by MC Marketing Charts

The most socially engaged enterprises are experiencing business value returns 4 times higher than those who have the least social engagement presence, finds PulsePoint Group in March 2012 survey results.

Respondents were asked about the impact social media is having on a range of areas including sales effectiveness, operating margins, revenue growth, and product innovation. Extensively engaged businesses reported a 7.7% business impact on these key areas specifically from their social engagement, compared to 3.9% for those with limited social engagement presence, and 1.9% among those with the lowest social engagement presence.

The report defines socially engaged enterprises as those that actively engage customers in meaningful conversations enabled by social technologies, to the benefit of both parties.

 

by MC Marketing Charts

59% of senior marketers either agree (39%) or strongly agree (20%) that companies that do not fully embrace social media will not survive, according to a recently-released study commissioned by Facebook and conducted by Forrester Consulting.

The survey of 101 VP- and C-level marketing professionals found 71% of senior marketers agreeing that companies can gain competitive advantage by leveraging social media, and 60% also agreeing that social media enables businesses to be more successful.

Social Media Integration Still Immature

Despite a majority of respondents believing that their level of social media adoption could put their survival at stake, integration remains at relatively low levels. Just 37% said they started fully integrated social media into their marketing organization some time ago, while an additional 17% said they had begun doing so this year (the survey was conducted in December 2011). This means that close to half have not begun fully integrating social media into their marketing organization, including 16% of the respondents who have no plan to do so. This same trend was found in a survey of CMOs by Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, released in February 2012. Although CMOs responding to that survey expected to increase their spending on social media, they admitted that the channel remains poorly integrated with their firm’s overall marketing strategy. In fact, 18.4% of respondents rated the extent of their integration of social media a 1 on a 7-point scale, where 1 represents no integration at all. And only 21.1% of the CMOs rated their firm’s integration of social media efforts a top 2 box score.

Meanwhile, the Facebook survey indicates that levels of integration throughout entire companies are even less mature. Only 12% said they had started some time ago to fully integrate social media throughout their company, while 29% had started this year. By comparison, 20% had no plans to do so. Responses were similar when it came to social media integration into sales force enablement: 23% had begun doing so some time ago, while one-quarter had no plans to do so.

Most Lack Long-Term Strategy

Data from “Organize for Success in The Connected World” indicates that almost 3 in 10 senior marketers have no long-term (at least 3 years out) strategy for becoming a social business, and have no plans to begin implementing one. In fact, just one-third said they had started a long-term strategy either some time ago (17%) or this year (16%).

Social Strategy Highly Distributed

When asked to what degree various parties owned the social strategy for their business, respondents reported a wide array of partial owners, including sales (45%), corporate communications (41%), marketing (39%), PR agency (39%), the office of the CEO (38%), and a brand agency (35%). Marketing (39%) was most often tabbed for full ownership of the social strategy, followed by corporate communications (30%).

 

By Stan Schroeder

 

On March 21, 2006, Jack Dorsey tweeted the first ever tweet on Twitter.  The sheer fact that you can understand that sentence shows you how far Twitter has gone since then. It has become the de facto short message system of the internet and the favorite social networking service of celebrities all around the world.

And, with over 500 million users, it is the largest one-to-many open communication platform on the web.

However, the service’s beginnings were modest. The service started out as an off-hand project from the creators of podcasting company Odeo, and though it immediately showed potential, it was plagued by frequent downtime in its first couple of years.

Stability problems seem to be a thing of the past now, and Twitter handles and hashtags have become a part of popular culture – they are regularly seen on TV and movie trailers. Ask a celebrity how you can reach them, and the most likely answer will be their Twitter nickname.

When it comes to business plans, in the last 12 months Twitter has been somewhat eclipsed with Facebook’s IPO. The questions about Twitter still remain the same as on its last birthday: Will it go public, will it be acquired by a giant such as Google, Apple or Microsoft, or will it simply keep growing?

We’ll see. In the meantime, happy birthday, Twitter!

 

by MC Marketing Charts

Digital marketing spends are growing. This year, one-third of respondents project digital channels to make up 60% or more of their marketing budgets, up slightly from 31% in 2011.

On a broader level, though, 62% expect to spend more than 30% of their marketing budgets on digital channels, representing a 17% increase from 53% in 2011. Concurrently, the proportion forecasting a spending level of just 0-9% dropped 19% from 21% to 17%.

 

 

by Lauren Drell

We’ve all been hearing a lot about Pinterest lately, so you’re probably wondering whether you should take the plunge and create a profile for your company. We say you go for it, especially if women are your target consumers–70 percent of pinners are female. Pinterest has a highly engaged audience–a reported 3.3 million users logging more than 421 million page views–so there’s plenty of opportunity for brands to flesh out pinboards and catch pinners’ eyes.

