Inspire Advocates to Influence

Inspiring Advocates to Influence:How to Improve Revenue, Retention, Reputation

w w w. s u m m i t m a r k e t i n g . c o m Summit Marketing 2

IntroductionMotivating and enabling your brand advocates to become influencers encourages them to share positive experiences and information about your products and services with their networks.

Consumers, not brands, lead marketplace shifts now. They drive product changes, demand quality, real-time customer service, and make purchasing decisions by leveraging the connections and information that technology affords them. Consumers no longer depend only on marketing messages for insight. They share, learn and actively influence each other on their terms without the barriers of geography or time. Consumers elevate brand reputation that directly impacts retention and revenue.

Advocates tapped by brands to serve as influencers help augment sales, marketing and customer service efforts. Even more important, consumers trust each other more than marketing professionals. According to a Nielsen report released in April 2012, 92% of consumers around the world trust word-of-mouth or recommendations from family and friends, above all other forms of advertising – an increase of 18% since 2007. Per a 360PR MomSquad® report in December 2011, 54% of moms will look at third-party blogs and websites for insight during the purchasing process.

Consider thisYour marketing strategy and execution plans need to take into account the ever-changing consumer purchasing and customer service experience. Learning how advocates can help supplement your efforts and influence the diverse and growing number of consumer touch points is critical to business success.

This paper serves as an initial “how-to” to help your company:

• Identify advocates • Assess how, where and when an advocate has the most opportunity to influence• Inspire advocates to influence their networks • Establish metrics to measure social influence and its impact to

reputation, retention and revenue

92%

54%

of Consumers TrustWORD-OF-MOUTH RECOMMENDATIONSfrom friends and family above all other forms of advertising

o f M o m sLOOK AT THIRD PARTY BLOGS AND WEBSITESf o r i ns igh t dur ing the p u r c h a s i n g p r o c e s s


A brand advocate is someone who speaks, pleads or argues in favor of your brand. In the world of social media, advocates don’t always speak in your favor. Sometimes they express concerns which help you improve — if you’re listening. All mentions generate opportunities to represent your brand in the public eye, further solidify relationships with advocates and possibly acquire new champions.

The first step is listening for these opportunities and making the most of them. Tracking a massive sounding board like the internet may seem overwhelming. But understanding the tools available to listen and proactively notify you of company mentions, sentiment and advocates helps you save time, minimize risk and improve profitability.

Listen to the talk of the townIf your company has local stores dispersed across a region, nation or internationally, you will need a geography filter in your monitoring tool. Comcast recently reported savings of over $1 million in customer service costs from an outage that occurred duringlast year’s World Series. Geographic filtering allowed Comcast to quickly isolate the issue andcommunicate status by monitoring and responding to complaintsoriginating from the affected area.

Know when you’re under reviewEmploying a tool that can proactively notify you when your brand is reviewed lets you quickly turn a negative experience in to a positive one. In addition to monitoring review sites, you should claim your listings on these sites so customers know how to contact you and know you are paying attention to them.

Popular online reviewer sites you should pay attention to include Yelp, Google Places and Foursquare. Angie’s List (consumer paid community), Open Table (restaurant), and Insider Pages (medical/health care) are top niche sites that may also be good to watch, depending on your industry.

Be hospitable and engageEnable your advocates to share their voice with you on assets that you create and develop. Add a blog to your website where you can interact with consumers through comments. Add contact forms so they can request more information. Create accounts on social networks like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Encourage conversation and interaction on all of them.

Check which location-based applications such as Foursquare, Front Flip or QR codes are available in your area that can further in-store engagement. Consumers often share tips, comments, and experiences on these applications, providing key insights that help define and identify your advocates.

$1 Million

Comcast recentlyrepor ted in a case s tudy

SAVINGS OF OVER

by fi l tering on geography

Who are your advoCaTes and hoW do you fInd TheM?


understand the toolsMany monitoring tools exist and range in price from free to very expensive. Our largest clients can generate thousands of mentions per day across all forms of media leading us to partner with industry best practice tool providers, BurrellsLuce and Engage 121. This partnership enables Summit Marketing to monitor, manage and report in real-time the connection between influencers and brand reputation, retention and revenue. Your needs and budget will dictate the best tools for your business.

