How to Start Right-er with Dean's

$25,000 in Visa gift cards sound good? To 500,000 people, it sure did – and about 50% of the traffic that came to the site was complements of bloggers. This educational site was sponsored by Dean Foods, and the “Start Right, End Right” promotion really put the company’s brands out there. In addition to the multiple Visa gift cards winners received (after entering an entry code, found on the caps of participating milk brands), the site included healthy tips, coupons, custom calendars and fun facts about milk. Add some fun graphics and you get the gist – it’s a branded site that offers helpful health information to families. And it really worked – milk sales went up five percent for the month of January after flat comparisons for months before.

Each of Dean’s 26 regional milk brands across the US had its own branded version of the site, and Kraft Foods worked with each to promote snack suggestions to go with a glass of milk. But back to the aforementioned bloggers, who were a driving force behind this campaign. Dean’s and its allies employed the use of “mommy bloggers,” reaching out to about 30 of the biggest influencers via phone or online conversations in the hopes they would blog about the campaign. “We paid extra attention to the bloggers, early on, and made them aware of the promotion and didn’t try to trick them,” said Rodney Mason, chief marketing officer of Moosylvania, the St. Louis-based agency that handled the promotion. And blog they did… Moms loved the idea, and the educational Web site was a hit for Dean’s.

Now it’s time for my two cents: While reaching out to bloggers was a great start, I think the campaign’s effectiveness could have skyrocketed if some simple social networking elements were added. Nowhere on the site are there “Share This” capabilities… which means while bloggers are included, there was no way to incorporate viral sharing on Facebook, Twitter or any other viral sites. Considering more than two thirds of Facebook’s users are outside of college, and 75% of Twitter users are 18-49, the additional spread could have hit double the amount it did. Bottom line? Great start to a campaign involving social media… but had Facebook and Twitter been involved, Dean’s “Start Right, End Right” campaign could have ended even, er, righter.

How To Do It Big (But Right): B2B and Social Media

So by now you probably realize the potential social networking holds for both you and your company – but you might be unsure as to how you can really use it effectively. A recent Mashable article (HOW TO: Use Social Media for Enterprise Business by Ben Parr http://mashable.com/2009/06/30/social-media-enterprise/) outlines four of the best ways to use social networking from a B2B perspective. Below are his suggestions – as well of some examples of how we are making social media for us:


1. Build a reputation of expertise.

Blogs, according to Parr, are the best way to illustrate your know-how. Sure, a large number of followers can garner a lot of attention, but if you choose to blog about niche topics, and someone stumbles upon your blog when searching for a relative solution, you have hit the jackpot. Become an expert, write about things people care about and interact with fellow bloggers as well as your readers; before you know it, you can become the go-to resource – something we all want.

We operate three blogs at JB: Mine, the graphic design blog (http://www.cuttothepaste.com) and a marketing “newbie” blog (http://www/marketingnewbiekimberly.com). Though we might not have thousands of followers (yet!), we blog about what we know: design and marketing! We blog about things people want to read about: creative logos, outrageous ads, trends in the industry…. And we acknowledge our readers through comments.


2. Research your customers

Get some background on your customers to help keep you in the loop. This means checking out their Facebook profiles/fan pages, Twitter profiles and blogs. You can not only see how they portray themselves, but also how they interact with their own customers. This can help you get a feel for the company in general, as well as what others are saying about them. It would be wise to also be up on their (and your!) industry-wide trends. Google Alerts is one way to do this.

We are heavily involved in the SoNet arena, so simply by having Twitter and FB accounts, we like to think we know a lot about the trends of the minute. Simple tools such as search.twitter.com, hashtags and Google Alerts help keep us informed – because with social media, things are always changing, and if you are not up with the latest and greatest, you can miss out. We monitor the trends, then respond and adapt accordingly… which is the best approach, in our eyes.


3. Ramp up your networking

This one’s pretty obvious: Networking really can help get your foot in the door. Whether it’s by knowing someone who knows someone who knows someone, meeting up through a Twitter meet up or connecting via Linked In, being involved is important. It can help you stand out from the crowd, illustrating you as someone who is connected and socially apt. And we all know its connections such as these that can establish relationships, which can then lead to the signing of a contract.

Within the past year I have met several great contacts through Twitter. These are contacts that tweeted out things of interest to me, which I then reached out to. Since then, we have shared tips and referred one another to potential clients. Really, it’s easy. Be open minded, reach out to others, say something of value and go from there. Changes are if they are using a social site such as Twitter, and you go about it the right way, they will be receptive.


