On Mad Men, the ad execs of the 1960s rely on focus groups and psychologists to understand their clients’ customers.  Today, we have Twitter, Facebook and blogs.

Instead of employing tricks and misdirection to learn what people really think about a product or a brand, we’re now empowered to share our opinions with anyone who’ll listen, 24 hours a day.  But this generational shift from privacy to oversharing has created a whole new problem: we now offer too much input, rather than too little.

Thankfully, the web is loaded with tools to help you understand what your customers (and your competition, and complete strangers) are talking about.

• Wondering what’s on people’s minds? Start with Google Trends, and then dissect Twitter’s Trending Topics.
• Concerned about public sentiment?  Try any of these 25 social media tools for tracking online conversations.
• Have questions? Ask your customers directly with these online survey tools.
• Managing multiple campaigns? Keep track of them with rich metrics analysis from Radian6 or Scout Labs.

As you can see, there’s no shortage of ways to listen to your customers.  And now you can analyze what they say vs. what they really mean, all from the comfort of your laptop.

Of course, what you actually do with all that information is another story entirely — but at least you’ll never be in the dark again about what your customers really think.

Overwhelmed? We can help! Connect with us on Twitter or Facebook!

The last month of US box office has been dominated by Inception, the latest thriller from director Christopher Nolan.  Despite Nolan’s pedigree (Memento, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight), Inception is still a huge box office surprise for one big reason: late summer is normally a cinematic dead zone.

With heat waves, family vacations and a general pre-autumn malaise ruling the day, this is the notorious timeframe when Hollywood dumps the films it doesn’t expect to be winners.  And yet, here we have a complicated movie without blockbuster stars, and it’s earned over $200 million.

Why?

Because people can’t stop talking about it.

Have you seen the multiple theories about its meaning on Slate?  Or New York Magazine?  Or Salon?  Or the blog posts and infographics created by the film’s rabid fans?  Or how it’s still (as I type this) a top-10 trending topic on Twitter a full five weekends after its release?

Inception succeeds because it’s a movie people can:

• Relate to
• Form opinions about
• Deconstruct
• Debate
• Satirize
• Be inspired by

Inception is a product that fuels its own hype.

Does your product do that?

As Amazon’s Jeff Bezos famously said, “Advertising is the price you pay for having an unremarkable product or service.”  And while that’s an oversimplified (and somewhat cynical) statement, it’s not entirely untrue.

The more people are willing to talk about you on their own, the less you have to convince them that you’re conversation-worthy.  When people are voluntarily talking about your product, it allows you to invest more time and resources on creating those products that delight your customers, rather than creating noteworthy (but temporary) illusions of interest.

Ultimately, a great ad campaign can make a good product sound interesting, but a great product starts conversations all by itself.

You should start a conversation with us on Twitter or Facebook!

So where’s the overlap between your goals (profit) and your customers’ goals (solving their problems)?

One Tip: Find a Common Enemy

Ecover (our client) creates ecological cleaning products.  As such, they’re naturally passionate about the environment.  They stress the need for sustainability in everything they do, from their product ingredients to their factories to their supply chain.

Ecover also knows that their core customers are informed and passionate (and, at times, frustrated) about environmental issues.  And that’s one reason they’ve asked us at Creative Concepts to help them build their Ecover Facebook page and Ecover Twitter account as forums for broader ecological discussions that go beyond the limits of buying and selling.

Obviously, Ecover wants to sell their household cleaning products.  That’s how they stay in business.  But if they didn’t occasionally shift their focus to the big picture (i.e., the real world), they wouldn’t be true to their ethics as a company.  And by giving their customers a platform to discuss the issues they feel strongly about, Ecover provides a secondary service to their audience: a community that’s actively engaged in improving the world we live in.

In Ecover’s case, finding a “common enemy” with their customers is easy: pollution, erosion, waste, ecological misinformation… the list goes on.  Each of those issues makes it harder for Ecover to do its job (cleaning without further burdening the environment), and each of those issues also makes it harder for Ecover’s customers to live a happy, healthy life.

Thus, spreading the word about global ecological problems — and, ideally, sharing practical solutions — is in everyone’s best interests.

So… where do you and your customers have a common enemy?  (Hint: It’s not your competition; it’s what you and your competition each exist to prevent.)

We may not have common enemies, but we can still be friends on Twitter or Facebook!

