Social Media

I think that most companies continue to struggle with how to effectively use social media and how to elicit interaction with the product/brand on the internet.  I think the reason for this is that companies don’t fully take the time to understand how their consumer wants to interact with them in meaningful ways.  For example, this summer I worked at Nestle on the California Pizza Kitchen frozen pizza brand.  We shared a Facebook cite and twitter account with the restaurant, which the agency for the most part controlled.  It seemed as if, for the most part, consumers only wanted to interact with us when we were giving something away (coupons, drawings, etc.).  It was hard to quantify the success of the interactions (likes, tweets, posts, etc.) and so the interactions were deemed useful mainly in creating awareness for new promotions or improvements.  In all the company did very little to track or quantify the interactions.

But, over the summer I did discover an interaction with consumers online that was beneficial to the brand team.  There was a blog out there for CPK consumers to talk about their experience with the frozen product.  The blog posts dated back more than two years and it was for the most part a few forum for complaints and compliments.  Two years ago the majority of the comments were positive, speaking about the relationship with the restaurant or their favorite flavor.  About a year ago the comments took a turn for the worse.  Consumers were complaining about the quality of the pizza – not enough toppings, broken crusts, toppings that were lopsided, etc.  The brand team hadn’t been managing this cite, but around the same time they had switched production facilities.  It took them over a year to realize just how bad the new product was (which they were working on during the summer that I was there) when they could have caught the problem earlier with this group of bloggers.  You can literally track complaints on this cite with sales over the year and see a direct relationship.  Blogs about consumer complaints should be a key focus for any CPG or consumer facing company because it is a free way to get direct consumer feedback that can sometimes be quantified and related to sales data.

From a consumer perspective it is difficult to understand consumer social media use and the objectives for using it.  Many social media users can be lumped into age groups in which the consumers may typically use the same type of social media.  But, as platforms become more and more popular the demographics using them become wider.  The classic example is Facebook, which started out as only for people currently in college and now is “used” (using that term lightly) by grandparents, 10-year-olds, babies and even dogs (I am currently friends with 2 dogs).  Each of these age groups have different objectives for their Facebook usage – keeping up with friends, trends, pictures, stalking, etc.  It is hard to track what every one of them is using it for, but there may be ways of grouping them.  For example, if users decide to put in their birthday and gender then they can be grouped into age and gender categories.  From there, Facebook can track their usage as a percent of time active on the page.  They can divide their time by scrolling through the newsfeed, visiting friends’ pages, playing games, looking at pictures, reading news articles, etc.  If there were common usage characteristics by age group then companies could figure out how their product/service aligns with this usage. 

One interesting case study about the effectiveness of social media is the Orabrush story.  Orabrush is a basic toothbrush designed to clean your tounge.  The company created a Youtube video that for the first two years generated more views than sales of the item.  The most interesting part of their success story is that they spent $28 on a Facebook ad, targeted at Walmart employees in Arkansas, that just said “Walmart employees have bad breath. Walmart needs to carry Orabrush. It will sell better than anything in your store.”  Within 48 hours Walmart called up the owner of the brush and placed an order for over 700,000 units.  In this way the ad was effective, powerful, and had quantifiable results.  Here’s the story: http://adage.com/article/digital/a-walmart-shelves-social-media/230126/

There are more traditional ways that consumers interact socially - Facebook page, twitter account, Pandora ads, Youtube videos, and website.  When quantifying the interactions a person is having it is most important to understand:

·         how much time they spend on different cites/places

·         what channels they use to interact with others

·         how many people do they have meaningful interactions with

·         how are they accessing the media (computer, cell phone, tablet, etc.)

Once you know how the target audience interacts with social media you can better place ads or information.

For example, our persona for the Nordstrom project is named Kirsten.  Kirsten has been on Facebook since she was in college – she mainly uses it to keep up with friends, post and view other’s pictures, read her friend’s newsfeeds and posts, and sometimes to stalk ex-boyfriends.  Kirsten has updated her profile with her work and school experience, her hometown and her birthday, but she doesn’t extensively post topics about her hobbies or favorite things.  She checks Facebook on her smartphone once before going into work, once or twice throughout the day at the office if she had time, and again at night if she is on her laptop.  She typically spends 5-15 minutes at a time on it and only posts things 3-4 times per month.  If we were going to try to reach her through Facebook we would most likely want to understand her use – does she look at friends’ posts to learn about fashion, sales or new products?  Has she ever clicked on an ad on the side column?  Has she ever sought out a retailer’s Facebook page, or does she have any brands that she “likes?”  Are there certain times during the day that she is the most likely to be on Facebook?  Or, is she offended by advertising on her social media and having a Nordstrom ad would actually dissuade her from shopping there?  These are all important questions we would need to think about before investing in advertising or targeting through Facebook.

Another type of social media (less obvious than Facebook) is consumer reviews.  I have heard that it is significantly more likely to have a consumer write a bad review than a positive review.  For the most part these people are venting or warning others about a product or service.  On an online retailer, such as Nordstrom, it is very important to be in tune with what consumers are saying about the product.  It is crucial to give them a format to review the product, but it is even more important to address their concerns.  This should be monitored on both the Nordstrom site and in the blogosphere.  Complaints can be addressed with solutions or promotions, but for the most part people just want to be heard and recognized for their trouble.  But, you don’t want to train consumers to expect a coupon every time they complain about something.  There is a fine balance here that Nordstrom, a company known for customer service, needs to understand.

In general, social media is a format for marketing that continues to evolve as technology advances.  Companies need to understand how the different types align with their products, services and brand name.  Not all consumers want to interact with businesses/promotions while they are on social network cites – but it could also be a great captive audience.  A great example for a new place to put advertising is in aps or games.  If I were to start my own company today it would be hard to not fall into the trap of having a Facebook page, twitter account and website.  Trackable items like coupons or codes would help quantify the effectiveness of the media, but for the most part I would just focus on brand awareness.  If my company were large enough I might hire an agency to manage these accounts for me, but again it is hard to understand effectiveness.  In general, an investment into social media as a method for reaching consumers is worthwhile if you are reaching your target consumer, promoting awareness and not spending too much money to get in the consideration set.