Micro Persuasion

Customer Service is the New PR

Four years ago I wrote this...

"One day CRM systems will bolt in blog monitoring functionality so these posts automatically get funneled to the right place. For now, they need to be handled onesie twosie - but handled nonetheless."

Now today Salesforce.com has added Twitter customer service tools to its already formidable suite. Forrester Analyst Jeremiah Owyang sees Twitter's future as social CRM.

However, I don't think Twitter will be the only game in town. There will be lot of venues to vent, all of which can have an impact on brand reputation as journalists discover all of this conversation through Google, Twitter Search and other search engines. GetSatisfaction.com is growing. I wrote about this in our most recent white paper (see trend one).

In addition, I cover this in my first vlog on the Edelman Facebook page (forgive the acting!). My takeaway is that this isn't just a CRM concern, but rather it requires close coordination between customer service and PR. There's a great study on this from SNCR. What's your view?

Inside Obama's Social Media Toolkit

Edelman's Digital Public Affairs team in DC has authored an awesome white paper that takes you inside the Obama campaign. You can download it here (PDF). The white paper imparts several lessons: start early, build to scale, innovate where necessary and more. You can find other Edelman white papers on our site. This includes 9 on 9 - key consumer trends for 2009 (also in PDF format).

Radical Transparency: Three Lessons Apple Can Learn from Google

Google isn't exactly known as the most transparent company in the world, but they're light years ahead of Apple - a company that in some ways they share a kinship with when it comes to their reputation for innovation. Apple (or for that matter any big company) can learn a lot about radical transparency, customer service and PR from Google, even though they're hardly perfect here.

First, Google does a great job of telling you where they're fallible. Many Google products have pages that list the bugs that they know need to be fixed. GMail and Google Docs are just two. You can visit each of these pages for an update and even let Google know if you're experiencing one of these issues.

Apple, by contrast, just lets you know when they've fixed bugs, but leave it to bloggers to dig into the code to see just what was fixed. Most Apple software update release notes from Apple simply say "Bug fixes."

Second, Google, like Apple, has forums where users can voice their opinions about new features, gripes, wishes, use cases and more. Google employees actively participate in these forums and you can track their activity. Here's a page that shows you all of the posts that a Google Reader forum guide, "Roger," has responded to. Apple does the same in its forums. Here's a list of all of the postings that Jason L has responded to.

However, the difference between the two is that users can rank the posts of Google employees or even report misconduct. I give credit to Apple for participating, however, I wished they would let users rate employee postings.

Finally, Google has a ton of blogs. Most of them link back to the bloggers who link there. Some are beginning to allow for comments. Google Blogoscoped aggregates them here. Even better, all Google blog posts clearly identify the employee who authored the post and their title.

Apple meanwhile has one blog for its much troubled MobileMe services, which I am probably dignifying by calling it that. It's bascially a news feed of product updates. The authors aren't identified. Worse, there are no comments or links to other bloggers.

There are other companies in the tech industry that go even further than Google in their transparency - namely Dell and Microsoft (an Edelman client). However, Google and Apple are often closely linked in their cultures. The reality is, though, that when it comes to customer engagement, they are quite different.

Even if Twitter is Just a Geek Haven, It's Still Very Influential

There's been an interesting discussion over the last few days about Twitter's reach. WSJ reporter Kara Swisher surveyed her dinner party and found out that no one there uses the micro-blogging site. Meanwhile Gina Trapani on Lifehacker is running a survey asking if Web 2.0 benefits only the tech elite.

Now let's look at the data. According to figures just out from Hitwise, Twitter is the 439th largest social networking site and 4309 overall. To be sure, growth is booming. But the site is still niche.

So all of the signs generally point the same way. Most of the social networking and online communities are definitely geek havens. MySpace, Facebook and YoutTube are three that have gone mainstream. So does that mean these smaller sites, like Twitter, are not worthy of a brand's time? Hardly.