4. Learn from others

This one is really important, especially since social media is constantly changing. See what others are doing and how it is working for them. Learn from others’ mistakes and incorporate elements of their success into your SoNet strategy. You can do this by following the tweets of industry leaders, getting an RSS feed to top blogs and asking questions. We do all this and more. We read sites such as Mashable to learn about, for example, Twitter’s recent changes; we read tweets about apps we are thinking about adding; and we talk to others about their finding, likes and dislikes.

We aren’t perfect, but our ability to learn while rolling with the punches has gotten us where we are today: A company leading the charge in successful SoNet campaigns. All it takes is a little trial and error and a lot of elbow grease… but once you discover how social media can work for you, it just might make all the difference.

Is Your SEO in the Wrong Hands?

Over the past few years we've built our sites by developing a pretty smart CMS system, and we've have always had the ability to manipulate a lot of SEO energy through this method. We could always control the domain, the title tag, the secondary page naming conventions, meta tags and relevant content, but there was always one item missing: the infamous external linking. In the past we contracted out (like many of you guys have, undoubtedly) to a traditional SEO company, hiring them to populate directories and blogs with the relevant keywords while taking folks to the article within the website to maintain the ole point of origin that Google like so much.

After a few tries at this, and after becoming a little more educated on backlinking, a few things occurred to me:
1) I was trusting our client’s verbage to be controlled by thirty interns typing to get my site noticed by Google, but these individuals had little regard for the clients USP or messaging concerns. That’s a very scary thought.
2) SEO consists of directories and blogs… well heck, that sounds a lot like social networking to me.

With that in mind, I began on a pilgrimage to put the SEO back in the hands of the message providers and evangelists within the company -- no longer in the hands of a group of 20-somethings on their way to the closest watering hole at 5:01 pm. With just a bit of a time committment and a quick lesson on how to navegate and use these sites, employees be empowered to do it themselves. Harnessing the power social networking tools, which are working conjunction with the website, and empowering the client to spread the message to their followers (and Google) -- welcome to Do It Yourself SEO!

The Death of the Database

My developer and I were banging skulls recently, discussing the goals for revamping one of our client’s online sports radio sites. He mentioned that in order for site users to get the premium info they wanted, we would need to ask for an e-mail and mobile number. He felt that that method was necessary in order to reach out to these folks in the future and create a metric for success.

I started thinking about the lack of necessity when it comes to gathering e-mail addresses and mobile numbers; rather than hinder any traffic, we should give them everything for free – the need to give out personal contact information simply doesn't exist. What is important is giving access to people in the method they desire. It’s my belief that 10,000 e-mail addresses, accumulated in a company database, are less valuable than 2,500 RSS subscriptions, 2,500 e-mail subscriptions, 2,500 Facebook accesses and a captive audience. Why annoy your audience with interruption marketing when you can provide users with the info they want, when they want it and how they prefer it? Meaning, if they want to be notified of a Cubs win or the pregame lineup, give it to them in an RSS feed or post it to their Facebook account when they allow access – don’t inundate their inbox or their cell phone with messages that are reminiscent of SPAM.

The database is dead, but access to information is alive and thriving…

Puzzle Piece #7: Strategy

Once you have all your profiles set up and some knowledge about each site, you need to broadcast your info to reach a waiting audience. The following are the recommended steps to get the most out of social media.

1. Blatant advertising is not appreciated or respected.
For every article you post that was written by your company, post 10 from another source that are relative to your audience. We recommend Alltop for industry-specific articles people will actually want to read.

2. Use budurl.

It not only shortens long URLs, but it also keeps track of numbers as far as how many people are reading your articles. It will quantify your traffic and show you what is (and isn’t) working.

3. Build relationships on each and every site.
Posting information is not enough. It’s important to converse with people by posting on others’ blogs, writing @replies on Twitter, answering questions on LinkedIn, etc. Engage with others – it will pay off.

4. Blogs: get your posts out to a larger audience.
You can autopost your new blog entry through your statuses using ping.fm. If you use this site, it can also track your numbers via budurl.

Other option: Use pingvine.com. This site enables your blog’s RSS feed to automatically update ping.fm (thus, less work for you). This will still update all your statuses, but it has a downside: You can’t use budURL in conjunction with this site, so you cannot track the number of viewers.
To use: Go to pingvine.com and select ping.fm. Enter your blog’s RSS feed (the same one entered into FeedBurner) and your ping.fm application key (click on “application key” to get yours). Now when you update your blog, it will update all microblogs on ping.fm.

Puzzle Piece #6: Reputation Monitoring

Social media allows people to voice their opinions to millions of listeners. Wanna know what they’re saying about you? Use the following sites to monitor your online reputation.

