Digital Influence Mapping Project

Zombies Bite Off Half of Digital Advocacy

 It’s a great idea. Unleash well-produced zombies as mailmen, first-responders, shoppers on the streets of city, capture the ‘freak-outs’ of passerby’s and then cap with the meaningful, action-inducing message.

“Put Zombies Back on TV” is the flag we are waving. AMC Networks is the one doing the waving. We have seen these disputes before between content publishers/networks and the distributors. Usually it is about money. Who gets what slice of the pie. It is usually pretty complex and impossible to decipher who is “in the right.” Essentially, it is two big corporations battling to protect their business needs. The consumer’s interest doesn’t enter into it unless you count the enjoyment we get from watching their programming (which we pay for one way or another). And this is where this corporate advocacy program falls apart. The best that they can do is to try and trigger AMC show fans (e.g. Walking Dead, Mad men, Breaking Bad) to scream bloody murder.

The Zombies are great. Of course, I am exactly who they are trying to reach….almost. I love Walking Dead and all of the combined zombie canon. Problem is, I am not a DISH Network customer. Best that I can do for them is share the video or share the message of the campaign. The DISH network customer, on the other hand, they want them to literally switch to another provider who does carry the AMC shows.

 

Three problems

The issue is too complex and I really don’t know who to support in the battle.  AMC hasn’t done enough to simplfy the issue, if that is even possible. Here’s how they explain the issue on their microsite:

“DISH’s decision to drop AMC, WEtv, IFC and Sundance Channel had nothing to do with our fees, or our shows. In fact, unlike almost every other dispute you see between providers and programmers, and despite DISH’s misleading claims to the contrary, this is not about fees.

The simple truth is that DISH is using their consumers as pawns to attempt to gain leverage in a lawsuit involving an old and unrelated business venture that has nothing to do with AMC, nothing to do with our shows or fees, and certainly nothing to do with DISH subscribers, who just want to watch the shows they love and are paying DISH for. You will not see any AMC Networks’ shows on DISH any time soon.

In other words, since DISH’s reason for depriving you of AMC programming is based on a lawsuit that won’t be resolved for a long time, this problem won’t be solved shortly, unlike other disputes between programmers and providers, which typically are resolved in a matter of days (weeks at most).” 

 

Huh? What “old and unrelated business venture?” Without simplicity and transparency I cannot possibly form a view as to which profit-making enterprise is worth supporting. AMC’s claims that the only way I see my beloved show is by voicing my discontent or outright switching (to one of the cable providers who are not likely to be bastions of customer goodwill, themselves)

If you are a glutton for detail (it won’t help sort it) then here is how Chip Lebovitz at CNN Money summarized it:

“The two companies have waged a legal war for over four years. In 2008, AMC Networks and its then-parent company, Cablevision, sued Dish (DISH) for $2.5 billion for breaching its 2005 carriage contract with Voom HD, a suite of channels created by a Cablevision (CVC) subsidiary. The dispute centers on whether Dish violated the contract when it dropped Voom because, Dish claims, Voom didn't spend enough money on programming. A trial is set for September 18th in the New York Supreme Court.

The timing of Dish's decision to drop AMC seems retaliatory. Dish first threatened to drop AMC in May, a week after it lost an appeal in the Voom lawsuit…

This is a litigation strategy. By not renewing [AMC Networks], Dish gained leverage in the underlying lawsuit," says Thomas Claps, an analyst at Susquehanna Group. "It highlights the fact that Dish faces significant headwinds in the [Voom] trial."…

According to Nielsen, in the last six months The Walking Dead had the highest rating in the key 18-49 demographic among Dish's basic cable subscribers. The network also has popular shows like Mad Men and Breaking Bad.

Any Dish blackout of AMC, regardless of its motivations, hurts AMC significantly more than it does Dish. Without access to Dish's 14 million subscribers, AMC ratings and ad revenue will drop, weakening a company already struggling with net debt of over $2 billion.”

 

I feel like a zombie on the wrong end of one of Darryl’s arrows from the show The Walking Dead. My head hurts.

