Cymfony's Influence 2.0

More evidence that Boston is the hub of social media

As reported in the Boston Globe, OutsideIn.com ranked Boston the "bloggiest" city in America.

New York and Chicago are way down the list...and forget about Cincinnati....

I've said it for a long time: with companies like Cymfony, BzzAgent, eons, gather, Communispace and many others...researchers like Walter Carl at Northeastern University...pioneers in applying social media to public relations like SHIFT Communications...and 4 members of the Board of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, Boston is THE place to be as a social media firm.

Coke Blak Tasting – The Results are In

After posting Blog Bits last Friday, I was curious to see what Cymfony employees thought about the taste of Coke Blak and decided to have a tasting.  Here are the results (out of 17 participants):

41% did not like it
53% liked it but would not buy it
6% liked it and would probably buy it again

So, I think its fair to say...if consumer’s taste buds are similar to those of Cymfony Employees,  Coke Blak probably won’t be around for much longer. 

Blog Bits - Week of April 24th

One of Coke’s newer products is Coke BlaK, a coffee infused cola.  John Moore of Brand Autopsy comments on this product as well as leads us to an interesting post by Paul Williams (of the Idea Sandbox).   Williams shares his impressions of this drink and also offers a story on his tasting the failed Starbucks' coffee infused cola – Mazagran.  Yes, you read it right – Starbucks' FAILED coffee infused cola.   

Being intrigued by Williams’ post and the product, Moore bought a 4 pack of Coke BlaK – his overall impressions are that the coffee/cola tastes like a “low-grade, lightly roasted artificially flavored coffee.”  He also compares it to “Tab with a slight hint of bad, flavored coffee.” Ouch. 

Some comments on Moore’s post are: 

• “I doubt that I could have ever brought myself to even taste the stuff, let alone pay money for it”
• “It sounds so disgusting that I haven’t even had the urge to try it”
• “Maybe I’m the only one who like this… but not enough to spend over $1 per bottle on it.” 

Will Coke BlaK succeed?

One of the comments pretty much sums it up “I’m sure that Coke BlaK will generate initial sales in the States based upon the initial curiosity factor but I doubt repeat sales will follow because the product lacks taste appeal.” 

Another way to advertise… Coming Soon:  Ads on iTunes.  Marketing Vox reports that Apple CEO Steve Jobs supports the idea of ad supported podcasts.  To ease users into the concept, the ads will be placed in the lower left hand corner of the iTunes library.  TV networks have already found a way to profit from this.  Currently, networks charge iTunes’ users $1.99 per download of an episode that is “ad-free.”  ABC plans to offer free versions of these episodes (which they normally charges a fee) if it is downloaded on an ad supported site.  NBC and AOL are also planning to do something similar. 

John Cass, of PR Communications, points to an interesting post which talks about color preferences based on age, gender, and associations.  Here are a few of the findings:

• Green is very popular with the under 18 set and decreases in popularity as we age.
• Purple gets more popular as we grow older.
• Everyone's least favorite colors: orange and brown. Then grey for women and yellow for men.

Blog Bits - Week of March 20th

Here is an interesting blog to visit:  Customer Listening: Markets are "Conversations"...Brands are you Really Listening?  The description of the blog can help give you an idea of its content:

The world is changing, marketing is changing, today, more than ever, consumers - your   customers are in control. Marketers, brands you need to evolve and listen to the ones that make you alive...the ones that buy your products, recommend them to others, and have ideas to evolve them. STOP TALKING, STOP ASKING, and start LISTENING & CONVERSING. Brands you either listen and adapt or die... Do you really think you have the choice?

The latest post is on how focus groups don’t work as well as marketers think because the discussions are “fake.”  The author, Laurent Flores, compares focus groups to an aquarium, the fish in the aquarium may be real but the way they are featured is not, it is completely artificial – the same way a focus group is set up.  So what should you do instead of use focus groups?  Flores recommends, “Go in the street, talk, and listen to people. They have millions of things to say, be natural and listen..."Netography" or the science of listening to consumers on the Internet is there to help.”

Check out Marsha Gellar’s latest article “Are Newspapers and TV dying?” In this iMedia Connection article Gellar discusses the latest data from the Pew Internet Project on how the growth of online news-gathering is mirroring the growth of broadband adoption, a new study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a survey released at the annual Association of National Advertisers that concludes TV advertising is becoming less and less effective, and more.  Some stats that Gellar points out in this article are:

• 50 million Americans turn to the internet for news on a typical day.
• For broadband internet users, online news is a more regular part of the daily news diet than is the local paper. Not surprisingly, for home dial-up users, online news is not as much an everyday activity.
• Over the last four years, overall internet penetration rose from 58 percent of all adult Americans to 70 percent, and home broadband penetration grew from 20 million people (or 10 percent of adult Americans) to 74 million people (37 percent of adult Americans).
• According to the ANA, 78 percent of respondents to the study think TV advertising is less effective than it was two years ago, mainly due to the proliferation of digital video recorders that allow users to skip commercials.

Blog Bits - Week of March 13th

In the spirit of March Madness, here is a post for all of you basketball fans...

John Moore of Brand Autopsy posts Marketingology meets Bracketology.  In his post he leads us to the Shotgun Marketing Blog which shows how businesses engage in marketing in much the same way people fill-out their NCAA Brackets.  Moore’s favorite comparison is:

NCAA Bracket - After you fill out the bracket, pay into the pot, and tape your bracket to the wall, you no longer have any control. The teams will make or break you.
MARKETING - You can develop a great marketing plan and set it into motion, but in the end, it's your good/bad choices and the mindset of the market that will determine how it turns out.

