Jay Byrne IABC Southern Regional Conference 2011 (Adobe PDF – 3MB)

http://www.jaybyrne.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Talkers-2011-Jay-Byrne.pdf.

I’ve been asked to provide an example of intersecting real world behaviors with new media tactics. So, let’s take Twitter. While some will use Twitter for customer service, others for one-to-one and one-to-network information sharing, the fact remains that most people aren’t using Twitter or going there in their day-to-day interactions.

But, something a significant volume of people do is search and scan news online. Twitter influences what stories we are likely to see in online news aggregator sites (e.g., Google News, Yahoo! News or your local newspaper’s website which pulls in those feeds) and has an influence in traditional search. Your tweets, if properly executed and syndicated, can play a role in this influence. If you want to know more, read on…

To tweet or not to tweet… consider taking two minutes to read this before you answer.

Like websites, then blogs, people have been rushing to Twitter as the next best thing now for a couple of years and often for the reason “because everybody is doing it…” As with anything, our reasons for investing our time and energy should be measurably linked to goals and not just following the crowd. I have this type of conversation with my pre-teen son and daughter every week; I never imagined I’d be having it with multi-billion dollar clients – but in the words of HL Mencken, “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people…”

If a goal is to create awareness, linked to opinion formations which eventually support beliefs upon which our target audiences act associated with our organizational or personal goals, then we should consider how and why microblogging (e.g., Twitter, Foursquare, Tumblr or microblogging features on Facebook and LinkedIn) can support that goal.

Like most social spaces, Twitter is first and foremost an “awareness” channel. Using this service you can create direct awareness of content for the people in your network and those to whom you extend your network using specific Twitter platform tactics (#hash tags, @directed tweets and RT re-tweets). However, the real value of Twitter is its power to influence broader awareness outside of the Twitter network where the majority of people reside.

In 2009 Google made a minor investment in Twitter to gain access to their live and full stream of content for use in Google’s search and the Google News aggregator algorithms. Search engine algorithms use a variety of factors to determine what search results appears above others and – this is most important for Twitter and our interests – what news stories to display on top of others in their news aggregator portals (e.g., Google News and Yahoo! News). These algorithms now tap Twitter seeking keywords tied to hyperlinks associated with news to influence what news items show up on top of these news aggregators and the news portals which display their results.

News portals have significant and broad influence – the content from these sites is streamed to hundreds of thousands of local news websites and topic portals where the vast majority of consumers and influential public policy figures get their news today. News and search portals are critical opinion formation spaces which can then lead to desired belief formations in support of our goals.

Twitter influences which stories appear and in what order they appear giving those who have effectively Tweeted first and with the most frequency (syndication) an edge on determining what the rest of the world sees on specific topics. Twitter can drive awareness AND help influence content that determines what opinions the public forms about a given topic.

News and search are influenced by Twitter

Now, only a small percentages of Tweets use effective tactics to influence search and news algorithms. If you aren’t able or willing to use these tactics effectively then the ROI on your time and energy will be limited. The two most important to consider are:

1. Inclusion of a hyperlink. On microblogs this typically involves using a URL shortening service like http://bit.ly (my preferred service).

2. Inclusion of a relevant keyword associated with the topic, to which you can also assign a #hash tag. By including the “#” pound sign or hash tag in front of a contiguous string of characters you can alert others on Twitter interested in that topic and create new visibility for your Tweet which can help syndicate your search and news influencing links.

On any given day and for any given topic there may be numerous news reports (these can be from mainstream sources or simply blogs) associated with sustainable agriculture, biotechnology, etc… Typically, stories which have been amplified via Twitter with the following characteristics will have more influence than other stories:

• “First to be tweeted” – links to stories which hit Twitter first frequently appear as the top news. Speed matters.

• Most tweets (and re-tweets) – stories with the highest volume of links from Twitter frequently appear on top. Even if you aren’t an “early tweeter” you can help support those who are by re-Tweeting or re-posting their contents to your Twitter account. Size (volume) matters.

• Weight of tweets – the more people following your tweets (subscribers) gives them more weight. Further, you can add to this weight by linking your Twitter account to your LinkedIn, Facebook or other social media accounts so that your tweets are automatically syndicated to those networks. So “following” one another in our Twitter network and syndication within our other social networks, just like linking to one another’s blogs gives all of our tweets (whether we are tweeting or not) additional influence. Validation (followers) matters.