 The second problem I have is a simple social design and messaging one. They need my advocacy even if I am just a fan and not a customer. The video has a proper ‘throw’ to the “putzombiesback.com” site. Okay, I’ll bite (so-to-speak). But once there, my actions are not as clear and simple as they could be.  If I am a customer, they want me to switch. If not, I can either go to the @AMC_Assist  Twitter handle (>750 followers) or click on one of the ubiquitous social network share buttons at the bottom of the page (only 15K Likes on Facebook and only 5 Tweets?).

I want to share content not pages. Crafting a fan-oriented message that links to the video yet still carries a message of the campaign is what we need. Instead, the auto-fill on the tweet-share says something flat and not action-oriented. 

“DISH Customers have lost AMC, WE TV, IFC and SUNDANCE Channel.”

Why not, 

“If you luv Walking Dead, don’t let DISH Network keep it from 14 million fans. Join the Zombie swarm (link).” 

This lets me be a part, keeps the focus on the show I have an affinity for, and  drives me to deeper content as a collective action. 

The thrid problem is hardly that simply because I dont know what they have done to market this effort to the right people. But I hope that are using Facebook's Connections Analysis Tool (CAT) and other targeting efforts to deliver stories with clear calls-to-action to people who are fams of the shows, live in Dish customer regions, have affinity for similar programming, are big TV lovers and so forth. They could run this more as an advocacy program and less like a corporate issue deserving of a newspaper ad and, in this case, a cool video wth a mcirosite support.

Half a job done, I think. 

But wait, then there is the response from Dish Network Chairman Charlie Ergen, not much a fan of AMC programs. he essentially recommends that we just watch our video programs through iTunes. Not sure what kind of advice that is from someone who runs a satellite network:

"He was also dismissive of AMC which has acclaimed series includingMad Men and Breaking Bad. “They’re critically acclaimed but not viewed as much by our audience”, he says. “And our customers can go to iTunes and get Mad Menthe same time it’s on. We could pay the entire iTunes bill and it would be cheaper”

Welcome to Social@Ogilvy!

(this post is also found in s similar form on our new Social@Ogilvy site)

The Social Imperative

Brands will spend between 17-18% of their total marcom spend on social media within 4 years. They will spend more on social business solutions. They are seeing value and expecting more every year. 

The key reason? 90% of us look to friends and family for the most trusted recommendations on products, service and issues. 70% of us count on consumer opinions online above traditional media. And it’s only going to grow. Millennials are three times more likely than Boomers to look for a social opinion on choices they make. 

The future is brand advocacy. And it cannot be faked, gamed, or outright ‘bought.’

There are only three ways to connect with and build a strong relationship with customers and stakeholders these days. 

1. Deliver highly relevant content or service. This could be advertising, media relations or what we call ‘owned’ content (including valuable services). Now it’s all highly targeted and tailored. No more 360 degree ‘onslaughts’ of interruptive advertising. Now our messages must be deemed highly relevant to our targets to earn their attention. Lets use the ‘10 degrees’ that matter. Useful content to run a sustainable business from DuPont. Better ways to use member ‘points’ from American Express. 
2. Be discoverable in search. When people search Google, Baidu or Yandex, brands need to be there for all the topics that intersect between a person’s intent and where the brand can add some value. Ford on fuel efficiency. Hellmann’s on Real Food recipes. 
3. Earn our way into their ‘social graph.’  To succeed in social media, we must become genuinely valuable to the people we serve and earn their attention, their advocacy and their business.   Inviting people as VIPs into the launch of the new Ford Explorer in Facebook. Sparking a social conversation about the dreams of the next generation of Chinese from Johnnie Walker. Helping Hong Kong parents celebrate their baby pictures in a much bigger way from Huggies.

How we form opinions about products, services and issues is constantly changing. It’s imperative that we make social a new way we do everything.

What is Social@Ogilvy? 

Social@Ogilvy is the global, cross-discipline team of social experts from across all of Ogilvy’s businesses delivering social solutions to all parts of our clients’ business. This is new. This is bigger than before. We have been designing and executing social media marketing and communications programs for 7+ years as 360 Digital Influence – a specialty practice born out of Ogilvy Public Relations. We quickly grew to deliver social solutions for all sorts of marketing and communications clients. 

