Interacting with Social Media to Strengthen Communication Strategies

Blake Cahill SVP of Marketing

www.visibletechnologies.com

• A study by The Society for New Communications Research found:

– 81% of consumers believe that blogs, online rating systems and discussion forums give them a greater voice regarding customer care, but less than 33% believe that businesses take customers’ opinions seriously

– 74% of respondents based their purchase intent of brands on others’ experiences shared online

– 59% of respondents use social media to “vent” about a customer care experience

• BusinessWeek recently reissued their 2005 cover story on blogs to emphasize the importance of social media and the need for social networking

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Why Social Media Matters

Consumers are increasingly turning to online communities and Social Media to form opinions of

brands and to make purchasing decisions

It’s Chaos Out There!

HEALTHCARE Newsgroups

Social Media Challenges Uncontrollable environment

Where do I get started? What can I glean?

Where is the ROI?

PR and Social Media

Currently the PR and Communications industry are primarily focused on:

• Listening for mentions about clients’ brand

• Using Social Media for outreach and campaign publicity

• Monitoring and mitigating in the event of a crisis

Tomorrow - communications and PR need to evolve and focus on:

• Real-time social media engagement to monitor and manage brands effectively

• Influencer identification

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Social Media PR Benefits…and risks?

• Speed - instantaneous dissemination of not just news, but images, audio, video, and other multimedia content as well

• Reach - widespread coverage, enabling breaking news to reach a much larger and broader reader base than standard media outlets alone

• Perception - enhances both brand awareness and image

• Insight - gather input and feedback directly from target audiences, for more effective reputation management, products and services, campaigns, etc.

• Influence – identify key brand advocates and influencers to engage with

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© AberdeenGroup 2008

Social Media Monitoring and Analysis: Generating Consumer Insights from Online Conversations

Jeff Zabin Research Fellow Aberdeen Group

June 19, 2008

7 • © AberdeenGroup 2008

Research focus


What companies are saying

Inherent in the power of Web 2.0, the

emergence of online communities, and the transfer of power from big,

centralized command-and-control structures like corporations to large

groups of disseminated individuals like

customers is the need to move from push information to pull information.

Matt Smith, Vice President, Customer Insight

Both the customer you

serve well and the customer you underserve

have the loudest voices in social media.

Sean O'Driscoll, General Manager of Community Support Services

A lot of social media tools

do a great job of telling you what’s being said and who’s

saying it. What we really want to know is who’s

listening to the

conversation and how does it permeate outwards.

Christine Stasiw Lazarchuk Director, Global Market Research

Online dialog is a good way to

get feedback and understand how consumers feel about our

brand and to get suggestions for our business.

Adam Brown Director, Digital Communications

Cathy Halligan, Chief Marketing Officer

Social media monitoring enables

us to track how our company is being portrayed. It’s a barometer

we use to determine the viral spread of our messages and if our

tactics are working.

Ed Garsten, Manager, Electronic Media Communications

We monitor social media

because it provides unsolicited and unbiased consumer

opinions about our products and brands in real time.


What PR agencies are saying

We understand what people get out of

a conversation from both an emotional and utilitarian perspective, That way,

we’re better able to give people what they’re asking for. It’s hardly a passive

exercise. Participation is important

from a PR perspective. It’s not just a matter of listening to what people say,

but of giving them what they need and motivating them to participate in this

system of feedback even more

strongly and passionately.

Bryan Senser, Vice

President of Planning

Using the capabilities of a

monitoring service, we’re able to build confidence

with our own marketing team, to show them what’s

happening on a positive,

neutral, and negative tone. That kind of data really

helps them feel comfortable going into this arena.

Davina Gruenstein,

Management Supervisor

The blogosphere came

along and completely obliterated the models we

had for knowing when our clients were being talked

about. But it also created a

lot of new opportunities. In the last two years, clients

have been asking proactively about

monitoring social media

and that's when we started turning to vendors for best-

of-breed solutions.

David Bradfield, Senior

Vice President and Partner


Birth of a benchmark


Top pressures


Top actions


Who uses social media insights


Metrics for determining

Best-in-Class

Time to marketing

information.

Customer satisfaction.

Actionable insights

derived from social media

monitoring and analysis.

Ability to identify and

reduce risk.


Year-over-year improvement in other metrics


Top capabilities – and where PR agencies can help!

[email protected]

Take the current survey: aberdeen.com/survey/socialmediamarketing

Chapter One – what we have learned so far…

Bob Pearson PR WEEK

June 19, 2008

#1 – the online world is undergoing its most

significant transformation ever in

our history

GROWTH EVERY SECOND

7 PCs Sold

2 Million

e-mails Sent

7 People Logon For

the First Time 11,000 Songs

Shared 1,157 Videos

Viewed on YouTube

2 New Blogs

Created

#2 – Customers want to speak with us in their first language

English reaches 1/3 of the world in a good day

Internet Usage by Language

English 30%

Chinese 15%

Spanish 9%

Japanese 7%

French 5%

German 5%

Portuguese 4%

Arabic 4%

Hindi 3%

Korean 3%

Italian 3%

Russian 2%

Dutch 2%

Swedish 1%

Norweigen 0.5%

Danish 0.3%

Rest of world

8%

Internet Usage by Language

English Chinese Spanish Japanese French German

Portuguese Arabic Hindi Korean Italian Russian

Dutch Swedish Norweigen Danish Rest of world

#3 – new countries have formed that are not being treated with the full respect that their nation’s population deserves…..

