Rolling Talks

Listening - Attentio Case

For the IAB Net Café on Social Media I asked Attentio to present their case on the Mobile industry to illustrate the very first step to make while developing a Social Media strategy: listening. I find this case very powerful in demonstrating not only who is speaking about the brands and how brands are being discussed but especially in showing the correlation between buzz and volume of conversations. For an audience of marketers, slide 15 only is worth..well listening. Now I realise that the case needs to be demonstrate for full understanding. Any question, or need for in-house presentation, let them/me know.
Ignite  Social Media is currently started a series of posts on Social Media Mistakes. Guess what's mistake #1? "Not listening. Not responding. Not good". Be it with free or pro tools, start listening today!

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IAB Social Media Net café- Notes

Last Thursday I introduced the first Social Media Net Café for IAB Belgium. 112 attendees- average presence for a hot topic and for me definitely my biggest audience ever (Im not precisely a showwoman :). I wanted to do it a bit differently: after pointing out my key messages I introduced the 4 other speakers as an illustration of the flow marketers could keep in mind to remember the 'big picture of Social Media (more in following post). Here's how my intro sounded like:

• I started by pointing out my own mistake i.e. entering SM by the little door of blogging, focusing on one tool only makes me miss the big picture for a couple of months. I notice the same mistake in the majority of my clients' approach today. Picking up one or two tools, they completely miss the big picture of SM and lose time - money and trust too- in developing a successful approach to SM.
• Then I showed this slide, mentioning that 90% of the presentations I attended on SM start with this picture. I admitted mine too till I realised showing this slide would be answering my clients' first question: "which ones shall I be using?". And this is not the good question to start with. First question should not be focused on tools.
• I then switched to this picture Laura Fitton showed us at Going Solo. I guess I use it with a similar meaning as the one she meant as I remember precisely when I took a note while listening to her to use this to make the strategic framework crystal clear:  don't focus on the tools/the ingredients. Focus on the benefit you're going to deliver to your audience (which might just be as for this cookie brand, never an ordinary day again). The first good question is focused on people and objectives. Thats when I mentioned briefly the POST framework.
• But before starting with the POST framework, I urged them to check one more thing. If they plan to join the party out there with this mindset - here comes slide 3, also stole from Laura's presa- they're not going to have fun, and neither will the other participants. " Make sure you 're ready to see what is out there to be seen, hear what is out there to be heard, talk with who is out there willing to talk with you" . Which made it a perfect transition to Attentio monitoring business case.

I guess it was kind of surprising as a lot of people would have expected numbers, tools' description, impact, reach and so on. I felt I really have to stress this key messages though. While it minds sound obvious when you read it, believe me, the gap is huge between theoritical know-how/ evidence and practical approach. Thanks to @pistachio for visual inspiration ;)

Slide to keep- Not a kids world anymore

Quickly going through an nth study on Social Networking - found here . Stumbling upon this slide I'll use and re-use, take my word for it. I love the colors. And on an other note, there's hardly a day going by without me mentioning "its not a kids' world anymore" and till today I've been using this slide (source: Nielsen Netratings august 2006):

Now I hope I read the first slide correctly - as being the standard age breaks reported by Nielsen Online - independently from this particular study. Won't check (now) - hey, blogger's priviledge :-)
Please point me if I'm wrong. An other blogger's priviledge . Its week end after all. Time for the Chimay bleue!

Club Med & Social Media

Working for Club Med is probably the best way I could find to get the feeling breaks are just a call away. That is at least true for happy bloggers like Ine who's enjoying a short trip at Chamonix to share one of the great Club Med villages 'haut de gamme' experience - with a special focus on gastronomy, wellness and design- not speaking about skiing... This is the first step the brand is taking to seriously engage with Belgian bloggers- and surely not the last one, stay tuned.
A special thanks to Adhese for developing an other première on the Enchanté network this time: a banner giving life Twitter and FlickR updates posted by Ine (like the one you can see on my blog as of today) will be displayed on a dozen of influencial Belgian blogs till April 9, day Ine will be returning from the trip. This action would not have been possible without Interel, Club Med PR agency, which strongly understands and proactively integrates Social Media in their daily clients' strategies. My pleasure to work with you all guys.

