Ch. 10 – tapping the groundswell with twitter

What can you do with 140 characters? Entertain? Inform? Twitter users make great use of a few keystrokes to get their message out.

Twitter followers: unlike other social media platforms, Twitter users can follow anyone.

Hashtags and searches: as public media, Twitter updates are searchable. Hashtags (#) are used to associate a tweet with a topic, and this makes searching the topic easier and helps to identify trending topics.

Mentions and retweets: Simple protocols such as using the “at” symbol (@) along with the users handle will direct the tweet to that user, or retweeting can send a tweet viral, getting your message around the world quickly.

Links: Lots of people use Twitter to get links to their websites out there. This is particularly useful for blogs or articles.

Lists: Twitter added the ability to create lists in 2010. These are lists of people you follow and they’re share-able.

Apps and tools: There are multiple tools available to help make managing your Tweets easier. They’re available on Apple and Android systems. They can minimize web addresses (which is important when you only have 140 characters to play with).

Twitter users are influential and highly connected. The Social Technographics Profile of twitter users shows us that they’re more likely to be creators and conversationalists and the demographics indicate that twitter users are more educated and wealthy than other people online (table 10-1)

 

Listening to Twitter is essential. It can help business keep an eye on their brand and see if there are any trends they need to be aware of.

Using Twitter to talk is straightforward. If its done well it can be interesting. The trick is to keep it interesting enough that others will mention it or retweet. Media outlets often have multiple twitter accounts and often reporters will have their own with many followers.

Energizing is to find others who like your product/service and amplifying their voices. Using fans to promote a brand by tweeting or retweeting can be energized with competitions which get ideas trending.

Influential Twitter users will follow trending topics, particularly for their own company, and use the information to ensure customer needs are met.

Embracing with Twitter may be most easily accomplished by communicating with users and customers.

Twitter is easy to use and ubiquitous. Some good advice for Twitter users:

Lock up your handle – there are lots of examples of famous people or companies who’ve had someone “take” their handle. Usually having someone pretending to be you and tweeting doesn’t end well.

Listen first – before you post, learn what people are saying about you.

Be ready to support people – customers will expect support once you’re out there. Direct these customers to someone who can help – tech support group or customer service representatives.

Follow others – it costs nothing.

Be ready for a crisis – increasingly people look to Twitter during times of crisis. Mayor Nemshi from Calgary used Twitter almost exclusively during the floods in 2013, to great success.

Respond, retweet, and link – keep the experience rich; respond to people tweeting to you, retweet or mentions of interesting topics, and links to material on your site.

Staff it – use Twitter regularly, even if its not a full-time job. Make sure someone is keeping the posts coming.

Check with legal and regulatory staff – Twitter is pubic, and on the internet. Once it’s out there, it’s out there.

Having gathered a following, don’t waste it – Keep the interesting posts coming and once you’ve built interest in an account, ensure you have a long term plan for it.

WIN House could best take advantage of Twitter for it’s demographic profile of users during fundraising campaigns. Some clever tweeting can get the message viral (or at least more exposure) to the more educated and affluent people in the city. This is also a target market for fundraising.

References:

Li, C., & Bernoff, J., (2011). Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press

Images:

Demographics of Tweeters retrieved from https:// losscandalous.wordpress.com/

Social Technographics Profile of tweeters retrieved from https://www.flickr.com/photos/beingpeterkim/5788456879/

Chapter 8 – helping the groundswell support itself

In Chapter 8 we learn about the costs of traditional customer support versus groundswell support.

Typically, once a product has been purchased a company hopes to not hear from a buyer again, as this would suggest that the customer is in some way dissatisfied with the product. In addition, the costs of providing customer support can amount to upwards of $7 per call, all inclusive. For this reason webistes with self-service options and off-shoring call centres have popped up. While cheaper, customers still weren’t satisfied and took to the internet to start helping each other.

The result was support forums, wikis, and Q&A sites. The value to companies and consumers was, in the case of a well-monitored forum like Dell’s, an enormous cost savings realized from allowing consumers to share solutions. The benefits from a collaboration in the form of a wiki is manifested in dollars and increased confidence gained because people are more inclined to believe suggestions from peers than from companies. This collaborative effort will also engage Spectators, Critics, Conversationalists, and Creators, as defined in Chapter 3 – Social Technographics.

If you’re considering how you can let the groundswell support itself you need to consider a few factors:

• The groundswell needs you to participate. Keeping your site busy will drive additional traffic and links to your site.
• If there is an already existing community – take advantage and join it! The information gained from users is invaluable and contributing can help to foster a more collaborative environment.

Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff offer this advice (Groundswell, 2011, pp. 174-176) :

• Start small but plan for and allow for growth.
• Engage your most active customers, they are most likely to become the site’s leaders
• Drive visitors to your online community through aggressive advertising and promotion
• Ensure your site has a reputation system. People will contribute to these communities for a variety of reasons. Some do it for altruistic reasons, some for the appreciation they get. Others are competitive and want to be seen and valued as a top contributor.
• Let the customer lead. Listen and respond to consumers and offer them the opportunity to recommend improvements.

