For those who prefer an interactive explanation, here is a video of a short presentation I did late last year on ‘What makes a brand social?’.

Four themes for 2012

The ‘GooTwitFace’ phenomenon
Google, Twitter and Facebook will continue their products and features ‘arms race’,  becoming increasingly like one another in their battle to win brand budgets. The beneficiaries will be all of us, and brands in particular, who will be able to use enhanced pages, apps and analytics.

Understanding data
Handling, and understanding, the huge amount of data created by social media will continue to be a big challenge for brands and organisations. However, the tools to help us do this will improve dramatically. We’ll look back on early versions of ‘Influencer tools’ and wonder at their limitations.

Integration of social into CRM
Organisations will increase the resource and time invested in properly integrating social customer service into their overall customer experience. This will be particularly notable in the financial services industry.

Location based marketing increases
Ever increasing penetration of smart-phones and tablets will see increased spend on location based marketing, particularly in the retail sector. Offering customers an enhanced experience in-store by adding a ‘digital layer’, retailers will be more proactively involved in the online research process that is happening in-store already.

Would love to know what you think, and let’s see how these look in December 2012!

Finally, have a very Happy Christmas, and peaceful New Year.

With this in mind I was pleased to be able to listen to Azeem Azhar (@azeem) the founder of Klout competitor, Peerindex, at yesterday’s #dellb2b event in London. He provided his take on just how good the current tools are, and how he thinks influencer rankings can be used.

My view is that the current tools (the third competitor in this market is PeopleBrowsr’s Kred) are blunt instruments that should only form one small element when assessing influence. And this appeared to be shared amongst the gathering of social media, technology and business thinkers at #dellb2b.

When Azeem asked the room ‘Who believes influence can be measured in a single number?’ just one hand was raised amongst the sixty people or so present (@bejaminellis you know who you are!). The consensus was that there is a huge problem when applying a single influencer ranking for an individual when influence is such a subjective area. For example one person’s influencer could be another person’s non-entity, or an influencer in a certain subject in one geography could be irrelevant to those in another.

Azeem admitted that ‘There is no single accurate definition of influence at the moment’ but he believed that one could emerge over time, moulded by market forces. “There needs to be a standardized definition of influence. That will emerge from the to-ing and fro-ing of the market, and for that there needs to be competition.”

As luck would have it one of those competitors, Kred, in the shape of PeopleBrowsr’s Andrew Grill @andrewgrill, was in the audience. He agreed that the definitive influencer ranking doesn’t exist, and questioned if it ever would. Andrew said: “We have a really big responsibility. We are scoring humans, can that ever be definitive? I think it’s important that there are three or four companies out there doing this to give healthy competition.”

So is that the future? A ‘basket’ of different influencer rankings that gives an aggregated picture of how the individual scores in terms of online influence? That solution is probably little better than the single rankings.

From my practical experience in mapping influencers for brands the best solution is to use human analysis, rather than automated rankings. By using monitoring tools to gather data about a particular topic, then diving into that data and tracing relationships and information flows between individuals you establish if individuals have reach, relevance and respect around the brand (or issue) you are working with. These insights can then be used to create comprehensive profiles of each influencer, and to map the links between them.

I do use automated influencer ranking tools on occasion to double check named individuals. Most often though I use them to fuel some banter with @samhilary on who is further up the Peer Index NMA list. (he’s winning!)

Open will beat closed

The business models that will thrive are those which “work with the internet rather than against it”. Jeremiah believes that “open will win” and cited as an example Altimeter itself, which makes all its research openly available, compared to other research firms that charge for access. He sees Altimeter’s  business model, which gains its revenue from follow-on advisory fees, as more sustainable than the paid-for content model.

“Make the market your marketing department”

By adopting an ‘open’ business model, distributing content widely, and providing individuals with the tools to link back to your content, the entire market can become your marketing department. A business like GiffGaff is a good example of a company where the customers are working for it in this way. (GiffGaff ranked highly in Headstream’s Social Brands 100 listing, published in March)

URLs will go away

As we enter the era of the social web i.e. an internet built around people rather than machines, the traditional architecture of the internet will change radically. Jeremiah sees a future where “corporate web pages go away, URLs go away, search as we know it goes away. We will know so much about customers that we won’t need those things. Data will be used so well that we can predict and anticipate what the market wants.”

Europe vs. the U.S

Jeremiah had two observations. First, Europe is 24 months behind the U.S. when it comes to adopting social business practices, and second, Europeans are much more decorous when it comes to conversations on Twitter, in the U.S. the Twitter ’noise’ is much greater!

Teaching people to shout

If you respond to unhappy customers on Twitter without a co-ordinated and in-depth social CRM strategy in place, you are simply “teaching them to shout at you some more”. Only those companies that are prepared to introduce a service culture throughout the organization e.g. Zappos, will be able to handle customers successfully. Jeremiah is wary of any company that says it wants to undertake social CRM if the executives aren’t prepared to get personally involved.

