A consulting project I'm working on includes helping a global brand optimize and grow a special-purpose professional networking community. After the community had been in place a couple of months the client wanted to ask members what new features they'd like to see. Normally I'm all about putting the customer first, but in this case I thought it was the wrong approach. When you're building a social network in a niche market the steak should come first: get the fundamentals right. Leave the sizzle for later.
First, it's important not to set expectations you can't fulfill. In this case, the client is using a hosted solution built around a template with a limited feature set. Giving community members an open-ended invitation to suggest features the client can't deliver has a high probability of disappointment. They're likely to start listing fun or flashy applications that caught their eye on Facebook...the type of thing that builds engagement once you're a loyal member but may not correlate to establishing the core value that motivates someone to join and return in the first place.
In the early going it's smarter to concentrate on a straightforward presentation (think Google) of basic activities that create value, such as sharing questions and information and facilitating connections between people who want to find each other. Discussion groups, blogs, wikis, ratings, Q&A, and some type of personal matching engine are a good start. Early on, focus marketing efforts on building usage of essential features rather than on proliferating functionality. If the underlying concept of your community is on target, people will sign up and return with or without the extra bells and whistles. After it reaches critical mass and is yielding a positive ROI you can invest in sizzle to generate more usage and time on site.
Furthermore, while it never hurts to open communication channels and invite people to talk back, when you're operating online you don't need surveys to reveal the activities people like best. With recall more perfect than any questionnaire responses, your web analytics disclose what features people do and don't use, where they spend the most time, when they visit, and the paths they take through your site. To understand how your community is working, dive into site stats.
Here's a great example of how, in the world of special-purpose online communities, steak trumps sizzle. Just this week some former colleagues in Brazil launched a community for IT and telecom professionals, CW Connect. To get the community up and running quickly they chose a US vendor's hosted solution. In some cases, page templates unavoidably and a bit awkwardly mix English and Portuguese. But instead of stressing over imperfections, my friends focused on the opportunity of launching the first professional networking site in their market in Brazil. Instead of Facebook "feature envy" they kept it simple. The plan paid off: Brazilian IT and telecom professionals who haven't had a venue for making connections and sharing solutions are flocking to CW Connect. CW Connect is starting with a good steak, which means there will be opportunities for lots more sizzle in the future.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
New Study on PR Measurement
Speaking of PR, the publication PR News has just released its Guide to Best Practices in PR Measurement Vol. 3. The guide costs $399, but you can check out the table of contents and a couple of articles for free. Chapters include Measurement Research, Measuring Media Relations, New Media Measurement, Measuring Integrated Marketing, 360-Degree PR Measurement, Measuring Reputation, Impacting the Bottomline, Measurement Case Studies, and Measurement Resources.
The web-enabled demand for measurability and demonstrable ROI is affecting every area where businesses spend to gain reputation, build brand, and promote products and services. Among the topics in the New Media Measurement chapter: Measuring Web 2.0, Measuring the Impact of Online Influencers, Measuring E-Mail Performance, How to Measure Social Relations, and A Conversation about New Media Metrics among Digital Luminaries. There's additional discussion of online and social media topics in other chapters, too.
The report notes that "measuring the value of PR's contribution to bottomline business results has never been harder--or more necessary." In any case, the focus on measurability is here to stay, and it's good to see various professional specialties specifically calling out the need to learn more.
The web-enabled demand for measurability and demonstrable ROI is affecting every area where businesses spend to gain reputation, build brand, and promote products and services. Among the topics in the New Media Measurement chapter: Measuring Web 2.0, Measuring the Impact of Online Influencers, Measuring E-Mail Performance, How to Measure Social Relations, and A Conversation about New Media Metrics among Digital Luminaries. There's additional discussion of online and social media topics in other chapters, too.
The report notes that "measuring the value of PR's contribution to bottomline business results has never been harder--or more necessary." In any case, the focus on measurability is here to stay, and it's good to see various professional specialties specifically calling out the need to learn more.
Bypassing Media: Is PR the New Advertising?