Now we have grown into Social@Ogilvy. We are a true global network with a common approach. 

Integrated Social Media Matters More 

The whole PR vs. marketing battle is moot. Social media will inform every discipline and deliver business value for the foreseeable future. Social media as a standalone specialty doesn’t make sense. All the power and potential in social based solutions comes to life when you integrate it into marcom and other functions. 

We design integrated social solutions that combine deep disciplines like crm, public relations and shopper marketing and rooted in what drives behavior.  We plan around owned, earned and paid media working together for a compound effect and at its heart our work is ‘social by design’ – phrase used now by Facebook but that captures what we do quite well. 

A Global Shift

We do believe there’s a new customer and stakeholder journey defined by the increasing impact our networks have on purchase decision and our behaviors. How we buy, vote, and form opinions has changed. We tap into our 130 friends (the Facebook average) to discover, consider, compare, decide and rave about products, services and issues.

This shift is happening in one way or another all over the world. Growth markets like China, Indonesia, Brazil and Turkey will define the next episode of social media use. They are all growing their social network use and outpacing western markets including the US. That’s why we have grown the world’s largest global team delivering solutions relevant in each local market.  

And it’s more than just marketing, we design social business solutions that use the collaboration and advocacy strengths of social media to drive value internally and in customer relationships while at the same time managing risk. 

 

Join Us

We will be participating or hosting 23 events in and outside of Social Media Week this week in NYC, London and Hong Kong not to mention a dozen other markets. Join us as we launch this new ambitious business. It's been a wild ride to get to this point and we would love to see you. You can find out more at our new Social@Ogilvy site.

A Great Facebook Integration for Social Marketing from Safefood

A week ago, I had the great chance to speak at an event hosted by Ireland's Safefood, an organization "responsible for the promotion of food safety on the island of Ireland." They brought together social marketers from the region to share about their experiences working in social media. Folks from Bord Bia, Ireland's Food board and the Irish Blood Transfusion Service all shared some interesting cases.

Safefood is humble about what they have accomplished themselves in social media. They organized this event to accelerate sharing towards everyone's benefit. Just that step - hosting a sharing conference - shows an innovative spirit and commitment (disclosure: safefood works with Ogilvy in Ireland) Despite their humility, Safefood has one of the best Facebook integrations I have seen from any marketer not just the social media community.

The program

Weigh2Live could be described as a typical social marketing health campaign. Its got the clever name and the ambition to help the population help themselves towards better eating habits and weight management. 

 

How they integrate with the social Web

When you visit the safefood organization site, the first two things I notice are:

1. clear navigation based upon whether I am a consumer, educator or professional
2. great cross promotion into their various social networks including

• Facebook - engaging consumers via Weigh2Live program
• Twitter - an organizational handle for all relevant news
• Linkedin - a prioneering use of the "Companies" function to connect people with the people at safefood
• Ning - access to a private network

Safefood also maintains a blog on their main url. Here's how the author, who is a great guy, introduces himself: "My name is Dermot Moriarty and I live with my beautiful wife and two boys in Dublin. During the day, I work in the communications team at safefood and count myself very lucky to enjoy what I do, working with great colleagues in Dublin and Cork...." Here's a great post to give you a flavor - "Social media and our food." 

Most organizations would then create an informational Website to ensure they did their duty of delivering the correct, approved information for consumers to seek out. Most government organizations for years assumed their job was to offer the information on their own Web site. Knowing that most have not embraced sophisticated SEO programs, that means they expect consumers to seek their Web site out from all the other health, wellness and food sources out on the Web.

Not safefood. They went to Facebook. 

How they use Facebook

The Weigh2Live program comes to life in three ways on Facebook. Smartly, they set it up that once you are registered in the program, you never have to leave Facebook to interact with it. They have also kept the program, itself simple and I believe, credible. Rather than join the diet fad race which requires some innovation to draw weight plan fanatics convinced there is some model out there that allows them to eat what they ought not to and still lose weight, safefood offers the basics - information, simple tools and a way to get support form others.