Everybody there is talking to somebody else — some in groups, some in pairs.

All except one guy.

A guy in a suit.

A guy who’s moving from group to group and arbitrarily shouting unwanted information at people, and then moving on.

He doesn’t care if you have questions.

He doesn’t even care if you respond.

He just wants to make sure that you heard what he had to say, because the only thing he’s capable of talking about is himself.

Does That Sound Like Your Brand’s Social Media Strategy?

According to marketing firm 360i’s recent report on Twitter usage, odds are, it probably is.

From the MediaPost summary of the report:

The six-month study from 360i reveals that 43% of consumer tweets are conversational — replies to other people tweeting. Yet only 12% of marketers’ tweets demonstrate active dialogue with consumers.

This means that while “normal people” spend almost half their time actively conversing with their fellow Twitter users, companies are only conversing in 1 out of every 10 tweets they send.

Which, obviously, begs the question…

What Is Your Company Talking About?

Do you use Twitter as a megaphone to broadcast company-wide news?

Do you use Twitter for sales, showering your followers with coupon codes?

Do you use Twitter for lead generation, littering your tweetstream with linkbait in the hopes that unsuspecting readers will click through to your sales page and be mysteriously compelled to give you money?

If so, you’re at the wrong party.

Remember to Put the “Social” in Social Media

If you only had one minute to chat with a complete stranger, would you rather tell her something about yourself or learn something about her instead?

Why can’t it be both?

On Twitter, people value (short) conversations.  The nature of the service lends itself to bite-sized interactions and splintered attention, which actually increases the need for meaningful connections in shorter amounts of time.

Yes, people like to listen. But they also like to talk.

The key is to make time for both.

Is your social media strategy a two-way street?

We drive on a few two-way streets: Connect with us on Twitter or Facebook!

And while it’s true that both services…

• Are built around publicly shared “status updates”
• Enable users to “follow” or “friend” each other
• Can be simultaneously updated through third party services like HootSuite

… you’ll soon realize that the audience for each service has very different goals and expectations.

Broadly speaking, Twitter is good for…

• Connecting with peers and industry professionals
• “Water cooler” discussions of breaking news & pop culture
• Real-time information-sharing, research, Q&As, etc.
• Technology-focused and business-driven discussions
• One-way broadcasts, with occasional commentary

… while Facebook is good for…

• Connecting with people you already know “in real life”
• Threaded discusssions (where all comments are collected)
• Personal opinions
• Photo albums
• Videos

Twitter, while offering less robust features than Facebook, is also (paradoxically) considered to be the more professional and business-oriented platform.  Meanwhile, Facebook (like MySpace before it) is the more visually-driven sharing platform among friends, family and acquaintances.

This means that the users of each service have different expectations for their experience on each platform.  And if you’re piloting a brand across both channels, you need to be aware of those differences.  (Dan Zarella writes frequently, and well, about how to do this.)

For example, in December of 2009, we at Creative Concepts were helping The Children’s Aid Society promote their annual Miracle on Madison fundraiser.  Most of the news about that particular event — celebrity sightings, fashion updates and high-end sales — differed from the vast majority of The Children’s Aid Society’s traditional topics (children’s health, education, foster care and family services).

We quickly learned that the charity’s followers on Twitter remained open to the Miracle on Madison messaging, but their fans on Facebook chilled to the idea.  While they may be interested in the actual work being done by The Children’s Aid Society, that must seem at odds with more “commercial” updates about a high society Manhattan fundraising event.

So they made their voices heard – some abandoned The Children’s Aid Society Facebook page.

When we noticed a drop in Facebook numbers that coincided with an increase in Miracle messaging, we followed our instincts and dialed down the Miracle mentions on Facebook.  And when their fans’ behavior subsequently returned to normal, we chalked that up as a lesson learned — and one we believe is worth sharing:

Facebook is not Twitter is not MySpace is not a blog.  You may have one message, but you have multiple audiences.

Listen, and then adjust your pitch.

Want to hear our various voices? Follow us on Twitter and Facebook!

No matter how great your content is, if nobody knows about it, it’s useless.

Fortunately, the folks at MicroArts have compiled some best practices for sharing links on Facebook and Twitter, including some analysis on optimal dates and times to share  from social media scientist Dan Zarrella.

But while these insights are helpful, they’re also fairly broad.  A “one size fits all” approach may help your messages get seen by large numbers of people, but if you want to ensure maximum connectivity, you need to drill even deeper into what your audience’s habits are telling you.

