Each week at Ford, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.
If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+.
Industry
- Coca-Cola mentioned an internal study they conducted that indicated that online buzz didn't do much to boost sales. Wendy Clark, their SVP of Marketing, made some clarifications to that in AdAge, noting that "it's the combination of owned, earned, shared and paid media connections -- with social playing a crucial role at the heart of our activations -- that creates marketplace impact, consumer engagement, brand love and brand value."
- We've mentioned social TV before - and that its future lies with Twitter, not Facebook. Well, Nielsen continues to shed light on this as it discovered that an increase in Twitter volume about live TV correlates with an increase in TV ratings across varying age groups.
- Rishad Tobaccowala, a pioneer in digital marketing, says that because of their ability to secure earned media, PR professionals are natural digital storytellers and therefore well suited to social media.
- A series from We Are Social deals with brands and the future of marketing first with brands defining the future (Part 1) and then with communities vs. platforms (Part 2). But it really got interesting as they're now talking about ads vs. added value and how brands should stop interrupting and start interacting.
- The increased use of DVRs has concerned many marketers in recent years - mostly around the concerns about ads being skipped on recorded shows. Such programming makes up one-third of weekly American TV viewing, but as much as 41% of the recorded shows are never watched, according to a Motorola Mobility study.
- eMarketer takes a look at the differing behavior of Boomers, GenXers and Millennials in digital, social and mobile environments. Of note: digital video is the best way to reach boomers.
- Contently is broadening its services beyond helping place freelance writers and is now helping brands master content strategy as it will find photographers, infographic artists and editors in collaboration with Visual.ly
The Platforms
- Facebook plans to roll out threaded comments to its commenting system this week.
- This new feature will help manage multiple conversations on a post, and ensure that people who visit a page will always see the best conversations.
- The most active and engaging conversations will be shown at the top of posts.
- At launch, this feature will only be available on desktop, but Facebook plans to make it available on mobile and in the Graph API in the future.
- Brands can opt into Replies through the Page admin panel starting Monday, March 25. All Pages will have Replies enabled on July 10, 2013.
- Third-party page management applications will not automatically have this feature at launch but will have access to add it in.
- Almost all cover photo restrictions have been lifted on Facebook, leaving just “images cannot have more than 20% text”
- We all have heard that only 16% of Facebook Page updates are seen by fans, right? Turns out that's a myth. For a very insightful post that busts the 16% myth, read Convince & Convert's post.
- Google is planning on packaging their chat services (Google Talk, Voice, Hangout, Messenger and Google Chat for Drive) and rebranding as Babble.
- Google is going head-to-head with Evernote and OneNote with its new product Google Keep, which is part of Google Drive. You can jot down notes or even use audio that will be transcribed. Currently available on desktop and Android systems only
- Google+ is from Mars, Pinterest is from Venus - or so goes the common understanding based on demographics. Click through to see why these two sites have very different demographics and what it means.
- Tumblr now hosts more than 100 million blogs, containing over 44.6 billion posts. And only half are animated gifs. ;-)
Big Data/Measurement
- With big data making many details of our lives easier to ascertain, it also makes old school marketing tactics look spammy and downright embarrassing at times.
- As we continue to better define metrics and measurement, you might wonder which social media tactics work best? As always, it depends on your objectives. But if those objectives include increased engagement, then prepare accordingly: these are the tactics that require time and resources (human and budgetary).
- Google has launched The Value of Mobile Calculator, designed to estimate the value that mobile drives over apps, over mobile sites and more.
Legal
- Shift Communications takes a look at the FTC Dot Com disclosures and provides some examples of what to do and what not to do when tweeting.
- CMP.LY has a white paper on the FTC's decision, as well as a Slideshare deck as an executive summary.
Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later
- Virgin is widely respected and admired for its social media activities. Check out how Virgin uses social to connect with customers, improve their products and services and run their business. They do social business without even making it look difficult.
- So-called "native advertising" is being discussed more widely these days. At the Native Advertising Summit (see? That didn't take long.) , panelists discussed the very notion of advertising, how it is changing and how brands and media are trying to make editorial and advertising lines blur.
- We Are Social has a fascinating look at The State of Social in Asia that delves into the size and penetration of social particular markets, as well as the rise of mobile chat.
- Here's a fantastic Index of Disruptive Technologies for 2013 by Jeremiah Owyang
- All of the links above are available on Delicious.
Commentary
One of the best corporate blogs - bar none - is the Disney Parks Blog. What makes it successful? Ragan's PR Daily takes a look at the three types of content that drive Disney Parks Blog. As a site that got its start to help reduce the number of press releases journalists were receiving, the Disney Parks Blog was well ahead of its time with respect to what we now call content marketing.The site is rich with content and features three types of posts that make it interesting, relevant and emotionally appealing to fans and guests as well as journalists. First, the blog is excellent at humanizing Disney. Every post is written by a cast member - but not just the communications or marketing teams - real employees who have interesting jobs and take us behind the scenes to see things we normally wouldn't see if we were visiting. So right away, Disney is humanized. Here's a great example from one of my favorite exhibits at the Magic Kingdom:
The next kind of content is what Disney Parks social media director Thomas Smith calls purposeful storytelling. For example, the opening of the new Fantasyland is a great example of putting storytelling to use to describe the history and construction behind that section of the park. And the final category of content is remarkable experiences: giving people a chance to come to the park or attend exclusive events, which helps to spread the word.
So the simple formula: Make your brand more human, tell stories purposefully, and give fans and customers remarkable experiences. Add in some thoughtful planning and you've got yourself a strong content plan.
Image source: zoonbar (Flickr)
