Social Media: Another Channel to Monitor Brand

At this moment, there are many customers, prospects and peers whose are talking about your brand, your business and your competitions in social media. This conversation cannot go away although you do not listen it. On the other hand, by paying attention on what being said in social media, you can protect your brand, find out opportunities and stay competitive.

Here are some reasons why firms should pay attention on monitoring brand in social media:

-          To realize the complaint – By watching for post complaining about your products or services or company, it can provide a chance for you to show how responsive you are and to demonstrate problem-solving abilities.  Also, it provides opportunity to reach out others people who have same concern.

 -          To understand customers’ needs- When people want to make a purchase decision, they are likely to ask the general public for advice. This situation provides an opportunity for firms to reach out with an offer of assistance.

-          To monitor competitors- By knowing competitors’ interaction toward customers, you can gain opportunity to reach out to potential customers who may dissatisfy with competitor’s products or services.

-          To know influencers- Influencers can help firms by spreading an opinion on a brand faster and that opinion express potentially carries more weight.

 -          To measure the ROI – Companies can measure ROI by tracking the mentions of a brand in user-generated content before, during and after campaign, isolating positive words associated with a brand and counting the number of times they were used over a period of time.

Source of information:

http://www.toprankblog.com/2008/05/top-10-reasons-for-monitoring-brands-in-social-media/

The Benefits of Social Media In Marketing Strategy Aspect

Social media can be a productive marketing channel by many reasons. The benefits of social media can be identified as follow:

 -          Gain insight into a community of interest- Social Media can be a good source of marketers to do market research as it builds social communities where customers can interact, share information and make recommendations. 

-          Build brand visibility and authority – Firms can build and enhance brand awareness by participating, providing information and interactions, and paying close attention to the interest and needs of their customers.  

-          Influence and promote products or services – Firms can promote their products or services by providing information of products/services though different social media types depending on the preference of customers.

 -          Generate income from advertising supported site – the social communities which provide good quality and interesting content will be attracted from ad supported sites as they see these social communities as the effective distribution channel.

PR evaluation in “LOVE context”

This concept comes from Philips Young’s blog.  After I read his post, I was impressed by the way he compares “PR” with “Love”.

• How can you evaluate your love? This is some possible answer:

           - Count how many times you have sex with your partner.

           (By the way, you have to realize that people usually have more sex in the beginning of the relationship and after a while it may decrease although the length of their relationship may be longer.)

• How can you evaluate PR? Here is some possible answer:

           – Measure by analyzing ROI (Return on Investment).

From the above possible answers, you can have some interesting result from counting. However, it is not useful measurement. Love and PR are more complicated since both of them rely on relationship which only quantitative measurement is not enough.

In the tricky sight of PR, “PR is lazily characterised as being about creating an image,. But in real relationships, whilst it is always nice to hear nice things, what really matters are actions… does your partner listen to you, are they considerate, do they make you laugh, do they make your life better or worse? Likewise for PR, the real value of an organisation is reflected in its actions – it is not what you say, it is what you do, and deep down PR can’t escape this truth. If our organisations aren’t lovable, they won’t be loved…”

 Ps. Now it’s time for us to express our love toward PR by creating blogs. So, my classmate, do you have any suggestions how we can survive from our tutor’s evaluation?

Source of information:

http://publicsphere.typepad.com/mediations/2007/12/do-you-love-me.html

Could Social Networking replace WOM Marketing?

Nowadays, we couldn’t deny that social networking is a significant element that allows us spread word of mouth. The question is that “Are social networking and professional networking sites trying to replace word of mouth marketing?”

There are two forms of WOM marketing, formal and informal. Formal (which is from a known friend, colleague, family member), WOM marketing is the most influential form. Informal is influential, but it’s strength is determined by the behavioral nature of the recipient of the information. From what I’m seeing Informal WOM (ie. LinkedIn, MySpace, a blog and the like), may be more powerful with negative actions than with positive recommendations because people seem more prone to pass negative messages.

Moreover, while social network could greatly strengthen and reinforce marketing, it could also corrupt itselves. This is a particular danger from the huge open networking community who don’t care and don’t know most people in their networks.

Therefore, in my opinion, social networking can enhance word of mouth but can’t replace it. The key is to realize that social networking is a tool of communication, not the end-all communication itself.

What’s your view on this issue? Do u agree that social networking could replace WOM marketing?

Push and Pull PR : Concept and Implication

What is push and pull public relations?

• Push basically means the tactics used to distribute a company’s news including using press releases sent out via wire services, email or fax. Nowadays, press releases are  distributed to various news website such as Google news, Yahoo news and MSNBC.  Also, push strategy includes pitching the media on story ideas and contributed articles. 

• Pull activities are based on the demand consumers have for online news as well as the search activities of people in the media looking for subject matter experts, researching past news coverage and looking for story ideas. Pull PR makes it easy for the media and your intended audience to find and pull themselves to your news. The examples of pull PR are SEO, social news and bookmark sites, and blog. Additionally, the thing that ties all these social media together is RSS as it can be automatically notified if anything match what readers are looking for.

From the above concept; by having my own blog, , i realize that blogging can be both push and pull PR. This is because information can push via RSS but at the same time people are pulling that information as well. Furthermore, blogs are inherently very search engine friendly and can be effecive as it can create content that’s going to pull people back to posters.

