Marjorie Clayman’s Writing Portfolio

Professional writing profile of Marjorie Clayman

Archives for July 2010

Social Media, ROI, and Stinky Cheese

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I’m going to throw Blogging best practice on its head here and ask a question at the start of my post. Do you think ROI can be measured for a Social Media initiative?

I believe it can, but I think it’s going to be a completely different equation. It’ll be kind of like the difference between the US Gross Domestic Product and Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness. Most of all, I think that measuring the ROI of Social Media will have to depart from a numbers-based system. The “investment” is going to have to be refigured as the investment in Social Media is a) often not financial and b) does not remain the same for any duration. That’ll be kind of tricky. But the really tricky part will be measuring the new “return.” Let me use myself as an example to illustrate that point.

What is that SMELL?

When I reformatted my personal blog into a professional blog, I decided to add Google Analytics so I could monitor my progress. I won’t say this is a user-friendly process. It’s doable, but there may have been a bit of swearing involved. Anyway, when I first started blogging, I would check Analytics every day. Since I was starting from, well, nothing, anything that happened showed as progress on that mesmerizing blue graph. And if you want to talk about influence, you don’t need to go to Fast Company. I was very lucky at the beginning of my blogging days to have some very gracious heroes of mine retweet links to my blog, and boy did my Google Analytics love those days!

As I got more involved in conversing and sharing and less involved in pure stats, I stopped checking Analytics as often. In fact, quite a bit of time elapsed between my check-ins to my Analytics page. So, two weeks ago I decided to see how I was doing. Two letters describe what I saw. P. U.

These stinky results were quite a surprise to me. My blog seemed to be getting more comments, I was receiving a lot of really nice and gracious compliments, and people were generally telling me that I had a good thing going here. But this was Google Analytics. I mean, GOOGLE! They can’t be wrong!!

What Means More To You?

I decided, especially after receiving some very good thoughts from the lovely Ann Handley (aka marketingprofs), that there were a couple of things to consider.

First of all, Analytics systems are not perfect. They are really really good, and they give you building blocks on how you can improve things, but they are not perfect. I can say this with 100% confidence because my Analytics once told me that I had zero visitors two days in a row, two days that I actually received a handful of comments. How could people comment if they weren’t there? This made me a little suspicious.

The other thing, though, is that my Google Analytics numbers don’t really matter to me a whole lot anymore. I mean, if I see that the average time spent on my blog dives to negative 7 seconds or something like that, I’ll take it seriously. I still like to monitor what kinds of posts people seem to find the most interesting. But even if I didn’t have access to these Analytics, I would feel that my blog has become successful because I am getting out of it what I want. I am having good conversations with people, I am sharing ideas, and again, thanks to very gracious people with more pull than I, I’m even getting seen by people who are not directly tied to me, which is pretty cool.

Fans and Followers and Connections, Oh My!

This logic carries across all of the big Social Media sites. Are you unhappy with the number of followers you have on Twitter? Are you lusting after 29,999 more contacts on LinkedIn? If so, have you asked yourself why you’re unhappy with those numbers? If you had 150,000 followers on Twitter instead of 50, how would your life be different?

It’s easy to think, from a business perspective, that the more followers you have, the “better” you are doing, or the more likely you are to increase sales. I must humbly disagree. There are currently about 500 people following me on Twitter. I follow around 370 of them. What is that margin of difference about? Not everyone who follows you is really going to further your business success or provide for you the kind of experience you want. You might have someone following you because they follow anyone who says the word “dog.” You might have a few spam-bots following you. Those sure aren’t going to help you. And then you have people who follow you solely because they want you to follow THEM. That’s why numbers don’t equal influence. Numbers do not lead to Social Media success.

What is the Social Media ROI equation?

Back to my original question. Can you measure ROI in Social Media? I can tell you that so far, the return on my investment, which has been lots of time, has been a massive amount of education, meeting and getting to communicate with truly brilliant and inspiring people, sharing really enjoyable conversations, being able to benefit from graciousness shown to me by others, and building connections that might lead to friendships, partnerships, collaborations, or all of the above. If you are a business, you might be building a team of brand evangelizers.  You might be spreading the buzz.

