Over 20,000 conversations across social media platforms each week highlight ‘travel + social media’. Didn’t have time to read them all? I’ve rounded up the hashtags, personalities, and content that mattered this week.

Let’s dig into the last week starting with our previous Travel Tuesday (January 31) to February 6, 2012!

Hashtags

I’ve shared previous posts on travel conversations on Twitter, but here’s a bit of a look at the most frequently used hashtags in ‘Travel + Social Media’ according to Insights.

• The big winner: #TTOT – This hashtag, which stands for Travel Talk on Twitter, seems to be #winning with over 17k mentions over the previous week.
• Runners up: #travel and #tni.
• Lesser volume, more niche: #vacation, #traveltips, #hiking just to name a few.

What does this mean, and why should you care? Great question! While there is a huge following of the #TTOT hashtag, and there are a great number of people conversing there your potential audience may also be greater when using this hashtag for your own content. You may want to consider also zeroing and identifying the topic of your content in an effort to gain attention of the people who it will most directly affect.

Filled with #history #art #culture the #European #castles surely have it all : ow.ly/8iXmn #ttot

— culture_jammer (@culture_jammer) February 5, 2012

Most retweeted and mentioned travel talkers on Twitter

Having a look at some of the most retweeted usernames and Twitter users who got mentioned the most in relation to our ‘Travel + Social Media’ profile, I uncovered a few fun people I was not already following. Consider this your #traveltuesday list of who to follow today:

• @TravelDudes is killing it! I think Melvin must be sharing content that matters to his followers, otherwise he wouldn’t be showing up as the number one guy retweeted and shared last week.
• @malloryontravel, @toniwonitravels and @nickhealy are three people who got lots of attention last week, too and they weren’t far behind @Traveldudes!
• @zipsetandrea, @hjortur, & @zipsetrachel are a few more tweet chat hosts who sure do talk travel lots!
• Don’t forget about @lonelyplanet and @msnbc. Their travel content gets shared lots by interested travel folks.

Some of the best of the best

It could hardly be a ’roundup’ if a few links weren’t tossed around and share, now would it? Here are a few highlights from what’s been shared widely (or wildly) over the last week:

• Why Social Media ROI Is Complicated For Hotels – This little gem is brought to us by @AreMorch. I liked what Are wrote regarding his social media strategy stages for hotels. He moves us through ‘reaction’ to ‘realization’ and challenges hoteliers to now jump on board building relationships.
• Kuoni reveals their ‘Travel Trends‘ report for 2012. It just intensifies my desire to trael to Thailand as soon as possible.
• Congratulations are in order for Quirky Travel Guy as he celebrated his one year travelblogiversary 
• And to end a round up with another one of sorts, Betsy A. Decillis thinks you should get to know these tourism peeps.

So there you have it. Whether you’re looking for relevant conversations,  someone new to follow in travel, or a bit of recent news, this is it. Of course, I’ve left a lot of cool stuff out. That’s where YOU the community come into play.

Please, tell us who you think we should pay attention to. Share with us your favorite recent link. Or even pimp yourself out as an awesome travel voice. See the comments section below? Now….. Go!

Jenn Seeley tweets, talks and blogs about Travel, Entertainment and Leisure. Follow her on Twitterand check out her most recent posts here.

Measuring the ROI of social media is a controversial topic that many people find daunting and scary. But the key to ROI is to understand the fundamentals: you already understand what’s important to your business. Whether you’re in sales, marketing, PR, HR, customer service, product development or just about any part of a modern business, these steps apply to you.

I spoke this morning at the Social Commerce Summit in New York City, hosted by Business Insider. Here are the seven steps I shared.

1. Establish your goals in advance. If you don’t know what you want to do, you’re much more likely to fail. (As in life.)

2. Tie them to your existing business goals (leads, conversions, web traffic, customer satisfaction, sentiment, awareness, employee satisfaction, recruiting). It’s much easier to sell the C-suite on the idea of driving sales leads than getting more Facebook likes.

3. Understand that every department will have a different definition of ROI. A successful social media PR campaign will look different than a social media customer service initiative.

4. Decide in advance how you will measure success. What are the metrics that spell success for you?

5. Focus on campaigns. If someone asked you to define the ROI of your marketing activities as a whole, for instance, that would be a huge undertaking. It’s the same with social media. Break them down into manageable chunks: “We want to use Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to get more attendees to our next event.”

6. Make them trackable through your web analytics. You can create a unique landing page to drive your traffic; for instance, a landing page to register for the event. Create a unique URL for each social channel, and your web analytics will tell you how people came there.

7. Understand that, in the end, ROI is a formula and you need all the data to truly calculate it:

Gain – Cost / Cost

How much did the activity gain for you? If its a simple dollar amount like a sale, it’s not too hard. If it’s a new employee, what’s your average cost to recruit an employee through traditional means? And how much did you spend, including the cost of your time?

Any steps I’ve left out? Comment here or tweet us and include #socialcommerce.

While creating a social media strategy, and discovering conversations on the social web are important for your brand, so is sharing your results with the decision makers in your organization. With help from Radian6’s widgets and Summary Dashboard you’ll be able to display your findings in clear, concise reports – making it easier to dig deeper into your data than ever before.

Interested in learning more about Radian6’s reporting capabilities? Let Product Managers Tom and Corey walk you through the process.

Radian6 TV: Report On Your Activity

Interested in learning more about Radian6? Click here to get started with us now.

Can Radian6 notify our HR department when someone shows interest in job openings with our company, or similar positions with competitors?
Absolutely. Set up alerts through the Radian6 Analysis Dashboard to receive either daily or as-it-happens notifications, depending on the desired frequency. Have social media posts emailed directly to you, or enable Instant Messenger alerts to guarantee posts are directed to the right people so nothing falls through the cracks.

Is there an easy way to find out more about potential candidates online?
When it comes time for the detective work involved in finding out who’s behind a post, Radian6’s Social Profile helps you connect the dots. Our Social Profile tool provides a list of known and possible accounts or connections that person has elsewhere in the social sphere: their personal blog, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn profiles, a YouTube video, for example. Use these to gain insight into what kind of a person they are.

Our business has enough full-time staff; we’re looking for students who can work for us part-time. How can we narrow our social media search?
Our sophisticated search options allow you to zero in on specific regions, demographics and niche markets to make any kind of recruiting a breeze. Apply the keyword filter to a Radian6 Topic Stack in the Engagement Console to display results containing specific words, such as “part-time”. Or filter by text in the Radian6 Analysis Dashboard to conduct a “search within a search” for ad-hoc analysis.

We have a small HR department and none of us have been formally trained in social media nuances. How can Radian6 help us get started?
Not sure what to monitor? Don’t know if you have enough staff to listen and engage effectively online? Radian6 Professional Services augments your social media efforts by offering online listening station setups, custom reporting, and more. We also offer a ton of free resources to help your company succeed in the social space

Unfortunately, our company had to fire an employee recently, and we’re worried they might take their resentment to social channels in an attempt to hurt our brand reputation. Can Radian6 help us with damage control?
Yes, Radian6 is your best defense against online negative publicity. Radian6 picks up all public mentions of your brand, and even allows you to narrow the conversation to specifically those with negative sentiment. Don’t let disgruntled former employees be a liability. Quickly defend your company against critics, catch confidentiality breaches and mitigate legal risks with the help of Radian6.

Have more questions about our platform? Check out our comprehensive FAQ here.

Get Started Today!

Looking to learn more about what makes Radian6 the industry leader in social media monitoring, measurement, and engagement? We’d love to connect with you and discuss your company’s social media goals and what makes us the choice of over 3,000 organizations globally.

Just fill out the sign-up form and a Radian6 representative will gladly reach out to you, answer any questions you have, and let you know all about the power of the Radian6 platform.

As an HR professional, you’re in the business of hiring the right people, preparing them for success in your company, and keeping them happy to hold on to talent. Radian6 is a comprehensive human resources tool – it helps you recruit and train new hires, gauge staff satisfaction, and empower employees to embrace social media wisely.

Contact Us

Recruit More Talent for Less

Leverage the power of social media to find the perfect candidate for any position. Zero in on specific geographic areas to identify prospects with the required skills and desired personality traits for the job. Compared to traditional methods, cost-per-hire is significantly less using social media, and a great way to post job openings – fast, public, and often free. Broadcast jobs on social channels, get retweeted by followers, and let word-of-mouth maximize the number of interested applicants.

Professional Social Networking

Social media is all about creating community, and that’s especially important for online HR efforts. Radian6 can help your business make connections, identify talent on LinkedIn Questions & Answers, and build successful professional networks. Our powerful platform provides valuable Insights about the authors of social media posts so you can begin to screen candidates and determine if they’d be a good fit for your company. Stay ahead of the curve by tagging potential talent so you’ve already got a queue for future job postings.

Watch for Warning Signs

Find out what candidates and employees are saying about your company online. Protect brand reputation, prevent a misapplication of employee time and ensure employees are held accountable for their online actions. Monitor public-facing employee communications to guarantee compliance with company policies, protect the efforts of other parts of the business, and red flag breaches of confidentiality, especially in sensitive industries like financial services.

Share & Compare

Reduce email clutter and improve cross-company collaboration by bringing staff together on an employee social network. Simply load a Chatter stack in the Radian6 Engagement Console to scale social media across your organization. Share interesting content and best practices to train new hires and keep employees informed. Track conversation trends, understand sentiment about working for your company, and find out what’s needed to keep your staff happy.

Google+ Hangout with President Obama

Regardless of where you stand politically, last night’s Google+ Hangout with President Barack Obama highlights some important aspects of social media engagement.

The Google+ hangout was diverse with two wives, a group of students, a war veteran, a small business owner and others. President Obama listened and communicated with these Americans and others while effectively leveraging a platform that was comfortable for them and a vast majority of his audience. How do we know this? Before the hangout, a total of 228,094 people submitted 133,184 questions and cast 1,630,369 votes on the White House YouTube channel. This was a successful example of knowing where your audience spends their time. Here are four lessons you can apply to your social strategy:

Be innovative. While Obama has incorporated townhall meetings on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn during his presidential campaigns, this marked the first ever Google+ Hangout with a President. Talk about catering to your audience and encouraging dialogue. You too can be innovative if you know your audience and find a way to connect with them.

Engage your advocators and face your detractors. Obama faced the difficult questions about the economy, foreign aid, homelessness and unemployment rates head on. While some Google+ Hangout attendees had voted for him, others had not. Challenging questions are inevitable, especially in social media, and your community is judging you based on your ability to handle such questions. Think of this as an opportunity to turn your detractors into brand advocates and to further confirm the decisions of ambassadors. Honest, sincere and transparent answers go a long way.

Use multiple platforms. If you’re going to host multiple parties, you’d better mix up the venues. In this case, the White House effectively utilized several social media channels. People could submit a question on YouTube, watch on Google+, or follow along on Twitter using the hashtag #askobama. The next time your business wants to engage with your community be sure to know when and where to host the party (or parties!).

Understand public relations 101. Never turn down an opportunity to sway public opinion. It is important to use every conversation as an opportunity to improve your image, even if that means laughing at an impersonator.

It can be challenging for a brand to be knowledgeable, educational and laugh at the same time. Social media takes practice and requires companies to take chances. Find the right balance and your community will grow and reward you in return. What did you think of the first ever Google+ Hangout? I’d love to hear your thoughts! If you missed the hangout, watch it here. 

TD understands that customers expect their bank to be accessible, helpful and responsive to their needs. To TD that means being there for customers where they feel most comfortable, whether it’s in the branch, on the phone or via social media channels.

Learn how TD has built up their social media teams to deliver superior service online and into the hands of their customers.

Radian6 Community Managers (left to right) Heather, Melanie, Genevieve, Jenn, Bart, Mike (hidden) & Jason

…. would undoubtedly be social media without community managers.

Think for a moment.

Remember the time when you were upset that the hotel staff ignored your ‘Do Not Disturb’ request by knocking on your door and you tweeted about it?

Or the time you were upset about a flight delay? Lost luggage? Or worse, your guitar got broken so you wrote a catchy song that you never knew would go viral?

Maybe you watched the Costa Concordia cruise disaster and made your opinions clear on your blog.

Alternatively, you’ve tweeted, shared on Google+ and uploaded images of fantastic vacation experiences and otherwise made social media an important part of your travel experience from start to finish.

While social media IS an excellent tool for customers in the travel industry to express opinions, ask questions, seek advice on where to stay, or engage with a resort, let’s not forget the hard-working people behind the brand. The person who answered your one question, or the person who is knee-deep in a crisis and burning up the Twitter feed with lightening-speed responses.

Today is Community Manager Appreciation Day (#CMAD). Behind the Twitter handles, the corporate blogs and the shiny new Pinterest boards, are intelligent, engaging individuals who are doing those little deeds that delight you. That special note that showed up in your hotel room, the adjustment on your vacation package price and the complimentary upgrade for the misunderstanding at your gate? Someone in a community role was looking out for you.

Sure, not all travel brands are equal. Some have invested and believed in community management while others still are dabbling and testing the waters. Just remember, there’s a human behind there. Someone who works very hard and who loves what they do.

Please hug a community manager today (like in this group hug above!) and share in the comments your favorite community manager in the travel industry and why. Give them props. Make them glow.

Throughout today, Radian6 is supporting Community Manager Appreciation Day (#CMAD). Check this blog post and Twitter (@radian6) for more content around this day.

Do you pass the mom test?

Social media is still relatively new to many marketers, but it has definitely changed the way companies communicate with their prospects and customers. While there is always some stigma to telling people that they are using social media wrong, the following tactics will not win you friends or influence people. And your prospects and customers won’t like it either.

Remember that social media takes place in full view of the public, so by following some of these questionable activities, you can risk alienating followers.

1. All Link and No Context

It is fine to send @replies on Twitter to potentially interested people, but make sure you send something of value. If you send a link only, with no context, people won’t click the link. There is plenty of spam on social media platforms, so don’t get lumped in with the spammers.

2. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat

If you discover people that you think might be interested in your products or services and you send them an @reply on Twitter, try to vary or personalize the message a bit. Many people will click over to your Twitter profile page before following or engaging back, and they won’t respond if they see an entire page of the exact same tweet to multiple people.

3. Is This a Bad Time?

Social media as a marketing and engagement channel needs to be targeted from a time stand point, as well as targeting the right audience with the right message. Share at various times of day to determine the best ones to share your content. Consider a global audience too. Posting content at times when your primary audience is asleep will not generate any traction for your messages.

