May 15 2013 ·
0 comments ·
Uncategorized ·
1
How you behave in response to stress is a great indicator of your true character. This applies to social media as much as it does offline.
You may remember our blog post from the beginning of April on The Top 5 Ways Brands Can Annoy Customers.
Well it turns out we left one method of annoying consumers off the list and we have none other than a small restaurant in Arizona to thank: Amy’s Baking Company Bakery Boutique & Bistro.
The name is a mouthful and their Facebook page will you give an ear-full.
After being featured on an episode of Gordon Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares (where owners Samy and Amy Bouzaglo were subsequently rejected by Ramsey for being too difficult to work with), the owners were swept over by tsunami waves of criticism that were handled so inappropriately on social media that they just exacerbated the problem.
Lesson #1 from Amy’s Baking Company Bakery Boutique & Bistro:
If you don’t want to deal with something, delete it!
An admin on the company’s facebook page, speaking from the perspective of the owners, went on a rage filled post-a-thon that resulted in more than a dozen posts like this:
While the posts were later deleted, screenshots had already been taken and posted all over the internet, from Reddit to Buzzfeed…but no one looking at their facebook page will know, right?
Lesson #2:
Don’t learn from your mistakes.
In 2010, Amy, the namesake of Amy’s Baking Company Bakery Boutique & Bistro (typing that name out is exhausting), turned to Yelp to air her displeasure with feedback posted by a customer.
That post must have done wonders for their business because a few short years later, she was back and angrier than ever!
And now for Lesson #3, a favorite of disgraced politicians:
When the going gets tough, claim that you were hacked.
Don’t forget to mention the FBI – it adds an air of authenticity to the claim.
Suffice it to say that this is a textbook example of how not to handle backlash on social media.
America now knows all about Amy’s Baking Company Bakery Boutique & Bistro, but we’re guessing that none of these people have any interest in ever opening a menu there. How the Bouzaglo’s handled this situation should have involved patience, apologies, and not swearing at the public in a series of heated and immature posts.
No matter what your brand is, let this be an example of how not to do social media
Mar 11 2013 ·
0 comments ·
Josh Jordan ·
2
It wasn’t so long ago that Capital One sent out enough credit solicitations by mail that the USPS gave them their own special rate (that sound you hear is the USPS sighing and remembering the good ole’ days).
If you’re going to mail 1 Billion pieces a year, I guess you should get a little bit of a discount.
And, it wasn’t so long ago that Cap One called up their suppliers and said, “Hey, listen, ummm … the economy is kind-of tanking a little and we need to pull back. So … yeah. Sorry …” I’m paraphrasing of course, but you get the picture.
So why was I so surprised to see this?
Feb 18 2013 ·
0 comments ·
Social Media ·
1
Most of us know that social media gives brands the critical opportunity (and necessity) of listening to consumers.
Consumers often take the lead from the brands whether it’s identifying an emerging style or simply figuring out what to have for dinner.
Brands often take the lead from consumers by identifying influencers and leaders within their target demographic and employing their newfound knowledge to improve their products and services.
Sep 28 2012 ·
0 comments ·
Social Media ·
0
Why are our Community Managers involved in every step of the content development process? Why do they participate in brainstorming campaign ideas and check in daily with insights and information about their brands? Why are they required to use data to back up their feelings and not rely solely on instincts? Because we never want our clients to get into situations like this:
Lesson #1: When you ask someone what they think, they’re going to tell you.
The comments on the picture started rolling in immediately and the bulk of them were negative. The fans focused on their distaste for the dress but were quite polite and complimentary about the women pictured. Now while you can never completely predict how people will respond to content, a strong Community Manager should have a good feel for their community and be able to anticipate potential responses, and plan accordingly for them.
That’s why I was so surprised by the brand’s response:
Lesson #2: Respond appropriately to situations and anticipate how your comments will be perceived by the community and audience at large.
Now this could have been an attempt to redirect the conversation and get people to say nice things about the dress…but it didn’t work. Some of the fans got upset that LOFT assumed they were being unkind to the women pictured and responded to the brand, and some fans began discussing how “rude” others were being. Fans then began to move from expressing their distaste for the dress, to expressing their distaste for the brand.