I agree with Moore’s pick but for the sake of being different, I’ll go with my favorite being:

NCAA Bracket - Filling out a bracket doesn't necessarily mean that you know what you're doing
MARKETING - Placing and ad in the paper or a spot on the TV/radio doesn't necessarily mean that you are marketing.

Go Grizzlies!!! Who are you rooting for?

On a completely different topic from March Madness, John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing posts “What's The Opposite of Love?”  In this post, Jantsch discusses how this famous quote by Elie Wiesel is really more to point in business and in life. 

“The opposite of love is indifference. If people don't love your business, it's unlikely that they hate it. If they don't care they just won't do anything. What I'm getting at here is negative feedback from your clients and prospects. While it may feel hard to accept - I say welcome and embrace it. If you're not getting any negative feedback, it may not be because all is well, it may in fact be because they don't care enough to tell you.” 

Jantsch goes on to give examples on how to handle negative feedback and even provides an example of a real complaint that he received and his response. 

Blog Bits - Week of February 20th

BL Ochman leads us to a great post by Chris Abraham of Applied Blogging Workshop that lists articles on PR blogging, personal blogging, corporate blogging, and how to blog.  Some of the articles on the list include:

• What makes a blog successful?
• How to Start a Blog
• The Blog is Mightier Than the Bomb
• The Top Reason Why I Blog
• An Argument for Online Market Intelligence
• The Blogging Process

Even though a recent post by John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing is geared toward small business marketers – It is important for ALL marketers to keep in mind.  Jantsch’s post Strategy Before Tactics states that “small business owners fall prey to the marketing idea (tactic) of the week because they have no marketing strategy.”  His number one tip is to create a strategy for marketing your business and then put every tactic into making that strategy real.  Some strategies he suggests:  dominate a narrow market niche, package your services like no one else and create a category, and become famous for doing one thing. 

MarketingVox reports that newspapers such as the Washington Post, Houston Chronicle, San Antonio Express, and the San Francisco Chronicle plan to syndicate bloggers content on their sites.  They are looking for blogs about travel, women’s issues, technology/gadgets, food/entertainment, and more.  For bloggers that are interested they must apply to join the network and provide a full-text RSS feed with no ads.  SearchEngineJournal speculates that the syndicated blog content will eventually make it into the print versions as well. 

Blog Bits - Week of February 13th

Have you heard the term “Mobilize your blog?”   Duct Tape Marketing’s John Jantsch posts on how mobile devices are becoming more powerful in the blogosphere.  Now blog readers are subscribing to and reading blog posts from their mobile phones or PDAs and marketers have to keep up.  Jantsch states, “While converting all of your web pages, blog posts and RSS feeds to mobile standards might as well make sense, it looks like a pretty big undertaking.”  That’s when you turn to help.  A service called WINKsite allows you to easily turn your current blog RSS feed into a version that can be read on mobile devices.   Jansch also adds, “Using this technology certainly comes under the heading of coolness, but I think that it also supports one of my major marketing principles as well – deliver your marketing message in as many forms and formats as possible.”   

Need a blog post – Wayne Hurlbert of Blog Business World introduces the “link roundup.”  “For one posting a week, a blogger can devote the blog space to linking to some interesting and perhaps overlooked posts” states Hurlbert.  By doing this, two needs are satisfied – the blogger has a post and the reader has a pre-selected group of theme related posts to read.  Hurlbert also offers tips on when to use and how to write the “link roundup.”  Hmmm - Can you say “Blog Bits?”

Looking for new ways to enter the world of blogging – see what Coca-Cola has done with the blog “Torino Conversations.”  MarketingVox points out that six college students from China, Germany, Italy, Canada, Austria and the U.S. are blogging about their experiences at the winter Olympics – thanks to Coca-Cola who is paying for their trip.  There is one catch – the students must keep all of their posts positive.  The site also allows podcasting, posting of photos, and comments from readers. 

Blog Bits - Week of January 30th

Christopher Kenton of Marketonomy has come up with a new advertising model and will introduce it at Ad:Tech San Francisco this spring.  Kenton’s new model goes something like this:  “Instead of buying ad space for a set CPM or CPC, you place a bid for ad space at whatever price you want to pay. At the end of the auction, the space doesn't go to the highest bidder, it gets divided up and spread among all bidders in proportion to their final bid. That means any advertiser can buy space without getting squeezed out of the market, and the pricing is set by market demand.”

Micropersuasion’s Steve Rubel points us to a new blog by Ted Demopoulos and Shel Holtz called Blogging for Business.  This blog accompanies a book with the same name. According to Rubel, “The blog focuses on practical business implications and uses of new media and technologies. There's a lot of good information there including a post on if executives should blog.”

Interested in becoming a member of IABC?  Now is the time.  During the month of February, the membership application fee will be waived for both new and lapsed members who join or re-join IABC. 

Blog Bits - Week of January 9th

Elizabeth Albrycht mentions two upcoming teleseminars that she is taking part in over the next week on CorporatePR.  The first teleseminar on The New Realm of Digital Influencers:  The Importance of Analyzing Consumer-Generated Media is with Cymfony’s CEO, Andrew Bernstein.  This one hour PRSA teleseminar is on January 17th at 3:00 pm EST.  The second teleseminar Elizabeth is taking part in is Putting the Public Relations Back in PR and will be on January 18th from 3:00pm to 4:00pm EST.

Yesterday, Todd Van Hoosear of Topaz Partners spoke with Cymfony’s VP of product Strategy, Julie Woods, at a two hour roundtable discussion for the Mass Technology Leadership Council.  Overall, Todd was pleased with the way that seminar turned out, but thinks it fell short in demonstrating a real business case for online marketing so he did a little research and posted the highlights on Tech PR Gems.  Some of his findings include:  An excellent overview of different online business models, a link to Charlene Li’s Blog which is full of great ideas, a New York Times article on blog revenues and business and more.