• AlertTools Tools that notify you of online mentions of your company/products/services based on keywords you choose (company name, product name, etc.).

• SocialNetworkingTools Numerous tools exist to monitor posts, tweets and status updates published on your social networking assets.

• SocialMonitoringTools Robust and integrated monitoring tools listen to third-party conversations on blogs, forums,

review sites and communities. Typically more expensive, these tools commonly support influencer identification, content scheduling, local level engagement and reporting.

Low cost tools for beginnersIf you’re just beginning your search for advocates, you may want to consider the following tools:

• GoogleAlerts– http://google.com/alerts When Google Alerts identifies a keyword mention, it sends an email to you immediately, daily or weekly based on your preference.

•Seesmic – http://seesmic.com: Monitors Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn from your desktop or mobile device.

• SocialMention – http://socialmention.com: Monitors 100+ social media properties and reports back on the keywords you set.

• BrandMonitor – http://brandmonitor.thismoment.com: Great for tracking articles, blog posts, and tweets in near real-time. Also provides reports.

• Engag.io– http://engag.io/welcome: Compiles information about you and your competitors including all comments made on your various social assets to improve tracking and response efforts.

If you are in the market for a social media management tool, be prepared for an onslaught of data. We recommend assigning a resource to analyze your data and suggest improvements accordingly.


3 FactorsT H A T C A N D E T E R M I N E A PERSON’S INFLUENCE

Once you identify advocates, the next step is to assess how much and what kind of influence each may have. All customers are important and should be cared for. How advocates are cared for and where they may best help influence can be determined based on Bibb Lantane’s Social Impact theory.

Followers, likes, pins, or views are not necessarily or the most important factors in determining a person’s influence potential. Many influential people today were only emerging online participants a few years ago, and new influencers appear on the scene every day. Brands that initially neglected these emerging influencers regret it now.

a c c o r d i n g t o B i b b L a n t a n e ’s soc i a l Impac t t heo r y, t he re a re

Often times, we find advocates who may only participate in one niche community. The community may be small but the following is loyal and often takes actions recommended by the advocate. The community happens to be full of our target market. In this case, the quality of community overrides the quantity and we create a plan to approach the advocate accordingly. These advocates should be placed in the Strength influencer group.

Advocates who are hyper local and use location-based applications may help drive foot traffic to local destinations (physical proximity). Advocates who like to talk about shared-interest topics – and have their own blog – may influence through temporal proximity. Advocates who enable their blog readers to comment, post and make it easy to share content could help elevate traffic to your site, increasing leads and improving retention. These advocate groups align with the Immediacy influencer group.

Advocates who are most active in large online conversations — and across diverse channels — can have substantial influence. These advocates, based on the simple factor of total reach, typically serve in the Number influencer group. This is true whether or not the advocate has his or her own dedicated site/blog/network profile.

Strength: How important the influencing group is to the individual.

ImmedIacy: Physical (and temporal) proximity of the influencing group to the individual at the time of the influence attempt.

number: The number of people in the group.

Determining where each of your advocates aligns under one or more of these three factors can be done by analyzing their social assets, behaviors and various social indicators. We take a look at analysis tools and what indicators to consider on the next page.

Understanding influence, purpose and potential of an advocate helps determine priority response, crisis support and campaign outreach efforts. Only the can brand reputation can be managed best throughout the entire customer lifecycle.

WhICh advoCaTes have The MosT opporTunITy To InfLuenCe?


social indicators to consider when determining influence potential• Number of readers• Number of back-links• Number of blogs listed on blog roll• Number of groups linked to blog• Alternative forms of content (ex: podcasts/video blogs)• Post schedule & content topics• Location• Sharing venues (ex: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest)• Sentiment analysis• Number of readers in other venues• Access to writing for other venues (ex: one of our blog writers also was a writer for a major online magazine)

analytic toolsIn addition to the monitoring tools mentioned earlier, analytic tools can help you obtain the social indicators noted. The analytic tools highlighted below are free and provide a variety of information like:

• Number of website viewers• Viewer demographics • Recommendation of similar sites that may introduce you to previously unknown advocates

• alexa&Quantcast – http://alexa.com & http://quantcast.com: These simple and free tools require only a URL to use. Sites lacking a significant following may not

have data available through these resources, but one of these sites will typically provide at least basic information. Visitor demographics, back-links, and recommended similar sites are just some of the social indicators you will find.

determine an influencer’s grade• twittergrader– http://twitter.grader.com: This Hubspot-hosted tool is easy to use. Twitter Grader provides good insight as to what factors go into

the grade and tips on how to improve it. In addition to an influence score, Twitter Grader provides rankings at the city, state and national level.