One comment turned members of their community against each other and unleashed a firestorm of negativity towards the brand.
Lesson #3: Every experience comes with opportunities.
So what could LOFT have done to truly redirect the conversation and create a win for their brand?
Here’s one idea: Give Facebook fans a coupon specifically for that dress and ask them to upload a picture of themselves in it – let them style it, DIY it, mod it up. The fans can vote on whose take they like the best and the top 3 would get a chance to meet with the LOFT design team and be a part of the creative process. The winners can report back and the experience can be turned into a video where the fans highlight all of the great styles the team’s coming up with. Win back some positive sentiment, get the fans personally involved in the brand, give them a reason to believe in the future of the brand and remind people how much LOFT values them.
Community Managed.
__________________________________________________________
When she’s not working as a marketing manager for Make Me Social, Mandi Frishman enjoys analyzing brand pages on social media (seriously). During her time studying at The University of Florida, Mandi became convinced in the power of learning through play. She has since committed herself to playing (and learning) all day, every day.
Jun 25 2012 ·
0 comments ·
Make Me Social, Social Media, Tim Howell ·
0
Recent updates to Facebook’s EdgeRank formula, and the way they calculate your People Talking About This score, could be putting your social efforts in jeopardy. Why is a behind-the-scenes math formula so important? It’s a simple answer with a lot of data behind it, so we’ll start with the easy facts first.
EdgeRank determines your success on Facebook.
That’s it. It’s that cut and dry. If your brand page has a high EdgeRank, your page will almost definitely be successful – depending, of course, on your definition of success. If success, to you, means user engagement, brand awareness, and viral growth, then we are on the same page.
How does EdgeRank work?
EdgeRank is an algorithm, essentially a complex mathematical formula that weighs several different factors to determine how relevant your content is to any given Facebook user. The formula looks like this:
Facebook has been notoriously silent on the exact numbers in this equation, but Jeff Widman, operator of EdgeRank.net, has broken down the basics of the system.
Facebook looks at all possible stories and says “Which story has the highest EdgeRank score? Let’s show it at the top of the user’s newsfeed…If EdgeRank predicts a particular user will find your status update boring, then your status update will never even be shown to that particular user…The numbers on this are frightening. In 2007, a Facebook engineer said in an interview that only about 0.2% of eligible stories make it into a user’s newsfeed…
The simplest possible explanation is that Facebook considers the amount of Likes, Comments, and Shares your posts receive, how many of your fans are friends with each other, the type of content you are posting, and what every single Facebook user thinks about those types of content. All of that gets added up into a total score, which is tallied on every single post your page makes.
How can I improve my page’s EdgeRank?
Short answer: you can’t. Long answer: you can’t, and you’re asking the wrong question. EdgeRank is a constantly-evolving formula, which takes in thousands of points of data to make by-the-second updates. Combine that complexity with the fact that Facebook also filters results through at least one other formula before they make it to a newsfeed, and you are facing a hopeless challenge.
The point that we keep making to clients is that it is much easier to improve your content than it is to try to game the system.
So, what’s new?
A recent update to Facebook’s algorithms has changed the way your page’s People Talking About This, or PTAT, score. This score is a combination of several forms of engagement, including shares, likes, and comments. Until now, that number related only to first-level engagement on a post. The tracking stopped, once you got beyond the original posting.
With this new update, the PTAT score includes engagement a post receives at the second level and beyond. Now, if a user shares George Takei’s latest cat pun, his PTAT score includes all of the likes, shares, and comments that post receives from its entire viral lifespan, even from users that never saw the original post.
This update has led to some drastic jumps in PTAT for many highly-engaging pages. Takei’s PTAT has jumped by nearly 110,000 since the change, with similar numbers coming from several of the top pages on the platform. As we discussed earlier, your PTAT score is the most important aspect of your content’s EdgeRank, so higher PTAT scores ensure that your content is being seen. This means that activity on a cat photo George Takei posted three weeks ago could be boosting the EdgeRank on a post he makes today.