These are a few highlights from a wide-ranging and excellent conversation over a lunch organized by Neville Hobson @jangles, and supported by Dell’s Kerry Bridge @kerryatdell. Many thanks to them for making it happen, and to the other guests @sheldrake, @benjaminellis, @jas, @abigailh and @sophiebr, who made it such a great conversation. Lovely photo here.

Its latest transparency initiative is the ‘Domino’s Tracker’. The tool allows customers to track the status of their order, see the names of the Domino’s team involved at each stage, and to post customer feedback. This has been pushed into the public domain via a billboard in Times Square, to the delight of some staff members in the video here -

Impressive stuff. What I like is the use of real-time customer feedback to not only improve the service experience and product in the long term, but also motivate staff in the short term. It’s a good example of joining-up customer experience, brand, and product development through one platform. It also demonstrates a core principle of social, don’t think about what’s in it for you, but what’s in it for your customers.

What other industries could take this approach?  Telecoms, support services, software?

At Headstream we’ve had the privilege of chairing Brand Republic’s Social Media  Strategy conference in 2010, and 2011. What was noticeable at this year’s 5^th July event was a refreshing honesty that few brands have ‘cracked’ social as yet, and that early integration of social into the broader marketing strategy is the route to success. This was in contrast to last year’s event where the mood was more triumphalist, and at times reflected the view that social was ‘just another channel’, that had been mastered.

As a result, the day was full of great opportunities to learn from the challenges and surprises brands have faced in social, as well as their successes, and to have an honest and open discussion about the challenges we share as marketers responding to social.

Here are some stand-out moments from the day for us.

1 – It’s all about the customer

Jonathan Williams, Director of e-Marketing at Trader Media Group (owner of Auto Trader) reminded us that ‘getting closer to customers’ is at the heart of social strategy. He emphasised the gilt-edged opportunity that social networks and two-way conversations are giving brands to achieve this. Kathleen Schneider from Dell, echoed Jonathan’s point, saying that CEO Michael Dell’s mantra has always been ‘Find ways to get closer to your customer’.

2 – Should we get hung up on complex ROI formulas?

For Dell the fact that social media has allowed it to get closer to customers in multiple ways is enough ROI in itself to justify the company’s heavy investment in social. Similarly, Cheryl Calverley, from Birds Eye Iglo Group, said the fact that social has ‘made word of mouth measurable for the first time’ is a significant ROI for any brand.

3 – Integrate social as early as possible in strategy and planning

Stressing the need to integrate social into brand and campaign thinking as early as possible, Melissa Littler, Marketing Director at online retailer Brand Alley, said ‘Social works best when it isn’t a bolt-on, when it’s thought about from the outset, and creative is optimised (for it)’. Peter Markey, Chief Marketing Officer at insurer RSA Group, said that the ‘More Than Freeman’ campaign for RSA’s UK insurance brand More Than, had ‘considered social from the start’. This was reinforced by Asad ur Rehman, Director, Global Media (Foods) at Unilever, who said “Social strategy has to be integrated. Embed social upfront in your marketing strategy or your business strategy, it cannot stand alone.”

4. Earning the right to engage

Asad encouraged the room to keep adapting traditional marketing thinking in order to respond effectively to social. “As marketers we need to switch our gears. First we need to earn the right to sit at the (community’s) table, then we have to earn attention, then and only then, we might have earned the right to deliver a product message.” Asad cited Lynx’s ‘Keeping Keeley’ campaign as a great example of this approach.

On the same theme, Peter Markey, said that the personality brought by the More Than Freeman character earns the brand the right to engage with customers who typically only contact their insurer once a year, at renewal. Peter also shared the insight that early in the campaign the tone of voice used on social platforms by the character was ‘too quirky’ and didn’t engage, but by observing interaction levels, testing and learning, a more effective tone of voice was developed that earned significant engagement.

Keep the customer at the centre, integrate social early, see the bigger picture on ROI, earn the right to engage, and be ready to test, learn, fail and adapt.

All great points, and signals that social is no longer the new kid on the block.

The panel featured speakers from digital, integrated and media agencies, with Dave Coplin from Bing (@dcoplin), and Linked-in’s Sally Keane and Jonathan Bradford completing the bill.

Social media’s diversity was aptly illustrated with case studies ranging across the B2C and B2B sectors.

TMW’s Mark Harrison (@mvharrison) outlined recent Facebook activity undertaken on behalf of Lynx. One interesting takeaway was the need for brand owners to adapt their thinking in social, and get away from the CRM mindset. Harrison said that in the course of his work with Lynx he had come to realise that simply having the objective to use social platforms to drive a number of fans through to the Lynx exclusive community site isn’t sufficient. Instead the priority is to facilitate the peer-to-peer conversation on Facebook through talented ‘social editors’ that become a valuable part of the community, akin to a good host at a party.