Talking too much

here, there (actually there I could not make it anymore but maybe in May, we'll see..) and not enough time to write on the blog. I know... Frustrating :-)
Btw, working on a Social Media Net Café for the IAB on May, 22nd so if you have suggestions, feel like participating,etc. let me know. Agenda is almost closed but lets be flexible.

While Im on the subject, Attentio is co-hosting an Academy with Emakina on my favorite topic. Half-day event followed by lunch will be held in Place Flagey on the 21st (March yes - second round in April 17th in Gent). Practical presentations on SM, focus on business cases , impact on strategy and of course monitoring&measurement. If you want to attend, drop me an e-mail.

User Generated Content - Cherry&Cake production

Last October, Alain Caviggia asked me to challenge his view on UGC. He was creating a presentation for the Customer First Belgian event where he planned to present a less known activity of Cherry&Cake (guess what :-), the creative agency he founded with my ex-DAD-now-LBI-colleague and friend Sven Nijs. He wanted to discuss the content with me: we spent hours kindly arguing about the best practices and benefits of UGC and how brands should take advantage of it.

Talking with this funny living advertising encyclopedia learned me a lot and I guess at the end I was the one who was being challenged. It took him a couple of weeks to post his presentation and a couple more for me to mention it. But now that their brand new webiste is ready, the time's right. Enjoy.

Social Media Starfish

In last October, Scoble introduced his Social Media Starfish concept, stressing something in his introduction I experienced when I first came into Social Media back in August 2006, entering by the little 'blogs door': It took me a couple of months to realize blogs were part of what I then called "a bigger niche" -thats when I changed my first tagline from 'how brands should use blogs' to my actual one, but still want to change all my categories..- and a couple more to realize the niche was indeed a complete different mindset of communicating, radically changing how marketers should and eventually will target their message and approach their audience (this marketing focus being just a small part of what Social Media is all about, but the one I'm dedicated to).

Funnily enough I'm stumbling on it while reading a ClickZ article stressing the birth of a new army of Free Agents, leaving traditional firm employment in favor of independent employment with a clear mission to educate companies and share knowledge about SM. The emblematic story of RT summed up in 2 posts :-)

Dont fear customer reviews

"Consumers generally had good intentions when writing reviews. Nine out of 10 respondents said they wrote reviews in order to help others make better buying decisions. Nearly 80% wrote reviews in order to reward a company."

25% of US retailers added customer reviews options on their sites for this Holiday shopping season.

A good sign to let go indeed. More on emarketer

Forrester Consumer Marketing forum

On Thursday, I'll be attending one of the most exciting events of the year with one of my business partners, Simon Mc Dermott from Attentio. Thursday's night is blogger dinner time with - among others- Jeremiah Owyang , Peter Kim and others Spanish celebrities ;). Unfortunately our favorite one won't join. Amaia, we'll miss you! Can't wait to be there. Plus qu'une fois dormir :-)

Foops, first social Belgian network for newborns

"Belgian Foops!, the first social networking site for GENERATION Z, has already signed up more than 12,000 members (both born and unborn), even though it’s still in private beta mode. On Foops! parents can place pictures or sonograms on behalf of their offspring, and assist tiny members in filling out their profiles (including favored brands for diapers, toys and apparel), after which they gain access to virtual playpens where members communicate, poke and twitter via visuals and symbols. Each playpen is extensively sponsored by multinationals, some of which have plunked down more than EUR 1 million (approximately USD 1.45 million) for the privilege to interact with infants 24/7.

The only thing worse than being talked about...

To-the-point article to illustrate Oscar Wilde's hypest quote in Social Media: "The only thing worse than being talked about is NOT being talked about.” Quite funny to read this today. For a couple of reasons :-)
From Hello My Name is Blog/Scoot: "If your customers are not ACTIVELY telling their friends about your business…That means you're probably

1. selling a dead brand.

2. different, not unique.

A new health forum in Brussels

Tonight I attended an event to the Brussels Parliament. Nothing to do with the actual political situation in Belgium- though the Health minister for Brussels Capital - one of them- did mention it - but maybe he was just planning to have an early exit ;) I was invited by Jean-Luc Raymond to discover a great project for parents and professionals who have to assist kids affected with diseases requiring a stay in hospital.
Hospichild is an initiative from the CDSC asbl. The initiative is quite unique - Jean-Luc made some research and could not find any equivalent worldwide. Tonight the team were officially launching their forums - one for the parents, the other for the professionals. It's their first - and surely not their last-attempt to use social media tools and they're very enthusiastic about it. This is a beautiful project. I wish them the best. And for Belgium too.

