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K Ü N G D E S I G N

Social Media: Who's Talking About Your Brand?

June 2009

© KÜNGDESIGN 2009

Table of Contents

Executive Summary 3

What is Social Media? Should I Care? 4

Conversation, Back by Popular Demand 5

Where Do Conversations Happen? 6

Who Should Talk? (Hint: it's not an intern) 7

Hey, Listen! 8

Google Loves Action 9

Trade vs. Public Opinion: Which One Counts More? 10

What Tools? 11

Where Is Everyone? Who is Everyone? 12

How Does This Sell Products? 13

How to Start? 14

Once Begun, Is This Forever? Who Has Time for This? 15

Who Are We and Why Are We Such Smarty Pants? 16

Appendix 17

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KÜNGDESIGN 787 Del Ganado Road San Rafael CA 94903 • 415.721.0525 • www.kungdesign.com Twitter:@kungdesign Posterous: kungdesign.posterous.com email: [email protected]

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Executive Summary

Social Media is user-created content that shares ideas and opinions with an online audience. Communication on a broad scale was, until very recently, reserved for organizations with big budgets. But now consumers are driving brand perception via social media tools that have democratized the ability to reach, influence and shape opinions about products and brands.

In a study, 60% of consumers trusted online consumer reviews and opinions. An average of just one-third trusted company-created ads and direct mail. Consumer-created content has nearly twice the influence over purchase decisions that brand-created content does.

Social media offers an opportunity for a brand or product to get into the conversation that consumers are having. e audience is growing: 75% of the US population is active on the internet and usage spans ages. Across all age groups (13-75+) 35% of the online population uses social networking, 81% research products and 32% rate a person or product online.

Social media is interactive and immediate so required is a social media strategy of both talking and listening. It can support sales by providing a brand or product a platform to engage in dialogue and more authentic than the one-way voice of advertising or press releases. A tweet, blog post, podcast or video that brings the process and thinking behind the making or enjoyment of a product to an audience is information that adds value to the consumers' understanding and perception of the brand.

More importantly, a social media program enables a brand to engage in a give-and-take discussion with consumers - information and conversation flow two ways.

It is not a stand-alone outreach program but works in tandem with other marketing efforts, building on conversations that consumers are already having about brands and products to create a program of engagement marketing that is grounded in authenticity, transparency, sharing and listening.

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What is Social Media? Should I Care?

Landlord, may your lies malign bring destruction on your head!You yourself drink unmixed wine, water sell your guests instead.--grafitti on the wall of a tavern in Pompeii

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Consumers have had opinions about the products they buy for millennia, and eager to share their opinions for just as long.

But opinion distribution and audience scope were limited by geographic, financial or political constraints. ere were few options for sharing opinions beyond vetted comments published by existing outlets ('Letter to the Editor') or privately created opinion pieces ("Common Sense").

Ease of creating and distributing personal opinions to a wide audience has changed (thanks, World Wide Web!) and has given consumers a platform, and in some cases, a soapbox.

at's what Social Media is: it's user-created content that shares ideas and opinions with an online audience. It's not a fad - consumers are driving brand perception via online tools that have democratized the ability to influence and shape opinions about products and brands.

Why does this matter to you, your brand and your product or service?

In a study, 60% of consumers trusted online consumer reviews and opinions. An average of just one-third trusted company-created ads and direct mail. Consumer-created content has nearly twice the influence over purchase decisions that brand-created content does.



Your Brand - It's Not Just Yours

A brand is the story that's told about it, from product to customer experience to reputation, and that story is only partly defined by the company who holds the trademark and makes the goods. Also shaping the story are consumers who buy, love (or don't), and talk about a brand, defining it via online tools that have democratized the ability to influence opinions and purchase decisions.

Effective social media encourages conversations about a brand among ALL the people who have a stake in a brand and share in its success. Success is what drives these conversations: the company wants its brands and products to thrive with increased sales and enhanced reputation.