From this FMCG fest of girls, ‘Likes’ and the ‘Lynx Effect’ we leapt across the business world to Philips’ challenge to engage B2B audiences for its medical scanning, lighting and town planning products. Jonathan Bradford, the Linked-in account manager behind the work with Philips, made the useful comparison of Linked-in as the ‘heavy end’ of the social engagement spectrum, creating spaces for in-depth discussion and debate, compared to the ‘light’ world of the Facebook ‘Like’.

While different in approach, and target market, the outcomes of both pieces of activity were impressive. For Philips the Linked-in activity has created an active Linked-in Group around lighting with 31,000 members, and healthcare Group with 41,000. These numbers are significant when you consider that there are just 25,000 decision makers globally when it comes to a large healthcare product, like a CAT scanner. Within these groups 60 pct were manager level, and 4,440 discussions have taken place. Perhaps most crucially Philips’ Net Promoter Score within these groups is above 50.

In the case of Lynx , the brand has undertaken focus group research with customers that are fans on Facebook, and those that aren’t. Amongst the fans there is a much higher propensity to buy Lynx products, and up to 3.5 times more value of product is bought by the fan group. Even after discounting the fact that those that fan (‘Like’) the Lynx pages may be brand advocates before joining the community, it’s a compelling argument for brands to engage.

So, interesting work, good results, and particularly in the Philips example, an indication of how the activity supported the wider business, and brand, objectives.

If anyone in the room held onto any doubts about social’s ability to impact wider strategy, they were surely swept away by a superb presentation from Bing’s Head of Search, Dave Coplin @dcoplin.

After channelling Lemmie from Motorhead for a brief moment (!), Dave went on to stress that the search engines’ days of “chasing the algorithm dragon” are past. He said “search and social are now intimately linked”, which is driving Bing’s priority to bring the social web, its networks, and trusted human relationships to bear on search results. “People want to make human decisions, not algorithm decisions. We are seeing a shift from relevance to trust in search”.

To take advantage of this opportunity Dave recommends that brand owners – “let go of the control of the brand, enable communities, and accept you can no longer ‘build it and they will come’, today your brand online is more of a community bazaar than a cathedral”.

On the day Google + was launched, his words made a powerful impression.

It was a highly informative afternoon, illustrating the growing sense in the industry that social has ‘grown up’ to a point where a strategic approach is a must.

So far I’m impressed. There has been a tendency towards Mashable and Techcrunch articles, but it’s also thrown up some neat new stories and sources that I might have missed in the constant ‘flow’ on Tweetdeck.

Coming back from the Easter break on Tuesday I logged onto URL shortening service bit.ly, to see their very similar news app News.me being plugged. Again an application to let your Twitter network, and in News.me’s case other people’s network, help filter and find news that is of greatest relevance to you.

Is this the future of news? I believe it is. Why should we any longer only digest what a sub-editor and section-editor on one of our national newspapers believes we most want to see? The future of news is personal, dynamic, and tailored to each of us, tailored by the power of the semantic web.

This personalisation is happening across multiple platforms. The BBC remains my favoured news gathering source, but I hardly watch news bulletins at scheduled times any longer, and I used to almost daily. Why? Well I’ve likely already seen most of the content on line, stories of interest have been brought to my attention by my social network, and if I do watch a bulletin I’m likely to do so on I-Player or Virgin Plus.

All of these factors add up to a huge challenge for traditional news franchises i.e. the owners of the classic print and broadcast news brands. But hey, we’ve known that for years.

One publisher that keeps itself at the forefront of thinking in this area is The New York Times, through its R&D Lab. The Lab (which developed the News.me application in collaboration with bit.ly) is a JV with the Nieman Foundation at Harvard University. Its self proclaimed aim is to, ‘attempt to figure out how quality journalism can survive and thrive in the Internet age’.

In a fascinating post from the R&D Lab’s Megan Garber she gives an insight into Project Cascade, a new tool the Lab has developed with UCLA professor Mark Hansen ‘to track the life of our stories once they leave the newsroom’s confines and go out into the world’. It’s powerful stuff, attempting to visualize across multiple axes the flow of content online, who moves it, in what way, and what nuances are added as it proliferates.

At the end of the post they insist that from The NYT perspective it ‘won’t necessarily dictate, or even affect editorial decisions’. Rather it could ‘affect the packaging of stories and the way the Times presents them online.’

If you ask me that’s a missed opportunity. If this tool can genuinely mine, and surface, powerful insights into what makes content work well in the online eco-system, then hell yes, base your editorial decisions on it.

