Newspapers can thrive in a social media world

When the Guardian tweeted  on Wednesday evening about it’s live blog for that evening’s Apprentice show, it demonstrated very clearly how newspapers can embrace social media and use it to their advantage.  Forget print (long-term), integrating social media and using it, is how newspaper brands are going to survive and prosper.  By blogging about the Apprentice live, the Guardian is extending its influence and value and role as a commentator. It’s true that the Guardian understood the power of social media globally early on and embraced it with open arms. I really do hope it propers especially with its new digital first strategy announced recently.

Coincidently, Twitter has also been talking about the influence of social media in newspapers this week.   Twitter has recognized that it has become an invaluable tool for the media when it comes to finding  and sharing stories,  so it has now released a guide that shows journalists how to best use the tool in their daily work. ‘Twitter for Newsrooms,’ has no new info particularly but the fact that Twitter has launched an official guide for journalists is indicative of how social media sources make the news now.

Facebook has also recently undertaken a similar initiative, launching a Page for journalists on Facebook, intended to be a resource for journalists who want to incorporate social media into their reporting, networking and storytelling. The social network also kicked off a journalists’ meetup programme.

It’ll be interesting to see how social media tools and newspapers continue to integrate for the benefit of all. It’s a revolution and it sure is changing everything fast.

Social media sites are walking all over UK laws

To say that our current laws and jurisdictions can’t cope with global social media sites is becoming more and more self-evident with the latest football scandal which escalated over the weekend. Whilst the name of the  footballer was revealed via Twitter and abroad,  the English media were enforced by the injunction to stay schtum. It’s clear that our laws will need to be changed to embrace our new global world of communication and social media.
Whilst said famous footballer tried to obtain a High Court order asking Twitter to reveal details of users who had revealed his identity, legal experts claim it was doomed to failure because the High Court in London has no jurisdiction in California where Twitter is based.
There was an avalanche of online publicity with 100s of Tweeters repeating his name which was further reinforced when the Today programme, BBC Radio 4’s flagship current affairs show appeared accidentally to reveal the footballer’s identity – BBC correspondents then tweeted his name making matters worse.  As the Scottish Sunday Herald also revealed his name, it’s quite clear that the our global world that shares news online cannot be restricted by injunctions.  The law needs to be modernised because enforcing injunctions and controlling the media can’t last.

82 percent of people who have worked in a restaurant or bar own iPods/iPads, compared with 66 percent of people in general.

These figures have been put together by a website called www.correlated.org  Everyday Correlated.org, ask a new question, for example: are you left handed? Then with a clever bit of coding and maths, they work out which set of previous questions can give the biggest discrepancy from people in general and forward you an email with the results.

At this stage the sample groups are only reaching just over 300 so these correlations should be taken as interesting rather than factual and short of combining with a massive social network like Facebook, twitter or LinkedIn, we as communication professionals will not really be able to utilise them.  However, with stats like:

“71 percent of perfume/cologne wearers prefer debit cards over credit cards, compared with 53 percent of people in general” 

you can begin to see the beauty of this site.

Mobile: the next big thing in Marketing and PR

The number of people accessing the internet via mobile devices may reach 1 billion by 2014, meaning mobile will overtake the PC as the most popular way to get on the Web. At the same time, more users will be consuming mobile apps with the mobile app market reaching $8.3 billion in 2014 compared to $3.8 billion forecast for this year.

This makes thinking about the marketing opportunities of mobile and mobile apps all the more pressing and exciting. Many brands are already incorporating mobile apps into their marketing and PR campaigns. Deodorant brand Lynx has launched a mobile app which encourages consumers to share their party experiences with selected friends by streamlining their social media activity in one place. The application will be promoted through the company Facebook page, YouTube channel and a dedicated website and will act as a media channel for future brand and marketing campaigns.

What’s significant about this example is how it makes the most of how the mobile platform allows marketers and PR professionals to interact with consumers regardless of time and location. The increase in mobile internet usage is a great opportunity for brands to engage consumers through social networks, while using dedicated apps and location-based websites to make their messages relevant to consumers. Additionally, mobile apps can be used to create innovative, interactive and engaging forms of content using specific Smartphone functionalities such as multi-touch navigation, cameras, GPS, etc.

Not surprisingly brands and media companies are focusing significant efforts on tapping into the mobile platform. In the era of mobility and social networking, mobile devices will have a profound impact on how marketers and PR professionals communicate with their target audiences.

Social media revolution! So what’s next?

Social networking websites have seen unprecedented growth with communications professionals quick to adopt social media as a new platform for conversations about their brands. However, initiating online conversations with target audiences is often not enough when it comes to raising brand awareness. Identifying social media influencers among these audiences and encouraging them to talk about the brand is as important as participating in online discussions and putting up corporate messages on social networking websites.

The US baseball team Cleveland Indians has successfully used this strategy to build a strong relationship with their fans by becoming the first sports team to have a social media suite in their stadium. The idea encourages social media savvy fans to tweet and blog about their experiences from watching the games and to help raise brand awareness.

Another interesting example of emerging trends in social media use comes from the finance sector. Hedge funds and other investors are considering embracing sites like Twitter and Facebook to rally support for their industry and reach out to small shareholders and potential allies. Small investors are already using social networks to increase their influence versus big shareholders on boards. Websites such as MoxyVote.com allow small shareholders to vote on corporate issues independently or as part of a broader group and strengthen their role in corporate decision making.

