Whatever happened to the 'Social Media Election'?

In the wake of Barack Obama's use of social networks in the Democratic Primary and US Presidential Elections, everyone was expecting the current UK General Election to reflect the growth of social media. We now find ourselves over halfway through the official campaign and such a shift is yet to happen.

On the contrary, at present 'old media' seems to be winning out over new. The television debates have, to date, had a bigger impact on the campaign than almost anything that many generations can remember. Social media use by the major parties has been limited, with many of the major figures spurning the opportunity to connect directly with voters through the medium.

Last night I went to a talk by Justin Webb, the former BBC North American editor and presenter for Today on BBC Radio 4. Justin was comparing the UK and US election processes and provided some interesting insights on both similarities and key differences.

I took the opportunity to ask for Justin's view on the role of social media. He is clearly not a big advocate, often berating his co-presenter at the BBC, Evan Davies for using Twitter. His feelings were that it will be some time before social media makes its presence felt in a positive way in the British electoral system.

"The key impact Obama's use of social media had on the US elections was as a news story", he told me. "The media all said, 'look, Obama's using social media', and that provided him with more coverage.

"The other interesting influence of social media was how it benefited Obama's fundraising efforts. It allowed him to attract millions of small donations from ordinary people. I think the Liberal Democrats may already be benefiting from this here. Perhaps social media could have a big impact on political fundraising in this country."

At present though, Webb believes that social media's role in electoral politics is limited. "We need a generation to get old with social media for it to have a major impact in general elections", he said.

Don't underestimate the power of a politician's gaffe during the closing days of the election to have a much bigger impact than ever before, thanks to social media . With camera phones and Flip cameras at the ready, any slip up can be both shared globally and repeated ad nauseam irrespective of how many people witness it in person. The news media pick the stories up and run with them as people share them on Twitter, Facebook and Youtube.

This may not be the 'Social Media Election' many people expected, but new media can still have a role to play.

Connecting is not Enough....The Newsletter

A new edition of Connecting is not Enough - the newsletter came out this afternoon and you can enjoy all of the networking wit, wisdom and just a little April fooling here.

This Easter edition includes:

- Social Media and the UK General Election - How the Chancellors were tweeted

- 'Looking for...' . Two new candidates looking for your help finding them work, and a vacancy to be filled.

- Tips on following up, getting testimonials and taking the perfect picture.

- Working out your Networking ROI

- Some Easter fireworks from Greece. 

Win tickets to The BIG Event in Hertfordshire

We are just a couple of weeks from The BIG Event in Hertfordshire. As well as Chairing the event I am also appearing on a Social Media Panel along with Ecademy Founder Penny Power, Twitter specialist Mark Shaw and Media Coach Alan Stevens.

Taking over the MC duties while I am on the panel is my good friend David McQueen. David wants to make sure that he asks the right questions of the panellists, so he'd like to know what questions you'd like us to answer.

I have three tickets to The BIG Event to give away to readers of my blog, Facebook and LinkedIn pages and newsletter who come up with the best questions to ask the Social Media Panel.

Please send your questions to me at andy@lopata.co.uk. Closing date for entries is midday on Thursday 25th February and winners will be notified that afternoon.

Connecting is not Enough: The Newsletter

The latest edition of the Connecting is not Enough networking tips newsletter is available to read online now.

The first edition of the New Year includes:

- My predictions for 2010

- Listening for people

- Asking questions on social networks

- Getting started on LinkedIn

- All you need to know about Man Flu

Don't forget, if you want to receive the newsletter into your inbox every third Thursday, you can subscribe using the button at the top of this page.

GUEST BLOG: Do It Like Shaq

Every now and then I invite someone to share their relevant expertise with readers of this blog.

In a recent edition of his excellent 'Media Coach' newsletter, Alan Stevens looked at how US PR Expert Amy Martin built a Twitter strategy for Basketball legend Shaquille O'Neal that has seen him build two million followers and built further press coverage as a result.

