Our conclusion being that if brands could find a way to recruit more high sharers more people would recommend the brand to their friends and sales would almost certainly increase.

Over the past couple of weeks, two brands have caught my eye for running campaigns designed to increase the number of high sharers interacting with the brand.

The first is Samsung which has launched Samsung Nation. This is a social loyalty program where people can earn badges (and rewards) for reviewing products, tweeting, sharing links, contributing to Samsung communities and, of course, buying a product!

It is a fantastic execution designed to tap into the exact finding of our study using a combination of gamification techniques and monetary rewards to not just recruit high sharers for the brand but to get existing sharers to start sharing even more.

The second example is right at the other end of the spectrum because it is a niche online small business: http://tirechaindealer.com/. (You guessed what they sell).

I discovered them last weekend. It was raining in San Francisco so I got excited at the prospect of going skiing again in Tahoe so I thought I would get prepared.

I purchased some chains and then on Monday morning when I got in to the office there was an email waiting for me which offered me $3 for recommending them on Google by clicking +1 and a $10 refund for taking part and dropping a link in a discussion forum (nice crowdsourced SEO) or writing a blog post.

What they are doing is really smart. Their program is definitely SEO lead but the principles are exactly the same for recruiting and activating high sharers.  After all, I did find them searching on Google so it is clearly working.

Having mentioned both of these examples at a recent company meeting lots of people had experienced similar programs. One such program mentioned by @Codyelam was from a vacation rental firm Holiday Velvet, which was offering 35 Euros for Liking them on Facebook and 50 Euros to a customer who created a video of the apartment. I know the Euro isn’t in great shape right now but 35 Euros for a Facebook like seems a bit pricey!

I am sure you have examples of other brands creating programs to incentivize sharing content so it would be great to hear about them so we can start to collate them.

If you are interested in learning more about High Sharers and how brands can identify and activate them we are holding an event in San Francisco on 13^th December to discuss this study in more detail.

Only B. Bonin Bough, Global Head of Digital at PepsiCo, talked much about customer insights. He provided plenty of anecdotal examples of how the much-hyped Gatorade Mission Control  has enabled them to pick up and understand consumer behavior trends by mining social media, so that they could tactically capitalize on these through engagement (including real-time ad buying based on where conversations happen). I have to admit that when I originally heard of Mission Control, it looked too much like a PR stunt, aimed at creating a cool factor around the blinking screens on the wall to appeal to the inner astronaut in us – the gloss of the video didn’t get into how this was anything different from just having a bank of screens with the standard Radian set up. But hearing Bonin talk (see video of him speaking at the event embedded below), it was clear that they actively use it to gain insights into who their consumer is and what makes them tick. One amusing insight example offered was the fact that they early on found that Gatorade had an appeal as a hangover remedy – an insight they chose not to pursue –Bonin said – because the market for alcoholic athletes just didn’t seem large enough.  But Bonin offered plenty of examples of insights that they had run campaigns off of – such as what would make athletics directors understand the hydration benefits of Gatorade over water, something they found wasn’t coming through clearly from observing conversations. Social media is a window into the mind of their target market and a through that, a it’s a window into the health of the brand. Ultimately, as Bonin pointed out, if their target market understands Gatorade’s messages and the brand attributes that differentiates it from the competition, this has a direct impact on sales – something they have learned from “60 years of research.”

I believe that over time, brands will increasingly realize the massive value they can unlock from this data in terms of understanding motivations, trends, and behavior of the people that should matter most to them – their customers and prospects. Marketers are still spending pretty much 100% of their research budgets on traditional methods to understand their customers (online surveys are not exactly much of a radical departure from traditional methods, so they don’t count). This will change, and I predict it will be a dramatic change, though it will complement rather than replace traditional research. Systematic and methodologically rigid harvesting of social conversations and behavioral data is in the process of legitimizing this amongst a few leading brands (a few of which we are working with currently).  And as consumers start to understand that brands actually are paying attention to what they want, it will create a stronger incentive to share, as it will ultimately benefit those consumers.

