Before Obama’s Cairo address on June 4th, publicity was geared towards asking people to sign up for text messages of the speech in Arabic, Urdu, Persian and English. Which was nice research, given the growing prevalence of cell phone usage in the middle east (over 44% penetration, ’08 eMarketer). And what about the home team? US cell phone couldn’t subscribe, due to laws prohibiting State Dept. funding to reach a domestic audience, but anyone could receive the frequent updates via twitter & facebook.

Salon.com comments that over 2,000 people gave a virtual thumbs-up/likes this! to the speech’s closing lines – and also on the video “Muslim Americans Serving in the US Government” that joined the White House YouTube channel and website posting the same day.

- Sarah

As you may gather from my  tone, I am not a fan of this approach. And I’m struck by the paradox inherent in MediaPost’s article relating the findings of the new Knowledge Networks report (Check out the link to the mediapost article here:  http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=106445) that ‘social media is ineffective re: advertising’.  For ‘advertising’ as we old reach-n-frequency folks have known it, I’m sure that’s true.   But the Knowledge Report study finds that good ole’ Word of Mouth is still the #1 promotional force in consumerland.  What’s word of mouth?  People talking.  TRUSTED people talking to each other.  And what’s social media?  The same bloody thing.  Advertisers, to be sure, will not be the main thrust of those many, many conversations, and some who try too hard to insert themselves into organic conversations come across as either boorish or clueless.  That’s the reach and frequency game.  Conversations – real ones – are different.  But I challenge the notion that social media isn’t an effective playground for smart marketers.   Word of mouth has always been trickier – and more demanding of actual human understanding, goals and motivations – than the broadcast model.  Why was anyone expecting social media to be different?  Don’t write off the medium because you expected it to function like a TV set.  Rather,  start looking at your customers are people.  They’re not always buying your product, but they are always being themselves.  How can you be relevant to them?   Actually relevant, rather than ‘relevancy powered by quantitative research points’?

Isn’t that the beginning of any good conversation?

- Sarah

2. You cannot undo a post. On top of that, Twitter posts are crawled by Google. By no means do these facts call for censorship, but a second of pause before submitting a post does not hurt.

3. People follow updates to hear information that appeals to them. If you are managing a corporate/ branded account, stick to appropriate topics and don’t veer too far off course. If you do want to broach a new topic, take it slow and give your followers as much context as 140 characters allows.

4.  Frequency matters. Ever notice that you start glossing over updates from a user if they over post? While some leaders of the Twitter pack can get away with 30+ posts a day, stick to updates that people will want to pay attention to. That way…they will.

5. Tone matters. While 140 characters is not a ton of space, it is sufficient to establish a tone and POV.

6. Diction is your friend. Saying what you mean to say can be difficult. On Twitter every word counts. Make them count.

7. People like to be re-tweeted. It makes them feel worthy. If you don’t have something to say, find someone who does and give them credit where credit is due.

8. Monitor when you gain followers. If you send out a post about what you did last night or what article you’re reading…keep it up. While its not an exact science, this measurement will show you what fellow Tweeps are interested in.

9. Follow back. No one likes to dance by themselves, so if someone follows you, check to see if you’d like to return the favor. Do not feel obligated to follow everyone, but it doesn’t hurt to look. If there interested in what you have to say, the opposite is likely true.

10. Lastly, remember Twitter is social, interactive and communal. If your goal is to connect with your consumers, provide them value. It’s possible to communicate without constant promotion–in theory at the very least.

Underhanded tactics like astroturfing aren’t just unethical, however. In some cases, they are illegal.
There are numerous FTC regulations surrounding social media practices, including buying links, giving bloggers freebies in exchange for writeups, and viral content. In addition, Google has its own standards on what’s ok and what’s not.

Of course, these regulations are notoriously difficult to enforce. But, before you begin any social media initiative on behalf of your product or company, it’s worth it to understand what’s truly illegal, what’s simply underhanded, and how you can embrace social media without abandoning your ethics.

Read the full article, “Is Social Media Marketing Illegal?“, at SEOMoz.

I discussed strategies for the often frustrating task of measuring the effects of a social media engagement. My advice? Nail down concrete KPIs before you begin your foray into social media; use reliable proxies to measure nebulous concepts like engagement; look at the campaign holistically; and stay focused on what really matters – whether it’s awareness, sales or customer retention. Lastly, do projections to help manage expectations and understand what you need to do to break even.

My co-presenter, social media guru Brian Watkins of Omniture, spoke about Omniture’s work on integrating social media cues like Twitter posts, so stakeholders can get all the information they need from their analytics suite.

View my slides on Slideshare to get a taste of the presentation.

I see two sides to this situation.  On the one hand, I am sure worse sentiments were shared by fellow Eagles fans on their own Facebook pages, but at the same time, employers should not stand for libel or slander against their company (especially when dolled out by their own). Is it realistic for companies to expect constant decorum from their employees on their personal time and personal social profiles?

The 6-year employee of the Philadelphia Eagles is not the only instance where someone faced severe consequences after letting their emotions fly on a social media outlet. Geary’s Organic Media Manager Andrew Rodrigues says this situation is a great example of how companies need to institute a corporate policy about social media because this is not an isolated case.

Do employees have the right to post comments about their employers on their personal profiles? Is a Facebook post any different from criticizing your job to friends at a bar or restaurant?

Here at Geary, we like to cap off each week with an Innovation Session – an informal meeting with food, drinks and a presentation from the front lines of interactive marketing.

Last Friday, we chose to explore the various ways that Barack Obama and John McCain are marketing themselves online — with a particular focus on Web 2.0 strategies.