Consumers have a stake in this too: they don't want a trusted brand or product to go away. Or they do - if they have a problem with a brand or product, passion to see it change or fail is a powerful motivation to communicate. Motrin saw the impact of negative consumer opinion on an ad it ran in 2008 as a Twitter-fed backlash resulted in the ad pulled and an apology from the brand to angry 'Motrin Moms'.

Consumers are increasingly engaged in conversations online, and companies can't control it, stop it or edit it. What they can do is embrace it, and make active engagement a central part of the marketing plan.

Conversation, Back by Popular Demand Conversation is, by definition, two-way. You talk, I listen, then I talk and you listen. It is an exchange of ideas, opinions and information that is generous and intimate. It is not one-way with a controlled message, like advertising. Once thought a lost art, conversation is becoming a defining online activity.

But one-person-at-a-time conversation is time-consuming, and why social media tools are so powerful. ey enable 'mass intimacy': one-to-one speaking in a one-to-many environment. And just because you are not leading the conversation doesn’t mean there isn’t an active conversation about it. e second most popular page on Facebook is Coca Cola and Coke didn’t start it - fans did.

Consumers are passionate about what they love (and hate), and have multiple forums to both praise and bash a brand - charm them or disappoint them, there is a public forum for their opinions to be stated.

To see an example of unfiltered (that is, real consumer) comments about wine, go to http://www.cellartracker.com/intro.asp

Search for a wine you know. You'll see genuine feedback from the people at the front line of who defines a brand - the people who use it. ey’ve started the conversation but it's not to late for you to join in.

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http://www.cellartracker.com/intro.asp

http://www.cellartracker.com/intro.asp



Where Do Conversations Happen?

Conversation isn't just face-to-face discussion. Each component of your brand and product, in both physical and digital channels, is busy communicating an aspect of your brand.

ere are two primary channels, and we've listed typical communication tools within those channels. What's important to note is that while the tools of the physical channel are almost exclusively the arena of a brand owner due to the cost of distribution of messages, digital channels are equally available to both brand owners and consumers.

When we say that conversation and communication are democratized, this is what we mean. ere are far more tools available for use in the digital world than in the physical, and more are constantly being developed and adopted. What's more, many are free and so widely used by consumers.

Conversations are initiated and responses made instantly, along newly-formed online demographic lines that do not conform to current demographic groups. e influence on purchase decision from peer-to-peer conversations is stronger than from brand-created content.

is is not an exhaustive list, but examples of popular tools and methods in both channels.

PHYSICAL CHANNELS Primarily brand-created content

DIGITAL CHANNELS

Brand and consumer-created content

Stores, offices Web site, e-commerce

Graphic Identity Email

Products Banner ads

Packaging Video sharing: YouTube, Vimeo

Ads: print - radio - TV Image sharing: Flickr, SmugMug

Direct: mail - phone Social Network: Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin

Sales support: POS, displays Opinion: Yelp, TripAdvisor

Events Blogs

Personnel (sales, customer service) Podcasts

Forums

Audio: AudioBoo, Blip.tv,

Virtual worlds: Second Life, ActiveWorlds

RSS

SMS

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Who Should Talk? (Hint: it's not an intern)

e person with whom you have personal contact when you go to McDonald's is the person who takes your order. Apart from actually eating the food, this encounter is the most intimate you'll have with the brand. Your perception of the global behemoth that is McDonald's can be shaped by that encounter. If you have good experience, you'll feel positive about the brand. But a bad experience can change that.

So your most immediate and intimate contact with the brand will be with a person in the organization who is among the most junior and least familiar with company vision and purpose.

Wow.

Don’t make the most junior, least informed, or newly hired person the one responsible for conversing about your brand. is person will help shape opinion about the integrity of your brand and product: this is NOT a job for an intern. Find the people in your organization that are the most passionate and most knowledgeable about the products, and give them the power to engage. ese should be the voices of your brand - and it's OK to have more than one, giving your brand a layered but consistent voice.

What you think is most interesting about your brand might not be what consumers want to hear, and your marketing department, while skilled at developing and broadcasting messages, might not be the only passionate voices you've got.