For start blogging, the way we try to leave comments on other blogs is push PR as it can build interest and makes others know us by speading our names. Later, since our names become visible and people start comming to us, our strategies will be transited from push to pull. By accumulating value and network,  we can invest more time into being productive with our articles to make our blog more attractive and enhance readers’ interest. After that, the loyalty of readers toward us will be created and maintained.

By having our own blogs , now we are doing push and pull personel PR strategy without knowing this concept before, aren’t we?

Social networking in recruitment process.

Social network site are web sites which people use to connect or work with each other and to form on-line communities. Students often use social networking Web sites like Facebook and MySpace to express and share some of their wilder experiences during college, but they may be surprised to know that potential employers may also be viewing their online profiles during the hiring process.

ExecuNet, an executive job search and networking organization, conducted a survey of 102 executive recruiters and found that 75 percent of them use search engines to get information about candidates. Also, 26 percent of applicants have been eliminated because of the information they found. 

Is it fair for candidates? Should employers use network profiles in recruitment process?

In the positive side, this practice can make the hiring process easier by getting more information about candiates. Also, candidates can use thieir social network profile to extend resume as it can express their passion and depth knowledge for the area they interest or expertise.

On the other hand, there has arguement that organization shouldn’t use this method for hiring. This is because social networking profiles aren’t resumes as it is used for casually interacting with others in an information setting, on personal freetime. Thus, the company can dismiss the talent prospective candidate due to false or misleading information posted about those candidate on sites.

So, what’s your view on this issue? If now you are looking for the job and you know that many companies view your social network profile when making hiring decision, how do you feel about it?

source of information  :

http://www.interbiznet.com/ern/archives/060830.html

http://www.nbc5.com/nbc5next/13743677/detail.html 

The Top 5 Things Businesses Must Do To Get Publicity In 2008

Yesterday, I browsed through the website to read interesting PR articles. Finally,“The Top 5 Things Businesses Must Do To Get Publicity In 2008 ” written by Monique Caradine, a Chicago-based broadcast media professional and President of Momentum Media Group, Inc., came in my mind. This is because her suggestion makes me feel that the way to start doing PR for any companies is not hard as I ever thought.

Here are the top 5 things she recommended to start the company’s publicity efforts in 2008

1.) Do a media plan.
Planning is the key to media success. Take some time and think about what newspapers, magazines, news shows you would like to appear on this year. Once you’ve identified a few media outlets, decide which topic you want to discuss. Then find out which producer or reporter you should send a pitch letter or press release to. Don’t wait for the media to find you, take your story to them.

2.) Position yourself as an expert.
If you have a wealth of experience in your industry or you know things that other don’t, don’t be afraid to call yourself an expert. Find your niche, bring new and unique information to the market and you can begin to attach the expert title to your name. When journalists and producers see the word “expert,” your chances of getting featured increase dramatically.

3.) Write a “How-to” article.
Take your expertise and put it in a step-by-step format that will allow readers to easily apply the strategies you recommend. Submit your article to websites, magazines and discussion groups and you’ll be surprised how many people you help and how much publicity could result from it. This strategy also helps you position yourself as an expert.

4.) Write a letter to the editor.
If you see an article in the newspaper that you strongly agree with or object to, use that as an opportunity to write a letter to the editor. If your letter gets printed with your name and company info, that’s free publicity!

5.) Do something good in the hood.
When a company or community organization hosts an event that helps other people, an opportunity for free publicity is automatically created. Find a unique way to tie it in with a major holiday, anniversary or commemoration and you could wind up featured in your local paper or on the news.

The use of online video in USA.

 This news is from www.prnewsonline.com posted on Jan 28,2008

A recent survey shows that Americans are frequenting video-sharing sites like YouTube at skyrocketing rates. To no one’s surprise, young people, especially males, are watching online video in droves, but the survey also shows that almost everyone is now getting in on the action:

• 48% of Internet users have visited a video-sharing site such as YouTube, compared with 33% in December 2006.

• 15% said they had used a video-sharing site “yesterday,” compared with 8% last year.

• 20% of men watch a video on a site like YouTube on a typical day, compared with 11% of women.

• 14% of those 30-49 use a video-sharing site on a typical day, up from 7%.

• 30% of those 50-64 have ever visited such a site, and 7% visit regularly.

• 54% of all adults have high-speed connections at home.

• 22% of Americans shoot their own videos, and 14% of them post some of that video online, up threefold since April 2006.

In my point of view ,according to this result, it can conclude that nowadays online video tends to play more important role in American lifes. Therefore, it is another interesting choice of media channels that firms can use to gain attention and reach target audiences besides traditional channels such as television, radio and newsaper. Advertising and public relation activities can be broadcasted through this channel.  Moreover, in my opinion, this media channel is also suitable for small company. This is because it not only can reach target audience but also save cost of advertising.

Student and Celebrity Love for Tap Water on Valentine’s Day

This news is from www.prnewswire.com. After i read it, i found that the public relation method of this non-profit organizaton is interesting.

As the objective of encouraging students to reduce bottle water consumption and increase tap water consumption, “I Heart Tap Water student video contest” has been launched to gain an interest of target audience. This contest started on this Valentine’s day (2008) and the submisssiom for the contest will be accepted until April 14,2008.

This contest challenges students to produce a one to two minute video focusing on a declaration of love for tap water and reason why we should stop comsuming bottle water. The contest will be judged by celebrities and the winner of this contest will receive $1,500.

Moreover, if you are interested to participate in this contest and would like to get more information, please vitsit at http://www.takebackthetap.org.

Looking forward to see you, my lovely readers, as a winner of this contest!!!