Executive Summary: In just a few short years, social media has exploded, capturing the attention of not onlymillions of consumers, but a large and growing share of marketers as well. However, in the race to jump on the socialmedia bandwagon, marketers should focus on the strategies and tactics that are most likely to lead to success. ThisInsight Brief covers 10 best practices for social marketing:

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1. Don’t think social media, think social marketing.2. Know your objectives first—then develop your social strategy.3. Recognize the secret ingredient: trust.4. Listening comes first.5. Don’t just barge into a conversation: Add value.6. Be authentic, transparent and humble.7. Recruit from your core: the brand enthusiasts who already

love you.8. Target the coveted influentials.9. Adopt a long-term/real-time approach.10. Integrate social media with other online and offline

communications.

10 Best Practices forSuccess with SocialMedia

February 2010

Geoff Ramsey,CEOgeoff@emarketer.com

Digital Intelligence Copyright ©2010 eMarketer, Inc. All rights reserved.

In this Series:10 Best Practices for Success with Social MediaSlideshow: Social Media Marketing by the NumbersFive Reasons Why Marketers Need to Have a Social Media StrategyWhere Does Social Media Fit Within an Organization?What You Need to Know About Earned MediaSeven Guidelines for Achieving ROI from Social MediaSocial Media Misfires: How to Head Off Trouble Before It HitsThe Future of Social Media Marketing

Insight Brief

Comparative Estimates: US Marketers Using SocialMedia, 2008 & 2009 (% of respondents)

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center forMarketing Research*, Nov 2009

Association of National Advertisers and BtoB magazine,Aug 2009

Forrester Research, 2009

Equation Research, Aug 2009

PROMO magazine*, Apr 2009

BtoB magazine**, Nov 2009

Awareness*, Sep 2008

NetPlus Marketing*, Mar 2008

2008

49.0%

-

-

-

-

-

46.0%

38.9%

2009

80.0%

66.0%

64.0%

59.0%

52.1%

54.0%

-

-

Note: *social networks only; **among B2B marketersSource: various, as noted, 2008 & 2009

110568 www.eMarketer.com

For additional information on the above chart, see theEndnotes section.

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 2

Executive Summary

Already, more than one-half of marketers are engaging insome form of social media activity, according to survey datafrom a number of researchers.

Moreover, interest in social marketing is hardly waning. A dozenindependent surveys show that 41% to nearly 80% of marketersare planning to boost their spending on social marketing over thenext year or so.

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With so much intense interest and activity, the big question is: Aremarketers doing it right?

eMarketer has reviewed dozens of reports, articles, interviews,blogs, conference presentations, thought leader opinions, whitepapers, studies, surveys and other sources in order to synthesizethe best thinking and practices for social marketing. The following10 points provide a road map for social media success.

1. Don’t Think Social Media, ThinkSocial Marketing

Paid media advertising on social sites is not the

biggest opportunity for most companies. Rather,

marketers should recognize that social interactions

can affect nearly every facet of their organization,

including employee communications, customer

relationship management (CRM), product design

and public relations.

“Companies that want to maximize theirpresence on the social Web must takeadvantage of social networks in all stages of the purchase funnel, from awareness tolearning to buying to loyalty. It is shortsightedto focus only on advertising in social networkswithout a firm understanding of all the ways they can enhance a marketingplan, including branding, direct marketing andlead generation, e-commerce and customerrelations.” —Debra Aho Williamson, senior analyst,eMarketer, in the eMarketer report “Marketing on SocialNetworks: Branding, Buying and Beyond,”August 2009

Research data supports this broader marketing approach. ForresterResearch, for example, found that while 41% of marketers areplacing ads on social sites, 64% say they’re building their own socialmedia presence.

Social marketing is more about empowering, organizing and trainingselect staff members to engage on social platforms—and building acorporate social presence—than it is about paid media placements.

“A very large amount of money is being spent on social networks, even though the spending isn’t necessarily going against ad inventory. If you’re good, you canget a lot of value on social networks fromvery little investment. You are almostrewarded for getting better results byspending less money.” —Ian Schafer, CEO, DeepFocus, in an interview with eMarketer, June 2009

Eventually, online social activities and connections will be bakedinto every form of digital content on the Web, including brandmarketers’ Websites, e-commerce shopping sites, searchengines, and content, media and entertainment sites.