Optimizing Your Outreach Strategy

Once you’ve developed a reliable social media strategy, it’s time to start analyzing the results.  For example:

• On which days are your messages most often read & shared by others?
• At what time of day are your links most often clicked on?
• By whom are your messages most often read & shared?
• Do those results differ among Twitter, Facebook, blog readers, etc.?
• Do those results differ among topics or talking points?
• Do your results improve by messaging more often? Or less often?
• Do certain members of your team craft more effective messages than others?

How do different calls to action (i.e., “watch this”, “learn more”, “find out”) play out on different channels, at different times of day, etc.?

Do you regularly reach out to bloggers, podcasters and other journalists?  If so, do you keep track of who actually shares the information you provide to them, and which leads are dead ends (whom you may actually be annoying)?

While you don’t want to become paralyzed by strategy, you do want results.  And the more you know about how your messages are being processed, and by whom, the better you’ll be able to craft messages that work.

Want more great tips? You should follow us on Twitter!

You can’t force people to care about you.

Plenty of services will sell you Facebook friends and Twitter followers, which is the modern equivalent of buying a list of email addresses: it’s spammy.  We’d never advise that our clients do that because it’s invasive (and, often, it’s a waste of money).

There’s also the tactic of “batch following” other users — or, in layman’s terms, manually choosing to “follow” (or “subscribe to the updates of”) dozens or hundreds of Twitter users at a time, in the blind hope that those people will choose to follow you back in return.

The problem is, very few people do.  It takes such little effort to follow someone on Twitter that doing so is no longer seen as an expression of interest in that person, but a self-interested request for attention on the part of the follower.  (In other words: “Hey, I see you.  Now look at me.”)

This is explains some of the lopsided “follower ratios” you’ll see on some brands’ Twitter accounts.  In many cases, a company has chosen to follow thousands of users, but only a few dozen users have found that brand worth following in return.

Keep that up and you’ll start thinking your brand really is boring, when your problem is actually in the execution.

Don’t Beg.  Be Interesting.

At Creative Concepts, we encourage our clients to build their online following organically, by reaching out to:

• Existing customers
• Potential customers
• Industry peers
• Industry journalists (bloggers, podcasters, newspapers, magazines, etc.)
• Anyone with a problem that our client can solve

For example, in the dead of winter (or, worse, in the dog days of all this summer air conditioning), Twitter is alive with the sound of head colds.  Users can’t help but complain about stuffy noses, dripping sinuses and general misery.  They’re also frequently in search of a remedy — and that’s been a great opportunity for (our client) Bigelow Tea to suggest lemon or mint teas that might help ease someone’s sore throat.

We find proactive engagement to be a far more valuable way to grow our clients’ web communities.  Not everyone responds, but those who do are more likely to continue that active engagement, and to spread the word among their own audiences.

And since social media empowers your brand to find its own audience, wouldn’t you rather have an audience that actually pays attention to what you’re saying?

Do you want to pay even more attention to us? Follow us on Twitter!

But there was one problem with the article: in Ecover’s eyes, the methodology that Which? used to create the report was flawed, erroneous and misinformed — and now it was being reported as a verifiable truth.

Ecover responded with a full rebuttal of Which?’s claims, including a direct statement from Ecover’s CEO, Mick Bremans. And while the tempest appeared to subside, we at Creative Concepts helped Ecover remain vigilant for continued mentions of the report across all of its web channels.

When one Twitter user, Jane C Woods, tweeted a link to the Guardian’s article, Ecover’s Kipling Wagner noticed and responded by sending Jane a link to Ecover’s rebuttal. Afterward, Jane — who’s an Ecover customer in the UK — took the opportunity to ask Kipling a question about a problem she was having with her dishwasher, which she believed may have been caused by Ecover’s dishwashing products. Kipling and Jane each researched the issue — Kipling within Ecover, and Jane with her repairman — and each came to a similar conclusion, with steps to remedy the situation.

We (CC) asked Kipling and Jane about their discussion on Twitter, and here’s what they had to say.

Kipling Wagner, Assistant Marketing Manager and Brand Activator at Ecover, Inc

CC: How did you first discover Jane’s tweet re: the Which? article?

KW: I saw Jane’s tweet through my monitoring alerts on Tweetdeck.

CC: Why did you feel compelled to share Ecover’s rebuttal with her directly?

