So you are now all set up on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Awesome! Now there is a new network joining the mix, and it has quickly become one of the big ones: Foursquare. What is it? Where is going?

Foursquare is a location-based social networking system that is starting to spread like wildfire. The platform has a ton of possibilities moving forward. Restaurants, bars, and clubs are already on board, posting coupons and incentives for customers to check in at their locations.

Ready to jump on the Foursquare train? Here are a few tips for how to get started:

Start a Foursquare account, and start checking-in on your phone. Let’s be honest, it is a fun network to play around with, and droves of people are starting to use the app in cities both large and small.

Is your business consumer based? Start offering incentives for customers to check-in at your location. I have personally utilized a few free appetizer incentives myself, and I have seen some great retail deals around the local mall. Your customers will see your special offers in a pop up on their screen when they are near your location, so the app helps drive people to your location, or at least prompt them to take a look.

If you are in charge of multiple locations, make sure you log on and claim them. As Foursquare grows, so will the number of people trying to claim businesses that do not belong to them.

Foursquare is still new. Most businesses are still trying to figure out how it can benefit them, but it is a social media tool that millions of people are joining. It can’t hurt to get involved. Like a social media campaign, take time to strategize how you want to utilize the tool, and execute.

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Fan pages are all the rage today for businesses both large and small. My experience has been that personal pages can be just as powerful, and even more so in most cases. The key is finding a balance between your personal life and your business life with your online presence.

Sales people and entrepreneurs have an incredibly powerful tool at their disposal in a platform like Facebook. You can connect to hundreds or even thousands of potential customers, and even make those people active advocates for your cause … if you know how to communicate to them.

You see, people love dogs and kids. Photos of little Sally and Fido playing in the back yard are great for drawing friends, family, and acquaintances to your page, but that’s not going to do much for your business. Following that post up with a post about your new latest and greatest company news can lead to something more profitable.

Balance is the most important part of social media marketing. Everyone hates the sales guy who follows you around the showroom floor. Do not become that guy online.

It says it all right there in the first word, “social” media. In order to communicate effectively, and build relationships online, you have to be social. No one likes the guy that talks shop 24/7.

In order to keep your audience interested, find a balance between your personal content, and promoting your business online.

Image via Wikimedia Commons

Every so often I’ll have a client approach me about buying followers on Twitter, or advertising on Facebook. I’m sure there are a few organizations that would benefit from these tactics, but I’ve never been a part of one.

Content draws interest, not the number of subscribers.

It truly does not matter if you have 100 or one million followers. The only thing that matters is that you are creating and communicating your message in a unique way to those who are paying attention. The better the content, the more traffic you are going to generate. Building a huge base with no content just leads to a bunch of people who do not care about what you are saying.

One million followers who do not care about you is worth nothing; 100 followers who will actively advocate for you is priceless.

How do you generate this content? Well, that’s another post. If you are new to the social media business world, start with researching what your competitors are doing. Learn what is working and what is not.

Social media platforms are the ultimate capitalistic form of marketing: open competition for any and all to see what kind of tactics are being used by the competition. The key is understanding what is working and what is not. The one fail-safe in all of this chaos is content.

In this business it is just as important to learn about what others are doing as it is to be working on your own projects. Therefore I am constantly searching platforms and watching how others are developing content.

One of my favorite quotes is from the TV show The West Wing, in which a speech writer says that “good writers borrow from other writers, and great writers just flat out steal from them.”

This could not be more true with social media marketing. Learn what content works, create it, and watch your numbers grow.

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Visa Branded Facebook Page

Lost in the Facebook privacy and security hooha was another change the popular social networking site made to its operations. Companies and advertisers can no longer create custom landing pages that force visitors of their Facebook pages to view them first. Companies can still create custom pages, but they must be added as a tab that users click to visit.

Companies with official pages can still add custom HTML to the left-hand sidebar via an application that asks or urges users to visit their custom tab. But no one can be dumped to a custom page straight away.

There was some outcry from advertisers and corporate entities following this move, as there is with any change the site enacts. Any platform with so many users can expect some level of discontent whenever the familiar is eschewed and new tactics are put in place. But in this case, I’m inclined to side with the “Tough cookies” crowd.

I’ll leave the arguments about how Facebook’s privacy policy affects the relationship between producers, advertisers and consumers to MoveOn.org and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Being on Facebook is voluntary, and there is no reasonable expectation for privacy beyond that which you would find anywhere else on the public internet.

Facebook wasn’t build for brands to use as their personal playground. It was created, much as the internet as a whole, as a tool for communication and collaboration. After beta testing on Mark Zuckerberg carried his Utopian dreams of sharing everything, all the time, to the masses when he opened the castle walls to allow anyone to join.