If you want to influence news and search and are willing to adopt one or more of the tactics which can make that happen, Twitter may provide you with a decent return on investment.

http://www.jaybyrne.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Byrne-v-Fluence-Conference-Board-May-2010.pdf

http://www.jaybyrne.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/v-Fluence-Digital-Health-Technologies-2010.pdf

Among these, there are hundreds of applications that reference virtually every major pharmaceutical brand name, offering services from basic prescribing data to “cost-saving” generic or over-the-counter alternative options. These have been developed by medical publishers, pharmacies, payers, hospitals, advocacy groups, alternative health promoters, health care professionals, litigators, government agencies and others. Virtually every therapeutic area is already represented with growing offerings for disease management. For example, Virginia Commonwealth University recently announced an application for physicians and patients to monitor daily asthma treatment routines.

Late to the game but starting to appear are apps from the pharmaceutical industry. When it comes to pharmaceutical company-branded apps, most are free of charge, while the costs of general healthcare-related apps for the iPhone range from free to $299. More specifically, 23 percent of all medical and health applications are available for free; the median price charged for the remaining 77 percent is $1.99.

You can read the rest of this article on v-Fluence.com.

Using a Cellscope to Check for Diseases.

The latest whiz-bang application for mobile users, CellScope, comes to us from researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, whose tool enables cell phone cameras to be used as fluorescent microscopes. This means that mobile devices with cameras, like the iPhone, can be adapted to collect and transmit images from blood and sputum (snot or spit) to diagnose the presence of malaria parasites and tuberculosis.

While this fluorescent scope device currently requires a plug-in component, we’re not so far away from software or camera upgrades that would make this adaptation accessible to any iPhone or android device user. Similar applications could easily include the detection of E. coli or other bacteria in food. Imagine that your ground beef smells a little off. Take a snap with your cell phone, and learn if you’ve got a contaminated Big Mac. How about H1N1 (aka, Swine Flu)? Sneeze, and snap a picture; diagnosis and links to related information, services or therapeutic products could be delivered in real time.

The possibilities that these types of mobile applications afford, which inform decision-making and influence behavior at the point of consumption, are endless. Are we ready for mass access and control over food quality or disease diagnostics, like the examples noted above? It won’t matter if we’re ready or not, it’s coming. I’ve written before on the demise of the PC being driven by mobile applications; this is just the latest nail in that coffin, which extends mobile’s reach well beyond where anyone could have predicted.

Continue reading the full post at the v-Fluence Company Blog…

Not all of the more than 25,000 mobile applications (apps) currently available for the iPhone and other smart phone devices were intentionally designed to kill the PC; however, virtually all of them are training us for that eventuality. Point of consumption content opportunities and risks are booming and organizations that are not positioning themselves now for the related shifts will find themselves at significant disadvantages.

The demise of the PC will not surprise anyone who has studied the history of the ever-shrinking computer or my fellow boomers who still remember when the IBM Selectric™ dominated desktops over ThinkPads™. It may be harder for the X and Y generations to envision a completely PC-free world; however, they will be leading the way with their rapid adoption of mobile and other point of consumption interactive tools.

The key question for those seeking consumer and other key stakeholder influence is, “Where and when are their points of decision and consumption, and how do I effectively participate at those places and at those times?” For many, that transaction point will be via some mobile application interfacing with a smart phone, car GPS system or other Web enabled appliance or device. So, if you are still fiddling with finally launching that killer Web site or edgy corporate blog today, you can stop reading now – it’s unlikely you’ll be around to worry about this.

Continue reading the full post at the v-Fluence Company Blog…

Predictions of the death of the American newspaper are appearing with greater and greater frequency, along with the actual demise of several well known dailies. The Rocky Mountain News recently ceased publication altogether and the Christian Science Monitor will move to an all-online publishing platform next month. The Web is the accused assassin and cause of this mainstream media crisis. It also is the primary driver behind traditional media’s search for a sustainable way to exist profitably online.

What many newspapers don’t realize is that they have yet to perfect the basic mission of successful Web publishing: Link relevant content with relevant audiences for increased ROI opportunities for relevant advertisers. When they do, they may staunch their current hemorrhage and – gasp – perhaps make money online.

Time Magazine has taken up the apparent demise of print journalism with a cover story and recent report predicting the potential demise of eight to 10 of the most endangered papers in the country. Time suggests these once-powerful media mainstays are close to shutting down or moving to online-only publications. But will just a shift to online publishing save them?

Continue reading the full post at the v-Fluence Company Blog…

This past week we were talking about Skittles and an innovative campaign launched by the marketers at Mars, Incorporated, next week it will be something else. That’s the nature of our fleeting attention span and how the Web has helped whittle it into many minute buckets filled with fleeting bits and pieces of information – yes, even fruit-flavored rainbow colored ones.