Compared to solid things like “clicks” and reader response cards and actual in the pocket sales, these things can seem pretty darned fluffy. But I think this is the new currency when it comes to Social Media. Social Media moves fast for a long time. It takes awhile for a flower to bloom, even when time lapse photography is used to speed things up. It takes awhile to build new relationships and new networks, too.

Do your Social Media stats stink by your standards? It really only matters if this is preventing you from accomplishing what you want to accomplish. How do you measure that? Well, that’s the real question, isn’t it?

Image Credit: http://www.sxc.hu/profile/Halifaxsxc

Are you a meat and potatoes person?

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It seems like these days, everyone wants to be Oprah or Dr. Phil. Every day on Twitter, I see literally hundreds of people sending out inspirational or motivational quotes out to the world. The preference is for people to tweet out happy and brave things. Sound byte sort of things. This is an odd juxtaposition to commercials that are on the television every day (you remember commercials, right? Those things you fast forward through on your DVR?). Perhaps you have seen or heard about this one:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-ZNcjtxNbY&hl=en_US&fs=1]

If everyone is so inspired and motivated, why are there so many commercials for anti-depressants? Why is there a commercial about a woman who is so depressed she has to talk about herself as if she is a wind-up doll?

Maybe a lot of these quotes and inspiring words are genuine, but sometimes I wonder. Look at Oprah. Look at Dr. Phil. If you say the same kinds of things they do, then you are on your way to becoming a star. You’ll get retweeted. You’ll build a fan club. Right? It doesn’t matter if your area of expertise is marketing, business, fitness, or something people can’t really quite put their fingers on.

Meat and Potatoes versus Filet Mignon and Asparagus

Personally, and it is a personal preference, I don’t really try to emulate these superstars of motivation and chipperness. That’s not to say that I go around like Eeyore trying to drag people down. However, when I talk to people, when I am conversing with someone or trying to help someone, I don’t try to wow them. I don’t try to create a retweet or a few moments of “Wow, she just said that!” There’s nothing WRONG with that approach. It’s not bad. I view it like one of those super fancy meals at a really high brow restaurant. The kind of restaurant that might serve a “deconstructed something or other.” The kind of restaurant where you get a giant plate with a nickel-sized piece of meat that has a sprig of mint on top of it. It tastes great, divine even, but you’re going to be wanting a hamburger and fries on your way home.

Yes, this is the part where I say that I want to be a burger and fries. I want to converse with people in ways that are genuine, authentic, and really truly meaningful. If I happen to help someone with something, I want it to be noticeable if not tangible. I want it to last. I want to be the person who teaches the poor man how to fish rather than just throwing him some truffles now and then.

Back to Basics

You’ve heard it a million times. In today’s world, authenticity, being human, being yourself, counts. MarketingProfs announced a study today that stated that personal voice, not brands, rule the roost on Twitter. What does that mean?

To me, it means being a meat and potatoes kind of person. When I talk to someone about business, when I talk to someone online, when I’m participating in a chat or posting here to my little world of writing, I would much rather get my point across and start a conversation in lieu of being quoted a few dozen times because of a nuanced little turn of phrase. If I meet you in person, I’m probably not going to introduce myself via a quotation from Nietzsche. Similarly, I don’t try to introduce myself that way in other scenarios. I don’t like trying to talk in sound bytes. I like just talking. I like a “stick to your ribs” conversation that leaves you feeling a little more full than you were before. And that’s how I like to be talked to as well, just for the record.

How Do You Relate?

How do you communicate with people online or in person? Are you maybe a filet person online but a meat ‘n taters person in real life? Maybe it’s the other way around. I used to look at the retweets on Twitter or the shared Facebook status updates and I think, “Man, if I could just come up with something so clever and refined, I could get retweeted 20 million times.” But my own personal experience is that trying to do so feels like trying to walk down the street in a tutu. It just doesn’t feel right because it just isn’t me. As I’ve gotten more used to Twitter, getting retweeted is about the last priority on my mind. I’m conversing, passing on other peoples’ thoughts, and listening. Meat and potatoes kind of stuff. It’s not the right way. It’s not the wrong way. It’s most certainly not the most exciting way. But it is my way. What’s yours?

First Image by Hanka Lehmannova. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/hankaleh
Second Image by Jean Scheijen. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/vierdrie

Is a failure to integrate inhibiting your success?