Looking for better writing skills?  Sometimes you just need the right tools.  John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing points to a list of 50 tools for writers by Roy Peter Clark that will help writers improve their skills.   Here is a list of some of the tools:

· Writing Tool #1: Branch to the Right
· Writing Tool #2: Use Strong Verbs
· Writing Tool #3: Beware of Adverbs
· Writing Tool #4: Period As a Stop Sign
· Writing Tool #5: Observe Word Territory
· Writing Tool #6: Play with Words
· Writing Tool #7: Dig for the Concrete and Specific
· Writing Tool #8: Seek Original Images
· Writing Tool #9: Prefer Simple to Technical
· Writing Tool #10: Recognize Your Story's Roots

Blog Bits - Week of January 2nd

The Pew Internet & American Life project has delivered a new report titled “How Women and Men Use the Internet.”  According to Marketing Vox, the report states that the proportion of women and men who go online has for the most part evened out (68% of men and 66% of women are internet users) but what they do online remains different.  Men tend to look at weather & news sites, download music and find financial information where women use it more to find health & medical information, email and look up directions. 

What to write about when your blog well runs dry… BL Ochman leads us to some tidbits from Jonathan Kranz’s “Five Surefire Content Ideas (When Your Blog Is Drawing Blanks).”  Kranz’s tips include:
· Announce something
· Respond to an article or newsletter
· Reflect on an event
· Respond to a reader’s concern
· Share a personal anecdote
BL Ochman includes a sixth tip for the list – Take a break from blogging. 

John Moore of Brand Autopsy continues his yearly tradition by posting “My Top Twenty-Five of Ohh-Five.”  Some of Moore’s top posts of 2005 include:  Being the Best-Not the Biggest, According the Marketing Bloggers, Marketing Intervention Guidelines and What You Do vs What You Did.   

Blog Bits - Week of December 12th

With 2005 quickly drawing to an end, this seems to be the week to post about case studies in the marketing and PR world, and see what lessons can be learned from them. The Kryptonite Lock PR case study has become a classic, especially for those preaching the importance of media analysis and the convergence of MSM and CGM.  In this interview you have the opportunity to hear the other side of the story from Donna Tocci, Public Relations Manager for Kryptonite.  Not only does this interview give another perspective on the case, but the comments made by the readers also add insight.  Tocci agrees that, “companies absolutely need to keep track of the blogosphere,” but the most important conclusion made is that the time you have to react has significantly decreased in the PR and marketing world. 

When Tocci was asked what she would change if she could go back in time, she answered that “there is no way for a company to answer all of the individual blog posts or forum posts during a crisis. No way. There isn't enough time in a day. Having your own blog or even a website that is easy to change information on, like we do, is a way to get out some information, but just like the traditional media, everyone wants their own quote that is unique to their blog or news coverage. Just like you! That is also why companies need to do the research I mentioned above now, before a crisis. Know who the influential bloggers are in your space and start a conversation. Create a relationship or two or ten.”

Another lesson for the PR world is that of SunnComm Technologies. Taking a look back to October 2003, Ben Silverman wrote about PR hits and misses. Here he highlighted Sunncomm, the company that works on DRM protection for music CDs. In brief, “a graduate student at Princeton found two easy ways around the copyright protection software, which is supposed to make it impossible for consumers to copy the CD and illegally distribute it. The grad student wrote a paper about the holes in the software -- one way to disable it is by holding down the "shift" key for a few seconds -- and posted it online.” Jeremy Pepper at POP! PR Jots takes a look at the current situation of SunnComm and suggests some much needed improvements.

When looking for information, one of the first places I usually go to is www.wikipedia.com.  The concept is unique, having a free content encyclopedia that is collaboratively written worldwide in over 200 languages.   According to a story published this week in the journal Nature, Wikipedia is about as good a source of accurate information as Britannica, the venerable standard-bearer of facts about the world around us. Britannica as a whole came out looking a bit more accurate than Wikipedia (That averages out to 2.92 mistakes per article for Britannica and 3.86 for Wikipedia ) but regardless, the Nature study shows validation of the fundamental structure of Wikipedia.

Blog Bits - Week of December 5th

Blogiversaries?  I thought I had heard it all but I guess not.  Yes – blogs have birthdays which are called Blogiversaries.  Blog Business World’s Wayne Hurlbert addresses this new phenomenon in his recent post.  Hurlbert states “It’s a frequent occurrence to notice a blogger celebrating one, two, three or even more years in the blogging community.”  He also comments, “Blogiversaries are a reminder that blogs have staying power as a new medium of informational exchange.  Blog birthdays also tell us that bloggers are now a permanent part of the Internet landscape.”  What will they think of next in the blogosphere?

How much influence does a blogger have?  This is the question asked by PR Communications' John Cass.  When looking into this issue, three criteria were defined to help an employee determine their level of empowerment:

1. Autonomy of judgment
2. Level of authenticity, and
3. Level of subordination.

Cass suggests that, “one way to measure the level of empowerment for a blogger in a company is by tracking the progress of a blog post and its effect on an company’s policies and strategies.”  With company blogs becoming more popular each day, this is a question that will be asked by many others. 

Have you heard of the broken windows theory?  Brand Autopsy points us to a new book by Michael Levine titled Broken Windows Broken Business.  The broken window theory argues that crime is the inevitable result of disorder.  “If a window is broken and left un-repaired, people walking will conclude that no one cares and no one is in charge.  Soon, more windows will be broken, and the sense of anarchy will spread from the building to the street which it faces, sending a signal that anything goes.”  Levine’s premise in his new book is that a “broken window” in business happens when someone isn’t paying attention to details. 