Circling back to the topic of ROI, one panel discussion with Gilt.com and Fab.com was a useful reminder of the value of sharing – for them, social sharing was a critical ROI driver – it measurably leads to new sign ups and subsequent revenues, and social sharing is rapidly catching up to email campaigns in terms of effectiveness and contribution. And this link between sharing activity and customer acquisition is an important one to measure – your referrer data in your web analytics can give you great insight into who come though from sharing activity, and if set up right – you can track it all the way to conversion. Now, that’s an indisputably valuable ROI metric.

See the infographic we created of the study on Mashable.

We conducted a survey of over 3000 consumers in the US and UK and asked them to share their online experience of researching products that they were intending to purchase. The research covered 12 categories of brands that could be grouped into High Involvement (typically higher priced goods including consumer electronics/travel/financial products) and Low Involvement (typically lower priced goods including health and beauty/baby products/music products.)

To put the research into context, it is now over 4 years since Forrester published its Social Technographics research which showed that 13% of population could be defined as Creators (upload their own content, for example a YouTube video), 19% were Critics (consumers who had written reviews of a product or service) and only 19% had used a social networking site.

The picture is very different today. The number of people who could be classified as Creators and Critics has gone up three-to-four fold, while the number of people on Facebook (THE social networking site), we can estimate at over 64%, using Facebook and US Census data combined.

Like it or not – the social consumer has arrived.

High Sharers vs. Low Sharers

Every day, consumers are creating and sharing millions and millions of pieces of content related to brands. One of the most fascinating pieces of the research was the fact that consumers are clearly divided into two different camps.

1. High Sharers: people who actively create and share brand content across a range of different channels

2. Low sharers, people who are more passive consumers of content.

High Sharers, who account for approximately 20% of the population, are more likely to be younger, more likely to be loyal to a brand and three times more likely to recommend products to their friends.

Low sharers on the other hand tend to be older, more concerned with brand quality than image alone, and are more likely to switch brands.

Influential Channels

Another facet we looked into as part of this research was the relative influence of owned and earned media channels as well as the influence of search. It turns out that there are some very important differences when we look at the influence of individual channels for High vs. Low Involvement brands.

For High Involvement brands, their own brand web site, as well as review sites and search have a much higher relative influence. However, for Low Involvement brands, Facebook and Twitter are relatively much more influential.

Even at a category level, there are some very important differences. For example, if we look at the consumer electronics category, review sites are the single most influential channels alongside the brand web site, which also has a very high relative influence. However, for these types of products, Facebook has a relatively low influence.

What Can Brands Learn From This Research?

This research is, we believe, the first study to show that people who share content about a brand are more likely (by a factor of three) to recommend that brand to a friend. These fascinating findings are what brands need to incorporate into the way they approach their digital social strategy. Using this research, brands may identify some very specific ways in which they can turbo charge their digital social strategies depending on the product category.

To cut to the chase, if there are three things to take away form the study, we can summarize them as follows:

1. Brands need to use the data they have to understand the relative influence that each of their digital channels have on different stages of the purchase and advocacy lifecycle. Then they should optimize each channel’s respective content.

2. Brands need to identify and nurture High Sharers as these sharers hold the keys to driving brand advocacy. (The result? Sales.)

3. Brands need to make sure that both their communications and marketing teams optimize everything they create in order to drive value in organic search.

My presentation featured recommendations for how the consultants, managing their small direct sales businesses, can leverage Facebook to build awareness, find new customers and ultimately, increase sales.

For my comrades in digital strategy, from “the Valley” to “the Alley,” there was nothing revolutionary about what I talked about. This has been on the forefront of our minds for several years now.

But for this audience, this information was a revelation — new, vital and appreciated.

And for me, this speaking experience gave me a few hours to take a step back from my obsessive need to know “what is the next big innovation in tech?” and focus on the massive amount of people who are only still discovering the impact of social media.

(Sidebar: Speaking on stage in front of 1500 people with flawless skin? Kind of intimidating!)

Photo Credit: http://stylemaven.com/

I imagine it’s incredibly overwhelming to be new to digital marketing and have all of these tools and updates and apps and platforms and strategies and insights and case studies and best practices bombarding you from all corners of the web. Where do you even start? What do you try first? How complicated it must all seem.