• Klout– http://klout.com: Due to its ever-changing algorithms, Klout is most effective when it is one of many tools used to

determine influence. It also can provide indication of other topics the advocate may be interested in, thus serving up potential partnership and campaign ideation possibilities.


InspIre advoCaTes To

InfLuenCe TheIr neTWorKs

Be where they areIn addition to your own social and web assets, your brand needs to incorporate outreach tactics. Find the forums, blogs and conversations where people are talking about your brand. Listen to what they are saying and don’t be afraid to jump in when you can add value to the conversation. Often, companies open accounts on a variety of social networks and grow frustrated when no one follows or participates. More than likely no one knows the brand exists on those platforms yet. Getting out of your own backyard and visiting where others live and converse is critical to social business success.

have a purpose Creating content always starts with establishing purpose. Is your purpose to inform, engage, inspire or move a person to action? Content can actually achieve multiple objectives at a time, but its primary purpose must be established before it should be created. In addition to content purpose, you should consider three key factors:

• distributionchannels – Determine the where, when, what, why and how. Not every channel works for every type of content. Know your audience prior to distribution and share content that is helpful, is wanted and/or addresses an issue. Think integration: Leverage traditional and online channels to work together and expand awareness. Use an editorial calendar for all content to make sure channels are receiving an appropriate amount of attention and delivering messages meaningful to your audiences.

• humansenses – Technology accelerates change. It does not, however, change the essence of what provokes organic engagement and response. To tap into that human dimension, create content that appeals to the different human senses – sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. Create word pictures. Describe in detail. Provoke memories deeply rooted in the basic senses. You will grab attention faster and keep it longer.

• tone – Does your content need to be serious, funny, emotional, loud, etc? The tone sets the stage for copy and art and can make or break the user experience.

humanSenses


Technical agilitySome see technology as a barrier, when in fact it is the solution. Partner with your IT teams. Stay up to date on the latest tech solutions and learn from your peers. Understand the possibilities and use technology to your benefit. Technology can help lower costs and accelerate revenues, if used effectively.

Do you enable the actions you want people to take? You may need to take a step back and strengthen your overall foundation before moving forward with social outreach. Maybe your website needs to be redesigned. Perhaps you need to to add a forum, a blog, a donation button or sharing icons throughout the site.

Whatobjectivesdoyouexpectyourwebsitetohelpyouachieve?Willusersfindyoursiteinformativeandintuitive?Hubspot’sMarketingGrader(http://marketing.grader.com)isafreeassessmenttoolthatcanprovideyouinsighttowebsiteandsocialperformance.

Make it easyAdvocates will influence their networks but you must enable them to do so. If you want your advocates to share something, make sure it is shareable. If you want them to solicit action, make sure it’s easily actionable. If you want them to tell the world how awesome you are, then be awesome and deliver what you promise.

Make it consumable from anywhereConsumers are becoming electronic device junkies. More than 40% of consumers watch TV while also using a computer, iPad or mobile phone. People may experience your brand on a 5” screen in the morning when they wake up, a 24” screen when they get to work, a 9.5” screen in the coffee shop, a 60” screen on TV in the evening and then back to the 5” screen before they go to bed. Creating visually diverse content that grabs your advocate’s attention – regardless of their device, is more important than ever.

In addition, smart phone growth is exploding. Consumers activated 1.5 million smart phone devices from December 1, 2011 to December 24, 2011, while 6.5 million devices were activated on Christmas Day. This growth pattern is sure to impact content consumption and utilization. Optimizing all of your digital assets for mobile viewing is critical. Taking into account texting, mobile applications, and browser resolution further enables influencers to share their brand experience real-time, potentially producing faster revenues.

40%of consumersWATCH TV WHILE ALSO USING A COMPUTER, iPAD or MOBILE PHONE

M o r e t h a n

Mold your message so it’s easy to consume wherever, whenever and however your advocates want to consume it.