First, let’s go through a quick explanation of how it works. Pinterest is a visual social discovery network. You create online pinboards (like a bulletin board) for various categories (i.e. “dream home” or “things to buy” or “recipes”), and you “pin” items to it. You can pin a photo or video in three ways:

• Upload it directly to Pinterest from your phone, computer, etc.

• Use the Pin It bookmarklet on any site on the web to pin the item–it will be pinned with the URL, so you can always go back to the original source.

• Repin other people’s pins, either by seeing what your friends have posted or browsing the dozens of categories on the site.

Sounds fun, right? Now, businesses beware: Pinterest etiquette clearly states that it’s not a platform for self-promotion–it’s not a broadcast mechanism like Twitter or Facebook–so brands need to approach the site a little differently. Here are some tips for navigating Pinterest, along with a rundown of how various companies are already using the visual social network.

1. Promote a lifestyle

Pinterest designer and co-founder Evan Sharp sums it up well: “For most consumer brands, the idea behind your brand makes sense on Pinterest.” Since you’re not supposed to blast pictures of your products on Pinterest, try to think outside the box and pin images that capture a lifestyle and/or the essence of your brand. Pinterest calls for a more holistic approach to marketing, and it can be more effective and engaging than traditional advertising because the consumers can really see how your brand fits into their lives. For example, Bon Appetit can’t just pin pictures from the website or magazine, but it can pin images of cooking appliances, beautiful kitchen decor, cutlery, dinner parties and delicious creations or recipes–basically anything related to cooking and food. Seeing these culinary items will continually drive home the Bon Appetit brand, thus making pinners more familiar with and more likely to trust the brand, visit the website and maybe even subscribe to the magazine.

On your page, you can curate as many boards as you like. Pinners can choose to follow none, a few or all of your boards, so don’t be afraid to be adventurous and curate a wide array of boards–the point of Pinterest is to explore and discover new things, so eccentricity is appreciated and encouraged. If you own a hotel, post pictures of landmarks near the location, food from local restaurants and even pieces from local artists. Own a restaurant? Post pictures of the farm where the meat is raised, the appliances and gadgets used in your kitchen or anything related to the name of the restaurant–for example, Panera could have a board devoted to beautiful artisanal breads. If you’re in fashion, you can pin new trends, fashion sketches, pictures of fittings and shots from runway shows.

Beyond pushing one’s products, you also can use Pinterest as a way to convey your company culture–post pictures of the office, the mascot, people’s cubicles, lunch breaks and office events. Fans are interested in these details, and this imagery helps to humanize the brand.

For a look at what some brands are already doing on Pinterest, check out the roundup below. Perhaps they’ll inspire your own boards.

• West Elm: The furniture brand posts images of various rooms–bedrooms, bathrooms and kitchens–to inspire the interior designer in you. By showering you with beautiful homes, it gets you thinking about nesting without taking an overtly sales-y approach.
• Gap: The fashion company pushes the envelope and goes a bit into promotional territory. It’s Holiday Gift Guide board is a collection of beautifully designed ads with marketing copy, a la the in-store signage. On a “wintry’ board, there’s a collection of images of snow and icicles, interspersed with Gap’s own puffer jackets. And there’s a board devoted to people wearing Gap, from Gap models (like Amy Poehler and Will Arnett) to everyday consumers.
• Etsy: When your website is a marketplace for creative and adorable goods, Pinterest is your social network soulmate. The brand pins images of “handmade weddings,” stationery, fashion, gift ideas, “cool spaces” and holiday decorating tips.
• Rent the Runway: The fashion-rental site groups its boards into occasions–bachelorette party, fall wedding, dance party, New Year’s Eve–and each board contains various “looks” for that particular event to help you get inspired and achieve an appropriate look.
• Birchbox: The beauty subscription service pins close-ups of made-up hair, eyes, lips and painted nails to show various looks that can be created with makeup. There’s also a board devoted to food, since a girl has to eat.
• Modcloth: The ecommerce site sells apparel, but its Pinterest page looks more like a deep-dive into vintage-loving founder Susan Gregg Koger’s mind. There are retro pictures, DIY crafts and home decor boards, which essentially make the Modcloth page a go-to for any thrift-store shopper.
• Chobani: The yogurt brand has aggressively marketed on social media sites, and Pinterest is no exception. There’s a board for treats made with yogurt, recipes that can use Chobani instead of other ingredients such as sour cream, the CHOmobile’s travels and even utensils (adorably called “We Would Like To Eat With You”). Like the brand’s fun, healthy voice on other social media channels, the Pinterest page is a perfect destination for active individuals who embrace life.
• AMD: The tech company curates boards for a nerd’s life–there are quirky gadgets, creative interpretations of the computer mouse, cute laptop bags and pictures of computer workstations.
• Whole Foods: Whole Foods is a healthy lifestyle mecca, and its Pinterest boards reflect that. There are boards devoted to recycling, beautiful gardens, kitchens, art projects and even the Whole Planet Foundation, which offers microcredit to the entrepreneurs who sell goods through Whole Foods. The Pinterest is holistic, just like the brand itself.
• Travel Channel: You’ll observe a serious epidemic of wanderlust on Pinterest, which means that the Travel Channel has an innate advantage. With access to destinations far and wide, the brand is able to fill up boards of beaches, food, city landmarks, exotic animals, travel souvenirs and more. There are even boards devoted to the channel’s various shows to give an inside look at what goes on when the camera turns off and to offer insights into the hosts’ travels.
• Mashable: Our community team pins memes and other tidbits of web culture, in addition to gadgets, which are the facets of our digital and tech coverage that are the most visual.
• The Today Show: NBC’s morning show has something for everyone on Pinterest, since that’s also what it offers on-air. You’ll find behind-the-scenes anchor antics, pics of the Today Plaza, recipes and even cute animals.
• Drake University: The school pins images of dorm life, as well as bulldogs (Drake’s mascot) from all over the web.

