StumbleUpon released an Android app recently. One of the most popular tools has become the app discovery feature where a site visitor picks a few categories to find apps. More than one million apps have been stumbled on, according to the company. The success is no surprise for some execs. The social site recently joined the ranks of media communities directing streams of consumer traffic to Web site home and landing pages. At least that's the case for Mint.com. Acquired last year by Intuit, the personal finance service targets the tech-savvy professional between ages 25 and 40 with above-average income who is heavily into social media. Paid search had been too expensive, so Mint.com began working with StumbleUpon in 2008, contributing articles and videos for community members to stumble on. The company built a brand in the StumbleUpon community that drives traffic to its Web site, according to Stew Langille, vice president of marketing at Mint.com. Langille says both paid and organic content placed on StumbleUpon provides a far better return on investment (ROI), compared with paid search, display or any other type of advertising. Mint.com averages 180,000 monthly visits from StumbleUpon. "We had a specific goal to target cost per acquisition," he says. "The advertising drives people on StumbleUpon to view organic content, which we want the community to pick up and share." To target interest groups through StumbleUpon Ads, Mint.com created a campaign targeting anyone who indicated an interest in weddings to promote its Wedding Budget Checklist page that now receives more than 80% positive ratings from StumbleUpon users, and averages more than 5,000 page views per month since April. The company also had success promoting its home page to females age 18 to 25 in the U.S. who are interested in self improvement, averaging nearly 15,000 additional page views each month for the past seven. With the ability to directly target specific audiences based on their interests, Mint.com's use of StumbleUpon Ads led them to develop unique Web content to reach key audience categories aside from financial. The results are the lowest cost per new user and most cost-effective conversion rates of any paid advertising efforts. StumbleUpon content drives traffic to Mint.com's Web site where about 2.5% of visitors sign up.
Marketers struggling with their social media strategy may be having trouble because they haven't yet grasped how to move from being a faceless corporation to a "friend." According to Firefly Millward Brown, which recently released research into successful strategies within the social media space, many marketers are struggling with translating their brand attributes into a personality that can engage consumers in a two-way dialogue. "If you enter into the space as a brand, [consumers are] going to ask you to reveal yourself," Rob Hernandez, global brand director at Firefly Millward Brown, tells Marketing Daily. "[Marketers need to] be comfortable hearing about and talking about your flaws, and that's not something that's traditionally done by marketers." Unlike the approaches of the past, these new "rules of engagement" for social media mean marketers need to adjust the way they approach consumers. Because they have not fully explored how to go about changing their approach, some companies are paralyzed between doing nothing at all and doing only the bare minimum and thinking they're done. "It has a huge opportunity and potential, but many don't know how to harness it yet," Hernandez says. "They put up a Facebook page and think that will be sufficient. [Consumers] sniff that out pretty quickly, [thinking] it's insincere at best and pandering at worst." But social media, Hernandez says, are more relationship-based. Therefore, they need much more nurturing and personalization than other approaches. "You have to abandon the corporate mentality and approach and think of it as a person and interact with them as a person," Hernandez says. "You've got to be interesting and be relevant, with a personal connection with [consumers]." Fostering relationships based on trust and relevance is important because consumers are wary of brands' encroachment into the social media arena, Hernandez says. "Their number one concern was that [marketers] are going to pretend they have figured it out and co-opt the experience," Hernandez says. "They would rather it's a relationship building tool." To help, Firefly Millward Brown offers 10 rules of social media:
1. Don't recreate your home page in social media: don't rehash the same information people can get elsewhere. 2. Listen first, then talk: create a dialogue 3. Build trust by being open and honest: transparency is key. 4. Give your brand a face: give consumers someone or something accountable for the brand. 5. Offer something of value: give without wanting something in return. 6. Be relevant: don't be invasive without purpose. 7. Talk like a friend, not a corporate entity: speak in simple, casual language. 8. Give consumers some control: be comfortable with the fact that you can't dictate the message any more. 9. Let consumers find you/come to you: brands that seek consumers too fervently will be seen as intrusive and interruptive. 10. Let consumers talk for you: people will advocate for brands they care about."Essentially, all social media and social networking are built on inherent circles of trust," Hernandez concludes. "If you want to engender that level of trust, you're going to have to be transparent and be willing to accept the good with the bad."
In a bid to become the primary online online destination people use to figure out what to watch on TV, TVGuide.com this morning announced it has added personalization features to its popular "TV Check-in" feature, which allows users to share the shows they are watching with their Facebook friends. Starting today, logged-in TVGuide.com users will also begin to see a personalized "Hot List" of their favorite shows throughout the site, featuring tune-in information for those shows, as well as "I'll Watch" buttons to alert their Facebook community of friends. The new features are part of a progression that is blending TVGuide.com's core content with social media applications to enhance the TV program navigation experience. Since TVGuide.com launched "TV Check-in" Oct. 20th, the site has averaged 10,000 check-ins per day. The top checked-in episodes include shows from all of the major networks, including more than 7,400 distinct episodes of TV shows. Among the top checked-in shows are such fan favorites as "House," "Vampire Diaries," the CMA Awards, "Sons of Anarchy," Monday Night Football, "The Office," and "Blue Bloods." Christy Tanner, senior vice president and general manager of TVGuide.com, calls the approach "social TV," and says the personalized hot lists make the concept more personally relevant to individual users, while at the same time allowing them to share their TV viewing preferences with others.
