Blog posts in Internet marketing

Like Minds - morning session summary

So, the morning session of Like Minds is over and we’ve covered two interesting presentations which have generated a fair amount of debate.

First up, Jonathan Akwue, the “digital thinker director” of Digital Public, offered “an outsider’s view of social media”. He took a challenging stance, insisting - to gasps -that “Digital technology does not always make things better”. Jonathan cited the example of self-service checkouts at supermarkets, which may have created cost-efficiencies for supermarkets, but are a source of consternation for many frustrated shoppers (although several Marketing Donut correspondents actually said they like self-service checkouts).

What social media has done, however, is release the inner gangsta rapper in all of us. Like hip-hop, social media have given ordinary people the means to control the channel of communication and to get their personal message ‘out there’ in an unfiltered form. Social media are “open source” and they are transforming the way we communicate and interact with each other:

You can use social media to change people’s lives,” Jonathan claimed. “You can use it to save people’s lives. We can make massive behavior changes."

Unfortunately, if you have such an open source communication channel, you need to be prepared for what people are likely to say – a point many corporates have yet to really grasp.

Jonathan was followed by John Bell, digital PR guru for Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence Team, whose “Time for a strategy - Beware social media tokenism” presentation focused on the need for businesses to generate and measure proper business impact through their social media presence.

Citing the example of ITunes on Facebook - which has three million fans - John challenged the easy view that numbers equal success. “Does this really mean three million people are engaged?” he asked.

He went on to stress the need for businesses to find appropriate ways to measure the impact of their social media activities and to only continue with activities that actually have a measurable business effect. Otherwise they are simply tokenism.

His presentation gave rise to interesting discussions around the value of having a social media policy and the kind of voice you should adopt on Twitter, to which several of our followers contributed:

@atkirby I think it's important to try and sound like a human being on Twitter, not a robot.

@7db Like biz attire: Wear (voice) what (how) your customer does.

@global_lingo  Strong selling isn't the way forward but for B2B that can be a struggle.

So that’s it for the Like Minds morning session. We’ll be picking it up again shortly – please do follow our live coverage.

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Q&A: Like Minds speaker Olivier Blanchard

Marketing Donut will be bringing you live blog coverage of the second Like Minds conference on Friday 26 February. In this, the second interview in our Like Minds mini-series, Olivier Blanchard (OB) explains what the Like Minds theme of “people-to-people” means to him.

Why does social media need small businesses?

OB: Firstly, the vast majority of businesses around the world are small. If only large, enterprise space companies adopt and integrate social media, we will never see the kind of broad adoption in the business world that will truly bring about the next evolution of B2C communications.

Secondly. small businesses tend to innovate faster than large ones. In terms of innovative uses and integration of social media, as well as the development of new social media tools and applications, the small business community is already doing most of the heavy lifting. Remember that pretty much every social media platform in existence today, from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to Radian6, Scoutlabs and Seesmic started out as small businesses.

What is your take on the theme of “people-to-people” for this year’s event? Will it be a lasting business culture change?

OB: Yes. People are wired to communicate, share ideas and align themselves with the communities they relate to. The very nature of "social" finds its roots in community. The evolution of communications technologies, especially in the real-time digital space, has already eliminated the 20th century's notion of “six degrees of separation”. We have now shifted to “three degrees of separation”, solely through the social web, as LinkedIn illustrates.

Now that people have adopted these technologies, there is no turning back. People are connected to real-time information today like never before, and thanks to mobile, that link has shifted from the desktop to the pocket. Facebook, Twitter and a number of other online social networks help connect people to information, to each other, and to markets 24/7, regardless of where they are. As businesses learn to interact in this real-time P2P culture, both they AND their customers will learn to rely more and more on this type of instant communication. Barring a technological or cultural cataclysm, there is no turning back now: technology has taken P2P from physical face-to-face to digital face-to-face, breaking down geographic, time-zone and socio-cultural barriers, and facilitating not only communications but commerce. The ball isn't likely to roll backwards.

What can we expect from you at Like Minds People-to-People?

OB: Clarity. What I hope to convey to the audience at Like Minds P2P is first and foremost a clear vision and framework for properly integrating social media in their business or organisation, from strategy and multi-silo planning to layered management and rich measurement. There's a method to integrating social media and P2P in the enterprise, and I will focus exclusively on that.

Olivier Blanchard is a social media expert blogger and strategist. He manages the Brandbuilder marketing company and advises on brand strategy in order for firms to adapt to integrating traditional and new media marketing techniques.  

• The Like Minds conference takes place on Friday 26 February. Half day tickets are still available and full programme details can be found on the Like Minds website  

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