To Tweet or not to Tweet?

I recently heard an interesting story that shows a different side to social computing, one that all marketing departments should heed! 

Twitter is a strange thing, it reminds me a little of a science fiction story I once read set in a world where everyone knows what everyone else is thinking - like that story, on Twitter your thoughts are on public display.  How is that relevant to marketing?  Well it's not possible to differentiate yourself and your opinions from your company any more.  Every time you "tweet" your clients and customers are just as likely to read what you say - this can be a great thing if you say something to enhance your image or that of your brand, but Twitter invites less guarded comments which could be disasterous!

James Andrews from Ketchum wrote a tweet on landing in Memphis on his way to see a big client to give a presentation.  His tweet said in part "I would die if I had to live here".  Well before he had even arrived at the client's offices the comment had already reached, and annoyed, a number of employees at this key client of his.  This prompted a highly critical response and risked a vital business relationship.  David Henderson's blog has the full story while Anthony Power asks some interesting questions about the context of the twitterer.

The finding is clear though, not only is the brand message no longer the sole property of the organization, but that message has many new facets some of which are out of marketing's control entirely.

Given all that, I probably shouldn't tell you this, but you can find me on twitter at http://twitter.com/mike_talbot I'll try not to say anything too contentious!!

Marketing, now it's a dialogue

Many of the clients that I'm talking right now to are struggling with the realisation that marketing is now a dialogue.  Out on the web the message they put out is under constant scrutiny and discussion.  Brands have to start engaging with the online social community because so many people are now using sites like TripAdvisor as their primary research tools.  Let's face it, you need a lot of good reviews to overcome one bad one - I know I always read the bad reviews first when I'm thinking about buying a new product or choosing a place to stay.

Building social communities into brand websites is one way to go, and there is evidence that just providing the opportunity for user contribution enhances a brand's image - but there are a lot of emotional challenges to overcome when you could easily face criticism on your own web property.  Undoubtedly many brands will have to grasp the nettle and start to provide comments and reviews as part of a community so at least they can maintain some of the brand objectives, and brand monitoring tools like SEER help to understand the web of information surrounding a product or brand on the Internet.

Marketing Data Sales Remain Strong

I was visiting a client recently who are in the data sales business and it looks like business is booming.  The theory is that buying extra data points and demographic variables to increase targetting is far cheaper than sending more communications - I've been arguing this for years, but it looks like the current turbulent climate is finally breaking people out of the mould and making them reconsider their acquisition strategy.

The current trend seems to be to buy less names, but select them more tightly and add on profiling variables to help with response tracking; this leads to an increase in the CPM rate but a decrease in the volumes.  I guess it's too early to say if the conversion rates will increase as expected across the board, but I know from experience that this approach really works in many industries.

It seems that recession is driving efficiency in the direct marketing world, it's certainly got people behaving differently...

Obama the most techno-focused US president EVER!

I've been in the USA this week and the inauguration buzz has been unstoppable!  So I thought for my inaugural post I'd take a moment to talk about Obama and marketing technology.

A democrat in the White House is always of interest to marketers due to the party's views on privacy: are we in for a deluge of new stringent privacy laws that will set the tone for legislation on our side of the pond?

If you look at the policy documents published by team Obama you'll find that there is a well defined commitment to safeguard the privacy rights of Americans against possible abuses due to new technology.

Then again, it's interesting to note that Obama used a high tech database driven approach to marketing his campaign for the presidency.

The Democratic National Committee have amassed information on 13 million registered voters and have used Catalist data to profile out the whole US population; they've built social community web sites and run email campaigns as well as using all of the traditional channels like phone and mail to get their message across.  You have to say it was pretty successful effort!

If you're interested in the details then Marc Ambinder has a break down of the process and data sources.  Meanwhile Wired blogger Sarah Lai Stirland pointed out just after the election that all of the data captured by the process is still highly relevant and is likely to be pressed into service again and again - this leaves the democrats with a conundrum on privacy as they've become fully fledged database marketers themselves.

There's no doubting Obama's commitment to understanding and using technology - one of his policies is to appoint the first ever US Government CTO to drive the American economy and the bodies of state to greater levels of efficiency.

This is a laudable aim, and you never know I might apply for the job if we ever get one in the UK, but perhaps the geek had better get back into the cupboard for a while as the word on the street is that the new position may not have the power to set budgets and hence create the required momentum.

That's not stopping the interest though, a web site designed to help shape the policies of the new position is getting some interest, with visitors voting on different options - is this techno-democracy at work I ask?