4. Hello My Name is

It is called social media because people and companies are expected to be social. Follow basic rules of conversation and be polite, including introducing yourself or your company. Contacting someone on a social platform with an offer when there is no established relationship is sure-fire way to get no response.

5. You Can Count on Me

Every social media platform has way too many updates for every one of your followers to see, click, read and take action on all of them. So many in fact, that the number of updates per second has even increased since I started typing this sentence. It is important to build followings that are much larger than your targeted audience, because most won’t see your posts. And this doesn’t even take into account things like Facebook algorithms, where that platform doesn’t even show all updates to your fans. Don’t count on any more than a small percentage of fans and followers seeing any individual message.

6. Have I Got A Deal for You

There has been plenty of healthy debate about whether it is okay to sell on social media platforms. While surveyed consumers have said that they follow brands to get discounts and special offers, hard sales would get tiresome. Companies need to provide value to their followers and fans in exchange for their attention. If all you do is pitch your products and offer deals, people will tune you out and label you forever as a fast-talking, snake oil salesman.

7. He Said, She Said

Social media is not one big hug where everyone stands around the campfire singing songs, but you are still better off focusing on the positive aspects of what you can provide. Negativity may succeed in politics, but if you spend all your time bad mouthing your competitors on your social media, you risk two results. The first is loss of your followers attention, but the second is driving potential customers to your competitors. Do you want them to ask the question, “Hmm, they spend so much time trying to knock these guys down, let me go see what they are all about?”

8. Blogging the News

A blog can be many things, including a place to share company news. Nobody really wants to read a press release on a company blog. I am surprised at the number of companies who still do this. There is a place for press releases, and it’s called a newsroom. And there are even lots of examples of innovative newsrooms, but a blog is about sharing company thought leadership, providing valuable educational content to readers, and improving search results by answering questions customers and prospects are asking in their search engines. A press release doesn’t do any of that, and you won’t gain any readership of your company blog by posting them on it.

9. Ignoring the Inbox

Many people prefer getting their company updates on social platforms, rather than via email, but the majority of business communications are still happenin’ in the inbox. It will change as more digital natives enter the workforce, but it hasn’t yet. If you don’t support your remarkable and educational content by also sharing it with prospects by email, you are missing a huge opportunity to gain their attention.

10. Have Fun, but Share with Your Mom

There is a great sense of online propriety that is really appropriate for business social media and that’s the mom test. Sometimes when trying to be too creative or too cute, you cross the line in a way that is not appropriate for your customers. There be may some industries where there is no line, but for most of us, if you are sharing things online that you wouldn’t share with your mom, it won’t connect with your prospects and customers.

What are some other sure-fire ways to fail with social media? But if you looking for ways to succeed and present your business in the best possible light, follow some of these basics of social media etiquette. And make your mom proud too.

Recently, I had the pleasure of chatting on Twitter with Steven Frischling (@flyingwithfish), Airline, Aerospace & Travel Social Media Consultant. The conversation came about as a result of my recent post, 12 Tips to Talking Travel on Twitter, where the use of hashtags was my number one tip. @flyingwithfish felt it was rather generic, and he was right. It sparked this post, and possibly will contribute to future #traveltuesday posts.

@jenn_seeley OK, #Travel chatting on #Twitter (1) Use the hashtag #Travel (2) Participate in #TTOT on Tuesday & #TNI on Thursday #SMtravel — Flying With Fish (@flyingwithfish) January 6, 2012

So let’s look more specifically at some of the best hashtags for travel conversations on Twitter.

#Travel – Begin with the obvious. Travel. Just keep in mind that a search for #travel is going to yield a broad return of results. By that same token, it’s an excellent place to start.

#SMTravel – Want to be a bit more focused? #SMTravel is more specifically ‘social media’ and ‘travel.’ Just like with #Travel, you’ll see these hashtags used frequently.

#TT – Instead of #traveltuesday, go for the more succinct (and less character hogging) #TT instead. Of course, I still plan to call today what it is – Travel Tuesday. Learn more about Travel Tuesday here.

@jenn_seeley (6) Skip #TravelTuesday and use #TT as a hashtag, it is more widely followed & gives you more space to tweet. #smtravel — Flying With Fish (@flyingwithfish) January 6, 2012

#TTOT – In long form, it’s Travel Talk on Twitter. According to @traveldudes, it is THE travel hashtag to use. Twice every Tuesday at 9:30 am & pm GMT, travel professionals and aficionados alike gather at the hashtag to talk. Discussions, questions and even the ability to suggest topic ideas are facilitated here and at the Facebook group.

#CruiseChat – Another Tuesday chat (at 2pm EST) is about all things cruising. Thank @AvidCruiser and @CruiseBuzz for getting this one going. Similar to #TTOT, a question and answer format keeps this chat hopping.

#LuxChat – Pamper yourself and join @LuxeTiffany for luxury travel conversations on the second Wednesday of each month at 5:30 pm EST.

#TNI – Set time aside Thursdays at 3:30 EST for the “Travelers Night In” weekly Tweetup. @ZipSetGo brings us a fast paced, conversation-packed chat. With 10 topical questions zipping by furiously while travel tweeters add in a new question every ten minutes, this is an excellent opportunity to network and find like-minded travel enthusiasts.

*bonus* #NUTS - While not specific to travel, it seems that many travel folks are enjoying a “Not so Usual Therapy Session” brought to you by Midlife Road Trip. This week will be my first convergence upon the hilarity that takes place. The great travel conversations in midst of a reprieve from every day stresses and the fun I keep hearing about that is #NUTS. I hope to see you there on Tuesdays at 3:30 EST!

While some of these hashtags appear to correspond with a specific scheduled tweet chat, people still tend to use any of them when they are relevant, regardless of the day on the calendar. Try not to tweet without them. Hashtags can play a significant part in making new, lasting connections.

I plan to be present in these conversations whenever possible. What about you? Do you attend regular travel tweet chats? Do you have a favorite not on this list? Let’s hear about it!

Jenn Seeley tweets, talks and blogs about Travel, Entertainment and Leisure. Follow her on Twitterand check out her most recent posts here.

We recently shared a post and video about the United Nations Development Program‘s social media efforts, in case you missed it, you can find it here. This week, we have the second video in this two-part series, featuring Sebastian Majewski from the UNDP once more. He’s been using Radian6 to help identify stakeholders for UNDP and create a network of influencers.

The UNDP has experienced the power of using social media to find interested parties actively talking about relevant issues. It means that their supporters can make their voices heard within the organization, and it means the UNDP can gather feedback on important issues and share this across the organization. Social media allows citizens from every corner of the world to make their voice heard, and for the UNDP this means they can hear from those in developed and developing nations, giving them a more complete view of the issues impacting citizens.

Listen as Sebastian explains what identifying stakeholders does for the UNDP, and how it’s impacting the work they do when they bring the information gathered from social media monitoring back to the General Assembly.

Creating an influencer network can be a powerful tool. It can help you bring the voice of your fans, customers, and supporters into your organization. It can help you share information and ideas with the right people and keep a pulse on the issues or trends that are impacting your organization or industry.

Have you started to identify your influencers? 

Today’s world has become more connected and more accessible then ever before. Long gone are the days when distance made communications a challenge or struggle. We now live in a world where millions of people carry the Internet in their pocket and staying in touch is as simple as the click of a button. And with this privilege comes the power and the responsibility to help create positive change. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) believes that by working together we can help to eliminate poverty and end hunger, that if we all take one action, we can be a force for change. From this idea their campaign “Take One Action Against Poverty” was born.

The team at the UNDP saw the power and opportunity that social media offered their organization; it was a chance to reach citizens in the over 177 countries and territories. It was a chance to engage citizens, mobilize their supporters and volunteers, and take real steps towards change. Take One Action is a simple concept: if each person were to take one action against poverty, against hunger, against suffering, we could help make a dramatic difference in the lives of so many. The goal was to document these efforts and share them across various social media channels, the hope was that these images would inspire and motivate others.

The results have been remarkable – watch as Silke Von Brockhausen, Social Media Manager for the UNDP, explains the project and how they are using Radian6 to help track their efforts and engage with their supporters around the globe.

And with that, I would like to wish everyone a very happy holidays and as we look towards 2012, consider what is possible for the coming year – what are you capable of achieving this year? What will your one action be? 

Wunderman is a creative agency that truly appreciates and understands the value of relationships. It’s not surprising that they were an early adopter of social media and Radian6, as they have been a leader and innovator in the agency space for the past fifty years. The addition of Radian6 to their tool kit has allowed them to offer their clients real-time, global intelligence collected from the social web. The ability to provide this information for their client, Nokia, a world leader in mobility, has helped the team at Wunderman collect insight into the app developer community. They can see this community’s view of the Nokia’s adoption of the Windows Phone OS platform.

Social media gives Wunderman and Nokia the chance to collect insights and data from all over the world, and it allows them to do this in a timely and cost effective manner. The team at Wunderman is using Radian6 to find conversations across countries and in more than seven different languages. Learn more about this project in our case study and check out this great video, featuring some of the creative minds at Wunderman that helped make this project possible.

This month we are taking a deeper look at campaigns and how to incorporate social media to help make them successful, however, audience participation plays an important role in this partnership. To demonstrate that, I wanted to share another example from my visit to District 16 in the Miramichi (learn more about my visit and District 16 in this post and this post). They incorporated social aspects into some things they were doing everyday to make it work for their community. Take it from District 16 – the following are three ways to help ensure success in social media that can also apply to your social campaign.

1. Make it Engaging

District 16 wanted to make their district more social and provide their staff, students, parents and community members with some simple and easy ways to engage. They videotaped their morning announcements and shared them through their website, and posted pictures from the classroom of students working and learning. This was engaging for the audience of family and friends who loved a peek on what the students were doing daily. Students also enjoyed seeing themselves on the site.

This content was perfect for the audience to consume. Parents were provided with additional conversation starters at the dinner table instead of, “What did you learn at school today?” they could talk to their kids about what they saw. How are you considering your audience and what will draw them in?

2. Consider Ease of Use

When District 16 was considering the design of their school websites, the emphasis was put on ease of use. Since the users were teachers, every design decision was based on making their system as easy to use and as effective for educators as possible.  They created an interface whereby with 2 clicks any teacher can easily post Teacher notes, Image Galleries, Videos, Weblinks and Audio Files. It didn’t matter if a teacher or student changed schools because they knew exactly what to expect from the system. As Jamie O’Toole said, “The reason why ease of use is so important is that teachers do not have time to be learning new software. They needed something easy that was user friendly and required little professional development to get started.”

There were lots of opportunities for District 16 to add fancy features to their Drupal system, but they stuck to what they knew their community would use and be able to learn easily. Have you considered ease of use in your social campaigns? There are lots of ways to have community members participate, but are you considering the most intuitive and easy-to-use methods?

3. Replace an Existing Process

Instead of asking teachers to participate online by adding social as a task to do at the end of the day, educators at District 16 are encouraging teachers to use their webpages as a way to replace some existing processes. For example, they post homework online instead of taking the time to give it to students at the end of the day, enabling the teacher to spend less time posting it to the website.

Consider ways you might be asking your audience to participate that goes beyond their regular day. Are there ways that you can integrate what you are asking of them into their daily routine that will not add a lot of time, but will instead provide value?

How are you considering your audience for social campaigns? Any favorite examples of campaigns that make it very easy for the audience to participate?

Melanie Thompson is a Community Analyst at Radian6. You can see some of her previous blog posts and more about her here.

House Party is a unique company that offers people the chance to have a party in their own home, with exclusive access to amazing products. Learn how the social media team at House Party uses the Radian6 platform to focus on measuring how social media can amplify authentic word of mouth for their clients.

Last Friday I shared some great ideas for content curation with you from Joey Savoy at District 16. Today I wanted to share a bit more about the District and what they are up to because I think it can inspire us all.

While visiting the representatives from District 16, 15 and a group from the Netherlands the common theme was to determine the best ways to raise the next generation of Global Citizens and what a big responsibility indeed! The importance of proper social media and new media education is incredible. As Joey shared, “The value of collaboration has been immeasurable in School District 16. It has provided our students with authentic learning experiences that cannot be found in any textbook. On a daily basis, our District thrives on promoting 21st Century Learning Skills such as Communication, Collaboration, Global Citizenship, Critical Thinking, and Problem Solving.”

Premier Alward, and local MLA's hosting the morning video announcements at Gretna Green Elementary.

So how can we learn from some of the things that are happening in the District and how do we apply them to our own communities? The following are three key takeaways:

Reward
School District 16 takes great pride in the creativity and innovation shown by its teachers and students. Technology has been leveraged to support the curriculum and enhance student learning. Every year District 16 celebrates these achievements by hosting the CUTE Awards, which recognizes the “Creative Use of Technology in Education” The community is very supportive of this event, which has been referred to as the Academy Awards of Technology in District 16. Supporting partners from the tourism and business sectors are always more than willing to take part in this amazing event.

Think of ways to reward your community and recognize them for some of the great things they do for you. This encourages and empowers them to go out and continue to strive to be great.

Lead the Way
On the global front, School District 16 has often been recognized as a world leader in the use of technology in education. In June 2010, the Miramichi region was recognized by SMART Technologies Inc. as the 1st SMART Showcase Community in the world for the implementation of SMART Boards in all schools and throughout the community.

Think of ways that you too can lead the way and be an expert in various areas for your audience. Leading the way sets you apart and encourages others to look to you for advice and ideas.

Be Unique
In addition to this, School District 16 has also been designated by Scientific Learning as the only National Reference Site in Canada for Fast ForWord Learning.

Think about how you can stand out above those around you. What ways are you drawing others in and providing something unique?

Also consider that District 16 is by no means the biggest District or the most well known in Canada, but their community (and now you!) know what they are doing and are inspired by them. Thousands of people are visiting their school websites daily. Most specifically friends and family of students and their local community members, but they know how to inspire and speak to this audience because they have found a way to keep them coming back. You don’t need to be the biggest company or the most well known globally. You need to speak to your audience and find ways to keep them engaged.

Next week I will review how District 16 has set-up their websites to ensure their parents and friends return. We’ll look at why their audience checks back on their websites daily and what you can learn from this.

What are some ways you reward, lead the way and stand out as unique? What are some ways you plan to do so in the future?

