We initially launched a single issue blog last year, dedicated to showcasing CFS’ commitment to Microfinance. It told the story of Belma, a bank employee returning to her native Bosnia to see the impact CFS funding is having within local communities. As a pilot project this site gave CFS an insight into the advantage of using a fast, flexible platform to share stories in an informal way. Customer response via comments was fairly positive, and as the banking crisis hit, highlighted the benefits of providing an open channel for dialogue with the bank – a real point of difference within the industry.
This first foray into blogging created an internal appetite to showcase more campaigns, like those against Toxic Fuels or financing renewable energy , and also publish regular news content to create and sustain a dialogue with the various communities of interest. Populating a site of this nature and nurturing the community is a considerable and important task and CFS has made the commitment to the blog’s success by putting dedicated resource into place. We’re looking forward to seeing how this community grows and develops and continuing to help CFS demonstrate how they truly are ‘good with money‘.
Hitwise data released yesterday shows that Twitter has continued its inexorable rise in popularity, with UK internet visits to the micro-blogging site up by six times since the beginning of the year – leading to its entry into the top 50 UK websites for the first time.
Whilst the name Twitter and all its related Tweet-isms might be breeding ennui in some jaded marketers, it’s also the case that according to Hitwise this site is receiving
‘more UK internet visits than the Daily Mail, RightMove, MSN UK Search, Directgov, and all retail websites – with the exception of eBay, Amazon UK, Play.com and Argos’
- all of which probably pay large parts in many traditional online media plans.
Not only is that a whole lot of eyeballs but Twitter is also proving to be a valuable referrer of traffic. Hitwise reports:
‘As well as being the 50th most visited website in the UK, it was also the 36th biggest source of traffic to other websites in the UK during March’.
All this activity has lead to a rapid growth in the amount of attention paid to Twitter in companies’ marketing strategies, according to Econsultancy’s UK Search Engine Marketing Benchmark Report, released last week. Compared to last year’s 3%, this year 49% of marketers cited in the report are including Twitter in their social media marketing mix.
Ideally this new focus on Twitter would be part of a holistic social media marketing strategy with the tool being chosen to fit the target audience and set objectives – not just a bit of ‘me too’ activity. Sadly the same report carries evidence that this might not be the case – 19% of respondents aren’t tracking their activity at all and 49% have admitted that they have no idea how successful or otherwise their campaigns have been.
So, we can see that there are sound reasons for brands to engage with Twitter – but it’s essential to first identify a clear purpose for the activity, alongside a set of objectives against which you can then measure your success and justify your investment.
Today is the 10th anniversary of The Cluetrain Manifesto – a set of 95 theses about how business is changing forever – that became a book of the same name. Although the term ‘social media’ wasn’t used until years later, many people hail Cluetrain as the start of this new world, and it’s been a huge influence on us here at NixonMcInnes since we started in 2000.
To mark the 10th anniversary of Cluetrain, a wiki has been set up where people have been volunteering to pick up one of the theses and write a blog post about it.
I grabbed theses No. 20, mostly because I thought it would be fun to write about:
“Companies need to realize their markets are often laughing. At them.”
You see, in the age of Cluetrain, a brand isn’t something that you position and control. Your brand is whatever the people out there say you are. And as Chevy found out, they’re often laughing at you.
And you don’t just get laughed at when you invite the crowd to write advertising slogans for you. Next time you have a corporate slip on a banana skin, you’re gonna get laughed at. Very publicly.
Having rats infest your fast food restaurant is unlucky. Having a TV crew show up is unwanted attention. But having a million people forward the clip to their friends because they think it’s funny. Well, that’s Cluetrain.
Oooh, people are cruel aren’t they? Yep, but it’s hardly surprising after centuries of corporations telling us what to think them.
Even messages to your own employees will make their way into the public domain, and you can get laughed at for that too, as Mike Soutar found out.
“It makes such a difference”
So where does all this leave us? Well, it leads us quite neatly onto thesis No. 21 – “Companies need to lighten up and take themselves less seriously. They need to get a sense of humor.”
No company has done this better than Blendtec. Taking their slightly awkward, nerdy CEO and putting him in front of a camera blending stuff that was never meant to be blended. From an initial outlay of $50, Blendtec have increased sales by 700% just by allowing people to laugh with them, and not just at them.
If you’re at Internet World tomorrow (Weds 29 April) why not stop by the snappily titled ‘Web 2.0, Social Networking, Usability, Design & Build Theatre‘ at midday for a panel debate on the subject of buzz monitoring. I’m chairing the session, and I’m joined by panel members representing buzz monitoring technology vendors; agencies and brands, so it’ll be a good mix.
If you’re wondering how to approach buzz monitoring at your organisation, then come along and ask a question.
Can’t make it? We have a free e-book on buzz monitoring that you can download from our ebooks page (no registration required, unless you’d like us to notify you of future e-books.)
To get on the list, every employee in the company was surveyed by Worldblu, a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to spreading democratic working throughout the world of work. The survey covered the 10 dimensions of democratic organsations.
I personally feel quite humble about being accepted onto the list. Whilst it’s fantastic to have the principles that we try to run our company by validated by an external assessor, I know that we still have a VERY long way to go. We know that sometimes we don’t always live up to these ideals, but we have a shared commitment to get better and better at it. The purpose of entering NixonMcInnes for the Worldblu list wasn’t for the PR or badge of honour, but for the feedback we’ll get from Worldblu to understand how we benchmark against other democratic companies. I’m hoping to learn which of the dimensions need the most work and get some ideas about how we can improve.
If your company operates democratically, we’d love to hear from you. Apparently this year there were only two companies from the UK accepted onto the list – us and Happy Computers. It would be fantastic to have more on the list next year.
You can read more about organisational democracy on my personal blog.
Here at Nizomk Towers, we have been following, with keen interest, the conversations flying around teh internets about theperilsof URL-shortening services, such as TinyURLet al. Apparently, with both the number of available URL-shortening services growing, along with the reliance on them, what we have is a ticking time bomb, just waiting to explode in our faces! Yikes!
Are you, or is someone you know our new Office Manager / Bookkeeper? We are looking for the right person to join our fun and lively team of social media experts… Read more…
