Can 140 letters constitute the most boring conversation ever?

Ok I admit it: I don’t get twitter. Unless you are mega famous who cares what you are doing anyway? And as for business executives using this ‘next best thing’ to communicate with colleagues, even 140 letters can constitute the most boring conversation ever. Is this just another social networking fad that finds it difficult to appeal to anyone other than the chronically idle or have I missed the plot?  Kind of got a kick out of Julia Gillard following me though – yes I started following her first…….funny how something that would get me arrested in the world of atoms is ok in the world of bytes.

Has Qantas damaged Brand Australia?

The idea of grounding an airline in today’s world of interconnectedness sounds like the stuff a Jeffrey Archer or Ken Follett block buster is made of.  If this was a case study you would probably be critical of its authenticity.  But that’s exactly what Alan Joyce (CEO) did with Qantas and the debate now is whether his actions have damaged Brand Australia?

In asking the question I wonder if we aren’t confusing two things here: brand identity and brand image?

The ‘problem’ for Qantas is an identity one – a fight for the soul of the airline.

Either it is a commercial enterprise run along commercial principles or it is a national airline with nationalist tendencies …. including a staff cost irreconcilable to a competitive environment.

Fix the identity problem and the image will be fixable.

Leave the identity issue unresolved and no amount of money or spin will pull a brand out of a death spiral that will end with a hard landing (ok weak pun but you get the point?).

I think Qantas will become a classic case study of how a CEO (with the unqualified support of his Board) can wrestle back the identity of a brand and go on to fix the fall out and crisis in image that Qantas no doubt feels right now.

Although$20m in free flights, and a no nonsense refund of costs associated with the decision to ground the airline, will go a long way to resolving an image problem even of this magnitude.

And as for those customers who swear they will never fly Qantas again?

They will be at the head of the queue for one of those freebies.

Online reputation management – when the message is positive but off strategy

You can imagine the situation – a comment about a brand, while positive, is entirely off strategy. 

Years ago I worked for autotrader.co.za. 

From time to time we would receive ads that – while representing a positive commentary about the brand – were entirely off strategy. 

Private advertisers would try and list their mother-in-law at a real knock down price. 

Hollard Insurance advertised 24 individual photographs depicting where a motor vehicle should have been.  The only problem was they had been stolen – not to worry said Hollard ‘that’s what we are here for’.  Great for Hollard, not so good for Auto Trader. 

And then Rand Aid advertised ‘a 1916, work horse, in great condition if a little worn around the edges, looking for a good home’.  You guessed it – the model was someone’s grandfather, an octogenarian who, having fallen on hard times, had nowhere else to go.  Rand Aid, a charitable organisation, was asking for donations to help them provide for people when they couldn’t provide for themselves.  Clever take but not on strategy. 

In the social media space we see the same sort of commentary. 

‘I love my jeans because no one else can afford them’ – not great if the brand aspires to coolness rather than exclusivity. 

‘My car is so hip I pick up guys all the time’ – a problem if the vehicle is pitched at the family values conscious yummy-mummy brigade.  

We call this sort of message ‘Incongruous’ – positive (I love my jeans and I have a hip car) but where there is dissonance between the nominal brand message and the commentary (coolness and family values not exclusivity and a guy magnet).

In such circumstance a brand should adopt what Pierre Berthon, Leyland Pitt and Colin Campbell refer to as the ‘applaud stance’. 

Here a brand is primarily positive about the comment but doesn’t do anything to encourage it.  

By applauding, the brand doesn’t appear tyrannical but is able to legitimately observe the conversation real time.

Matrix: Source:  Berthon, Pitt and Campbell, California Management Review, Vol.50,No.4, Summer 2008

Online reputation management – what happens when they dig your brand?

So far in this series on reputation and social media (online reputation management or ORM) we have covered ‘Reputation management in a changing world’, and used a matrix adapted from an article by Pierre Berthon, Leyland Pitt and Colin Campbell showing ‘How to use social media when a commentator is being subversive’ and what to do ‘…when they are being contrarian’.

Now let’s use the same model, this post and next, to talk about how to engage when a commentator ‘digs your brand’ and what do to when their commentary is ‘incongruous’ to the nominal brand message.

 Q3 of the matrix below would apply where a message from a commentator was aligned with a brand message and was positive in attitude. Here the message would be viewed as ‘concordant’ which means the author digs your brand.

The question is ‘what to do, if anything, in such a situation?’