Melanie Thompson is a Community Analyst at Radian6. When she is not engaging with the Radian6 community she can be found reading or blogging. Find out why she calls herself Mrs. 20 Q’s by reaching out to her on Twitter @MelanieAThomp.

Students are utilizing social media for various reasons, but most often they are using these sites to find information and make connections. In this webinar recorded November 17th, Chase Fritchle explains how Devry University is using social media to make lasting connections with their students.

For more information and resources about social media monitoring and engagement visit our Higher Education area.

When Douglas Quinby of PhoCusWright (Senior Director, Research), took four travel industry professionals to task in a roundtable discussion of heavy hitting topics, it was a fast moving thirty minutes. In the hot seat today were:

• Jeff Fagnan, Partner, Atlas Ventures
• Brad Gerstner, Founder and CEO, Altimeter Capital and Chairman and Founder, Room 77
• Noreen Henry, SVP, Global Partner Services, Travelocity Global
• Kevin May, Editor, Tnooz.

With little time to elaborate on the pithy and provocative topics, the panelists shared their thoughts and opinions thoughtfully and succinctly. If you missed it, or simply want to revisit the conversation, then consider this the spot to stop. I’m going to focus on the first three topics discussed as the fourth point was cut off by the clock.  By all means, share your thoughts about the conversation in the comments below!

• Don’t try to be social. WHOA. What? Trust me, when a social media gal such as myself hears a quote from Facebook investor Roger McNamee starting with these words, my interest is piqued. Douglas asked the panelists to agree or disagree with this statement and the general thoughts were:
• It is hard to compete with the existing social media platform giants so perhaps creating yet another one is asking for failure
• Think of ‘social’ as more than a platform. Social should be woven and threaded  into all parts of travel business, not seen as a stand alone. Social. Mobile. Cloud.  Big data.  You can’t survive on being just one of these.
• Everyone’s talking about Google. When asked how Google Flight Search (GFS) stacks up out of the gate, the panelists rated it a 4 on average on a scale of 1-10. (10 being awesome, and awesome being a word banned from being spoken at PhoCusWright). Jeff was the most generous, awarding GFS a 7/10 for the speed, level of complexity, cleanliness and compelling interface. But what does this mean for Google? Well, the second part to the question discussed Google travel as a whole, and new start ups looking to build travel search functionality to compete with Google might be in for a tough fight. Existing big travel search brands such as Kayak, Orbitz and TripAdvisor have their established brands on their sides to help with smoother sailing ahead.
• What about daily deals/flash sales? Following the number of travel companies, ‘experts’, brands and consultants that I do on Twitter, I sure see a lot of offers in my feed in the run of a day. Travel distribution groups are aware that people love a deal, and so are leveraging the ebbs and flows of supply and demand. It was felt that there should be room for everyone to play in this pool, and that those with an established presence clearly have an edge.

Clearly there were other topics not covered, and much more to be said about those listed above. Thirty minutes barely gave the audience a taste of what could be a 7 course meal. None the less, it was a great little bite into hot button conversation among professionals in travel. You can view the recording here.

I’m curious. What did you think?

Jenn Seeley is a Community Engagement Specialist in the Travel vertical trying to make her way around the world both virtually and physically through social media. Connect with her @jenn_seeley

Creating content for your website is hard, time-consuming work. Therefore, you’ll want to make the most of your content by sharing it across your social networks. Don’t stop there though; take it a step further by thinking about how you can maximize your content to get more out of it.

Get Specific

Consider sharing specific types of content on specific social media platforms. Let’s use Facebook as an example, instead of sharing a link to your latest blog post, think about this – there are five types of content you can post and Facebook values each of them differently.  In order of significance, they are: Photos , Videos, Links, Status updates and Updates from applications. Since the Facebook algorithm favors photos, take the photo from your latest blog post and share it with a link to its corresponding post in the description or comments. Doing so takes advantage of Facebook’s algorithm and still covers you sharing your latest article. No one said you couldn’t get creative!  Now, think about how you can share content across Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and more.

Consider a Series

Give your content junkies something to look forward to, something to come back for again and again. How about a series? Each Tuesday on our blog we do a fun series around travel called “Travel Tuesday.”  You can do something similar that would appeal to your audience and their interests or what your specialties are.  If you’re not quite sure where to begin or you need a little inspiration, check out your industry’s buzz across social media outposts. Determine if there are events or chats that take place regularly, like on a weekly or monthly basis. For example, there’s a handy Google document that covers over 550 Twitter chats and their matching hashtags across various topics.  You can then create a content series that coincides with these chats and/or events.

Repackage and Revitalize

You’ve already put the hard work in. Now take a step back and look at all the content you’ve created and how you can revitalize it. One way you can do this is to monitor the social conversations taking place across your industry. Is there someone looking for information on a topic you’ve already covered? Go ahead and become a resource – share that eBook, whitepaper or blog post, in response.

You can also take your material and repackage it. For example, if you’ve written a number of eBooks, post them to SlideShare. You could even break that eBook down into several blog posts to be shared on your corporate blog. These shorter articles may be more easily consumed by some members of your community. It also gives you the opportunity to keep things fresh if there have been changes in your industry since your eBook was published.

These are just a few suggestions to consider to help you make the most of your content. What ways are you maximizing what you already have? What ideas would you add to this article?

Trish Forant is a Community Manager at Radian6. She’s also a mom, a gadget girl and a passionate philanthropist. Connect with her on Twitter at @Dayngr.

The healthcare and pharmaceutical industry continues to be challenged as it relates to patient non-adherence to medical advice concerning their prescribed medications.  With their ever expanding user base, can social media platforms as well as other emerging technologies provide Pharma companies with the means towards improving patient adherence?

In 2003, The World Health Organization (WHO) released a report noting that anywhere between 30 to 50 percent of medications prescribed to handle long term ailments were not being taken as directed by physicians.  This non-adherence to essential medications is a frequent cause of preventable hospitalizations and patient illness.  Additionally, pharmaceutical companies need to find other ways of keeping the revenue coming in beyond new prescriptions. They need to improve patients’ adherence to taking their prescribed medications. Improving patient outcomes, cutting down on the cost of hospitalizations & re-hospitalizations and contributing to the bottom line; medication adherence is a topic well worth considering while forming a social media strategy.  In this post we’ll discuss two strategies for improving patient adherence to drug regimens, reminders and patient education.

Reminders

New technologies are indeed addressing the issue of medical adherence with a few clever, innovative approaches.  Let’s take a quick look at trio of examples being used by Pharma and healthcare professionals:

-  One drug company has begun utilizing a near sentient bottle cap that emits flashing lights and ringtones as reminders, sends weekly e-mail updates to family members and orders refills from the pharmacy. In doing so they found that the use of a wireless reminder instrument led to a 27% higher rate of patients taking their medications on time. It won’t be long before your prescription medication does all of your grocery shopping!

-  The University of Iowa Children’s Hospital has turned to Facebook to remind teenagers to take their medications on time with their Iowa Medminder application. Indeed, healthcare professionals have realized that with the younger demographics, it’s not official until it’s on Facebook.

-  Researchers at Mount Sinai Hospital implemented a program called CareSpeak to send text message reminders to teen-aged liver transplant recipients in order to get them to take their prescribed anti-rejection medications.

Patient Education

Medication reminders are essential, but they’re only the tip of the iceberg. Focusing on reminders alone doesn’t completely address all the factors that lead to non-adherence. Patients can often slide into non-adherence due to a simple lack of understanding of their medication regimen.

Fortunately, patient communities abound online nowadays.  If you are concerned or confused about the drug you have been prescribed, you can see how other consumers feel about it by engaging with peers across all sorts of blogs, wikis and forums devoted to all types of disease states.  Healthcare and pharmaceutical professionals have an opportunity to listen for these conversations and engage directly with these patients in healthcare discussions.

The ability to converse with other patients in these communities is an incredible means of providing people with comfort, tips on dealing with disease in their everyday life, and the knowledge that they are not alone in facing their health challenges.  Finding these online discussions will give engaged healthcare and pharmaceutical professionals a chance to add their thought leadership and subject matter expertise to the mix and likely increase patient education.  One thing that is clear is that patients today, more than ever before, WANT to better understand their health issues and their prescription medications.  And, they WANT the healthcare industry to help them understand their medical issues and be a part of their conversations as much as possible. Patients who gain a proper understanding of their condition and their prescribed drugs, before they start taking a medication, have to be considered more likely to stick with their treatments.

Medical professionals are learning to more proactively communicate with patients to educate and inform them on their diseases and their drugs. Using social media platforms as tools to provide health advice is building positive physician-patient relationships and should help to ensure that patients remain better adherent to their medications in the long run. There is no easy fix-all solution for getting patients to stick to their drug regimens. However, anything you can do to enhance medication adherence would have to be considered a plus for doctors and patients, to say nothing of the family and friends concerned about their loved one’s well being.

What social media tools do you use for reminders? Have you spotted any other examples of pharmaceutical companies or health organizations using social media to improve patient adherence? Tell us in the comments section!

Jason Boies is a member of the Radian6 Community Engagement Team.  His focus is on the worlds of Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals.  Get a prescription for Health & Pharma themed tweets by following him at @JasonBoies on Twitter (and make sure you stick to it).

Even before social media, family vacations were a lot of fun when I was a little girl. One of the ways I remembered my trips and archived their special moments was through scrapbooking. Not the new-fangled-way of scrapbooking, with embellishments and ornate stickers, but the good old fashioned slap-something-on-that-manila-page and call it done kind. I collected brochures of the places we visited, snapped pictures to be processed when we returned home, and collected little pieces of memorabilia that fit nicely between my pages – and I shared the book with guests who came to visit.

Social Media Scrapbooking

While many people still scrapbook today, even more are sharing their adventures electronically. You probably remember the early days of digital photos and email, and that friend who always tried to email, large download-limit-breaking, photos to you of beaches and theme parks. Now, social media has made photo sharing much easier. Travelers are embracing the variety of options at their fingertips to share their pictures and stories across the social web.

Sure, the average guest at your resort may not be a professional photographer, and they may not be a “travel industry influencer” across social media channels, but they’re posting images of sunsets, landscapes and beach-time fun. They’re already broadcasting their good times about you, and your business, and you didn’t even have to ask.

How You Can Use These Unsolicited Social Media Shares To Grow Your Travel Business

Certainly, some friends and followers of social media loving travelers may limit themselves to vicarious living, but others are paying close attention. On one occasion, I recall being so captivated with the snapshot of a beach my friend had posted on Facebook – I made it my screensaver. Months later, I asked her to remind me where the photo was taken. She excitedly shared every detail of her stay at The Fairmont Southampton in Bermuda, right down to the patio she was sitting on as she snapped it from her iPhone. Though, I haven’t made it to Bermuda yet, her travels now fill a book of must-see destinations I otherwise would have never known about.

How you can leverage social sharing:

• Create an environment or even a distraction from the norm. Maybe you don’t have Cinderella’s Castle for the background shot like Disney does, that’s alright. Search for something iconic and make sure you point it out as the perfect picture opportunity. Guests are already showcasing your property, so come up with something clever that will generate plenty of discussion and will create a connection to your brand when people see multiple images popping up across the social web.
• Have a monitoring platform, and a strategy, that includes coverage of shared media – such as videos and images. Be on the lookout for the organic images your guests share.
• Be present and involved in online communities, where sharing is fun and easy. Create accounts on video and photo sites built for easy sharing like Flickr, YouTube and even Facebook. Encourage your guests to share their images and videos with you across these social platforms. Then, reward them for being part of your unofficial PR team with points, coupons, bonuses, etc. – you get the picture!
• Talk about their experiences with them. Engage them in conversation across the social channels they frequent, such as Twitter. Your guests tell the story of staying with you, or visiting you more authentically than any brochure will. Let them help point people in your direction.

At the end of the day (or the end of their stay), your guests are going to share what moves them, what inspires them and what makes their vacation enjoyable. Travelers haven’t changed much, despite the change in media – they still love to share their travel experiences. Though the sharing is primarily electronic now, brochures are the equivalent of links back to your location, and personalized pictures with the smiling faces of friends set the stage to draw more new friends to your destination – it’s still up to you to provide the compelling experiences and surroundings. Once you’ve got that covered, then you can leave the electronic scrapbooking up to your guests.

Discussion: Have you visited a location because of social media shared content from friends, colleagues or family? Do you have a story about how photo-sharing online, drew new business to your destination?

On a lighter note: For those of you who like to get creative with photography on your travels. Check out this great travel photography flickr group and the 10 best travel photography websites for inspiration!

Jenn Seeley is a Community Engagement Specialist who travels vicariously through the many bloggers, tweeple and travel aficionados she engages with on a daily basis. Tweet your travel & social media stories with her at @jenn_seeley!

When it comes to writing content, you’ve been there and done that. You’ve got a great following but there seems to be less and less interaction after each post goes live. You’ve been looking for a few ways to breathe new life into your brand’s website. What’s a writer to do?  Your blog is the perfect platform to show off some other forms of content that can help spotlight your brand and invite your community to get involved.

Don’t limit yourself to sharing content on your blog or website, though. Step outside your comfort zone and consider spicing things up by sharing these 5 forms of content, across your social media outposts:

Add Photographs: Did you know that business-oriented web pages with images performed 91% better than those pages without images? Let’s face it, we’re visual people. We’d much rather read an article that has a photo attached to it than just a straight page of text. Photos are a great way to draw people in for a closer look.  Another creative way to use photos is by sharing them on your Facebook page. The photos you share there can give your community insight about your company’s culture and tone. Please don’t limit yourself to sharing photos of your products. Share photos from conferences, events and even holiday festivities around the office.

Embrace Video: Did you know that 71% of online Americans use video sharing sites? Video is an excellent way to tell stories, share information and educate others. Consider using video to share tips or even to demonstrate how your product could be used. Video is wonderful way for you to show the human side of your brand. How about creating a top ten list of your most asked questions and have your executives answer them on camera? Maybe even do it Letterman style.

Create Podcasts: Including a podcast as a part of your content is like having your very own radio show. It’s a fantastic opportunity to share audio content with your community. Even if you’re not sure about creating and hosting your own podcast series, you can still create podcasts – just use the content you’ve already written. All those eBooks, white papers and case studies could easily be turned into podcasts for your community to download and take with them on the go. Imagine all the places your community might enjoying listening to your content, like at the office, during their morning commute or while working out at the gym.