Once the site could be used by brands to engage however they pleased, Facebook was thrust into the business of giving away free websites. Giving brands the ability to create custom landing pages, complete with Flash and HTML elements, took away the brand control Facebook had already well established. Suddenly, brands could engage consumers, run promotions, and just plain make money from the site with no recompense back to the mothership.

Now branded and official pages default to displaying the Wall, where the contributions from visitors and fans (Likers?) take center stage–just as Facebook was initially built. This enforced structure is in keeping with Zuckerberg’s publicly declared (and lately decried) philosophy of openness.

Yes, perhaps it makes it tougher for a brand. Yes, perhaps it’s bad form to reel out the rope only to yank it back in, as Facebook seems to be fond of doing.

But advertisers need to remember that it’s not our world, we just live in it. A hammer wasn’t invented for us to slap a logo sticker on, it was invented to be more efficient than a rock at driving a small spike into wood. Facebook wasn’t invented for us to shout our message at people, it was invented for those very people to talk with each other.

Want to make the most out of Facebook? Use it in conjunction with your own website, vanity URLs, Foursquare, Twitter and the like to deliver a clear, consistent message and enable your visitors to engage with you however they see fit. Give your loyal fans special deals and promotions to reward them for advocating on your behalf. Augment your traditional media by giving consumers a place to go where they can actually do something rather than be passive receivers of your message.

But don’t expect Facebook–or any other communication tool–to be modified or re-purposed to cater to your needs. Facebook isn’t for you, and neither will the next big thing be so. Play along or take your ball and go home.

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I have plenty of “friends” and connections on social networking sites who I don’t actually know all that well or talk with on a regular basis. I’m at 598 on Facebook, 208 on LinkedIn, 165 followers on Twitter, and however many people actually bother to read my posts on the Raidious and Marketing Tech blogs.

What does this mean? Not a whole heck of a lot. Friends, connections and followers aren’t like dollars: having more doesn’t get you more of anything.

Unless you actually do something.

You can tweet all day until you’re blue in the face, share your Google Reader items (link building!) and all that jazz, but unless you get out there and make things happen all of that sharing means precisely nothing.

I am a big proponent of the idea that with a modicum of work and dedication, a person can make things happen while others are content to watch (and talk about it). In college I started out trading shows with other bands from other cities in the hardcore/post-punk scene. My band would play with bands in their city, and they would play with us here in Indianapolis.

Pretty soon, we had a great network built up. Then bigger bands I didn’t know started calling asking me to book shows for them. In a few short years I went from booking shows in people’s basements to filling small- and medium-sized bars and clubs.

Then in 2001 I got the opportunity to organize a show for the legendary band Fugazi. Long story short, with a lot of help from friends in the local community and a ton of work, we sold out a 700-capacity hall, had professional lights, sound, and security, and it was one of the highlights of my musical life.

Why did I, little old me, get the chance to do this? Because I was willing to work for it. Because I developed a reputation for being a straightforward, fair person with whom to work. Because I focused on what I cared about. Because I tried to give the city of Indianapolis experiences that it might not have ordinarily had.

Social networking sites are today’s analog of the underground/independent music scene spawned in the 70s and through its heydey in the early 2000s. People with common interests and influences connect with each other through a shared platform and experience. Some of these people are mere acquaintances, some of them may be dear friends and trusted colleagues.

By connecting with this diverse group with shared ideals, you instantly have a pool of resources you can call on. By putting in the hours and work to bring that community tangible experiences, you draw all of them closer together. And you’re engaged in the most wonderful human experience: putting something out into the world.

Organize a meet-up group. Attend a conference and actually talk with people without trying to sell them something. Volunteer to give lectures and workshops at local schools and businesses. Share yourself, not just your opinions.

“Draw a crazy picture,
write a nutty poem.
Sing a mumble-grumble song,
whistle through your comb.
Do a loony-goony dance
‘Cross the kitchen floor,
Put something silly in the world
that ain’t been there before.”

– Shel Silverstein

(I think about this poem often. I’ve reproduced it here without consent, so go buy a book or two to make up for my transgression. But these words are important to me and I really wanted to share.)

Congratulations! You’ve taken that first step toward taking your brand into the digital space by bringing a social media team on board.

Now, who are the first people these folks should meet with? The IT department? Marketing? Communications?

Yes.

Maybe this wasn’t the answer you were hoping for, but it’s the right one.

A truly effective media strategy bridges all of these verticals to create not only a clear, consistent online presence for your brand but also a carefully executed communications plan.

Let’s break it down:

IT

Your IT department is not only in charge of making sure your computers and networking function, but also establishing proper usage policies and network safety and integrity. The very nature of social media with its sharing of links, videos and other content on password-protected sites creates a security issue.

