Marcel's Mindweeds

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Sociale media. Het betekent voor iedereen iets anders ondanks dat men wel snel de meest bekende websites en diensten opnoemt als er naar gevraagd wordt. Zaken zoals Hyves, Facebook, Twitter en anderen worden snel genoemd.

Toch betekent het op een dieper niveau voor elke gebruiker iets anders. De een houdt graag zijn of haar netwerk bij op deze manier, de ander gaat het om snel contact te leggen en voorts in real-life verder te gaan, de ander gebruikt het om oude bekenden op te sporen, en weer anderen zoeken naar opinie over merken, producten, enzovoorts.

Hoe moet je daar als merk nu mee omgaan? Wat ga je eigenlijk meten? wat wil je weten? Welke waarden in online sociale omgevingen zijn van belang en als je deze in kaart heb gebracht, wat doe je er dan mee?

Er zijn naar mijn idee drie ‘hoofdlijnen’ die je kunt onderscheiden op het gebied van merken, meten, weten en sociale media:

1. Relevantie: engagement, loyaliteit, invloed van, waarde van inhoud van communicatie over ‘X’, context, intensiteit
2. Inhoud, content: wie praat er over je, wat wordt er gezegd? hoe staat de communicatie in verhouding tot het ‘merk/product’ of ander lijdend voorwerp.
3. Gewicht, impact: invloed op loyaliteit, welk publiek spreekt het aan, hoe verloopt bijvoorbeeld de conversie, heeft de ‘impact’ ook een aankoop tot gevolg?

Ik ben erg benieuwd naar jullie gedachten omtrent het meetbaar maken en meetbaar inzetten!

On Monday I always take some time to read reviews. Just read a review on what some experts consider to be a better website. I think it is a bit strange to give people the label ‘expert’ that easily, but ok. After seeing some sites that I myself do not find very new or extremely good I saw one that I think is strong because of the simplicity. Visa combines Flickr with ‘responsabillity’ in a nice and simple way.  Click here to see the site.

Sorry, this article is not available in English (yet).

Not so many posts before this one I wrote about the Skittles stunt with the widget and Twitters search page on Skittles.com. They really did surprise the world with their social media approach. It resulted in huge worldwide exposure and it is trend setting in my opinion.

It got me thinking. What is going to happen with authentic ways of marketing with this kind of exposure on the rise? I can imagine that a lot of organisations that are making money of more contemporary wasy of marketing and advertising will have to make a very big transition in order to get with the program in time. Next to these changing environments there will be completely new ways of marketing that will prove to be very competative.

Because of this I started an initiative called Twitvertising whch will be developed over the coming months. It is supposed to assist organisations and people with responsible marketing through social media. It is still in the very early baby step stage. If you feel you can help, or if you have any ideas on the subject, please let me know!

Are statistics behind social media important? We think they are. It is exciting to see several known and less known social media find their way in the internet and we will just have to wait and see what happens when someone starts shaking the tree.

Nevertheless it is very important to create more insight in social media starting now! How are media used? By which groups? In which markets? Where can we measure succes? Where do people stop? What does it mean for organisations? And so on…

To measure is to know are Kelvin’s famous words and they could not be more true in this case. Without the correct background information organisations and people that use social media will merely be driven by ‘the new’ in new media and not because of the possibillities it offers for their target groups. We will build a solid basis for social media, the backgrounds and effects. With this we hope to provide the different user groups information that can help make the right choices.

A lot of big brands still do not know what to do with social media and how to fit them into their strategy. Organisations are very often enclosed in old school ways of thinking and acting forthcoming from media strategies based on old school media traditions. A shift in mindet has to be made when it comes to media and social media specifically.

Below you will find some points of attention of which I think that they should play a role creating a ‘new school’ approach.

• Organisations tend to operate very regional and local. When content is produced and shared by consumers it is mostly doen so without a ‘localized’ intent. The consumer will share with everyone, around the globe and whenever her or she feels like it.
• Control works restrictive. The more an organisations limits the use of social media the less effect it can expect. The consumer and content producer is in charge!
• Go, go, go! Do not ponder to long, start experimenting intenally. Your employees use social media as well (at least, most of them do) and they often render contribution without even knowing. They know what will and what will not work.
• Sociale media are very personal and not everyone will like or understand it instantaneously. Promote, support, explain, anchor it and keep it ‘fun’.
• Accept time. It takes time to become involved, to build a community, to get into interaction with and involve communities.
• Make the communication and interaction measurable.
• It will not work if there is no reason for the consumer to get involved. Results will be different from a standard advertising campaign. This makes it difficult. How to keep the audience engaged?

There must be dozens more that influence a solid social media strategy. Such a strategy is becoming more and more important, the consumer is demanding. They work with those media sooner than organisations would like to or even could. Learn from the consumers!

Questions or remarks? I would love to hear them.