StumbleUpon released an Android app recently. One of the most popular tools has become the app discovery feature where a site visitor picks a few categories to find apps. More than one million apps have been stumbled on, according to the company. The success is no surprise for some execs. The social site recently joined the ranks of media communities directing streams of consumer traffic to Web site home and landing pages. At least that's the case for Mint.com. Acquired last year by Intuit, the personal finance service targets the tech-savvy professional between ages 25 and 40 with above-average income who is heavily into social media. Paid search had been too expensive, so Mint.com began working with StumbleUpon in 2008, contributing articles and videos for community members to stumble on. The company built a brand in the StumbleUpon community that drives traffic to its Web site, according to Stew Langille, vice president of marketing at Mint.com. Langille says both paid and organic content placed on StumbleUpon provides a far better return on investment (ROI), compared with paid search, display or any other type of advertising. Mint.com averages 180,000 monthly visits from StumbleUpon. "We had a specific goal to target cost per acquisition," he says. "The advertising drives people on StumbleUpon to view organic content, which we want the community to pick up and share." To target interest groups through StumbleUpon Ads, Mint.com created a campaign targeting anyone who indicated an interest in weddings to promote its Wedding Budget Checklist page that now receives more than 80% positive ratings from StumbleUpon users, and averages more than 5,000 page views per month since April. The company also had success promoting its home page to females age 18 to 25 in the U.S. who are interested in self improvement, averaging nearly 15,000 additional page views each month for the past seven. With the ability to directly target specific audiences based on their interests, Mint.com's use of StumbleUpon Ads led them to develop unique Web content to reach key audience categories aside from financial. The results are the lowest cost per new user and most cost-effective conversion rates of any paid advertising efforts. StumbleUpon content drives traffic to Mint.com's Web site where about 2.5% of visitors sign up.
Last week, leading advertisers convened in Miami for the Association of National Advertisers' annual Multicultural Marketing & Diversity Conference. Historically, Hispanic, African-American and Asian-American marketers have fought hard for budgets even though demographic trends point to the fact that today's minorities will become the majority in the coming decades. Hence, the summit was subtitled, "Multicultural -- The New Mainstream." One marketer who clearly sees the growth of multicultural audiences converging with the growth of social media is McDonald's. Rick Wion, director of social media for the company, gave an excellent keynote presentation on "Multicultural Social Media," specifically detailing how he manages its 3.6 million fans on Facebook, 60,000 followers on Twitter, 4000+ daily check-in's on Foursquare, and 2 billion daily views on YouTube. After the event, I had the chance to speak with him about the golden arches' approach to social media, two of its successful promotions and his advice for using the medium. Q: How do you, as McDonald's director of social media, distinguish between customers needs for information, entertainment and dialogue in social media? A: We are extremely customer-focused at McDonald's and part of that effort includes extensive research to understand where customers are talking about our brand while also developing a sense of when and where they are looking for different types of engagement. We've found that Facebook and YouTube tend to be more about entertainment while Twitter and blogs are generally focused on dialogue. Q: At the conference, you talked about a promotion you did with "Papi Blogger" and his trip road trip across the country where he and his family would eat at McDonald's locations. Tell us about that. A: The Papi Blogger road trip was a chance to partner with a leading Hispanic blogger as he embarked on an amazing cross-country road trip with his family. As part of their journey, the Ruiz family visited notable McDonald's [restaurants] in New York, Chicago and even Roswell, N.M., while blogging, tweeting and posting videos about the experience. His 46-day journey showcased how McDonald's is a part of Americana. In addition, it highlighted our commitment to families through our menu and visits to Ronald McDonald House Charities. Q: McDonald's did a "Face of the Fan" promotion for the World Cup. How did that work and what kinds of results do you see? A: The Face of the Fan promotion was a way for soccer fans to show their team passion through the McDonald's Facebook page and our McDonald's MeEncanta.com site. The mechanics of the promotion let consumers upload a picture and "paint" their face virtually with the flag of their favorite team. Part of the success of this program was that it let Hispanic customers celebrate their heritage by choosing any country in the app rather than being limited to the most populous ones. We saw tens of thousands of users paint their faces and also a 40% increase in traffic to MeEncanta.com. Q: Your celebrity endorsement of Michelle Wie worked well. How did she promote McDonald's through her Twitter feed? She tweets in both English and Korean. How did that build a global following in both the U.S. and Asia? A: Social media was a critical component to extend the reach of this program. Our partnership with Wie received a tremendous amount of positive buzz and excitement. We kicked off the partnership with announcements through both McDonald's (@McDonalds) and Michelle Wie's (@themichellewie) Twitter and Facebook pages. The second and third phases of the social media campaign began with the launch of the TV commercial and digital game at myinspirasian.com. To date, this campaign yielded an amazing 197 million traditional and social media impressions. Michelle's fans continue to respond favorably to the partnership, especially the direct engagement with Wie and bonus content like the behind the scenes video of the commercial shoot. Golf bloggers and influential twitterers were blogging and sharing McDonald's new brand building commercial with Michelle Wie with their social networks. Bloggers and twitterers highlights include Stephanie Wei (blogger/writer and golfer), Ryan Ballengee (golf blogger and broadcaster), Danielle Tucker (radio host of The Golf Club Radio Show in Hawaii) and Fastfoodjunky (popular Twitterer to tweet news of quick service restaurants). Q: What recommendations can you make for marketers about tapping into social media for multicultural audiences? A: My main piece of advice would be to start with solid research about how and where your audiences spend time. Only after you have this understanding should you then seek to engage with these audiences through social communities and events that are meaningful and culturally relevant.