Your Message

Your Message

5am

10pm

9am

Your Message

12pm

Your Message

7pm

Your Message

People may experience your brand on a 5”

screen in the morning when they wake up ...

A 24” screen

when they get to

work ...

A 9.5” screen in the

coffee shop ...

A 60” screen

on TV in the

evening ...

And then back to the 5” screen before

they go to bed.


Social success – specifically measuring advocates as influencers – needs to be directly aligned with overall business goals.

No brand is perfect, and you should set your goals realistically. What percentage of mentions should be positive? What is your website lead conversion target? What costs can be saved if customer service issues are handled online vs. an 800 number? What percentage of donor growth should be generated by social media activity? Establish trending expectations, month-over-month growth projections, and overlay it on your business goals to determine how your influencers impact reputation, retention and revenue.

Knowing your key performance indicators before you start directly impacts the social flow you want to achieve. Understanding metrics helps determine what tools should be used to ensure you capture and accurately report relevant information. For instance, if you want an advocate to share a URL with their networks, then you may want to consider using a tool like Bit.ly that allows you to track how many times the URL link was clicked and shared by others. (You can learn more about Bit.ly at http://bit.ly)

After building a key performance indicator plan, you may realize you need Strength influencers over Number influencers, and so on. Starting with the end in mind drives the entire social strategy and game plan. Don’t wait until launch. By then it will be too late.

advoCaTe InfLuenCer resuLTEXAMPLE: Advocates are identified and inspired to share a video. Did the advocate share the video and therefore become an influencer? Did the number of video views increase? Did those who watched the video take the action requested/desired? Did they complete the action? Did reputation improve? Did customer attrition decrease? Did revenues increase?

If there is a breakdown identified or trends aren’t moving in the right direction, you need to review and adjust.

Here are the first areas to check:

• confirm your advocates are aligned to the proper target influence groups• ensure you are empowering/inspiring your advocates with meaningful and motivational content• be certain the best efforts of your advocates aren’t being diminished or negated by poor quality and

service issues from your brand

There is much to consider, but given the amount of data now available and the real-time nature of it, mid-stream reviews can be conducted and adjustments can be made quickly and with confidence.

Begin with the end in mind – what is success?


summary & additional perspectiveTechnology combined with change can be overwhelming and challenging to the best-laid business plans. The risks are high but so are the payoffs if you implement a strategy that takes advantage of all the opportunities that exist in a digital world. Identifying and connecting with your advocates, and empowering them to share their experiences with others can be achieved through innovative solutions.

Other agencies can help you engage advocates. Summit Marketing helps you inspire these advocates to become influencers through intelligent, effective marketing strategies, messaging, creative content and specific digital tactics.

Summit will also fuel your strategic planning process by identifying:

• when advocates want to talk to you • when advocates want to share with others • your audience’s preferred communications channels • offers and communications that drive customer interactions

These are critical in repositioning a brand/campaign, providing a message platform that identifies points of differentiation and generating tactical communications that build a meaningful and motivational dialog.

how can you gain the full advocate advantage?Individuals share opinions about your brand with the push of a button. You must keep your finger on the pulse of your customer base. Identifying and courting current and future advocates strengthens your brand and creates business driving influencers. To keep your edge or gain an advantage in the marketplace, contact Summit Marketing today.

references

http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/reports-downloads/2012/global-trust-in-advertising-and-brand-messages.html

http://practicalanalytics.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/omni-channel-retail-analytics-a-big-data-use-case/

http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ebay/1740974805x0x553936/1062c9ec-0318-47a3-8250-bc728d25b28b/eBay_ShoppingShowcase_Sam_V4.pdf

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/the-100-year-march-of-technology-in-1-graph/255573/

http://vimeo.com/5846105

http://www.360publicrelations.com/momsquad.html


dougtoomayDirector, New Client Engagement(O) 913-562-3407(M) [email protected]

LISaQuaLLSVP, Interactive Services(O) 913-562-3401(M) [email protected]

Kansas City8515 Bluejacket StreetLenexa, KS 66214800-843-7347

St. Louis, MO3 CityPlace Drive, Suite 500St. Louis, MO 63141866-590-6000

Washington, DC2011 Crystal City Drive, Suite 750Arlington, VA 22202571-483-2400

Business

Inspire Advocates to Influence