Engaging Consumer Influencers:

Listening, Planning & Engaging

What is Influence?

Social influence occurs when an

individual's thoughts or actions are

affected by other people.

Social influence takes many forms

and can be seen in leadership,

persuasion, sales, and marketing.

Why does influence

matter now, more

than ever?

75% of people don't believe that companies tell the truth in advertisements.(Yankelovich)

What’s the most trustworthy source for purchase ideas?

Word of Mouth

Editorial

Advertising

US 81%

WW 70%

56%

55%

55%

59%

2006 eMarketer

Can brands engage

online influencers?

Strategic Approach to Social Media & Word of Mouth

Conversation Maps Influencer Maps

Blogger & Influencer Engagement Programs

Co-creation Program Design & Management

Live Community Events

Video Content: Viral, Episodic, Channels

Community Design & Management

Social Network Activation

Search Reputation Management

Digital Media Relations

External Blogs Internal Blog Photo Feeds Video Feeds

LISTENING

Where Do We Look?

Start Listening

Monitoring Type

Tools

Free Google Blogs, technorati, IceRocketBlogpulse, Quantcast, etc…

Consolidated Monitoring

Radian 6

Advanced Services

Visible Technologies (enterprise & response)Nielsen Buzzmetrics (outsourced reports)BuzzLogicCymfony (cgm & traditional)UmbriaBrand DimensionsKaavaOthers: Andiamo, Biz360, eWatch, MediaSource

Listening: Message Boards, Blogs, Social Networks, Opinion Sites…

We were sorry to read about your experience and hope to be able to

resolve this issue and regain your confidence in us once again. In order

for us to do so, we’ll need more information from you to access your

account and remedy the situation. Please call Select Comfort directly at

1-800-787-5230 and ask to speak with AJ Stewart.

I will not recommend Sleep Number to anyone again (and I have done so in the

past) and if it comes up in the conversation. I post on Epinions and Craigslist

and intend to mention this in my posts and on my Blog. Instead of using a little

common sense, looking at longtime customer satisfaction, you have lost this

customer for life.

Two days after my diatribe about the Sleep Number bed appeared on this screen,

I was apologized to and told to call a number and ask for a particular person.

When I called I got a nice young lady named Amanda who asked what the

problem was and then the poor dear had to endure my ire while I detailed the

trouble. She listened with patience and asked me to hold on to see what could

be done. About 2-4 minutes later she comes on and says “we’ll be taking that

charge off your Amex”. I rescind my cessation of possible future purchases of

their product. The beds are as good as they advertise.

PLANNING

Characteristics of An Online Influencer

An Influencer is an individual or Web site which

• Engages others in conversation,

• Inspires others to continue the conversation and to expand the circle of

engagement,

• Participates consistently to maintain a timely conversation,

• Is seen as credible by his or her audience to speak about the issue at

hand,

• Compels others to want to hear what he or she will say next, and

• Creates content that is “remarkable”/worth remarking on.

Assessing Influence

• Blogs & Microblogs

– Number of inbound links

– Frequency/timeliness of posts

– Followers & subscribers

– Number and content of comments

– Affiliation of author

– Search engine visibility

– Traffic

– RSS feed subscriptions

• Videos & Photo Communities

– Number of views and downloads

– Number and content of comments

– Ratings/peer assessment

– Relevant groups

– Number of subscribers

– Number of inbound links

• Message Boards & Forums

– Breadth of boards

– Quantity and timeliness of activity

– Search engine visibility

– Affiliation

– Membership numbers

– Traffic

• Social Networks

– Membership numbers

– Types of community features present

(e.g., profiles, blogs, video, message

boards)

– Activity level on features

– Affiliation

– Search engine visibility

Inbound Links

RSS Subscriptions

Site Traffic

Conversation Index

Recency & Frequency

Identity & Affiliation

AMPLIFYING THE QUAKER LIVING PROOF BLOGGER WEEKEND

One weekend. 16 bloggers. Getting smart on Oatmeal! In November 2008, Quaker hosted 16 of

the top health and wellness bloggers to begin a dialogue about heart health and Quaker

products. Attendees were provided WiFi and a registered Twitter hashtag to use with their

coverage. As a result, participants posted a total of 139 times on their blogs, Twitter, Flickr and

YouTube accounts – generating an estimated reach of 6.6 unique monthly visitors (UMVs), more

than 3,000 blog comments, and 705 click-throughs to a product.

To Sum Up...

RSS Dashboard

Grab it: www.theDailyInfluence.com

To Sum Up...

• Trust favours' word of mouth over mainstream media

• Social media (the technology) makes it easier for

WOM to spread farther, faster, and to a wider audience

• When looking to engage consumer influencers online:

1. Listen first

2. Plan by identifying people who are influential

3. Engage

Thank You!