Geeks are by far more influential than any other online contingency, except the big media. Geeks pass the puck from Twitter to blogs back to Twitter. Eventually it hits Techmeme, Saul Hansell at the Times takes notice and then the whole world knows.

That's why smart companies like JetBlue and Zappos are legitimately engaging on Twitter. It's becoming a front line for customer service. At a minimum, every consumer facing company should be monitoring the chatter. Even better, participating can cut problems off at the pass or even better foster evangelists. The numbers may never tell this story. For more, see Chris WInfield's mini case study.

Three Emerging Digital Careers to Watch

About a month ago, I wrote about three career tracks that won't exist in a few years - at least as I see it. Now let's take a look at three emerging digital jobs that will become increasingly important in the years ahead.

The Chief Customer Experience Officer (and those who work for her)

Want to know if a company is a good witch or a bad witch? It's easy. The web knows. Google, the media and online communities are littered with tales of companies that have exemplary products and customer service. However, it's often easier to find those that have been vilified for the opposite. That's the thesis of Pete Blackshaw's forthcoming book - Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3,000.

Here's an experiment. For fun, enter any company into this special Google search engine I set up and let me know what you find.

Brands are increasingly recognizing that customer experience is everything. They will follow the model that Zappos and others set in optimizing online and offline channels. Digital touch points, for many companies, will be the most critical. Since August 2006, customer experience job listings increased 57%, according to simplyhired. (User experience is directly related and equally important and I believe will increasingly become more integrated with the total customer experience.)

"customer Experience" trends

"customer experience" jobs

Digital Storytellers

Harvard Business Review last month noted that most executives cannot articulate the objective, scope, and advantage of their business in a simple statement. "If they can’t, neither can anyone else," HBR posits. That's not good.

Remember, much of the developed world is coping with The Attention Crash. If a company can't tell pithy, authentic stories in the right places at the right time to the right people, someone else will. For more on this, I highly recommend the book Made to Stick.

Search may change that. Google is downplaying SEO and increasingly rewarding those who create quality content. This includes the pros/media, amateurs and brands. Blended Search - which integrates noteworthy videos, news and images with web results - is winning over users, according to Jupiter Research.

Net, as Jason Calacanis notes, there is a big market for people who know how to create or cultivate compelling content that pulls in people. To that end my employer is starting up Edelman Studios - a virtual content house that will identify online talent and pair them with brands. Many in the Hollywood community, ex-journalists and advertising/PR creatives will orient their careers in such a direction. Don't be left behind. There's plenty of need here.

Super Crunchers

Here's another book recommendation for your summer reading list (sorry, I read a lot so my clients don't have to). It's called Super Crunchers. In the book, the authors explain through case studies how companies that are able to mine through mountains of data and make it work for them usually win. Another great book on this topic is Moneyball, which I have written about before.

The digital space is the most addressable media and marketing platform ever. However, most marketers are not “quants” and data is largely under utilized by many companies.

Data mining and visualization tools reduce risk, make business more efficient and measurable. Great rewards will come to those who know how to dig into data and make sense of it all and can parse that into insights that help companies optimize the dollars they put online. Be that guy or gal.

Those are three emerging careers on my list. What's on yours? The one topic I did not cover is developers, who I suspect will continue to remain in high demand for years to come.

The 4-Hour Workweek - Behind the Meme

I am starting a new semi-regular feature here called Behind the Meme. You've heard of the VH1 show Behind the Music. This is similar. Each post will take a look at a meme (e.g. an idea that spread through conversations) and how it started in the Web 2.0 sphere.

This time I am looking at Timothy Ferriss' new book, The 4-Hour Workweek. I just finished listening to the unabridged audiobook on my iPod Shuffle,which I use as my go-everywhere audiobook player. You can get it at your bookstore or on iTunes. (Some report glitches with other iPods. Word is the Audble.com version works fine.)