Comparative Estimates: US Marketers Who Plannedto Increase Spending on Social Media Marketing in2009 (% of respondents)

King Fish Media, Oct 2009

78%

AdMedia Partners, Jan 2009 (1)

77%

Unisfair, Sep 2009 (2)

75%

VerticalResponse, Nov 2009 (2) (3)

66%

Millward Brown, Apr 2009

64%

BtoB magazine, Nov 2009 (2) (4)

60%

StrongMail, Dec 2009 (5)

59%

MarketingSherpa, Dec 2009 (2) (6)

57%

Reardon Smith, Jun 2009

56%

Forrester Research, 2009

53%

Datran, Jan 2009 (5)

44%

Association of National Advertisers and 'mktg', May 2009 (1) (7)

41%

Note: (1) includes word-of-mouth spending; (2) in 2010; (3) among smallbusinesses; (4) among B2B companies; (5) worldwide; (6) average of sevenindustries; (7) when recession endsSource: various, as noted, 2009

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10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 3

1. Don’t Think Social Media, Think Social Marketing

Advertising: A Tiny Slice of the Social Marketing PieeMarketer estimates that US advertisers will spend $1.3 billion onsocial network advertising in 2010, up 7% from $1.2 billion in 2009.By 2011, social network advertising will rise to nearly $1.4 billion.While these may seem like large numbers, they still represent lessthan 6% of the total US online advertising market.

Why are marketers reluctant to spend more ad dollars on socialsites? The reasons are many but tend to fall into two camps:

� Marketers are concerned about their ads appearing adjacent tocontent that is not appropriate for their brands.

� Research data strongly suggests that consumers tend to ignore advertisements, particularly standard banner ads, inthese environments.

When companies budget for 2010 and beyond, a substantialportion of investment should go not to paid advertising but tocreating and maintaining their social media presence. Paidadvertising’s role should be to drive traffic and engagement withthe larger social media presence.

2. Know Your Objectives First—Then Develop Your Social Strategy

Since social media marketing has the potential to

affect so many areas of an organization, the

enormity of this opportunity leads many

marketers to chase after every technique, tactic

and metric that passes them by.

Social media marketing works best, though, when it is tied to aselect number of key objectives that support the overall business.Identifying a few metrics that directly relate to a single businessobjective is far more effective than trying to keep track of dozensof data sets just because the tools are available.

The Top Two Social Media Marketing ObjectivesBroadly speaking, the most important objectives relate to creating deeper relationships with customers and branding.According to a 2009 white paper from Russell Herder and EthosBusiness Law, where 438 senior-level executives were asked to list the values of social media, the top two were to enhancerelationships with customers/clients (81%) and to build theircompany’s brand (also 81%).

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Similarly, in a December 2008 MarketingSherpa survey of socialmedia marketing professionals, respondents said social mediamarketing was either very or somewhat effective at:

� “Influencing brand reputation” (92%)

� “Increasing brand awareness” (91%)

Finally, according to a September 2009 study by Econsultancy andbigmouthmedia, the top-ranked “major benefits” for social mediamarketing among companies worldwide were:

� “More brand awareness” (73%)

� “Increased customer engagement” (71%)

Whatever objectives or goals companies set for their social mediaefforts should be tied as closely as possible to ROI measurements.

Value of Social Media According to US Executives,July 2009 (% of respondents)

Enhance relationships with customers/clients 81%

Build our company's brand 81%

Be a viable recruitment tool 69%

Be a customer service tool 64%

Enhance employee morale 46%

Note: n=438 management, marketing and human resources executivesSource: Russell Herder and Ethos Business Law, "Social Media: Embracingthe Opportunities, Averting the Risks," August 6, 2009

106327 www.eMarketer.com

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 4

3. Recognize the Secret Ingredient:Trust

If the primary benefits of using social media are to

enhance a brand and form a deeper relationship

with customers, the secret ingredient that allows

marketers to realize these benefits is trust.

The perception of trust is a vital component of most brands today.If consumers have high levels of trust in a given brand, that signalsa strong relationship; low trust levels warn of a poor ordeteriorating relationship.

Marketers see social forums and communities as a means toengender trust with consumers and to allow them to share thattrust with others. Businesses have realized that consumers trustother consumers—particularly their friends, family members andcolleagues—more than they do any other form of media ormarketing. It is one thing if a laundry detergent brand claims in itsadvertising that it gets clothes whiter. It is quite another thing if realconsumers tell their friends and family about the brand’s benefits.

“Conversations about brands, products andservices are increasingly woven into theinteractions of social networks as a meansto connect with others, and theseconversations have great influence eventhough people aren’t consciously askingabout brand opinions.” —Shiv Singh, vice presidentand global social media lead, Razorfish, in Razorfish’s“Fluent” report on social media, July 2009

Consumer Trust: Insights from Research StudiesWhen making purchases, consumers rely more heavily on theadvice and opinions of fellow consumers than they do any otherform of media, including ads and editorial content.