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A couple of weeks ago, the results from the 2010 Miller Heiman Sales Best Practices Study were released. The major take-away from the study was that companies that show high alignment between sales and marketing tend to experience greater success. These companies, for example, are more likely to see increases in qualified leads, retention percentages, and customer billings.

Finding this study was a bit serendipitous, at least from my perspective. For the last couple of weeks, I have been encountering what I consider to be a false dichotomy. “Sales or Marketing.” Who is responsible for Social Media? Who is responsible for lead management? Who is responsible for guiding product managers? Sales or marketing echoes at the tale end of all of these questions. I keep feeling like I am missing something when these dichotomies are presented. Shouldn’t it be sales AND marketing?

The Miller Heiman Study makes me wonder how much success companies of all sorts are missing because of a failure to integrate employees and their efforts. Marketers have been talking about integrating marketing initiatives for a long time now, but somehow, the fact has gotten lost that a company’s success rests upon the ability of its people to work together, support each other, and strengthen each other.

Why does integration lead to success?

It doesn’t take long to realize the advantages of integrating the efforts of everyone under a company’s roof. Why, for example, would companies experience more success if their marketing and sales people were aligned?

• The marketing team could target the audience that the sales team feels has a high potential
• The sales team could report to marketing when sales or leads spike-marketing could take note of what initiatives correspond with the success
• The marketing team can deliver leads. The sales team can run with them
• The sales team can ask marketing for marketing pieces that would assist in nurturing leads and retaining customers

What if the PR department was integrated into this mix? What about the company’s leadership? What happens when these bridges of communication and shared knowledge don’t exist?

The Corporate Culture of Competition

I understand that in some companies, people or departments are pitted against each other. Some executives may believe that this kind of culture breeds stronger individuals or more efficient workers. In these kinds of environments, it is easy for people to equate knowledge with power. The more you share, the less power you have.

We are no longer in an era when this mode of operation is remotely beneficial.

Customers are needing service and support 24/7. Social Media is live and connected 24/7. The world is perpetually changing. Technology is perpetually changing. Is a silo culture really the best way to interact with that environment? Is it not better to come together, merging talents and experience so that changes can wash over the company like waves rather than tsunami?

It’s not a black-and-white world

People seem to be really excited about dichotomies these days. In Social Media, oppositional concepts are great ways to start conversations or to get replies. The reality, however, is that the perpetual “this or that” antagonistic perspective is unhealthy and very likely detrimental for a company. If you must envelope yourself in dichotomies, how about this one:

Silos or sales?

Social  Media is not the only place where information should be shared. The process needs to start within company walls and conference rooms. You might not know exactly what benefits you’ll see from this new approach. Do you know what you are losing by passing it up?

Image by Miles Pfefferle. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/TheUsher

What is your heart made of?

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Let me take you to a hopefully entirely hypothetical place.

Some giant computer virus has managed to do the unthinkable. It has wiped out Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious, all of the sites that have been the darlings of marketers for the last few years.

You go in to work. The show must go on.

What do you do?

Where is your compass?

If the essence of your company has remained unchanged in the face of perpetual change, the answer to this question should not be difficult. In fact, the presence or destruction of the entire Social Media world should not inexorably alter how you interact with your clients or customers. It should not alter your company’s mission statement or philosophy.

Think about Zappos (it’s hard not to these days). Granted, they are getting a lot of buzz via Social Media, but do you think the entire heart of the company would crumble if they couldn’t tweet anymore? Social Media is not the way to happiness there. Taking care of customers is.

Are you resting the entire future of your company on this new networked revolution? Have you taken key words like “Listenomics” to heart to the point where little else is left?

Take a company EKG

Here’s an idea to try. Sit everyone down (or just sit down yourself) and tell them that you need a short write-up that will be your profile description on your company’s Facebook page. If you have a solid company mission and soul, the descriptions should be pretty close. There should be similar verbiage there. Here is what we do. Here is why we do it.

If you have your corporate heart intact, Social Media can certainly accentuate your positives. You know what keywords are important to you, so you’ll be able to optimize for them in sites like Facebook and Twitter. People will be able to find you easier. You’ll use the same language across all of your Social Media accounts, so your brand will become more familiar to people regardless of what site they are using. There won’t be a disconnect between reaching your company online or reaching your company by phone.

