BrandStand

February 22, 2010 | Melissa Eggert

Is Twitter right for everyone?

I read Brandweek this past week and have been thinking over the feature article titled “The Tweet Hereafter – Just how effective is Twitter as a marketing tool?” The argument in the article is rooted in the lack of participation on Twitter, the decline of new users per month, and the disconnect between large brands and their audiences on Twitter.

I bring up this article because I see validity behind the points. I think it’s something to consider when suggesting Twitter to clients or for your own company. One director of social media strategy stated that Twitter was effective for only a few areas of marketing:

customer relations management

deals and promotions

conversations for smaller, lesser-known brands.

The statistics also prove a point. Large brands, such as Verizon and Target, have 5,000 to to 10,000 followers. Smaller “organic” brands like Woot and Someecards have almost 2 million followers. And some celebrities? 3-4 million. Why? Because the smaller brands and the celebrities have distinct personalities that larger brands simply cannot have on Twitter (unless it’s the CEO or a customer service help-line like Best Buy’s Twelpforce). Think about how many checkpoints corporations have to go through if they want to get their tweets approved, etc. It takes a long time, and the personality gets lost in the process.

The CEO of Someecards, which has 1.7 million followers in a little over a year, credits his success to his ability to express his creative personality within his brand on Twitter (snippets of wisdom, random links, etc). Twitter matches with the company mission – their cards are all short-form communication. They are known for great one-liners. Twitter works.

Bottom line: No one is really certain how long Twitter will be around. But what I am learning is that before we jump into these social network tools, we need to be thinking about what purpose they serve us. Does Twitter really work for your company? It’s easy to set up an account, it’s easy to acknowledge that everyone in involved in it currently – but are you asking: Why is it good for me?

Being on the cutting edge is crucial in this industry. Equally so is our ability to evaluate these cutting-edge trends and decipher whether or not they align with our brands’ goals. I would love your feedback.

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February 16, 2010 | Jeff Cohn

How Toyota’s brand will lead to its recovery

Sure, Toyota’s brand is in peril. We’re reading about this all over the place. But here’s a thought beyond the conventional wisdom about the fall of Toyota and its brand. It will bounce back, and fast. Here’s why. Toyota has spent the better part of 40 years building its reputation in the U.S. market. It has millions of brand-loyal customers. And for the most part, Toyota has maintained its brand with a focus on customer safety and satisfaction, with the goods to back it up.

It wasn’t just a made-up story Toyota wanted to tell. It had the customer-satisfaction scores and consumer-testing-agency scores to back it up. The Toyota brand was real, believable and of the highest integrity. Most important, it came from within, not from customer focus groups. This built a tremendous amount of brand equity in the U.S. market, equity the company will rely on for the next few years.

Unlike the U.S. automakers, Toyota (and its luxury division, Lexus) is a solid brand, and it will weather this storm. In a few years, Toyota will regain its market share and be back with a vengeance. Its leaders have made it their objective to regain their No. 1 brand position in the hearts and minds of American consumers, and you can be sure the company’s commitment to return to glory is job one. Nothing less will do for this company.

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February 12, 2010 | Steve Chitwood

Google all a buzz over social media

Surprised? Of course not. Google has been dipping its elephant-size toes in the social media pond for some time. Remember Orkut? However, it appears the testing-the-water phase is far behind us. Today’s announcement of the acquisition of Aardvark, a social search service founded by ex-Googlers, is the latest in a series of steps that illustrate the dominance of social media in our online culture today and, more definitively, Google’s commitment to remaining at the convergence of maturing online trends.

While the Aardvark addition pales in comparison with other acquisitions in recent years, such as the $1.6 billion paid for YouTube (now the second-largest search engine, masquerading as a social video-sharing site), it continues to extend Mountain View’s reach into the social web while taking another competitive swipe at perennial runner-up Yahoo! – this time targeting the popular Yahoo! Answers service with which Aardvark competes using a decidedly social media flair. The upstart leverages your own social network connections to provide answers to a user’s questions.

Earlier this week, Google Buzz came thundering onto the social scene offering much the same functionality as Facebook. With Buzz, users can create profiles; embed media from sharing sites such as Picassa, Flicker and YouTube; share information; create groups of friends; post status updates, etc. ¬– all from the comfort of a couple hundred million existing Gmail accounts. While disrupting Facebook’s momentum seems unlikely, the heft of Google’s offering, its reputation for solid technology and its immediate availability to the vast Gmail user base make it a social networking contender worth watching. While I was writing this post, this tweet came across my screen: “Google Buzz makes Facebook look like some college kids’ computer science project.”

One could catch the buzz about Buzz by following the very popular trending topic on Twitter. You could also point your browser to Google and take advantage of Google Social Search. For the last couple months, real-time content from Facebook, MySpace.com and Twitter has been integrated into traditional search results, blending in wall posts, blog entries, tweets and video tags and bringing real-time relevance to users’ queries.

Few dispute that social media is here to stay, that the rise of social networking has truly changed online behavior and that new technologies and evolving trends promise to maintain the dizzying momentum we have seen over recent years. Even fewer should dispute that, however social media matures, Google will be an ever-strengthening force.

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February 9, 2010 | Jeff Cohn

Enough already with the Super Bowl ad hype.

This year, I did something completely different on Super Bowl Sunday. I watched the game in its entirety. When I needed a drink or other break, I did it during the commercials. There was nothing compelling about the commercials, so why bother, I asked myself. I’ll do what I’m supposed to do and watch the game. (As a former New Orleanian, I was completely engrossed.)

Afterward, I wondered what was lost from those great years of Super Bowl ads in the 90’s and before. And then it hit me. Advertising as a marketing strategy is only one prong of building a company’s brand today. There are online strategies, PR, social media and a host of more effective ways to generate awareness and visibility for brands beyond the tried-and-true methods of marketing.

The most creative marketing solutions today are happening with integrated online and offline strategies. Take, for example, the Colorado Tourism Agency’s “Snow at First Sight” campaign. This brilliant campaign (it should be noted that it was developed by another agency) did a great job of generating awareness for Colorado and its wonderful snow through media coverage and online awareness. And the CTA didn’t even have to spend $2.5 million on media alone.

I’ve never been a big believer in the idea of a Super Bowl ad to generate buzz. This year, I’m even less taken with the idea. The integrated marketing and PR tool box is simply too rich now with ways to reach the targeted consumer without huge advertising outlays. It is my belief that this is where the real creativity will be found in the years ahead. So relax — it’s now safe to run to the restroom between plays of the Super Bowl. You won’t be missing anything.

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