If you do there is a greater chance that your content will be ranked and selected to appear in the personalised news vehicles that will increasingly make the ‘editorial decisions’ for individuals. Do that successfully and the NYT might just persuade more people to pay for full access beyond its recently introduced pay-wall.

Taking a step back from the intricacies of the traditional news business’ struggle with the open web, what is at the heart of this, is value.

As a publisher, brand publisher or individual publisher, your ability to create content that has value for your audiences is what will decide your success or failure. Happy creating.

Following the launch of our Social Brands 100 report last week, we’ve been thinking that this famous quote has some resonance with our ranked brands.

Born social.

One of the surprise Top Five entries for some commentators is the crowd-sourced mobile operator, giffgaff. This innovative business has been making waves in the mobile space since its launch in November 2009. Conceived from the outset as a social business, where its customers can gain rewards by providing customer service and marketing support, this is one business that was ‘born’ with social principles at its core. Indeed the business model was refined through crowd sourcing the question ‘what would you want from a mobile network run by you?’.

Another interesting example is Innocent Drinks. Interestingly, the fast growing FMCG brand, launched in 1999, pre-dates the explosion of mass social behaviour on platforms like Twitter and Facebook.

But, according to Ted Hunt, in charge of digital engagement at Innocent from 2006 to 2010, the company already had social principles at its heart. His job was simply to tell this story through social channels, not to transform the business for social. Evidence that true social engagement is more about behaviour and content, not technology and platforms?

Achieving socialness.

This transformative state is the most common that our ranked brands find themselves in. A good example is the retail bank, First Direct.

Launched as the first ‘telephone bank’ 25 years ago, it’s always been an innovator.  In the last few years the Leeds based company has proved its agility once again as it develops social behaviours, and strategies. It features as the only financial services company in the Social Brands 100 thanks to its social media newsroom, i-Phone app, Little Black Book and Talking Point initiatives.

Other notable ‘achievers’ are the BBC, Ford, Burberry, Sky and BT Care. All these brands are introducing effective social principles into the way their organizations work, and rightly being recognized for it.

Social thrust upon them.

This is the most interesting group. A collection of well-known brands that have been pushed into adopting social behaviours, and business models, after being hit by a social reputation crisis.

Dell (ranked #1), Domino’s Pizza (ranked #26), Eurostar (ranked #36), Virgin Atlantic (ranked #37) have all suffered from high profile crises that were either caused, or exacerbated, by social media.

To their credit they have all responded positively. Dell has famously put active listening of conversations around its brand at the very heart of its business model. Domino’s Pizza took the opportunity of its staff induced crisis, to proactively engage with its customers to reinvent the chain’s whole food offering. Eurostar has gone on the record to say that the stranded trains crisis of late 2009 prompted the transformation of its customer service and Twitter profile. Virgin Atlantic has taken positive steps in social engagement after getting stung by staff comments on social platforms in 2008.

These high profile corporate car crashes act as a lesson to all brands that have yet to consider how they will evolve their brands, and transform their businesses, for social.

So, if you’re one of those ‘pre-social’ brands thinking about how they will adapt for the new rules of a connected world, please don’t wait for a crisis to ‘thrust’ you in to it!

One teeny-tiny request for next year, would you consider a name change? Would you, could you, ditch the ‘M-Word’? Social Brand Week London is pretty catchy! But Social Business, or Social Enterprise, would do just as well.

With the SMW brand going strong, this is probably a long shot (!). But changes like this would be a tangible sign that the blossoming industry around social specialists is growing up.

The underlying point is that the term ‘social media’ diminishes the transforming effects of social networks, and social behaviour.

The traditional definitions of media focus on the collective phenomena of: ‘newspapers, radio and television’, which have the ability to ‘communicate with and influence people widely’.

Of course platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Slideshare have this publishing power, but the social behaviour they allow is utterly different.

Because they are networked, content and conversation can bloom into any size or shape.

Because they provide a back-channel for two-way conversation, there is an expectation of being listened to, not just talked at.

Because they increase transparency, disconnects between truth and reality are exposed.

Because they allow sharing and co-creation, powerful movements can grow (as the Egypt uprising shows).

Breaking the link between ‘social’ and ‘media’ could help us move the debate forward. To start thinking about social not as ‘another channel’ (hate that), but as the forerunner of a linked, open world, where information and influence flow freely, and uniquely, for each individual, as per Sir Tim Berners-Lee’s vision for the semantic web.

For brands, approaching this stuff at the platform (media) level isn’t sustainable. In true Darwinian fashion, the brands and organisations that will thrive will be those that can evolve the fastest, from the inside out, transforming structure, behaviour, skills, responsiveness, and culture, to meet the heightened demands of a newly connected people.

What do you think?