With his permission, I have reproduced Alan's piece here.


DO IT LIKE SHAQ


One of the greatest examples of bringing the power of social media into the world of PR has been the promotion of the Phoenix Suns basketball team, and their star player, Shaquille O'Neal, during his time there. The person responsible is Phoenix-based PR expert, Amy Martin (known as @digitalroyalty on Twitter). She now helps to manage Shaquille's online presence, using a range of sophisticated measurement tools.

Due largely to Amy's efforts, Shaquille has close to two million Twitter followers, and is regularly mentioned in the traditional press as an example of how to use social media well (creating yet more buzz).

So how does it all work? I spoke to Amy on several occasions to find out. A crucial factor is the speed and detail of monitoring the response to Tweets and updates on various sites. Amy has refined the functions of measurement software to allow her to see the effect of a single message. She calls it Return on Influence (a new form of ROI), which is distilled down to an index, showing whether the efforts have had a positive or negative impact on the brand, as well as by how much.

Amy has developed a Twitter strategy called Random Act Of Shaqness, which includes:

Identifying influential fans and websites;
Helping Shaquille create individual Tweets;
Capturing events using audio, video and photos;
Sending out messages and links to influencers.

Every single activity is tracked and measured, up to and including click-throughs to Shaquille's website, and whether a purchase is made online. Amy refers to the whole system as an online ecosystem, in which she can detect hotspots of key influencers or groups of fans, who can be targeted in later efforts.

The Phoenix Suns have also benefited as a whole from using social media. They have over 25 employees using Twitter, and each of them chats to fans (and future fans) on a personal level. They were probably the first sports organisation (or possibly the first organisation of any type) to digitally reveal the faces and personalities behind their logo. On their first Twitter night, in January 2009, the Suns were featured on over 300 websites, ESPN TV, and were mentioned thousands of times in Tweets. The exposure gained, relative to the effort put in (inviting fans in to meet the players) was huge. Not only that, but the positive mentions of the brand (analysed by the software mentioned above), soared, culminating in a large article about the event in The New York Times.

Now that's the way to do it...

As well as reading Alan's excellent newsletter, you can learn more PR and social media tips in his new book Ping: How to tap into the power of traditional and social media to massively improve your profile and your profits.

LinkedIn Made Easy

In my workshops, talks and coaching sessions at the moment there is a great deal of interest in how to make the most of LinkedIn. This has been reflected in a growing number of books and training courses on the subject.

One such book is 'LinkedIn Made Easy', an e-book from Linda Parkinson-Hardman which not only offers a very simple step-by-step guide to using LinkedIn but through which Linda is aiming to raise £400,000 for charities The Hysterectomy Association, Kiva and BCCT.

At 42 pages Linda's book is a quick and straightforward approach to LinkedIn, taking you through some of the key steps to using it strategically. At £4.99 it's certainly very useful and it's all for a good cause.

The Perils of Ignoring the Conversation

Yesterday I gave a presentation at The Retail Conference about The Importance of Networking to Retail. In the presentation I focused on retailers' use of social media and the importance of engaging with customers who are already talking on the various social networks.

During the morning panel session, the panelists were generally dismissive of the need to embrace sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Representatives from Waitrose and Fortnum and Mason felt that their customers would not be using such media and they would be talking to the wrong people.

I thought I'd have a look to see just how much people are talking about Waitrose and Fortnum and Mason online at the moment. I searched Twitter for conversations about both companies and, as I expected, both were being talked about.

Indeed, thanks to two media stories about them in the last few hours, there were quite a number of comments about Waitrose in the last hour.

A key point of my presentation was that people have always talked about retailers to their friends and family. With the advent of such media, the conversation is now global and an individual's reach is far greater. It's often repeated that bad news spreads more quickly than good and people commonly have gripes about retailers.

I won't deny that there are dangers for big business engaging in social media. But if you're not in the conversation, you can't respond to what is being said about you, good or bad. Retailers can no longer hope that people come to them with their problems. A proactive attempt to join the conversation, engage with their customers and have a say in what is said about them can make all of the difference.

