ANA Marketing Maestros

Getting the Most Out of Your Social Media Campaigns

By Irina Skaya

A recent ANA/BtoB Magazine/Mktg survey reported that 66 percent of marketers utilized social media in 2009 compared to 20 percent in 2007.  In order to fund their new media efforts, 55 percent of marketers have already shifted funds from their traditional media budgets. In 2009 Web site ownership, search engine marketing and display advertising are among the new media platforms that received the most funding. And in 2010, blogs, mobile and video are supposed to be at the top of the list.

According to the survey, The top concerns for marketers when considering newer media platforms are the inability to prove ROI (45 percent) and having metrics to properly allocate the mix of traditional and digital media (43 percent).  Social media analytics is young and most marketers do not know where to start.  First thing is first: know what your objective is, what you are trying to measure. Do you want to know what people are saying about your brands? Do you want to see how people are interacting with your brands on specific social networks? Or do you just simply want to know upcoming social media trends or maybe what your competitors are doing in the social media space?

As the social media guru of the ANA, I always look for new measuring and monitoring social media tools. I came up with a social media metrics superlist-my favorite online tools that will help marketers get started with social media analytics.

PS. They are all free!

• Twitalyzer: measures brands' and individuals' impact and success on Twitter by reporting on relative influence, signal-to-noise ratio, generosity, velocity, clout.
• Keotag: monitors mentions of your brands across dozens of Web sites, including Technorati, Blog Pulse, Google Blog, del.icio.us, Blinklist, Twitter, Bluedot, Newsvine, Digg, Blog Lines, YouTube, and more.
• Trackur: a 14-day free trial allows you to monitor your brands' online reputation and your competitors', and track your campaign's effectiveness.
• Social Networking Media ROI Calculator
• Blog Metrics

The ANA Marketing Insights Center has a great number of resources for marketers who would like to utilize social media to learn more about their customers and engage them directly and involve them in their brands.  In the ANA Today newsletter, "How Social Media Transforms Marketing," and "Skittles: Follow the Rainbow on Twitter" are the top-read articles. The above articles are available for ANA members only. If you are not an ANA member, browse through our 101 library where we have an abundant amount of social media resources, including "Marketing with Twitter."

If you use other social media tracking tools, please feel free to share them with us. We'd love to hear from you! Leave a comment or email me at [email protected].

Social Networks

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Good Night and Good Luck!

By Kaitlin Villanova

My close to two year stint at the ANA has been nothing short of fun and exciting. Some of my favorite memories are: the dinner cruise around Manhattan on the Forbes Yacht, a lot tour of Universal Studio’s, meeting cast-members of Grey’s Anatomy, getting a headlock from Gene Simmons, regular trips to fun (and warm) places like Florida, Los Angeles, and Phoenix. Visiting the chic New York offices of Google, Yahoo, RG/A, Publicis, Deutsch and many more…

The ANA is a wonderful place that has provided me with, what feels like, a free graduate degree in marketing and advertising.  As a content writer, I have had the opportunity to attend most of our industry leading conferences such as the Masters of Marketing, Brand Innovation, Marketing Accountability, Integrated Marketing, Business to Business and various committee meetings. Little me sitting in the audience looking up at the “industry celebrities,” such as Steve Ballmer, Beth Comstock, Becky Saeger, Cammie Dunaway, Steve Sullivan, David Lubars, Linda Kaplan Thaler and many more.

With so many fond memories here, it’s hard to say goodbye, but it is time for me to continue on my path of career building. Working at an organization like the ANA I have learned the value of a personal network. I have made so many wonderful connections with colleagues, business partners, and conference attendees.

One of my favorite chapters of Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point is titled “The Law of the Few.” In this chapter, Gladwell describes a type of person he calls “Connectors.”

Connectors:
1. People with a special gift for bringing the world together, people specialists
2. Know lots of people
3. Have an extraordinary knack of making friends and acquaintances, making social connections.
4. Have mastered the "weak tie"; a friendly, yet casual social connection.
5. Acquaintances represent a source of social power, and the more acquaintances you have the more powerful you are.
6. Social glue: they spread the message
[Excerpt from: The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell Chapter 2 Page 30]

I am in no way claiming that I have even come close to this type of social idealism but this excerpt reminds me of the true value in every business and personal relationship.