But when it comes to content, what never fails to surprise me is how simple an idea can be while still having enormous impact.

Rodan+Fields is a particularly special client to me because they “just get it.”

They recognize how imperative the digital landscape is to their business, and they also understand that creating compelling, interactive brand content is the best way to engage new customers.

Last winter, we created the The Age-O-Meter for them.

This Facebook app, which allows users to upload a photo and then “age” it to see what they’ll look like down the line, has since been featured across the media landscape, from Shape Magazine to the long-tail beauty blogs. It was also a recent finalist in the Technology Innovation Award category of the Direct Selling Association‘s annual awards.

None of us — client or agency — expected The Age-O-Meter to be garnering so much attention and engagement still, more than 6 months later.

And yet, it continues to boast incredibly high engagement numbers, has nearly 100K photo transformations and remains the only app of its kind created by a major beauty brand.

People always ask me to tell them what I think is the “COOLEST,” most “VIRAL” brand content. Then they’re always shocked when I list the simplest of ideas — single-action apps, info-graphics, contests, punchline media (short funny videos or cleverly written list-posts).

When a brand is deciding what content to produce, the most important things to keep in mind are identity and message. Who is your brand and what is it trying to say? There is always a story there — a lesson to teach, a motivation to share, an emotion to incite. And within those stories sometimes lie simple content ideas.

But if your message is clear, sometimes simple is all you need.

The same goes for location-based apps. Foursquare. Check. Gowalla. Check. Facebook Places. Check. Again, I tried all of them but I dropped them equally quickly as I struggled to find a place for them (literally). For me, the reward just wasn’t sufficiently strong. I just can’t get excited about becoming a mayor or telling everyone where I am.

However, I think that is all about to change. A couple of weeks ago, Virgin America launched its own badge reward program to coincide with the launch of its new Terminal at SFO.

The campaign is designed to get people to explore the new Terminal and broadcast some of the innovative new features of the terminal to their newsfeeds. I am a huge “fan” of Virgin America which is one of the reasons it appealed to me. It turned checking in into an activity where I could show my affinity for the brand and get my Virgin America badge of honor. While it wasn’t part of the promotion, I am sure they must be planning to offer small rewards for people who make it through to being Navigator or Captain.

What sort of people do check-in? Why do people check-in to places? Or brands? What would make them want to check-in? (To understand this in more detail, we have just commissioned a consumer poll asking exactly these questions, so stay tuned.)

With Facebook just announcing Facebook Deals, the motivation for people to check-in might be about to take a whole new turn. Building on Facebook Places, it will be very easy for Facebook to start offering specific brand deals to people who mention brands in a news feed or use Facebook Places check-in data as well as existing profile interest data to start to create much more relevant deals. The possibilities for combing the social, mobile and location-based elements of Facebook with the Facebook Deals engine is exciting for both brands and consumers.

I am convinced that the convergence of social and location is going to be huge this year as more and more brands experiment with providing incentives for people to check-in when they visit, see, interact or buy a specific product or brand.

At Beyond, we are excited to be working with the organizers of the Social-Loco conference in San Francisco on May 5^th exploring the convergence of mobile, social and location.

There is no question that Foursquare and Gowalla created the social check-in concept. However with Facebook’s ability to bring the combination of Groupon and Foursquare to 600 million people means that Facebook will undoubtedly take the check-in concept to a new level.

Over the last two years online, there has been a noted decline in trustworthiness for “a person like myself,” according to the recently released 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer. However, consumer trust in company-employed technical experts and CEOs increased in this same period.

It doesn’t seem like it, but it’s only been in the last six years that we’ve really committed to this crescendoed social media zealotry of WOM! Referrals! Tribes! Friend Circles! Likes! SmallTownMentality2.0!!

We’ve been tossing around questions like, “What’s the ROR — return on relationship?” and asking each other to redefine ”engagement,” as if it really means anything other than what it’s always meant — “not boring.”

And now, ironically, we’re hearing about a burgeoning era of “Friend Fatigue.” (No, I didn’t make that up.)