IT needs to be involved from the outset to ensure that digital marketing practices adhere to network standards and policies. If your company is blocking sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, your social media plan is already hamstrung.

Marketing

Your marketing team, whether they are internal or external through a PR firm or ad agency, has set branding standards for your company. Social media activities should adhere to these standards, and all planning for digital should involve these parties.

A major goal of marketing campaigns is establishing a clear and consistent brand identity. This identity must be maintained across all verticals in order to maintain its integrity and effectiveness. Getting buy-in from the marketing team from the beginning mitigates surprises down the road.

Communications

Your company communicates information not just via marketing but also via media outlets and, depending on the industry, via public safety and/or crisis communications channels. Like it or not, people expect all official means of communication (Twitter, Facebook, etc.) to be reflective of and responsive to these types of information dissemination.

If you’re only looking at social media as a marketing tool and ignoring the potential utility for crisis communications and customer service, you will probably end up getting burned. Building in these variables into your digital marketing content plan ensures that the public has the opportunity to get critical information in a timely fashion and in via the tools with which they already connect with you.

In the event of a major crisis, your company also has an opportunity to shine by shifting gears and utilizing those channels to assist with public safety and awareness. The recent earthquake in Haiti gave us a good example of the Red Cross and others utilizing Twitter to get out crucial updates in real-time.

So yes, digital marketing is all of these things and more. Fortunately we at Raidious can help.

Politico

An article in the current New Yorker, “Non-Stop News,” discusses the blinding speed of the news cycle as it exists today, pointing out the fact that President George W. Bush’s administration–while still being responsive to cable and internet news–didn’t have to deal with the likes of Twitter and Facebook.

Political blogs existed and were certainly popular, and indeed some of the largest (Huffington Post, Politico) were formed during Bush’s tenure. But blog readership at that time was determined by subscriptions to RSS feeds, links from other sites, and perhaps references in traditional media. If readers were really astute they might find it on Digg or Reddit.

The landscape is much different for the Obama administration. Now as soon as a blog post is published it’s tweeted and Facebooked instantly. With monitoring tools like Cotweet, Tweetdeck and myriad others, it is possible to respond just as quickly. Journalists tasked with covering the White House are stretched further and expected to produce faster than ever before.

According to the article, every day NBC’s Chuck Todd:

• does eight to 16 on-camera interviews
• writes the first post on NBC’s blog
• appears on the Today Show and/or Morning Joe
• churns out eight to 10 tweets or Facebook posts
• publishes three to five blog entries, and
• co-hosts the one-hour MSNBC newscast “The Daily Rundown.”

Granted, this is the output of one of the most active and astute political reporters out there, and covering the beltway and White House goings-on is one of the biggest jobs in journalism. But for a company, what business is more important than yours?

Who is your organization’s Chuck Todd? And what if you don’t have one?

That one person not only needs to approximate or match that productivity, but coordinate with marketing, communications, IT and often compliance. They need to plan content in advance as well as react to current and unforeseen events and discussions. They need to make certain that all communication across all these digital channels maintains a consistent voice and message. And they need to make sure that all these efforts are measured and analyzed as they relate to conversions and the bottom line.

So who’s it going to be? The intern? The secretary? Or a team of people who can get inside your organization and find out what makes it tick, then work with you to present the best possible image?

In the beginning stages of forming Raidious, we liked to somewhat whimsically ask the question “What if CNN covered your company?” Now we realize the aptness of that question, and how clearly and precisely it describes what we do. And as we’ve found, it also describes exactly what many companies need. Maybe you do too. Get in touch and we’ll talk about it.

Image courtesy the Matchbook Museum

As the old saying goes, the more things change, the more they stay the same. The advent of smartphones has fostered the idea of putting brands in the customer’s pocket.

Or has it?

In my usual puttering around the recesses of the web looking for I-don’t-know-what, I ran across the Matchbook Museum–an online gallery of old promotional matchbooks. For those too young to remember the days when physicians endorsed cigarette brands and everybody smoked (or those who haven’t watched Mad Men), it was common for businesses to give out matchbooks imprinted with their logo and some sort of brand message.

In poking around the Matchbook Museum, I found a brand I recognized: Kroger, a supermarket chain located in the Midwest. Their entry in the canon of carcinogen-inhaling enablement can be found here, encouraging customers to “strike a friendship with Kroger” and promoting their “Top Value” coupon stamps.

The idea behind promotional matchbooks was simple: every time a customer went for a match, they were presented with a company’s logo and a brief marketing message. This constant branding exposure implanted that message in their subconscious, much the way billboards, print ads and other traditional media advertising would. Kroger’s message was more warm and fuzzy than most: “Strike a friendship.” In addition to the clever double-entendre (“Strike.” Matches. Get it?), they were more than just a place to buy groceries: they were your friend.