In 2009, Nielsen Online conducted a global study among 26,000consumers in 50 countries. The study asked consumers to ratetheir trust in various media formats. Notably, fewer than 42% ofrespondents deemed mobile ads, banners or even online searchresults trustworthy. Instead, “recommendations from peopleknown” trumped every other form of media by a huge margin,with 90% of consumers placing their trust in these interactions.

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Many other surveys and studies validate the Nielsen data above.For example, respondents to a Lightspeed Research survey ratedfamily members, close friends and even social network contactsmore trustworthy than blog authors, store employees or acompany CEO.

And Internet users surveyed by Leo J. Shapiro & Associates werefar more likely to say their purchase decisions were influenced byfriends and family, or by consumer online reviews, than bynewspaper, TV or radio ads.

Clearly, marketers see an opportunity to leverage this peer-to-peertrust factor by participating in and influencing social conversationstaking place on the Web. But the way in which they do that iscritical. The first step toward earning trust with consumers, as inany relationship, is to listen.

Advertising Tactics/Media Trusted* by Internet UsersWorldwide, April 2009 (% of respondents)

Recommendations from people known 90%

Consumer opinions posted online 70%

Brand Websites 70%

Editorial content (e.g., newspaper article) 69%

Brand sponsorships 64%

TV 62%

Newspapers 61%

Magazines 59%

Billboards/outdoor advertising 55%

Radio 55%

E-mails signed up for 54%

Ads before movies 52%

Search engine results ads 41%

Online video ads 37%

Online banner ads 33%

Text ads on mobile phones 24%

Note: *participants responded that they trusted each tactic "completely"or "somewhat"Source: Nielsen Online, "Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey" as citedin company blog, July 7, 2009

105383 www.eMarketer.com

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 5

4. Listening Comes First

“Listening” in social media is a core competency

that marketers must master.

Companies of all kinds, including, Dell, Starbucks, JetBlue andComcast, are attracted to online social communities because theycan help marketers get closer to their customers, tap into atreasure trove of consumer insights, quickly discover changingattitudes and perceptions and potentially leverage a halo of trustthrough the opinions and conversations of others.

But in order to realize these benefits, marketers must first listen.Moreover, they need to practice active listening—systematicallymonitoring what is being said, spending sufficient quality time insocial communities to absorb and understand consumer sentiment,and, finally, applying what they’ve learned from the experience.

“Social networks are a constantly changingdatabase of consumer sentiment, attitudesand information, and marketers today haveonly the earliest glimpse of the potential.” —Debra Aho Williamson, senior analyst, eMarketer, in theeMarketer report, “Marketing on Social Networks:Branding, Buying and Beyond,”August 2009

New and Better Listening ToolsListening is hardly a new concept in marketing. It’s just that thetraditional listening channels of the past—conducting focusgroups, observing shopping behavior in malls and offering toll-freehelp lines—are woefully inadequate compared with the toolsmarketers now have at their disposal. Today, marketers canmonitor and track what vast numbers of consumers are saying inblog posts, tweets, Facebook comments and in other socialcommunities and forums.

With these online social platforms, marketers can now effectivelylisten on a massive scale, at very little cost.

“Marketing used to be a linear process, witha discussion flowing from the CMO to thetarget audience. In today’s digital age,communication has evolved into a newmodel that requires active listening andengaging in numerous conversations.”—Pete Krainik, former marketing chief at Avaya and CMOat DoubleClick, in MediaPost, November 2009

Of course, there are different levels of listening. At this point, mostmarketers are already at or past the stage of setting up Facebookand Twitter accounts, and have begun regularly observing whatpeople are saying there. Other, more advanced marketers aredeploying sophisticated monitoring systems that track—in realtime—what targeted groups of consumers are saying. They then usethat information to serve up relevant messages to their audience.

Turning Listening into a Measurement ToolMarketers who choose to listen on a consistent, ongoing basis cantap into a powerful form of marketing measurement. Marketerscan use regular listening to:

� Find problems or defects with a product that may need to be fixed

� Discover that the customer service process is broken in aparticular region

� Learn that consumers have a misperception about a product or company and—even worse—are telling everyone about it on Twitter

� Gain a better understanding of how consumers perceive orexperience a product or service

� Learn about the language consumers use to describe a productor those of competitors, and then use those insights in offlineand online advertising messages

� Get a faster read on how consumers feel about a company’sadvertising campaigns and be prepared to change them on the fly

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 6

4. Listening Comes First

How are major brands using listening as a socialmedia tactic?

