Here at 1000heads we’re not very good at staying put, however lovely our offices are. At any one time a few of us are always on the road, headed to some event to speak, facilitate or simply listen, and you can always keep track of what we’re doing via our Meet Us @ calendar (just to your right on the sidebar).
Reliably outspoken ‘heads James and I at last year’s Like Minds
However, we thought we’d flag up some of the events we’ll be running or involved in over the next few weeks – there should be something to appeal to everyone, and if you’re already attending, make sure you let us know and say hi (mine’s a dirty martini). So…
Tonight James and I are heading to Like Minds 2010 in Exeter, the innovative media conference which unfolds on Thursday and Friday with an outstanding programme of keynotes and workshops themed around ‘Creativity and Curation’. We’ll be hosting lunchtime talks on word of mouth and silence, respectively. Oh yes.
Also this Friday but over in France, Lilian will be kicking off the first MeetFriday tweet-up for social and media folk in Lyon, so if you’re across the channel drop in.
On Tuesday 2nd November Dons and I will be joining New York ‘head Adam for the Digital Mission / Rep Online breakfast, and I will also be around all day available for coffees (or cocktails) and chats with anyone wanting to find out more about what we do and the word of mouth industry – just drop me a tweet or mail.
On Wednesday 10th November I am back in London running a free workshop for Royal Mail about direct mail and WOM called ‘Plugging DM into WOM: turning reach into spreadability’. Along with Benn Achilleas from Neoco, I’ll be showing direct mail practitioners how to harness a WOM approach to enhance their DM efforts – and vice-versa – so if you work in the industry sign up now.
With my WOMMA UK hat on, on Wednesday 11th November we have a morning event from Posterscope exploring ‘Social media In The Real World – Or, how the convergence of on and off line social networks with mobile & display advertising technologies is creating a new Out-of-Home communications paradigm’ – again it’s free to attend so register asap.
On Monday 15th November I’ll be talking about our work for Cancer Research UK and other great not for profit case studies at the ‘Tech For Good’ conference in London – a must if you want to find out how to harness communities for charitable causes and campaigns.
And then from 16-20th November I’ll be in Las Vegas at the WOMMA Summit 2010, moderating an international panel of WOM experts discussing ‘Nation, culture and WOM: how does consumer WOM differ across global cultures and how must brands tailor their approaches accordingly?’ We’ve also been nominated for their WOMMY Awards, once again for the undeniably wicked #NokiaNav.
Of course, the wider team will be hitting lots of other networking and learning events over the next few weeks; these are just the edited highlights. Let us know if you think we should be coming to yours.
And if you’d just like a quiet chat over a coffee, we’re always here. Except when we’re on a train or a plane, that is
Here at 1000heads we’re not very good at staying put, however lovely our offices are. At any one time a few of us are always on the road, headed to some event to speak, facilitate or simply listen, and you can always keep track of what we’re doing via our Meet Us @ calendar (just to your right on the sidebar).
Reliably outspoken ‘heads James and I at last year’s Like Minds
However, we thought we’d flag up some of the events we’ll be running or involved in over the next few weeks – there should be something to appeal to everyone, and if you’re already attending, make sure you let us know and say hi (mine’s a dirty martini). So…
Tonight James and I are heading to Like Minds 2010 in Exeter, the innovative media conference which unfolds on Thursday and Friday with an outstanding programme of keynotes and workshops themed around ‘Creativity and Curation’. We’ll be hosting lunchtime talks on word of mouth and silence, respectively. Oh yes.
Also this Friday but over in France, Lilian will be kicking off the first MeetFriday tweet-up for social and media folk in Lyon, so if you’re across the channel drop in.
On Tuesday 2nd November Dons and I will be joining New York ‘head Adam for the Digital Mission / Rep Online breakfast, and I will also be around all day available for coffees (or cocktails) and chats with anyone wanting to find out more about what we do and the word of mouth industry – just drop me a tweet or mail.
On Wednesday 10th November I am back in London running a free workshop for Royal Mail about direct mail and WOM called ‘Plugging DM into WOM: turning reach into spreadability’. Along with Benn Achilleas from Neoco, I’ll be showing direct mail practitioners how to harness a WOM approach to enhance their DM efforts – and vice-versa – so if you work in the industry sign up now.
With my WOMMA UK hat on, on Wednesday 11th November we have a morning event from Posterscope exploring ‘Social media In The Real World – Or, how the convergence of on and off line social networks with mobile & display advertising technologies is creating a new Out-of-Home communications paradigm’ – again it’s free to attend so register asap.
On Monday 15th November I’ll be talking about our work for Cancer Research UK and other great not for profit case studies at the ‘Tech For Good’ conference in London – a must if you want to find out how to harness communities for charitable causes and campaigns.
