social media retreat: the decade of connectedness

Day one

• 9.00 - New World Order - Thomas Power • 10.30 - My Brand – Thomas Power• Core Process, Personal and Corporate Branding• 12.00 LUNCH • 13.00 Connectedness – Louis Gray

– Why Social Media exists– Why Social Media is rising– Statistics and Market Analysis.– Headlines.– Tools. – Teaching the key platforms.– Knowing. Listening. Engaging

• 5.30 Teaching day ends• 6.00 Dinner in the Dogwood Room – ground floor

Day Two

• 8.30 – Continental Breakfast

• 9.00 - Listening, Managing, Monitoring - Bob Barker and Jenny Ryan– Alterian Brand Performance, Listening tools, and conversational analytics– Social Media Monitoring tool demonstration– Report and individual report Distribution

• 12.00 - LUNCH

• My Brand Digital – Louis Gray and Thomas Power– Developing your Social Media Strategy for 2010 – Planning where you go from here as both an individual and a brand– Lobbying internal Corporate support for social media– Overcoming hurdles– Dealing with hassle, complaints and support online across multiple platforms

– Being seemingly everywhere at once

• Getting Things Done

• Suggested Next steps

• 17.00 End – but we will be around....

Thomas PowerChairman, Ecademy 1998-2010

http://www.ecademy.com

http://www.ecademy.com/

“Connectedness”: The art & science of being connected

Social Media

JOIN

Join

Join

Ecommerce

sign in

register

create account

Social Media

JOIN

Join

Join

Social Media

Follow

Follow Me

Following

Brands are Media

Find me

Join me

Follow me

“Core Process”What do you and your brand stand for?

“To blog or not to blog…”

“Is Twitter Google?”

2020 Futures

“The winner of the game is theone with all the names”

2020 Futures

Networks become Banks

Paypal BankFacebook Bank

Twitter BankGoogle Bank

Thomas PowerChairman 1998-2010

http://www.ecademy.com

http://www.ecademy.com/

The Connected DecadeFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray

Managing Director, New Media, Paladin Advisors Group

Enabling Us to Connect

• Early adopter tech geek blogger– 2,500+ posts since 2006

– Launched many social services.

– Active social media user, especially FriendFeed, Google Buzz and Google Reader

• Member of advisory boards– SocialToo, ReadBurner,

BuzzGain, Teens In Tech, and YackTrack

• Managing Director, New Mediaat Paladin Advisor Group

• Father to 20 mo. twins

A Little More Background

• UC Berkeley Graduate– Double Major in Mass

Communications and Political Science (1999)

– Worked as Online Editor, Crime Reporter for student newspaper from 1996-98

• 12 Yrs In Silicon Valley– Internet Valley from 1998-99 as

an E-commerce Analyst

– 3Cube from 1999-2001 as the Web Marketing Manager

– BlueArc from 2001-09 as Director of Corporate Marketing

The Connected Decade

THE CHALLENGE• More Data Than Ever• More Sources Than Ever• More Connections Than Ever• At a Faster Pace Than Ever Before

BUT A NEW ERA EMERGES• Real 1-1 Connections With Brands and Customers• Real-Time Discovery and Responses• The Influencer’s Dilemma• Getting to Action Faster than the Competition

More Info Than Ever

“In 2009, more data will be generated by individuals than in the entire history of mankind through 2008.”

– Harvard Business ReviewThe Social Data Revolutionshttp://blogs.hbr.org/now-new-next/2009/05/the-social-data-revolution.html

More Places Than Ever

Really. More Places Than Ever.

More People Than Ever

“According to our research, Twitter is as of December processing more than one billion tweets per month. January passed 1.2 billion, averaging almost 40 million tweets per day.”

-- Royal PingdomTwitter: Now more than 1 billion tweets per monthhttp://royal.pingdom.com/2010/02/10/twitter-now-more-than-1-billion-tweets-per-month/

More People Than Ever

“Today we're celebrating our sixth birthday, and this week there will be 400 million people on Facebook. Just one year ago we served less than half as many people...”

-- Mark Zuckerberg, FacebookSix Years of Making Connectionshttp://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=287542162130

More Connections

“Today the average Twitter account has 300 followers; in July, it had 70.

The average account now follows 173 accounts; in July it was only following 47.