In social media, content is king, and that has never been truer than it is now. It is time for companies to make sure that what they’re putting out is something that users actually want to see. As the EdgeRank formula continues to evolve, content that belongs in corporate board rooms will become quieter and quieter. Eventually, those pages will have to wake up and realize they’re speaking to an empty room.
______________________________________________________________
Tim Howell is a content manager for Make Me Social. He studied fine art, psychology, and international pop culture at Bowling Green State University. In his spare time, he is a blogger and social activist with a passion for cooking. You can find him at gplus.to/TimHowell
Jun 25 2012 ·
0 comments ·
Make Me Social, Social Media, Tim Howell ·
0
Recent updates to Facebook’s EdgeRank formula, and the way they calculate your People Talking About This score, could be putting your social efforts in jeopardy. Why is a behind-the-scenes math formula so important? It’s a simple answer with a lot of data behind it, so we’ll start with the easy facts first.
EdgeRank determines your success on Facebook.
That’s it. It’s that cut and dry. If your brand page has a high EdgeRank, your page will almost definitely be successful – depending, of course, on your definition of success. If success, to you, means user engagement, brand awareness, and viral growth, then we are on the same page.
How does EdgeRank work?
EdgeRank is an algorithm, essentially a complex mathematical formula that weighs several different factors to determine how relevant your content is to any given Facebook user. The formula looks like this:
Facebook has been notoriously silent on the exact numbers in this equation, but Jeff Widman, operator of EdgeRank.net, has broken down the basics of the system.
Facebook looks at all possible stories and says “Which story has the highest EdgeRank score? Let’s show it at the top of the user’s newsfeed…If EdgeRank predicts a particular user will find your status update boring, then your status update will never even be shown to that particular user…The numbers on this are frightening. In 2007, a Facebook engineer said in an interview that only about 0.2% of eligible stories make it into a user’s newsfeed…
The simplest possible explanation is that Facebook considers the amount of Likes, Comments, and Shares your posts receive, how many of your fans are friends with each other, the type of content you are posting, and what every single Facebook user thinks about those types of content. All of that gets added up into a total score, which is tallied on every single post your page makes.
How can I improve my page’s EdgeRank?
Short answer: you can’t. Long answer: you can’t, and you’re asking the wrong question. EdgeRank is a constantly-evolving formula, which takes in thousands of points of data to make by-the-second updates. Combine that complexity with the fact that Facebook also filters results through at least one other formula before they make it to a newsfeed, and you are facing a hopeless challenge.
The point that we keep making to clients is that it is much easier to improve your content than it is to try to game the system.
So, what’s new?
A recent update to Facebook’s algorithms has changed the way your page’s People Talking About This, or PTAT, score. This score is a combination of several forms of engagement, including shares, likes, and comments. Until now, that number related only to first-level engagement on a post. The tracking stopped, once you got beyond the original posting.
With this new update, the PTAT score includes engagement a post receives at the second level and beyond. Now, if a user shares George Takei’s latest cat pun, his PTAT score includes all of the likes, shares, and comments that post receives from its entire viral lifespan, even from users that never saw the original post.
This update has led to some drastic jumps in PTAT for many highly-engaging pages. Takei’s PTAT has jumped by nearly 110,000 since the change, with similar numbers coming from several of the top pages on the platform. As we discussed earlier, your PTAT score is the most important aspect of your content’s EdgeRank, so higher PTAT scores ensure that your content is being seen. This means that activity on a cat photo George Takei posted three weeks ago could be boosting the EdgeRank on a post he makes today.
In social media, content is king, and that has never been truer than it is now. It is time for companies to make sure that what they’re putting out is something that users actually want to see. As the EdgeRank formula continues to evolve, content that belongs in corporate board rooms will become quieter and quieter. Eventually, those pages will have to wake up and realize they’re speaking to an empty room.