Blog Bits - Week of November 28th

Church of the Customer Blog notes that WOMMA has been extremely busy recently with the launch of their new blog, podcast and newsletter that complements the organization's January 2006 Word of Mouth Basic Training Conference, WOMBAT.  Cymfony’s CEO Andrew Bernstein will be on a panel discussing “Measuring the Impact of Word of Mouth Marketing” at the WOMBAT conference on January 19th, 2006 in Orlando, FL. 

Market Sentinel posts on a case study of the French Riots and the UMP party interior minister purchasing keywords such as “riots” and “violence” on Google Adwords to place political advertisements.  The ad is at the top of the paid search and leads to an online petition in support for M. Sarkozy who is a candidate for the French presidency.  Controversy has surrounded one of the keywords that they have purchased “racaille” which translates to “scum.”

Since we’re talking about France, Marketing Vox reports via TechWhack that the French lead Europe in time spent online according to research by the European Interactive Advertising Association (EIAA).  The EIAA found that on average users in France spend 13 hours a week online, compared with 11 each for Britain and Spain.  The European average is 10.25 hours and Italians spend the least amount of time online averaging only 8 hours per week. 

Blog Bits - Week of November 14th

Ever wonder why people keep a blog?  So does Dominic Shaw of The Monkey Speaks.  PR Machine lead us to his post on Why Keep A Blog where Shaw lists some findings from a recent survey conducted by AOL. 

Here are some of the top survey findings:

Blogs as therapy
· 50% of respondents blog as a form of self-help therapy
· 1/3 of bloggers write about self-help and self esteem topics
· 54% like to share their thoughts and feelings and 43% like to chronicle their lives

Bloggers write for themselves
· Consumer bloggers feel no pressure to write blogs – only 16% write one because it’s the latest trend and 21% because of their friends or families do
· A significant percentage (47%) say they feel no pressure at all when they know they have an audience reading their blog.  Although – 54% admit it may take them longer to write

Blogging Etiquette
· 40% of bloggers say it is important to address messages people have posted in their blog as a timely manner
· One-in-five bloggers worry about offending people in their blogs.

More on Blogging
· Survey respondents write and maintain an average of two blogs.
· Consumer bloggers spend an average of four hours per week writing their blogs

Geek News Central points to “16 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Blog” on Build A Better Blog.  Some of the tips include:

· Read and comment on other blogs that are in your target niche
· Submit your blog to traditional search engines
· Submit your blog to blog directories
· Add a link to your blog in your e-mail signature
· Print your blog URL on your business cards
· Make sure you have an RSS feed URL that people can subscribe to
· Post often to keep attracting customers
· Use trackback links when you quote or refer to other blog
· Make a commitment to blog everyday

The Hub is a bi-monthly online magazine which John Moore of Brand Autopsy recommends a recent article from.  The Hub is designed for senior-level marketers and the latest issue includes a Q&A with Anne Saunders, Starbucks Senior Vice President.  Moore posted a few of Saunders comments from the article as well as his take on it. 

Blog Bits - Week of November 7th

B.L. Ochman posts on how to create a word of mouth campaign in five easy steps from information provided by five word of mouth “heavy hitters” at Ad Tech NY:   

· Finding the right people to talk about you (influencers & evangelists)
· Giving them something to talk about (viral email, samples, buzz, and more)
· Creating tools to make it easier for them to talk to each other (blogs, discussions, tell-a-friend forms)
· Participating in the conversation
· Tracking and measuring results

Ochman says, “They agreed that WOM can be unpredictable, but that it is an inexpensive and remarkably effective way to create consumer evangelists.” 

Want higher search engine rankings?  Blog Business World’s Wayne Hurlbert talks about how to achieve the “page one search placements” not only by adding interesting and informative content but also by adding links to your blog’s or website’s internal pages.  “When most bloggers or website owners think of links, they naturally consider links to their home page first – After all, the blog and website homepage is the most obvious and visible page to be on the receiving end of an inbound link.  Too often, the very important links to internal pages get forgotten.”  Hurlbert goes on to talk about how blogs in particular receive an abundance of incoming links to internal pages, how search engines place importance on internal site links and the importance of  “link anchor text.”   Link anchor text is the wording that appears on the clickable link line.  Hurlbert comments, “Bloggers often use very powerful link anchor text, often without concern for the resulting SEO benefits, to describe the receiving post. With that keyword rich link anchor text in place, the inbound link packs double the search engine punch.”

“…if you always have to think outside the box, maybe it’s the box that needs fixing.”  That is one of John Moore’s, of Brand Autopsy, favorite quotes from Malcolm Galdwell which leads to the discussion of the “forward thinking” Douglas Rushkoff’s book Get Back In The Box.  Moore points out that Rushkoff over the next few weeks, will be posting short excerpts from his book-to-be-published on his blog. 