The average account today has posted 420 updates; in July that number was 119.”-- HubSpotThird State of the Twittersphere Report #SOTwitterhttp://www.hubspot.com/blog/bid/5503/HubSpot-Releases-Third-State-of-the-Twittersphere-Report-SOTwitter

Faster and Faster…

Why Social Media ExistsFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray


What Is Social Media Anyway?

• Social Media is a new genre of sites and services that integrate technology, user participation, and user generated content.

• Tools:– Blogs and blog comments– Social networks– Microblogging services– Lifestreaming applications– Content sites (Bookmarking, Photos, Video,

Presentations, etc.)

• Impact:– Social media has grown to play a significant role in Marketing,

PR, Customer Service and Branding for individuals and companies.

– Social media enables unprecedented speed, reach, transparency and familiarity.

Why Has Social Media Evolved?

• Humans Have a Need to Share and Connect– Web 1.0 enabled us to share text updates and simple photos or

videos on flat Web pages and sites.– With improvements in bandwidth around the world and evolving

Web standards, we gained the ability to share more rich media, and consume it more quickly.

– Intelligent algorithms were designed to find connections between people, and display live relevant updates, often featuring user generated content (UGC), the core of Web 2.0.

The Human Web – All of It

• With Sharing Comes Option to Share Everything– Air of comfort and trust leads to social networking users sharing

their intimate thoughts and details online, from births and deaths and weddings to the mundane, including pet updates, meals, and even one’s exact location online, tracked to the minute.

– The social Web enables humans to find similar humans with similar interests flung across the globe. No single interest, no matter the oddity, or rarity, can be neglected online.

– These humans, your customers, are sharing what they like about you and are more than happy also to share what they don’t like, and they want you to know they have a voice.

Situation Analysis

• Traditional Media Outlets Are Being Decimated– Readership for traditional technology media is disappearing, and

publications are struggling to stay in business. Many have ceased to do business altogether, while others have laid off reporters, cut analysts.

• IT Prospects Are Trusting Peers Ahead of Companies– The trust levels of CxOs are at all-time lows, thanks to high visibility of

corporate scandals and economic strife.

– Instead, prospects are turning to colleagues and peers within the industry to learn what products work well in which environments.

• Social Media Outlets Accelerating Visibility, Replacing Traditional– Even as news media falters, blogs, wikis, microupdating services, social

networks and aggregation sites are becoming the place to converse.

Finding Customers and Prospects

Human TouchHuman Touch OutboundOutbound SearchEnginesSearchEngines SocialSocial

Direct SalesDirect Sales

Inside SalesInside Sales

Direct MailDirect Mail Search EngineOptimization

Search EngineOptimization

AdWords &Yahoo! Search

AdWords &Yahoo! Search

AdvertisingAdvertising

Social Networks

Participation

Social Networks

Participation

Social OutletMining

Social OutletMining

But Don’t Make a Buzzword Land Grab

• Companies Are Jumping In Quickly With A Flawed Strategy– The race to start blogs and initiate Twitter accounts is often done

without seeing how the process fits with PR, corporate messaging, customer service activity.

• The Impact Of Not Being Prepared Can Be Seen In…– Blogs and Twitter accounts that have not been updated frequently,

or have been abandoned altogether.– Messaging that runs contrary to or in a collision with the company’s

vision statement.– Poorly designed blogs and other social media posts that don’t live

up to the standard seen elsewhere in the company’s brand.

A New Reality Forces New Rules

• The Old Strategy of PR, Demand Gen and Customer Service– Find a way to entice prospects to come to you, whether to your phone

number, or your Web site, in practically any way you can.

– Act like an authority and deliver your polished message. Take time to make it perfect.

– The idea: the more visitors to the site, or the more phone calls, we get, the more leads we deliver, and the easier it is to measure success.

• The New Strategy of Social PR, Demand Gen and Service– Go to where the customers are, no matter where they are.

– Respond quickly in a familiar way, on message, but as an individual, not as if the response has been vetted or moderated.

– The idea: Become a trusted peer or ally, and you will become part of the conversation, recommended, and eventually, a partner.

New Marketing Formula

• It’s not about spamming (email, TV, radio, newspaper) 1,000,000 to reach 100 anymore.

• It’s about connecting with 10 people who reach 100 who reach 1,000.