For their part, the Mars marketers deserve acknowledgment: They took a bold step this week and embraced the fact that consumers, not the brand team, increasingly control their brand and image online. In fact, they’ve gone so far as to actually turn over the keys via their brand Web site, www.Skittles.com, which they re-launched largely as a navigation tool that overlays social media spaces where unfiltered, regular consumers are talking about their products.

This berry (pun intended) interesting marketing scheme on behalf of the Skittles brand clearly seeks to create the impression that they’re letting consumers control their brand. To wit:

• Skittles’ homepage offers a “chatter” tab that defaults to an overlay on Twitter. Updates occur minute-by-minute with tweets (short-text consumer generated commentary) about Skittles. (The company’s campaign initially launched with the Twitter page as its de facto homepage, a move that’s since been changed to incorporate the brand’s Wikipedia page. More on this in a minute…)
• Navigate to Skittles media and it leads to their YouTube channel (for video) or Flickr page with Skittles search results (for photos).
• Skittles’ “friends” tab takes you to their Facebook profile.
• Individual Skittles product types open their Wikipedia product page.

While Skittles is not the first company to do this (an online marketing agency in Boston launched something similar a year ago), they are certainly the first major brand to take this approach and are generating a significant amount of buzz. The day the campaign launched, #Skittles was the leading topic being discussed on Twitter and the resulting traffic headed to Skittles.com (more than 2,000 “tweets” per hour at one point) created bandwidth delays for Twitter users. Even the mainstream media took note.

But less than three days into the campaign, Skittles stepped back. While generating plenty of buzz, the Skittles marketing scheme encountered a measurable volume of criticism and unflattering commentary from Twitter users about the brand and the campaign. This included several attempts to bomb Twitter with claims like:

“NEWS ALERT: Mass Skittles recall – China blamed in latest melamine/Ebola/salmonella scandal…”

Ever since, there’s been a see-saw of debate. What’s fascinating to us is what both the cheerleaders and naysayers of the brand’s effort seem to have overlooked. In our view, the Skittles effort offers-in an arguably pioneering way-insights and lessons that can help us all better understand how to connect traditional Web 1.0 marketing and social media.

Campaign “Red Flags”

One of the first things we noticed when reviewing Skittles’ campaign took us by surprise-the description tags for the Skittles site seemed odd (see image below). In short, Skittles marketers (or their online agency) used description tags to make it look like consumers, via social media spaces, had created the search results description. We made an early prediction: Social media purists would find this tactic off-putting, and they’d likely howl about it.

That’s pretty much what happened. And, in the midst of the backlash and Twitter bombing, we also found that Skittles marketers added more fuel to the fire by securing temporary Wikipedia “page protection” for their brand profiles. This tactic to limit edits also spurred more criticism.

Taken together, these tactics cast the Skittles brand as “inauthentic” in social media spaces, where authenticity and transparency are paramount.

Campaign “Take-Aways”

But despite those steps, the Skittles campaign is instructive to all online marketers on several fronts. As we reviewed the buzz and backlash, we wondered: Where’s the measurement?

It’s true that Mars will likely generate several positive data points: increased site traffic, more Facebook fans, high-visibility media coverage and a strong volume of broad, social media buzz. Critical references aside, overall brand awareness of Skittles will be at a peak. However, will this be a major success or a missed opportunity?

The Web affords so much more than traditional marketing measurements. Eyeballs, impressions and click-throughs, yes, but it also allows us to bring our audiences closer to decision points-be they simple purchases or the formation of more complex opinions. Other than visibility, conversion metrics appear to be largely absent as part of this campaign. Will Skittles ever get another chance with such high interest to include an element that would facilitate a purchase or bring us closer to their rainbow-colored treats?

Another question occurred to us: Why essentially dump, rather than integrate, Skittles’ brand Web site into the campaign? Skittles’ decision to replace its homepage with its Twitter page proved problematic. The idea’s unquestionably bold, but with a demographic that skews towards teens and younger children excluded by birth date restrictions from the new platform, it’s a risky move.

Indeed, Skittles’ decision to replace Twitter with Wikipedia, then Facebook, then YouTube as its “homepage” resulted from recognition that it could not control the tone and substance of the consumer conversations. With Twitter or Wikipedia, at any given moment the most visible content could be a mythical recall claim generated by an anonymous poster or editor.

That decision appears wise, given the negative and profane comments posted on the Twitter page. Still, we think it offers a lesson about how to effectively integrate corporate and brand Web sites as social media portals. Doing so would allow marketers to retain some control of their online image while allowing the broader, consumer-driven conversations to occur.

This week we’re talking about Skittles. Kudos to their success as the brand’s awareness has probably never been higher. But how to make that heightened awareness stick and convert it to sales is what Skittles’ long-term Web strategy should be about-and that’s where we’ll focus our conversations next week and beyond.