Use SlideShare: SlideShare is the world’s largest community for sharing presentations. It has 55 million monthly visitors and 120 million page views, and is one of the 200 most visited websites in the world. Added bonus? In addition to presentations, SlideShare also supports documents, PDFs, videos and webinars. (Repurpose your content!) Plus, SlideShare makes sharing so easy. Your community can download your slides, embed them on their own site or even use them as a part of a presentation to make a case for getting on-board with your brand, as opposed to your competitors. SlideShare even allows you to categorize and tag your content so it’s that much easier to find, too.

Include Infographics: People are talking about and sharing infographics. Infographics are a great way to visually communicate information in a fun and creative way. Plus, your infographics don’t have to be run of the mill either, they can be as unique as your business or brand. In fact, some infographics, like the ones created by the folks at ImagineThink.net, could even be considered works of art. Additionally, if you want to make your infographics more shareable, be sure to include Tweetable statements to go along with them.

I hope this post helped kick-start your creative juices.  For more information on creating content for a social media community, be sure to grab this month’s eBook!

How are you spicing up your content? Are you already incorporating different types of content into your social media strategy? If not, which of these five would you be most likely to try?

Trish Forant is a Community Manager at Radian6. She tweets about social media and her adventures in South Florida. Connect with her on Twitter at @Dayngr.

Companies that are new to social media monitoring and engagement frequently wonder where to begin. This can even be a bigger challenge if nobody is talking about your company or brand.

Here are 100 examples, divided into 10 categories, of things that you can listen to and monitor for across the social web.

Content creators are often inspired by their surroundings when developing ideas for their social media profiles, but their content strategy is the guiding principle that makes it all work. Maybe that means I’m hungry, because why else would I come up with a hamburger analogy for developing a content strategy.

One way to look at a company’s social media content strategy is to ask the questions of who, what, where, when and why, but I’m sticking to the hamburgers. I must still be hungry.

Hamburger
The meat of your strategy, and don’t worry, this will be the only bad pun in this post, is the high level topic of your content. Whether you are sharing content on a blog, Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, you need to know what you are writing about. Effective social media content is educational or entertaining. People don’t really want to hear about your products. Your website already does that.

Prospects and customers want to find solutions to their problems. They want to know how to do things better or more efficiently. Airlines don’t blog about their ticket prices. They share travel tips or information about popular destinations.

Cheese
Cheese makes a burger tastier and keywords make social media content more relevant. Do you know what keywords are important your followers? Many marketers focus on keywords for search, as in what keywords are prospects searching for, but in the endless stream of social content, it is imperative to know which keywords are drawing their attention on the social web.

Ketchup
Condiments are a matter of personal preference and my preference is ketchup. A key element of your content strategy is your target audience and their personal preferences. Many companies create personas to define who their target customers are, so they can create relevant content. Talking to a CTO is different than talking to a CMO. They have different concerns.

Pickles
How do you slice the pickles that you put on your burger? They can be sliced in circles, sliced the long way, or even with a crinkle cut device to make pickle chips. These are the different kinds of content you can publish, like written blog posts, photos or videos. There are lots of ways to tell stories and share best practices with your target audience. Knowing what kinds of content resonates and drives the most traffic back to your blog lets you create the right mix.

Lettuce
A big lettuce leaf adds crunch and texture to a burger. The voice and tone of a company’s content adds texture to the words, photos and videos you post to make them more interesting and entertaining. Humorous videos about routers are more likely to connect with viewers than factual, straightforward product videos.

Bun
And it is all held together by the bun. This represents where you post your content. For many businesses a blog serves as the hub of all their social content. All content posted on their social media profiles points back to the blog. The bun keeps everything organized, together and properly branded.

What are the most important elements of your content strategy? Have you thought about all 6 layers in the example above, or are you stuck in the hot dog of content strategy?

Photo credit: Flickr

Jeffrey L. Cohen is a social strategist at Radian6 and the co-author of the forthcoming The B2B Social Media Book. You can follow Jeff on Twitter at @jeffreylcohen.

Radian6 had an opportunity to sit down and discuss social media monitoring and engagement for small business with one of our small business customers, Relish Gourmet Burgers from Atlantic Canada.

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The 2011 World Series had conversations that extended past the ball fields and into the social web. This Radian6 infographic looks at conversations across multiple social media channels to provide the top conversation topics, hashtags, player buzz and more. Who generated more conversations – the Rangers or the Cardinals? Which players scored a home run when it came to social media buzz?

We’ve got the details in this exciting infographic.

Click to View Full Size

In this case study, find out how Relish Gourmet Burgers is using Social Media channels as cost effective, small business alternatives to traditional marketing and media.

Frontier Airlines is currently in its 18th year of operation, they have more then 5,500 employees and they operate more then 500 daily flights from Denver International Airport, Milwaukee’s General Mitchell International Airport and Kansas City International Airport. Frontier flies to more than 80 destinations in the US, Mexico and Costa Rica. With that number of daily flights, it means that Frontier has thousands of customers depending on them each day.

Find out about how Frontier Airlines and Marco Toscano are using social media to reach out and connect with their customers in this webinar recorded October 20, 2011.

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I really enjoy getting the chance to sit down and chat with our customers about their business and how they have achieved success, especially in social media. I also enjoy a good burger, so when I got the chance to spend the morning at Relish Gourmet Burgers, I was thrilled. Relish is a small business that has seen rapid growth since opening the doors to their first location in 2010, in the past year they have opened an additional three locations and have four more planned for 2012. They quickly won the hearts of their customers with engaging, energetic staff, fantastic specialty burgers, and the ability to innovate.

Co-founders, Rivers Corbett and Chef Ray Henry shared with me some of the ways they have used social media to share the energy of their restaurant over social channels like Twitter (you can find Relish on Twitter – @RelishUs). Using social media they have been able to create a community of not just customers but fans and friends.

Check back next week, as we will be posting a video of our conversation with the team at Relish. Thanks again to Rivers and Chef Ray for hosting us and sharing their story.

Do you have stories of how small businesses are using social media to help grow their business? Have you had a great experience with a small business connecting with customers through social channels? Please share!

Sarah Carver is Public Relations Manager at Radian6. She is always inspired by great customer stories. Find her on Twitter at sarahcarver12.

Airlines are upping their social media game and becoming increasingly present in online communities. Whether you are hoping to increase the number of passengers on board, provide an additional means of convenient customer service or be prepared to manage a crisis, you can leverage social media to make this plan a reality.

In this ebook, for the airline industry, we go through the steps to discover and implement social media for your airline.

Visit our Social Media for Airlines section to learn more about how Radian6 is helping the industry.

Contact Us

This Use Case for the Software Industry discusses how organizations are gaining competitive knowledge, amplifying their supporters and building a community around their brand by leveraging the power of social media.

With over 40 percent of Americans turning to the internet to facilitate a discussion on some aspect of health care, there’s no better time for the Health Care Industry to connect with the social web. As patients continue to become even bigger advocates for their health and wellness, there will be more and more discussions popping up online.

I recently chatted with Mark Schaefer about the changing nature of how companies communicate with their customers. Social media engagement is just one of six digital layers between companies and their customers.

The Six Layers of Customer Engagement:

1. The Web: When companies moved to the web, they asked customers to be self-sufficient with regard to things like product information, customer service and ordering.

2. Social Media: The social web opened up possibilities of public, two-way conversation.

3. Facebook: This is the internet for many people, and they handle all of their communication, with friends and companies, through the world’s largest social network.

4. Mobile: With a phone in every pocket, customers are now looking for information that they can consume on their mobile devices.

5. Augmented Reality: Digital information can now be placed on top of the real world.

6. The Game Layer: This builds on the mobile layer and lets businesses turn the world and their businesses into a game.

And during the interview, Mark demonstrated his ability to “walk the talk” of social media by sharing these ideas on a leisurely stroll.

Radian6 is the social media monitoring and engagement platform used by more than half of the world’s Fortune 100 companies.

Learn how we can help your organization succeed in social media by watching this short demo about how a customer like “GNC Live Well” might use Radian6.

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Find out how social media monitoring and listening can benefit your team’s and your organization’s Sales, Marketing, and Customer Service goals.

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Jason Falls, co-author of ‘No Bullsh*t Social Media’, discusses stories behind the book and the lessons learned from companies’ social media success and failures, that can be applied to any business.

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There are only a few more days until a group of my Radian6 colleagues (David Alston, David Thomas, Tom Hasselman) and I take flight for sunny Orlando to attend the SOCAP International 2011 Annual Conference. For those who haven’t heard of SOCAP (Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals), it is a business professionals community “committed to promoting customer care and customer engagement.” Through various events and online resources, SOCAP provides companies with networking and idea sharing opportunities to assist them in developing and strengthening their business-customer relationships.

With a fantastic line up of keynote speakers and breakout sessions, this year’s annual conference is sure to be an exciting and valuable event filled with lively discussion and debate. I’m sure we will also manage to have a bit of fun, if my experience at the SOCAP Symposium earlier this year is any indication.

I was a first time “SOCAPer” at the symposium in May, and a relative newbie here at Radian6, so I went into the event with curiosity, anticipation, and a bit of nervousness. Upon arriving, any anxiety I had almost immediately dissipated. From the moment we picked up our credentials at the check-in table, the people and atmosphere were welcoming and kind. SOCAP really is like one big happy family (pardon the cliché), and it is clear that everyone shares a passion for what lies at the heart of SOCAP: the customer.

During my three days at the SOCAP Symposium, I listened to keynote and session speakers who brought their own unique backgrounds and perspectives on a variety of topics, from building digital relationships to the importance of play. Social media featured prominently, and there were many discussions, both on stage and on the floor, around its various applications, from sales and customer service to crisis management. The speakers at the event really hit home the point that social media is not going away any time soon, and like the telephone and email changed the way businesses and customers interact, social media is doing the same.

I’m looking ahead to the SOCAP International 2011 Annual Conference as a continuation of these discussions, and I know I won’t be disappointed. The organizers have put together an agenda chock full of topics related to social media. Mobile technology features prominently, which isn’t surprising, considering the rising popularity of smartphones and mobile apps as portals where customers can engage with brands, look up peer reviews, and seek the opinions of their social networks before making purchasing decisions. There are also sessions around SCRM, online marketing, customer care, and complaint resolution, to name a few, all of which pick up nicely where the symposium in May left off.

I have signed up as a social media ambassador for this year’s annual conference and will be tweeting throughout the event. I will do my best to share some insight and inspiration that will take the discussion online and allow all of you to join in. There will be lots of other attendees tweeting as well, so be sure to follow the conversation, share your comments, and ask questions using the #SOCAPac11 hashtag. Chat with you soon!

Zoë Geddes-Soltess is a Community Engagement Specialist at Radian6, with a focus on Consumer Packaged Goods and Retail. You can follow her on Twitter at @zodot.

Cruiselines, airlines, travel & tourism companies alike are incorporating fun into their efforts to engage and involve their community of fans, friends and followers.  Social media channels are host to many brands looking to captivate would-be travelers with their clever contests, catchy sales and fun discussions.

One phenomenon that I have found especially fun recently, is the way that brands within the travel industry use Facebook to create conversation and build their community. So this #traveltuesday, let’s take a look at a few of the fun threads and conversations happening on the popular social networking sites.

For starters, the fun factor draws us in! Take this recent ‘fill-in-the-blank’ style discussion  that Carnival Cruise started within their Facebook page community.

It felt so fun, that I had to get in on it too, making me one of 117 people to comment on a post also ‘liked’ by 128. Despite the sudden decrease in temperature, I hadn’t thought of booking a cruise today, and now, not only can I see myself on THIS Carnival Cruise specifically, but I want to take my BFF Karla with me (and beat her down that waterslide!).

I never imagined that one day a cruise line (or any brand, really) would create a discussion on Facebook that I would care to jump in on, yet today many people are engaging.  So what makes this engagement successful?

I’ll leave you to think on that for a moment while I toss another one your way. Delta Airlines asked on September 29th:

Nowhere in their question did they ask ‘Are you flying Delta today?’ or beg you for your business. I see no mention of anything outside of a harmless question that successfully enticed 205 people to take the time to answer, never mind the giant number of ‘likes.’

Although Paris Las Vegas asks the question about themselves: “Tell us about the best thing you’ve eaten at Paris Las Vegas,” it is still a fun discussion that’s light on the marketing messaging we’re accustomed to in traditional media.

One does not need to look too long to find examples of brands who are simply attempting to get people talking. What could be the value in generating conversation that has little to nothing to do with your brand? And why would you use your best social media talent to essentially engage in a fancy ‘chat’ with a large audience of unknowns?

At the very least, a travel industry brand is showing their human connection and making friends. But more than this, the responses and interaction lead to a deeper understanding of the variety of experiences and interests that their fans and followers have. Social media channels should be more than just about pushing what you’re selling. If you’re not already expressing genuine interest in your passengers, customers, guests and followers, why not try a little social experiment and see where it takes you?

Do you have a story to share? What is your favorite example of a travel industry brand engaging you in light, fun conversation? Or maybe you’re a brand who wants to shout out about the great things you’re doing. Tell us!

Jenn Seeley dreams of waterslides on cruise ships followed by yummy food and warm beaches. She can be found engaging in #traveltuesdays on Twitter as @jenn_seeley.

The business environment is changing. I’d even say it’s transforming. As the social web starts to impact both businesses large and small, they are embarking on the quest to adapt and become a social business.

This month, we take on that quest in our eBook, Strategically Social: 5 Keys to Becoming a Social Business written by Brent Leary. Specifically, we look at five high level areas where strategy in social is making the most impact.

Socializing the Business Culture…Not Just the Business Technology

While customers’ abilities to create and share information has evolved and grown, their core philosophies have remained intact. They continue to want to be valued, listened to, and have companies act on what they hear.

Companies who grasp this concept and are willing adapt their business approach to accommodate this new social customer can ultimately deepen relationships and be viewed as a valuable partner.

The New SaaS: Social as a Strategy

The benefits of becoming a social business extends far beyond brand awareness and deepening customer relationships. Lead generation, increased revenues, maintaining profitability are just a few potential outcomes of a strategically-social business.

Focus on Customer Retention/Experience

While the benefits above are important and exciting, keeping your existing customers happy and engaged is just as vital. Leveraging social channels to improve customer engagement is another way to stay connected with, and have a better understanding of what’s important to customers.