The Landscape Is Changing

• 86% of US companies use one of the four major platforms.

• 28% of US companies use all four of the major platforms.

• 72% of the US Fortune Global 100 companies are on Twitter.

• 20 percent of all Tweets mention a brand.

Source: Burson-Marsteller

By Embracing Social Media

• Gain Mindshare– By executing with a

consistent message across all vehicles

– By acting bigger than reality– By updating frequently, with

valuable content– By engaging with partners,

prospects and competition openly in a positive way

• Execute With Best Practices– Become a trusted brand– Speak with personality– Listen and respond quickly– Engage with the community

and participate– Keep a consistent pace– Delivering a dynamic Web

site that Google and other search engines prefer over a static one

Anticipated Benefits

• Brand and Thought Leadership– Be more active in the faster-paced world of social networking. Frequent

updates will show the company is delivering consistent activity and listening to the market.

– The company can be seen as developing thought leadership.

– Executives may gain additional speaking opportunities, or syndicated pieces.

• Web site Traffic– Google favors sites that are updated frequently, and have new content.

More frequent updates would keep the site looking “fresh” to the spiders and keep the company high on related keywords.

– Thought-provoking blog posts and social content will increase links.

• Visibility and Engagement• Revenue and Pipeline

The Rise of Social MediaFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray


Social Media Is Becoming Media

• Ten Years Ago, We Talked About Grasping the Web and eBusiness– There was a massive land grab on the Web for E-commerce and adding E-

stores to traditional sites. Offline brands were struggling to find an online presence and build out a unique Web site.

– Today, practically every business has a Web presence.

• Today, the Unfamiliar and New is Social– Where consumers and early adopter enterprise companies were first to

market in embracing social elements, it is now becoming assumed that your company will be present and active in social media.

– Soon, I hypothesize we won’t talk about this “New Media” anymore. It will simply be what we do in a standard course of business.

NBC: Olympics Tweet Tracker

CNN and Facebook for Inauguration

Yahoo! and Twitter Team Up

Yahoo! and Twitter Team Up

• Updates from Twitter displaying in line with Yahoo! results.

Social Is Being Integrated Into Everything

• Real-time results from the Social Web on Google– More prominence for Twitter updates is given than the official account for

brands themselves.


• Google Social Search– Displays friends profiles and updates that are relevant to the search

just completed– In line with traditional search results


• Google Social Circlehttp://www.google.com/s2/search/social#socialcircle

http://www.google.com/s2/search/social#socialcircle

Social Media Is Becoming Media

• It Is No Longer A Question of Providing Value– Information is power. Real-time information is incredible power.– The middleman of press and analysts has been eroded, and you

can now talk directly to your constituency, without interpretation of your message or paying tens of thousands for the privilege.

• It Is No Longer a Question of Siloed Conversations– Social media is discoverable and it is integrated.– Social media is pervasive.– Social media, even with this pervasiveness, is growing and showing

up in ever more places with no signs of slowing.

Market Insight, Trends & StatisticsFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray


Global Social Networking Growth

• Time Spent Has More than Doubled In 2 Years– More than 300 million – Facebook alone saw

more than 200 million unique visitors in December of 2009.

– Nearly 6 hours per month per user on Facebook in December of 2009.

US Social Networking Growth

• US Social Networking Traffic– “In the U.S., time spent participating in social networks and reading blogs increased 210%

year-over-year and the average time per person grew by 143% year-over-year in December 2009. Media darlings Facebook and Twitter captured the greatest volume of attention and engagement, outpacing the overall growth for the category at 200% and 368% respectively.”

A Global Phenomenon

• Non-US Visitors to Social Networking Sites are Majority– While US visitors are far and away the largest chunk of users, more

visitors reside outside the US, and some countries have more activity per user (See: Australia). The UK also shows 6 hours per individual.

YouTube activity

“People are watching hundreds of millions of videos a day on YouTube and uploading hundreds of thousands of videos daily. In fact, every minute, 20 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube.”