78% of Marketers Say Social Media Gives Competitive Advantage

"According to a recent Coremetrics survey, titled "Face of the New Marketer," 78% of marketers indicate that social media initiatives give them a leg-up over the competition. Fifty-eight percent of marketers have implemented CGM or reviews in the past 12 months, and 31% have launched a blog." More from BizReport

How to market- hum sorry, converse - on Facebook?

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Forrester Charlene Li is one of my favorite readings. This time she released a presentation on how the brands should market on Facebook. Good reading showing:

1. it's no longer a kid's world (you know, I know, but they still don't :-). 12% have children under 16! Yes  ma'am!
2. some best practices to leverage Facebook power within marketing strategies. But why does she include bannering in it? - especially given the title of the presentation stressing the fact that Facebook marketing requires communicating NOT advertising. ?!?

Adverblog recommends this reading along. Seems like a more in-depth analysis of the platform. Printing will be required though to make the best out of it..

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Rolling Talks Social Media Workshop

That's it: what kept me real busy these last 2 weeks is over. I've been lucky enough to organize my first Social Media Workshop for the consultants of The House of Marketing, the Belgian highly reputed marketing expert consultants' company. Many thanks to Véronique Vergeynst who made this possible and who helped a lot with the organisation phase. During the 3 hour workshop, I presented two parts: one over Social Media landscape from a user point of view, the other was about the impacts for marketers. I also invited 6 great professionals to share their experience with social media.
Thank you again to all my passionate speakers, Julie from Skynet, Diane from Dell, Nathalie from Electrabel, Pierre from Virtual Words Translations, Simon from Attentio, and Jacques, stuck in Milan, but will be for next time ;) ( Have a look at the agenda here ).

If you're interested to have this workshop - or a similar one- home let me know.

On Circle again

Flipping through one of my favorite books, Naked Conversations, again:

" It began with conversations. Then we got into broadcast media. Now we are going back to conversations." It's a full circle" - Terry Catchpole, the Catchpole Corporation

Except that now conversations are global...

About circle and connections

What do I do now when I want to take a 15min break? I go to Facebook you dummy! But I also remember I have a nice blog to update so, here's my little 5 min to my dear Rolling Talks (Yep, I started with Facebook).
While doing data research -I'll tell you on what but one post at a time please- I found this - well I don't remember how we call that, anyone? - and it makes me think of the Microsoft Circle of Media. I don't know their reason to choose that name but I like the idea they put a bit of everything you'll read below inside. 
I don't remember either where I stole it... Nothing to do with getting older though, just a stupid cold, thanks for caring.

Connections we make
Influences we earn
Relationships we build
Conversations we conduct
Leveraging newfound knowledge, we
Engage in new projects, collaborations...friendships. And then, we make new connections..

"I'm not just a kid- I'm a producer, publisher and promoter'

Interesting reading on the impact of SN in kids life and the influence on marketers. Chosen bits:

• "Kids want more freebies, more connection and more production utilities, and brands have the opportunity to jump in and facilitate." 
• "the majority of teens are spending more time with new media than traditional media."
• "Nearly half (47%) of 9-17 year olds, including more than half (55%) of teens, report participation in one or more advertiser branded activity types in the last month."
• "Overall, 20% of teens report adding branded content to their own websites in the last month"

On what they want:

In London, darling!

That's where I am for a couple of days, meeting some business partners and enjoying some time off with my friend Jo. We'll be posting our new nice discoveries on Eurostar recent blog - Belgian initiative- Placetobiz. Jo is a frequent Eurostar traveller and she already contributed to the platform when she discovered the Oyster card. She likes the idea of sharing tips with the fellow travelling business community. My 1st tip will be about shoe repair and where to find them- my Tunisian shoes did not survive their day-long walking in East London yesterday... Im now in the business lounge of our hotel- only one free connected computer in this high standing hotel! What a shame! But since Im a guest here I wont complain nor mention it publicly ;-0... As Im typing this, Im eavesdroping a conversation with ' forum, discussions, negative comments in...positive comments since..competition...' I love this city ;-0

When Art comes from women generated media

Picture this. You're one of France's best-known living conceptual artists. You're 51 and visiting Berlin. Your mobile beeps, it's an email from your boyfriend. In a hideously self-absorbed message about human emotion, he dumps you electronically, saying it hurts him more than you. He signs off: "Take care of yourself." You're heartbroken. Then you think of its potential as art (more...).

