Future in Social Media for Restaurants?
The big question at the end of the night was “what’s next in social media for restaurants” and the consensus was point-of-sale loyalty programs, personalization, and more location-based services.
The objective for restaurants to use social media is to get consumers as close to the cash register as possible. If you are a restaurant owner and you are not using Foursquare to offer specials or loyalty deals, you should claim your Foursquare location asap. Jen Rubio from Postling said that often times after work she will open her Foursquare app and look for places nearby that offer specials and go to that bar/restaurant. People love freebies or specials so you should find ways to incentivize people to come in to your restaurant.
Placepop is a geo-based application that gives customers a virtual loyalty card that lets any local business reward you as an individual for your loyalty, or as a group for your collective visits. The next step for geo-based apps in the restaurant business is for businesses to see that you have checked-in and purchased something which will validate the transaction on a deeper level. The Placepop app also allows you to request reward programs to the venues you frequent. It was only a matter of time before old-fashioned loyalty club card programs head in the direction of digital and mobile applications. One application that already does this is Key Ring which allows you to store loyalty cards on your phone using bar code scanner technology. I look forward to throwing out all those cards with the 10 punch out sections to get my free frozen yogurt, manicure, etc (you get the picture)- they always get lost orI forget them. Having all my loyalty cards on my phone consolidates everything onto the device I use the most.
Gretchen from Urban Spoon, the leading provider of time-critical dining data, talked about the need to launch perks attached to reservation systems. The key point is that similar to how businesses can offer specials on Foursquare, restaurants should also start launching specials attached to when you make a reservation on sites such as Urban Spoon or Open Table. Note: It was mentioned that Urban Spoon will be adding a reservation system to their app in the future.
Personalization will also play a large role in where social media for restaurants will go . The panel said they expect apps in the future to be customized where they will recognize what you have purchased in the past when you check in to locations and suggest items you may like at your next visit. For example, if I got a martini at the event last night and checked-in (which I did using Foursquare – shame on Citizen Smith for not having any specials) then wouldn’t it be great if the next time I went to the bar they would suggest a drink I might like based on my previous purchase?
Food Blogger PR:
Lesley Balla, food blogger for Chow Balla and previous editor for Eater LA an Tasting Table LA, talked to the audience about how to reach out to food bloggers. A great way to get bloggers to visit your restaurant is to host blogger dinners which will help your restaurants get some online publicity and build buzz around your brand. One food blogger in the audience mentioned that she recently attended this type of dinner where the restaurant owner did a contest for who could build the best pizza for their “pizza of the week” special. This allowed the restaurant to establish an online presence on those food blogs in a creative and personalized way.
Did you attend the event? Have any notes to add to this discussion or maybe some apps that you want to bring to my attention? I always appreciate the feedback.
5 Questions for Russ Robinson Photography on Facebook & Social Media [Interview]
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on September 14th, 2010
Russ Robinson is a photographer based in Tampa, FL where he specializes in fashion, glamour, beauty, high school portraits and commercial photography. His Facebook page was recently mentioned in a Facebook Success Summit webinar by social media guru Mari Smith. I reached out to Russ to learn more about his company’s internet marketing/ social media strategy. This interview doubles as a great case study on how to create valuable campaigns and use social media for increased online exposure. Visit Russ Robinson Photography’s Facebook page to see how they engage with their “fans” and take a look at his website if you’re looking for a photographer in the Tampa area. You can also contact him directly by email.
1. When did you choose to integrate social media into your marketing plan and how did you go about creating a strategic business plan to do so? Approximately how much time do you spend per day managing your social media accounts and blog?
I launched my Facebook page in June 2009, mostly as an experiment in exploratory marketing. At the time, my fledgling photography business was a mere 6 months old, and I was on the lookout for new methods of lead generation. Through a fair amount of SEO research, I learned that having lots of high-quality inbound links to my main portfolio website would likely yield higher Google rankings. I was already using my photo blog in this manner, strategically placing relevant keywords and anchor text in my articles, and I figured that having a lively Facebook page would only serve to create some synergies.
However, my primary challenge with creating a page from scratch is that I’m not a web developer by trade, and at that time I had no startup capital remaining to hire one. So I basically taught myself the fundamentals of HTML/CSS using various books, videos, and online resources, and a month or two later I had the basic layout completed. Of course the page has gone through a few major revisions to get where it is today (including the recent switch from 760px to 520px), but since I coded everything myself, I didn’t have to worry about relying on a developer to make these modifications for me. Very handy situation, but certainly not for the faint of heart, given the constant (and usually unannounced) changes that Facebook tends to introduce at the most inopportune times!