We tried to keep the presentation non-partisan, but it was difficult because Obama has made aggressive social media efforts his trademark. He has an active presence on MySpace, Facebook, and niche social networks such as Faithbase and BlackPlanet; active accounts on Twitter and YouTube; text message updates; an active social network at my.barackobama.com; and much more. McCain also has a social network on his main domain and presences on the big social networking sites, but his presence on Twitter and niche social networks is bare-bones compared to Obama’s, and he does not have a text messaging program.

We hypothesized that Obama’s aggressive efforts are primarily a function of the citizens he’s trying to reach — young people and first-time voters, as well as independent voters who spend time on niche online communities. We’re guessing that Obama has found that online efforts are a cost-effective way to reach new, disaffected and undecided voters — and he has the deep pockets to back up these efforts.

Here are some fun facts about each candidates’ online efforts:

• My.barackobama.com, Obama’s in-house social networking platform, is run by Chris Hughes, one of the co-founders of Facebook.
• Obama’s various websites get about 20 million visitors a month, compared to 4 million a month for McCain-affiliated sites.McCain is much more active in paid search advertising than Obama. At one point, McCain was bidding on 226 keywords, compared to only 174 by Obama.
• Obama ran 17 negative paid search ads, while McCain ran only three – the opposite of their general strategies, where McCain’s advertising ran much more negative than Obama’s.
• At present, Obama’s infomercial has 1.6 million views on YouTube. This is significant reach, but it’s dwarfed by the 33.55 million people who watched the infomercial on TV.

To learn more about this topic, you can view the full PowerPoint presentation.

I also recommend “Obama’s Wide Web” from the Washington Post and this article from MediaPost, which gives details about the candidates’ paid search strategies.

Social portals (especially twitter) are being bombarded with messages such as “@XYZ has a twitter grade of 98/100″ and “I have just received my millionth follower” and “I have 2 billion friends on Facebook” and so on.  Now a little gloating is fine, but what is the need for intimidation (or intwimidation as one Gearyite likes to say)?

Apply this idea to your high school experience.  Were you the popular kid, the captain of the football team, the homecoming queen or were you more of a loner, hung out with less people, had unappreciated talents?  It shouldn’t matter if you fell into that first group or the second – you were a person (lets hope anyway).  Scoring the winning touchdown of the homecoming game shouldn’t be more important than winning the science fair or playing in the band.  So why would having 2 billion online friends be so much better than having 50?

Many people look back on high school with terrible memories of the cliques and how they were treated.  At some point I would like to think we all grow up and learn that everyone has something to offer – be it a beautiful painting, good advice, interesting tweets or some other gift that may yet to be discovered.  It is possible that some of the people who pump themselves up in social spaces were the kids that did not get noticed.  However, if that is the case why attempt to make others feel like they aren’t good enough or don’t belong?

Don’t discredit someone online who has few followers or friends, they may have wanted it that way or they just joined the site.  Social media is about connection.  So make a new friend today and remember to be nice.

It’s important to remember that Twitter is merely a platform; it combines many features of forums, blogs, text messaging, email, social networking sites, and instant messaging. When used with finesse, Twitter encompasses all the best features of all of those tools — and the marketing potential.

So, how can businesses use Twitter? In the simplest terms:

1.    Learn what your biggest fans — and your biggest detractors — are saying. Enter your brand name (including variations and misspellings!) into search.twitter.com and see what people are saying about you on Twitter. Why bother with old-fashioned focus groups when you can get valuable, up-to-date customer opinions so easily?

2.    Spy on your competitors — and your competitors’ customers. Get valuable insight into how your competitors are using Twitter to connect with their customers, and learn what people do and don’t like about your competitors’ products.

3.    Connect with your detractors — before your competitor does. Again, Twitter’s Search feature gives you near-psychic ability to see what your customers are saying about your brand. When someone complains about your brand, why not step in with a helpful tip, a coupon, or simply an acknowledgement that you care about them and value their opinion? It may just win them over.

4.    Be a hero. When a Twitter user pipes up with a problem or question about your product, swoop in to save the day. Help them solve their problem or acknowledge their complaint — and if they have a real beef, take the conversation offline so it can be resolved fully.

5.    Solicit feedback. Twitter’s short format encourages candor, so ask your customers questions. How do they use your product? What features would they like to see? What do they like the most, and the least, about your product? You’ll be amazed what valuable input can be communicated in just 140 characters.

6.    Reward your customers. Use Twitter to promote contests, distribute coupons, invite your fans to try out new products, and distribute fun factoids about your brand, company culture, etc. The key here is to give your fans and customers a compelling reason to follow you on Twitter and stay engaged with your brand. Also, never underestimate the value of an occasional contest or coupon giveaway —Twitter users love freebies.

7.    Attain CRM nirvana. If used wisely, Twitter can help you build and maintain mindshare, build up a loyal customer base, and turn your detractors into diehard fans. It can help you promote new products, get candid feedback, and be a hero when people have a problem or complaint. And it can help you trounce your competition. In short, Twitter is an extremely valuable as a CRM tool.

So, before you dismiss Twitter as trendy or dumbed-down, ask yourself:  “My customers are on Twitter. Don’t I want to hear what they have to say?”

This story received press coverage and acclaim on mainstream media and in the blogosphere alike.

Apparently, popular culture was not paying attention. A MediaPost Publication released this morning quotes that 58 percent of the general population does not know what social networking is. How exactly is this possible?

The article goes on to say that over one-third of those who are engaging in social networking say it is losing its luster, and they are subsequently losing interest. Most other studies, reports and predictions hail that social networking is still an up-and-coming forum that holds amazing marketing possibilities. So who should we believe? Marketers or the public?

Is social networking destined for greatness and mass adoption or join the ranks of outdated fads before it?