Take care of yourself, Sophie Calle

note:  I would have loved to express myself on a 'take care of yourself' blog :-)

Who said PR agencies are slow to catch on social media?

While doing research for my first contribution to the Belgian Press Relations Center's newsletter, I was reminded 3 studies done recently by major international PR companies in the social media field:

• 'The business value of blogging' - a 30 page- pdf by Mark van der Wolf from Lewis PR (which was also referred to at the Euroblog07 in Gent and at the IAB European Blogging Workshop). Delivers an interesting 4 step guide to blogging and insights on the European and Asian cultural differences concerning blogging attitude.
• An explicit 'Corporate blogs are still outsiders in Belgium one page by Leads United (which initiated the debate over blogging organised by the BPRC in April).
• and the 'New wave of advocacy' from Weber Shandwick, introducing the 'badvocates' neologism, opposed to the brands' advocates.
  

The greedy me particularly enjoyed Mark's "Blogs come in different flavors".
Implying that " any decision on blogging should therefore start with an in-depth analysis of the business benefits that the various types of blogs might bring to a company." Mark, you've been warned, I'm going to use this- probably unquote ;-)

All of them are definitely worth reading. And now time for a guide on ' Crisis blog- the best practices' :-)

Social software, shifts behind the hype

Interesting reading this morning on the significance of social software (complete paper here by Danah Boyd, from UC Berkeley).

I often hear questions and remarks - often from techies profiles- on the what seems to be continuous renaming of existing concepts. I remember one of my former colleague's  reaction when i started to talk about blogs in our company: 'Blogs are CMS. What's all the fuzz about? Whenever marketeers discover a 'new' technology, they change its name and that's the end of it."

True enough, Danah points out monetization can indeed announce the end of the majority of social sotware as we know them today, but she also defines shifts 'social software' implies  (in comparison with 'previous wave of new technologies' ;):

Are social networks a sales tool? You bet!

I had a very interesting discussion this morning with a Belgian CEO over social networks. I met Pierre Leonard from Virtual Words - a translation company- last May during a 'viral marketing' breakfast and I noticed him because he asked a question even marketeers are too few to think about: 'How can a blog be a marketing tool?'
So when we decided to meet to discuss it further, I thought I'd would be the one to answer questions. Expectations...Wrong, we were told before :-) Pierre is a convinced user of social networks and what he had to say prompted dozens of questions on my side.

Shortly stated, here's a Belgian CEO's learnings on social networks:

Honoured member of 1st Belgian blogging experts

I was invited by Jean-Paul De Clerck, founder of i-scoop and owner of interactive marketing portal Digimedia, to join the first Belgian network of blogging experts. I'm delighted to join them and can't wait to share our experiences - particularly with JP, Robin and Philippe - don't know yet the others members Tom Cuylaerts and Michel Dirckx. And to embody a Voltaire's daughter ;-)

More info on our services on Business Blogging :-)

Ever wanted to know how a good social networking site looks like?

Check out now Imagini! Beautifully done, nice recommendations (also a bit more and a bit local could do.. but still beta version and yet almost 3 million users - after 2 months of launch and 6158 registered Belgians), great feelings; so these days, I appear to be on the  'easy rider' side : always taking life how it comes. No I don't get fazed by life, i just breeze through'. :-)

Here's part of my profile.

And my visual DNA

Make yours (in 5 min through nice pics) and let me know how much we match.

New craft, new words

Tonight's discovery: social mediafy, v., like in “And 'social mediafy' your marketing and public relations to get more people talking." Source: Foghound

Guy Kawasaki on how much Truemors costs

How he built a Web 2.0, User-Generated Content, Citizen Journalism, Long-Tail, Social Media Site for $12,107.09

Have a look at Truemors here.

IAB European Congress - the after

So much happened during the last 2 days I did not manage to blog during the congress (pity though because the wifi connection was excellent- kudos to the Belgian IAB team for the organisation and specially to Sara). Interact Congress was a great place to be and meet  'colleagues'  from ...euh yeah.. all over Europe.