KW: I felt compelled to share it with her directly because of a combination of details. I looked at her other tweets to gauge what type of twitterer she is (was she sending out quality messages? Interacting with people positively? Was she influencing others? All of which she seemed to be). I also noticed that someone had thanked her for sharing the original Which? article, and this alarmed me because I knew this article was gaining momentum virally. If people were looking to her tweets for trustworthy information, I knew I had to share our side.

CC: How did you go about investigating her question re: her dishwashing issue?

KW: She replied to me, thanking me for the Which? article clarification, and then followed it with a product question. I was reluctant to answer because she is in the UK and we’re in the US, and I was worried about the invisible boundaries and crossing lines within our own company. Now I was interacting with a UK consumer, not just a UK tweeter. First, I let her know I had seen her question, and then I sent an email to our communications department to confirm with them my suspicions on why she was having said issue. Once they got back to me, I let her know the verdict.

CC: How do you feel about the exchange thus far? How has it been beneficial to you / Ecover?

KW: Absolutely beneficial. Although she’s way over in the UK, the boundaries on the web are non-existent. It’s important that we’re able to take a potentially negative situation – spreading of an inaccurate depiction of Ecover through questionable journalism – and turn it into an informed and positive exchange. Also, Ecover is very focused on being honest and transparent, so having the (new) ability, thanks to Twitter, to talk to someone about their concerns (like the Which? article) and then wind up resolving a product issue is priceless. I value that Twitter allows us to do all of this with our audience. It’s like “super practice” for those of us in marketing to be able to work out issues with our consumers, all under the watchful eye of others; we learn more about our own company and products and our consumers at the same time. It’s very rewarding.

Jane C Woods, Personal Development Specialist for Women

CC: How did you originally come across the Which? report?

JW: I am a regular subscriber to Which?.

CC: Were you surprised when Kipling contacted you with Ecover’s response?

JW: Very surprised. Initially, it ‘freaked’ me a bit, as it felt a tad ‘big brotherish;’ but then I realised that all big companies keep an eye out for discussion of their products.

CC: How did Ecover’s rebuttal change your opinion of the Which? report (if at all)?

JW: It didn’t really. Although I guess I would agree that the Which? report hadn’t gone into huge amounts of detail. I had had a problem with Ecover for a while in that my machine does get gummed up. Repairman said it’s a common problem with Ecover type products, and I also had to put some cleaning fluid through my machine… which kind of defeats the object doesn’t it?

CC: Was Kipling’s advice about your dishwasher problem helpful?

JW: Yes, in that it was the same advice as given by the repairman, i.e., run a very hot wash now and again, and run it empty. I do leave the drawer open, but I’m not convinced that will help.

CC: Do you frequently engage with businesses on Twitter? Do you find these kinds of digital interactions beneficial?

JW: Yes, often. I also tend to use Twitter to promote my business. It’s very helpful and it encourages me to buy from companies I have tweeted!

********

Considering Jane’s ongoing concerns about her dishwasher, we expect more discussions between Kipling and Jane — and between Ecover and their growing international customer base — in the future.

After all, every problem has a solution, and those solutions almost always involve a conversation.

Is your business talking — and listening — to customers?

See, now that businesses and consumers can use social media to interact publicly, it’s changed the way people judge the brands they’ve spoken with.  Customers notice how often they’re being listened to, and what kind of value is being created for them by the interactions they have with brands.

In other words, now that you can talk to your customers in the same channels where they’re already chatting with their friends, they’re judging your company as a friend.

And, depending on how your brand conducts itself, this may or may not be a good thing.

Are You a Good Friend?

Are you polite?

Are you reliable?

Are you a good listener?

Do you help others learn to help themselves?

Can you tell the difference between “someone who needs advice” and “someone who’s just venting?”

When the chips are down, are you the one your friends can rely on for coming through in the clutch?

Congratulations: you’re someone that the people around you are probably very happy to know.

On the Other Hand…

Are you perpetually late?

Do you always know best?

Are you always talking about yourself?

Do you have an excuse for every mistake you’ve made?

Do you resent the flaws you see in others, and wonder why they can’t be more like you?

When in doubt, do the people who know you realize that they’ll need to look elsewhere for help?

If so, you’re not a very good friend.  In fact, you’re probably the kind of acquaintance most people avoid, and tolerate only when they have to.