In terms of the amount of time I spend managing my online presence and marketing efforts, I would say that it occupies a significant portion of my typical day. I’m actually not a full-time photographer (I work a 40-hour job in a cancer hospital), so I obviously can’t stay on top of things 24/7. But my mornings before work, most of my lunch hour, and my evenings & weekends are filled with social media activity in one form or another.
2. You have one of the most unique Welcome pages that I’ve seen which gives users a discount code instantly once they “like” your page. You also allow people to send you a direct message on Facebook from that same page. How did you come up with this idea and how difficult in terms of coding was it to implement?
The moment I first discovered that there was an FBML tag out there that made it possible to provide fan-only content, I was instantly hooked on the idea, and immediately began brainstorming different ways of implementing this feature on my own page. Eventually I concluded that since I’m predominantly catering to a local market, I should probably offer something that would appeal specifically to prospective clients in my immediate area (Tampa, FL). So I decided to run with the “10% Discount” idea, even though I figured that people who lived more than a few ZIP codes away probably wouldn’t be quite as incentivized to “Like” my page.
Fortunately, I soon discovered that my assumption was incorrect—geographic proximity was no obstacle whatsoever, as it turned out that people were willing to click “Like” for no other reason than to see what would happen if they did. When I was originally writing the copy for my page, I intentionally emphasized the word “instantly” in the top paragraph to suggest that something interesting and/or out of the ordinary might happen if the user clicked “Like”. It ended up working like a charm—better than I could have imagined. What’s more, I’m blessed to have a much higher than normal retention rate, as only 50 people out of 1400 have hidden me from their News Feed. This suggests that even though some folks clicked “Like” despite the fact that they may not have initially been all that interested in my page, the vast majority chose to stick around and engage with me once they saw the content I was producing.
Regarding the link that I provide on my page for fans to contact me via private message, it actually came into being as a result of some experimentation with URLs and Facebook IDs. At some point I saw someone post in an online forum what might be considered a “prototype” of this idea, and I simply carried it a step further. It really wasn’t all that difficult to create—in fact, I’d like to share with your readers how to create a link for their own pages:
- Find your “Facebook ID”, which is a unique string of numbers that represents your personal Facebook account (a quick Google search for “find Facebook ID” will yield plenty of sites offering step-by-step instructions)
- Replace the X’s in the following URL with your Facebook ID: http://www.facebook.com/inbox/?compose&id=XXXXXXXXXX
- Add this new URL as a link on your page, just like you would any other link. Voila! =)
3. You engage with your “fans” quite a bit by asking for their opinion on images, using “likes” on posts to determine what type of promotions to launch and spotlighting specific people by tagging them in posts. What has been your most successful Facebook campaign to date?
My most successful campaign to date, at least in terms of growing my fan base, was a contest for a free professional photo shoot. To enter, I asked fans to tag my page in a status update on their personal profiles. However, I provided very specific instructions for doing so. Basically, they were asked to update their status to say something like “Help me win a free professional photo shoot by becoming a fan of Russ Robinson Photography!” Most important of all, in order for an entry to be considered valid, my page had to be tagged properly in the status update so that it appeared in blue text and was a clickable link.
This requirement accomplished several important objectives:
(1) it generated a large number of “Likes” from friends of existing fans who ended up clicking the link,
(2) it created lots of goodwill, since I was truly giving something of value away for free,
(3) it put my photography portfolio in front a fairly large group of people who might never have seen it otherwise,
(4) due to the inherently viral nature of Facebook, I ended up getting lots of fans who “liked” my page simply because their friends (or friends of friends) had also “liked” it, and
(5) when someone tags your fan page in a status update, it also shows up on your fan page wall.
So I basically had a super-convenient way of tracking all the entries to my contest—all I had to do was watch my fan page wall! Now, in full disclosure, I *did* run into a few instances where people had properly tagged my page, but it failed to show up on my wall. This turned out to be an issue with the way those particular fans had configured their Facebook privacy settings, so please bear that in mind if you decide to try a promotion like this on your own page.
4. You also have a blog and Twitter account. How have those helped you further connect with people online? Which outlet have you received the most positive feedback from since you started engaging with potential and existing customers online?
Honestly, I’m not entirely certain at this point exactly what role Twitter will play in my social media marketing efforts moving forward. To date, I’ve had extremely limited success with that particular medium, and I’m beginning to wonder if maybe it’s just the nature of my particular line of business. While only a very small minority of my clients are using Twitter, almost all of them are using Facebook, so as far as I’m concerned there’s no question that the latter yields a much better return on my time investment.