Online reputation management (ORM) software will have alerted you to the post and you now have an opportunity to engage with the commentator if you wish.

And you probably should.

Previously, we discussed the need to ensure that the use of social media not only engaged in a meaningful conversation with the community but that the engagement be used to ‘live the brand promise’.

Critical is to allow those people interested in your brand to also help develop and improve on the brand promise.

Never before have focus groups and labs been so easily and readily available to marketers.

But there are risks.

Often when someone is asked for an opinion there is an expectation you will act on their advice. This isn’t always possible which in turn can cause resentment.

The positives of facilitating further engagement with someone positively disposed towards a brand are enormous.

But they need to be used wisely.

Source:  Berthon, Pitt and Campbell, California Management Review, Vol.50,No.4, Summer 2008

How to use social media – when the social commentator is being subversive

In this quadrant (Q2 – see the matrix below) the commentator may on the surface be in line with the brand message but uses parody for comic effect or ridicule.

In this way there is a conscious effort to undermine the core values of the brand or to highlight the gap that exists between the brand promise and delivery against that promise, often with legitimate reason.

Dave Carroll’s ‘United breaks guitars’ music video is a good example of this (check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo)  as is Michael Macintyre’s Comedy Roadshow videos in which Ryanair comes in for some pretty funny (but subversive) parody.

The problem here is that long after the complaint has been resolved the YouTube video remains in the public space (in the case of United almost 10 million visits so far).

The threat in such a scenario is significant and needs to be neutralised/repelled.

There are different ways to achieve this but all favour the passive.

This doesn’t mean a brand can’t post a copy of the email correspondence between it and an aggrieved customer leaving other users to make up their own mind as to the reasonableness, or otherwise, of the complaint. It’s difficult though not to sound defensive or worse still that your brand doesn’t have a sense of humour.

By far the best response is to leave others to defend the brand while ensuring communication of your brands message is consistent.

For all its mistreatment of guitars there are a great many satisfied United customers – the trick is to have them come to your brand’s defence while you craft your communications strategy to neutralise concerns customers may have that you don’t value their property in the same way they do.

(Ps Check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P45E0uGVyeg&NR=1 for one of Dave Carroll’s follow up videos to the United ‘series’)

Matrix: Source:  Berthon, Pitt and Campbell, California Management Review, Vol.50,No.4, Summer 2008

Anatomy of a Twitter death hoax

There aren’t many people who can call themselves social media scientists.  Someone who can is a person by the name of Dan Zarella who has just completed a really interesting analysis of the death hoax involving Nelson Mandela and prior to that Justin Beaver.  According to Zarella at  ’around 9:40 GMT on Saturday (15 Jan 2011) the phrase ‘RIP Nelson Mandela’ began trending worldwide on twitter, sparking a wildfire of tweets about his status as dead or alive.  This is not the first time death hoaxes have surfaced on twitter, but it was the first time I noticed one early enough to analyse it to try and find out how it happened.  So I grabbed all of the still existing tweets about Mandela from the weekend (15-16 Jan) and started digging.  Below is a timeline of over 6000 tweets about Mandela’.  Zarella’s findings were that:

• The first person to use the phrase was a person with the name ’lebolukewarm‘ (who has since deleted the tweet) (Let me know if you know their real name)
• The tweet was retweeted 71 times  in a few minutes 
• Although lebolukewarm wasn’t the first person to tweet it appears lebolukewarm was the cause of the rumours ‘tipping point on twitter’.
• This may undermine traditional ideas about influential users as lebolukewarm only has less than one thousand followers.
• NB Lebolukewarm shared with Dan the original BBM received – but declined to give the person’s name because they requested anonymity 

The challenge here was that it only took one person to act as a vector for the meme moving from Blackberry users to twitter.  The implications here are tremendous and show once again why one has to i) be certain of your source before retweeting and ii) be prepared for a social media firestorm. Those responsible for the welfare of Nelson Mandela need to practice their response to each and every rumour regarding his wellbeing.  So too should every brand manager.  Waiting for it to happen can only result in reputational damage and in the case of business an erosion in brand equity.

Social media requires you to be clever and subtle

It isn’t immediately clear how social media can help develop brand equity in ‘unsexy’ sectors like personal hygiene and banking products.

Most companies fail in the social media space because they see a presence as being sufficient. ‘Have a FaceBook profile … now what?’ sort of thing.