Remember - it's not about you: it's about what you represent to consumers. ey may have multiple lines of interest in your brand, and the deeper, richer and more comprehensive your brand's story, the more engaging it is to your audience.

Social media offers an opportunity for the highest-value people in the organization to reach out directly to consumers and converse with them. However, the voice you value highly may not be the same one consumers value: don’t assume it’s the CEO.

ink about what information and whose perspective is of value to your consumers. If you collect customer feedback, read their emails, conduct surveys or log customer service requests you already have data about what is of real value to your customers and fans.

Using a winery as an example, the high-value voice might be the winemaker, tasting room manager or wine club manager - and it might be all of them. It depends on your audience and what is important to say about your brand in a way that can be told most authentically with social media tools.

It's worth repeating: don't make this the job of and intern, or even an agency. People know when a message is not authentic (read the book 'Blink'?) and fake messaging is possibly more damaging than not talking at all. If you can't talk authentically yet, you should not talk, but you can listen.

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Hey, Listen!

A listening strategy is based on finding what people are really saying about your and your brand, because they are talking, even if you're not listening yet. Discovering a difference between what you think your brand or product is known for with what people are really saying adds a dimension of awareness to your own understanding of your brand, and will help form the structure of a social media program.

Listening is an important part of conversation and what people are saying about you--and your competitors--will help direct you to areas where you can most meaningfully converse.

Interestingly, a lack of conversation about a brand is an important indicator of its relevance to consumers: as GM's sales have slid, so have online searches for GM brands over the last three years, even with GM's annual advertising budget of over 3 billion dollars.

A listening strategy is a key part of a successful social media program: a basic Google search is an example of a starting point. ere are free and paid listening tools, but using these is not a one-time audit - it's an ongoing ear to the ground.

A listening strategy continues to evolve once you've joined the conversation too - the specific mix of tools and venues depends on where your consumers are and how you're engaging them.

But listening is part of the process, and critical to maintaining the conversation with consumers.

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Google Loves Action

With 66% of the US search market, Google and its algorithms define search engine optimization and is the current standard for how web page, web site and online presence are gauged. As Google continues to refine its search tools and adds functionality and personalization to the search process, brands and products must work harder to retain a strong presence in search.

Google offers the ability to filter search results by recency, showing results only from the last 24 hours, or the last week. More search filters allow users to search videos, reviews, and there is even the Wonder Wheel. To see these in action, perform a Google search on your brand, and then select 'show options' at the top le.

What this means to you is that if your online conversation is limited to a web site that gets updated periodically, and an occasional press release, you stand a greater chance of being missed in a search that is filtered by recency. And if consumers are writing about your brand or product, those comments will supersede your carefully craed words on a results page.

is does not mean that a social media program should be implemented just to bump search results. Search engine optimization processes are an important but separate exercise from social media. You should join in the conversation, not for the page rank results but so that you can engage in dialogue with your customers and add your perspective on your brand to the conversation. Frequent engagement with consumers will make your brand more visible and your voice more important in the conversation that is happening about your brand.

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Trade vs. Public Opinion: Which One Counts More?

A trade publication or journalist may praise a wine as 'citrus notes with a refreshing finish', while a consumer posts that the product tastes like 'a glass of water with a Lemon Pledge float'.

Opinion is democratized, and that's good. While it's tempting to dismiss bad consumer reviews as simply tales from the lunatic fringe, these passionate people shape your brand's perception as much as you do and it's critical to engage authentically and honestly with them. Read what they say - you'll probably learn something about your product, and while it might be painful, it's important to hear what real consumers have to say, away from the un-spontaneous and controlled environments of surveys and focus groups.

Consumers trust each other's reviews and opinions a great deal more than what you say about your product: 60% of consumers trust online peer product reviews, while only 39% trust print and only 16% trust company blogs (more on that in a minute). Peer opinion counts, and it might not be saying what you think, or things you like.