I encourage you to keep your network alive. Now it’s easier than ever to stay connected with business partners and former colleagues with sites like LinkedIn and Facebook. However, never underestimate the power of a good old fashion phone call or lunch meeting just to catch up.

Well, that just about concludes my participation with the ANA Maestros blog. Cheers blogsphere. It has been a pleasure.

Marketers in the Blogosphere

By Will Waugh

I like to keep track of what ANA members are doing in the blogosphere. I get asked who's blogging all of the time by our members . Marketers' appearance in the online world plays an important role with consumers and end users that demand transparency in the companies they give their loyalty too. Thanks to PRWiki for keeping me up to date as more marketers are set to enter this space in 2007. A brief list:

• McDonald's VP of Corporate Social  Responsibility hosts Open for Discussion focusing on what this major advertiser is giving back to the community
• Oracle has so many blogs that they actually have a directory of blogs
• Wells Fargo and their popular Guided by History blog
• Southwest's Nuts About Southwest is a perfect representation of their brand in the blogosphere
• Cisco's High Tech Policy blog
• Marriott's CEO Bill Marriott on a plethora of issues, including brands.

We are just scratching the surface here. There are many more marketers who have jumped in and jumped out. I expect to see more involvement here in the coming months/years as it gets harder and harder for marketers to communicate with their audiences.

Technorati tags: blogs marketing consumer

A Customer's Story - What Bad Employees Do To Your Brand

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

During a winter trip to the lovely Whistler Blackcomb Ski Resort in British Columbia, Canada, I learned firsthand about the dark side of one to one marketing. No, not the digital type this term invokes but the good old fashioned one on one, personal sale that built companies such as Fuller Brush and Avon.

My experience was with a vacation timeshare and the outcome was not pleasant, but now that company is going to learn about the power of the conversation and how in the digital communication world we inhabit, the customer has a voice – a loud voice. I can express my displeasure with this company not to a few friends but to many hundred through blogs, social network sites, etc.

So what happened to incur this wrath? As my husband and I sat warming up in one of the ski lodges, we were scoped out by a marketing person since we fit their demographic (stable looking couple, in the age bracket of those who might be induced to purchase a timeshare at this fabulous resort – how is that for traditional targeting?!). When the pleasant young man started chatting us up, whereas this hardened New Yorker would have ignored him back home, we began conversing and were ultimately invited to a vacation timeshare presentation. Since we had never participated in one before we accepted (and the offer of 2 free lift tickets was enticing!) Little did we know what we were getting into when we later arrived at the sales office– the hard sell began. Ultimately our twenty-something salesman - a former self-acclaimed champion snowboarder - became very offended when we steadfastly refused his incredible price incentive. He ended the session by loudly insulting us and berating us for attending "just for the free gift" (Well of course – but they offered!)

So what are the lessons here?

• For one, be sure you thoroughly train all of your touch points. Your most customer facing among them should not insult your customers. The well honed marketing campaign about this company’s charming accommodations at this terrific ski resort can all be for naught when up against a rude employee.
• Second, monitor the conversation and respond – read the blogs and track what is being said about your company and correct negative perceptions. I plan to post negative comments about this company on communities that I frequent such as TripAdvisor and I will actively seek out other relevant blogs on which I can complain about them.

Don’t let this happen to your company and if it does for legitimate reasons, react to it and correct it at the source.

Technorati tags: timeshares marketing blogs

Marketing Lessons from Ozzy

By Will Waugh

I had a radio show back in high school on WGAJ FM 92 Deerfield. I was a metal head and loved Ozzy Osbourne. So I really appreciated CK's article on Marketing Profs Daily Fix highlighting the ancient headbanger and the magic behind his marketing.

The business decision: Let people experience summer music tour Ozzfest for free and have advertisers pick up the tab! Actually concession fees will also complement the sponsorships along with "slotting fees" for bands.

Normally Ozzy isn't mentioned in an article along with the words "marketing savvy" (which is actually associated with his wife Sharon) so that is why I pointed it out. Read on into the Comments section where this post created a lively debate.

Do You Participate in the Conversation?