It’s hardly news that the internet is leading to big changes for the advertising business, a transformation that has important consequences for online media companies that monetize with ad revenue. But in a Web 2.0 world where social media complicates the landscape and yesterday’s hierarchical models of content presentation give way to the audience’s collective wisdom, will brands start shifting resources from advertising to PR? If so, what does that mean for online media businesses?
Advertising and PR exist side by side, as complementary strategies for shaping opinion and motivating behavior. Traditionally, advertising has been a more direct investment in an anticipated outcome, where the advertiser has lots of control of the message and presentation—and pays for the privilege. PR, on the other hand, is about more subtle influence that attempts to work its way through the audience’s network of influencers and authority figures. It’s the network idea that makes PR an interesting option in the social media environment.
In classic PR, the “PR man” (or woman), either at an agency or a company, has a powerful file of media contacts to leverage when it’s time to get the word out. That model is endangered as change roils the media industry: there’s rapid turnover in newsrooms, and in any case, audiences now rely less on the voice of big media to tell them how to think. In a world where social networking and Web 2.0 put the “me” in media, people are more likely to depend on their favorite blogs, discussion groups, RSS feeds, wikis, online Q&A, and direct online networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr, or Twitter. For an old-school PR traditionalist that could be a challenge; for a PR 2.0 professional, it’s a big opportunity.
That’s because PR’s classic strength of developing opinion-influencing messaging, and its intuitive grasp of how to navigate the web of persuasion, map well to Web 2.0’s proliferating content channels and network-based communication structure. The savvy PR professional can insert himself or his brand directly into the network without having to rely on a third-party introduction from a journalist—not via subterfuge, but by establishing the client brand as a valuable information resource. Then, through strategies such as tagging, RSS, voting, and old-fashioned hyperlinking, the content is disseminated virally.
The viral uptake model is also coveted by online advertisers, who look to social media to drive deeper engagement with products and brands. To be sure social media has many benefits for advertisers, especially in uncovering preferences, needs, and affinities that can provide better targeting, higher conversions, and an advertising experience that feels less intrusive. But the fundamental quid pro quo of the advertising value proposition can only go so far in social media. There’s a point where efforts cross the line into PR. That might mean companies will shift some budgets from advertising to PR as social media gains traction, cutting media sites out of the revenue stream.
The online medium constantly challenges us to rethink assumptions about boundaries between business categories. Advertising and PR will continue to exist as the conjoined twins of the persuasion industry. But in this new world we’re creating online, don’t be surprised if the bright line that used to divide them begins to blur around the edges.
Advertising and PR exist side by side, as complementary strategies for shaping opinion and motivating behavior. Traditionally, advertising has been a more direct investment in an anticipated outcome, where the advertiser has lots of control of the message and presentation—and pays for the privilege. PR, on the other hand, is about more subtle influence that attempts to work its way through the audience’s network of influencers and authority figures. It’s the network idea that makes PR an interesting option in the social media environment.
In classic PR, the “PR man” (or woman), either at an agency or a company, has a powerful file of media contacts to leverage when it’s time to get the word out. That model is endangered as change roils the media industry: there’s rapid turnover in newsrooms, and in any case, audiences now rely less on the voice of big media to tell them how to think. In a world where social networking and Web 2.0 put the “me” in media, people are more likely to depend on their favorite blogs, discussion groups, RSS feeds, wikis, online Q&A, and direct online networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr, or Twitter. For an old-school PR traditionalist that could be a challenge; for a PR 2.0 professional, it’s a big opportunity.
That’s because PR’s classic strength of developing opinion-influencing messaging, and its intuitive grasp of how to navigate the web of persuasion, map well to Web 2.0’s proliferating content channels and network-based communication structure. The savvy PR professional can insert himself or his brand directly into the network without having to rely on a third-party introduction from a journalist—not via subterfuge, but by establishing the client brand as a valuable information resource. Then, through strategies such as tagging, RSS, voting, and old-fashioned hyperlinking, the content is disseminated virally.