Labour Appoint 'Twitter Tsar'

The Guardian report this morning that Labour have appointed a 'Twitter Tsar' to encourage their MPs and candidates to embrace social media in the run up to the General Election.

After the success of last week's 'We Love the NHS' campaign, political parties are beginning to recognise the power of social media as a tool to engage with a disaffected electorate and to create a viral effect to take their campaigns into homes in a way never previously possible.

Political leaders have been heavily criticised in recent years for being remote from their electorate. Social media offers an immediacy and opportunity to engage that has been lacking, and an increasing number of politicians have been adopting social media independently.

It has taken the parties a long time to completely embrace this change. First signs came over two years ago, led by Barack Obama in the States but also by some parties in the UK. I first wrote about the trend in March 2007, here.

It will be interesting to see how effectively Labour, and their New Media Campaigns Spokeperson, Kerry McCarthy MP, use such tools, and how the Conservatives respond, despite their leader's recent public criticism of Twitter.

Can you Tweet with your Hands Tied Behind your Back?

I met with a client last week to look at their networking strategy. They were particularly interested in how online networks, such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, could benefit their business.

As we looked into opportunities open to them, it became clear that they were well set up to use online networks very effectively to engage with their customer base, make key connections, boost their profile and reputation and to drive traffic to their website. They also had the advantage of a member of their team who is a very talented writer and a freelance journalist in his spare time.

One key strategy I recommended was for this member of staff to start a blog about their industry and share some interesting, challenging, funny and possibly the odd controversial story. They could then use Twitter and other sites to signpost the blogs and, assuming the copy was engaging enough, spread the word.

A major obstacle then became clear. The UK/European office of this company has its hands tied by their head office in Australia. There is already a company Twitter account, but if they want to add to it, they have to send the tweet to Australia first for approval. This loses any advantage of spontaneity and engagement that Twitter offers.

Any other blogging or social networking is also restricted by Head Office, who are more concerned with protecting the company brand than the advantages offered by new media.

I do not wish to dismiss the importance of a company's brand and the threat posed by social media. However too many companies are focused more on the control of such media than on the opportunities they offer the business. Those that have taken a risk have, on the whole succeeded.

With the media coverage of Twitter recently, more companies are creating their own Twitter Feed. While brands that automatically have a following may benefit from this, others lose the point. With a few exceptions (such as news feeds) people want to follow people on Twitter. They will warm to and engage with an individual sharing their thoughts, actions and responses more than they will with the one-way broadcasting approach taken by companies.

Why not allow more than one employee to each have their own Twitter account? It shouldn't be difficult to set ground rules to protect the company from damaging behaviour. In the meantime, potential customers are more likely to build brand loyalty from the relationships they build with those individual employees.

Control over social networking hampers their effectiveness and perhaps it is time for companies to trust their employees rather than control them.

Word of Mouth on Steroids

I saw this blog on the 'Get Elastic' blog yesterday (ironically through a post on Twitter). They refer to the advert below by Faberge in the 80s. The concept of telling friends to spread the word about your business hasn't changed.

Thanks to social media though, the numbers have.

The Power of the Social Web

I have just seen that an article I recently wrote has been linked to on the internet by people in four continents, all in the same day.

If you still think that Twitter is purely a gimmick and a passing fad, it may be time to think again!

Mixing Business and Pleasure

In the last few months, there has been a rise in the number of people boasting two profiles on Facebook. Concerned by the horror stories in the media about people being fired, losing jobs or being thrown out of college because of indiscrepancies caught on the social web, many are making the choice to keep their personal and business lives seperate.

While I understand the reasons behind this, I think it is a shame. For the first time ever it has been made so easy for us to educate our personal network about what we do in a non-intrusive manner. No-one is suggesting that you force your business down other people's throats, but how many opportunities are missed, both to help and to be helped, by not sharing our business lives with those who care the most about us?