Automation and Integration: Creating Social Business Processes

With a wide array of social channels out there, the amount of data may make you both wide-eyed with opportunity as well as perplexed with how to organize it all. As Mark Redgrave shared in his guest post yesterday, it’s all about turning content into conversations to understand customers and create more efficient opportunities.

Measuring the Value of the Social Customer Summary

We know that the more data you obtain, the more you can learn. As you categorize or segment customer data by how much they spend with your business, you can begin to focus your efforts on the groups you feel would be most beneficial to your bottom line.

Is your business on the quest to becoming strategically social? How would these keys impact your business? Check out the eBook, Strategically Social: 5 Keys to Becoming a Social Business and share your thoughts!

Amanda Nelson is a Community Content Manager at Radian6. She is an avid writer, content curator and border collie fanatic. Find her on Twitter at @mileigh13.

We live in a world where data is big. And everywhere. Can you go about your workday today without saying “data”? For fun, put a quarter in a data jar for every time it comes out of your mouth.

Out there in the cloud, a storm of big data is brewin’. When it rains back down on earth, this data shower nourishes the seeds of life for us marketers. We harvest fields of comments that sprout and reactions that bloom.  We mine the goodness beneath the surface—bust out your picks and shovels, boys, there’s data in them there hills!

Data is 0s and 1s, right? Wrong. When data is in the form of a conversation, data is HUMAN. A conversation describes what human beings love or hate. What they are going to do, or feel, and why. By definition, this is very personal. People and their conversations are truly amazing, full of color, texture, and energy. We actually imagine it looks kinda like this:

Unfortunately, as is so often the case, once we get our hands on this lovely data we have a tendency to literally process the life out of it. We “clean data” and “purge data” and “scrub data”. This might make it orderly and neatly packaged, but it might also critically take away the part that is human:

So how do we make sure the data stays colorful and full of personality? Lucky for us, the latest social media tools and technologies now allow us to experience how our customers—human beings—are really “being” in the social realm. We can understand them better, in all their colorful glory. We no longer have to strip the person bare, down to the basics of their demographic data of age, gender, residence, etc. And because we understand them, we have a greater opportunity to respond in a highly personalized way. We can add back the layers of what each person is wearing today—and engage in a way that make them feel individual and special.

Human conversation is a wonderful thing—the very essence of our society. Embrace social conversation in all its color and texture at Internet scale, and you will really start to make it personal:

(Data was used 17 times in this post. I’ll donate $4.25 into the data jar.)

Mark Redgrave founded OpenAmplify in 2008. You’re most likely to spot this new California resident in the heart of downtown SF or catching a wave in Santa Cruz. Follow Mark and his OpenAmplify team: @openamplify.

For many of us, the cooler weather is creeping in but Radian6 has another plan. We are heading south! It’s time to talk social in the southern U.S. at a wide variety of conferences over the next few weeks. While the topics are vast, the concept is the same: the social web is changing the way businesses do business.

The first stop is BOLO 2011 in  Scottsdale, AZ. From October 9th through 11th,  Craig Comeau and Dave Lewis will be part of a conference which empowers marketing talent to leverage the power of the social web. With workshops, forums and even a Vaudeville-style event showcasing attendee talent, it seems that the social web and marketing could be a match made in Scottsdale.

Let’s travel further south to Dallas, Texas where Jamie Casey, Darren Macleod and Bob Faigel will meet call center professionals from around the world for ICMI’s Call Center Demo and Conference on October 11th through 13th. It’s a hands-on experience with tours of call centers, exhibits and presentations. All the while, attendees will learn how their day-to-day experiences are impacted by social media and the opportunities to utilize it for the greater good.

Our last stop for today’s post brings us about 1,100 miles southeast to the SOCAP Annual Conference in Orlando, FL. Join a group of Radian6ers including David Alston, David B. Thomas, Zoe Geddes-Soltess and Tom Hasselman for an experience about customer relationship management and the social web. It’s on October 16th through the 19th.

With all this hot social talk, I’ll apologize to my sweaters. They’ll have to wait a bit longer.

We want to know your travels for the next few weeks. What conferences are you attending? Are your social conversations heating up?

Amanda Nelson is a Community Content Manager at Radian6. She is an avid writer, content curator and Border Collie fanatic. Follow her on Twitter at @mileigh13.

Last night, the world learned about Steve Jobs passing. I couldn’t possibly write anything about him that hasn’t already been said by someone else more elegantly or eloquently, nor would I attempt to do that here.  Jobs and Apple changed computing and the technology world as we know it. Simply put, he was a visionary. Because of that, his passing (and the legacy he leaves behind) got me thinking about the future of business and how social media relates.

We’re All Pioneers

When it comes to social media, we’re forging our own paths. There’s no doubt we have plenty of great leaders showing us how it could be done and maybe even how it should be done. But there’s nothing to say that you can’t do it a little differently – handle social media for your business in a way that best suits your business’ personality. Think outside the box. How would you use social media for your business if there were no one to tell you that you couldn’t do it that way? When you think about which platforms your business will focus its social media efforts around, don’t forget that there’s more to social media than just Facebook and Twitter. In other words, if your consumers or clients love video, consider those outposts as well. Then, go out and make great videos that really show people why they’d want to do business with you!

Everyone Can Contribute To the Social Enterprise

In Seth Godin’s book, “Poke the Box” he asks “When was the last time you did something for the first time?” Do you remember? It doesn’t matter if you are the Founder and CEO or the new hire. You’ve got ideas and those ideas could very well help take your business to another level. Let’s say your call center is providing great customer service, how can you do the same or better, using social media? Use your imagination, brainstorm, be creative and experiment. I’m not suggesting you throw strategy out the window – just suggesting that you should expand your horizons and keep a very open mind throughout the process.

The Future

The future of your business is unwritten. Businesses are moving toward becoming more social – shifting into social enterprises. You can ignore change, embrace change or create change. Are you going to spend your future keeping up with the competition or blazing new trails? It is really up to you.

“Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.” – Steve Jobs  [The Wall Street Journal, 1993]

What wonderful things will your business do, using social media?

Trish Forant is a Community Manager at Radian6. She’s a mom, a writer and she enjoys helping people connect. You can connect with her on Twitter at @Dayngr.

Brian Solis from Revolution talks social media and the biggest shift in business in many years with Marcel LeBrun, SVP and GM of Salesforce Radian6. Catch the full episode here.

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For the most part, my relationship with my utility company is pretty much limited to my monthly bill. But behind the scenes, utility companies all over the world are working 24/7/365 to make sure constant power is delivered, whether it’s electric, nuclear, gas, etc. And communication is a huge driver.

The social media world is no different. Many utilities companies recognize that their customers, thought leaders, colleagues and prospects are sharing and conversing via social media. But are utility companies listening and engaging back? Do they know how their customers think and feel about their brand? If not, where do they begin?

Enter Isaac Pigott, Alabama Power‘s communications strategist. (He was also an Emmy-winning TV reporter, which explains today’s video format). With experience in crisis management, social media, and no fear of the camera lens, we thought he’d be the perfect person to pin down for some video Q&A on how social media and utility companies work together.

Hi Ike. Can you tell us how the utility industry benefits from social media?

What are some of the challenges of social media?

So now we understand some of the challenges and benefits, but as a utility company, how do you get started?

For utility companies, how important is listening?

With your crisis communications expertise, how do you incorporate social media into your crisis strategy?

In your opinion, what does the future hold for utility companies and social media?

Thank you so much for your time today, Ike. Great videos!

How would you have answered some of these questions? Do you think listening takes precedence over engagement or are they equally important? Share your thoughts and questions. Ike may join in!

For the United Nations Development Programme, a global development network supporting countries all over the world, the daily challenges are not minor. Poverty, gender inequality and education are typical challenges this nonprofit seeks to solve on a daily basis. But as Sebastian Majewski shared in yesterday’s webinar, there is the opportunity to put an end to these challenges once and for all. How? With social media.

Sebastian’s thought starters:

• Listen – Find the conversations and understand them. Use a social listening tool that enables you to identify the conversations in an effective way.
• Determine the channels – Find where conversations are happening. This could influence where you engage and where you start new conversations.
• Determine influencers – In these conversations there are heroes leading the charge, making change, and developing a community of their own. Who are they? These leaders can play a role in reaching your goals and finding them is a big leap forward in making change.

The UNDP recently celebrated its 100th International Women’s Day and with the influence of social, it was a natural decision to tie social in to the special day. The UNDP looked at chatter around the event days before it occurred. They set baselines for the conversation and the landscape. From there, they studied the conversations during and after the event, which enabled them to establish key takeaways. Here’s a snapshot.

• Video was a strong mechanism for engagement. Views and comments of the International Women’s Day videos went above and beyond expectations and that approach can be a platform going forward.
• The bulk of conversations were dominated on Twitter. This opens the door for UNDP to listen, engage and focus their energy in that space.
• Take chances! Try video, venturing into different channels, etc. and see what hits.

The big question that came out of that webinar, to me anyway, is the potential for social. Is it truly powerful enough to end world issues? With the combination of people coming together, the desire for change and the technology to connect, the opportunities are endless.

But I’m not the only one with questions. The webinar had some great inquiries from the community and are now posted below with Sebastian’s answers. Also, here are some helpful links from yesterday’s session:

• Webinar recording
• Case study

Heather Read: With social media networks only providing limited geographic information how can you reliably target your communications or listening program to a specific local community?

Thanks for the question, Heather. Using the example of the International Women’s Day, we assumed that nurses and midwives in Africa are important stakeholders in that issue arena. Skilled attendance during childbirth has emerged as a critical issue in recent years in attempting to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Almost half of the total maternal deaths each year occur in sub-Saharan Africa where the lifetime risk of a woman dying from pregnancy related causes is estimated at 1 in 16 by comparison with an overall average of 1 in 2800 in ‘developed’ parts of the world (src: WHO).

Our aim was to identify active organizations through keyword search rather than using the geographic information provided by the dataset. Crawling the dataset and searching for keywords, such as “maternal health”, “midwives” or “reproductive health” helps you to related posts. You can also prioritize posts by calculating the engagement level and conversation reach of the posts. By doing that, we were able to identify important stakeholders around the issue of maternal health. From there, you need a qualitative approach to identify specific local communities, which means you will have to take a look at the posts.

Bart Byl: What kind of penetration does social media typically have in developing countries? Do you just focus on engaging the influencers who do have access?

The digital divide (link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide) is an important issue and a limitation for our research. While most of the content is produced in the USA, the developing world is catching up quickly. Mobile technology is far more developed than Internet connections. Working closely with NGOs and the civil society helps us to identify groups that are very influential. However, the digital gap will shrink over the next decades.

Nicholas Ledner: Have you started cultivating any relationships with any of those influencers?

Yes, we are actively cultivating relationships with influential stakeholders. The approach is to add value to their work. If we work with the example of the midwives, we try to highlight relevant work, reports, statistics and events to especially those groups. In my opinion, that kind of communication is more effective than targeting those message to the general public. First, the targeted stakeholders appreciate the content we provide and second, they are strong in diffusing the content to a wider audience.

Yes (hi folks), how do they deal with folks who don’t use English?

The official languages of the United Nations are the six languages that are used in UN meetings, and in which official UN documents are produced. They include Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English, French, Russian and Spanish. Since we are just getting started with Social Media Monitoring, we are not able to produce the datasets in all languages. Radian6 does offer the opportunity to search in different languages. In practical terms, you need to create a topic profile for each language version and use translated keywords and terms.

Airline Frequently Asked Questions

We currently manage multiple social media accounts – how can you help make this easier?

Our Engagement Console pulls all of your Twitter handles into one easy location, helping you to keep your finger on the pulse of your brand. You can even pull in your Facebook account to stay connected with your fans there, too.

We also allow your team to work collaboratively on projects together with our workflow capabilities, so not only can you manage multiple accounts – you can work with your team to ensure that all questions and comments get replied to as quickly as possible.

We’ve been monitoring the online activity of our competitors – now what?

If passengers are discussing experiences they’ve had with other airlines on the social web, now’s the time to take their comments and critiques and turn them into actionable results. Think of these comments as potential sales leads – they’ll give you the opportunity to understand what your competition is doing, and allow you modify your offerings accordingly. Check out our applications section to learn more about the power of social for generating sales leads.

Our customers are travelling all over the world – how many languages do you track?

Radian6 currently tracks 17 languages, including: Chinese, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish.

We’re hoping to use the social web to reach out to customers about flight cancellations and delays – do you monitor in real time?

Everyday we work to return over 8 million relevant results to you, so that you’re always in touch with customer conversations.

Our customer support teams work around the clock – do yours?

We’re pleased to offer 24 hour a day support, five days a week. Call, email or ping us on Twitter and we’ll have you back on track in no time. Click here for more information on our support hours, and all of the ways to reach out to our team.

Have more questions about our platform? Check out our comprehensive FAQ here.

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Airline customers are social. As the leading social media monitoring and engagement platform, Radian6 can help airlines listen and connect to with their customers on the social web.

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Visit our Social Media for Airlines section to learn more about how Radian6 is helping the industry.

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Markings on the kitchen wall as a child grows. Adding chocolate chips in a cookie recipe (and dumping in a few extra for good measure). Filling a test tube to the meniscus in science class. These widely different measurement-related scenarios not only have a sentimental tie, but the word is defining growth (child growing), creation (baking cookies) and testing (science class). And even when we refer to measurement in terms of social media programs, growth, creation and testing applies. Who knew we could get sentimental?

Measurement is Growth.

Social media programs cannot stay stagnant. They are living, breathing things that need to be nurtured and cared for as they grow and change. For instance, we’re sure you can agree that no two days are the same on your Facebook page or Twitter handle. Your customers and colleagues are conversing about different topics constantly and in order to engage in the conversation, you need to monitor and measure your social program. As you engage and learn the conversations and social media platforms that are most beneficial to your brand goals, you’ll adapt and grow your campaign in those areas. Which platform generates the highest share of conversation for your brand – Facebook, Twitter or something else? As we learned in the GNC webinar, blogs and forums housed the most conversations around health and wellness. GNC knew those platforms needed to be a focus for their own growth potential.

Measurement is Creation.

Results can taste as sweet as chocolate chip cookies if you just know how to create an effective social media program. Knowing who’s who your social media neighborhood helps to determine which direction you may want to go when delving into the space. You want to find that niche opportunity to stand out. This also enables the opportunity to be creative in your program. If you’re a bank and you see that Foursquare check ins are popular, create a Foursquare program such as a higher CD rate upon check in. Use the knowledge you gained from measuring the space in order to let the creative juices flow into your unique social media recipe.

