Convince and Convert Blog: Where Social Media and Email Collide

As discussed recently in “Why Are We So Scared of Our Customers?” and “Presto, How Social Media Makes Bad News Good” I’m seeing the fear of negativity preventing more companies from embracing social media. 

The typical social media objection is that if the company has a conversation with consumers in a public forum, the company will be forced to respond to inadequacies, and doing so will just make it worse. Consequently, many large brands are now engaged in social media “listening” campaigns, but not engaging with consumers directly. 

Sometimes Letting Go Allows You to Steer

Of course, listening is better than ignoring, but actually getting involved with your customers online doesn’t give you less control, it gives you MORE control. If you give customers a legitimate, easy-to-use mechanism for interacting with you and amongst themselves, a large component of the feedback about you is likely to end up within that mechanism. And then you can do something about it. 

Consider Comcast. What is a better circumstance for the company, listening but not engaging while customers post videos like this (which you’ve probably seen since the original has been viewed 1.35 million+ times on YouTube), or engaging and actually encouraging customer feedback and complaint via Twitter (@comcastcares)? (read bottom up for killer customer service on Twitter from Frank Eliason at Comcast)

Control Via Facilitation

Dell has a Project RED application on Facebook. Within the forums, there are several consumer complaints about Project RED and how much it actually helps Africa, versus being a craven marketing ploy. While Dell itself doesn’t appear to be engaging in the dialog, it is facilitating the conversation (with other consumers defending Dell vociferously).

And because all of this is happening on an official Dell production, they have MORE control over it than if it was happening on a blog or some other Facebook page. They could comment officially. They could take down the forums. They could reach out privately to negative commenters. 

If this conversation was taking place on some other blog, Dell’s options would be greatly curtailed.

Creating a mechanism for customer feedback using social media is the post-modern equivalent of the suggestion box. Brands that don’t do it because they don’t want to loose control don’t understand that facilitation provides control, it doesn’t eliminate it. 

What do you think? Do you have examples of brands facilitating customer dialog using social media? Your comments are my food.

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Thanks to Jason Falls for the inspiration (okay, it’s a straight rip-off) for this post. Jason pointed out five lesser-known bloggers that he reads regularly (including Convince & Convert). His post seems to have triggered an a-ha moment, as several other excellent social media bloggers including Mack Collier and Amber Naslund have posted similar lists of people to read. 

This is truly the genius of the World Wide Web. A hyper-linked community that enables users to find interesting and useful content based on the recommendations of real people, enabled (but not driven by) technology. 

Here’s my Fab Five bloggers. People I read that may be less well-known by Convince & Convert readers. Also, because I work in email marketing and digital marketing in addition to social media, my list is not purely social media focused, as are those cited above. 

Tamara Gielen

Tamara’s blog BeRelevant is dedicated to B2B email marketing best practices. Tamara doesn’t post a ton of her own content, but her ability to cull down the huge output of blog content about the email industry, and include only what’s legitimate and groundbreaking on her own site is a godsend. 

Tamara is also the founder of the Email Marketers Club, a social network for professional emailers with more than 1,700 members. By day, Tamara is the Director of Email and Digital Dialogue for OgilvyOne. She lives in Belgium, and can be found on Twitter @tamaragielen 

Bryan Eisenberg

One of the few folks out there who have been in digital marketing as long as me, Eisenberg is a conference staple (especially search conferences). His insights into customer experience, usability, information architecture, and conversion rate optimization are simply unparalleled. If you need to get more results from your Web site, he’s a guy to follow.

His blog Grokdotcom is more of a company-wide production now, but still brimming with insights. Watch for his regular series of books too. His new one, “Call to Action” is outstanding, and “Waiting for Your Cat to Bark” is required reading for all Web designers, project managers, and information architects I hire. 

He’s on Twitter @theGrok

Dan Zarrella

A great blogger with no shortage of opinions about social media, search, and cross-linking. Not afraid to rock the boat, Dan Zarrella brings serious science to the discussion of social media and viral marketing. He believes that “going viral” is no accident, and I believe he’s the number one guy to watch in terms of the emerging confluence between blogging, other forms of social media, and SEO.

He’s got some very useful tools for maximizing the search and viral friendliness of your blog. Check them out in his Tools section. 

Dan is on Twitter @danzarrella

Michael Gass

I do a lot of work for ad agencies and PR firms, and Michael Gass’ blog Fuel Lines is redefining how agencies think about business development. A great example of a blogger picking a distinct topic and absolutely owning it, Michael eats his own dog food (and the food of other dogs as well). You see, his consulting business is based on helping agencies use smart blogging, SEO, and social media to generate inbound leads - rather than shooting in the dark making cold calls.

In addition to regular, insightful posts about the future of ad agencies, Michael has added a ton of value to his blog with a sweeping survey of the agency biz dev landscape, and a “best agency blog” competition.