Even if you never plan to leave the rat race, Tim's book is outstanding and sure to be popular on beaches and iPods this summer. In it Tim describes in great detail how to use 80/20 rule, Parkinson's Law and "batching" to reduce the need for email, meetings, phone calls. This is music to minimalists and GTD fans like me.

Ferriss also talks about how to put big chunks of your life on autopilot with everything from personal outsourcing to online businesses. Some of it is applicable to everyone immediately, other parts - like selling much of what you own to go live in Argentina for a few months - are not for the faint of heart.

Tim's book hit store shelves on April 23 - just a few weeks ago. It debuted at an astounding #123 on Amazon.com and rapidly ascended the charts. As of this writing it's #21 overall. So how did Tim do it? Was he on Oprah? Did he have huge media coverage or an ad campaign to support the book? Nope. He did it all via word of mouth on blogs. (In the past Tim has outsourced his PR needs to his virtual assistants India, who he uses to book media interviews. It's in the book. Think about that!)

The following chart shows how The 4-Hour Workweek has sold since it debuted on Amazon ...

As of this writing there are exactly eight news stories about the book Google News. And some of these, like WebWorkerDaily, are blogs. That's not exactly what you would expect for a book that's ascended up the charts the way The 4-Hour Workweek has. I bet the media will pick up on this book soon.

Think about the competition too. This is the beginning of the busy summer book-selling season when everyone is looking for vacation reads. Tim is competing with everyone from Lee Iacocca's new leadership book to Don Rickels' memoir. The 4-Hour Workweek is ahead of both of these on Amazon, as well as perennial favorites Getting Things Done and The Tipping Point. Amazing for a first-timer.

So how'd he do it? By bonding with geeks like us. Tim spoke at the SXSW Conference in late March. His brief, five minute presentation set the blog world on fire. Plus, he built relationships there with lots of influencers. He also relaunched his own blog around the same time.

In April he spoke for just five minutes at the Web 2.0 Expo Ignite event. The speech was so riveting, he was invited back to the stage the next day for more. He also hooked up last month with Brian Oberkirch for a super podcast, which I highly recommend. The buzz only continued to build from there. Uber-blogger Merlin Mann, who writes the incredible 43 Folders productivity blog, picked up on the podcast, so did Problogger's Darren Rowse and the meme was off to the races.

All this buzz increased pre-orders for the book, which is why it debuted so high. Finally, earlier this month Robert Scoble got hooked and now all of his minions - myself included - are on board.

Here's a look at some incredible charts I pulled from Technorati to illustrate just how much buzz there has been for the book. The first chart shows mentions of Tim Ferriss (I used a few variations to compensate for misspellings). The second does the same for the title of the book.The lessons?

• Go where bloggers go
• Be there with a message and a story that will appeal to their interests, not yours
• Build and maintain those relationships through your own blog too

Disney.com Re-Launch Has Widgets But Still No Web 2.0

Disney has finally lifted the curtain on the big Disney.com overhaul. The launch was teased in Bog Iger's keynote at CES. I opine on it in my column in this week's Advertising Age, however I didn't see it live until just now. Unfortunately, it's a walled garden that does nothing to bridge to other communities where people already publish. They clearly don't get what Web 2.0 is all about.

One of the big features that Iger touted in the keynote are Disney's widgets. Well, Disney.com definitely has widget functionality in Disney XD. It looks and feels a lot like Mac OS X Tiger. Perhaps Disney was influenced by having Steve Jobs on their board.

However, unlike YourMinis or any other similar platform, you can't add your own content. Oddly enough you can do this on My ESPN, also a Disney site. They let you add the RSS feed of your choice.

What's worse, there's no way to take the Disney widgets and embed them in your own site. Just think of how many millions of citizen marketers would be thrilled to do so! I realize this site is targeted for the younger ones, but some of the TV and movie content is for teens. And many pre-teens and teens have their own blogs and MySpace pages. Look at Jeff Jarvis' son Jake for example. He's a wizard.