Measurement is Testing.

A silver bullet does not come with a social media program. While there are many proven methods, trial and error is a great way to determine what’s working and not. And if you’re constantly measuring your results, you can determine results quickly and adapt your campaign accordingly. Consider A/B testing, whereby you try two different social media programs at once to see which one pulls stronger results. Last year’s Social Media Marketing Conference has a session on A/B testing. Here’s a recap.

This month, we’ve tied measurement to words like complicated and controversial. But measurement can be creative and educational too. It’s all about how you use it to work for you.

What comes to your mind when you hear the word measurement? Are there other terms that play into growth, creation and testing? Share your comments.

Chris James, Director of Social Media for GNC, joined Sarah Carver for a healthy, half-hour, kitchen table-style Q&A session on the brand’s social media successes. That kitchen was brimming with questions from listeners and it soon became a forum of topics ranging from community to strategy insights to the selection of social media platforms.

GNC’s social strategy has a number of goals including a productive net increase in discussion and questions, having a two-way dialog with their community, and monitoring conversations and questions. But moreover, it’s all about getting their community started on their health and wellness journey with GNC being a part of that exploration. And that drills down to each individual. Community members encompass celebrities, athletes, moms and more. They sometimes include dogs. The idea is to turn detractors into brand ambassadors as GNC partners with individuals on their journey, no matter their mindset. “Social media success equals customer success,” says Chris.

But how does a brand get started? While anyone can create a social media program, having a plan in place upfront is the best way to stand out. This infrastructure is built on listening.

• Listen to customers
• Listen to industry
• Listen to detractors and ambassadors

By listening, you will get a sense of what the community is saying and how and where they’re saying it. This sets the stage for your plan. “We’ll change our plans to address customer pain points,” says Chris. In GNC’s case, while the larger share of voice lived on Twitter and Facebook from a medium perspective, blogs and forums housed the bulk of the customer conversations. The brand needed to be there. As Chris noted, “We are closely listening and engaging as part of our business practice.”

Once the plan launched and the community formed, the individual stories began to unfold. There were stories about weight loss, about beating a triathlon time and moms getting healthy. “It validated that what we’re doing is making an impact.” The brand was sure to engage with the community for better information, customer service and to be an outlet for customers 24/7. “The service doesn’t end when the stores close,” says Chris.

For GNC, social media is weaved into the fabric of their brand. Chis hopes that soon, this practice will not be called “social media” but it will just be doing business the right way.

We thank Chris for his time and to the listeners for their great participation. Don’t worry if you missed it – here’s a recording of the webinar. While we didn’t get to all the questions during the session, Chris was kind enough to take all additional questions and answer them right here. Take a look and if you have any thoughts, feel free to comment!

Ricardo Betancourt: Could you tell us how did you choose the social media websites to be part of? Why Facebook, why Twitter, or other?
[Chris James] The truth is, we went where the party is already happening. Our Facebook & Twitter properties pre-dated me coming to GNC but it was really about following the pack at first. Then, once we used Radian6 to ID other properties (forum & blogs) where people were talking about us, we began to slowly work our way into those conversations.

Kyle Spittler: Are athlete & celebrity community paid or earned endorsements? Examples?
[Chris James] Yes and no. GNC and our vendors have paid endorsers we work with. Others are people we admire or have mentioned us on Twitter or are somehow connected to health, wellness or sports.

@Auctionzip: Do you use the GNC name or ‘twitter account’ or fb profile when answering questions on these niche forums?
[Chris James] We try and keep our branded properties consistent with “@GNCLiveWell” but when we engage elsewhere we like to represent the brand as individuals to enhance our credibility on their site and not come off as spammy.

@donaldbjackson: Have you considered creating a dedicated GNC community forum? Why or why not? When is it appropriate for a co. to consider?
[Chris James] Yes but we are moving away from that strategy based on our successes with Facebook and Twitter. A branded community is only worth it if you have the resources to a) drive customers there and b) keep the conversation on the site fresh day in and day out. Otherwise, consider a corporate blog or avoid it altogether and leverage Facebook, Twitter or some other hot website where your customers spend time.

@donaldbjackson: Which parts of Radian6 service do you use most? Do you supplement with other services? Which?
[Chris James] We use all of it AND we use point solutions for various platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. The vendors or tools you use should reflect the goals of your social media strategy. There isn’t one single template or toolset to get you there.

@donaldbjackson: Can you talk explicitly about how you tie together social media and customer service? Is this handled all by one department?
[Chris James] No, it’s a shared task currently with Marketing being the ones out there and mixing it up every day and we escalate more serious issues to our phone reps on an as needed basis. At some point next year, the reps will also use Radian6 to proactively assist customers with issues.

Jim King: The word “community” is used so much now. What does community mean?
[Chris James] Pretty simple. It just means a group of people with common interests. I can ID at least 5 “communities” of customers we want to target. The challenging thing is that they are all over the place online. I wish there was one site or place they hung out but by nature that’s not likely so we try and go to as many of those sites as possible or influence people in those communities to speak on our behalf.

Vince Tobias: Have you had any unprecedented experience in your community? Say in an attempt to regain customer confidence, the company gave an exception for this one customer. It then created a trend or mindset for other customers to follow suit because this one customer shared his experience in social media. How did you react or what could you recommend to avoid such unwanted incident.
[Chris James] We haven’t but I’ve seen it happen in prior roles at Dell and AMD. The fact is, they will share their experience no matter what. The only thing you can even attempt to do is mitigate how far their opinion spreads. If your brand is out there actively engaged and helpful, a bad incident is less likely to become a “group think” problem than you can’t control. The only way to know what issues are out there or need to be addressed is if you listen first.

Nigel Linnane: Do GNC customers ever ask/wonder how you have picked up on their conversations. you have not started?
[Chris James] A small few. Most get that Twitter, for example, is not private. We draw the line though and don’t respond to specific Facebook posts that did not happen on our page. That would be creepy. It’s a semantic difference but people who share on Facebook expect their conversation to be private even when their privacy settings have it showing to the whole world.

Ghazwan Almoazen: How much do you promote GNC in your posts?
[Chris James] We are actually heavily promotional because we are a retailer and people expect to get deals thrown at them but we try to be conversational as much as possible. At brands I have worked for in the past, it was very much the opposite. I guess it depends on your business and what your customers expect from you. The more likely you are to be personal and conversational, the more likely they will trust what you say. The more you are a shill for your brand & bottom line, the more likely they are to ignore you. Somewhere in the vast middle ground is the balance.

Ricardo Betancourt: How can you measure the social media impact?
[Chris James] That all depends on what we want to “impact.” Sales? Well that’s tough if we doing anything else besides giving them a coupon code. Awareness? Site Traffic? Conversion? Social marketing is capable of achieving a lot of different business objectives but you have to know how your customers use social media before you can know how to market to them and what you will be measuring success against. It’s not a shortcut to revenue or lower costs, but when utilized properly can absolutely help drive those numbers.

Rosemary  Cafasso: How do you define “listening” — does that include the analytics?
[Chris James] I make a distinction between listening and analytics. Listening is the active act of qualitatively assessing what is being said about your brand or products. Quantitative analytics almost always follow a qualitative assessment and are necessary to judge magnitude of conversation or results from a conversation. However, analytics usually come at the end of something and are a reactive process. Listening is active and can even be a proactive process.

Kyle Spittler: What are GNCs specific measures of success in Social Media (likes/shares/clicks/etc.)? Do these vary based on project/campaign?
[Chris James] Yes, they vary based on what the goal of the social activity is and on the measure outcomes available to us. Facebook engagement consists on impressions, likes, clicks, unlikes and page views. The relevant measure needs to be matched up with the goal: maximizing message reach, driving additional customer attachment, driving .com traffic, unsubscribe rate, etc.

Kyle Spittler: Do you find there is enough social media volume to justify being out there?
[Chris James] Absolutely. Good example is in Twitter. We have 75k followers and get mentioned a few thousand times per month. The amount of times just our brand (not our Twitter account) gets mentioned on the web is 10 times greater. Shortage of conversation is not a challenge in the health & wellness industry.

Joel Kelly: Can you talk more specifically about monitoring and your plan for it? Do you have specific teams handling monitoring, or is it a shared role among people in each department?
[Chris James] We have some sharing of the burden across groups but only specific people are authorized to respond on behalf of the brand they must undergo training to have that privilege. We intend to expand that program outside of HQ and into the stores eventually, allowing associates, managers and franchisees to be a part of the conversation.

Keith Huddleston: With Brand in mind how do address customers who are creating negative feedback or legal allegations?
[Chris James] It depends on the nature of content. In many cases, we simply report it to legal or if there is something we can do we escalate it to Customer Service. A response is only made if we feel it can help resolve the situation. Otherwise, we hold our tongues. We have guidelines in place that help determine the best course of action.

@donaldbjackson: I’m looking for case studies on starting communities. Any you can recommend?
[Chris James] Dell and Microsoft have many case studies. Tech has done online communities well over 20 years.

Social Media for Agencies

There’s never been a more exciting time to be involved with an agency. Whether you’re part of an advertising agency, a digital agency, or work for a public relations or market research firm, Radian6 has real-time solutions to help both you and your clients succeed in the social space.

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Successful Campaigns through Social

Conventional advertising like print and television allow for one-way messaging, but Radian6 gives creative agencies the chance to engage in back-and-forth communication. This social advertising approach not only helps put a human face on the corporation – making the brand more trustworthy and relatable – it also provides immediate feedback that aids in positioning successful promotions. Create viral marketing campaigns based on the voice of the customer and your brand’s advocates will help you advertise by spreading the word through social media.

Facilitate Public Relations

Not all voices carry the same weight online – bloggers with many website visitors, for example, or Tweeter users with lots of followers, have more influence. PR agencies can benefit from Radian6 by discovering who these influencers are, then stay on top of how they’re shaping public perception. The real-time nature of social media serves as an early warning system and is the best defence against negative PR. Respond quickly in crisis management situations, protect brand reputation and provide constructive counsel to your clients by suggesting an outreach program that’s tailored to what people are saying online.

The Social Web, Your New Focus Group

Radian6 helps market research agencies better understand shifting social landscapes as they relate to the companies you represent. Social media is ongoing and organic, forever changing. Use our platform to discover emerging trends, zero in on sentiment, and determine how things have changed over time. Gain valuable demographic and geographical information to learn more about who, what and where people are talking on the social web, then use these insights to suggest how your client can improve product and service offerings.

Demonstrate Social Media ROI

One of the challenges all types of agencies face is selling the value of social media to clients. How does your agency prove that online engagement efforts are transforming your clients’ businesses to be more profitable? The Radian6 platform provides measureable metrics that can confirm social media ROI. Tally comment count, inbound link count, likes, votes and more to better understand the big picture behind posts. Measure the effectiveness of online marketing with more precision by using compete.com data or web analytic integrations like Google Analytics, Webtrends and Omniture. Determine what topics are driving people to your website, and find out how much time people are spending there. Quantify leads and establish conversion points that prove your clients are getting return on their social media investment.

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How Can Airlines Leverage Social Media

The airline industry is all about forming communities. Many of your travellers are regulars, people who log countless hours in the skies for business or pleasure. The social web is a great place to interact with these frequent flyers, gather their feedback on where you’re succeeding, and where you could stand to make some improvements. Your customers will appreciate your willingness to connect, and putting a customer service agent on the front line ensures you’ll be reacting to situations before they turn into bigger issues.

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Up, up and away.

We’re Here to Help

People are continuously using the social web to discuss your airline. They could be tweeting from an airport with questions on flight delays, or maybe using Facebook to celebrate their great experiences with your in-flight crew. Use the social web to reach out to ensure that they’re having the best experience possible each and every time they take to the skies. In much the same way that you turn to Sabre for their expertise in the field of airline solutions, Radian6 is here to help you manoeuvre through the social web.

Monitor Competitor Activity

Listening on the social web won’t only be beneficial when it comes to conversations pertaining to your brand – it’s also helpful for figuring out what people are saying about your competitors. Want to see what’s causing people to sing the praises of a rival airline? Maybe you’re hoping to gain insight into why their last marketing campaign was such a success? Social media monitoring can help you uncover these stories, and more.

Handle a Crisis Situation

Interacting on the social web can be invaluable for connecting with your passengers during those hectic times, especially when the weather is causing delays and cancellations. Check out our case studies section to learn how Air Canada overcame potential weather-related flight cancellations by reaching out to their passengers via Twitter.

Interact with your Passengers

Social media monitoring should not be used only in crisis situations. Tuning into routine passenger conversations is a great way to provide outreach, not to mention stellar customer service. Maybe you’ll discover they’re discussing your in-flight entertainment and suggesting ways to make it better. Perhaps they want to congratulate your team for another job well done. No matter what they’re saying, these are discussions you don’t want to miss out on.

Enhance Customer Loyalty

With your passengers hanging out on the social web, there’s no better place to perform a little customer outreach. Facilitate giveaways, and reward your customers for using check-in services while waiting for their flights. It’s just another way to create a stronger community surrounding your biggest fans.

Get Started

The “Age of Interruption” is over. Brand perception is no longer influenced only by advertising, public relations and corporate messaging. Brands are now a sum of the conversations about them. Those conversations are happening everywhere and now being shared across the social web. Traditional marketing has changed. Social Media has created new and exciting ways for brands to engage with consumers and build fans.

Play

Listen and measure social conversations

Are people talking about you online? Learn who is talking about your brand and what they are talking about. Discover how your brand, product or service is being perceived by your community online and identify advocates that can influence public sentiment about your company and products.

Shape your brand with social media marketing

Understanding the health of your brand is easier than ever. Monitor public perception of your company and products on the social Web and understand the volume, overall sentiment, key demographics, influencers, and more. Look for trends, adjust your plans, and engage where you can make a difference.

Gain social market intelligence

Get a deeper understanding of what’s important to your customers, what is influencing their decisions and how they feel about your competitors. Stay ahead of emerging trends and get meaningful intelligence to guide decision-making and marketing planning.

Measure campaign effectiveness

Are your Marketing efforts generating the results you expected? Use social media monitoring to understand what is driving conversations and the “why” behind your social traffic, such as in-depth sentiment, demographics, likes and dislikes, and more. Adapt content and messaging based on campaign buzz and analytics.

