The current generations of young consumers grew up with digital embedded in their lives. They are digital natives and take to twittering, tagging, sms-ing like earlier generations take to opening the refrigerator.
* Brandon Evans, Managing Director, RepNation Media
* John Kadlic, Executive Director of Business Development, Resource Interactive
5 Rules for Customer 2.0 Engagement
1. Authenticity Trumps Celebrity
2. Niche is the New Norm
3. Bit Sized Communications Dominate
4. Personal Utility Drives Adoption
5. Customers Own Brands
Jake: Impressive list of rules - Brandon has done a great job outlining the details behind these 5 rules. It was hard to capture all of his data points, so I would strongly recommend checking out his presentation (hopefully he has submitted it to the WOMMA folks).
Brandon outlined the case study behind the Mountain Dew college targeted program: Dew DYI. Amazing to see what people can create based on/around the Dew brand.
John takes the stage...
John's group is about to launch a new book, Open Brand.
Global Gift Culture
Much more than Consuming:
* Creating
* Sharing
* Influencing
"The rise of iCitizens" - the people who are at the forefront of creating, sharing, and influencing.
What motivates an iCitizen?
* Competence - "I can!" (flickr, Wikipedia, delicious)
* Collectivism - "I connect!" (Facebook, MySpace)
* Change - "I am!" (Beauty Dish blog)
* Celebrity - "I matter!" (Ze Frank)
(Digtial Millennials study MySpace profile: www.myspace.com/ruready4us)
Creating connections:
* hp.com/printstudio
* PCAVOTE.com
Lunch session speaker: Andy Sernovitz
Advertising is the price of being boring.
If you're ad is not worth talking about, don't spend the money to push it out.
Boring + WOM = Fantastic
* Will it Blend blender
* Heinz asked for consumers to create their next commerical. 4700 submissions, 5.2 million views
* Fisk-a-teers
You found success when your customers are in tears over your product.
7 WOM Emotions (uh oh, here comes the group activity!)
* Happiness
* Love
* Surprise
* Fun
* Belonging
* Pride
* Anger
This panel is focused on discussing the concept of, and the engagement with "Brand Fans". How do you listen? How do you bring them into the brand experience?
Brands
* Moderator: Rob Key, CEO, Converseon
* Jeff Sinelli, CEO, Which Wich
* Angela Vargo, Manager of Product Development, Southwest Airlines
* Christine Hight, Director of Consumer Research, Hilton Hotels
Brand Fans
* Jamie Clear, Brand Fan, Alli
* Ken Davenport, Owner, Davenport Theatrical Enterprises, Inc.
P&G has said that 50% of innovation will soon come from outside the company.
Hilton entered the brand fan interaction process by starting with a small, 4 month trial using Communispace with three research activities per week. The initial assumption was that they'd run out of thing to talk about. But the community members actually came back with more ideas, thoughts, discussion points on their own. This community started to form around topics separate from the "research" portion driven by Hilton.
One of Hilton's realizations was that there are preferences and there are contracts. A special pillow is a preference, a non-smoking room is a contract. (This was one of those things that seems obvious in the light of day, but until "outsiders" bubble it up, it's not brought out in the light)
Southwest first launched into the "listening" process with their blog. They've wrestled with listening to the brand fanatics when their opinions may differ wildly. They listen to the fanatics, but they have to be smart about the way they implement suggestions and drive their business.
The Southwest blog driver is actually from the Product Management team, which she says makes a lot of sense given the nature of the blog feedback and the charge of the Product Management team.
Ken says that there are two unique problems:
* How to brand an industry as a whole
* How to listen to people talking about your specific product
He doesn't do everything the fans ask, but he'd "be crazy not to listen".
Christine: When you ask for feedback, be sure to be prepared for frank, honest discussion. Angst has been clarified about the fact that the lower end brands give free wireless access while the "full-service" hotels don't. Close the loop - feed back solutions to the community, even if there's not an immediate solution.
There are good ideas and there's bad ideas... how do you separate the two?
Angela: Customers complained about the fact that Southwest hadn't released a specific holiday travel scheduled so Southwest posted a blog entry that gave a technical description about the "why". The customers went nuts! To them it was a personal issue - people wanted to book their trips to grandma's. The technical description made the customers irritated rather than informed.
Are we in a honeymoon period for these customer communities? If community members aren't getting answers to their questions, they'll quickly disappear or become even more jaded towards your company. Product communities are new and exciting to the members, the biggest question is not how to get them there, how do keep them engaged.
Why do you participate?
Jamie: "I was there from the beginning I want to help out and stay involved."
To Angela: "Do you screen the various internal bloggers to find the best person to write content?"
Answer: "Yes."
Hilton's community team has little daily interaction with the PR team, unless there's a specific crisis issue. They'd like to do a better job of funneling insights back into PR and other teams.
Hilton has to retire people from their Communispace community in order to keep things fresh. They wish they could retire those folks to a "retirement community" (so to speak), but there's not enough funds yet.