Facebook Tracker: They have essentially pulled all of the tools from the microsite into a Facebook tab. I can maintain a dead simple food diary, activities and my weight goals - all within the page. Most importantly, I can post to a private wall that only select friends can see. We often joke about "death to the campaign microsite." Microsites have a purpose. That is largely to serve as a billboard for a program and provide good Google juice (good search results). But today, we bring the interaction into the social networks themselves. For a typical campaign, I would spend less than 15-20% of my non-media budget on a microsite and all the design effort would go towards SEO performance and a solid brand presence. 

Your Friend's Support Group: I can select from my Facebook friends which will have access to my Weigh2Live posts. This relieved my first concern - that facebook users would not want to share weight-related updates with the same crowd that sees their daily wall updates. This is a great strategy for any sensitive issue. It allows people to form their own support group from their friends. That has some campaign advantages later should you want to target some supporting engagement ads to drive acquisition and participation (see Facebook's "learned targeting")  

 

Community Discussions: The weakest part of the program so far is the just launched discussions. I have yet to see a great Facebook marketing page with a vibrant use of the discussion tab. safefood has launched specific discussions for about 9 different groups including conversations dedicated to women, politicians and even bloggers. For now, these remain largely empty although they did just launch. Vibrant discussions are the hardest to catalyze. It may make more sense to find the one conversation that people are dying to have and help make that happen or grow vs. launching nine.

A Great Integration

Safefood is a small, scrappy public organization. They may be humble about what they have accomplished but they have done a lot of things right:

1. they activated Weigh2Live fully within Facebook making it possible for people to take advantage of the program without leaving their social network of choice

2. they combined utility with the unique community aspects of Facebook to create real value for participants (this is no Facebook "bolt-on")

3. they are innovating and trying solutions not planning for months the perfect plan (which is never perfect)

4. they are letting their personality come through. Their willingness to be seen and heard via their blog and LInkedIn pages is a fantastic way to let the people and their passion shine through  

What is social media literacy and why should it matter to the UN?

The UN established the 8 Millennium Development Goals (MDG) to rally the world around a worthy BHAG (big hairy audacious goal) which can be summed up as end poverty by 2015. Talking about social media in relation to some of the catastrophic problems they are trying to solve like gender equality and HIV/AIDS seems like, well, it seems trivial. But I actually think social media can help. 

I spoke on a panel at the UN during International Literacy Day. The event featured former First Lady Laura Bush who has been a champion of education every since her early career as a teacher. The focus of the event was clearly on literacy and education and how they can contribute to reaching the MDG. These goals require global commitments to build and staff schools, change culture and a whole lot more to make any of this add up. So, why does the emerging world of social media matter? Simple, I think they are looking in every direction for solutions big and small. And while I admit that teachers, schools and shoes for children to get to those schools are clear priorities, I do believe social media can help. 

Social Media Literacy 

There are two ways that social media can even come close to addressing any problem in the MDG. One is by giving individuals more choices through the benefits of digital and social media. The second is by strengthening the efforts of the worldwide non-profits trying to solve the problems head on. Unlike the field referred to as 'media literacy' which generally talks about understanding the vast media landscape and how messages are crafted and delivered, social media literacy is that plus understanding how you, too, can use it to reach your goals. 

Here are 5 practical applications for digital and social media literacy. These could be described as the benefits of knowing how to use and understand aspects of social media accessed by mobile devices, PCs (including the One Laptop Per Child) and other emerging devices.  

Communications via a Social Graph: building a network of “socially useful friends.”If I can connect with others in my community quickly, they can offer help, advice or verify my experience. If a citizen is turned away from a polling place they might check with their friends/social graph to see if they had a similar experience. 

Relevant Information On-Demand: getting and sharing relevant information when most needed. When Indian farmers access crop prices via mobile they are tapping into market information when they most need it. MetroTeenAIDS in DC uses an SMS text system to let teens find HIV/AIDS testing facilities in DC.

Social Grassroots: growing and activating support communities to change conditions and behaviors. Six people were arrested in Mozambique for sending the original text messages protesting the price of water and electricity. 

Collaborative Communities: Building global connections around affinities vs. political or geographic boundaries. We are building global wikis all the time around interests. They are intended to help people collaborate on work across all sorts of geo-political boundaries. Ogilvy’s social media wiki is a great example albeit a professional one. 