Inviting your professional contacts into your personal life also has its benefits, along with some pretty obvious dangers! After all, we've always been taught that 'people buy people', here's your chance to let others know more about you, the person.

I have found that I've forged a lot of deeper relationships with others in my professional network because we have found that we share similar passions outside of work. As I mentioned, there are obvious dangers, but common sense and a degree of moderation should, in most cases, help protect you.

What Kind of Twit am I?

A very cold weekend and an extremely snowy Monday morning left me with the time to explore something I'd promised to do for some time. I'm now officially a Twit (or something like that, I'm still getting used to the jargon!)

Despite months of resistance I have finally joined the ever-growing Twitter community. I'd originally passed on yet another social network, with concerns about the validity of sharing single sentence status updates, telling people when I'm going to the loo and of replicating what already takes up far too much of my time on Facebook.

The language of ReTweets, Twitbacks, TinyURLs et al also put me off this other universe. Yet it was always going to get me.....one way or another.

In November I signed up for a webinar on Using Twitter for Marketing from Hubspot and I have subsequently listened to fellow business experts such as Alan Stevens and Rod Sloane tweet about how much Twitter is benefiting their businesses. Despite rumours to the contrary, it was these influences and not the promotion of Twitter by stars such as Jonathan Ross ('Wossy') or Stephen Fry that lured me in!

So, early impressions? I've been surprised at quite how many people I know who are already on Twitter. A lot of them I knew about but there was clearly a party going on and I hadn't accepted my invite! From a relationship-building perspective, it should certainly help consolidating some existing relationships and develop new ones by providing further opportunities for conversation and interaction.

There seems to be a strange etiquette on Twitter that if someone 'Follows' you (they opt to receive all of your updates), you Follow them in return. This can mean you find yourself following all manner of people in who you don't have much interest, and create more 'noise' which could hide the updates you really want to see.

Many would argue that you do need to build and expand your network on Twitter to really gain the benefits; the style of connecting certainly appears to be a lot more random than other networks.

Twitter certainly provides a great way to access new blogs and information of interest, as people share news and articles with each other.

The major concern is the level of distraction. I think it's important to understand how much time needs to be invested in Twitter to get a return and what that return is likely to be. Time will tell.

There are a range of resources on how, and why, to use Twitter. I particularly like this blog by Nikki Pilkington explaining how she uses it to all new 'Followers'.

I would be interested in your views on using Twitter. Are you a heavy Tweeter? Do you get much from it? Or have you avoided it like the plague? If so, why?

For the Twitter experts, what would your top Twip be?!

There's no doubt that Twitter is here to stay, for the moment anyway. As I type this, the conversation on Radio 5 Live is all about how Twitter is being used to discuss the current weather conditions. The cold and snow may have adversely affected some businesses. I get the feeling that Twitter isn't one of them.

Government Adopts Facebook - a Step Too Far?

I had an interesting meeting with a group of policy makers and a press officer from Northern Ireland’s Department for Employment and Learning (DELNI) last month. I have been talking to the team there for a couple of months about their pilot to become the first Government Department to have a Facebook presence.

With the creation of the new brand pages on Facebook, this creates a great opportunity for larger organisations to appeal to a key demographic group in their own backyard. The challenge, as discussed in my previous blog here, is to do this without driving away the very people you want to attract, or sit with few ‘fans’, like the friendless geek at a party.

The guys at DELNI want to attract back to Northern Ireland people who may have left in their teens to study in Scottish and English universities and who have never returned. They are also keen to encourage other people to look to Northern Ireland as a land of opportunity. They want to paint a rosy picture of the country as a place of opportunity and a lively social scene.

But is it a step too far for a Government department to expect to become popular on Facebook? There are already concerns that the way businesses, and older people, have embraced Facebook will lead to younger people finding new places to play. If we start to see The Inland Revenue, The Ministry of Defence and The Home Office in the playground, what effect will that have?

Interestingly, the age group that DELNI want to attract are older than Facebook’s original demographic, having already left university and settled into permanent employment. They are far more likely to be in their mid-20s and older.