As I wrote in the AdAge piece, in this new era Disney's greatest opportunities online lie not in creating bigger walled gardens but in spreading its content far and wide. This means giving rabid fans the content they want where they want it. Yes, Disney needs to get comfortable seeing Mickey and crew on blogs and YouTube. It also means that Disney will need to allow people to adapt its work so they can express their own creativity. That didn't happen and it's too bad.

More in the piece on AdAge.com.

American Express Rolls Citizen Marketing Effort

American Express has launched a promotion called 15 Second Clips that invites participants to submit a 15 second ad about their lives. It's themed after My Life, My Card ads featuring celebs.

PodGuide TV, while praising this effort, is skeptical about the citizen marketing approach overall. He says that it backfired with Chevy's attempt to allow users to make their own spots. I disagree. Even though the Chevy effort resulted ads instead about gas-guzzling SUVs, we're still talking about this campaign. 

The Amex effort offers a highlight reel of the submissions as a feed (RSS). The campaign judges are acclaimed directors Martin Scorsese and M. Night Shyamalan. I like this idea lot, but I feel that Amex could have made it stronger by letting consumers judge the campaigns, not just the celebrities. In addition, they might generate more submissions by partnering with a large video community like YouTube or by letting vloggers enter via a special tag like My Life, My Card.

It should be interesting to see where this goes.

McPunims

McDonald's is launching a nifty marketing program that gives customers a chance to be featured on its packaging. You can enter online. All you need to do is submit a personal story about anything you love in 100 words or less plus a digital photo. I like this idea a lot. Co-creation is the way to go these days. Where this falls short though is that it does not utilize any of the tools that consumers are already using to share - e.g. their blogs, myspace pages, Flickr photostreams, etc.

Journos Take to the Web to Save The Merc

A group of journalists from the San Jose Mercury News have launched a Web-based PR campaign to appeal to readers to help them Save The Merc. This is a very smart word of mouth advocacy campaign. The journalists are tapping into the paper's base of influential reader evangelists in an effort to preserve what they have built.

(Via The LA Times.)

Institutional Power Declining, Forrester Says

In a breakthrough new report Forrester Research is declaring institutional power on its way out thanks to the adoption of social media technologies. The report surmises: “Individuals increasingly take cues from one another rather than from institutional sources like corporations, media outlets, religions, and political bodies. To thrive in an era of Social Computing, companies must abandon top-down management and communication tactics, weave communities into their products and services, use employees and partners as marketers, and become part of a living fabric of brand loyalists.”

This is one of Forrester's most forward thinking pieces of research to date. I highly recommend purchasing it. It covers more than just the implications on marketing, but also for IT and enterprise technology vendors.

The report reinforces the results of the Edelman trust barometer. For marketers, the analyst group recommends we should: let customers be the brand; become aggregators of content that's not our own; and become more transparent, but not too open that we endanger consumer privacy. This is consistent with the find, listen, engage, empower model.

The following chart provides a snapshot of all of the different social technologies that are contributing to this change. Clip and save it. It's a roadmap to the new centers of gravity with some handy stats to boot.

(Disclaimer - Forrester provided me with a free copy of the research and asked that I not distribute it in full but that I could quote from it.)

 

Technorati Tags: Forrester

Make Your Own Steve Jobs Keynote

Yes, you too can play Steve Jobs and make your own Macworld keynote.

(Via Philipp.)

Advertising 2.0 Whitepaper

I haven't read this yet, but after a quick scan it sure looks interesting. Paul Beelen has written a whitepaper on Advertising 2.0. It looks at the influence of technology in advertising, marketing and media, and the threats and opportunities triggered by the revolution of the new, social internet. Hmmm, sounds familliar!

Technorati Tags: Advertising

Call 1-800-2Podcast Your Gripes

Buzz-o-phone is aggregating opinions about products, services, brands and companies via an 800 number (1-800-591-5375 to be exact). All diatribes are instantly available to the world as a podcast. Here's the feed if this floats your iPod's boat.