Spontaneous Innovation: Digital and social technologies combined to solve community problems. The everyday application of new technologies sparks development of new ideas like the use of M-currency in Africa that allows people to send unused mobile minutes as currency to family members (M-Pesa from Vodafone is a commericalized version of this phenomena) 

Some of these 5 are more practically useful  to organizations trying make a difference in markets with low Internet or broadband access. But remember, there are 5 billion mobile phones in hands across the world. Add to that a few other tangential data points and the possibilities of social media in the hands of individuals across developing countries becomes real: 1/5 of Facebook access is via mobile device and even Uganda has almost 220K members. Social media literacy - understanding and capacity both for the individual and the organization trying to help the individual could contribute to reaching the goals.

The Next News: 5 Trends & Implications for Communicators

We are all living through the long reboot of the traditional media and news business. Being in the midst of the change makes it difficult to recognize on a daily basis exactly where the broad media world (publishers of news and information via broadcast, print and digital channels and platforms) will end up any time soon. It's too easy to shake our heads at the apparent resistance of the newspaper industry to change while the business disintegrates. While there may be resistance (there is in every established business), there are plenty of smart people inside that industry exploring answers. Just look at what the Knight Foundation is funding in terms of media experiments. 

Communicators need to change, too

Marketing and communications specialists are no different. There are plenty of forward thinking innovators just as there are plenty of folks relying on past models to carry them through. To be ready for change and to willing to make that change, we need to recognize the implications of how media is changing to understand how we might adapt and take advantage of that change. Ross Dawson had a useful article creating the Future of Media. I wanted to look at what these things mean for communications professionals who work on behalf of clients/brands. 

Here are 5 trends and their respective implications for communicators:

Outsourcing to content networks

This past week, Demand Media made news with its planned $125m IPO. They provide content and social infrastructure applications via their own content sites and partners sites like the San Francisco Chronicle. Their manifesto reveals the principles drive a new media company:

• Start each day by listening to the customer
• Make content that is unequivocally useful
• Build superior web experiences
• Invest heavily in our professional freelancer community
• Focus on the economics
• Never rest

They are doing what established media companies find so difficult - scaling content development via a network of freelancers, balancing community and content, and delivering value as defined by the user. There are others in this space. Examiner.com maintains a network of hyperlocal writers creating news distributed through their Web site in a scalable model. Even Huffington Post is praised for its mix of community and scaled content from a network of writers.

Implication: If a percentage of content on the San Francisco Chronicle comes from Demand Media, who should communications pros be pitching stories to? How can they connect relevant brands with niche writers? It's going to take a more thorough indexing of individual writers - sometimes within networks -  and its going to take a new approach to the working with a combined paid and earned model. 

Maintaining a database of the hundreds of thousands of citizen journalists out there is a Herculean task, never mind building relationships with them. In the Long Tail world we rely on business like Demand Media and Examiner (and Huffington Post and BlogHer) to aggregate them. Sometimes they are also the branded portal (e.g. Huffington Post), sometimes they are the unseen guts of other media properties (e.g. Demand Media). Communications professionals will need to think in terms of a blended paid/earned model to get access to these experts. Each of these businesses see themselves as gateways to their writers and discourage communicators from reaching them directly (or more aptly, the effort of reaching out to them directly doesn't match the return). Communicators need to think more creatively about combining paid media and earned media that deliver a value all the way down the chain to the consumer/customer/public. 

Scaling via consumer generated media

Most media properties have incorporated some degree of consumer generated media. Whether it is CNN's iReport or the New York Times, media properties have embraced consumer generated media as a supplement to their main editorial and as a way to reward engagement with their content (if my content is featured there, I will promote it). 

Implication: As the best writing continues to be curated and aggregated by those who have reach, brands need to refine their approach to influencer outreach. They need to get to the writers before they are aggregated.  A two-tier effort can help optimize coverage for a brand. The first tier is very close, personal relationships with the top 10, 20 or even 50 high-reach and relevance writers (influencers). The second tier is less intensive and includes a longer list of relevant influencers who may want to stay connected with what the brand is doing. This is the evolution of media relations and not a new concept.  