Dell. “By listening carefully, we have been able to harness socialmedia as an early alert system. For example, if customers arehaving issues with a new product and we need to develop newdrivers, then we can get this information early through the Web.This enables us to react quicker, and means we often get thisinformation six weeks earlier than we would have otherwise.”—Richard Binhammer, corporate group communicationsexecutive, Dell, in an interview with Econsultancy, December 2009

Hewlett-Packard. “I view listening as an important analytic.Listening and other analytics can drive your strategy at a macrolevel. Consumers either reinforce your strategy or correct it andgive you opportunities for ideas, products and services and/orsegments or geographies that you’re not even in.” —Michael Mendenhall, CMO, Hewlett-Packard, in an interviewwith eMarketer, May 2009

Most marketers, however, have not paid attention to this listeningadvice. Even though a majority of marketers are participating insocial media marketing, only 16% of those surveyed by the CMOCouncil in 2009 said they regularly monitored social forums.

Worse, marketers who ignore conversations that transpire in socialmedia are destined to become out of touch, not only withconsumers, but also with the essence of their own brand. Why? Intoday’s digital age, consumers have a far more powerful voice indefining and shaping a brand than ever before. Whatever realitymarketers picture for a brand’s image, it is trumped a thousand timesover by the perceptions, experiences and expressions of consumers.

“Social networks have allowed Clinique to gain global consumer insights. Polling,discussion boards, comments, pictures and videos have provided Clinique exposure to a wide range of qualitativeconsumer sentiments.” —Emily Culp, executivedirector of digital/consumer marketing & alternativemedia, Clinique, in an interview with eMarketer, July 2009

Applying Social Listening to Advertising CampaignsMarketers can also use listening to help create ad campaigns.According to a November 2009 article in The Wall Street Journal,casino operator Harrah’s Entertainment scanned reviews andcomments on Twitter, Facebook and other social sites to betterunderstand which features were most appealing to consumers.Based on this learning, Harrah’s changed the messages in itsonline ads, resulting in a double-digit increase in online bookings.The company also revamped its traditional ad campaigns to reflectthe insights gleaned from tracking social forums.

“Being relevant to consumers is the way tocommunicate about your brands.” —Monica Sullivan, vice president of advertising, Harrah’sEntertainment, in The Wall Street Journal, November 2009

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 7

5. Don’t Just Barge into aConversation: Add Value

Listening is essential, but an even greater

opportunity awaits those marketers who choose

to go to the next step: fostering and responding to

consumer conversations.

“We’re getting to a point where if you’re notresponding, you’re not seen as an authentictype of brand.” —Adam Brown, director of the Officeof Digital Communications and Social Media, Coca-Cola, inan article in The Wall Street Journal, August 3, 2009

Participation, however, requires caution—and likely a newmindset with regard to consumer messaging. Marketers shouldnot assume they can simply “join” a conversation consumers arealready having. Instead, they must create their own connections,be prepared to respond when they are mentioned directly andearn the right to participate in existing communities when theyhave something of value to offer.

Emulate How Consumers Interact with Each OtherRemember grandma’s advice, “If you can’t say something nice,don’t say anything at all”? The corollary for social conversations isthis: “If you can’t add genuine value to the conversation, thendon’t say anything at all.”

Companies wanting to engage consumers on social networksshould strive to emulate and take cues from how consumers areinteracting with their friends on these sites. Consumers aremotivated to participate on social platforms by the constantstream of status updates, photos, links and other forms ofinformation that their friends post.

A company that markets camera equipment, for instance, shouldnot barge into a blog where people are discussing photographytechniques and shove promotional messages under their noseswhile pretending to be just another consumer. It would be farbetter to provide some helpful (i.e., non-product-specific) advicefor taking pictures, making sure it is clear that whoever isresponding indicates they are a representative of the brand.

There are many ways to add value to digital forums:

� Address problems that consumers bring up related to a productor category.

� Respond to customer needs, either individually or to the group.

� Provide factual information and links to correct a misperceptionor dispel a rumor.

� Offer widgets, apps or other consumer applications that serve aspecific customer need or want.

“[At Clinique, we] develop engaging content specifically designed for the social media space—we do not repurposeassets and simply post them to Facebook or YouTube. This includes ensuring thatcontent is refreshed and time-sensitive, so there is always a sense of newness forthe consumer.” —Emily Culp, executive director ofdigital/consumer marketing & alternative media, Clinique,in an interview with eMarketer, July 2009

To keep up with the stream of conversations and do an effectivejob of responding, most companies will need more than oneindividual assigned the task.

Get the Company Involved: It Takes a VillageBecause social marketing has the potential to affect almost everyaspect of an organization, a single employee, or even a team ofsocial experts, will likely not be able to keep up with the dialoguetaking place on social communities all over the Web. In order toscale social engagement and realize the benefits on anenterprisewide basis, companies will need to establish direct linesof communication between consumer groups and variousappointed stakeholders throughout the organization, representingmost or all departments.

