Social Media Usage in Fortune 100 companies

Youtube and twitter rate highly for activity, but Facebook and blogs win when it comes 2 way engagement with customers. A good percentage of all companies surveyed use at least one social media platform, but US and Asian companies are the most proactive when it comes to exploiting the power of all 4 platforms surveyed.

I found this an interesting overview – but missing data on LinkedIn usage, the social media site of choice for most  businesses.

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I think that I enjoyed doing the SEO the most, as keyword analysis reveals so much about what people are looking for and gives great insights on things to consider when creating marketing messages and site content. SEO also highlights the importance of proper organization within a website – from source code construction and technical instructions to text content and visual layout. Looking at a website through the lens of Google Analytics can tell you exactly what is performing well and what isn’t. However, SEO is ongoing process and not a quick fix, but a very worthwhile exercise for any business, as long term attentive management can yield high organic search engine rankings.

Our Social Media Marketing report delved into the top 12 social media platforms and how to use them from a commercial business perspective. We gave examples of how we used the platforms on behalf of our client and offered tips on how to make the most of  your own youtube channel to participating in LinkedIn groups, as well as demonstrating the power of Blogs versus the reach of twitter.

For the Digital Advertising report, a couple of different methods of online advertising were examined. This ranged from online sponsorship to Google adwords to Direct Ads on LinkedIn. We constructed examples of ads for both Google Adwords and LinkedIn DirectAds, refining the messages to suit different target audience segments.

The Digital Marketing Strategy document contained an overview of our online activities and recommendations, the competitive and economic environment in which our client operates (our focus was UK and Ireland – Software as Service industry), research findings from face to face interviews with HR managers and  focus groups that we held with Plato business network groups and future strategic recommendations. It was a lot of work – but it was a great opportunity to really get up close and in depth with digital marketing and its commercial application.

So now I’m starting on part 2 of my practicum / thesis and next step is to present our findings to three different audiences;

• Our client – HRLocker
• A DCU Academic panel
• To our peers within the class.

The goal here will be to to make sure that all the information we gathered is distilled into its clearest and most concise form – so that all three groups we are presenting to will get something out of it.

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Given the choice between writing a thesis and doing a team project with a real-world company, I chose the latter and myself and my team (Antonio Minuta, Colin Oliver and CarolAnn O’Sullivan) have got down to business with our chosen practicum company – HRLocker and its MD & Entrepreneur, John Dennehy.

Our mission is to create a marketing strategy for HRLocker. So this week we are working on SEO analysis to make the most of HRLocker’s current website and we are busy establishing a social media footprint via twitter, blogging etc for the company .We will also be conducting primary research on product feasibility with SME business groups.

HRLocker offers HR management software tools for small to medium sized businesses, currently features include; employee records organization, time-sheets, holiday tracking and secure storage for HR Documents such as employee handbooks etc online. Everything that HRlocker offers is online and its part of a growing Software as a Service (SaaS) trend that predicts that days of installing software in individual computers is nearing its end and in the future many business services will be accessed on online from anywhere.

Both told inspiring stories of how they started their respective enterprises and how they both really have their communities to thank for the success of WordPress (open source coders) and Craigslist (all the users). Ben Hammersley editor at large (from Wired magazine ) also attended and gave great insight and opinion on the future of newspapers and news media – maybe a cull is long overdue as in Ben’s opinion (and I agree) a sharp edit of news media outlets could be a good thing as news might become more relevant again, and not just a ‘filler’ for 24 hour news stations. An excellent event, am already looking forward to the next one.

To bring things more up to date I read  Socialnomics by Eric Qualman (a rather nerdy xmas gift to self – but very enjoyable at the same) that was published in 2009, so although, also rapidly dating, (such is the subject matter) but a really good overview, analysis on online social media behavior and how it can be harnessed from a marketing perspective, as well as a few predictions about the possible future developments of social media as a media resource and channel.

I also read Blink and the Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, really liked Blink in particular as it explored with the concept of  dual process theories of reasoning looking mainly at system 1 (associative system – snap decisions that are biologically innate or formed because of past experience) and contrasting it with system 2 (rule based system – a thought process that is very structured, controlled and acquired by formal tuition). System 1 – which Gladwell refers to ‘the power of thinking without thinking’ and ‘thin slicing’ is all about gut decisions and why and how they matter. In the immersion week that I did in my first week in DCU we covered this topic, but with more focus on system 2, but I found that this book gave balance to the subject overall, and well worth a read to anybody that’s interested in human behavior.

Am off to the Web Summit on february 4th in Trinity College, so I hope this event will be good as it features Craig Newmark (founder of Craigslist)  and Matt Mullenweg (founder of WordPress,  – thanks for facilitating this blog Matt!), so will be posting again soon to let you know how it goes

For example, as posted by Kaushik, here are some clean definitions from Klout:

Engagement
How diverse is the group that @ messages you?
Are you broadcasting or participating in conversation

Velocity
How likely are you to be retweeted?
Do a lot of people retweet you or is it always the same few followers?

Reach
Are your tweets interesting and informative enough to build an audience?
How far has your content been spread across Twitter?
Are people adding you to lists and are those lists being followed?

So you can see from these metric indicators above (there are many more), that Twitter is much more than counting how many people are following you and who you are following back -  Re-Tweets data lets you see how your tweets are perceived by other users, as you can track how influential your original comment has been -  how often (if at all ) are you quoted & re-tweeted by someone else on twitter – its a indicator of engagement which is the heart of social media. I recommend reading Avinash Kaushik’s full blog post as it broadened and deepened my understanding of Twitter and its functionality immensely.

Niall’s top tips were:

1.    Do ask established bloggers for their advice and help
2.    Blog consistently at the start – once a week, around the same time
3.    Share your knowledge and expertise freely in your blog
4.    Make your blog a resource for your readers
5.    Drive traffic to your blog via use of social media
6.    The real reason for blogging is ultimately to engage with people
7.    Use your blog to ask questions and encourage interaction
8.    Don’t forget to include a call to action at the end of your blog
9.    Use your blog to build your personal brand
10.   Don’t be a perfectionist, just get on with it

I was lucky enough to attend with a sizeable crowd of fellow DCU masters students and it was a good practical balance to theory that we learn in class.

So If you know of any other practical tips on blogging, or are looking to get started yourself please post as I would love to find out what’s working for other fledging bloggers out there.

Find out more about Derval Concannon at www.firecracker.ie

To put us really through our paces, the marketing course arranges all the students into many teams (I’m in 6 different teams) – so its very busy, but also very sociable. We all have to present topic’s in class and so far I’ve done a presentation on Brand Communities (Changing consumer class) and just today  Lynx, Chocolate temptation Ad deconstruction (Marketing Communications class).

All this while brainstorming and storyboarding our youtube viral video (brand management class) and fitting in case study analysis (marketing management & strategy class) and arranging a focus group (for my market research class)  – Its all in days work here, and I have say that’s it can be pretty challenging from a time management perspective , but also lots of fun, and will 50+ in the class – its never ever boring, and its exactly why I decided to this course in the first place – new people, new ideas, new ways of doing things.

Find out more about Derval Concannon at www.firecracker.ie

Among other things, the immersion week is to include a presentation by Carr Communications, and a team building day run by Hosca management consultants all with the aim of  helping us to get to know each other before the hard work begins, so I’m sure that this will be lots of fun and very very interesting . I will be balancing the masters course with my work at Firecracker, for the benefit of all and, as ever, will be keeping you updated via this blog on the new developments in the marketing world.

Find out more about Derval Concannon at www.firecracker.ie