     

Our News Feed is in Facebook (and Facebook mobile)

There's a reason, Mark Zuckerberg calls the feature in Facebook 'News Feed.'  More and more people rely on the updates from their social graph - all of their friends, colleagues, influencers - as they appear in their social network updates. How many times has Twitter been cited over the past 2-3 years as the channel for breaking news? Well, all of that gets funneled through the Facebook News Feed. If my friend "likes" or shares a story from the New York Times, it shows up in my News Feed and I may click through to the story. If my friend "likes" or shares a story from TheFordStory.com (client), it shows up in my News Feed and I may click through to the story. 

Implication: Social networks make us all curators on behalf of our extended 'friends.' Brands can be content creators and/or media publishers themselves by following Demand Media's principles of listening to what their customers want to know about and publishing that. So, first, let's start behaving like the best content creators and publishers out there. Then, lets get that content into the hands of people who want it - where they want it.  By developing an approach to "social grassroots" brands can develop an authentic following (one based on delivering true value not corporate messages) via social networks and earn a place in the News Feed of customers and prospects. A third and final point, part of making the most relevant and useful content is formating it for delivery the way we all consume content. Make it work on mobile devices and you will up your reach considerably. According to Pew, "33% of cell phone owners now access news on their cell phones."

Our news on-demand is in Google

When we want to know about something - news or information - we go to Google or whatever major search engine serves our market. 

Implication: While "universal search" in Google displays true "news" content under that header, it does so on the same page that all the other results appear on - thus universal search. Consumers may distinguish between what the New York Times has to say about a product recall, but they may also be interested in what the company says about it. Brands must take up the challenge to be prolific content creators and be expert at multimedia search engine optimization. This must start with what we call "Consumer intent modeling" or the simple process of paying attention to what people are searching for to match their needs better with our content. We need to work hard to have our content show up on the first two pages of Google search results for the terms consumers find relevant. That's how they find news and information they are looking for. 

The coming renaissance of professional journalists

I grew up admiring journalists like Tom Wicker and David Halberstam. They played a role that I valued. While the headlines around news and media is dominated by shrinking newsrooms and troubled business models, I believe that overlooks a coming renaissance for quality journalism. Yes, the kind of stuff I would pay for. 

Implication: Traditional 'earned media,' where a communicator connects the needs of the audience, the journalist and the brand and does so without hyperbole or spin, is not going away. Just as there will be a premium of great journalism, there will be a premium on great communicators willing to earn their way into stories through relevance and value more than anything else. 

Brands Could Adopt Two Ways Advocacy Teams Use Social Media

 

We have been doing some interesting work with our colleagues over at Blue State Digital lately. The fundamental approach is to apply the same disciplined advocacy approach used in Obama for America campaign to brands. Not just brands in the non-profit space but commercial B2C and B2B brands. The obvious question is how anyone might expect that we can move customers or stakeholders for a major brand with the same urgency of a presidential election. How can we expect consumers or employees to care as much about a company or brand as they do for their elected official or a community referendum to the point they will take action? It's true that not all products earn the same attention as a hotly contested election. The principles of advocacy can apply to brand communications. We can drive people to speak out in support of a company or brand, and not via some trickery or robo-calling but by cultivating a valuable relationship.

I read a great post from Beth Kanter on  "Knitting Together Your Website, Email, and Social Media Content" which reminds me of the action-mindset of most non profit marketers. They have tight budgets and need to be crafty. They are also more akin to direct response marketers who try and adjust. They can be formidable social media marketers (and one reason some non profit advocacy groups like Greenpeace have become ninjas while brands remain "white belts" at best.   The non profit marketer has got quite a few things to teach the big brand marketer. And I am not talking about lesson for the brand's social good program. I am talking about selling product and building brand value. 