Blog Bits - Week of October 31st

Did you know that almost ½ of all online marketers will engage in some form of word of mouth marketing this year and next year a majority of digital marketers will conduct such efforts?  Church of the Customer Blog shows some data from a new report by eMarketer and the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA).   The report lists the “top ten reasons why word of mouth marketing is gaining momentum.”  Here are a few: 

1) The consumer is gaining control
3) Empowered consumers are not just negative, they are fighting back
4) There is a marked increase in online advertising
8) New tools can now track and measure online word of mouth
9) Online word of mouth marketing campaigns have a long shelf life

Copies are free to members of WOMMA

How are you spending your Ad and PR Budgets? PR machines points to a post by Passionate that gives some excellent tips on the “Old Way vs. New Way.”  Some of these include:

Old Way – Hire a creative, award winning advertising designer
New Way – Hire a creative, user focused product designer

Old Way – Focus Groups
New Way – Field trips for employees (take them where the real customers are doing work)

Old Way – Ads that talk about how you’re better than the competition
New Way – Articles that talk about what you’ve learned from the competition

Market Sentinel provides some insight on a recent article in the New York Times (requires free registration) that profiles how Wal-Mart has taken on their detractors with a pro-active PR campaign, run by a number of ex political campaigners.  “The PR campaign emphasizes the Wal-Mart positives (good value, local employment) and looks to off-set a campaign of detraction from pressure groups like Wal-Mart Watch, run in part by trade unions who oppose the company’s employment practices and who cannot get recognition from the company.”

Some Key quotes from the article that Market Sentinel has listed:

A confidential 2004 report prepared by McKinsey & Company for Wal-Mart, and made public by Wal-Mart Watch, found that 2 percent to 8 percent of Wal-Mart consumers surveyed have ceased shopping at the chain because of “negative press they have heard.”

Once a darling of Wall Street, Wal-Mart’s stock price has fallen 27 percent since 2000, when H. Lee Scott Jr. became chief executive, a drop that executives have said reflects, in part, investors’ anxieties about the company’s image. Sales growth at stores open for more than a year has slowed to an average of 3.5 percent a month this year, compared with 6.3 percent at Target.

To keep up with its critics, Wal-Mart “has to run a campaign,” said Robert McAdam, a former political strategist at the Tobacco Institute who now oversees Wal-Mart’s corporate communications. “It’s simply nonsense for us to let some of these attacks go without a response.”

Blog Bits - Week of October 24th

Jeremy Pepper from POP! PR Jots addresses an article written in the New York Times on “the whole new era of customer evangelism with blogs.”  While Pepper was reading the article it made him think about the differences between “corporate evangelist blogs, true consumer evangelist blogs and the old school days of enthusiast websites that seem more and more relevant today.”  The article mentioned many blogs including Hacking Netflix, Tracking Trader Joe’s, The BarqsMan and McChronicles and pointed out that some of the companies (Barq’s parent company - Coca-Cola) did not even know about the blog, The BarqsMan, and others are tracking the conversations such as McDonald’s with McChronicles.  Pepper points out that in-house corporate PR people or PR firms should be doing what McDonald’s is doing - “tracking conversations, and jumping in when needed, or hey, even offering previews of new products and offerings… you know, the old school PR skill of working with media, being that bridge.”  Pepper continues his post with talking about how there is a fine line between the corporate blog and the customer blog. 

As noted on MarketingVox, “A best-guess extrapolation of blog-related surveys and data suggests that work time spent reading and posting to blogs this year will consume 2.2 percent of U.S. labor force hours, and work time spent on blogs unrelated to work will take up 1.65 percent of those hours, reports AdAge (via MediaBuyerPlanner).”  About one in four people in the labor force visits blogs and on average spends 3.5 hours during the work week engaging with them.  Although this report my be a concern to corporation’s HR departments – it validates that more and more people are starting to read, post and create blogs and corporations should be tracking what they are saying.

Blog Business World’s Wayne Hurlbert posts on how Article Submissions are a powerful technique for adding additional readers to your blog.  “Articles also provide powerful inbound links to your blogs or website, adding strength in the search engines.”  Hurlbert points out that both sides benefit when writing and submitting an article, “By writing informative & interesting articles, on your topics of interest, free long term publicity for you and your blog are achieved…Website owners are constantly seeking fresh and informative content for their own site visitors and your articles can provide them content.  In return for your free article, your blog or website received a return link.”  Hurlbert also addresses that many questions arise on where to send your articles for submission and includes a link to a website with many article submission sites. 

Blog Bits - Week of October 17th

Market Sentinel points us to a survey by Guidewire Group that was done for the BlogOn 2005 Conference.  The survey is on US corporations embracing blogging as a way of reaching their target markets.  Here are some facts from the survey:

· Companies use external blogs for public relations and marketing and demonstration of thought leadership (61%)
· 40% of survey respondents have a blogging CEO
· 20% of respondents expect blogs to generate income
· 58% expect them to improve rankings in search engine results

The biggest challenges in corporate blogging are:

· Maintaining enthusiasm (42%)
· Encouraging adoption (36%)
· Technological problems (30%)

Sam Whitmore posts on  “The Big Picture”, a visual tool for navigating related news.com articles.  It is a ‘CNET News.com special feature, connecting the dots between stories, companies and topics within the news.com site.  This is an interesting tool, allowing for a visual demonstration of how stories and people relate to each other.

Kevin Dugan, who presented at the Cincinanti Chapter of PRSA this past week, has made his powerpoint presentation available online, “The Lifecycle of a Media Relations Pitch.”   All too often, public relations practitioners focus solely on the middle of the pitch, but this presentation will go through all three of them. Dugan adds, “Having presented it, I will throw out two important caveats. 1) The notes are ROUGH background vs. a strict script. 2) The verbiage is biased towards print media vs. electronic or online. However, as these are the basics, they still apply to all forms of media IMHO. Any and all feedback is appreciated.”

Blog Bits - Week of October 10th

Jeremy Pepper of POP! PR got a sneak preview of the first chapter of Jeremy Wright’s  book, Blog Marketing, which  the is now also available on Wright’s site…  Pepper says that if the rest of the book is a good as the first chapter “Wright might just have a winner in his hand.”    Pepper said,  “The chapter begins with a cute story about a business looking into blogging, and Wright goes into an analogy about being a fly on the wall of your customers:”
Now imagine that you could use this up-to-the-minute information to determine what your customers want, how they want it, what they will ultimately buy, and what they’re willing to pay for it. This is the power of the blog.
According to Pepper “this book is not going to blow away people that have been blogging for any amount of time but it will help marketing departments that are thinking of tipping their toes into the blogosphere some food for thought.”