People have too many so-called friends, and they fill a variety of increasingly specific roles. Some of them aren’t even really friends – just acquaintances or familiars that got mixed into our social networks. We add them, and then we filter them, hide them or block them out of our update feeds.

Our platonic ideal of “Friend” has become so broad that when breaking it down, we find even grainer classifications: High School friends (good for memories), College friends (good for comparisons), Professional friends (good for networking).

Yet despite all the friend-filtering, your company is now, more than ever, being told by marketers, PR teams and digital strategists like myself that you have to be a better “friend” to your consumers.

You have to hang out (social networks and micro-communities), work on your relationship (customized content and voice), listen and respond (open community management and commenting), support and compliment (social incentives and favors for influencers), and even play games with them.

Well, it’s true. The Internet is one giant real-time playground where the popular kids still rule the school. And if you’re not friends with those kids, prepare to eat your lunch alone.

But back to the Edelman report, and here’s what I hope inspires:  These “friends” you’re making are ready to get more serious about their relationship with you.

Chances are, if you’re doing a good job with your digital strategy and social media engagement, your friends already “Like” you. They follow your tweets, they give you feedback and they show loyalty to your products.

What this report is telling us, though, is that they’re ready to make an even deeper commitment. They want to know your CEO and who your top talent is. They want to hear your opinions on a variety of areas, and not just insights specific to your own products. They want to know more than just your financial quarterly reports, but what you’re passionate about, what innovation you hope to achieve and how you’re planning on getting there.

So how do you become “more than friends” with your consumers?

It’s all about content, and lots of it.

Your brand needs to own and amplify as much and as varied content as it possibly can. Not just about your products and where they can be purchased, but why. Why do you even produce those products? Who are the individuals working on making those products better and why are so many different skill sets needed? What does your CEO do when she isn’t working on those products? What is your passion?

All of these deep questions are just the type of intimate things people want to know about each other, and your brand in a serious, committed relationship is no different. People want to read your thoughts, watch your videos, play your games, and share all of those things of their own with you.

By creating a content-rich, multi-faceted brand experience online, you are opening up yourself to having a real relationship with your customers – giving them new information, making room for them in your narrative, showing passion for them, and, let’s be real, keeping them engaged.

(Remember? Not boring.)

Like with all committed relationships, getting serious isn’t easy and takes a lot of time, energy, patience and compromise. You’ll have to take a good look where you’re spending your marketing, advertising and PR dollars, and really ask yourself – is all of this buying me my best relationship behavior? Kind of like asking yourself, “Would I date me?”

So… would you?

Never one to be left behind, we have written our first collaborative whitepaper from all disciplines of our agency on these new updates to Facebook Pages and outlined everything you need to know from search, digital creative, content and community, and research/analytics.

Here’s a sample of what’s within:

Download the paper below to learn more.

Facebook Pages: The Updates and What You Need to Know

Original tweet from the @kennethcole account

An apology was issued relatively quickly, but as with all social media gaffes, the damage was already done, and both bloggers and mainstream news sources had picked up the story.

@kennethcole apology

Subsequently, in true Twitter-schadenfreude, an account, @kennethcolepr, was immediately set live, firing mocking missives such as, “Rolling through Germany? Gestapo by our new Berlin store! #KennethColeTweets.”

What a nightmare for the brand, huh?

This kind of mistake always offends me. Independently of my opinion on the content of the tweet, what is upsetting is that not only does this kind of public #fail scare other brands away from social media efforts, but it also underlines the still slow-to-adopt standard requisite that brand community management strategists should have both journalistic experience and ethics training.

The real-time web is a 24/7 conversation that is being moderated by the entire world. Allowing your brand to join this conversation is, of course, crucial to your marketing and business development efforts.

And while natural communication mistakes will be made — words will sometimes be misconstrued, audiences may not always share in all of your opinions, etc. — there is a level of intelligence, common-sense and intuition that cannot be allowed to fall off your list of imperatives.

We work with brands to create and communicate their voices. Part of this learning process also involves understanding that this commitment of resources to social media is no longer an “also-ran” in marketing budgets.

