Paul Gillin's book, that I've also covered in previous posts, is proving to be a far more insightful read than I anticipated.
The 3rd Chapter 'The Enthusiasts' covers the friend/enemy creation dilema that every company worries about when they start to deal with the Influencers. One of the biggest concerns at this point is how to identify and solicit their opinions.
In one case study he cites about the Nokia N90 phone, he covers the way that the Enthusiasts were identified and dealt with.
This is a filtering process of:
a. Identify a seasoned professional who can help
In this case, they got Andy Abramson on-board
b. Scour the Internet (blogsphere, Google, Technorati, etc.) for the respected voices
Note: It doesn't say what criteria and weighting he used
c. Whittle your list down to a select a small group of individuals.
Again, it doesn't say how this was exactly done. But 50 people were sent actual product to in advance of the official launch date. I guess 50 may have been a number set by Nokia, but even this is a szeable investment for something they hadn't done before ($600 X 50 = $30,000 retail value).
d. Monitor the response you get fromthese selected individuals.
According to Paul (and Andy I assume), over 40 bloggers responded by writing about the phone.
I do however have a couple of further questions:
1. How did he measure the 'Buzz' created by these 40 bloggers?
2. What would happen if this was a service or a non-tanglible product?
2 comments:
Hayden,
Paul's book is indeed excellent.
To your questions, quantitative analysis or metrics are more appropriate to the advertising model. We never took that approach from the start. PR and corp comm types for years have been fighting the battle with clients whose marketing folks want to know how a story compares to ad delivery and costs per impression or cost per thousand (CPM.)
Social Communications is the next generation of PUBLIC RELATIONS. Many also lose sight of the fact that PR and now Social Communications are not simply "publicity" or "media relations" but "relating to the public at large" or the "public audience you hope to reach."
You also referenced some things we did not disclose, and you're right we didn't intentionally. A lot of black magic is involved in how we conjured up just who we chose, and candidly, that's our value or IP in the mix, the art of the profession, more than the science of math and algorithms that hit ratios and impressions, CPMs and TRPs are based on. Those are for the ad buying crowd.
What we're doing is for the other side of the house that needs to creatively build brand mindshare in a way that is better perceived by the public than ads or sponsorships (two industries I've been involved in heavily as well in the past.)
Hope this helps to clarify a bit more, while we still attempt to intentional obfuscate what makes our agency so desired. With 8 clients acquired in the last year alone (six were venture backed startups at one point, two were public that were taken private by companies like IBM, eBay, Google, etc.) our recipe for success must have more in it that only tasting good and going down the right way. What we're doing with Social Comms is working and working very well. Let me refer you to a Washington Post story that we didn't solicit:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/04/AR2006080401441.html
Feel free to reach out to me if you want to know more. aabramson AT comunicano DOT com
Andy Abramson
CEO,
Comunicano, Inc.
Andy
Thanks for your comment and it is always good to hear it from the actual source. I certainly understand about retaining some of the secrecy, we all have to pay for the mortgage somehow :-)
I agree with you entirely that Social Media IS Public Relations, albeit evolved into a dialogue that is enabled by new communications methods. The recipe is still developing, but it is up to those that understand it to help clients to correctly engage and further their relationships with their market/customers/public (and obtain new ones along the way hopefully).
Good luck with that Black Magic
Hayden
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