On the other hand, if this exercise explodes in your face, my recommendation would be to back away from Social Media until you get sorted out. You see, Social Media is kind of like a mirror. If you are together and on message, it will reflect positivity back to you. However, if your message is muddled, Social Media can not only fail to benefit you, but it can also become a corporate nightmare. Questions that are key to using Social Media, like “what is the voice of our company?” will be a mystery to you. Branding your company in Social Media will be well-nigh impossible if you don’t know what your brand is or means.

Social Media is like a Siren. Beware!

Social Media and all that goes with it can certainly seem very compelling. “Everyone’s doing it!” “You must do this now or your company will fry!” To some extent, these whispers could be true. If a competitor is on a Social Media site where you are not, they have free range. But is this really anything new?

If a competitor advertises in a magazine that you aren’t advertising in, they have free range over that audience.

If a competitor has a radio spot and you do not, they are the only voice that audience will hear.

It’s really not that revolutionary. In the past, you would look at a publication or a radio station or a newspaper and analyze it. “Is this for me? Is this worth my money and time?” You had your company goals in mind, most likely. Your mission statement. Your brand.

Social Media can suck you in with promises of treasures untold, but like a siren, it can also be very dangerous, especially if you aren’t prepared. A single careless exchange can spell doom. Are you prepared for that kind of instant karma?

Like the heroes of old, before you venture forth into the wild frontier, you need to know who you are. You need to know what you stand for, what you are trying to accomplish, what the perils are, and what you are hoping to achieve. You need to have a compass. You need to know what your heart is made of.

I’m not saying don’t do Social Media. I’m just saying that if you know what your company’s heart is made of, you can survive when the new hot thing goes down. If you don’t know what your company’s heart is made of, you will crumble with whatever you tie yourself to. Beware. Be careful.

Image by Cecile Graat. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/Cieleke

Where will you be 50 years from now?

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Once upon a time, a man who had been working at a shoe store went back and told his bosses that he had good news and bad news. The bad news was that he was leaving the shoe store. The good news was that he was starting an advertising agency, and he wanted the shoe store to be his first client.

The year was 1954. The man was my grandfather.

Fifty-six years later, my grandfather’s bet is still alive and well. However, we are functioning in ways that no one could have imagined in the 50s. All work done on computers, including illustrations, for the most part? Email? Getting emails on these amazing smart phones? Who could have predicted any of what has become our day-to-day reality?

The elephant in the room

Right now, society is in a mode of instant gratification, and this really shows through when you start networking with people in the Social Media realm. I’m not just talking about the fact that people want answers immediately (which they do). But what is everyone talking about? The latest thing. How can you beat the Twitter game? How can you market with Facebook? A few months ago Foursquare was the hot topic, but already, Foursquare is starting to be overshadowed by Gowalla.

How fast are things moving? In the first Iron Man movie, at the beginning, there’s a shout-out for Myspace, not for Facebook.

There are a lot of experts who are telling companies how they can succeed right here and now. Social Media is the revolution and you have to decide how you’re going to participate. There are Facebook experts, Blogging experts, Twitter experts, and I’m sure Foursquare experts will be surfacing soon.

But what is not being talked about? How can you make these things work for you for 10 years? 20? Not to mention 50. There has to be something more to the game.

Fifty years hence

How does a company survive through an era of great change? How did factories survive the transition to automation? How did agencies like us survive the transition from markers to Macs? The secret is not just staying up on the hottest trend. The secret isn’t even how to master the hottest trend. The secret is to understand the business well enough that no matter what comes your way, you’ll be able to stay true to your company’s mission. You’ll stay true to the kind of service you’ve always given your clients. I don’t see a lot of “buzz” about this issue, and it worries me.

Where will you or your company be 50 years from now, when your kids or grandkids are laughing at you about how you used to use that old fashioned Twitter? What will you have to offer when your expertise on the “latest thing” doesn’t matter anymore because that latest thing is now old?

It may sound dire, but it doesn’t have to be. But if we only focus on the here and now and mastering what is right in front of us, we’re going to be in big trouble. It takes a different kind of fuel to create a long, steady burn. Do you have that fuel right now?

