Jackie Peters over at heavyBlog makes the case here for changing the ”job description” of marketers who use social media as a tool to reach a clients’ conmmunity.  Many great points made.  The biggest point is that social media is way beyond marketing because it is about starting a two way conversation which means a solid message along with listenting vs. pushing out a message to people who you think want the product or service.  Brian Solis also contributes to this concept here.

We at Creative Concepts have also worked hard to define what we do and explain it to the client so they understand the difference between an ad campaign and what we do when we enter the social networks, produce a video or build a blog.  If I get a client old enough to remember the days of TQM (Total Quality Management) then I am good to go (my father was a big TQM guy pushing it out to any company who was interested on behalf of Corning Inc….he was also a Baldridge judge so I know this stuff like the back of my hand!) but if we have someone who is hearing about social media and wants to know more, we have to define it in a way that makes sense today.

I work at this messaging every day for Creative Concepts because I firmly believe that social media is important to the future of every company.  To find a tool that helps you define your business and helps to explain what you do in your own words, to share with all who are interested the goings on of how you do business which allows greater trust from your customer, to hear direclty and immediately from the customer, to respond to that customer immediately and to get help from the customer when it comes to developing new products and more is way beyond marketing.  It is doing business smartly and the ROI is customers that last a lifetime!

As a citizen in the town of Fairfield, CT., and as a female, mother, wife and daughter, I have a favorite website called SuzySaid. SuzySaid is the essense of where the big web guys (google, yahoo….) and the internet as a whole would like to go. It is geared for women and focused on the town where we live. I believe that SuzySaid started in Fairfield, my town, and has now branched out to other towns nearby and gone as far as Texas.

Content is local. Content is constantly updated. Content updates are shared daily with opt in email blasts. Content is geared for the local woman. Content is created by local women. Advertisers love it!

And you don’t need to be local to use it…what if I want to travel to Austin, Texas? Wouldn’t it be smart to consult SuzySaid?

As a woman living in Fairfield, this is my favorite website. As a business person advising smaller local businesses (and soon larger businesses), I say this is the way to go.

Hats off to SuzySaid!

Five years ago, I knew that I wanted to run my own company and do PR, Marketing and Events….and so I did it. Four years ago, I had a feeling about blogs, knew nothing, went to a seminar, knew a tad more, and worked until I understood the blog world and how business could fit in. With the fun and the effectiveness of blogs, I knew we needed to expand into social networking (myspace, facebook and others) and online videos…and so we did it and have helped our clients increase sales and win awards.

This is a great story but the question to ask today is, with all that Creative Concepts offers, can we withstand a recession…more importantly can we help our clients through a period of flat or declining sales. The first answer is we are in great shape and the second answer is yes, we can help our clients not only muster through a possible recession but we can help them come out on top by using PR and social media as a way to reach new customers.

Taking the recession element away for the moment, there have been many studies that say advertising is not as effective as it once was. ZenithOptmedia says that ad spend growth is predicted to be up by 2.5% only for 2008 compared to 3.3% in 2007. Traditional PR still works but based on who you are trying to reach, you need to hit many channels before you get a customer’s attention. Channels would include print, radio and TV, events, and the word of mouth (WOM) sectors. WOM spending which includes social networks, blogs, videos and more is expected to increase 30.4% annually through 2011 to $3.70 billion as noted by Keller Fay Group which means that the corporate world has recognized that working the internet is an effective and successful way to reach your present and new customers.

Now putting the possibility of a recession back into the mix, the next question is where do you, a business, put your money so you get the biggest bang for the buck? Well I can give you the answer but you probably have already figured it out. Talking and sharing information within the online social networks or creating a new community for your customer is easier on the budget than paying for a TV spot or a glossy ad in a magazine!

Common sense will guide you (and so will Forrester Research as reported by Mark Walsh here) to wise spending for future PR and Marketing campaigns…a recession may just force the hand sooner rather than later.

Yes, I know so many people are on linkedin (an online business networking social media tool)…so many people are connected, and that is great.  I hope that it changes how people do business.  I hope that it turns the business world upside down with the social media/networking capabilities!

But here is one of my biggest problems with these start ups and many other small businesses.  In order for any business to grow, you have to make the customer happy.  You have to make any process easy whether it be signing up, changing a password, or changing your service.

Well, guess what?  Linkedin has made signing up very easy but when it comes to tweaking your subscription package, they make life very difficult.  First, you can’t downgrade your account online (even though you can upgrade, change your password, enhance your profile….).  There is no 800 number to call…all you can do is send an email and hope for the best.  I made my request through an online cust. svc. email and it took about 24 hours for a response.  The response that came back claimed they were cancelling my subscription.  That was it…no futher explanation from Loretta at Linkedin.