Interested in hearing what people are saying about your brand? Click here to get started with Radian6.

Ever watched the movie the Sound of Music? A whole family of musically talented people singing in curtains instantly pick up perfect tone on the first try. Some people are just naturally talented and for the rest of us, we need well defined structure and practice in order to accomplish our tasks. Just like learning a musical scale from Do to Do, when you first start out in social media analytics you need to know the language and stages you will end up going through during the process so that you always hit that perfect tone. Just as Maria told us, let’s start at the very beginning which is a very good place to start. Before you start building fancy reports and playing with percentages, you need to understand what it is you are building. Let’s walk through some of the words we use and resources on how to use and define them for your own data.

Goals
The first you need to do before diving in, is to define the goals that you are trying to accomplish through your efforts. These goals don’t have to always be defined in numbers. They can be all encompassing like, “Our goal is to grow the amount of opportunities we have to engage with our customers”. Sometimes it can be hard to get yourself started setting goals, but try to think of these as the big dreams that you are hoping to achieve. Remember that these are your goals, which gives you the right to adjust and re-evaluate as you move along.

Read More: Social Media Strategy: Defining Good Goals Neicole Crepeau

KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators) versus Metrics
Once you have your goals defined you’ll need to find the ways that you will measure the success or failure of these goals. In order to do this you need to define not just metrics, the formulas that show shifts in your data caused by your efforts, but a few Key Performance Indicators or KPI’s. Now, we may think that metrics and KPI’s are the same and yes they can be, but the main difference is that a KPI holds more weight. Where a metric may help you decide some little things, KPI’s are designed to help you make those big decisions. The changes to KPI’s are often what your executive suite like to track.

Read More: From ROI to KPI: Shonali Burke
List of Social Media Measurement KPIs: Jeremiah Owyang

Measurement
The measurement phase is where you are actually putting those metrics and your KPI’s into practice. You are tracking your data, classifying it and preparing the information so that down the line you can analzye and report on it. This is where you will use your social media monitoring platform, web analytics platform, CRM system or any other software that your company supports to help track the shifts in your data.

Read More: 6 Buckets of Social Media Measurement: Jason Peck
Social Media Data Dredging: Tom Webster

Analysis/Insights
When you perform the analysis of your data, you are looking for the “Why” behind the numbers. What caused the shifts? Why was there an increase or a decrease? How did the shift impact the overall picture? This is the first place where you will use the numbers to start telling the story of your goals and build those key insights that tell your teams exactly what’s happening out there. Telling someone that your Share of Voice increased by 5% is valuable, but telling someone your Share of Voice increased by 5% because of the increased adoption of your product in the technology sector versus your three main competitors is even better. Always make sure you know the exact reasons behind the deltas so you are never surprised by the numbers.

Read More: Introducing the Social Analytics Lifecycle: Ken Burbary

Actionable Items
These are the gold results that we are all looking for. They relate back to our goals and tell us what we are going to do, based on the results we saw in our data, to achieve or maintain our goals. We use our Analysis and Insight phase to build these actionable items. If we saw that we had a higher adoption rate in the technology sector than our three main competitors, we might want to say an actionable item for this insight is to continue to provide resources to that sector. We always want to make sure that our Actionable items relate back to our goals so that we continue to grow and maintain our efforts.

Read More: Too Much Data Versus Actual Insights: Chuck Hemann

What steps do you follow as a company when diving into your analytics? Do you have a set process you follow? Is there one person or many people responsible for this process?

It’s never pretty, but crisis management is a very real necessity for your brand and its external communication efforts. If there’s conversation around your brand discussing anything from negative press, to misinformation, or potential business threats, you should be prepared to not only listen in on customer conversations, but also to respond if necessary.

With Radian6, your public relations team will have the power to dig deeper into the conversations surrounding crisis situations, providing insight into your negative brand mentions – including what’s being said, who’s saying it, and whether or not the message is spreading.

To learn more about how social media monitoring can help in your next crisis situation, watch this video with Radian6 Product Managers Tom and Corey.

Radian6 TV: Identifying a PR Crisis

Now that you’ve learned the value of monitoring social media during a crisis, discover how interacting with your customers through the Radian6 Engagement Console can streamline your communication process, creating a complete audit of your conversation trail.

Respond Using Engagement Console

Interested in learning more about Radian6? Click here to get started with us now.

There is a very distinct and dividing line in social media. In one corner we have those that firmly believe that there is a definite return on investment from social media, and in the opposing corner those that firmly believe that there isn’t. Articles pop up on a weekly basis defending both sides and the discussion goes on. Naturally, ROI will need to focus on different numbers and metrics. On the one hand you have the cost of resources such as a person’s time spent managing or reaching out on social networks, and the cost of using software. On the other hand you might have metrics relating to the bottom line such as sales. Tracking sales resulting from social media doesn’t just help to justify the time or investment spent. It can also help identify what networks are the most valuable to a brand.

Lead Generation

Before looking at sales let’s take a step back and look at lead generation. Social media can be an extremely effective tool to drive interest, leads and potential sales. Social media monitoring and monitoring of online media provide the ability to track express needs, giving companies the ability to reach out proactively and pick up a request and action it in a matter of minutes. Beyond just monitoring, social networks can be an additional shop window, providing prospects with an avenue for inquiry aside from a website, the phone or a store. At relatively little cost companies can use social media to diversify their presence to a greater extent. However, much like real shops on the high street, these too need to be managed in order to ensure inquiries don’t land in a black hole never to resurface. As such, a conscious decision to be present on social network ‘x’ over social network ‘y’ must be drawn from previous research in conjunction with active oversight and management of these social networks.

Seeing It Through

If finding potential leads is at one end of the spectrum, conversions and sales are at the opposite. Understanding the link between both can go a long way towards ensuring that an investment and commitment to social media is valuable and is positively impacting the bottom line. Going beyond awareness and likes and retweets, companies may also consider traffic resulting in inquiries or purchases that were directly fed through to their site from social networks, which can be determined using web analytics tools, paid for or free. Whether social media traffic is diverted or not before a real opportunity substantiates, diligence in tracking the beginning to end process will go a long way to helping to make the case for social.

One of the first questions to ask should be how are leads tracked outside of social media? While some might use Excel, for large organizations this is likely achieved in the form of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. These CRM systems or (even spreadsheets) will host contact information, history and sales but also leads and the source for these leads. So when tracking ‘website’ inquiries one can just as easily track ‘social media’ or ‘Twitter’ as another lead source. This will make it easier to track new leads as a result of either a DM Twitter inquiry or a Facebook wall post through the sales cycle, starting at the point of entry. Analyzing this type of data at the end of the month will provide a clear picture of exactly how many leads the various social sources have generated, if they have closed and if so the amount of the sale.

Rocket Science

Tracking leads through all avenues including social media is not complicated, but often times proving social media ROI means you don’t see the wood for the trees. The conversation around ROI needs to become more specific. It isn’t necessarily about social media in and of itself but the overarching objectives that are to be achieved through social media (in addition to other mediums or initiatives). Simply put, social underpins and can help achieve or supplement sales, leads or outreach. There is no need to reinvent the wheel and apply a whole new set of measurements for social media when it comes to sales. A diligent process and tracking system will be a good start to providing ‘real’ numbers, helping brands make informed decisions on their social strategy.

What do you think? And which side of the dividing line do you stand on? Can you define a clear return on social media engagement? As always, we appreciate your thoughts, please leave your comments below.

Social media is about listening and engaging with your consumer base, whether that’s in a business to business or business to consumer sense, to learn ways that you can improve pretty much every aspect of your business. We spend our days listening to each other, engaging, building relationships and can get lost in a sea of replies, DMs, posts, likes, views and countless other metrics and terms that roll off all of tongues easier than the ABC’s. How many of us out there know what all of these metrics we talk about every day can add up to? Honestly ask yourself, how many of those 3 letter acronyms like ROI, ROE and KPI could you define in clear, concise way AND explain why they are important or even what they do at the end of the day? A few stumped faces? Well that’s okay!

There are some great industry experts out there who are helping to lead the way in this space and let’s face it numbers and analysis aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but one thing that we all do need to work together on understanding is their value overall. By working together as a community to help explore this analytics space a little more, it will mean that we’ll be able to put value behind our engagements, working towards things like the cost savings of online support or how much does tweeting a customer bring to a company in direct sales?

This month we are going to tackle this topic of analytics and measurement. The reason that our ebook for the month is titled “The Future of Analytics” is because while we will touch on the building blocks of social media measurement and analysis, we also want to challenge everyone out there to go beyond what we currently know and accept about analytics in our space. We need to start not just talking about what these metrics give us, but as a community talk about how we’re building these metrics, what works & what doesn’t and touch on the big issue of Standardization across our industry so we can move further down the path of defining our industry through the numbers.

So whether you are a social media analyst, community manager or just interested in knowing more about all the metrics you hear talked about throughout your day, join us this month as we start to dig deeper into the ROI, ROE, KPI, and all the other 3 letter acronyms we can find,  to talk about the why, the how and the future of social media analytics.

What stumps you when it comes “Analytics”? What have you been or trying to track within your company? What would you love to be able to show in hard fast numbers?

“When the sun comes up on a sleepy little town, down around San Antone’….” ahhhh, who doesn’t love the Doobie Brothers? Their hit “China Grove” still kills it to this day, almost 40 years after its release. Take a quick dance break, and watch it here – you know you want to!

What’s interesting about the tune is this – singer/guitarist Tom Johnston wasn’t completely aware that he knew a “China Grove” when he so named his sleepy little town. He said this in an interview: “The funny thing was that I found out in 1975 in a cab in Houston that there really was a China Grove…..in 1972 we were touring in Winnebagos, and we were driving into San Antonio. And there is a China Grove, Texas, right outside of San Antonio. I must have seen the sign and forgotten about it.” A case of subliminal messaging perhaps? If China Grove had been a brand instead of a town, its marketers would have died and gone to heaven.

San Antonio, Texas is where we start our tour today, and where the annual Eduweb Conference is held – this year on August 1st to the 3rd. This internationally recognized event for the higher education community attracts those who are involved in online strategy, marketing and technology. So, it makes sense that Radian6′s Director of Community Lauren Vargas will be there, as well as Account Manager, Business Development, Barry Pope, and Salesforce.com Account Executive Joseph Kogut. Radian6 is proud to be among an incredible lineup of sponsors for this important event.

Continuing our music theme, we keep spreading the news, and on August 8th Radian6 VP of Strategic Alliances Ed Sullivan, and Manager, Strategic Alliances Bob Faigel head to the Big Apple for CRM Evolution. If you’re attending also, you will come away with strategies that will help you streamline business processes, improve customer satisfaction and loyalty, prepare for customer trends that are reshaping the marketplace and leverage the latest technologies that will change customer relationships. And heck, you get to do all that in one of the greatest cities in the world.

And what would a little music/event roundup be without a hat tip to the city that started a revolution in contemporary music? The birthplace of grunge, Seattle spawned such talents as Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, to name just a few. And Seattle is where you’ll find Blogwell, on August 9th. You’ll also find Tom Hasselman, Product Marketing Manager at Radian 6, and Shannon Hofmeister Sr. CSM, Strategic Accounts. We’re thrilled to be able to help sponsor an event that, according to some past event attendees, is “A great forum for social media professionals to collaborate and learn from each other’s lessons and successes.” and “The most valuable source for staying current on B2C and B2B social marketing techniques in Fortune 500 companies.”

So that wraps it up for this edition of Where in the World is Radian6. In the spirit of all that is great in music, as well as the astounding pace of change and innovation that those of us in the social media world live in daily, we leave you with this quote:

I worry that the person who thought up Muzak may be thinking up something else.  ~Lily Tomlin

The lines dividing social customer service and community engagement are often blurred. In many respects providing customer service online is a form of engagement but there are some distinct differences and both have their own set of etiquette and guidelines. Some organizations have chosen to very distinctly separate the two forms of corporate social media by individuals and teams while others, often smaller companies with less resources opt for a social savvy individual undertaking a variety of online engagement. While there is no set formula for either there are general distinctions between the two, specifically concerning etiquette, around when to reach out and how.

First and foremost, at a top level, community could be summarized as an initiative that takes time, attention and constant reinforcement and nurturing. Customer service at its essence is addressing and resolving a problem, transactional, and as such has a definite end or conclusion. While paths may, and likely will cross, objectives differ.

Timing vs. Nurturing

A service or product problem expressed online is blatantly within the realm of customer service and should be addressed as a priority by the customer service team. Being both a customer and someone who on occasion addresses complaints online, time (and as little as possible) is of the essence. Any given issue may require extended time to address properly, however, initial contact and acknowledgement of it should be as close to instantaneous as possible (no pressure!). And, in order to avoid any unnecessary delay this should be resolved by the customer service department, either directly online or offline if it is regarding confidential information or requires further attention.

However, the community team has a role to play. If a customer is complaining online, community teams should be aware of who they are, and why they are upset. This information can help inform a future community content strategy. Moreover in some cases where the person is an influencer or someone known to the community team there is no reason why they should not reach out to this person to gain a greater insight into their concerns in order to gain some quality feedback.

Polar opposite to ‘the complaint’, ‘the promoter’ sits almost exclusively within the realm of community. While a promoter might well encounter a service issue, at which point customer service can jump in, ensuring that there is a relationship with the fans and brand advocates is something that is very far removed from transactional and needs to be nurtured. Promoters are not simply just advocates but often experts in their own right who can add immense value, from sharing your content to guest posts on your blog and inputting in product/ brand development. Very much the opposite of ‘touch and go’ these relationships can be integral to a businesses’ success.

Prioritizing

How, when and where you reach out will be intrinsically different when approaching a service based enquiry as opposed to a mention or industry conversation, as may be the case when acting as a community manager. Speed will be key if there is a complaint whereas content will trump speed on the community front. The value add of community is not necessarily being the first (although it can be nice) it’s quality content and encouraging and furthering the conversation. Community managers can be much broader in their outreach specifically with regards to the industry conversation and as such should approach relevant conversations with a critical and analytical hat. Their aim is to further the industry conversation and perhaps see beyond the horizon as it currently presents itself. As such the ways in which community managers vs. online customer service representatives prioritize is worlds apart and rightfully should be.