Savvy companies today are empowering select staff members tobe the voice, and sometimes face, of the company, encouragingthem to express their personalities on social platforms whileadhering to common-sense guidelines that reflect the brand,company or product.

In their white paper “EngagementDB: Ranking the Top 100 Global Brands,” consultancy Altimeter Group and Wetpaint argued that “engagement cannot remain the sole province of afew social media experts, but instead must be embraced by theentire organization.”

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 8

5. Don’t Just Barge into a Conversation: Add Value

This is the case at Starbucks, where nearly every department hasdeputized a representative charged with acting as a liaisonbetween the consumers conversing on social platforms and thedepartment. There are about 50 such representatives worldwide,and they are uniquely equipped with the knowledge and authorityto engage with consumers.

H&R Block provides another example of empowering employeesto directly engage with consumers via social media. According toa January 2010 article in Advertising Age, when the retail taxpreparer decided to go after Intuit’s TurboTax product with asimilar do-it-yourself online tax preparation software package,H&R leveraged its vast army of tax experts working across thecountry. From among its 100,000 employees, H&R selected a1,000-member tax team, who were then trained to be “socialmedia-qualified” to listen, respond, answer questions and provideadvice to consumers on social platforms and forums.

6. Be Authentic, Transparent andHumble

Marketers have spent decades carefully crafting

press releases, television commercials, magazine

ads and other advertising messages in order to

paint their brands in the best possible light.

The problem is, consumers today can sense insincerity. They havetoo much information at their disposal (think Google) and toomany ways to share their feelings with countless others (thinkTwitter) to simply take a company’s word for it and shut up. So, asformer Procter & Gamble CEO A.G. Lafley advised a few years ago,marketers need to “Let go!”

Part of letting go means adjusting the corporate voice. In the socialmedia space, consumers want to hear from real people, notdisembodied corporate entities pushing an obvious sales agenda.

“If you try to mitigate every piece of risk, youwill be either inauthentic or fail.” —Altimeter Group and Wetpaint, in their white paper“EngagementDB: Ranking the Top 100 Global Brands,” July 2009

Establish Clear Rules of EngagementHowever, before marketers invite everyone in their company to“have at it” with Twitter and Facebook communities, it is best tocreate and distribute a set of organizational guidelines directingemployees on how to engage with consumers via socialplatforms. Companies must:

� Skip the “marketing speak” and talk in a conversational, naturaltone—like a real person

� Put forth real people and real voices, not an amorphouscorporate front

� Speak in the first person singular, rather than the formal “we”

� Be willing to accept and acknowledge the negative commentsas well as the positive

� Be the first to acknowledge a mistake—and own up to it

� Provide full disclosure as to who they are, what they representand what stake they might have in a given topic

� Respond quickly if there’s a crisis (ideally within 24 hours, or sooner)

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 9

6. Be Authentic, Transparent and Humble

Some companies, such as IBM and Intel, take this a step furtherand have instituted formal guidelines for listening and respondingto consumers on social platforms:

� IBM Social Computing Guidelines

� Intel Social Media Guidelines

What have you learned about effectively drivingresponse and engagement in social networks?

Aquafina. “Authentic brands are the most successful. Brands thatengage in open, honest dialogue, as well as those that areaccepting feedback and criticism from the public, are more likelyto be welcomed.”—Stacy Taffett, brand manager, Aquafina, in an interview witheMarketer, July 2009

US Army. “We found that personal input and responses from theArmy are looked upon more favorably than input that seems like itis written like a typical news release or Army news article.” —Lt. Col. Kevin Arata, chief of social media, US Army, in aninterview with eMarketer, July 2009

Carnival Cruise Lines. “In order to drive response andengagement, brands need a ‘face,’ that is, a representative of thecompany who actively participates on the social networks. Peoplelook for and expect us to reply to questions and provide feedback.” —Stephanie Leavitt, social media strategist-interactive marketing,Carnival Cruise Lines, in an interview with eMarketer, July 2009

Learn more in the August 2009 eMarketer report“Marketing on Social Networks: Branding, Buying and Beyond.”

7. Recruit from Your Core: The BrandEnthusiasts Who Already Love You

Any product, brand or company with a large

following of loyalists—consumers who want

to share the good news with others—has a

ripe opportunity to exploit the viral power of

social networks.

Digital communities allow marketers to both find these covetedconsumers (through listening) and empower them to share abrand story with many others.