Adam Zand posts on Tech PR Gems the Top 100 Blogs according to CNET News.com.  “With more than 14 million blogs in existence and another 80,000 being created each day, how is a person supposed to find the ones worth reading?”  Some of the categories include:  cutting edge, digital lifestyle, media & search and many more….

Look who is jumping on the CGM Bandwagon, none other than music industry connoisseur, MTV. The newly available, MTVU is trying to harness consumer-generated media with its new mtvU Uber. It is now part of MTV’s 24-hour college network, seen on over 730 campuses which will now be available to everyone through mtvU Uber. It will also showcase a powerful line-up of original programming driven by new music, short-form series, and the best student-produced short films, music videos, animation and webisodes. “We are handing over an entire channel on-line to college students and everyone who wants new music," said Stephen Friedman, GM, mtvU.”

Blog Bits - Week of October 3rd

The week Steve Rubel is calling the marketing troops together to "Go the Distance." "The marketing community has got 75% of social media mastery under its belt. They conceptually get its importance, how it evolves marketing from a monologue into a dialogue and the importance of listening. What they don't get is the last 25% - how to put this into action immediately."  He also presents there ideas as to how to deal with this situation.

1) Hands-on Workshops: PRSA, Ragan, the IABC, PR Week and other organizations need to start running hands-on workshops - not just panels with bloggers.

2) Integration: Let's not do what we did back in the 1990s where we had lots of agencies with interactive divisions that had no connection to the mother ship.  We need integration.

3) Encouragement: There's no easier way to get people learning about blogs, wikis, podcasets, RSS, tagging, etc. than to get them to try it. Hill and Knowlton's effort is exemplary.  But it's a first step. We need to get more agency heads blogging.

Katie Paine wrote a brief report on the Third Annual Measurement Summit held in Durham New Hampshire from September 28th to October 1st.  There were more than 100 attendees, and from her report it sounds like it was a great time and sharing/networking opportunity.  "The talks were, as usual, very high level and there was much more of a focus on marketing and branding than on media relations." Our Vice President of Professional Services and Customer Support, Patricia Fennessey, also attended and spoke at the conference, and looks forward to attending the Fourth Annual Measurement Summit!

A new Blogger Survey 2005 with a total of 821 respondents is out!  It was designed to "better understand blogger's attitudes towards corporations and PR firms as well as help clients understand why and how they should engage the blogosphere." With a variety of viewing options like, survey charts, free-form answers, geographic data and language data, you can see a variety of responses to questions ranging from, "What is the primary reason you blog?" to "if you know a message is sent to you from a PR firm, how much are you likely to trust it on a scale between 1 and 10, where 1 is 'not at all' and 10 is 'complete trust'? (the average response was a 4.60) Another interesting section is the free-form answers where there are 872 written responses to the question: How do companies and their firm's PR representative generally interact with you?

Blog Bits - Week of September 26th

A recent MediaPostPublications article, Blog Champions: High Click-Throughs Offset Low Reach, discusses the growing importance of getting involved in consumer-generated media and how it can offer a relatively high ROI.  At the OMMA East Conference on Wednesday, Panelist Brian Clark, CEO of GMD Studios, said, "blogs and other consumer-generated media channels can be extremely cost-effective in driving Web traffic to campaign sites and creating interest." Through many companies fear the blogosphere and the potential damage caused by CGM, Clark argues that "companies can't afford to ignore consumer-generated media simply because they fear consumers might have unflattering things to say.  If you're afraid of what users are going to say, there are two strategies: You get involved in the discussion, or you stick your fingers in your ears and pretend it doesn't exist," he said.  "People are talking about you whether you're listening or not.

Corporate Engagement points to a great post on Global PR Blog Week 2.0 - "Adding Your Voice to the Conversation. Why CEOs Should Blog" by Jeneane D. Sessum.  Sessum challenges Seth Godin's theory on why CEOs should NOT blog because blogs work best on timeliness, pithiness, candor, urgency and controversy and Godin says "Does this sound like a CEO to you?" Sessum argues that many CEO-turned-bloggers are in fact "making the time and having a good time using the very characteristics Godin lists as what makes blogging successful." In the post, Sessum covers how CEOs are finding time to blog, how they are "unleashing" their inner blogger and much more...

Even though it's been a month since Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast - victims still need our help and members of the New Orleans Chapter of AMA are some of them.  John Cass of PR Communications is currently the president of the Boston Chapter of AMA and has expressed concern about the New Orleans' members and their current work situations.  Cass is putting together one site where all chapters of AMA from around the country can post specific jobs that they have available for New Orleans' Chapter Members.

Blog Bits - Week of September 19th

Can brands ignore blogs? Market Sentinel addresses "that in the world of newspapers and broadcast soundbites there may be a good case for PRs and Customer Relations departments not to become involved in public disputes about their company or product" but that's all changing with the new world of blogs.  "Unhappy customers who complaints are not dealt with rapidly can, and do reach a wide audience - from potential customers to those who have suffered similar problems and want to talk about it.  The effect can be viral, with awareness growing rapidly the longer the issues are not addressed."  In a recent study by Market Sentinel of ACNielsen's top 50 UK grocery brands - they found that 40% of them had critical or negative commentary in the top 10 Google results. Some of the brands with critical commentary included Coco-Cola, Mars Bars and Bird's Eye.  This is definitely something that brands can't ignore.

