Digital Marketing Commentary (Now With 15% More Snark!)

July 15, 2011

update: the jetblue social media volume stats

Filed under: analytics, social media — jilliantate @ 10:48 am

Out of curiosity, I checked to see how big the JetBlue Carpocalypse PR stunt really was. Here’s the details, courtesy of Radian6:

Here’s the buzz levels for “Carmageddon” over the last week. You can see it escalating daily as more news channels pick up the stories, and more people re-post those links. However, it REALLY spikes on 7/13, when JetBlue’s $4 BUR -> LGB fares hit the social web:

Jetblue’s “bump” to an existing major news story was so extreme that I had to see how much of the “Carmageddon” volume over those two days was actually due to the airline promo, and not due to other factors. Turns out that because the JetBlue story ran so quickly, it was only 25% of the buzz on Wednesday and Thursday:

Granted, that is still A LOT OF TRAFFIC when you have the City of L.A. asking celebrities to tweet about the closure. 25% is a pretty big chunk of the pie when you have EVERY NEWS OUTLET IN THE COUNTRY covering this story. (Even the Economist wrote about it – and they are pretty selective in their “real news” coverage)

The question is: what does the conversion funnel actually look like? How much of that buzz resulted in traffic to Jetblue’s website, and how many of those links resulted in clicks beyond the $4 novelty fare page? I would love to see how many new visitors spent more than 10 seconds on their site…or what their branded search term volume looked like yesterday. Will people think of JetBlue when they’re traveling in future? They certainly got the message out that they fly in and out of Burbank, and Long Beach, which are WAY easier to fly in and out of than LAX…even on days when the 405 is open.

July 14, 2011

you go, jetblue

Filed under: Digital Media, facebook, social media — jilliantate @ 9:18 am

Yesterday, one of my colleagues sent out an all-staff email letting us know about the JetBlue Carmageddon flyover.

At the same time, multiple extremely popular people on my Facebook friends list posted the link:

multiple links to the JetBlue promo

I wonder if JetBlue monitored how much social media exposure they got for that publicity stunt? Regardless, today, the flights are sold out:

I can’t wait to see the AdAge articles on this next week.

July 6, 2011

the trending tag on twitter is trouble like tribbles

Filed under: social media, twitter — jilliantate @ 7:13 am

I’m not particularly surprised that the Casey Anthony trial prompted a 150% increase in online traffic. Nor am I surprised that the #notguilty tag took off like a shot yesterday. But I AM surprised that a PR agency for @Entenmann assumed it was a trend about stealing cookies or something, and used it to tweet:

Who’s #notguilty about eating all the tasty treats they want?!

The Internet has so many inside jokes that you have to check every catchphrase BEFORE you use it. It isn’t that a PR agency used a trending tag to link Entenmann’s treats to an accused child murdered. It’s that someone who should know how to use Twitter and the Internet didn’t check the tag to be sure they understood the joke I have to agree with the guy who said he would have preferred bad taste to blatant incompetence.

But I think Entenmann’s is getting the benefit of the screw up here. The #notguilty tag today has more about Entenmanns than it does about Casey Anthony. They have 1,716 followers right now, but I bet they hit 3K+ soon. And, best of all, everyone knows now that they have a Twitter account. Seriously, who would think that Entenmanns would have a Twitter feed? They’re such a traditional supermarket brand, I would never have guessed. Now, they are getting thousands of free impressions about their PR company’s screwup. This honest mistake may actually end up in their favor, as the world is now watching their previously invisible Twitter feed. I sincerely hope their management recognizes that and doesn’t fire their PR people, who certainly seem sorry enough. You literally can’t buy this kind of publicity.

As a free suggestion, Entenmann’s and Likeable, I suggest that Entenmann’s immediately start making donations to abused children. Preferably money, instead of the diabetes-inducing products they usually sell. That would be a genuine way of showing their company culture while the spotlight is still on them. The folks at Groupon & Crispin Porter missed the boat when it came to highlighting Groupon’s charitable efforts regarding Tibet and the whales. I’m hoping Entenmann’s takes advantage of this.

Also, looks like the satirists did jump on this right away, but I’m sure they’ll have to give up soon. Unlike the @BPGlobalPR people last year, I doubt they can keep the one liners up ALL summer

January 26, 2011

Facebook Sponsored Stories: You Are Now Endorsing Any Brand You Mention

Filed under: facebook, social media, Uncategorized — Tags: , , — jilliantate @ 9:21 pm

I wrote the below as a comment to David Berkowitz’ post on Mashable about Facebook’s Sponsored Stories.