So here are two specific things that we can apply to brand marketing:   

1. Don't just publish content, drive action

All of Beth Kanter's recommendations in that simple post reveal an intuitive commitment to action. After all, non profits need donations, petitions signed, demonstrable advocacy, volunteers, rally supporters and more. Its all action. Beth has three steps she covers:

Step 1: Connect Everything

Step 2: Share Across Channels

Step 3: Reinforce What Works

In Step 2: Share Across Channels, she makes a great point about using the right channel for the ask (e.g. email for donation-asks)

"But what if you want supporters to connect with others who are also giving to the same campaign? That’s where social media can be highly effective. For example, on your thank-you pages and follow-up emails, you could encourage your supporters to share a story about why they are giving to your cause on your Facebook wall. Both calls to action – donate in email and share in social media – support the overall campaign by capitalizing on the strengths of the two different channels."

It's all action. Not just donating but capturing personal stories and testimonials and sharing across social media. Her overall recommendation of connecting all parts of your digital presence demands that brands start with a strategy that guides their design and use of websites, Facebook pages and email message arcs by the actions they need users to take. Advocacy specialists are keen real-time marketers - always adjusting messages, offers and so forth as they experience what works and what doesn't. This nimbleness could be the 3rd "way" that brands could adopt but I will save that for another post. (you might argue that this is the discipline of direct-response marketing and while that's true, advocacy marketers seem even nimbler)

More and more brands are publishing more and more content on the Web. We often speak about brands becoming media companies (e.g. American Express [cl] is this with Open Forum). They create more and more content to meet thought leadership goals or provide customers with more value through information, utility and entertainment. This quickly makes me think of brands emulating magazines which, of course, sounds so 1995. Rather than create and park content, brands could learn a lot from advocacy experts who craft and use content to drive action - advocacy or some more transactional conversation. Why dump a collection of videos on YouTube (and pulled into Facebook) when you could create an advocacy arc through the sequential publishing of the videos with asks to the engaged audience?   

2. Build your lists

Facebook wants brands to invest heavily in their service. Not only do they want brands to build large engaged fanbases within Facebook, they want to embed Facebook in their websites via Facebook Open Graph. As ReadWriteWeb dissected the login feature:

"Login with Faces & Facepile: The simpler publisher plugins enhance Facebook Connect. They makes it easy and compelling to sign in by leveraging Facebook cookies and showing faces of Facebook friends who are already members of the service."

Rely solely on that and you lose the data about your users. No email-based crm system. Advocacy groups, especially those running political campaigns, know how important it is to manage and grow a list of willing folks who can be called upon to advocate, take action, recommend to friends and donate. Without control of that list and the ability to integrate your email outreach with your use of social media, you will lose a big asset. You will lose your ability to expand the effectiveness of your list by accruing more and more information about your constituents. What do brands want to accomplish via social media? in some way or another, they want to activate people to advocate for their product or service (yes, and purchase). 

Advocacy experts have honed their abilities to drive action over the short term. I cannot speak to their ability to cultivate them over the long term. Brand managers and CMO's alike think in short term as much, if not more, than they do about long term relationships. As such they could turn to these advocacy experts to learn a thing or two. 

(image borrowed far too casually from: www.unmalumni.com/howler but thanks)

Turning Internet & Mobile Giving Into Investment

• President Obama called the $100m of US aid to Haiti an "investment." I like that.

• News stories report on the incredible amount of donation and word of mouth in support of the people of Haiti via mobile ($3m to Red Cross via texting) and Twitter

• The CTIA advertised an offer for free texting of donations to the American Red Cross ("Haiti" to 90999) and the Yele Haiti Earthquake Find ("Yele" to 501501)

• President Obama enlisted Presidents Clinton and Bush to spearhead a fund and effort to relieve the current suffering. You can donate there now - www.clintonbushhaitifund.org

• President Clinton has a longer term commitment to Haiti. He spent his honeymoon there and has remained involved. That's what I am talking about.

I noticed a tweet from Brian Reich, who knows a lot about non profits and driving advocacy,  over the past few days:

"We already knew web/mobile can bring in money after disasters. Need to see if groups can, or will, engage audience beyond fundraising."

Between the President's use of the word "investment," the Clintons' enduring involvment in Haiti and Brian's tweet, I can't help but want a longer term commitment to a cause. How can we use the same tools that we use everyday and make a long term investment in a part of the world with fellow citizens of the world? Certainly there are many many online donation services that will facilitate automatic giving, allow you to search and sort through organizations and causes to find one that you feel strongly about, and even connect directly with individuals via microlending. In many ways there is a wealth of choices for someone ready to make a commitment.