Gaming the opinion system doesn’t work: the FTC has instituted new guidelines about disclosure from bloggers who receive free products to review; Google demotes results from paid blog reviews that link back to the post sponsor.

Your conversation needs to be genuine, intimate and immediate to be valuable: you're building relationships.

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What Tools?Or, If only 16% of Consumers Trust Company Blogs, Why Am I Still Reading This?

ere is no one-size-fits-all solution - a single Twitter account may be all you need to get started in conversation, or a more comprehensive range of tools made need to be employed. A presence in a virtual world may have the highest visibility and positive impact on your consumer, or a regular blog post about the development of products may be the most appealing to your audience.

ere are mainstream tools and media darlings: specific tools and online conversation streams in which you participate may be standard or they may be niche.

Tools also evolve. Twitter was originally seen as a 'what are you doing' tool for teens, but the heaviest users today are mid-career professionals. And Facebook, once a student-only environment, now sees its fastest growth in users over 35, with organizations like the New York Times establishing a presence to engage with their audience.

Tools have different audiences globally: Hi5 is the top social networking site in 25 countries across Europe, Latin America and Asia and the largest for Spanish-speaking users; Mixi is big in Japan.

e tools you use depend on where your customers are and what media they engage each other with. It also depends on who they are: online, consumers are increasingly self-identifying in groups that defy both description and measurement with traditional tools.

Critically, what consumers are doing is talking amongst themselves with content they create. Your blog is your voice and how consumers perceive it and value it depends on what kind of information you share. If it is used as an alternate press release service, it will probably sink to that 16% trust level.

Fundamentally, to determine what tools to use you’ll need a social media strategy that first identifies where your audience is. You’ll need to determine what content you have that’s valuable to them and make a commitment to the conversation channels you employ (and it’s easy to over-commit).

Whatever the tools selected, if they are used to give consumers topical, insightful and relevant information that they can't find anywhere else, then your brand is giving up something of value, and that's bringing you into the discussion.

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Where Is Everyone? Who is Everyone?

Once upon a time, marketing departments found it useful to define a brand or product's typical consumer by giving him or her a name and story. So 'Anna', college-educated, 38, married with a dog and two kids under 10, who lives in an exurb, loves 'American Idol', works part-time and plays tennis with her husband on Sunday aernoons, is shorthand for a brand or product's target customer. Her typical, if imaginary, life provides a touchstone that can represent the thousands or millions of women who purchase and enjoy the brand and helps form a program of brand outreach and communication.

But there is another aspect to 'Anna': she also spends a substantial part of her entertainment time online, with an online persona that self-identifies as a 23-year-old, whose community is focused around online friends in activities like a book group that discusses speculative fiction, and who writes an influential blog about women authors.

e real 'Anna' fits both of these profiles, so the question in reaching consumers is not just where are they, but who are they?

Increasingly, they belong to what Gartner Inc. calls 'Generation V' or 'virtual' which is not defined by age, location, gender or social demographic, but by online behavior. e study breaks them down to four groups: creators, contributors, opportunists and lurkers. ese groups are defined by the content they create and share and their influence on the other groups.

How they spend their time online is related to age, but no age group is le behind. 87% of Gen Y (ages 18-32) go online and 67% of them use social networking sites. 82% of Gen X (33-44) go online and 36% of them use social networking sites. 79% of Younger Baby Boomers (45-54) go online and 20% of them use social networking sites. e fastest-growing group is ages 70-75. Across all age groups, 35% of the online population uses social networking, with 81% researching products and 32% rating a person or product online.

Increasingly, time spent online is used engaging in social marketing and less on other forms of online activity. It's estimated that the time consumers spent communicating online in 2008 was 32%, while time visiting websites for fun dropped to 20%. Conversation is replacing other forms of online behavior and engagement.