AND DID YOU REALIZE YOU HAVE HELP IN MAINTAINING IT?

#4 – your new home page is really cool…….but do you know where it is?

Today’s Home Page

#5) Less than 1% of a person’s time online will be spent buying a product.

THE REAL WORLD OF OUR CUSTOMERS ONLINE Opinions are formed during the 99% of time outside of purchase path

THE BROWSING EXPERIENCE

You poke around for information when

interested and you go to what you know (e.g.,

ratings and reviews,

special reports)

The Purchase Experience

<1% of a person’s

time is spent actually

purchasing our

products

Broadband users spend more than an hour and 40 minutes (48% of their spare

time) online, and more than half of this is spent accessing entertainment and

communication

Our Key Learning’s & Actions

#1 – The most important thing you can do is help customers with their technology problems

DIGITAL MEDIA STRATEGY: ENGAGE IN RELEVANT CONVERSATIONS WITH OUR CUSTOMERS ONLINE 24/7 WORLDWIDE IN ALL MAJOR LANGUAGES

Share Content & Participate • StudioDell – 127 videos produced in

last three months

• IdeaStorm (9,100 ideas & 130 business improvements)

• 173k members of ReGeneration

• Communities in 7 languages and growing

Join Conversations • Enter conversations via blog posts (up

to 100 per day)

• Pay attention regardless of size of blog

• Negative sentiment has dropped from 48% to 21% since August ‘06

Tell Our Story • Direct2Dell now leading blog & serves

as “Dell wire service”

• One of top corporate blogs

• 6MM page views per month

• 65MM page views for all community in first quarter

Resolve Dissatisfaction • Identify online & resolve CE issues

• New monitoring system tracks 99% of online

#2 – Blogging is global…..blogging is multi-lingual…blogging is by community of passion….blogging is not “one blog”

DELL CONFIDENTIAL

Outreach

6 million views last month

Available in English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Norwegian...

New blogs for small business, consumer, IT, cloud computing and more…..

OBJECTIVE:

Transparent, candid

and quick

communication

RESULTS:

#3 – would you rather do a focus group with 10 people or listen to 100,000 people debate ideas for a few months and ask them questions throughout the process?

DELL CONFIDENTIAL

Listen

13,000 ideas (external and internal)

130 ideas in action externally

www.dell.com/ideastorm

OBJECTIVE:

Encourage ideas,

feedback, input

and dialogue

RESULTS:

#4 – Customers are partners and partners join together to make a difference

Partnering with Customers

Recycling Kit and “Plant A Tree for Me” [add $2]

Support Reforestation: “Plant A Tree for Me” [add $2]

Free Recycling add $0

ReGeneration -- 173k members

DELL CONFIDENTIAL 38

#5 – Communities are more powerful than individuals. Communities want to help each other improve

Community solutions will decrease calls and empower our customers

#6 – the online experience at work should be similar to the online experience at home

Web access for all….

Wikis, blogs and forums…..

Ratings and reviews…..

And more….

facebook meets Dellbook

DELL CONFIDENTIAL 42

#7– Join your customer’s communities and become part of the solution

Direct to customer Q&A

#8 – you can see in real time if you are relevant to a conversation or topic…..it’s easy and free to see

From Dell Outlet to Friends Lists…..

#9 – if you are dealing with an issue, be truthful, transparent and diligent in updating your customers

“We believe that the video Dell produced, as well as other creative notification measures companies have pursued, are a positive for consumers and for the impression customers have of a recalling firm. “ – Scott Wolfson, Consumer Product Safety

Commission 48

#10 – Measurement requires thinking outside the box. Don’t try to measure with yesterday’s thinking

A New Set of Metrics

Awareness & Activity – SOV, visits, downloads and more

Conversations – comment to post/ratio; screen penetration; raw word increase/decrease; google screen analysis

Community – frequency of return visits; frequency of comments within visitors; idea generation

LEADERS WILL ENTER AND BECOME RELEVANT IN

CONVERSATIONS THAT OCCUR EVERY DAY IN EVERY LANGUAGE ALL

AROUND THE WORLD ABOUT THEIR COMPANY OR

PRODUCT

Companies that cling to the past may not realize it, but they will lose relevance.

MESSAGE

EXPERIENCE

CONVERSATION

RELATIONSHIPS

AFFINITY

&

TRUST

WE BECOME

CONVERSATION

ARCHITECTS

Ten Digital Media Observations

1) Messages are co-created in the marketplace. What you announce is the start. The community completes your message.

2) Customers don’t care about LOB’s. They gravitate to their “community of passion”.

3) If you focus on english, you are not reaching 65% of the audience. Ten languages = global.

4) When one billion new people enter a market in 4-5 years, they change it…….get ready for change

5) Great companies will excel in transparency. Others will find you cannot hide.

Ten Digital Media Observations

6) Ideasourcing allows the customer to walk our hallways every day. Become their advocate.

7) Response to issues must happen in minutes and hours, not days and weeks.

8) Language is no longer a barrier for news to travel

9) Your digital experience should be similar at work and at home.

10) Gut feel and common sense matter more than ever, despite the overwhelming feeling that it is all about technology

Key Coordinates

www.dell.com/conversations

www.regeneration.org

[email protected]