And then from 16-20th November I’ll be in Las Vegas at the WOMMA Summit 2010, moderating an international panel of WOM experts discussing ‘Nation, culture and WOM: how does consumer WOM differ across global cultures and how must brands tailor their approaches accordingly?’ We’ve also been nominated for their WOMMY Awards, once again for the undeniably wicked #NokiaNav.
Of course, the wider team will be hitting lots of other networking and learning events over the next few weeks; these are just the edited highlights. Let us know if you think we should be coming to yours.
And if you’d just like a quiet chat over a coffee, we’re always here. Except when we’re on a train or a plane, that is
I commented that 50+ women were less likely to be currently engaged on social media as they hadn’t grown up using it at significant moments of their lives. I also predicted that the new ‘digital’ mum will continue to engage online throughout her life, maintaining the relationships she has made along the way.
However, I began to wonder about the issue of time.
This may sound unbelievable to new mums, but as children get older, a mother has less, not more time to herself. She may begin to work or increase her hours, and find her evenings and weekends chock full of activities, parties and homework.
I have recently started my own blog and believe me, it takes time! Not just to compose content, but also to read other blogs and post comments in order to make those vital connections. When the current army of new-mum bloggers find their me-time increasingly compromised, will they want to spend it on their blogs or will they prefer Mumsnet? Will social communities be a more attractive alternative or will they find these platforms too limiting in terms of self-expression?
I’m sticking my neck out slightly, and forecasting that maybe a new communication platform will replace blogging for these women. Nurturing their online relationships will still be important, but they will be looking for faster ways to stay connected. Facebook, Foursquare and Twitter are already favoured over blogs for mums of older kids, but I think something between the two will emerge which will require less thought and less dedicated time, but still offer them an essential opportunity to express themselves creatively. It may originate directly to service this need, or grow organically from another (previously teen dominated?) site.
What do you think? Do you see this behavioural need being met by a new platform? And do you think it will happily co-exist with blogging, or mark the beginning of the end for the mummy blogger?
When I presented at last week’s Wildscreen 2010, the international festival for wildlife and environmental filmmaking, there was much discussion about how to go viral.
I explained the difference between viral and word of mouth in similar terms to Radia. A viral basically creates a social object – be it an Old Spice Man, a baby panda sneezing, or a T-Mobile flash mob – that is, a piece of content or experience which stimulates a low entry, huge and rapid peak of emotional engagement and social sharing.
Pretty quickly, that drops away. Which looks like this.
What word of mouth does is use those social objects or triggers as the start and not the end of the process, using that initial burst of excitement to kick-start a continual journey for the people involved. A WOM approach examines the reaction to the social object. It knows who is involved, why and how. It finds ways to then take their specific passion and build it into sustained and meaningful (i.e. revenue-driving) brand advocacy.
Which looks like this.
As Radia says, flings and meaningful relationships are not mutually exclusive. But I pretty much guarantee that if you enter a relationship thinking it’s just going to be a fling, without the ability and intention to turn your one night stand into a thousand and one nights of joy, you’ll be staring at an empty pillow tomorrow morning.
I’ve been digesting the wealth of info from Media Aces, the Association for Corporations and European Social Media conference I attended in Paris earlier this month. The aim of this event is to gather professionals (every 3 months) from corporations and encourage them to share their social media uses and progresses. It’s been founded by two leading personalities in the digital marketing space in France: Yann Gourvennec and Hervé Kabla.
Media Aces is an important conference for anyone wanting to have real/concrete case studies and not only the hyped ones, so I suggest you to join the Linkedin group for updates.
Loic Moisand (CEO at Synthesio) did the first presentation with a focus on the different types of brands. He selected four criteria to label them: conversation volumes, sentiment, social media presences and the [comments/post] ratio. He underlined the fact that health brands were the most talked about, as reflected by the research in Molly’s blog post last week (example: Doctissimo online forums in France).
The need for carefully strategic dialogue was also reinforced by Deborah Drai (communications manager at Kapa Santé), especially as the legal environment around this is very strict. All shared content should remain independent and as honest as possible, but also informative and clear for the audience.
Philippe Incagnoli (marketing director at Wall Street Institute) talked about their immersion into social media. They mainly use it to engage in conversations (with individuals on Facebook) and avoid “just” pushing information. They also use professional social networking site Viadeo to find HR directors and/or Training Managers, aiming to start conversations about how their service could be interesting and to follow-up. One essential rule is that they don’t go for too many tools but stay focused on their goals and priorities first.
The last (and very entertaining) talk (by Nicolas Sauvage from Reed Smith) was about the legal aspects regarding social media. It raised a couple of very important questions:
What if a salesperson creates a Facebook page for himself, without asking if it’s ok with the company? Interesting or to be forbidden?
What are the impacts of social media activities on the working hours and the contract of employment?
Should we exclude any uses of social media at the office?