I've been confirmed 2 things these last 2 days:

• First i'm no citizen journalist : I find it difficult - and even rude - to listen, discuss and type all together and was petrified when Robin kindly offers me to video interview some of our big leaders -I'd rather have informal chats and share thoughts without having to check the information or make sure my notes will be crystal clear - which they're certainly not enough for a full transcription here&now.
  
• Leading me to second point: I really love the social part of my new social media consultant cap : I've even been appointed CNO for Chief Network Officer :-) - thanks Simon, I particularly enjoy it because I defined my motivation as being a connector between people, between brands and consumers (yeah I know we heard that before, I did not make a video out of it but I have my black notebook to show ;).

We'll find all the presentations on the IAB Europe site and more content on Digimedia. As for now, what I keep in mind from the presentations and the talks I had with Jaap Favier and Javier Rodriguez Zapatero - (thanks to both of them for playing the game) is:

• Contact is king
  
• From mass media to masses of media
• From demographics to behaviour targeting (you have to go beyond demographics to offer your consumers the tools they'll want/be happy to use and ask for their feedback while developing those)
• Consumers want the internet to be a mirror of themselves
• Deliver what you promise

Or eat what you preach. Obvious enough. And yet...between what we hear and what we are delivered there's too often a big big gap. Obviously a lot to be achieved to put in practice the best ways to create the interaction within social media. Who said talking about them' Overhyped and undervalued'? :-) We could add for the brand side : 'Underpromise and overdeliver'.

IAB European Congress starts this Monday

I'm very happy to join the event as a 'reporter' for Digimedia. When i was 14 i wanted to be a reporter but my mum told me it was no job for a girl and certainly no job for a girl wishing to make money - financial autonomy was indeed part of the girls upbringing :-) I changed my mind for cosmonaut...

Lovely Heidy - from Heidi Lambert Communications - reached me to see if i wanted to meet some of the speakers and patiently explained to me that jumping on them in between interviews could still be an option if i rather have it my way but that she'd be happy to help.

There's someone i'd be particularly delighted to meet and lovely patient Heidy is trying to set it up : the man is Jaap Favier, Forrester VP and Research Director, who's going to speak about 'social computing'. If there's any question you'd like me to ask him, or if you feel like joining, drop me an e-mail or post here.

How's Twitter about?

What is social computing and why you don't know where to begin ...

Social computing is defined by Forrester as "a social structure in which technology puts power in communities not institutions". I guess social media, user generated content, consumer generated media all apply to it.

Yes I started reading Charlene's new report and there's already great stuff to share on pages 1&2 :-)

The question is not merely ' Shall I - the brand- use all these new technologies? ' but 'How can I can use them best according to my customers' behaviour? Her answer : know your target better, watch them use these new tools, and define 'what kind of relationship you want to build with them'. Then you decide what and how.

That's indeed a good starting point for you if you don't know where to start*. Rest reassured, you're a crowd out there. Why?

Charlene points out 3 major factors:

1- You don't understand why/what/how your customers are using these new technologies

2- You don't have enough experience on what/how you can use them and what can work for you

3- You can't keep up with the fast growing of new medias (once you've managed Youtube, Twitter is already the next thing )

hhhm,, love it, going on with my reading

* but as someone would say is not because the technologies are changing that the marketing approach has to. Or has it??

Why Forrester is a good example of a good blog's use for a brand?

I know and read only one of the Forrester's blogs, their social technologies specialist's, Miss Charlene Li's. Why only this one? because right know, it fulfills all my needs, and even more. Charlene uses her blog in a perfect way:

1- She connects with Forrester's clients, but more, with Forrester's potential clients,

2- She's the human face of this research-faced company,

3- She spreads the word about what they are doing/studying,

4- She engages people to participate by sending her thoughts, experiences about a particular subject

5- She uses the feedback she gets to integrate in her study, to find new possible orientations,

6- She gives back, provinding her readers with new findings and even full reports, for free - well at least if you're small as Rolling Talks.

I just received her new 'Social Technographics' trends report. I found a reference of it at I-merge blog, while doing research over the blog ROI and asked to receive it. Simple as that. I'll post about it, but if you want the great stuff now, it's here. Courtesy of Tracy Sullivan, Forrester's senior PR specialist.

Thanks Tracy, thanks Charlene & yes, thanks Forrester