WIN House has an opportunity to embrace these communities and let their clients help each other in many ways. A system similar to CarePages, a secure, non-intrusive, online method for patients to communicate with their friends and loved ones, could be adapted to WIN’s clients. In escaping a dangerous situation at home many abused women have to cut ties with everyone from their old life. Using this technology WIN clients could reassure loved ones of their safety – from afar.

WIN House could look at creating a wiki that offers the information one might need to re-establish herself. This could be low-income housing links, how to legally change your name, which government agencies to see about issues of concern, links and explanations of privacy laws. Input to this wiki could come from former clients, government agencies, WIN employees – the possibilities are endless.

As with every biarenaissance post thus far, the utmost concern and attention should be paid to the safety and security of users. In a potentially volatile environment, pseudonyms may provide the anonymity needed to set up a community such as this, in concert with a carefully monitored website.

Reference:

Li, C., & Bernoff, J., (2011). Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press

Image retrieved 19 July, 2015 from http://liveworkstudio.com/topics/online-powered-by-call-centres/

Chapter 6 – Talking

Chapter 6 of Groundswell tells us about connecting to our customers through the groundswell, by talking. This increased level of communication effectively pushes potential customers along the marketing funnel.

 

Talking, which is not to be confused with shouting (which is what mainstream advertising relies on to get their message to as many customers (reach) as often as possible (frequency)) includes finding out what customers want and need and then having the conversation with them.

We are given several examples of companies, like Proctor and Gamble, using the Social Technographics profile to determine the best use of the various social media platforms to get their messages and brand across, and these include:

1) Post a viral video – see YouTube for the viral videos made for willitblend.com

2) Engage in user-generated and social networks – as Ernst and Young did by building a Facebook page to get the attention of college students

3) Joining the blogosphere – HP took great advantage of this to get employees communicating with customers

4) Create a community – as we see Proctor and Gamble doing in beinggirl.com, where the focus is building a safe place for juvenile girls to share, with subtle marketing influence.

Li and Bernoff also recommend that brands use social networks, since that’s where their customers are. If a company already has a brand that people love and are passionate about, even better. Companies would be well advised to see what’s already out there, then create a space that encourages two-way communication.

Blogging, if done right, will have a positive effect on the bottom line. Cheaper than traditional advertising, there are still costs to blogging – particularly in terms of the time necessary to ensure the blog is properly maintained, both for quality and quantity.

WIN House can use these concepts to their advantage and start creating a website which will foster the same level of trust that the bricks and mortar facility has. This may look like P&G’s “Ask Iris” service, in which a qualified psychologist answers candid questions. Most important is to create a dialogue amongst the predominantly Joiner/Spectator social technographic that look to WIN House for help. The same creativity that was used to develop a website, beinggirl.com, for young self-conscious teenaged girls can be applied to tentative and unsure women.

Reference:

Li, C., & Bernoff, J., (2011). Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press

Marketing Funnel image retrieved 12 July, 2015 from http://wearesocial.net/blog/2009/06/purchase-funnel/

POST Process

POST is an acronym for the 4 step planning process for building a groundswell strategy. In order to make the most of your groundswell it’s important to understand what your customers are doing online, what they’re comfortable with, so that you can meet them where they are.

P = people. Who are they? Look at your social technographic profile. This will help you to understand what they’re ready for. If your customers are largely Spectators then starting an online community and expecting them to initiate conversation will probably disappoint.

O = objectives. You need to consider what your goals are. Are you interested in generating sales? Or is your goal to encourage employees to work with each other in a collaborative way or more efficiently? Do you want to increase your marketing reach? Deciding what your objectives are will help you to focus your efforts and achieve success. Li and Bernoff (2009, pp. 68-69) outline the 5 most commonly successful objectives in Goundswell as Listening, Talking, Energizing, Supporting, and Embracing.

•  Listening can be used for research and requires the participation of your customers.
• Talking is about spreading your message and starting conversations with your customers.
• Energizing is about identifying and encouraging your enthusiastic customers to sell your   company for you, and works best when there is brand awareness.
• Supporting is helpful when your customers are willing to engage in conversations with each other to share information
• Embracing, if pursued after reaching one of the other objectives, can be a very successful way to include customers and enthusiasts in the company’s fold to influence future products and/or services.

S = strategy. How do you want your relationships to change? What will these changes look like over time. The strategy is more than deciding on an objective, but fully thinking it through its lifecycle.

T = technology. One you’ve selected your strategy based on the people and your primary objective then you can consider the best tool to reach your customers. This may be through a blog, video file sharing, social media sites such as Facebook or Twitter. The technology you choose should be able to engage your customers in the way they participate online.

For WIN House, the predominant technographic profile of clients are Joiners, Spectators, and. Critics. Using the traits of these specific profiles, as characterized in the technographic profile from Forrester Research, below, will lead us to the conclusion that WIN House customers are present online, mostly passive – in that they will join sites and read others’ blogs, watch videos, perhaps even comment on other users’ uploads, but are less likely to start conversations. In light of the information gathered during the POST process, I would suggest that WIN House start with a blog to inform their clients about available resources, both within WIN and in the outside communities, including the online community. This will require an executive sponsor to demonstrate the priority placed on first talking to the customers.

Image retrieved from http://forrester.typepad.com/groundswell /2010/01/conversationalists-get-onto-the-ladder.html

Li, C., & Bernoff, J., (2011). Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press