“[Coke] has nearly 3.8 million fans onFacebook [who come there] to show theirloyalty and affinity for our brand. Ourapproach is to be a strong member of thecommunity that’s enabling consumers tocelebrate manifestations of the brand.” —Michael Donnelly, group director, worldwide interactivemarketing, Coca-Cola Co., in an interview with eMarketer,November 2009

By treating fans well, marketers will encourage them to spread thegood word to more people, and with greater enthusiasm.

Reward Your FansMarketers should also find ways to reward their loyal fans. H&M,the apparel retailer known for its edgy fashion looks, has used itsFacebook fan page, which attracts more than 1 million fansworldwide, to promote giveaway offers for the first 200 peoplewho come to a sale event. After the sale, H&M uploads photos andvideos from the event, inviting fans to add their own comments.

And Coca-Cola leveraged the 13.5 million members of its My CokeRewards loyalty group to create a private social community thatoffers members a first look at new program features and invitesfeedback in the form of discussion boards, activities andinterviews. In one promotion, the company invited its communitymembers to design a can for Coke Classic. Other members votedfor the winners and special prizes were awarded for the bestdesigns. Many fans shared their designs on Facebook and othersocial sites.

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 10

7. Recruit from Your Core: The Brand Enthusiasts Who AlreadyLove You

Let Your Fans Speak for YouBrand advocates can also help companies by coming to their rescuewhen trouble is brewing. If a brand is being trashed—fairly or unfairly—on social forums, for example, brand enthusiasts may step in to defendagainst detractors or “set the record straight” when misinformation isleaking out. This can be a very powerful counterforce, since theopinions of consumers are trusted more than a marketer’s. Consumersexpect businesses to defend themselves, but they are far more likely tobelieve customers.

Sometimes it is best for marketers to “bite their tongue” beforereacting to a negative comment, to give brand advocates a chanceto set the record straight.

Enlist Your Fans as Customer ServiceRepresentativesMany companies are finding that their customers can be bettercustomer service agents than the people who work in their callcenters. Why? Because the best customers are heavy users of aproduct or service, and they are therefore in a better position toinstruct others how to use it. They also likely have an emotionalconnection to the product or service that no call center agentcould ever match.

How do you put brand advocates to work for you?

Hewlett-Packard. “We wanted to help our customers solve theirservice issues more quickly, so we created the ability for people tohelp each other solve problems. We’ve had success in the metricsrelevant to solving customers’ problems—we’re enabling them tohelp themselves through this kind of online peer-to-peerexperience. That’s a different kind of brand effectiveness metric.”—Michael Mendenhall, senior vice president and chief marketingofficer, Hewlett-Packard, in an interview with eMarketer, May 2009

Intuit. Intuit already had a customer service operation to assistcustomers who were using TurboTax, a software program thatallows consumers to complete their own tax return. But thecompany wanted to see if their customers could do a better job.So Intuit created a customer service wiki that allowed users of thesoftware to answer questions and provide tips to other, lessexperienced customers. The results were compelling: 40% ofTurboTax users’ questions were answered by other customers,and at a higher rate of accuracy than the traditional call center.—As described in BusinessWeek, July 2009

8. Target the Coveted Influentials

Some consumers have more clout than others.

These so-called influentials, representing about

10% of the population, according to Keller Fay

Group, have an undue influence on others

because of their extensive digital networks and

perceived expertise in particular areas. Keller Fay

believes that influentials are 130% more likely

than others to talk about brands on any given day.

These influentials can move hundreds, thousands or even hundredsof thousands of consumers—to think, feel or even act differently.Importantly, influence is less about the quantity of any individual’sconnections and more about the quality and duration of thoseinteractions, as well as the degree to which the influencer is trusted.

Case Study: HP’s 31 Days of the Dragon

After seeing flat sales of its premium laptop product,nicknamed the Dragon, through traditionalmarketing channels, Hewlett-Packard tried a newapproach using influential bloggers.

The company launched a contest in which 31 techbloggers were assigned the task of giving away a freeHP Dragon (HP HDX Pavilion) laptop to one luckyreader every day for 31 days. Importantly, HP left it upto the individual bloggers, each of whom wascarefully selected based on their influence with likelyprospects, to devise their own promotional ideas andcontest rules. The bloggers came up with creativecontests that engaged consumers and encouragedthem to share the promotion with others virally.

At the end of the program, HP saw remarkable results:

� More than 380,000 links to the 31 blog sitesdiscussing the contest

� 25,000 contest entries

� An 85% increase in sales for the Dragon product

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 11

9. Adopt a Long-Term/Real-TimeApproach

Social media is about relationships, and

relationships of any kind need to be nurtured

(and measured) over time. Relationships are

also enhanced by connections that take place in

real time.