2. Use it like a focus group

Millions of people use Pinterest to keep track of objects they love, places they enjoy, foods they devour and things that inspire them. Therefore, you can view it as a sort of focus group. Look at the pinners who follow your brand and see what they’re pinning and who else they’re following. They’re volunteering a lot of information about their interests, passions, dreams and sense of humor in a more natural way on Pinterest than they would on say, a survey or even on Facebook, where they have to manually enter “sarcasm” or “travel” as an interest. Use this information to your advantage to glean insights about your target consumers.

3. Crowdsource

You can ask fans to pin pictures of themselves with their favorite product of yours and tag you, and then you can easily repin those photos onto a VIP board–it’ll give a shoutout to these fans and show potential customers that your current users really like using your product. If your company hosted an even recently, encourage people to pin and tag the photos as a sort of crowdsourced scrapbook. And around the holidays, encourage them to pin a “wish list” board to curate the gifts they’re hoping for.

4. Run contests

We’ve talked about crowdsourcing and asking people to tag you in their pins. The next step is to run a contest on Pinterest. Since the site is relatively new, there aren’t that many case studies, but one company recently did a particularly good job harnessing the power of Pinterest. From December 14 through 21, Land’s End Canvas‘s “Pin It To Win It” campaign asked users to create a Pin It To Win It pinboard (in the women’s or men’s apparel categories) and pin 10 to 20 images from the Land’s End site or repin them from the Land’s End Pinterest page. Once your board was complete, you were to email the URL of your pinboard to Land’s End for a chance to win one of 10 $250 gift cards–this was your official “entry” for the contest. A search on Pinterest shows that there were around 200 boards created for the contest, with each containing at least 10 to 20 images, which means a lot of Land’s End merchandise was injected into the Pinterest feed at no cost. Running contests like this is a great way to expose your brand and products to a large audience, given the viral nature of these images and the engaged Pinterest audience.

5. Inspire your team

There are a lot of inspiring things on the web, and you can create a sort of mood board for your company, pinning things that are relevant, interesting or inspiring to you brand and your team. Pin logos and websites with good design, clever copywriting, images of possible team outings (bowling night or karaoke, perhaps), colors to figure out your new advertising palette or use it to brainstorm an upcoming campaign. By browsing Pinterest, you might even see items that could inspire your company’s next big idea, so keep that Pin It button handy.

 

8 in 10 global company marketers rate search engine optimization (SEO) as either excellent (31%) or good (48%) in terms of return on investment (ROI), while 70% rate email marketing either excellent (23%) or good (47%), according to a report released in March 2012 by Econsultancy in association with Adestra.

Among digital channels, more respondents rate SEO and email marketing highly than do paid search (PPC – 56%), affiliate marketing (44%), social media (44%), and mobile marketing (41%). Offline direct marketing (36%) and online display advertising (28%) are rated highly by the smallest proportion, with 26% saying that online display advertising provides a poor ROI.

Agency respondents agree with company respondents’ top picks, though email marketing takes the lead among this group. 82% rate email marketing ROI as either excellent (37%) or good (44%), compared to 78% who score SEO as either excellent (32%) or good (46%).

 

by Colby Almond

Since I began producing content specifically for Pinterest in the last month, I finally have a large dataset and understanding of users to study. To test the specific impact that a Pinterest-only marketing campaign can have one a site, my girlfriend Alaina was gracious enough to let me work on her sunglass boutique site which was only averaging 20-30 page views daily. With careful research on what, when, and how to submit to Pinterest I quickly began to take over the “popular” section of Pinterest and grow her site to over 100,000 visitors within the first month.