Marketers struggling with their social media strategy may be having trouble because they haven't yet grasped how to move from being a faceless corporation to a "friend." According to Firefly Millward Brown, which recently released research into successful strategies within the social media space, many marketers are struggling with translating their brand attributes into a personality that can engage consumers in a two-way dialogue. "If you enter into the space as a brand, [consumers are] going to ask you to reveal yourself," Rob Hernandez, global brand director at Firefly Millward Brown, tells Marketing Daily. "[Marketers need to] be comfortable hearing about and talking about your flaws, and that's not something that's traditionally done by marketers." Unlike the approaches of the past, these new "rules of engagement" for social media mean marketers need to adjust the way they approach consumers. Because they have not fully explored how to go about changing their approach, some companies are paralyzed between doing nothing at all and doing only the bare minimum and thinking they're done. "It has a huge opportunity and potential, but many don't know how to harness it yet," Hernandez says. "They put up a Facebook page and think that will be sufficient. [Consumers] sniff that out pretty quickly, [thinking] it's insincere at best and pandering at worst." But social media, Hernandez says, are more relationship-based. Therefore, they need much more nurturing and personalization than other approaches. "You have to abandon the corporate mentality and approach and think of it as a person and interact with them as a person," Hernandez says. "You've got to be interesting and be relevant, with a personal connection with [consumers]." Fostering relationships based on trust and relevance is important because consumers are wary of brands' encroachment into the social media arena, Hernandez says. "Their number one concern was that [marketers] are going to pretend they have figured it out and co-opt the experience," Hernandez says. "They would rather it's a relationship building tool." To help, Firefly Millward Brown offers 10 rules of social media:
1. Don't recreate your home page in social media: don't rehash the same information people can get elsewhere. 2. Listen first, then talk: create a dialogue 3. Build trust by being open and honest: transparency is key. 4. Give your brand a face: give consumers someone or something accountable for the brand. 5. Offer something of value: give without wanting something in return. 6. Be relevant: don't be invasive without purpose. 7. Talk like a friend, not a corporate entity: speak in simple, casual language. 8. Give consumers some control: be comfortable with the fact that you can't dictate the message any more. 9. Let consumers find you/come to you: brands that seek consumers too fervently will be seen as intrusive and interruptive. 10. Let consumers talk for you: people will advocate for brands they care about."Essentially, all social media and social networking are built on inherent circles of trust," Hernandez concludes. "If you want to engender that level of trust, you're going to have to be transparent and be willing to accept the good with the bad."
In a bid to become the primary online online destination people use to figure out what to watch on TV, TVGuide.com this morning announced it has added personalization features to its popular "TV Check-in" feature, which allows users to share the shows they are watching with their Facebook friends. Starting today, logged-in TVGuide.com users will also begin to see a personalized "Hot List" of their favorite shows throughout the site, featuring tune-in information for those shows, as well as "I'll Watch" buttons to alert their Facebook community of friends. The new features are part of a progression that is blending TVGuide.com's core content with social media applications to enhance the TV program navigation experience. Since TVGuide.com launched "TV Check-in" Oct. 20th, the site has averaged 10,000 check-ins per day. The top checked-in episodes include shows from all of the major networks, including more than 7,400 distinct episodes of TV shows. Among the top checked-in shows are such fan favorites as "House," "Vampire Diaries," the CMA Awards, "Sons of Anarchy," Monday Night Football, "The Office," and "Blue Bloods." Christy Tanner, senior vice president and general manager of TVGuide.com, calls the approach "social TV," and says the personalized hot lists make the concept more personally relevant to individual users, while at the same time allowing them to share their TV viewing preferences with others.