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How Does This Sell Products?

e opinions of professional reviewers are well known: Robert Parker on wine, Roger Ebert on movies and Rick Steves on travel will influence consumers' purchase decisions. But many, many more consumers buy wine, see movies and travel, and while the vast majority of them may never post an opinion about what they're drinking, seeing or touring, their purchase decisions can be influenced by the posts of consumers who do.

ose opinions are not always based solely on the product or service, but can be shaped by other experiences with the brand that reviewers don't have, from customer service to store environment, both physical and online. is gives consumer opinion an added dimension of authenticity: while an individual consumer may lack the expertise of a professional reviewer, their experience is much more likely to be similar to what other consumers encounter. is context, and the sheer number of individual consumers who can share an opinion online, is a powerful force that can counter the message a brand makes about itself.

Social media supports sales by providing a brand or product a persona that is much more rich and three-dimensional than any print ad or press release can make. A tweet, blog post, podcast or video that brings the process and thinking behind the making or enjoyment of a product to an audience gives that product a face and a personality.

Don’t count on that changing opinions overnight, or being able to track its short-term ROI. is is not a campaign (although campaigns may be part of the plan). It's a new way of engaging with consumers, and while it may be in its infancy with tools and technology rapidly changing, conversation is now an important aspect of brand -and consumer communication.

Like all meaningful relationship building, it's not a sprint, it's a marathon.

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How to Start? Start with a strategy, goals and a plan. Opening a Twitter account and assigning it to an intern is not quite brand suicide (yet), but it misses the point of the power of social media altogether.

is means you have to consider - as a whole voice for your brand - your advertising, the conversations your brand is currently having, your customers, what they are saying and what they'd like to hear from you. Social media should be part of your marketing toolkit, but it does not have to be big - you can start small and ease into it. In fact, we suggest that approach.

e mechanics of setting up a social network are relatively simple, the tools oen free so it's tempting to jump in. But beware enthusiasm-without-planning: Oprah posted to her Twitter account 10 times on the first day, about 25% of all her messages over the first month of use. With over a million followers, but posts limited to 'what I did today' the Oprah brand is missing an opportunity to influence her fans.

In planning, don’t think about tomorrow, think about six months and a year from now.: determining your level of ongoing commitment to a social media program is a critical part in determining tactics.

It’s better to have a small set of tools that are used well than a wide range of tools that are launched and abandoned. Starting small you can find the value in the conversations, where your consumers are spending their online time, and what they really want to know from you.

ink about your point of differentiation and what you have to say that is unique. Rubbermaid's blog isn't about products - it’s about organization (best accomplished with Rubbermaid products).

Bring in a range of personnel from your organization as you develop your social media plan. Your Marketing department is key, but the perspective of Sales, Customer Service - anyone who is currently talking directly to consumers - should also be part of the process. ese views help create a richer conversation and illustrate where your high-value voices should really come from.

A plan should also have flexibility. As tools change, as online user habits change, and you learn from the online conversations, even as your personnel change, you'll want to be able to integrate changes in both the external and internal environment.

You might want to move into additional media too: YouTube, podcasts, vodcasts, AudioBoo may all prove to be valuable tools. A strategy that evaluates, listens, enables exchanges and allows for growth is what you plan for all of your marketing efforts. Social media and conversation should be no different.

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Once Begun, Is This Forever? Who Has Time for This?

How a social media program is implemented and maintained really depends on the culture of your company, and it may determine if you are a candidate for effective social media. You have to believe that there are articulate, smart brand ambassadors throughout your organization, and that they have something valuable to say to customers.

en you have to trust them and provide them the platform with which to say it.

If you truly believe that the best way to communicate with consumers is a controlled message delivered through print, TV and a web site presence, social media isn’t for you - yet.

at's OK - those are good tools - but they are not the only communication channels defining your brand. Consumers are having conversations with each other that are layered and nuanced and can give a dimension of insight into what they are thinking in a way that no Nielsen data or survey can.

And is this forever? Yes. Is it time-consuming? Like any new marketing program, it will take effort and attention to get started. But if it’s integrated into your overall marketing plan, and your strategy and goals are clear, conversing with consumers will be a manageable and valuable activity.

e specific tools will evolve and change, and the Twitter of tomorrow will replace some of today's tools. But there has been a fundamental change in how consumers gather information and communicate, and social media will only increase in importance and impact.