Fast-forward half a century to a time (right now) when even 10-year-olds on the subway have an iPhone, Blackberry or some other digital communication device glued to their hands. Companies are seeking newer and ever more inventive ways to establish personal relationships with consumers. We even use “friend” as a verb, thanks to social sites like MySpace and Facebook.

Nike has updated this model with their “True City” app, which provides hyper-local, real-time information (currently available in six European cities, presumably with American markets to come). The app essentially competes with services like Yelp with crowdsourced information and recommendations on bars, restaurants, music and more–and of course tries to sell Nike shoes and apparel.

The argument of whether or not users want recommendations from an athletic shoe company on the closest place to get the best martinis is almost irrelevant. What they’re attempting is to connect fans of their products by enabling them to share lifestyle tips with each other. Who better to recommend the best chicken wings in your neighborhood than people who like the same shoes you do?

Again, the idea here is simple: put your brand in a customer’s pocket. Just like a grocery store chain has almost nothing to do with smoking a cigarette or lighting the pilot on your stove, an athletic shoe company is hardly related to attending a DJ night at the local nightspot. But the notion that the company is your ally in making your lifestyle choices and altruistically wants to bring like-minded people together–complete with push notifications–is the real power play.

In short, the technology has changed, but the message is the same. Companies are putting their brand in people’s faces at every available opportunity, and we can look to the past for inspiration in building the future of marketing.

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eMarketer recently published some great research on current trends in marketing spending for social media.

Social Media = Content

According to their report there was a 23% increase in social media spending excluding paid advertising, which is a great sign for a company like ours. What’s even better is they are projecting an additional 35% for this year.

This is a great indicator that marketers get it. In the online space, you can’t buy brand preference, loyalty, awareness or affinity: they must be earned.

That’s not to say paid online advertising doesn’t work; it is very effective if there is a clear call to action, conversion path and great creative. But it is difficult for advertising to accomplish what an authentic, humanistic engagement can accomplish as it relates to hearts and minds.

One of the issues eMarketer brings up is the difficulty in tracking the marketing spend due to the number of different budgets from which it comes. Is it advertising? Not really. Is it PR? Probably not. Is it coming from IT? Nope. The need for resources to drive the socialization of business is the reason we’re here, but we constantly find ourselves working with our clients to help them figure out where the budget should come from.

So what’s the answer? We usually tell clients it should come from their Media budget, as social engagement–while not free–is still much more efficient than a typical offline media buy.

For instance, for about the cost of a week on a mid-market radio station or a single half-page newspaper ad in a mid-tier market, we can proactively manage a brand’s presence across the entire internet.

We make, manage, monitor, moderate and measure the content we create across all your brand’s digital platforms and outposts. Reallocating just a small portion of the offline media budget allows brands to actively participate in and leverage social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, company blogs, websites, email programs, and even mobile devices.

We’d love to tell you more about it: contact us any time. Here is a link to eMarketer’s full report if you have an extra $695 and you’re really interested. In the meantime, ask yourself: where is your social media budget coming from?

UPDATE: I changed the title of this post, because I came up with a better one. Also, there is a discussion we started related to this over on our Facebook Fan Page if you’re interested.

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In Early December, Chandler was kind enough to share a link to Rush Coil’s 8 Bit Christmas album with me. While Rush Coil’s record was great, I was more impressed with the little gem at the bottom of the page: a standalone commenting system.

Curious, I dug a little deeper to find Echo from JS Kit. I have worked on projects in the past with a WordPress back end that only provided comments on a page, and while not free ($12/year at minimum), Echo is a much easier approach to providing comments on any page.

Filed away as a great standalone option for comments and not much else, while catching up on Google Reader today, I ran across this article from Social Media Group. I spent some time watching Echo’s trailer video (embedded below), and it  looks to be a very promising comment replacement system as well.

Attracting comments on original posts is something that is becoming harder and harder to accomplish in today’s world of networks, aggregation, and conversational link sharing. Echo does a great job of capturing all of that conversation on the original post, in addition to providing an  authentication system via FaceBook, Twitter, etc.

Social Media Group’s article mentions a  TechCrunchIT pilot  regarding the quality of comments improving with this authentication.

When TechCrunchIT piloted the service they found that when they forced authentication via a social network before commenting was allowed, the quality of the comments increased considerably.

I do have reservations with replacing built in commenting systems with an external system, as this obviously presents an additional layer of moderation and maintenence, but Echo is definitely something worth looking into and experimenting with.

Update

Our friend Doug Karr from DK New Media is using Echo on his Marketing Tech Blog. Check it out and leave some comments!