Worlds not Universes Apart

While the way these two roles reach out online and the types of conversations they engage in differs, there is ample room for collaboration. The content produced by the community team should add value internally and externally. Likewise community managers may come across service issues either directly or indirectly and as such need to be well aware of support processes, and work to feed through any such content to the relevant teams. As mentioned earlier, smaller organizations may find one and the other in the same person however there should be a clear and differing process regarding how the various conversations are categorized and subsequently followed up and engaged with. Both online customer service and community engagement are pivotal and can benefit hugely from one another. Therefore, it isn’t necessary to prioritize one function over the other, but rather to prioritize the individual pieces of conversation.

What do you think? Can community and customer service work in tandem with each other? If not, why not? Do you agree that the two areas have fundamental differences? Please leave your comments below.

You’ve had a long, exhausting week and as you’re getting ready to shut your computer down for the evening you notice you’ve got new mail. Try as you might to resist, you decide to check them out, only to realize that you’ve got a handful of requests to connect from the same person across several social media networks. An even closer look reveals they are from a guy you chatted with briefly during a Twitter chat. You don’t really know this person yet, but already he’s looking to take it to the next level. To make matters that much more awkward, there isn’t even a note attached as to who he is or why he wants to connect.

Just because you’ve connected with someone a few times on a social network, doesn’t mean you really know that person. That takes time and doesn’t always happen if you’re limited to screen time.

We All Do It Differently

Each of us uses our social networks in a way that is unique to us – one man’s right is another man’s wrong. Some people add anyone and everyone to their public Twitter account while keeping their Facebook profile private, connecting only with close friends and family. There are so many variations on how public or private we can be across social networks that it’s nearly impossible to know everyone’s individual comfort level. Sometimes we have clues showing us how open or closed someone may be to connecting, but most of the time it is a guessing game that requires us to take some chances.

Beating the Odds

If you are interested in connecting with people across social networks without looking like a bit of a cyber-stalker, consider asking them if it’s alright to reach out to them on those particular networks. Let them know why you’re interested in connecting and if you haven’t been chatting with them long enough for them to know you well, give them a little information about yourself when you ask. Ask for what you want and you just might get it.

How Soon Is Too Soon?

We’ve heard that social media is a cocktail party, so if you were at a cocktail party and you just met someone would you follow them home? Probably not. Though some people might be flattered at the gesture and even find it endearing, many might be creeped out. The same could hold true for social media. This is not to say that you can’t connect soon after meeting, but it’s probably a better idea to take some time to get to know people before you reach out to connect with them across social networks.

Perhaps a better way to connect with the people you would like to get to know better is to invite them to connect with you instead. A simple status update, with a link, letting friends and followers know that you’re interested in connecting with them on Google+ (or your network of choice) is usually all it takes to start connecting the dots.

What’s Your Motivation?

The reasons you’d like to connect across platforms should really be about building relationships and providing value. Are there benefits to this? Absolutely! Ask yourself why it is you’re connecting and be honest with yourself. Is it a numbers game or are you truly interested in getting to know the people you are reaching out to? Being authentic is an integral part of social etiquette so make sure that transitions over to your social media efforts as well.

Is there such a thing as connecting too soon? How comfortable are you in connecting with people you’ve just met? Do you connect with the same core group of people across multiple platforms or do you have a different community for each social network you’re on?

It should come as no surprise that anything that we humans do online these days can be data gathered, analysed, and spat out again to provide insight into our behaviours. Even previously non quantifiable, amorphous, and very personal elements of your voice or body language – things like sentiment and tone – can now be sliced and diced to reveal varying levels of ‘feeling’ around a brand or company. We’ve talked this month about body language, or lack thereof, and how the loss of those subtle nuances when you are engaging online can affect your conversation. But there’s a new body language developing, body language that you might not even be aware you are projecting, and yes, as mentioned above, it’s gone digital. Steven Woods wrote the book on digital body language, appropriately titled “Digital Body Language – Deciphering Customer Intentions in an Online World” and he’s here today to share his thoughts on DBL with all of us.

Hi Steven, thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us. Can you share a bit about yourself with our community?

Sure thing, I live in Toronto, and have been here for almost 20 years. I’m the CTO with Eloqua, a SaaS company where we help organizations drive faster growth through a discipline called revenue performance management. Given the profound transitions that are happening with how buyers buy, I spend my working time understanding what our customers need from us over the next two to five years, and how we can best deliver that.

Toronto is a bit of a different technology scene than Silicon Valley, but one that I enjoy tremendously. My wife and I have a 16 month old daughter, so when I’m not travelling for work or out on the road talking about the book, we’re out exploring the parks and playgrounds in the neighborhood.

Your company, Eloqua, helps marketers ‘automate’ the science of marketing, and you’ve been quoted as saying that marketers who have succeeded in the last decade have understood one key thing – what is that “key” thing?

The big trend that has really changed the overall landscape in the last decade is that buyers now have full control over the information they need to gather to make a buying decision. This seems trivial at first, but it’s fundamental in so many ways.  So much of selling a product or service has been based on the idea that buyers needed to “call in the vendors” to learn about it.  Now, that has completely changed. You don’t need to “call in the vendors” at all, now that all the information you need is available online.

As that change has taken place, marketers and sales people have struggled to deepen their understanding of what buyers are truly interested in. While, in previous days, they might watch for signs of interest and curiosity in how a person reacted, smiled, frowned, leaned forward, or leaned back, now without a conversation, people are blind to that buyer insight.

And that brings us back to your book. What is Digital Body Language?

Digital Body Language is really the online version of body language – the hints and clues that you get from understanding a person’s actions and what they mean about that person’s intentions.

By looking at everything a potential buyer does online, marketers can begin to understand when they are just self-educating, what they might be interested in more information on, and when they would likely want to engage with a sales person for deeper discussions.

How does that differ from other forms of online consumer digital information gathering?

Collecting data is great, but until it turns into actionable insight, it’s of limited use. The first step in understanding buyers based on their digital body language is, of course, collecting data, but to really make it something that changes actions, we need to make it usable.

For marketing teams, that means using digital body language to understand how to personalize content, guide nurture campaigns, and target messages. For sales, it means rich visualization tools that allow a company or a buyer to be understood at a glance.

How can digital body language be used to help today’s businesses with sales, marketing and lead gen?

The first thing we can do once we understand buyer behavior based on their digital body language, is to better align sales and marketing. If marketing is working with buyers who are not yet ready to buy, and then alerting sales when a person’s digital body language indicates a buying interest, sales spends far less time cold calling people with no purchase interest. It’s better for both seller and buyer.

The second thing, with that basic sales and marketing alignment in place, is focusing on common metrics and a common funnel between marketing and sales. With a common language between sales and marketing, we can see one view of the truth across a full funnel. This provides better, longer-term insight into what buying processes are happening now and what buying processes can be anticipated to start in the coming few quarters.

With one view of the truth, across marketing and sales, we then have the foundation for what we call revenue performance management – the ability to understand and influence buyer behavior all the way from the earliest stages of interest to deal close. Knowing where to invest, and where not to invest, lets you drive more revenue at lower cost.

We are exploring Social Media Etiquette this month, and have talked about the difficulties in missing real body language cues in an online world. Is there digital body language etiquette?

Absolutely, one of the most important things in interacting with buyers is understanding when they are best left alone. A buyer doing some light early stage exploration and self-education may not want to be called by a sales person, and might find it to be an intrusion. Conversely, if a buyer is observed to be clearly struggling trying to find later stage, more detailed information regarding pricing, contractual terms, etc, a conversation with sales is often welcomed and productive.

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We want to thank Steven for taking the time to chat with us today, and sharing his insights. What do you think about Digital Body Language? Will it help or hinder your sales and marketing department in achieving their goals? Please share your thoughts and comments below.

Do you love sharing links on Twitter? Content and link sharing on social sites has skyrocketed in recent years. According to a recent eMarketer report, “60% of all messages on social sites are links to published content.” On Twitter alone, this is almost 60 million links to published content everyday!

Undoubtedly, as Twitter matures we will understand who in our community shares quality content and who is essentially, spamming Twitter. If you are new to Twitter you may wonder how to get more followers. Well, this is a bit confusing because most Twitter spammers often have over 25,000 followers despite their lack of quality content. It may be an attractive option to setup automated twitter feeds for content, however I believe that Twitter spamming links isn’t a great long-term strategy.

Linking to Bad Content

Linking to content that was written by a ghost writer in 10 minutes isn’t providing anything for your followers. The term “fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me” can apply here because it may only take once for you to lose the trust of your followers. Half the battle is attracting your followers to actually click your link, you don’t want to mess it up by giving them content filled with fluff. Make your content exciting, emotional, and informational. Any less, may cause you to actually lose Twitter followers.

Linking to Crappy Looking Landing Pages

We all know this guy. The guy who shares his, “Make Money Now” landing pages on Twitter. This guy is usually great at getting people to click on his links with actionable questions, facts or strong opinions in the headlines. What does this do? It drives traffic short term, but cannibalizes his long term social media strategy. I know of at least 20 people I follow that push me to the same landing page with every link. Subsequently, I don’t click their links anymore, and unfollow the people who send me there.

Self Promotion

Every social media guru will tell you social media channels, especially Twitter, are not for blatant self promotion. Self promoting products or services on Twitter will cause you to lose your community, fast. Say for instance you are linking to product pages with a tagline “check this out.” It may work the first 50 times, but you will lose credibility as a thought leader in your space. You are “That Guy,” the one who isn’t afraid to give a sales pitch to the father of a girl you are dating.

Now I’m not saying that you can’t promote yourself, if you are tactical and PR savvy, you can word your tweets to actually give your followers something of value. For example a great way to cross promote would be, “Today’s a hot one here in sunny SoCal, check out our blog post on how to beat the heat.” You then would write a blog post which hints at one of your products helping beat the heat. Perfect? I think so.

There is definitely a fine line you must walk operating business on Twitter. To be completely safe, stay away from trying to “show off” your company. You can humanize your brand, give industry news, and chat with your community but please don’t try to sell me anything!

Radian6 adds: What do you think? Have you ever link baited anyone on Twitter? Or felt a backlash when you retweeted content that you didn’t actually read, and found out it was spam? Have you found that magic way to both self promote, yet provide compelling and interesting information to your followers? We would love your thoughts on this subject!

Matt Krautstrunk is a writer who specializes in startups and social media. A native of Chicago, he moved to California for a new experience in the world of search engine marketing. His work has appeared on Search Engine Journal, Smart Blogs, and Convince and Convert. He also delves into topics ranging from social media marketing to SMB consulting for Resource Nation; an online resource that provides advice on purchasing and outsourcing decisions for small business owners and entrepreneurs. You can find him on Twitter, and on LinkedIn.

Image Credit: Switched.com

Ever find yourself in a crowded room where you only know about half the people around you? Some people walk up and directly talk to you, others you reach out to, but there’s always that one group of people that you can’t seem to meet. You linger around the food table overhearing small phrases here and there, wanting to jump in but just never knowing the right time. Just like a crowded party, social media engagement can sometime seem like you’re always waiting for the right time to jump in. In the social space and especially when using social media monitoring platforms to do your research, many of the keyword matched mentions you’ll see and be looking for ways to engage with will not be direct @mentions to you. Engaging with the “about” conversation is an art and not always paint by numbers.

“To” vs “About”
The big difference between these two types of conversation is that one has the direct intention of wanting a response from you. When you @mention someone you are walking up to that person, tapping them on the shoulder and saying ‘Hey, talk to me.’ If someone is talking about you or a subject you’re interested in, they may want you to jump in but they’re not expressly setting you up to. Think back to our crowded party and imagine someone who stands beside you talking about taxes all night long and you’re an accountant.

Inviting Yourself to the Conversation
If you see a conversation happening that is about your subject matter of interest or even mentions your name, there are times when it’s okay to jump in for these reasons. Just remember to be polite about it. Nothing kills a party vibe more than someone interrupting and saying ‘Talk to me, talk to me!’. If they’ve mentioned your name, offer to help with any questions they might have first or even simply ask if it’s you they are talking about. If the subject matter is what you’d like to engage with, have a reason ready why they should care about what you are saying. If they are talking about taxes and you’re an accountant, say that. Be transparent so your interest in engaging with them is clear.

Friendly Following & Lovely Liking
If you’re not ready to step up and dive into conversation just yet, considering giving someone a nod from across the room when you hear them mention your favorite sports team. Following or liking something someone says is a great way to acknowledge you’ve heard them, without running over and screaming ‘Go Team!’ in their face.

Private Message
If you are able to send a private message to the person, this can be a way to start a dialogue without interrupting their current flow. Think of if you were at a party and waited until someone had gone for another drink before approaching them. It gives you a place to engage one to one without invading the space of the group.

Follow Up Email
Maybe they’re one of your customers and you already have their contact information or maybe through your private messaging, they choose to share that information with you, whatever the case continuing a conversation that you saw in the social space over to a follow up email is another way of continuing the engagement. It’s like making a new friend and giving them a buzz after the party to go to a ball game, at the next party you’ll be able to talk to them directly since you’ve spent some time together.

Whatever way you choose to engage with the ‘about’ conversation, make sure you are aware of it and it varies from how you handle the ‘to’ conversation. Taking the time to plan these interactions will help to make sure you are the one at the party everyone wants to talk to!

How do you engage with the ‘about’ conversation? Do you respond to mentions that don’t directly @mention you? Do you treat all of these conversations the same?

Digital. Engagement. Social. Proactive Customer Service. The list goes on. Many buzz words are circulating at the moment, and companies are under pressure, more so than ever, to be present on social networks. Have you caught yourself in the last little while saying or at least thinking ‘Well I tweeted insert brand an hour ago and they STILL haven’t replied’. Exactly. There’s no question about it, online engagement is important. However, how much presence and engagement strikes the right balance? When is the right time to bow out gracefully or exit a conversation? These questions are important because you could quite literally be at it for hours thanking, double thanking, and triple thanking everyone for every mention and @ reply.

@ The Whole Organization

Online engagement could be the result of a whole host of reasons with benefits that will cut across the enterprise. Whether you are launching a social media campaign and tracking its performance, handling a PR disaster, building a community or just simply providing another avenue for customer service a subject Guy Stephens a resident expert on Social Customer Service blogs about extensively, some of the basics will remain constant. You will likely want to encourage promoters and on the other hand address detractors, setbacks or complaints. However, when do you stop and is there such a thing as over-engaging?

Let’s start with vocal detractors. Regardless of whether in our personal or our professional lives we’ve most likely all had a disagreement or two at some point. The same goe