David, did you see this article?
I was really surprised to see All Things D’s editorial take on this new program. I agree with your statement in your op-ed that your initial posts on Facebook “come from the heart”. In their initial posts, users, like you, are choosing to mention their association with a brand. The Sponsored Stories crosses that line from mentioning association to full-on endorsement. I may post that I’m at a Starbucks because I freely associate and identify with that brand’s image, but that doesn’t mean I want Starbucks to make that look like a recommendation to my friends. Also, I know most of my friends may miss my initial post in their Feeds, and blowing it up into a full on ad makes it very difficult to miss, and much less of the casual, organic mention I meant it to be.

As a user, I agree there should be an opt out. But as a marketer, I’m ready to get client ads up on there the second the option opens up to me in the self-service ads center. This is actually a fantastic fit for a brand who interacts well with people on their Facebook page, since engaging their customers in dialogue will give them lots of stories to sponsor. This could be part of really big Facebook strategies, and could help close the gap between paid and organic marketing on social media. It’s tough NOT to like it from a purely marketing standpoint.

September 7, 2010

@AZHelps is Missing the Boat (But At Least They’re On The Dock)

Filed under: Pharma, social media, twitter — jilliantate @ 1:15 pm

I’m engaging in a discussion today with the insightful, knowledgeable John Mack, over on his excellent Pharma Marketing blog. He saw my tweet on how I was impressed with @AstraZeneca actually monitoring Twitter and selectively responding to people who mention their brands (albeit with “canned” tweets). John, however, made several observations on how this program is actually failing the patients. You can read the background in the original post, but here’s my reply – which expands the thoughts surrounding my original tweet.

John, my “wow” was a reaction to a pharma company actually monitoring the Internet and acknowledging that they do so. In my experience, pharma companies do not want to monitor user generated content, because the lack of clarity in the FDA guidelines suggests they would then be responsible for reporting any adverse events that they come across. The FDA has said that they don’t expect pharma companies to monitor and take responsbility for the entire Internet, does that apply when a company publicly announces that they are reading Twitter? I think it’s a big step for AZ to monitor Twitter for mentions of their brands, and reply even with a poor canned message.

Granted, this campaign could have been executed far better. I would have recommended reviewing existing posts across Twitter and other channels, and devising many more pre-written tweets for legal approval. If the copy in a tweet was pre-approved, then it would be easy to develop a “response path” chart and have someone at AZ APPROPRIATELY with the right paths. I totally agree that calling a 1-800 isn’t the right answer for everyone…if someone wanted to call a 1-800, they’d have called it already. But I also don’t know what goes on in AZ’s legal department, or what the rationale was for this approach. It seems like every pharma company’s legal department interprets guidelines differently, and convincing them of the benefits & risks of a campaign can be difficult.

My hypothesis is that AZ wants to track all the users they reach out to, and that’s why they’ve asked them to phone in, as opposed to just visiting the site. That way, they can be sure the conversation continues in an environment AZ is more comfortable in, which can be monitored and answered by trained AZ people. Directing patients to the phone may also be their way of guaranteeing that any adverse events are duly and appropriately recorded and reported.

Still, I think this whole thing is better than the GSK approach to Avandia (ie. ignorance). Yes, @AZHelps is dropping the ball in responses – but they may be monitoring on the back-end, and gathering critical patient questions & input for their product. I would sincerely hope that the questions & mentions they are picking up on Twitter are going towards future product site copy. Now that they know what questions & statements people are making about their product, they have more ability to re-do sites like AZandMe.com to be actually relevant to the users who need a reliable information source in the first place.

September 2, 2010

Tempur-Pedic’s CEO Talks About Their Facebook Page

Filed under: Digital Media, direct response, facebook, social media — jilliantate @ 10:03 am

In this video, Mark Sarvary, CEO of Tempur-Pedic, talks about the integrated strategy his company took. Their commercial, “Ask Me”, told consumers to ask on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube about the company’s mattresses. “Ask me about my Tempur-Pedic!”

But what if you don’t know which of your friends have a Tempur-Pedic bed? That’s why, when “Ask Me” launched, I initiated a strategy to catch all those TV driven consumers. We had set up a Facebook page and a YouTube channel for the client back in Q2 2008, but neither was gaining the kind of popularity that would make them central hubs for conversation. Knowing that a brand’s Facebook page needs a certain critical mass, we applied our usual DR media buying tactics to drive more users to that page. Using a combination of site-wide “become a fan” ads (which were less expensive than homepage ads), and the inherent evangelism in the product, IMS drove almost ten thousand new fans to the Facebook page inside of three months.