The viral uptake model is also coveted by online advertisers, who look to social media to drive deeper engagement with products and brands. To be sure social media has many benefits for advertisers, especially in uncovering preferences, needs, and affinities that can provide better targeting, higher conversions, and an advertising experience that feels less intrusive. But the fundamental quid pro quo of the advertising value proposition can only go so far in social media. There’s a point where efforts cross the line into PR. That might mean companies will shift some budgets from advertising to PR as social media gains traction, cutting media sites out of the revenue stream.
The online medium constantly challenges us to rethink assumptions about boundaries between business categories. Advertising and PR will continue to exist as the conjoined twins of the persuasion industry. But in this new world we’re creating online, don’t be surprised if the bright line that used to divide them begins to blur around the edges.
Friday, April 18, 2008
Life After Facebook: Alternative Futures for Social Networking
I had an interesting discussion today about the future of social networking. It got me thinking that this functionality is being applied in two opposite directions. One you might call the Facebook-style umbrella approach. The other is more a la carte.
Sites such as Facebook are aggregating every social connection and sharing feature they can think of under one roof. Everything you’d want to do with your friends, relatives, business contacts, and other acquaintances—or even people who aren’t yet acquaintances but whom you’d probably like to know—is facilitated or enabled under a single social networking brand. It’s very efficient: create one profile, upload photos and videos to one place, enter one friend list, etc. More important from the business perspective, the brand gains tremendous insight into each network member, information that can then be used to target advertising or in other monetization schemes.
In the Facebook scenario there are only a few winners and many losers—similar to how EBay is on top with online auctions, Google wins web search, and Amazon corners the market for online book sales.
At the same time, though, there’s an alternative trend with many winners. These are the sites that are picking and choosing social networking features to enhance businesses across the spectrum of online services: media, e-commerce, financial services, games, informational sites, and all the rest. They aren’t Facebook rivals; they just want to harvest some of the engagement, loyalty, content creation, cost savings, insight into user preferences, and other benefits that various social strategies have to offer.
Sites that use these features well will enhance their businesses. Also, there are significant opportunities for third parties to provide software-as-a-service functionality to customers who lack the technical proficiency to develop applications themselves. While the universe of possible interactions online expands, the user experience paradigms converge. Business opportunities multiply. Sometimes the sum of the parts exceeds the whole.
Sites such as Facebook are aggregating every social connection and sharing feature they can think of under one roof. Everything you’d want to do with your friends, relatives, business contacts, and other acquaintances—or even people who aren’t yet acquaintances but whom you’d probably like to know—is facilitated or enabled under a single social networking brand. It’s very efficient: create one profile, upload photos and videos to one place, enter one friend list, etc. More important from the business perspective, the brand gains tremendous insight into each network member, information that can then be used to target advertising or in other monetization schemes.
In the Facebook scenario there are only a few winners and many losers—similar to how EBay is on top with online auctions, Google wins web search, and Amazon corners the market for online book sales.
At the same time, though, there’s an alternative trend with many winners. These are the sites that are picking and choosing social networking features to enhance businesses across the spectrum of online services: media, e-commerce, financial services, games, informational sites, and all the rest. They aren’t Facebook rivals; they just want to harvest some of the engagement, loyalty, content creation, cost savings, insight into user preferences, and other benefits that various social strategies have to offer.
Sites that use these features well will enhance their businesses. Also, there are significant opportunities for third parties to provide software-as-a-service functionality to customers who lack the technical proficiency to develop applications themselves. While the universe of possible interactions online expands, the user experience paradigms converge. Business opportunities multiply. Sometimes the sum of the parts exceeds the whole.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Trendwatch: What Can Web 2.0 Do for [Your Business Here]
In the past few weeks I’ve heard from several companies that are interested in using Web 2.0 techniques and technologies to enrich their online businesses. The interesting twist is that they aren’t media companies; they’re leading brands in fields such as e-commerce, financial services, and hardware. The Web 2.0 phenomenon has become such a vital element of the online user experience that audiences are demanding it on all the sites they frequent. It’s changed the way people see their own role in terms of interacting with businesses and information.