So what did I learn from these first 100,000 visitors and from a month of daily Pinterest marketing? Here are 6 simple lessons:

Lesson 1: Keep a Clean Image

If you’re planning to submit a traditional infographic to Pinterest with the hopes of it going big (assuming it’s not about Ryan Gosling) then the graphic will probably need a redesign. I have found that with Pinterest, infographics containing light and visually appealing colors (such as light blues, pinks, and yellows) have far more success than those that keep their neutral layout.

Why is this? Once your infographic hits the “new” page in any specific category there is only a small 10 minute window for the content to be repinned or liked. If you’re a new user with a small follower base this method is your only chance at going viral. If it doesn’t happen, you will have to wait another hour to try the submission again (see my blog for the Pinterest algorithm update). Since Pinterest is a visual pinboard, it will be in your best interest to redesign the infographic to be as color coordinated and appealing from far away as possible. I have also found that including actual pictures as opposed to graphics works significantly better on the boards.

Lesson 2: Size Matters

When submitting any graphic to Pinterest, this is the absolute biggest lesson that most marketers have failed to learn. My rule of thumb: if it’s over 5,000 pixels long, it doesn’t belong. Why is this so important? Because the REPIN and LIKE buttons are at the TOP of the submission. If a user has to scroll a mile just to see the entire image then it’s very unlikely they will scroll back up to press the buttons that really matter.

But not to worry, it is still possible to go viral on Pinterest with that monster of a graphic. To combat the “size” problem,  create a simple, square image in photoshop outlining the graphics title. Make it simple, pretty, and to the point. If you’ve been on Pinterest for any time at all, I’m sure you’ve seen the image to the left. There’s a reason for that.

Lesson 3: Perfect Timing

When it comes to other social networks the timing of submission is somewhat arbitrary. However, Pinterest seems to stick to a daily schedule of when their users decide to crash my servers with traffic. That is why every single day I am at my computer ready to combat the eventual onslaught of what I like to call “Before and After Work Traffic”. 6AM and 6PM eastern time, every weekday, this happens. With the exception of Fridays, when the spike tends to hit at 4PM.

What does this mean? First of all, Pinterest users are very devoted workers. Second of all, the perfect time to submit your image to Pinterest is at either 5AM or 5PM. After a good hour of your content gaining momentum and traction within the boards your content will be highly visible during the peak hours.

There is a catch, however, in that lately Pinterest’s servers have been having trouble keeping up with the large influx in traffic during these times. If Pinterest seems to be loading slowly or is going in or out, it’s best to just hold off on the submission for another time.

Lesson 4: Honesty Goes a Long Ways

I would be a liar if I said I didn’t have more than one Pinterest account. As a matter of fact, I have several (all for science). The most successful account that I’ve had is a novelty account devoted to being a woman’s best friend. With this account I have never been negative or submitted anything to the boards, however, I just cruise the popular section handing out free advice and honest opinions. By doing this on the popular boards, with a novel name (I used a picture of Ryan Gosling just for the heck of it) I was able to establish over 100 followers within a week.

Just like on every other social network I can confirm that novelty accounts do work on Pinterest.

Lesson 5: Be a Creative Friend

Every morning when I wake up, I check the popular section to see what’s trending. It’s typically food ideas, some shoes, and a Ryan Gosling “Hey Girl” for good measures. However, every once and a while I will see an infographic of viral that made it through the pits to “Popular” page glory. If I see anything on the popular page that I think I would ever possibly make in the future, I make a note of it in my notebook and go about my business. The point is: I would never want to burden the Pinterest community with something that’s been done before.

Much like the other social networks, the users of Pinterest recognize copies or reposted material. While you may have some immediate success in the short run, a well thought-out and creative post will bring in 100x the traffic than cheating your way.

This also means, however, that your content will be submitted 9Gag at one point or another and repinned via Pinterest. This is bad because 9Gag is the mortal enemy to all original content creators.  I have found that by skimming the Popular boards on Pinterest every few hours for your content you will eventually run across an instance where your submission has been rehosted. I nicely leave a comment accrediting the original source and more often than not the Pinterest user edits the submission to the correct link.

Lesson 6: Don’t be Suffocating

This lesson is where probably 90% of the new businesses I see trying to make an impact on Pinterest fail. If you have a business account on Pinterest and someone has chosen to follow your pins, then chances are they are aware of your products have have visited your page to see what you have to offer. If your only plan with Pinterest is to only pin your products or images from your site, then chances are you will fail miserably.

A great rule of thumb I like to tell my clients is only 1 pin per day showcasing a product. The rest of the pins should be advice, insights, or something funny that relates to the industry and account itself. Whole Foods never pins any sort of products to their boards, and for good reason. They have chosen to remain true to their core values and only pin about:

 

• Caring about the community and the environment
• Promoting healthy eating and education to our stakeholders
• Selling the highest quality organic and natural foods available
• Creating ongoing win-win partnerships with our suppliers