Long-Term FocusAs blogger and social media expert Joe Jaffe has frequently said,“[Social media] marketing is not campaign; it’s a commitment.”

Ford Motor Co. takes the long-term perspective with its socialmedia efforts. The car company uses social monitoring services tomeasure itself versus its direct competitors based on a number ofconsumer perception indexes, including product quality,environmental standing and technology. These measurements areconducted over a long period of time, so Ford can benchmark itsprogress, uncover shifting trends in consumer sentiment and bealerted to future potholes that may be coming its way.

“There’s a difference between monitoring[social media buzz] and measurement.Monitoring is the real-time, day-to-day stuffthat gets tracked that we need to be awareof and respond to and take into account aswe continue our communications efforts.Measurement is more the longer-term,trending-type studies.” —Scott Monty, globaldigital and multimedia communications manager, FordMotor Co., in an interview with eMarketer, March 2009

Soft drink- and snack-maker PepsiCo is also committed tomeasuring social media as an ongoing effort. In an interview witheMarketer, Rudy Wilson, director of marketing for Doritos, said,“The one thing people need to remember when it comes to socialmedia and consumer engagement is it can’t be a one-time hit.…The whole purpose of getting involved is you’re trying to build arelationship with the consumer. Building a relationship with aconsumer is like building a relationship with anybody.”

Mr. Wilson argues that this long-term approach to nurturingrelationships online had led to improved sales.

Marketers must be sure to track measurements consistently and over a sufficient period of time to observe subtle, slow-moving trends.

“We are really looking to focus the companyaround the consumer and build long-termaffinity, which includes awareness, loyaltyand ultimately, sales.” —Megan O’Connor, seniormanager of digital marketing, Levi’s, in an interview witheMarketer, July 2009

Real-Time ApproachNot only do marketers need to be in social marketing for the longhaul, they also need to be in it 24/7. Consumers are discussingproducts, brands and companies at all hours of the day, sevendays a week. Marketers need to avail themselves of the tools totrack these conversations in real time, so they can respondappropriately, before it’s too late. As Lt. Col. Kevin Arata, chief ofsocial media at the US Army, put it in an interview with eMarketer,“We know we have to be present on social media sites because inour absence, others will speak for us.”

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 12

10. Integrate Social Media withOther Online and OfflineCommunications

“The essence of social media is that itconnects—people with people, but alsopeople with content and brands. Similarly,social media done right is not execution in asilo. Social media improves brands’ ownedmedia value by generating site traffic andstimulating conversation.” —Taddy Hall, COO,Meteor Solutions, in an iMedia Connection article,December 2009

Like any other form of marketing, social media should not bedeployed or measured in a vacuum. Social media representsanother stream of touchpoints for the marketer, but they are mostvaluable when integrated with other consumer activities, fromsearch and e-mail to watching videos and reading news online.

According to the McKinsey Quarterly’s 2009 global survey, amongthe companies reporting measurable benefits from their socialmedia marketing efforts, 74% said it is important to integrate thetools with other forms of customer interaction.

One simple way to integrate social media within a broadermarketing effort is to use it as an inexpensive “sounding board” formeasuring the impact of offline campaigns and other initiatives.Doug Weaver, founder and CEO of the Upstream Group, sayssocial media can be like a Richter scale for marketers wanting togauge the impact of their entire marketing efforts.

“For perhaps the first time ever, marketers can put a campaign ora message out into the public consciousness and then really hearand see its impact,” wrote Mr. Weaver in his May 2009 newsletter.“A brand can throw rocks into the pond and then measure boththe quantity and quality of the ripples that follow. By all means,pour your time, money and resources into this channel to reallyunderstand the full ROI of all your marketing activity.”

In an interview for eMarketer’s special report, “Online BrandMeasurement: Connecting the Dots,” Pete Blackshaw,executive vice president of digital strategic services at The NielsenCo., reinforced this strategic approach:

“On one side, you’ve got paid media and on the other you’ve gotearned media. Put consumer-generated media, social media anda lot of indirect marketing on the earned side, and paid media—offline and online—on the unearned side. The two kinds [can]synergize [with] one another because paid advertising canstimulate the conversation. What we need is a measurementmodel that really can look at the two—both in distinct buckets, butalso as an ecosystem where one is feeding the other. Brand equityis heavily impacted by the way in which the two interact.”

Search and Social: A Classic CombinationOf course, social media can also be integrated with search. Socialnetwork conversations about brands, including messages or adsposted by marketers on social sites, can lead directly to search activityfor a particular product or brand. Conversely, consumers who aresearching for products or services online will increasingly be exposedto links emanating from social sites. Social and search represent anear-perfect virtuous cycle, with each reinforcing the other.