There are some companies though that are successfully engaging with customers, not by talking about their brands, but by illuminating the customer’s life in a way that adds real value.

Proctor and gamble’s beinggirl.com seeks to help teenage girls express themselves in a way they wouldn’t be able to otherwise. They can ask questions and post observations which attract empathetic advice from P&G ‘experts’ – these experts would be other users rather than P&G employees.

The site places the emphasis on listening, not talking to customers.

Toyota and AMEX adopt different approaches in that they provide customers with a platform to air their views and to make suggestions on how to improve on their products and services.

This isn’t always intuitively comfortable. The idea of providing a platform for customers to criticise a company makes most marketers head for cover.

Social media however provides them with a platform anyway so why not bring them into the fold? Engage with them honestly and sincerely in your own environment and show other customers you aren’t defensive or afraid of negative types of engagement.

It takes authenticity in the level of engagement to a whole new level.

Making social media work

I can’t think of a company able to lay claim to expertise in using the social media space, although there are some which come pretty close.

The trick seems to be in the nature of the engagement – we have previously spoken about authenticity but practically speaking there also needs to be a high level of integration between different web and mobisites.

Virgin Atlantic gets it.

Firstly it integrates its own website with FaceBook and Twitter. This way it has the best of both worlds – a deep and meaningful conversation via its own website (values and culture); an informal get together via FaceBook (pic swapping and storytelling); or quick and to the point via twitter (think flight delays, inclement weather, price specials).

The conversation is informal, honest and sincere and relies heavily on employee insights (best seats, making long haul flights more comfortable).

It also relies on real-life customer experiences, both positive and negative. There can be no more effective way of neutralising negative comment than by other customers having a more positive perspective than the individual who is unhappy with your product or service.

Seatguru.com engages with passengers in terms of where are the best seats on specific plane types. Taking an A340 to London? Hear what others have to say about which seats to avoid.

Groupon.com (now in SA) makes community based buying easier than ever before – feel like fly-fishing? Why pay the normal rate when you can wait until 20 like-minded individuals are able to make one block booking and receive the benefits of a group discounts?

Understanding the community you are appealing to is critical to making social media work.

More about that next post.

Building a reputation for authenticity in social media

How is a brand to be relevant in the social media space?

This is by far the most commonly asked question by those seeking to leverage social media.  It is also the easiest to answer.  Be authentic.

How can a brand be authentic in the social media space?

That’s the second most commonly asked question and is by far the hardest to answer.  It also defies a convenient sound byte.  A reputation for authenticity doesn’t depend on one single factor but rather requires a systemic approach to a conversation between a brand and its stakeholders.  I say stakeholders because it’s not just about customers.  It also has to include employees, service providers, financiers (shareholders) as well as other communities with a legitimate interest in what the brand or business is about (think special interest groups and NGOs).

Why include all stakeholders?

Authenticity by definition means a reputation for being ’real or genuine’.  This implies a process of testing, confirmation, a need to ensure that what you think you are getting is the real thing.  Cut corners, and exclude a stakeholder group from your communication, and you run the risk of being compromised in the validation process.  Someone won’t vouch for you when you need it.

Explain a systemic approach in more detail.

To be authentic you have to focus on a number of areas.  Here are just a few:

• The brand identity must be clear – what does it stand for, what are its values and how does it add value within the community within which it operates?
• You must be consistent in your engagement with stakeholders – a common message, common theme, similar language. 
• The brand promise has to be delivered.
• Your level of engagement needs to be open, sincere and transparent.  If you messed up recognise it and make amends.

 This is all one dimensional though – what about closing the loop?

Spot on.  That’s the next step.  The great thing about social media is it provides you with real time, detailed insight into your brand.  By providing your audience with an opportunity to give feedback you must be prepared to act on it.  Let them help develop the brand promise to the next level.

What about manipulation?

There is a natural tendency in the marketing profession to want to control the conversation.  With real time electronic ear technology readily available (think products like Radian 6), it is possible to know when a conversation regarding your brand starts.  Now imagine a client unhappy with your product or service.  How best to neutralise that unhappiness?  Have other customers defend your brand for you.  And that’s where manipulation can occur if a company decides to respond under a pseudonym.  

How to avoid manipulation?

Be authentic.

Atoms to bytes – the media’s future

Check out this article published recently in the 2010 edition of AdReview

http://www.monitoringsa.com/pdfs/2010_04_29_1398672.pdf

How will traditional and new media co-exist?