By Will Waugh

At the ANA, we conduct a number of surveys on anything from agency compensation to what keeps senior marketers awake at night. We do nothing focused primarily on this world; the "conversational marketing" space our friend Joe Jaffe over at Jaffe Juice is so actively engaged in. Jaffe, the crown prince of new marketing, is preparing a title for Wiley as a follow up to Life After the 30-Second Spot titled Join the Conversation (this link takes you to a wiki on the material). He is looking for brand marketers to participate in the conversation or, more pointedly, to take a survey to develop the framework for his new book.

I encourage all marketers actively engaged or curious about the space to take the survey (Joe is offering some topline nuggets before the book release to those who participate). Though the membership of the ANA are not all believers that the :30 spot is dead and buried like Joe (shameless plug for our TV Forum where we talk about this), there is an enormous amount of interest in the world of social media (or whatever you want to call it Steve). I, myself, look forward to the results.

Technorati tags: marketing social media

The Top Ten CMO List

By Will Waugh

When speaking with senior marketers of the ANA, I have been asked about blogs and their impact. Many have commented that they are "nice" and something they are interested in. Many times, I have been asked to send a list of blogs that would be relevant to what's important to them. Instead of culling down so many brilliant marketing blogs out there, I found some posts/blogs that focus directly on the CMO and the way they do business:

1. First, the person who speaks with more CMOs than anybody, our chief Bob Liodice. Here is a recent post where he predicts what he expects for CMOs in 2007.
2. Peter Kim of Forrester is doing an ongoing study of marketing organizations. His most recent post here on being a CMO.
3. Note to CMO by Stephen Denny
4. Marketing and media in the age of great cynicism from the former CMO magazine editor.
5. Brand Autopsy, particularly the post on the 20 Common Mistakes of Eager Leaders
6. Tom Peters blog on strategy
7. Guy Kawasaki offers practical knowledge for business people, here is a post with a great list of marketing podcasts
8. MarketingProfs Daily Fix has a ton of good stuff for all marketers, here is a great post on Setting Expectations for Marketing.
9. Of course, my good man Eric Kintz who is a senior marketer talking about the issues that affect them, here on social media and organic search.
10. Church of the Customer blog talks about what many CMOs continue to struggle with, word of mouth, customer insights and the world that is social media.

Technorati tags: chief marketing officer blogs marketing

Do You Have 18 Minutes?

By Will Waugh

I wish I had thought of this first. Forrester has introduced a line of podcasts where alot of their audio content is pulled from recent forums/conferences/meeting, etc. (something we have over a hundred a year of). Thanks to Charlene Li for the heads up (and welcome back to the blogosphere). The podcasts are short and accessible. Great use of content (the king) and utilization of audio from prominent marketers. Take a listen.

New Marketing Professional -- Renaissance Marketer

By Will Waugh

Marketing is changing, we all know that. What is interesting to hear, primarily from our senior marketers and board members, is the sort of talent they are looking for in this environment of continuous reinvention. Companies and brands have already changed the requirements for marketers. They are looking for expansive thinkers and superior problem solvers. The true ‘renaissance marketers’ will be educated in disciplines such as philosophy, behavioral science, applied psychology, history, literary theory, and econometrics (I knew that liberal arts degree would pay off).

I came across some great blogs/stories that play in one way or another into this theme:

• David Armano's brilliant Logic + Emotion, which talks talks about psychology and use of color
• Max introduced me to my new favorite site The New Scientist
• The daddy of all great reading lists from another favorite, Creating Passionate Users
• Rob Field's Marketing Pop Culture looks at how marketing and pop culture has transcended to a level of codependence.

Technorati tags: marketing insights renaissance marketer

What Would You Say to a CMO?

Thanks to CKs Blog for bringing to my attention, among other things, a blog called Note to CMO written as a call-out to chief marketing officers and the marketing community.

What would you write if you had a chance to say something to the head of the marketing function?

In reading this fascinating approach, it reminded me of an article we did where a few CMOs from our board told us what they are looking for in marketing professionals. As the holidays near and we reflect on personal improvements or career moves -- some things to keep in mind from some of the top marketing leaders. What are they looking for in a marketing professional:

Holistic, ‘system-thinkers’… customer-centric believers … innovators and dreamers … smart, effective communicators … results-obsessed managers… enlightened measurers … and great team leaders.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Technorati tag: CMOs