______________________________________________________________
Tim Howell is a content manager for Make Me Social. He studied fine art, psychology, and international pop culture at Bowling Green State University. In his spare time, he is a blogger and social activist with a passion for cooking. You can find him at gplus.to/TimHowell
May 23 2012 ·
0 comments ·
Greg Morgan, Make Me Social ·
0
Facebook’s IPO has come and gone, and while the big story is that there was no big story (save for a mini-scandal), the lead up to last Friday came with relatively few stumbling blocks….
Except one: GM announcing they will be ending their Facebook Ad spend.
Many that follow social media have heard the basic details. General Motors, which invested $10 million annually into Facebook ads, will be ending this endeavor by summer, citing that paid ads on the site have little impact on consumers’ car purchases. This loss of revenue is pennies on the dollar for Facebook (less than that when you consider the site had more than $3 billion in ad sales last year), but it is the perception of this decision that is more important.
The question many have been asking is, “If GM can’t make Facebook ads work, why wouldn’t others pull their spends as well?”
The question we as an agency have been asking is, “What was GM’s goal for the ads in the first place?”
Was it to attract followers and have a presence in their community? Lead gen? Branding? All of the above? Whatever the answer is, different strategies and messages have to be developed and expectations have to be set. If GM’s goal was for people to see their Facebook ad and decide to buy an SUV from them, then their expectations were out of line because any marketing expert (or novice for that matter) will tell you the bigger the ask to the consumer (especially in monetary terms), the harder it will be to have that consumer commit to a purchase.
While GM did not find what they were looking for, many have been working within the parameters set by Facebook quite successfully, and it is because they are first defining what success looks like before trying to achieve it. So look at the GM situation not as a suggestion for your own use, but as a cautionary tale on preparing before investing.
______________________________________________________________
Greg Morgan is Communications and Content Director 
for Make Me Social, a social media agency that develops customized social media strategies for businesses. With experience in industries ranging from sports to state government, Greg focuses in crafting messages for all types of clients in an effort to perfect what he calls “versatile communications.” Born and raised in West Hartford, Connecticut, he remains a loyal UConn Husky fan, despite now residing in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
May 23 2012 ·
0 comments ·
Greg Morgan, Make Me Social ·
0
Facebook’s IPO has come and gone, and while the big story is that there was no big story (save for a mini-scandal), the lead up to last Friday came with relatively few stumbling blocks….
Except one: GM announcing they will be ending their Facebook Ad spend.
Many that follow social media have heard the basic details. General Motors, which invested $10 million annually into Facebook ads, will be ending this endeavor by summer, citing that paid ads on the site have little impact on consumers’ car purchases. This loss of revenue is pennies on the dollar for Facebook (less than that when you consider the site had more than $3 billion in ad sales last year), but it is the perception of this decision that is more important.
The question many have been asking is, “If GM can’t make Facebook ads work, why wouldn’t others pull their spends as well?”
The question we as an agency have been asking is, “What was GM’s goal for the ads in the first place?”
Was it to attract followers and have a presence in their community? Lead gen? Branding? All of the above? Whatever the answer is, different strategies and messages have to be developed and expectations have to be set. If GM’s goal was for people to see their Facebook ad and decide to buy an SUV from them, then their expectations were out of line because any marketing expert (or novice for that matter) will tell you the bigger the ask to the consumer (especially in monetary terms), the harder it will be to have that consumer commit to a purchase.
While GM did not find what they were looking for, many have been working within the parameters set by Facebook quite successfully, and it is because they are first defining what success looks like before trying to achieve it. So look at the GM situation not as a suggestion for your own use, but as a cautionary tale on preparing before investing.
______________________________________________________________
Greg Morgan is Communications and Content Director for Make Me Social, a social media agency that develops customized social media strategies for businesses. With experience in industries ranging from sports to state government, Greg focuses in crafting messages for all types of clients in an effort to perfect what he calls “versatile communications.” Born and raised in West Hartford, Connecticut, he remains a loyal UConn Husky fan, despite now residing in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Mar 16 2012 ·
3 comments ·
Make Me Social, Mandi Frishman, Social Media ·
0
Author Reynolds Price once said of stories, “Millions survive without love or home, almost none in silence; the opposite of silence leads quickly to narrative, and the sound of story is the dominant sound of our lives,”
In cultures across the globe values are shared through allegories, pictures are painted with narratives, and emotional bonds are created through stories. This is as true online as it is offline, in life as well as in business; after all, aren’t the two woven together for at least 8 hours a day Monday through Friday?