• Google.com/alerts. Subscribe for this service via e-mail or RSS, and updates about you or your company can be sent directly to your inbox.

• Technorati.com. This site, according to Schawbel, is the “largest blog search engine in the world.” It can track any blog that links up to yours and send you RSS updates when someone is talking about your company.

• Backtype.com. If searching for your company amidst blog comments is your concern, this is your site.

• Backtracker.com. Discussion boards are a go-to to people looking to vent —and have others share their similar experiences. Get an instant update if you and yours are mentioned.

• Search.twitter.com. The URL says it all: Use this to search for any tweets related to your business.

(They are some of the best, based on the blog post titled “5 Free Tools for Personal Reputation Management” by Dan Schawbel.)

Our fave? Trackur.com. It scours the Internet and provides extras (like charts and filters) that other sites don’t.

And remember, if someone is talking badly about you or your company, instead of simply taking offense and dwelling on negative comments, address them — and take the criticism for what it’s worth: a chance to grow and learn.

Puzzle Piece #5: Social Bookmarking

Telling you to add the “share this” bookmarking feature had a purpose – to get you some face time on social bookmarking sites. Once an article/press release/etc. is created, adding it to bookmarking sites like Del.icio.us and Digg could potentially get your information out to thousands of viewers (if not more!).

These sites are great because your material is shown to people who are interested in the things your company is interested in. Traffic can be directed back to your site, relationships can be forged and your information can be shared with an educated, captivated community. It’s free advertising, placed in front of people who actually want to see your stuff. So basically, it’s a no brainer.

The following are just a few of the top social bookmarking and sharing sites. Noted are their strengths, weaknesses and potential business drivers.

Del.icio.us: 317,747 people per month (as of 2/28/09)
• Save all your bookmarks online, share them with others, and see what others are bookmarking
• You can access the sites from anywhere using your login info, and there is an
ability to set some as private (i.e. work- or client-related sites).
• This site would be great for organizing websites.

How to bookmark on Del.icio.us:
• Once logged in, simply click on “save a new bookmark” and enter the URL of the site you want saved.
• Click next, and enter notes and tags (to help you remember what the site is all about).
• You can select whether or not you want this site to be kept as a private bookmark.

StumbleUpon: 1,145,760 people per month (as of 2/28/09)
• Users choose their interests (cooking, business, advertising, etc.) from a list,
install the StumbleUpon toolbar and then a click of the “stumble” button takes
them to a site they might like.
• Users also click a button to say whether they like the site or not, and
StumbleUpon keeps track of the sites you like.
• Others can access your favorite sites by viewing your profile.
• This is more of a promotional vehicle. Add images and short articles and expand your network so others see the sites you have in your arsenal.

How to add favorites to StumbleUpon:
• Once you create an account, go through the topics and click on those that interest you.
• Opt to have the StumbleUpon toolbar installed, so from whereever you are on the web, you can simply click “Stumble” and you will be shown a site you might like.
• For each site shown, click either “I like it” or the thumbs down icon, and StumbleUpon will keep track of your preferences.
• If you discover a site you want added to StumbleUpon, click the “I like it” icon and fill in the site’s information.
• All the sites you liked will be saved on your profile.

Digg: about 23,900,000 people per month (as of 2/28/09)
• All news articles, videos, images, etc. are submitted by the community.
• Once something is submitted, other people see it and digg what they like best.
If your submission receives enough diggs, it is promoted to the home page of its category — or the front page for millions of viewers to see.
• Users can customize their home page and see only stories they would be interested in.
• Use this for promotion by adding some new media to the mix. Submissions will be posted under “upcoming stories,” where viewers look and either “digg” them or don’t.
• People see what you digg, so be active on the site and others will want to see your favorites. Add all forms of media to this site.

How to add favorites to Digg:
• Once you are logged into Digg, simply select “submit new” at the top of the site.
• Enter the URL and select which type of media it is.
• On the next screen, enter the title, a description of the site, choose a thumbnail and the topic you want it associated with (such as Business and Finance or Educational and submit the story.
• Digg will keep track of your favorites and share them with others.

Reddit: 1,347,084people per month (as of 2/28/09)
• The site aims to have what’s new and popular on the web. Users customize what they’re interested in. Votes train a filter, so the site only shows users things they might like.
• You determine what shows on your front page by saying if things are “hot” or “cold.”
• Use this as another promotional vehicle by uploading new sites — submission
titles are key to gaining recognition.
• Best for posting short articles and blogs.

How to add favorites to Reddit:
• Once you have signed in, click on “submit a link.”
• Simply enter the URL, title and category, and the post is submitted.
• Your faves will be saved, filed and shared.