This is not what I asked for!!  I sent a reply email and again no repsonse so I went back online to go through their cust. svc. email.  I got an email back which said that they were not able to do downgrades.  They had to cancel my subscription and then I would have to sign up again and pick the package I wanted.

Reid Hoffman, CEO, Allen Blue, VP Product Strategy, Keith Rabois VP Business and Corp Dev and other Linkedin staff…I thought the scare tactics went out when social media came in!!  Don’t tell me that you can’t do what I ask cause that is just stupid with the technology you have involved in your service. 

What is apparent to me is that Linkedin doesn’t care about their customers and their needs.  What is my motivation to sign up again…I can’t get anyone on the phone, they don’t respond in a timely manner, they lie and say they can’t do something they can do.  I am no longer a strong advocate for Linkedin.com!

As I have stated before, high quality customer service needs to be the new marketing tool (especially for linkedin).  The best way to maintain and get new customers is by listening and acting wisely.  Just ask Dell who is trying harder at customer service!  Just ask the Creative Concepts clients!

Greg Verdino over at Digitas has a great blog!  He writes about trends among other things and is now being quoted in the press.  One of the latest subjects has been about Second Life.  Greg talks about how Starwood Hotels got a lot of hype for creating “Aloft” which was an online resort in this online world where you can live a second made up life, buy things (with Second Life money) and now, experience violence.  The draw for many is that any player can recreate themselves and be anything they want to be.  Well the problem with Starwood is that they carved out a spot for themselves but didn’t work their new place after all was said and done…they have a hotel but no greeeters or staff which in the real world wouldn’t be good for business and in Second Life amounts to the same.

As Greg points out, when any company makes a bold move into these new forays, you can’t just create it, walk away, and think you are getting anywhere.  As with anything else in business (or life for that matter), make a choice, stick with it and work it the best you can.  This applies to blogging, podcasting, press releases or just keeping up with the bookkeeping.  If you let things go, any initial effort is a waste of time and money!  Consistentcy with every campaign or any effort will win the prize at the end of the day!

So what is a flog? It is a fake blog (writers from PR firms who pretend to be blogging honestly about a product or company in order to start a buzz) created by the geniuses at marketing and pr firms. Just kidding about the genius part. Edelman PR, one of the largest firms in the world and most recently Zipatoni have mislead their clients into believing that they know the best way to get exposure and get new clients and they know what is going on with emerging technology and viral marketing…for this Wal-Mart and Sony pay the big bucks.

Well if any of these men and women from these firms took the time to truly learn about blogging and its effectiveness within its communities and if these men and women were clear about doing business ethically, then the word flog would never exist.

Corporate blogging is a highly effective communication and marketing tool. eHobbies is a toy site. Once they created a blog, sales increased by 2-4% which is the trend for retail sites with blogs. There are many reasons to blog for business: increased search engine rankings, new clients get a feel for the business, reaching out to past and present customers…the list goes on and on. And yes PR and Marketing firms can be involved but only if there is full disclosure!!

As with everything else in life, there is no shortcut. Success comes from honest hard work.

Read about Sony’s flog debacle here.

So why in this day and age of proactive outspoken consumers, would a company not listen to their customer?  So many great things can happen when you listen and obey as a business owner (ask Dell who is finally getting it!):  loyalty, happiness which leads to viral marketing and therefore more customers, repeat business, better processes that lead to better time management which saves money…do I need to go on?

I have recently interfaced with 2 companies, one large and one local, that are so into their own existence that they forgot the customer matters.  For example, have you been to a Verizon store lately?  You walk in and speak to someone who punches your name into a computer so everyone in the store knows who you are…the manager and the sales reps don’t care but all of the customers now know who you are (maybe I should have given them Creative Concepts instead of Valorie Luther).  Then in my most recent experience in trying to make some slight admin changes, I got a customer service agent who tried to promise the world but forgot to write it in the account notes, I got a manager whose hands were tied and claimed he needed to fire the cust. svc rep for making undeliverable promises, I then went to another Verizon store who had “better management” where I got help from a woman who bared a little too much skin for the daytime.  Her big claim to fame was that basically the phones were all the same and the only difference was the rebates they get from the companies who produce the phones…are you kidding me??  Would David Pogue agree that all the phones are the same?  Needless to say I still haven’t gotten a new phone, can anyone help me?