The first challenge I put to them was how to make the page viral. If they are going to spread the word and attract fans, people need to feel proud of the association and happy to shout their involvement from the rooftops. I am delighted to see that, since we met, they have changed the name of the page from ‘Department for Employment and Learning’ to a much more simple, ‘Northern Ireland’. After all, who wants to tell their friends that they are a 'fan' of the Department for Employment and Learning?!

The next area to focus on is the content and it will be interesting to track their success in this area. The page will not thrive if the content is posted by the civil servants behind the campaign; it needs to be user driven. Facebook becomes viral when people’s friends see that they have posted content elsewhere on the site. If all of the comments and threads are posted by DELNI and not by their fans, it is merely an information portal and not a social network.

So, is this a step too far? Or an encouraging sign of Government responding to changes in communication and being creative in their approach to reaching their target market?

The real power of online networks lies......offline

An interesting combination of statistics stands out from the Ecademy survey released today. Over half of the respondents (56%) state that they get less than 10% of their business through online networking, with only just over 10% getting 50% or more from that source. At the same time, nearly 40% of members get over 50% of their business through offline networking.

Nothing unusual about that, you may think. After all, it would be fair to suggest that it is easier to generate business through offline networks, where you meet fellow members face-to-face, than an online network such as Ecademy. It is much more difficult to build personal relationships virtually after all.

The interesting stat comes further down the survey. The vast majority of respondents never attend any of the offline networks listed, with Chamber of Commerce faring best (41% of members attend sometimes, 59% never do) but most other networks failing to attract a sizeable majority of members who replied to the survey. So, where does the offline business come from?

Now, I'll put my hands up now and admit that I'm not a mathematical genius nor an expert in analysing such surveys. There may be a very clear statistical explanation for this apparent anomaly. If there is, I'm sure someone will point it out for me! I prefer to look for an explanation elsewhere, looking at what makes networking effective.

As I mentioned earlier, business networking is far more powerful when you can build relationships in person. Ecademy is a fantastic tool for building your profile and initiating new relationships. In my experience, however, the best relationships, and most likely opportunities for business, come when you get to know each other away from the online platform.

I was asked today how I make membership of a network like Ecademy pay. The site helps me to build my profile and the reputation for my expertise. Without doubt, however, any direct referrals for business have predominantly come from people I have taken the time to meet and build a relationship with. This is where the power of BlackStar lies, with members constantly meeting with each other. There are probably 1-2-1s between BlackStars every day of the week, and a lot at weekends as well.

To be truly effective, online networks should be treated as a means to an end, not the end itself. Somewhere to both initiate and manage relationships, where the relationships are developed in person, face to face. I believe that this explains the discrepancy in these statistics, people have made the connections online but converted the business by networking offline...in person.

Get a Lift From Online Networking

I was recently interviewed by The Sunday Times for an article looking at how small businesses can use online networks, such as Ecademy , LinkedIn and my own Word of Mouse.

The resulting article was published in the paper's business section today. You can view the article in full here.

Coca-Cola is less than refreshing

As more companies are alerted to the power of engaging with their audience through Social Media and as Facebook launch their new advertising strategy in New York, it is interesting to see just how wrong the big brands can get it.

Recognising that users of Facebook, MySpace and other social media will not respond positively to old-fashioned,in your face, advertising on the sites, savvy companies are setting up profiles, clubs and using viral videos to make an impact. So many have made great strides, yet Coca-Cola seem to have demonstrated perfectly how to get it so wrong.

The Technobabble Blog this week highlighted Coca-Cola's Facebook page. Quite why anyone would sign up as a 'fan' on their page is beyond me and very worrying (although I am sure that the whizz kids on their marketing would have envisaged more than 489 people expressing their devotion).