This session covered the state of the industry, looking at not only the overall size but projections of what the future holds. The session is based on the new PQ Media "Word of Mouth Marketing Forecast 2007-2011".
In 1970 40% of the media spend was on advertising. In 2006, 0.4% spent on Word of Mouth, but grew significantly faster than nominal GDP and overall marketing services spend in 2007
Most controversial subject of the research: What IS word of mouth marketing.
Segments
* Content & Services (83%)
*** Strategy and Consulting
*** WoM agencies
*** Online Communities
*** WoM Media
* Ancillary Products (17%)
*** Research and Measurement
*** Technology & Tools
(Both segments growing quickly and in a similar position)
WoM spend reached $981 million in last 5 years
Major drivers behind this growth
* Broadcast TV has lost 1/2 of it's viewing hours in last 25 years
* Consumers are not as engaged (media multi-tasking, skipping ads)
* Consumers spending more time out of the home
* WOM is trusted
3.5 billion WOM conversations per day in United States. 90% of WOM takes place offline.
"Only what get measured gets bought", and as such there's a need to standardize the industry on a Return on Experience metric.
In this session, Patrick Quinn, President/CEO, PQ Media introduced PQ Media's proprietary econometric methodology known as Medianomics (TM) and gave today's first look at the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Forecast 2007-2011.
The report can be obtained here for purchase.
* WOM marketing is defined differently by people, but PQ Media defines it as "an alternative marketing strategy supported by research and technology that encourages consumers to dialogue about products and services"
* Consumers are shifting from traditional to alternative media, which is a reason WOM is growing so strongly
* Spending on WOM marketing jumped 35.9% in 2006 to $981 million and looks to reach $1 billion in 2007
* 1/3 of all media usage is multi-tasking
* Key is that consumers trust WOM more than anything, but trust is sensitive and needs to be nurtured
* Most of WOM is off-line, so measurement needs to go there as well
* Brand marketers for the most part are going to agencies to run the campaigns and metrics
In a rapid-fire presentation, Quinn provided both an overview and details on WOM marketing ... but to get the full impact of his information, either purchase the report or sign up to receive the executive summary (see link provided above).
Sister Hazel Mantra: "No fan, no band"
Band wanted to build a community, something bigger than any song or show.
They made themselves incredibly accessible
Started with college towns, since music plays such a role in that point in your life. For every cassette they'd give away, they'd sell two.
When they'd expand to new cities, they could clearly see the impact of fans from other cities.
When people were waiting in the cold to get into a Sister Hazel show, the band would come out and do an acoustic set for them, buy them pizza. They were honestly concerned about their fans.
Fans had a sense of ownership, a sense that they "knew them".... which of course they did!
One of the "Hazelnuts" (the Sister Hazel fan group) says "I never wanted to bug the band, didn't want to be 'that guy'... but here I am!"
The band comes out after *every* show to sign CDs.
Jake: There is a clear vibe from the band that they truly appreciate the fans, and that they're not afraid of a little extra/hard work. Clearly it's showing a return. They also pay attention to the efforts of the fans, even if they seem a bit "weird".
Rock Boat (bands + cruise ship + fans) was pure - it embodied the spirit of what they were trying to do going back to their college days. No record execs, no spreadsheets, just fans, fan love, and the bands. (Each year's cruise now sells out in 24 hours) The band would sit down with their fans and ask about their year, see what they could do to help them.
Fantastic quote about the Sister Hazel fan community (or really any community):
It's something that when you're on the outside looking in, you can't understand it. If you're on the inside looking out you can't explain it.
How do these efforts drive financial success? There'd be no band without these efforts.
Hazelnut Fan: I participate because he's at a point in his life where he doesn't need "stuff" he needs experience. Refreshing to him, as a fan, that the band will come out before/after the show and talk to the fans by name, asking about their families, etc.
Jake: You know, the work Sister Hazel does is really work. It's tough to spend extra time on doing things like remembering a fan's family history, or taking time after the show to sign as many CDs as there are people. This social work is tough, it takes time, but the rewards are fantastic. I sometimes feel like the marketing industry is more concerned with leaving at straight up 5p every day than creating great ideas.
Band reserves a block of tickets for the Hazelnuts to bring a friend to introduce (indoctrinate) that friend into the Hazelnut culture, meeting the band, being backstage.
How do they measure success? They can see it because people keep showing up to their shows!
Don't like using the word "fan", or "customer"... it doesn't give the respect deserved. They call them friends.
Hazelnut fan: "It's like religion to me".
"The things we were doing back in 1994 have showed a return"
Keywords that sum up the session:
* Trust
* Empathy
* Hard work
* Passion
This year's Wommie Awards go to the following project:
* Affinitive - "American Skiing Company: MyA41.com Passholder Community"
* Converseon - "Second Chance Tree Project Takes Reforestation from Virtual World to Physical World"
* Fanscape - "Clear Channel NEW! Populating Site with Musicians Campaign"
* Quicken Loans -- "How Quicken Loans Became a Yahoo! Answers Knowledge Partner"
All four of these projects were presented at a high level and were very impressive. One in particular really stood out to me, based on the high level thinking (moreso than the project itself). The gentleman from Converseon talked about the "Rise of new tribalism" in relation to this WOM/social/community thing. He suggests we take an anthropological approach to the work we're doing.