As online activism becomes increasingly important for NGOs and private organisations, its potential to move groups of shareholders from passive administrators to active participants should not be underestimated. Engaging audiences as brand ambassadors or cause advocates is a great way of strengthening brand loyalty and encouraging a two-way model of communication. However, this area still has to be explored. As different industries adopt social media at different pace, there is plenty of space for experiment and innovation.

Communications today is about relevance say Brodeur

A great blog from Andy Colville and our friends at Brodeur on the changing world of communications and how ‘relevance‘ now sits at the core of their agency’s mission. Brodeur is committed to helping clients become—and remain—relevant in an increasingly noisy and turbulent environment. Relevance moves people from passive to involved and actually gets them to act. As we know, simply shouting louder does not make you relevant. For communications to succeed in today’s rapidly changing communications world – campaigns have to be ‘relevant’. Here in Europe, onechocolate is doing something similar – listening to each client’s particular communications challenges and then delivering campaigns that have them joining the important conversations and getting them talked about in all the right places. Like the blog Andy and good luck with the new vision, it’s very exciting.

Social Media – A British Love Affair

Hold the press everyone – it’s finally official. Social networking is now top of the list when it comes to our favourite British online pastimes. It’s even overtaken portals such as the BBC iPlayer, ITV Player and Sky Sports.com in popularity.

The stats are massive – last month Facebook accounted for over 12.46 per cent of all internet activity and there were 2.4 billion visits to social networking sites just in January 2011 alone.

Similarly Linkedin has more than 90 million registered users around the world and there are over 1 billion tweets a month on Twitter.

It seems the tipping point has finally come, with social media leaping ahead when it comes to influencing our online lives. And there’s apparently no end to this British love affair.

But despite all the numbers and stats, one fact remains clear – this revelation surprises no-one.

Social media is so much part of our daily lives, most of us don’t even think about using it. So it’s hardly a shock it’s dominating our internet usage.

In such a short time social media is now firmly in camp ‘Status quo’ – now that’s surprising!

Are user made virals good for the brand?

When brands attempt to create “viral” content, they have very little idea of the impact they will have.  A vast number of blogs and articles discuss the effect of viral content in great depth making it an almost academic subject.

One thing that is clear, is that when a video, for example, goes viral, if there is a brand involved, it can create a host of positive results and brand views.  When the old spice guy videos hit our computer screens, he changed the image of old spice, and this caused a huge upturn in sales. 

An incredible example of when the consumers do it them selves, is one of onechocolate’s favourite videos that has been bouncing around the office this week.  so head over to our home page and watch our video of the week.

Social networks? Watch out for friends’ posts while you are searching for information online

Last week Google announced that it was planning to implement changes to its Google Social Search platform to include posts from people’s online friends into its standard search results. The social search results, which previously appeared at the bottom of the page, will now be mixed throughout the list of results based on their relevance. Another interesting change in the search engine functionality is that users will be prompted to connect their social networking accounts any time Google’s algorithms find a public account that might belong to the same user.

As social networking profiles become more interconnected, people will be able to see publicly shared links posted by online ‘friends’ and connect their Twitter, YouTube, Flickr or Quora accounts. However, the upgraded social search engine will not include posts from the social networking giant Facebook. This does not come as a surprise as the two companies have a long history of trying to ‘steal’ each other’s market share with Google tapping into social media and Facebook developing its own email platform.

Despite excluding Facebook, Google’s Social Search platform will offer access to much more information about users than it was previously available. Some people will question whether this is entirely a good idea. Google seems sensitive to the privacy issues and allows users to opt out of the social sharing service by not connecting their online accounts to the search platform. However, if any of your online friends is ‘connected’ and shares or retweets your posts, they will become publicly available in the search results. Moreover, it remains uncertain how you would be able to control who sees to your online posts once you have connected your social networking profiles to Google.

Overall these changes highlight a number of trends which will potentially impact social media PR and marketing. As social networks are increasingly woven into online search engines and online profiles can be easily linked, businesses will be able to reach wider audiences and niche customer segments. SEO practices will be adjusted to take into account the rising importance of social networks for placing content in the top ranking of people’s search results. This will result in more intricate and subtle integration of social media tools into PR and marketing campaigns and will place higher importance on online networks.

Talking to people or talking to the press?

In an article written by Vikki Chowney in New Media Age, she comments on Andy Coulson’s resignation as David Cameron’s Director of Communications.  The piece is directed at the relationship between the PM and Rupert Murdock, BSKYB.  It suggests having such a close relationship is fantastic but can leave Cameron open to attack if the news network gets into trouble in a way similar to the News of the World’s phone hacking issue.  And follows by suggesting Cameron can use social media to connect directly to the people he represents.

Vicki Chowney concludes by saying:

“I just hope that whoever steps up to the role next has more of an idea of what can be achieved online. It’ll certainly never be the only answer, but right now it doesn’t even feel part of the equation.”

While brands are searching for new and innovative uses of social media and the people of the UK integrate it into their daily lives more and more, it seems a sensible suggestion that an organisation like a political party should also have a high profile social media strategy.  And one which allows some flexibility for ministers or advocates showing in their own words what is happening in the political circles.

It does leave us with an open question: which people in the public eye are using the social networks effectively and which ones are not?  Who would you suggest?