If you ever doubt the power of a good story, look at the view count on Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 video. Whether you agree with the organization or not, over 79 million views speak to the power of using storytelling to drive people to action. If you were one of the 79 million views you probably noticed that they used Facebook Timeline to tell that story.
This is not a coincidence – Facebook Timeline is designed for storytelling. While many assumed that the switch to Timeline was about aesthetics, it’s about a larger change that we’ve been watching happen since Make Me Social was founded in 2009. It’s the end of corporate doublespeak and the beginning of true corporate communication – where the audience talks back.
In a world where stories are written in 140 characters and the only walls that exist between nations are ones made of code, companies must learn to become storytellers…and the really good ones will learn how to make their audience a part of their story.
__________________________________________________________
When she’s not working as a marketing manager for Make Me Social, Mandi Frishman enjoys listening to books on tape and pretending that the words are coming from the storyteller doll that she made in 3rd grade. During her time studying at The University of Florida, Mandi became convinced in the power of learning through play. She has since committed herself to playing (and learning) all day, every day.
Jan 26 2012 ·
2 comments ·
Mandi Frishman, Social Media ·
0
When I was in high school I participated in a focus group about deodorant. I sat in a room with a bunch of girls that I had never met and was asked to share my memories of deodorant and give feedback on the smells that I enjoyed. The most memorable part of the experience was a girl who shared that she began using deodorant after her mother told her that she smelled like, “A meatpacking plant.” Her delivery was excellent – completely straight faced with no hint of emotion. It was the highlight of the focus group, although I’m pretty confident that the company who paid for that focus group did not enjoy it as much as I did.
Now this was “back in the day” (within the past 10 years) but not so far back that I don’t remember how much I was paid. For less than two hours of my time I made $60 and they gave me cookies. There were probably 5-7 girls in the room with me, each of whom were given $60. We were not the only focus group and I can only hope that they got something more than “girls will use deodorant when shamed by their mothers” out of it. But why all of this talk about how much we were paid? ROI, my friends.
Let’s fast forward to the glorious present, where teens tweet, brands want you to like them, and public content is indexed for your searching pleasure. How could that company get better information today? How could they expand their focus group while refining their data, and without paying for every bit of feedback? Two words: social media.
Your focus group is out there, tweeting, posting, and blogging about their deepest darkest desires, offhand thoughts, likes, and dislikes. They’re talking about your industry, your brand, your products, and even your employees. The social media listening tools that are available are incredibly powerful and allow brands to monitor whatever keywords they desire. For the first time, you have an opportunity to get unfiltered feedback, offered up in real time and without prompting.
If you’re reading this with a questioning mind, and I hope you are, you’re probably thinking: “What happens if that deodorant brand wanted to know what got young women between the ages of 13 and 18 to wear deodorant for the first time? Is it possible to move from monitoring to engaging in order to ask specific questions of specific audiences?” (I love it when you ask questions.)
Let’s respond to your questions by asking three questions:
- Does this brand have a Facebook Page?
- Does this brand have the ability to purchase Facebook Ads targeting females between the ages of 13 and 18?
- Does this brand have the ability to build a campaign soliciting stories through a branded landing page?
If the answer to any of these questions is yes, the brand can take their focus group from 5-7 girls uncomfortably answering questions for money, to thousands of girls answering questions for fun. People will contribute to your market research without expecting payment if you position the ask properly. Less cost, more quality – and high quantities of – information. ROI, my friends.
It’s time to unfocus your focus group.
___________________________________________________________
When she’s not working as a marketing manager for Make Me Social, Mandi Frishman enjoys perusing the internet for mentions of her dog, Emma. During her time studying at The University of Florida, Mandi became convinced in the power of learning through play. She has since committed herself to playing (and learning) all day, every day.