Sustained Commitment
I am looking for a way to contribute via donation, volunteerism and my ability to raise awareness via word of mouth to a part of the world that just needs extra support to reach a goal. My family has capacity and a will to help others and simply want to do it on a more personal level and via a sustained commitment. I am talking about 5-10 years of focused effort.

Coincidentally, Kevin Bacon was honored last night at the Critics Award with the Joel Siegel award highlighting his humanitarian efforts. They were acknowledging his creation of sixdegrees.org which built on the awareness of the meme in his name to create a compelling way for people to give. It is a partnership with the Network for Good which in some ways is that "hub" for long term commitment. I think this service is part of the answer. Here are the other steps we want to take that can extend the impact of our involvement:

• if our cause is located in one part of the world, we want to visit that place to "see with our own eyes..."
• any trip can include connecting with people locally and offering whatever we may have that could benefit them - sweat equity, internet expertise, marketing expertise, etc...
• a routine way of keeping in touch with what is happening in that community. Right now I use my Daily Influence Dashboard as a heads-up display on my business interests in social media and marketing. I could find ways to populate a tab of news and serach results for my area of commitment
• a routine way of spreading word of mouth beyond simple badges and email footers (but those are good to)

Any ideas on how to bundle all of this together into a lasting commitment that goes beyond periodic or reactive donation are welcome. Meanwhile, we are having a family meeting this weekend to brainstorm and I will let you know what we come up with.  

A Framework for Social Media in Crisis Management

This presentation which I and Jamie Moeller delivered in December through our partnership with the Wall Street Journal (and thanks to Thomas Crampton), offers a solid framework for Digital Crisis Management using social media (and responding to social media).

In it you will find:

• 5 Trends In Digital Crisis Management
• A Digital Crisis Management Framework
• 5 Keys to Managing the Crisis

WSJ and Ogilvy: Social Media For Crisis Management 2009

View more documents from jbell99.

Special Event: WOMMA SUMMIT 2009 - Wall-to-Wall Brand Cases

The best, most practical social media summit for brands will happen on November 16-18 in Las Vegas at the Paris Hotel. It's the Word of Mouth Marketing Association's Annual SUMMIT 2009. This year, we have packed the agenda with real world case studies from brands applying social media and word of mouth marketing to their marcom and business needs. Join Ford, Pepsi, CDW, General Mills, Weight Watchers,iTunes, SAP and more.

• Ford's Ray Day and Scott Monty pair up to talk about driving social media transformation through the enterprise
• FTC Chief of Staff Chuck Harwood will talk about the FTC's role in social media marketing and the imminent FTC Guidelines
• Comcastcares, Twelpforce and others convene for a customer service smackdown on the mainstage

If you are creating and executing social media and word of mouth marketing programs for your brand or organization (or client), come to the WOMMA Summit to share best practices and the latest innovations in the use of Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, blogging and offline word of mouth.

• The new WOMMY Awards will highlight the best of the best including best measurement models in social media and WOM.
• The Brands Council will offer special brands-only meetings
• And networking events will give you intimate conversations with your peers and colleagues from other companies to share experience

Join us now. While space is limited and no special price offers will be introduced, if you register and reference the code "fanofogilvy" you will recieve $100 off your fee.

Ogilvy will see you there.

Upcoming Events: Digital Citizen 09

Join me in Washington DC on October 8th for the Digital Citizen conference. I will lead a discussion around the 5 Barriers to Social Media in Public Organizations. The conference is designed around organizations serving the public sector - how they can commmunicate better via digital and even social means. Here's what else is happening:

• Aaron Smith, of Pew Internet and American Life Project, will discuss the latest research on how the Internet is shaping civic engagement
• A panel discussion with speakers from the Department of Defense, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and Steve Ressler of GovLoop discussing the interface of social media and public sector websites.
• Case study from Margaret Allen at the World Bank addressing the importance of transparency and of understanding the diverse needs of their global audiences through capturing Voice of Customer feedback on their website.
• Case studies from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), SAMSHA

To find out more and register visit the Forsee site.