BL Ochman points us to a guide on writing better comments on blogs by Lifehacker's editor Gina Trapani.  Some of Trapani's tips include:

• Stay on topic
• Make the tone of your message clear
• Don't post when you are angry, upset, drunk or emotional
• Own your comment
• Remember that nobody likes a know-it-all

BL Ochman adds a few tips of her own:

• Provide your full name and email address that can be verified
• Don't lie, you'll be found out
• Use clear language- none of the $5 words
• Follow what is being said about you and your company and respond quickly

Elizabeth Albrycht, a fellow panelist of Andrew Bernstein's at the PRSA conference in Miami Florida wrote the following article in Global PR Blog Week 2.0 about Is Transparency the Key to Improving PR's Reputation?  It revolves around her idea that :the ethical practice of public relations: that truth and transparency are two very different things, and that in the difference lies great potential for taking steps to improve the practice of public relations, result in more positive public reputation."  She concludes that "transparency may just give the ability to prove our innocence, thus improving the reputation of PR as a whole."

Here's the link to read other posts and comments from Global Blog week.

Blog Bits - Week of September 12th

“The Train has left the station,” “the weight of consumer-shared opinion is greater than our advertising power,” and “keep people happy,” are three words of wisdom from Andy Sernovitz, CEO of  WOMMA. When looking at the internet today and how it impacts the corporate arena, he created three new realities for today's marketers. “People are already talking about us. Are we going to join the conversation? There's no choice here. Ignore word of mouth and take the hits, or engage and turn it in your favor.” Are you going to hop on and ride the train?

The battle is on, the giant Google blog search in the right hand corner of the ring, Technorati in the other, the crowd waiting anxiously to watch the giant clobber any competition..  Who will the winner be? It is impossible to write up blog bits this week without giving a mention to Google’s blog search tool launch and the effect it will have for competitors like Technorati.  Many comments were made discussing the doom and gloom for Technorati, but I found an article which was able to look on the ‘bright side.’  The Telegraph online’s Shane Richmond put both tools through two rounds of tests, declaring in the end a narrow win for Technorati. This is only the beginning of the match, but a narrow win, but a win none the less!

What is a major challenge that faces all bloggers?  Being able to “clearly communicate and explain the power that these tools offer to the non-technical person” says James Torio who has written his Master’s thesis Blogs - A Global Conversation on the Social Phenomenon of Blogs. What Blogs Are: A Collaborative, Open Model for Information Exchange wrote that James has “taken on the challenge to write about blogs and media phenomenon they represent.” An interesting read and something that might help guide you when talking to those non bloggers.

Blog Bits - Week of September 5th

Looking for a way to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina? Boston's chapter of AMA is celebrating its 65th Birthday and is hosting a fundraiser to celebrate.  The fundraiser will be held on September 22nd, 2005 in Boston, MA. The cost is $15/person and $10 of that will go to Hurricane victims.  Not only will you be donating to a good cause - you will have the chance to network with Boston's best marketing professionals, meet AMA board members and above all - have a good time!

When searching for a company in Google - most companies have the hits directed to their homepage.  Wayne Hurlbert of Blog Business World suggests a different strategy for marketing those clicks count.  In his post, Hurlbert points out that website landing pages are often the most neglected sales points and that having a targeted landing page can turn visitors into customers. Hurlbert offers advice on the importance of landing pages and how to make the landing page conversation.

If you spend time writing your own blogs, reading other people's blogs, blogging on other blogs and trying to keep on top of the developments in the blogosphere, take a moment to read Seth Godin's new free ebook on blogging titled Who's There. Godin comments, "Who's There is not an ebook about how to write better or how to follow the traditional conventions about formatting and building a blog.  It's not designed to sell you one service instead of another, either.  Instead, I divide the blog world into three groups and turn my attention to one.  And in particular, I try to sell you hard on how building a blog asset can have a spectacular impact on you, your career, your organization and your ideas."

Blog Bits - Week of August 29th

What’s your favorite marketing, PR or advertising blog?  MarketingSherpa announced the top 10 Best Blogs on the topics of marketing, advertising and public relations according to their readership.  There were 52 nominees judged by 2,065 readers.  Some of the categories and winners included:

·         Best individual blog on the general topic of marketing and advertising

o      Awarded to: Seth Godin’s Blog

·         Best B-to-B marketing topic blog

o      Winner: Guerilla Consulting

·         Best blog on Niche Marketing

o      Winners (tie): Ypulse – Media for the next generation & WonderBranding - Marketing to women

For the rest of the categories, winners, and information on how the Best Blogs were chosen go to MarketingSherpa.com.

A recent post that has received many comments is “The most important word in marketing is…” posted by Scott Ginsberg on Hello, My name is BLOG.  Ginsberg’s original answer was “I have no idea” but then dug deeper into Google to help find some answers.  According to Google, the five most common answers when typing in the exact phrase “most important word in marketing” are:  you, why, commitment, new and free.  Ginsberg follows this list with the question “What do you think is the most important word in marketing?” 

Can you imagine a world where you could produce a product that your consumers really want while avoiding the multiple variables of using a focus group?  It appears more companies are starting to jump onto the WOM and blogging bandwagon, and this isn’t a world that is too far out of reach. Strategic Public Relations addresses the benefits and the feasibility of this concept by presenting Decker’s model of a word of mouth company.

Blog Bits - Week of August 22nd

A new survey, by Jupiter Research, has information on blog, RSS and podcast demographics.  Micro Persuasion's Rubel points out some interesting stats from this survey including the average consumer of blogs, RSS feeds and podcasts is male, earns big buck and, in the case of podcasts, is younger and 30% of companies with $50 million or more in annual revenue have deployed RSS feeds while 28% intend to offer them within the year.   