Image by Markus Huth. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/huthmark

SEO and Social Media Search: Two Different Animals

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“So now if you have a book called “How To Take Care Of Your Pet” and it includes information about cats and dogs, are you going to catalog it as a cat book, a dog book, or a pet book?”

It’s about 9 years ago and I am sitting in a cataloging class, part of my journey towards pursuing my Masters in Library Science. The professor has posed the question above. As one might expect, a heated debate followed.

In the world of Library and Information Science, catalogers are like a hybrid mix of website developers and SEO experts. Their job is to enter data about books, documents, videos, and the like so that people who would want those items can actually find them. The trick is that you have to guess what kinds of people would want those things and more to the point, how they would go about looking. In the case above, the issue was complicated because the choices were so similar, yet a wrong categorization could mean that one group of searchers would not be able to find the information they needed. For example, if the book was categorized as a “pet care” book, a person interested in just cats or just dogs might think it’s too general. Naturally, categorizing it as a cat book would leave out the dog people.

Back then, the stakes weren’t very high. It was a hypothetical situation, after all, and no money was on the table. But in the marketing world, these kinds of questions prevail, and there is a lot on the line. That’s why I find the recent trend of grouping SEO and Social Media search functions together very disconcerting.

Search Engine Optimization

There are two games at play when optimizing a website. First, you have the fun task of trying to win at the game of algorithms, especially with Google. That feat must be balanced with the equally important task of making sure you are in a place where your customers and prospects would expect to see you. There are lots of ways to reach both goals simultaneously, but it takes some careful crafting and a lot of research, not to mention a fair amount of due diligence and a willingness to update copy as needed.

When people search using Google, Yahoo, or Bing, they tend to want information or answers. You need to figure out what answers your company can provide. If you manufacture pet food, what questions would your existing or potential customers ask? “Which food is more nutritious?” “Is this food safe?” By carefully analyzing how words that drive traffic to your website intersect with words that show high prevalence in the search engine, you can usually get a pretty good read on how to position your company.


Social Media: Aka, the conversational crapshoot

In the ever-growing world of Social Media, the main thing that can be predicted is that things will be unpredictable. This is because rather than being based on just algorithms or link quality, Social Media search functions are contingent on what people are actually conversing about. On Facebook, you aren’t likely to see a status update that reads, “I have pain and pressure in the occipital region of my cranium. How can I relieve these symptoms?” You’re going to see updates that say, “Man, my head is killing me.” Going back to our hypothetical pet food manufacturer, it’s possible that someone might ask questions about nutrition or safety. However, it’s also possible that someone might just say, “I need to remember to go to the store to get Pickles more food.” Is your website optimized for the word “food?” Probably. How about “Pickles?” Probably not.

Is it impossible to place well in Social Media search functions if you’re a company? No. But it’s a very different process from optimizing a company’s website for search engines. People think and research one way. They talk and share in another way. A company must be ready for both.

Getting Found in Social Media

In order to get found in the world of Social Media, you need to become a bit less scientific and a bit more, well, yourself.  What words do you use when you describe your job or your company to a friend who isn’t in the business but seems interested? What kinds of questions does your customer service department or sales team get on the phone? What words do people use in conversation when they are talking to you in real time?

The best way to get found in Social Media is to go out there and join the conversation wherever it is happening. Look for groups, forums, people, chats, or blogs that talk about things related to what you do. Become a part of those communities. Learn to talk to your existing and potential customers in the ways that they define. And don’t depend on sites like technorati or Google Alerts to do all of the hard work for you. These sites are based on single words or phrases. Often the context is lost and the use of a word that happens to be important to you is completely irrelevant. Talk to people. Listen. It isn’t called Social Media for the fun of it.

Research Before Search

Whether you are engaging in Social Media, SEO, or both, research is the key and mantra. Google might tell you that a certain word is off the charts in traffic, but if it doesn’t have anything to do with your company, does it matter? You might be first on the Search Results page based on the keywords you used in your site, but if no one is using those words on Facebook or Twitter, you won’t get very far in those search results.

For SEO, make sure that the words you are using to optimize your website reflect how you want to be found. For Social Media search, make sure that you are using words that will help you find your customers.

It’s a subtle difference, perhaps. But then scientists say there is only a subtle difference between human and chicken DNA. Two different animals indeed.