He pointed to the adventures showcased in the Discovery Channel show, "Living with the Kombai Tribe", where two men try to become "adopted" by the tribe. Learning the language wasn't enough, they had to learn the culture too. Sure they could show up and pass out iPods, but that's a short-term connection. They take a different tact, learning the value of a pig to a village elder, for instance.
Oh, and by the way, his program won a WOM award, a PR award, and an advertising award. Clearly this new "social" thing is cutting across internal functions. Who owns WOM? All of us.
This session seeks to answer how mobile devices can drive advocacy, action and conversational marketing.
Moderator: John Bell, Managing Director/Executive Creative Director 360 Digital Influence, Ogilvy PR
Panelists:
* Kevin Granath, VP, Ansible Mobile
* Felicia Hill, Engagement Marketing, Virgin Mobile
* Scott Kelliner, Manager, Sugar Mama program, Virgin Mobile
* Chase McMichael, CEO, UnBound Technologies
Points of note:
* There is tremendous growth in the use of mobile technology in social media - in Japan a phone can be used to make purchases, t-shirts list numbers to text to take certain actions, and much more
* Diverse usage - everyone is engaged, with significant variations by market within the U.S and the European Union
* As many as 10% of mobile subscribers create/share content, with a 96% annual growth in photo messaging and a 137% growth in video messaging since '06
* Kelliner says Sugar Mama is based on an exchange between watching short online spots, rating them and providing feedback, and receiving a minute of airtime in exchange for a minute of the mobile engagement
* Hill said that two years ago, Virgin Mobile created a month-long text-based story (160 character limit) about a homeless youth that was considered a success, considering that participation wasn't free
* McMichael said that enabling users to use short codes across carriers was an important marketing development
* McMichael said that UnBound Technologies was able to map SMS usage to who messaged whom and through that see consumer affinity, which helped identify influencers and thus enabled being able to incentivize them
* McMichael said that viral widgets are mobile and are going to
* Granath notes that mobile extends the potential for WOM on a 24-hour day consumer basis (e.g. in the morning for getting news, at home in the evening for getting TV and movies information/interaction)
* How comfortable are customers with paying for participation in SMS campaigns? If the value proposition is strong, people are willing to pay.
This session discussed the similarities and differences between WOM in Europe, Asia and other places around the globe.
Panelists:
* Robin Fray-Carey, CEO and Co-Founder, SMToday Media
* Peter Auditore, Head Business Influencer Relations Group, SAP AG-Global Communications
Points of note from Auditore:
* Who are your influencers? Find them before developing your programs
* There is nothing new about WOMM, it's been around forever
* WOMM is all about brand - without brand, you're not going anywhere
* Don't put the cart before the horse, because if your brand isn't established ahead of time, where will you go and where will you hide?
* WOMM starts with brand experience and brand reputation
* WOMM hasn't changes before and after the age of the Internet, but its now at warp speed and the enabling technologies hurry it along
* The least significant single influence source regarding IT purchase decisions are blogs (#24 on a list of all influencers), while it's the VPs of IT security/infrastructure/something else that are the most influential
* The enabling technologies of the internet are today's WOMM marketing stage
Points of note from Fray-Carey:
* Overall climate in B2B media shows that print and broadcast info are on the decline (Pew study 2004)
* The Wall Street Journal Online even gets much of its information from "niche" blogs
* Engagement trumps impressions
* The goal for the sites Fray-Carey creates for her clients is lead generation
* This week SAP's myventurepad.com launched, and by bringing external bloggers on board, it broadens the impact
* Disintermediation is as relevant in B2N as it is in B2C
Andy Sernovitz, author of Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking lead the hands-on, participatory lunch-time activity.
* Sernovitz started out with the slide "I Love You" to reflect that he loved word of mouth marketing and the people who are passionate about it and are trying to be advocates that carry it forward.
* Tongue-in-cheek, Sernovitz said that word of mouth marketers are better looking, smarter, charming that the average marketers, which the audience certainly enjoyed hearing.
* You don't talk about a product because an advertisement is good, you talk about it because it makes you happy.
* Sernovitz argues that the fundamental question should always be, "Would anybody tell a friend?"
* Boring + WOM = Fantastic!
* His favorite WOM campaigns for really boring products are:
- Blender www.willitbend.com
- Heintz ketchup (search YouTube for examples, such as the under-appreciated uses for ketchup or www.heinzketchupideas.com)
- Fiskars scissors
- Duck Tape
* The 7 WOM Emotions
- Happiness, glee
- Love, arousal, passion
- Surprise, wow, astonishment
- Fun (e.g., e-mail jokes or Facebook apps)
- Belonging
- Pride, ego, "I want to be special"
- Anger, frustration, disappointment (the ticking time bomb of negative WOM)
* The audience shouted out examples of what it considered best examples of the 7 WOM emotions