Thinking of a redesign?  Normally when you hear that word you think of home, office or even web redesign.  With today's booming blog industry, blog redesign is now a new option.  Blog Business World's Wayne Hurlbert addresses this concept by taking a look into his good friend Tony Bloomberg's recent blog redesign of her blog Diva Marketing.  Bloomberg used advice from Peter Flaschner of The Blog Studio, along with her own redesign expertise, to come up with a new look that is "smart, professional, modern and a little playful."  Hurlbert now wonders what effect this redesign will have on the blog.  Will it gain new and larger numbers of readers, will it change the content focus of the blog and you always have to consider will it cause current readers to loose interest?  It will be interesting to see how the concept of blog redesign progresses and how many blogs will follow in Bloomberg's footsteps.

BL Ochman is the panel moderator for "Building Brands through Blogging" at The Power of Blogs seminar.  This seminar, put on by Thirdway, is September 13, 2005.  The discussion will cover topics such as who should blog, how to build a blog audience, how to monitor blogs and more. 

Blog Bits - Week of August 15

By being a member of WOMMA, John Moore of Brand Autopsy was able to get his hands on a preview copy of THE BIG MOO by Seth Godin. Moore comments that this “breezy” read is a compilation of 72 short stories contributed by 32 business thinkers to encourage us to remarkabalize whatever it is we do. What is THE BIG MOO you ask? Godin says, “A big moo is the extreme purple cow, the remarkable innovation that completely changes the game. Yes, a purple cow is what you need, but the big moo goes a step further. In order to grow at the pace the markets demand, you and your colleagues must find the big moo, the insight that is so astounding that people can’t help but remark on it.” 

Not only can blogging help companies know more about their customers, blogging can do the inverse and let customers get to know a company. Blog Business World’s Wayne Hurlbert stresses the importance of blogging in Relationship Marketing. Hurlbert points out that the first step in relationship marketing is instead of trying to sell a product or service immediately, let the customer get to know and trust you first. “People buy from people they know and trust.” By creating a blog for your company, customers are able to get to know your business on a more personal level. As they continue to read about your company’s daily activities, advice, etc., they will begin to feel like part of the company and become more compelled to do business with you. Hurlbert also recognizes that a blog will not only help with building relationships with new customers but will help keep current customers up to date as well.

 

Having trouble with e-mail marketing? A study of 175 retailers, conducted by Silverpop, reveals that a few simple changes to marketers e-mail practices can help them beat their competitors. MarketingVox gives some details of this study including statistics on how companies are retrieving e-mail and contact information and how giving e-mail registrants a choice of material they’d like to receive helps reduce opt-outs.

 

Blog Bits - Week of August 8th

Andrew Lark points to an interesting post on ProBlogger discussing SEO for Bloggers.  Darren Rowse is often asked “How do I get ranked number 1 in {insert favorite search engine?}” Over the next week, Darren is going to share 20 SEO tips for bloggers.  Each tip will be posted on 31 days to building a better blog.   

Steve Rubel takes us to a comical presentation on “If bloggers had been around throughout history.”  The presentation put together by Six Apart takes you through six historical scenarios with a blogging twist! 

Don’t miss Advertising Week September 26^th-30^th in NYC.  Adrants discusses, from the Ad Week press release, some of this year’s keynotes/panels including The Creatives on Broadway, Madison Avenue Legends, Dynamic Duos and Global Conversation 2005.  Be sure to also check out Cymfony CEO, Andrew Bernstein, on September 26^th as a panelist at Forecast 2006, which is a featured part of the second annual Ad Week.

Blog Bits - Week of August 1st

Earlier this week, the success of the Blogher 2005 conference was posted on our blog.  Jay Rosen of Pressthink also posted on this conference.  Rosen includes his notes on the conference which discuss the following:

1)      Making a conversation public – the reasons behind weblogging

2)      The Technorati Top 100

3)      Suggestions for making the top 100 list “more useful”

4)      Citizen Journalism

5)      The Blogging 101 Workshop session on flaming and anger online

6)  Fears assoicated with Blogging

B.L. Ochman promotes her e-report “What Could Your Company Do With a Blog?” on Whatsnextblog.com.   The report is on how companies are using blogs for marketing and PR success and includes topics such as:  Do you really need one, where should you start and how can you build an audience for a blog?

Are you keeping up with the growing blogosphere? PR Machine reports on a recent  survey by Netcraft that found that in July there was a 2.76 million gain of host names over June.  According to Netcraft this was due to "the explosive growth of weblogs, a growing number which are purchasing domains for branding purposes.

Blog Bits - Week of July 25th

Adland points to an interesting series addressing blogs and copyright written by Anne Holland at Marketingsherpa.  In the two part series, Blog Copyright Theft On The Rise and Blog Copyright Theft on the Rise Part II, Holland focuses on bloggers taking entire articles, posting to another site, and then giving little or no credit.  In the first series, Holland says these so-called “thieves” can be broken into two categories:  genuine fans and profit driven bloggers.  In the second series Holland gives some useful advice and hotlinks. 

For those who have just discovered the “Blog World," understanding what blogs are and how they work can be confusing.  Wayne Hurlbert addresses FAQ of non-bloggers on Blog Business World.  Hurlbert goes through 22 questions such as: What are blogs anyway? Are there different types of blogs? What value does a blog have for a business? And what value are blog comments?

About a week ago, on the blog Contentious, Amy Gahran posted the question “What if press releases where outlawed?” “What other types of documents, channels, etc. would you use to get your communication job done?”  Strategic Public Relations took on her challenge and came up with 12 News Release Alternatives.  Some of the alternatives include using infographics, creative writing s