Social media is not simply a set of tools, but a way of engaging with consumers, as they are engaging with each other. It requires transparency, a genuine voice and information that is valuable to consumers. It is a way to build trust and relationships.

It is not a stand-alone outreach program but works in tandem with other marketing efforts, building on conversations that consumers are already having to create a real program of engagement marketing that is grounded in authenticity, transparency, sharing and listening.

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Who Are We and Why Are We Such Smarty Pants?

KÜNGDESIGN is a multi-functional creative consultancy that for over 18 years has been helping companies communicate more effectively with consumers, in both the physical world and online.

Our clients and projects include Beverages & more!, Dreyer’s & Edy’s Grand Ice Cream, e Wine Group, Grocery Outlet, 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, Bechtel, Arsoa ( Japan), ai Farmers Bank (ailand) and a range of web, retail, social media and virtual world projects for boutique and niche businesses.

We specialize in being generalists: we are equally at home in the physical and digital world, with skills and a toolkit that spans both. We create ways to tell a brand's story, whether that's via a web site, blog, social network, by building an online community, or a place in a virtual world. Sometimes the story benefits from improved support in the physical world, like a new environment, signage or packaging.

We take a wide view of what tools, channels and solutions can be brought together to create an effective conversation with consumers. We value collaboration with our clients, their team and their resources, both internal and external: we think collaboration is the best way to create a program that can be successfully executed.

So we listen - you know your business, budgets and resources best, and our job is to help you increase the effectiveness of your communication, whichever channels are used.

To do this, we'll talk to you about your brand, goals, and your message. We'll outline a strategy to get you into the conversation. We'll get you set up, brand your presence (where possible) and get you going. And we'll have a plan for monitoring progress and suggestions for tweaks you can make as you learn.

You can find more information about us and see our portfolio at http://www.kungdesign.com

And you can listen to us at

http://twitter.com/KUNGDESIGN

http://kungdesign.posterous.com/

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http://kungdesign.posterous.com

http://kungdesign.posterous.com



APPENDIX

Zappos - the Twitter Case Study You Should KnowTwitter is just one tool, but it's got everyone's attention, so it's worth sharing how one company uses it to communicate. e story is an example of how a simple tool, used well and broadly, can improve the dialogue between company and consumer.

“When asked why he was on Twitter, Tony Hsieh, Zappos CEO said: “People relate to people, not companies.”

Quoted from the article here:http://scobleizer.com/2009/04/23/learn-from-zappos/

Facebook and Cokehttp://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/coke/stories/2009/03/30/coke_facebook_page.html

How Twitter Will Change the Way We Livehttp://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1902604,00.html

Gartner: Generation Vhttp://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=721008

Pew Research: Generations Onlinehttp://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/Generations-Online-in-2009.aspx?r=1

Netpop Research: Time Spent Onlinehttp://searchenginewatch.com/3633212

Forrester: People Don’t Trust Blogshttp://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2008/12/people-dont-tru.html

Word of Mouth Marketing Associationhttp://womma.org/

Rubbermaid - Adventures in Organizationhttp://blog.rubbermaid.com/

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http://scobleizer.com/2009/04/23/learn-from-zappos/

http://scobleizer.com/2009/04/23/learn-from-zappos/

http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/coke/stories/2009/03/30/coke_facebook_page.html

http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/coke/stories/2009/03/30/coke_facebook_page.html

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1902604,00.html

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1902604,00.html

http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=721008

http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=721008

http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/Generations-Online-in-2009.aspx?r=1

http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/Generations-Online-in-2009.aspx?r=1

http://searchenginewatch.com/3633212

http://searchenginewatch.com/3633212

http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2008/12/people-dont-tru.html

http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2008/12/people-dont-tru.html

http://womma.org

http://womma.org

http://blog.rubbermaid.com

http://blog.rubbermaid.com