Allowing unsupervised interns and jr. associates to represent million-dollar companies as first-responders to your internet consumer base (also known as, “the world”), means that you get what you pay for: cheaper, inexperienced monitoring and very likely, the threat of ethical immaturity.

I’m not here to slam Kenneth Cole too hard (and when the dust clears, they are welcome to give us a call if they want to talk Community Management strategy!). If they are a smart company, they will use this public face-plant as a learning-tool (much in the legacy of Domino’s or BP) for carefully reviewing the resourcing, goals and key performance indicators of their social media presence.

With so many innovative campaigns redefining the digital landscape, we’re looking to get inside the heads of the industry’s best and brightest to find out what they think will be the next big thing in 2011.

So to kick things we have an exclusive 4 part interview with Hugh Garry, creative producer at Radio 1, who was responsible for the highly successful ’U CTRL Katy Perry‘ project from last year.

Watch part 1 here and then head on over to our YouTube channel to get the rest of the interview!

Back in the day, the “doldrums” described equatorial areas of sea where the wind was so calm, sailors might have to wait days, weeks, sometimes even months, for the smallest of squalls to push their ships forward. That kind of listless inactivity would be enough for a crew to mutiny– and a few did.

Imagine three extra months at sea with this guy!

The non-maritime definition of the doldrums is pretty much the same as its original: dull, sluggish, uninspired. Anyone who’s ever had to write a 30-page client recommendation on, well, anything, might have encountered the doldrums as, “writer’s block.” The same goes for us artistic types who may be struggling to find the perfect design solution for the next project. When this happens, we open ourselves to distraction and discord.

Admit it: how many times have you resorted to arranging paper clips on your desk in fantastical formations or practiced balancing a pencil on your nose, just to avoid looking at a blank page?

Luckily, there are ways to be inspired creatively that don’t involve the possibility of graphite in your eyeball.

The next time you find yourself in the slums of Imaginationland, try out a few of the following tips.

1. Eat Something

Dude, beef and cheddars for $1 at Arby's!

While running on a full stomach can have disastrous consequences, running on empty is not so good either. Hunger can be a huge distraction to productivity. Grab a handful of walnuts or make a protein shake. Now might be the perfect time to finally try your sister’s vegan tempeh casserole. Bonus: if you hate it, you’ll have something to write about.

2. Cleanse Yourself

The Greek scientist and general jack-of-all-science-trades Archimedes is said to have discovered the principle of displacement in the bathtub, when he noticed that the level of his bathwater changed as he sat down. Later, Albert Einstein was once quoted asking, “Why is it I get my best ideas in the morning while I’m shaving?”

What was his favorite soap? Lever 3000.

There are theories about white noise from running water allowing your thoughts to wander, or the temperature rushing heat to the brain for enhanced brain activity, or even negative ions. Of course, this is more easily practiced in the comfort of one’s own home than at work (as far as I know, none of the Beyond offices have a special productivity shower… yet!), but that doesn’t mean you can’t find a suitable replacement.

I think some of our best thoughts come when we’re going through our various ablutions because of the ritual aspect: water, soap, rinse, repeat. It doesn’t take much thought, freeing our minds to slowly tackle our other issues. I’d argue you could probably get the same mind-freeing feeling from folding laundry or clearing your computer desktop.

3.  Exercise

I’m going to let Ms. Elle Woods take a stab this one:

Exercise: Keeping people happy and non-homicidal since 2001.

4. Teach

They say “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.” Whether this is necessarily true in actual professions is still up for debate, but there is some validity to the notion that teaching someone else can help yourself in the end. Let’s say you’re having trouble writing a blog post about finding inspiration. You might call up some of your pals and plan to meet up for movies and Milky Way bars. As you’re chatting near the end of A League of Their Own, trying to explain what is it you do at the job of yours exactly?, the proverbial clouds in your mind disperse and you’ve got the idea. Sometimes it just takes talking to a friend or colleague to break down the situation in easy, manageable pieces and find the creamy nougat solution.

Chocolate and conversation: a winning combination.

I hope these tips will help you on your next creative endeavor, but if you still find yourself completely lost on a new digital solution, feel free to call on us.