The role that my blog plays in my overall social media strategy has changed significantly over the past year or so. Being that my readership consists of two main audiences: (1) fellow photographers, and (2) prospective clients, I used to constantly struggle with trying to cater to the interests of both without alienating one or the other. For instance, a number photographers look to me as somewhat of an authority figure on certain topics, so naturally I feel inclined to share technical information, tips, and techniques with those readers. On the other hand, prospective clients are mainly interested in seeing my most recent work (especially any personal work that wouldn’t necessarily be suitable for inclusion in my portfolio), and they’re also typically looking to gain a much more informal “behind the scenes” glimpse of my overall personality and style as a photographer.
What I’ve done to mitigate the risk of alienating readers from either group is simply to redefine my posting strategy. Rather than writing articles that cater specifically to photographers or prospective clients and sort of flip-flopping back and forth between them, I’ve developed a unique way of writing articles that actually appeal to both groups simultaneously. A perfect example of this is strategy in action would be my “Before & After” series. Without question, these posts generate more “Likes”, comments, and “Shares” than any other. They feature a fully retouched image overlaid on top of a completely unretouched SOOC (straight out of camera) version of the same image. Both images are displayed together in a “rollover” format so that the viewer can easily control which image is visible by quickly moving their mouse pointer back and forth. It really is quite a lot of fun to do!
As I alluded to earlier, the “Before & Afters” are popular with virtually all of my readers because of the specific way they’re written. Prospective clients enjoy them simply for the “wow factor” of the rollover image, and typically skip over most of the text. Conversely, my fellow photographers pay particular attention to the text, as I generally include lots of technical information (camera settings, lighting, Photoshop techniques, etc.) to explain the effort that went into creating the final image. Everyone wins!
5. What is your opinion on traditional marketing vs. social media marketing (SMM)? Do you use a mixture of both or have you been focusing mostly on SMM?
I have definitely focused the vast majority of my efforts on SMM. The targeting capabilities of Facebook Ads are phenomenal, and as previously mentioned, the inherently viral nature of Facebook itself can quickly yield exponentially greater returns than one could ever dream of achieving through traditional marketing methods. Obviously, some business models are better suited to SMM than others, but fortunately for me, professional photography is extremely well-suited to it. Something as simple as the ability to “tag” a person in a photo lends itself to a whole wealth of marketing opportunities that never even existed before. It truly boggles the mind.
I continue to research and experiment with new ways of engaging fans through my page. As with virtually any endeavor in life, there will always be distinct successes and failures, but overall I’m very happy with the community I’ve been able to build so far. We regularly give each other feedback and encouragement, and we share in each other’s successes. I am truly blessed to have such a great network of folks to interact with.
One thing I would highly recommend to your readers who may be managing a Facebook page is to connect and engage with other pages and brands that truly seem to “get it” when it comes to managing a social media presence. For instance, I follow a large number of other photographers’ pages, not because I’m [necessarily] fans of their work, but because I like to stay abreast of which social media strategies are working for them and which ones aren’t. Likewise, I follow a wide range of other (non-photography) pages for the same exact reason. I’ve come across all sorts of useful tidbits, from great conversation-starting questions to creative ways of interacting and engaging with fans just by sitting back and watching what other people are doing. It’s amazing how many great ideas you can discover this way, and perhaps more importantly, you can end up saving yourself a lot of heartache by learning from others’ mistakes.
Having a successful page oftentimes means walking a very fine line between regularly engaging with fans and flat-out annoying them. It’s important to understand why your fans are fans to begin with, and what kinds of content will keep them engaged and coming back for more. Constantly bombarding them with self-serving and/or self-aggrandizing updates with no other motive than to try to generate business will surely spell death for your page. It’s all about delivering quality content. Do the research, be willing to experiment and take calculated risks, and constantly be on the lookout for new ways of encouraging fan interaction. Do all of these things, and you’ll be well on your way to a bustling, lively, highly successful page!
How Real Estate Companies Can Use Social Media [Interview]
Posted by Natasha Attal in Blog on September 2nd, 2010
Joe Stampone
I was recently interviewed by Joe Stampone of A Student of the Real Estate Game, a blogger and student at the NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate. He asked me some great questions on how real estate companies can use social media to expand their presence online and market their company and/or projects. Below I have included the interview to share with my readers. If you want to follow a great NYC based real estate blog, make sure to check out A Student of the Real Estate Game and follow him on Facebook and Twitter (@JoeStampone1).
- Prefab green construction (LEED Gold)