How to avoid confusion between personal and professional uses?
The main take-out was that there still are many questions and few answers, so it’s essential to start experimenting and learning ourselves.
With this in mind, there’s a similar session being run by WOMMA UK in London this Thursday 21st October at 9am, when ReACTS, the leading advertising compliance team at Reed Smith, will be presenting How can companies navigate the social media minefield? – exploring the benefits and pitfalls of social media in the workplace. It’s free to attend but places are going fast so check out the WOMMA UK website for further details and how to register.
The more case studies and learnings we can all share, the more quickly we can all learn and grow…
A couple of interesting pieces of research have surfaced this week: one looking at what we’re talking about online, the other more focused on how and why.
First, Synthesio has analysed around 200 million conversations in 17 countries over the past 3 months to produce:
It reflects that we’re still using social media very much as a consumer space based on specific passions rather than general ‘socialising’. Health scooping the top spot is a no-brainer, but the ‘soft topics’ you’d probably assume our social interactions focus on -love and family – are trumped by our active pastimes, areas saturated by big-brand products and services: games, auto, tech, sports, music, cinema.
This makes total common sense, of course, but it’s worth remembering: we’re broadcasters, not just communicators. We constantly ally ourselves with the things we love and want to discuss products and passions rather than just say hi to dad. It’s what makes the space so valuable for brands.
Secondly, Harbinger have been examining how women’s word of mouth works. Reflecting humankind’s general preference for face to face WOM, they discovered that they’re three times as likely to talk to friends and family about products rather than head online, and 92% prefer offline advice to internet research.
But their study also suggests that women are more likely to seek out others’ opinions about low-entry, impersonal decisions than highly personal ones. 71% will seek out WOM about restaurants, with entertainment and auto decisions rating highly too – but only 41% consult about fashion, and 30% about jewellery. This rather unexpected finding indicates that we’re still pretty sure of our own inner compass when it comes to decisions that broadcast our own unique identity and therefore feel less compelled to trawl for advice.
A final finding suggest this also depends on life stage. 26% of younger women who have just entered a stable relationship are apparently eager to share their ideas and advice, whereas only 4% of over-50s with grown children feel the urge, suggesting that a shift in identity drives a fresh need to express and reinforce it.
It’s real food for thought. When are we seekers, and when are we sharers? When do we prefer to be the recipients of WOM and when the broadcasters? When are we influencers and when are we influenced?
“Following on from the smattering of ill-advised hangers-on clinging to the coat-tails of the meme itself, we’re moving into the phase where agencies have had time to look on admiringly, schedule a meeting with their client, pitch a similar idea, rush it into production, write the press release and bring it to life.”
This level of personalisation is nothing new. In fact I doubt there are many reading this right now who will disagree with me when I say that the Old Spice campaign was just so impactful you’d be forgiven for thinking that they invented it.
However, what it actually succeeded in doing (on top of dramatically increasing sales, mass awareness and no doubt going on to win a bajillion awards in the new year), was highlighting the potential benefits of harnessing social media in this way. A – dare I say it – old and staid brand throwing themselves at social in such a left field and disruptive manner is going to win brownie points for sheer bravery alone.
But what about the #singingtweetagram? Inventive, yes. Fun, also. But this re-iteration and personalisation of tweets, again, is nothing new. When I first saw it hit I thought ‘Genius! It’s an audio version of IrkaFirka!’
For those of you not in the know, to be ‘firked’ is to have one’s tweet taken, turned into art and tweeted right back at you.
The Feed’s elevator pitch? Hashtag your tweet ‘#singingtweetagram’ and they’ll pass it on to the Rockabellas back in the studio who’ll sing it and again, send it back to you.
It worked too. We sent this -
And we got this back!
Great right? Right.
A few things -
What is the objective? How does singing tweets to *anyone* have any direct correlation with brand values, product launches, campaign assets… Who knows.
You heard the audio up there through Audioboo. For some reason The Feed didn’t think to add an option to embed the MP3 on my own site; share it through Twitter? Yes. Download and keep? Also. But no embedding for you.
I’ve never seen @FrankG laugh so much in my life. He loved this and he smiled. A lot. What else? When giving the ‘premiere’ of the clip to the rest of the office, they all laughed too. Wonderful stuff.
Number two is an oversight but one and three cancel out each other quite nicely. If your brand or your client can simply make someone smile and laugh, then who cares about the campaign objectives?
I look at it from time to time and, on occasion, point wildly at it whilst making some word of mouth-related point about something or other.
The best way to illustrate this? Spam is personalised. Post-it notes are personal.
Over the past couple of weeks we’ve been sending out our #WhatisWOM infographic posters to all and sundry* and every single one of them went with a hand-written, personal note saying ‘thank you and enjoy’.
This is important.
Relationships are important.
People are important.
And that, dear readers, underpins everything we do.