Now on a more local note, my daughter signed up for Jazz Tap dance class at D’Valda & Sirico Dance and Music Centre in Fairfield.  A couple of facts: they make you sign up for a year, my daughter is 6…guess what, she hates Jazz Tap now.  A company that cares about repeat business would understand that it would be hard for a 6 year old to commit to a year of the unknown…a nice local business would understand the dilemma of the parent and give a rebate or refund…not these guys…the only thing said was, “did you read the fine print on the contract?”  NO REBATES!  Wow how lovely….I can only wish them the best because they aren’t going to see me again and I will for sure use the power of viral marketing and tell everyone I know to not go there.  Did I mention they do a big performance at the end of each year that costs $$ for each little precious star?  Did I tell you that they quit teaching the kids new dances so they can practice for months the few steps they have been taught so their parents think they are dancing geniuses?  Did I tell you that a 5 year old, after spending hours waiting for her limited time on stage, was let go into a the lobby only to find hordes of adults where none of them were her parents (much crying ensued as you can imagine)? 

I think that customer service has been left behind or never thought of for many businesses both big and small so maybe top management can think of customer service as a marketing tool to be used to bring in more customers and more money…do you think if “the customer always comes first” is portrayed as “please the customer on all levels and you wil never have to worry about your business profits again” that will get some attention?  Just curious!!

 

This is a day that is truly exciting in the PR and Marketing arena!

Heading down to Greenwich shortly to the Greenwich Chamber’s Redman Hall to hear Jim Zebora speak. He is the Business Editor for The Advocate/Greenwich Time newspapers. I have pitched everything from blogging to a new business featuring a Greenwich resident who provides a community calendar for the area, Vivapop.com, and he seemed interested but the stories never took off. I was grateful though when he sent a reporter to our Business Smart Tools Conference in Stamford. In person “meetups” are always good and so I am heading in his direction to shake his hand.

Speaking of “meetups”…after Greenwich I am then heading into NYC to BEDNY for the Techcrunch Meetup where we are one of the sponsors and event managers. This party is the first of its kind in New York! It is a wild scene with people scratching and clawing to get in any which way they can…one AOL employee had to complain on Vallyewag in order to get attention from the infamous Mike Arrington.

For those who will make it up the elevator and past the check in desk, they will encounter very cool sponsors, live demos, food and drink, videos and music, a speech or two, and lots of networking…see you all there and look for the scoop tomorrow!

Went to OMMA today and was pleasantly surprised.  Heard from Rishad Tobaccowala, CEO, Denuo (what a smart and funny guy with lots of common sense), Ross Levinsohn, President, Fox Interactive Media who I had read about…was impressed then and impressed now by his gut instincts and his ability to move quickly and smartly into the digital age.  We all broke out into mini sessions where my favorite moment of the day came during the “Creative that makes friends with Social networks” where Henry Copeland, CEO, Blogads moderated…smart comments came from Sandy Marks on political campaigns online (she made statements like “you can create a sexy ad with click throughs but once the viewer has clicked are they finding what they are truly looking for or was the image/copy a ruse to get some fleeting attention from the viewer that in the long run doesn’t make sense (or get business or votes) for the client”) and Frank Radice, SVP The NBC Agency (the inhouse agency for NBC) said that less copy, more images and video makes for a strong presense on the web and can drive online users to TV which is a new equation for many to think about.

So the cool thing that I have concluded on my own especially after today is that this social media new digital age has leveled the playing field which is something to take advantage of.  All ages have entered the race and all backgrounds, men and women….it takes passion, thinking out of the box and flexibility to make something happen.  The truly creative, the truly hard working and the great listeners of the world will be able to make something of this new media.  It is very cool to be a part of this change in media and communications!!

As a new business, have you been frustrated with the PR and Marketing help you can afford?

As a small business, have the traditional PR and Marketing people offered you a tactic that has vision, longevity and a clear path to increasing revenue?

As a medium business that is growing and has a strong future, have you exhausted all possibilities that exist with the web so you can increase revenue?

As a medium business, have you hit a plateau and don’t know how to get to the next level for profits and exposure?

As a large business, are you having problems keeping your employees motivated….have you lost touch with the inner workings of the company…do you need to find a more hands on way of communicating internally?

As a large business, do you continue to market to your next potential customer who may not be your customer for 3-5 years based on their age?

Education and action is the only way to keep a company moving upward.  If you don’t know how to approach the internet as a marketing and communication tool, if you don’t want to rely on someone else in the company to understand and implement successful long term business strategies that include web based techniques, if you have no idea what the internet is capable of for any business, then join us for the Business Smart Tools Conference, www.BusinessSmartTools.com, where you will learn about the tech world from David Pogue, NY Times and CBS news tech corrospondent, you will learn about podcasting from Mike Dunn (Interactive Media, Hearst), blogging from David Parmet (Marketing Begins at Home), search engine marketing from Matt Kain (24/7 Media), online tv and video from Greg Verdino (ROO) and much more.

Register online and join us on Thursday June 13 in Stamford CT!