Make Dreams Come True

NOTE: This item is cross-posted on the Media Center's We Influence blog where every so often I will contribute to the conversation.

"What can companies do to invite the customer in?" sez Ogilvy PR's John Bell. The answer is really simple. Marketers need to stop thinking about themselves. They need to decipher what their customers want to achieve in life and then help them realize their dreams.

This is hardly a new idea. Some of the most successful marketers over the years have - gasp - used TV advertising to convince consumers that they had their best interests in mind. Take Apple's iconic 1984 commercial, directed by Ridley Scott. The ad told consumers: "Hey, we know you hate PCs. They suck. So come join our revolution and we'll squash them together." Apple used its advertising to tell consumers a story. It illustrated that Apple can make their dreams come true.

Flash forward 22 years. Today you can't do what Apple did with advertising anymore. Consumers are suspicious of not only marketing, but corporations overall. Their BS detector is on red alert. They only trust each other.

So what marketers need to do is empower. They need to help their best customers literally achieve their dreams and then shower them with so much genuine love, that they go out and spread the gospel to others.  Marketing is no  longer like carpet bombing, but more like gardening. Grow a tree and hopefully it will plant seeds and become a forest.

Zoom And Go Features iPod Friendly Travel Reviews

Peter West is over the moon for a neat site called Zoom and Go that archives consumer hotel reviews. The neatest part is that you can download to your iPod consumer-generated destination videos. I don't see any RSS feeds yet, but would love to.

Technorati Tags: iPod, Video

ESPN Wipes Ad Fees, Bad Reviews from iTunes

An update to my earlier post on the ESPN ads on iTunes. A reader points out that the “This is SportsCenter” ads that were sold on iTunes are now completely free (iTunes link). ESPN has waived the $1.99 fee it had been previously charging. However, they also appear to have wiped out all of the initial negative reviews over the fees!

Technorati Tags: Advercasting, Advertising, ESPN, iPod, iTunes

The Era of Me2Me Communications

Richard Edelman has a really smart byline up about what he calls the Me2 Revolution. In a nutshell, Edelman says that companies need to reinvent the ways they communicate, moving from top-down to an inside-out model. In other words, he's telling companies to mobilize their employees and customers to spread their gospel. He's also suggesting that employee blogs and podcasts be part of this mix. Amen.

Technorati Tags: Edelman, Richard Edelman

Ten Things Disney Can Teach Us About Blogging

I spent this past weekend hanging out at the Walt Disney World resort with my fellow blogger, Josh Hallet. This was my first visit in eight years. (I also was a cast member here for a few months in the early 1990s.) Disney World is a great place to study the principles of service. They breed millions of advocates worldwide. A visit here can also teach you a lot about blogging. Here's a sample of what I learned this past weekend from watching the WDW cast at work. Much of it can be applied to blogging...

It's OK to be Goofy
Always be upbeat
Remember, you're always on-stage
Little touches make a big difference
Deliver on what you promise
Good ideas should come from everywhere
Develop a service philosophy
Uphold key traditions
Communicate a compelling vision
Share the spotlight

PS - The next time you visit the Resort, be sure to check out the WDW Today podcast. It's unofficial and filled with great insider information.

Technorati Tags: Disney, WDW, Walt Disney World

Why Being Approachable is Good for Business

Scott Ginsberg has opened my mind to a really powerful idea in his talk today at the Word of Mouth Basic Training conference. He runs a company called HELLO, my name is Scott. What's remarkable about Scott is that he has been wearing a nametag for over five years straight, 24/7. Honest.

During his talk, Scott discussed how people and companies can become more approachable. He outlined four key principles...

Do something cool
Be that guy (e.g. the go-to person on a subject)
Cultivate fans, not customers
Own a word
Market yourself daily

Scott's story is quite amazing. And clearly blogging can make companies more approachable, which turns customers into fans and so on. For more to chew on, see his blog and podcast and his model.