Web 2.0 started as a media tool that enriched content, generated more pageviews to monetize through advertising, offered a low-cost alternative to content creation, and opened additional channels for distributing content. Using strategies such as AJAX, it provided a richer and more information-dense environment with less visual clutter. It gave the audience a seat at the table rather than a glass pane to press their noses against. The response was highly favorable: sites that adopted a Web 2.0 approach noticed they had more visitors who returned more often, spent more time on the site, and created lots of content. Web 2.0, it turned out, leads to the prized results of deeper brand engagement and loyalty.
If you need a refresher course in Web 2.0, Tim O’Reilly defined it in detail in a well known article he wrote in 2005 (now available in your choice of eight languages). As a quick primer, he contrasts the 1.0 and 2.0 web experiences like this:
The time that’s passed since the Web 2.0 concept was defined is like eons in “internet time,” yet surprisingly many major sites still haven’t gotten the message, and some Web 1.0 sites are still attracting investment and launching, seemingly oblivious to progress in the last five years. Against that backdrop it’s exciting to see online businesses beyond the media industry starting big initiatives to tap into Web 2.0’s power to engage customers, expose them to more products, solve problems, and spend more time on the site. Tools such as community, platforms for user-generated content (discussion groups, blogs, wikis), ratings, RSS feeds, AJAX, multimedia, tagging, and facilitating peer-to-peer interaction vs. a linear business-to-customer approach, are quickly becoming the norm for a spectrum of online activities, not only defining the user experience in the media niche.
Web 2.0 started as a media tool that enriched content, generated more pageviews to monetize through advertising, offered a low-cost alternative to content creation, and opened additional channels for distributing content. Using strategies such as AJAX, it provided a richer and more information-dense environment with less visual clutter. It gave the audience a seat at the table rather than a glass pane to press their noses against. The response was highly favorable: sites that adopted a Web 2.0 approach noticed they had more visitors who returned more often, spent more time on the site, and created lots of content. Web 2.0, it turned out, leads to the prized results of deeper brand engagement and loyalty.
If you need a refresher course in Web 2.0, Tim O’Reilly defined it in detail in a well known article he wrote in 2005 (now available in your choice of eight languages). As a quick primer, he contrasts the 1.0 and 2.0 web experiences like this:
| Web 1.0 | Web 2.0 | |
| DoubleClick | --> | Google AdSense |
| Ofoto | --> | Flickr |
| Akamai | --> | BitTorrent |
| mp3.com | --> | Napster |
| Britannica Online | --> | Wikipedia |
| personal websites | --> | blogging |
| evite | --> | upcoming.org and EVDB |
| domain name speculation | --> | search engine optimization |
| page views | --> | cost per click |
| screen scraping | --> | web services |
| publishing | --> | participation |
| content management systems | --> | wikis |
| directories (taxonomy) | --> | tagging ("folksonomy") |
| stickiness | --> | syndication |
The time that’s passed since the Web 2.0 concept was defined is like eons in “internet time,” yet surprisingly many major sites still haven’t gotten the message, and some Web 1.0 sites are still attracting investment and launching, seemingly oblivious to progress in the last five years. Against that backdrop it’s exciting to see online businesses beyond the media industry starting big initiatives to tap into Web 2.0’s power to engage customers, expose them to more products, solve problems, and spend more time on the site. Tools such as community, platforms for user-generated content (discussion groups, blogs, wikis), ratings, RSS feeds, AJAX, multimedia, tagging, and facilitating peer-to-peer interaction vs. a linear business-to-customer approach, are quickly becoming the norm for a spectrum of online activities, not only defining the user experience in the media niche.
In the next waves to break, Web 2.0 is expanding to mobile (the “phonetop”) and ideas about Web 3.0 are starting to coalesce. These days, whatever your online business, envisioning the future in 1.0 terms is like trying to get a clearer picture by adjusting the rabbit ears on a black-and-white TV.
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