Michael has been a huge help and a great friend to Convince & Convert. If you’re at an agency (and even if you’re not), read his stuff. He’s on Twitter @michaelgass

Jason Falls

Yeah, he put me in his five. But, I would have had him in here regardless. With the tsunami of blog posts, opinions, pass-alongs, retweets, and me-toos out there, Jason Falls maintains an exceptionally high quality level. If he says something on his blog - Social Media Explorer, it’s worth reading. If he sends a tweet, the link is worth clicking.

Unlike many (most?) social media consultants, Jason is actually a practitioner of the art. His work for Jim Beam via his agency Doe Anderson is one of the legendary examples of social media press releases and integrated microsites. His blog isn’t about what social media will become, it’s about what social media is now, and how to do it right. 

Jason is a straight shooter that’s not caught up in his own emerging Web fame, and among the top tier of social media and PR 2.0 “names” I find him to be the most dedicated to sharing and extremely giving with his time. He was an early champion of Convince & Convert, and I’ll never forget that. (Chris Brogan is another one that’s amazingly cool to lesser known folks, despite his insane schedule and content generation volume). 

Jason is a must-follow on Twitter @jasonfalls

Who Are Your Fab Five? Leave Them in the Comments, Or Write Your Own Post

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Will the Crest Weekly Toothpaste Launch Work?

In a sign that the guys who control ad budgets are getting the value of interactive advertising faster than the agencies that place it, P&G announced recently that they are introducing their new Crest Weekly toothpaste almost entirely through the blogosphere.

Samples of Crest Weekly were sent to prominent bloggers (as well as 600,000 Moms) in an effort to trigger an underground viral effect. P&G marketing honchos say that Crest Weekly is an unconventional product. You use it weekly to augment your regular brushing - it has more grit in it to give you that “just back from the dentist, but not numbed or broke” feeling. Thus, it is difficult to explain on TV.

While that makes sense, I suspect the famous data hounds at P&G are also cooking up a little test to see if social media can really carry the water for a launch.

It appears - at least for now - that it cannot, but results are inconclusive.

Ironic Lack of Word of Mouth for Oral Care Product

My search for blog posts, Tweets and other signposts indicating that bloggers indeed used Crest Weekly and wrote about it turned up fairly low volume - although Ariana Huffington’s smile looks a little brighter these days.

I found 10 separate blog posts, on well-targeted sites (beauty, women’s, shopping). I also found just one Tweet (from one of the bloggers promoting her post).

My favorite among them was Tia Williams’ “Crest In Show” post that artfully wove in her background as the daughter of a dentist. Nice!

P&G has not said how many bloggers were given samples, but they did disclose that they began arriving in early August. The product launches in stores next week (mid-September).

The Cavities in the Crest Weekly Launch

There are two fundamental problems with the Crest Weekly approach.

1. They actually sent the product out too early. Blogging is a NOW thing, not a “we’re working on the December issue in August” thing. Sending out samples 6 weeks before the product launches when one use of the product will clearly communicate the benefits to the blogger is too long of a lead time.

It will be very interesting to see if blog posts about Crest Weekly intensify next week when the product launches. I suspect some bloggers are holding their posts until closer to launch. If you find some new ones on Google Blog Search or Technorati, please let me know.

2. The tactic overwhelmed the strategy. The notion that a major consumer goods manufacturer would launch a product via social media is so novel (for now) that the buzz around it became about the marketing approach rather than about the toothpaste. In fact, there are actually more blog posts (including one more once I click Publish) about the social media launch then about Crest Weekly and its magical teeth scouring properties.

Hopefully, P&G won’t interpret this to-date tepid response from the blogosphere as a sign that social media won’t work, and will instead adjust its tactical plan next time around for greater success.

In a related story, Kellogg announced today that the ROI on their digital marketing for Special K cereal (blogs, ads, microsite) is superior to the ROI for traditional advertising. While this isn’t shocking to yours truly - a well-targeted and well-executed digital program will almost always beat traditional in a pure ROI fight - for a company like Kellogg to put that information in print (Ad Week) is a quite the watershed.

Have you launched a product or brand using heavy social media? Did P&G do the Crest Weekly program right, or wrong? Please tell us your story in the comments.

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To celebrate its 10th Anniversary, PR Week has launched a “Best PR Blogs” contest with YOU the agency community as the judge and jury.

PR Week nominated 16 well-known PR blogs, and asked each blogger to nominate another blog for the contest. The result is a 32-blog, March Madness-style blog off.

Each week, blogs are pitted head-to-head and the field is narrowed until a grand champion is crowned.

Voting couldn’t be easier. Just click. That’s it. Technology from buzzdash.com enables it, and prevents you nefarious PR types from voting 2,132 times for your friends.

There are several solid blogs in contention. My personal favorite among them is Todd Defren’s PR Squared - but that may be because I’m more familiar with him via Twitter.

Any predictions for winners? Other blogs that should have been considered?

Vote here now

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