Now, when consumers shopping for a mattress go to “Ask Me”, they find a vibrant Tempur-Pedic Facebook page, with 13,000+ “likes”, where they can ask their questions and read other owners real, uncensored stories. In this video from February, when the page was just over 10,000 fans, CEO Mark Sarvary talks about how more and more people are coming to that Facebook page every day, and how that fits in with the overall Tempur-Pedic strategy.

If the video doesn’t show up, above, it’s here on CNBC.com”

July 7, 2010

Twitter Announces New Advertising Model

Filed under: digital media buying, direct response, social media, twitter — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — jilliantate @ 9:18 pm

I just sent the below out to my team, for distribution to clients. We may not use a lot of Twitter here at my DR focused agency, but this may actually be a viable ad model…when Twitter figures out how much to charge.

Digital Breaking News: Twitter Releases “@Earlybird” Advertiser Channel

July 7, 2010 – Twitter today announced the release of a new advertising channel: the Early Bird Twitter feed. This Twitter account is owned and operated exclusively by Twitter, and will be used to promote deals and discounts which are exclusive to Twitter users. As of 2pm PST on July 7th, 2010, the @earlybird account on Twitter had over 16,000 followers, with approximately a thousand more following every hour.

For Twitter, this gives the site a real means of advertising income, without having to deviate from their community culture. The plan for Twitter to begin offering sponsored tweets was first announced April 13th, 2010, at AdAge Digital, when the site founders, taking a cue from sponsored search, promised to only place sponsored tweets at the top of Twitter search result pages. However, the model was experimental, and still being tested to be sure the tweets “resonated” with the audience. Now, Twitter has a dedicated advertising feed, one where users are given incentive to join through deals and discounts. Since following @earlybird is entirely voluntary, Twitter is able to keep their users happy, and avoid any model which could be considered invasive advertising.

For advertisers, this now provides a new opportunity to introduce their brand to new customers. Deals and discounts are proven incentives for users to sign up to receive advertiser offers. In a recent eMarketer study, 37% of users who “Liked” a brand on Facebook, did so because they were incentivized with coupons or exclusive discounts. Deal based sites such as Groupon and LivingSocial also command huge mailing lists of subscribers who receive daily offers via email. The promise of financial incentives has proven very attractive for the online audience, inciting thousands of people to sign up to receive regular communications featuring a variety of advertiser offers. The @earlybird stream on Twitter is very likely to command a similarly extensive following of highly responsive users.

While Twitter has not been a significant part of Integrated Media Solutions campaigns to date, this new advertising opportunity may prove to be an option for clients in future. This will be a national advertising opportunity, with over 100,000 “followers”. Recommendations will be made based on pricing and campaign goals, in keeping with IMS’ practice of media portfolio management

More information on Early Bird from Twitter can be found at:

http://support.twitter.com/groups/31-twitter-basics/topics/111-features/articles/208505-what-is-earlybird

Jillian Tate
Director, Digital Strategy
jtate@imediasolutions.com
@jilliantate

December 31, 2009

social media reporting isn’t all bells and whistles

Filed under: analytics, social media — jilliantate @ 5:45 am

I wish it was. You can automate bells and whistles; you can’t automate the kind of loving, hand-tagged work that I do on a social media report.

I spent hours today slaving over a hot Radian6 report, reviewing the past six weeks of social media posts for a pharma client. I’m trying to find patterns in the social media evidence for the FDASM movement, as opposed to the scattershot anecdotal evidence that many agencies have relied on to date. So I went through over four hundred posts, eliminating all the spam, foreign language, and unrelated posts. Then I tagged each post as a post type by category, assigned keywords based on the actual content, and analyzed the sentiment. This required actual reading of the vast majority of the posts, and an intuitive adult to tag and report on it. That meant, well, me.

At the end of the day though, I have a series of neat pie charts and bar graphs that illustrate and analyze the chatter surrounding my client’s brand over the last forty-five days. Now we can go to the FDA in February and say, hey, did you know that the most frequent posts we see regarding our client’s product are questions that the pharma company themselves are best suited to answer? Now, I have numbers. I just needed a full workday to really review the evidence.

Bonus for the media buyers: Combine frequency of posts with TV and search volume, and we may see some dovetailing worth mentioning. It will tell us whether the TV media drives social media chatter when it comes to pharma, or if its the docs and the referrals/recommendations who drive the demand. If its the latter, social media is more important than we thought, and we should let the FDA know that too.

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