There are some studies that compare a company’s Twitter profile to a blog.
The 2012 Edelman Trust Barometer study, which I’ve always found to be a fascinating read on where we are in social media practice, had some equally strong indicators as to where traditional and digital media sit on the trust scale.
For instance, trust in company’s web sites are (hold your breath!) up!
So this infographic, which summaries a survey by UK-based Text 100 is a good sidebar to the study. It speaks of engaging journalists using social media.
So many Super Bowl ads, so little attention to go around. I’ve always been saying these ads are a total waste of time. Do you really care if the Clysedales didn’t appear in a spot? (Apparently we do. They polled that question -and created a Wikipedia entry for them. Really!)
So, speaking of polling, I have to say that the $130 million Census campaign –never mind the cost of making the Bowl ad– is worth a second look. Especially with the cost of running the ad being in the neighborhood of $2.5 million.
“We’re advertising again,” the Census chaps say, observing what we all know that the Bowl is “rare, in that viewers are just as tuned in to see the commercials as the program itself.”
And yes, there’s the media-relations effect: Run the ad, get editorial comment. The famous carrot that says viewers will rush online once they watch the ad, because it that’s how TV –practically on life-support, tethered to the Net –works today.
But after they dispense with the popular wisdom about buzz and multiplier effects (perhaps after so many meetings with its agency, DDB) they note in true Census-boys style that “If just one percent of the folks watching the Super Bowl had their minds changed to mail back a census form they would have otherwise ignored, it helps save the taxpayers between $25-30 million in expensive follow up costs to collect these forms later.”
???
Translation: Watch ads, adjust your attitude toward being asked personal questions, save the country a boatload of cash, help us pay our agency.
I get that, Department of Census. No need to repeat this point about 3 times in your blog and press releases.
Yes, I mentioned a blog. This is where this campaign gets interesting because the obscenely expensive ad is supported with richer slices of content, some of which is embedded in social media channels. I like the fact that the Director of the Census is blogging, that there’s a Road Tour Blog and lots of space devoted to answering the questions people ask that make of break a census. The Flash site may be a tad too addy, but it documents stories, a la Story Corps, of ordinary people. The YouTube channel has plenty of video outtakes. The Flickr site has snapshots of an America few of us see every day. This one on left is supposedly at a Lutheran Church in Richmond, California. Thai dancers! The 5,000 fans on Facebook must mean something. and there’s Twitter just in case you miss all other channels.
So with all of this content so well thought out, is the cost of a Super Bowl ad really worth it? I liked the ad, but the greatest ad is not worth being tossed into a space filled with products and services that only seem to lust for eyeballs and water-cooler talk.
There are plenty of other ways to get buzzy, even if that was the objective. As Erik Qualman observes, why not use Facebook and Twitter to GET people to answer those darned 10 simple census questions, and not be entangled in “a $340 million boondoggle“? Because that not feasible, why not use social media to incentivize people to fill out their forms. If the media-as-a-repeater argument is important, why not let 300 million people start something that the media will talk about. (Rather than feed this controversy.)
I had just signed up with PageFlakes, which has been around but I have to admit is a pretty good aggregator of many other tools such as Facebook, Twitter, email etc.
Why are marketers are often reluctant to ask for feedback? Surveys are so easy to do and people are so willing to tell you what they think. Yet surveys seem to have been overshadowed in a world of social media, and trackbacks, and the ability to dig deep and look at keywords.
While I am a huge promoter of keyword intelligence, it’s so much easier to just ask when faced with a dilemma. No matter what business you are in, I bet you arrive at that fork in the road every few months: Should we email the latest report, highlight the URL, or add an RSS feed? Does it make sense to redesign the product page, or simply add one more tab? How do we know visitors are finding what they are looking for, and is our “bounce rate” killing us? Do people prefer PayPal over credit cards? How could we know that?
There’s the arrogant way, assuming we know everything there is to know about customer behavior. And there’s the smart way, realizing that people’s expectations may have changed since the last redesign or the last campaign, that new users may have altered our demographic mix.
We could add a feedback channel to the site, definitely allow comments on the blog, invite customers to be part of an ‘advisory group,’ do small focus groups, or do snapshot surveys.
I am compiling a list of things that went wrong, and the things that greatly improved PR, communications and marketing this year. Locally, nationally, across the pond.
Got any suggestions?
Some directions:
1. Most embarrassing PR moments.
2. Stupid quotes, and also the most eloquent ones.
3. About face. People or organizations who have done a 360.
We all love email. We all hate email.You may have noticed how the last few weeks were all about spam, not from the usual sources, however. It’s been variously called “co-worker spam,” “workplace spam,” and “PR spam.” Even “Facebook spam!”
While porn spam is on the decline (yeah!) workplace spam is burying us (you’ll find this Pew Internet report a good read.) to the point that 71% of us use email filters.
So we wanted to know where you stand when it comes to what irks you, and what you’d like to do about it. It should take you less than three minutes.
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The YouTube channel has plenty of video outtakes. The 
Is this the year of excessive networking?
We all love email. We all hate email.You may have noticed how the last few weeks were all about spam, not from the usual sources, however. It’s been variously called “co-worker spam,” “workplace spam,” and “PR spam.” Even “Facebook spam!”
