Social media engagement: are we making it up as we go along?
Or is it just me? Measuring the effectiveness of brand consumer engagement via social media isn't easy. Add integrating this social media engagement into the overall marketing strategy and the task becomes even more of a challenge. We're looking at each other for answers, and Twitter is full of people posting helpful links; anyone keeping up with them all?
I'm certainly not. Some individuals are stepping up to the plate to offer their advice, which is great and all credit to them, just so long as they are talking about real life cases, as opposed to the theory of it all. I hope this post offers some valuable real life analysis thoughts and tips.
Will Ford's gutsy social media campaign work?
Ford Motor Company was founded almost 106 years ago and it's been through its fair share of ups and downs over the years. But like other auto manufacturers, it's currently in a battle to survive one of the toughest economic environments ever seen.
So it's doing what other great companies have done throughout the years when faced with a great challenge: it's taking a risk. In this case, it's turning to social media.
How not to be the GM of your industry
Yesterday, United States President Barack Obama told American automaker GM what most of us have known for at least the past several months: right now, the beleaguered automaker is in no shape to stay in business.
GM's CEO Rick Wagoner stepped down at the request of the Obama administration and the company has little time to prove to the US government that it can right the ship or it will not be given the additional government aid it can't survive without.
Screw it. Let's read the paper
A friend of mine was recently hired as the ad director for a mid-market newspaper, owned by the Tribune Company. After he was there about a month I asked him, "so how do you plan on selling ads for a dying media?"
"For starters," he said, "I do something absolutely no one in that office does. Every morning I read the newspaper. Cover-to-cover."
New projections show lower internet ad spend
The online ad business was worse than thought last year, and it will be worse than projected this year. Brighter days will have to wait until 2010, according to recent data updates.
The first comes from Barclays Capital, which had already checked in with bad news last December. Over the past year the investment bank has gone from predicting 16 percent online ad spend growth (October report) to a six percent rise (December) and now pegs online ad spending calls for a 2.3 percent increase over last year to $23.7 billion. This joins recent reports from Bernstein Research's prediction that global online ad spend will grow only 5.9 percent, and Veronis Suhler's call of 4.9 percent
Ford revs up social media solution
Ford's social media director Scott Monty might have thought he was off to a safe start with a little audience participation during a recent conference presentation. "How many people here," he asked, "have ever driven a Ford?" Most of the audience raised their hand. "Now how many of you would buy one?"
And the room froze like a rusted carburetor. "That's the problem," he said.
The solution? Part of it is in a social media program that Monty believes will restore some of Ford's lost "humanity" as a brand and continue to put some distance between Ford and the two other Detroit carmakers, Chrysler and GM. "Somewhere along the line," said the company's digital and multimedia content manager, "we lost our personality. We can gain it back with social media."
Ford leads with interactive effort
Against all odds, and against all business logic, the early signs look like Ford Motors might be turning around. Unlike GM and Chrysler it has turned away government bailout money, seeking instead to get its house in order through more efficient operations. And unlike GM and Chrysler it internet effort is meshing with its product line and positioning.
The auto maker has taken at least some market share gains every month for the past year. And although it is prone to the same disastrous numbers that have led to those trips to Capitol Hill and concessions from its unions, some of its numbers are looking up. Ad Age reports that in the first two months of the year, the number of qualified buyers who planned to buy a Ford jumped 16% from 2008. Qualified buyers who intended to buy GM fell 12% and Chrysler 33%.
Turn your catalogue into weather-based targeted ads
All those creative assets gathering virtual dust in your catalogue, database, or inventory system? Tag them snowy, cloudy, sunny or rainy and turn them into dynamically-generated, weather-targeted ads.
Weather site Weather Underground has partnered with Dapper to create WeatherMatch, a real-time system that delivers ads that match local weather conditions, paired with items from a catalogue or other electronic inventory database.
Jaguar and Land Rover make big commitment to mobile
Luxury brands are gasping for air. Automotive doesn't seem to know where its next metaphorical meal is from. And the fabled Year of Mobile has not yet dawned. Yet despite it all, Jaguar and Land Rover have together committed $1.6 million to US mobile advertising.
That's a big, big buy. And it represents only 60 percent of the automakers' total mobile budget.
Mobile ad network AdMob will be running the campaigns, once they stop jumping for joy at company HQ. Earlier this month, the company got a C round cash infusion of $12.5 million.
As an article in Ad Age points out, this level of commitment to the mobile platform borders on the unprecedented. Mobile is still very much in the sandbox of digital spending, accounting for only a small proportion of experimental marketing budgets -- and who's experimenting with money these day?
The report cites TNS Media Intelligence data indicating Land Rover spent $63 million on domestic measured media in the
Site review: TopGear.com
TopGear.com, the sister site to the popular BBC motoring programme, has been trumpeting its relaunch with a series of viral videos seeded on sites like YouTube and Facebook.
The look of the site has been improved, while car reviews, and more blog and video content has been added. The redesigned TopGear.com also displays new and used cars from AutoTrader. This brings it into competition with sites like Autocar and Parkers, so I've been seeing how it compares.
Social media: the best and worst of 2009
Email marketing: six steps to improving customer engagement in 2010
Web 2.0
Graham Charlton
Strategy & Planning
