• by Kelly Shermach , April 16, 2008

Regardless of religious persuasion, most of us know the story of the loaves and fishes--how two loaves a bread and a handful of fish satiated a crowd of 5,000, eager for insight and intelligence.

Substitute a couple of metaphoric apples and sack of symbolic oranges, and you have the modern-day miracle of branded social networks.

Maybe the marketing allegory is a bit exaggerated, but it's likely that the Biblical account is, too. What's clear from either is that a little bit of investment and a fair amount of faith can yield great results.

Research sponsored by TNS media intelligence/Cymfony, "Harnessing Influence: How Savvy Brands are Unleashing the New Power of Blogs and other Social Media," showed that 49% of marketing executives say social media should be allocated significant resources. Thirty percent say that businesses must grasp social media with a sense of urgency: The payoff will be greater unfiltered customer insight, and increased brand awareness and loyalty among customers.

Many companies will choose branded social networks to generate these benefits. The research reveals that early adopters are implementing social media in their organizations at a rate 500% faster than wait-and-see marketers. "The ultimate value for a company is the low-hanging fruit areas," says Dan Neely, CEO of Networked Insights.

"For a company like John Deere, a community is just a means to an end--a way for them to understand what's going on inside the community they serve, to make the company more efficient," he says.

A community designed to get brand marketers from Point A to Point B by cashing in on community feedback and idea contributions has limited value.

But companies can feast on fresh produce during droughts and cold snaps by treating their communities as nearly infinite intelligence tools. Branded consumer communities generate competitive advantage from the direct insight contributed from customers, allow customers to inform business decisions, boost search engine optimization (consumer-initiated content feeds search results), grow client bases and nurture loyal, close relationships between a brand and its buyers.

Becoming the Top Banana of Branded Online Communities
The ripest, sweetest fruit comes from letting nature work in customer connections. As individuals and as community, they will yield straightforward opinions and ideas that a well-constructed online offering invites, but does not push as do traditional research practices such as focus groups and face-to-face surveys. Whether marketers intend it or not, these methods often yield conformity and false truths, fudged to help the brand save face.

Through social networks, consumers control communication, and brands that disclose how they will use that data will achieve accolades and encourage loyalty.

Hallmark launched a social network in the first quarter of 2008 that advances its participation in (Product) Red, the corporate-sponsored program launched by U2's headliner, Bono, to raise awareness and funds for AIDS prevention and care in Africa.

Hallmark.com/red includes a blog, a calculator that determines the impact (Product) Red purchases have on AIDS-related efforts, customizable greeting cards, an opportunity for consumers to share their stories, contests, video sharing, graphics downloads, networking on the microsite and at Facebook and Flickr, and an email newsletter.

"The community really leverages the opportunities Red is bringing forward," says Jill Webb, mass advertising manager for Hallmark. These opportunities include Red's MySpace friends and YouTube videos. Hallmark supplemented established Red connections with a Facebook application that lets consumers see how far their greetings travel in miles, from one friend or family member to another.

A social network provides "a huge advantage to get your message out there and a great way to target the socially aware consumer," she says. Hallmark likely will use the content uploaded by consumers to the social microsite in future marketing.

Building a Lemon Instead
"Plenty of brands are going into this for the wrong reasons," Neely says. "The mainstream is coming through and wants to launch just to have a community. A lot of e-tail companies do it just as another traffic driver."

They need to recognize the transition that has taken place in online marketing, he says. "We've moved from eyeballs to transactions to interactions." This evolution cannot escape asking and answering the question "Why?"--particularly when posed about consumer behavior, no matter the channel.

In addition, he says, companies that build lemon networks place focus on getting customers to engage with the brand rather than one another first and with the brand less directly as popularized by Motley Fool or MySpace forums. These brands have reinvested in the relationship between their businesses and consumers.

Lemons can be made into lemonade with network features including gaming, rewards and consumer fame--a community member's recipe published in the next home goods product catalog or on CPG packaging. "It's not just about using the Web. It's about using all media," Neely says.