SOURCE: http://www.youtube.com/t/fact_sheet

Twitter Exceeds 50M Updates a Day

Facebook Statistics

• More than 400 million active users

• 50% of active users log on to Facebook in any given day

• More than 35 million users update their status each day

• More than 60 million status updates posted each day

• More than 3 billion photos uploaded to the site each month

• More than 5 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) shared each week

• More than 3.5 million events created each month

• More than 3 million active Pages on Facebook

• More than 1.5 million local businesses have active Pages on Facebook

• More than 20 million people become fans of Pages each day

• Pages have created more than 5.3 billion fans

SOURCE:http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

Facebook Connection Growth

• Average user has 130 friends on the site

• Average user sends 8 friend requests per month

• Average user spends more than 55 minutes per day on Facebook

• Average user clicks the Like button on 9 pieces of content each month

• Average user writes 25 comments on Facebook content each month

• Average user becomes a fan of 4 Pages each month

• Average user is invited to 3 events per month

• Average user is a member of 13 groups

SOURCE:http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

Remember SecondLife?

• In 2009, 481 million hours were spent online by SecondLife users.

DemosFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray


Demo: Twitter

• Home for short updates• Microblogging• Popular with celebrities• Has seen dramatic growth• Many updates contain links• Replies to individuals• Hashtags centralize topics

www.twitter.com

Demo: Facebook

• A central home for people and brands

• News feed provides latest updates from sources you follow

• Fan pages and groups enable discussion of brands and products

• In some areas, drives more traffic than Googlewww.facebook.com

Demo: LinkedIn

• Your online resume• Focused on connections

with business partners• Endorsements of

connections show support• Integrated questions and

answers on the site• Could be leveraged for

demand generation

www.linkedin.com

Demo: Google Reader

• Online news reader• Lets you subscribe to blogs

and other news sources• Never miss a story• Eliminates need for

bookmarks• Lets you share the best of

the Web downstream

www.google.com/reader

Demo: FriendFeed

• A Facebook property• A tool to let you post all

updates from many services in one place

• Follow all friends in one place

• A platform for discussion• Real-time at its core• Deep search capabilities

www.friendfeed.com

Demo: Google Buzz

• Integrated in Gmail• Updates from multiple

sources in one place• Attention to quality around

sharing of links, photos and video

• Very new and the kinks are just now being worked out

• Highlights importance of the Google Profile

buzz.google.com

Demo: Slideshare

• Web presentation archive• Embed in blog posts• Downloadable by

prospects or other interested parties

• Great for discovery• Comments, favorites and

further sharing possiblewww.slideshare.net

Demo: YouTube

• Video archive• Dedicated channels for

brands• Valuable tool for ad

campaigns, messaging, and demonstrations

• Far and away the leader• Supports HD now

www.youtube.com

Knowing, Listening and EngagingFebruary 24th 2010

Louis Gray


Three Parallel, Important, Tracks

• Knowing

– Understand the tools and what they do. Know what Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Ecademy, Flickr, YouTube, Picasa, Google Buzz do, and what you should expect to find.

• Listening– Tools are available that let you watch for your company, your competition,

your products and industry in near real-time, from blog posts, to comments on blogs, to Twitter updates and other social activity.

– You can be alerted in real time, even if you’re not constantly surveying.

• Engaging– Instead of “speaking at” a marketplace, you can speak with the

marketplace, giving prospects, partners, media and competition an equal forum to participate.

How Can You Listen?

• Social Media Monitoring Tools– Like Alterian

• Saved Searcheson All Networks

• Alert services from TweetBeep, BackType, Yahoo!, Google

Signal from Noise

• Noise and signal differ by individual• You can reduce noise by filtering & unfollowing• Constantly review data sources• Follow curated lists from crazy people like me• Find “Best of” lists where applicable• Try new tools aimed to bring relevant value• Optimize for you, not for the crowd

87 © 2010 | Louis Gray | blog.louisgray.com

Listening Improves Your Engagement

• Don’t Forget That You’re An Uninvited Guest in the Social Party– You need to be respectful and aware of the others participating in the

room or community, and should be watching what others are doing, so you can be an equal voice.

– Listening enables you to gain early warning to problems, gain real access to actual and potential clients, and lets you have public conversations, rather than untargeted broadcast messages.

• Not Listening Can Be Sure Death In a Social World– Participants in social media watch how you approach the new medium,

how quickly you respond, how you follow, who you follow, and how you interact. Be truthful and transparent, and you can be invited back again to the next conversation.

– Ignore the nuances, and you are exposed as a pretender.

Social Media Retreat:The Decade of Connectedness

social media retreat: the decade of connectedness

Technology