The quest is surely made no easier by their attempts to engage with their young, socially aware, cutting edge audience in their company overview:

The Coca-Cola Company engages in the manufacture, distribution, and marketing of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups worldwide. The company offers nonalcoholic beverages, principally carbonated soft drinks, as well as noncarbonated beverages. Its beverage products comprise bottled and canned soft drinks and beverages products. The company's products also include beverage concentrates, such as flavoring ingredients and sweeteners; syrups, the beverage ingredients produced by combining concentrates, sweeteners, and added water; and fountain syrups that use equipment for mixing the syrups with carbonated or noncarbonated water for immediate consumption, and are sold to fountain retailers, such as restaurants. The Coca-Cola Company also produces and markets noncarbonated beverages, including waters and flavored waters, juice and juice drinks, energy and sports drinks, teas, and coffees. The company markets its nonalcoholic beverages under various brand names, including Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Fanta, and Sprite. It sells its finished beverage products primarily to distributors. The company sells its beverage concentrates and syrups to bottling and canning operators, distributors, fountain wholesalers, and fountain retailers. The Coca-Cola Company was founded in 1886 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.

Increasingly businesses of all sizes are looking to Facebook and other similar sites for their commercial value as well as just a social tool. Failing to recognise and respect the nature of the media and its users will render these attempts futile.

Making a Fortune from Facebook

I have been interviewed for this Yorkshire Post article following Microsoft's purchase of a stake in Facebook.

Is the money being spent on social networks reaching unsustainable levels?

Social Networking in Plain English (Yayyy!)

Through the Technobabble blog, I've come across this very quick and easy guide to what social networking is and why it's so important. It's a very basic overview of what networks are and how social networks make them so much more effective and accessible.

The filmmaker, Lee Lefeever from Common Craft has similar quick and easy introductions to RSS, Wikis and Social Bookmarking. If you've wondered about all of the funny words at the end of each of my blogs, like DIGG THIS! and DEL.ICIO.US, then watch the excellent Social Bookmarking video.

Business Networking on the Social Web

Social Networking blogger An de Jonghe has just published the results of an interesting survey into the use of Social Networks worldwide. An based the results on the responses of over 850 people from 54 countries over the first seven months of this year.

There are a number of interesting results in the survey. The first thing to take note of is An's disclaimer that the survey cannot be considered as scientific. It would be interesting to know how the survey was publicised as some of the demographic results are surprising, not least Belgium being the most active country for social networking and three business sites coming above Facebook as the most popular networks.

Accepting, therefore, that this is probably a reflection of a more mature and business-focused demographic than the average Facebook user (the typical respondent is a male parent between 30 and 40 years old), we can use this survey as an indication of trends in social business networks.

What can we deduce from the survey?

- Initially the survey suggests that people don't want to pay for their social networking memberships. According to de Jongh, only 20% of respondents were prepared to pay for membership. However, this needs to be put into the context of the question. Respondents were asked whether they preferred to pay for ad-free membership or whether they would prefer a free account with advertising. This 'either/or' choice does not tell us whether they will pay a membership fee if they can see value for money. With social networking sites like Facebook offering membership for free, it will be interesting to see which cost models prove popular for social business networks.

- Most respondents join primarily for business opportunities. de Jongh suggests that the future is bleak for niche 'hobby' sites if they don't offer business opportunities, with just 16% opting to join a social network because it caters to their hobby. However, in 'Marketing to the Social Web', Larry Weber suggests that many people will join social networks because of shared interests. Is there a difference in the way different generations use the web?

- 40% of respondents feel it is important to be able to use their own language when posting. With most of the major social networks having a global reach and using English as the common language, is there scope for country-specific networks and can they possibly be as successful given the global e-community? The success of Bebo in Ireland, where founder Michael Birch recently suggested they have a huge impact in the market, suggests that this is possible. In contradiction, three-quarters of respondents to the survey consider themselves global networkers in response to the question 'would you consider joining a network outside your own country?'

Meanwhile, the majority of respondents (54%) don't participate in offline meetings. See my post on Anti-Social Networking for more thoughts on this issue.

The full survey can be found here.