Research studies prove that display ad exposure can lift consumerresponse to paid search. Data from comScore, GroupM and M80indicates searchers are also more likely to keep a brand in mind ifthey have seen a combination of paid search ads and social media.

The research firms found a 19-percentage-point lift in searches onthe campaign brand among users who saw social media relevantto the brand in addition to the campaign’s paid search ads,compared with those who were exposed only to the searchplacements. And there was a further 13-point lift among thoseexposed to social media influenced directly by the brand.

107404

The effect was even more pronounced when it came to searchesfor product terms rather than brand terms. Users were almostthree times as likely to search after seeing influenced social mediaplus paid search, compared with paid search ads alone.

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Consumers exposed to paid search along with influenced socialmedia also had a 50% increase in click-through rate on paidsearch ads. Organic search click-through rates were higher, too.

US Internet Users Who Search on Campaign BrandTerms, by Ad Exposure, 2009 (% of total)

Paid search only 45%

Relevant social media and paid search 64%

Influenced social media and paid search 77%

Note: read chart as saying that 45% of Internet users exposed to paidsearch ad then search on campaign brand termsSource: comScore, GroupM Search and M80, "The Influenced: Social Media,Search and the Interplay of Consideration and Consumption," October 6,2009

107404 www.eMarketer.com

US Internet Users Who Search on Brand ProductTerms, by Ad Exposure, 2009 (% of total)

Paid search only

23%

Relevant social media and paid search

38%

Influenced social media and paid search

65%

Note: read chart as saying that 23% of Internet users exposed to paidsearch ad then search on brand product termsSource: comScore, GroupM Search and M80, "The Influenced: Social Media,Search and the Interplay of Consideration and Consumption," October 6,2009

107406 www.eMarketer.com

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 13

Endnotes

Endnote numbers correspond to the unique

six-digit identifier in the lower left corner

of each chart. The charts from the report are

repeated before their respective endnotes.

110568

110568

Extended Note: Several of these surveys asked if companieswere using social media/social networks but did not specify if itwas for the purpose of marketing.

Citation: Association of National Advertisers (ANA), BtoB Magazineand 'mktg', "Harnessing the Power of Newer Media Platforms forMore Effective Marketing," August 3, 2009; Awareness, "Trends andBest Practices in Adopting Web 2.0 in 2008" conducted by EquationResearch, September 9, 2008; BtoB magazine, "2010 Outlook:Marketing Priorities and Plans Survey Results," November 16, 2009;Equation Research, "2009 Marketing Industry Trends Report,"August 18, 2009; Forrester Research as cited by Women's WearDaily, September 28, 2009; NetPlus Marketing, "Online DataMeasurement Survey Results: Q1 2008," provided to eMarketer,March 17, 2008; PROMO magazine, "2009 Promo InteractiveMarketing Survey" conducted by Penton Research, April 1, 2009,with eMarketer calcualtions; University of MassachusettsDartmouth Center for Marketing Research, "Social Media in the2009 Inc. 500: New Tools & New Trends," November 17, 2009

Comparative Estimates: US Marketers Using SocialMedia, 2008 & 2009 (% of respondents)

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center forMarketing Research*, Nov 2009

Association of National Advertisers and BtoB magazine,Aug 2009

Forrester Research, 2009

Equation Research, Aug 2009

PROMO magazine*, Apr 2009

BtoB magazine**, Nov 2009

Awareness*, Sep 2008

NetPlus Marketing*, Mar 2008

2008

49.0%

-

-

-

-

-

46.0%

38.9%

2009

80.0%

66.0%

64.0%

59.0%

52.1%

54.0%

-

-

Note: *social networks only; **among B2B marketersSource: various, as noted, 2008 & 2009

110568 www.eMarketer.com

10 Best Practices for Success with Social Media 14

More Information and Analysisfrom eMarketer

For related information, see these eMarketer

reports, articles and interviews:

Marketing on Social Networks: Branding, Buying andBeyond

Seven Guidelines for Achieving ROI from Social Media

External Links

EngagementDB: Ranking the Top 100 Global Brands

Fluent: The Razorfish Social Influence Marketing Report

Giving Customer Voice More Volume

ContacteMarketer, Inc. Toll-Free: 800-405-084475 Broad Street Outside the US: 212-763-601032nd floor Fax: 212-763-6020New York, NY 10004 sales@emarketer.com

Report ContributorsSusan Reiter Managing EditorDebra Aho Williamson Senior Analyst/Project DirectorJoanne DiCamillo Production ArtistDana Hill Production ArtistNicole Perrin Senior EditorAllison Smith Director of Charts

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