That’s not a recipe for endearing yourself to the people you live with.  And when you’re a brand, the people you live with are your employees and your customers.

If you’re a brand that people want to know, they’ll be happy to introduce you to their friends.  They’ll want you to succeed, because they want what’s best for the people (and brands) they respect.

But if you’re a brand that people avoid and ignore, then convincing others of your merit will forever be an uphill climb.  And since you’ll probably complain about that climb, and hold grudges against the people who don’t help you along the way, it’s bound to be lonely at the top… if you ever get there.

Given that disparity, why not be the kind of person — or brand — that people want to help succeed?

And if you need some statistics to help us prove that point, check out what Dan Zarrella discovered about the power of negative tweeting.  (Hint: it’s not good.)

The tweeter in question was glowyjoeybunny, AKA Joey Alycia, who had answered Ouidad’s open call for hair models.  In addition to being a curly girl, Joey is also a technophile.  She blogs at Pink Sith, alongside her blog partner & site founder, Elvira.

During her visit, Joey tweeted about Ouidad’s great taste in music, how amazing her cut was turning out and what a wonderful experience she was having.  Afterward, she blogged enthusiastically (and unprompted) about her visit, proving that the “glowy” in her Twitter handle isn’t just superlative.

Impressed by Joey’s social media savvy, we asked her a few questions about Twitter, blogging and the way she interacts with businesses on Twitter.  Here’s what she had to say.

CC: How does your live experience change when you’re tweeting during an event (like your Ouidad visit)?

JA: I’ve found that when I’m live tweeting during an event, I’m more attentive to the details of the event.  This sounds counterintuitive, because one would assume that if I’m staring at my Blackberry and tweeting, I’m not paying attention – that simply is not true.  I become more attuned to details I feel my followers on Twitter would be interested in.

Also, from a marketing standpoint, I focus more on what is good and what isn’t good about the experience as a whole, because I am a fan of promoting businesses for good practices / criticizing businesses for bad practices.

For example, during my Ouidad visit I was tweeting about how pleasant the music was, and taking pictures of how nice the salon looked, etc. Had I not been on Twitter, I would have just been sitting there reading a magazine while my hair was being cut.  I would have been more worried about killing time and being bored than about what was actually going on.

CC: What types of experiences or insights prompt you to tweet about them?

JA: I will tweet about experiences that are really interesting and beneficial that I feel deserve to be mentioned, and I will tweet about experiences that are more negative and I feel deserve criticism.

For example, I was at a press event this past week where I could tell they had not planned for a large crowd because they did not have enough gift bags for the attendees.  I felt that if they wanted a positive review of the night and of the products being promoted that night, they should have had enough materials to provide to everyone.  I tweeted about that and received a very prompt and apologetic message from the event planners.

CC: You obviously enjoyed your Ouidad experience.  How did sharing it with your readers enrich the event?

JA: I absolutely loved my Ouidad experience!  I wanted to share it with my readers and my Tweeps (my followers) because I know that many people are hesitant to be a hair model because they fear that their hair would be ruined.  I wanted to promote the salon because I had such a wonderful time there, and I wanted to let other women know that being a hair model is a great experience.

Tweeting and blogging about the experience allowed me to focus on the details of my experience, and really allowed me to fully enjoy the luxurious (and free!) treatment I was receiving.  Like I said, had I not gone to the session knowing I was going to write about it, I would not have paid an ounce of attention to what was going on.

CC: Do companies often contact you based on your positive (or negative) online comments about their brands?

JA: Yes, companies often do contact either me or my partner on the blog about our reviews.  We appreciate having our efforts acknowledged, and we are also more loyal to companies who thank us for our reviews.  It feels good to know our hard work is being recognized!

CC: Which kind of feedback do you find more valuable: @ replies on Twitter or blog comments?

JA: I find both types of feedback more valuable.  I appreciate @ replies from companies, especially.  Companies tend to not comment on the blog as much as regular consumers / blog followers do.  I love blog comments from other women because they usually offer suggestions about products to review or application tips, which I love reading and find to be very helpful.

So… What’s the lesson here?

Brands: encourage your customers to talk, tweet and blog honestly about you.

If they love what you’re doing, they’ll share that love with their own audiences (creating new potential customers in the process).  And if they have a complaint, addressing it directly helps you simultaneously improve your business while demonstrating your respect for your customers firsthand.

Not bad for only 140 characters, right?