Mediameme

Why not use the power of social media to REALLY learn what people really think about your brand?

This handy little app called Brand Tag throws up logo and asks you to define it in one word.  It’s creator, Noah Brier, calls it an experiment in brand perception. Part rorschach test, part zeitgeist, this tool gives a manager the tag cloud of brand attributes that is, quite frankly, brutally honest (if you happen to be the poster child for horrible customer service). On the other hand, even halo brands like Whole Foods have a few ‘undesirable’ qualities (look at the size of the cloud around the phrase, “whole paycheck”).

Based on the tag cloud results, here are some other brands that could use an increase in their strategic brand spend this year:

Cannondale – definitely loved by a select few who can afford the pricey ride, it seems to suffer from some larger scale recognition issues that other luxury brands (Louis Vuitton, Bentley) don’t seem to have, although they each respectively have some other issues to deal with!

NBA – one of the most prevalent tags is Michael Jordan, who retired more than a decade ago!

Suburu — seems to be suffering a brand identity crisis between “rally / motorsport” and “lesbians”

BlueCross – when the words that leap out are: death, evil, rip-off and scam…it’s probably time to invest money in marketing.

Zappos – simply put, stands for shoes…for the 37 people who have heard of them (and love them like me!

Go play, add your brands and post your comments about which brand caught your attention (and why).

<Hat tip: Ken Burbary>

I’ve been traveling a bit lately which means I’ve actually had a chance to read something more substantial than Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus.  But I still don’t have a plethora of time to write a dissertation on each book, so I’ll rely on Hemingway’s infamous shortest story technique, but applied in a slightly different manner: six word book reviews.

The Future of Management, by Gary Hamel.

Unpredictable business reinvents management. Help wanted.

Groundswell: Winning in a World of Transformed by Social Technologies, by Charlene Li & Josh Bernoff

Tired ideas. Forgettable stories. Useless stats.

The Age of Engaged: Reinventing Marketing for Today’s Connected, Collaborative and Hyperinteractive Culture by Denise Shiffman

Four P’s become Five V’s. Profound.

The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom by Yochai Bentley

Law Professor drones on Internet collaboration.

Have you read any of these books? Include your reviews in the comments.

Ever thought about the interactive landscape in a literal sense?  Where the web site is more like a landscape painting you might see in a museum?

Check out UK electronica group Goldfrapp’s web site. Whether the home movie clips that play immediately are authentic or artificially created (much more likely the case), the fact that it takes up every pixel of the screen immediately grabs the visitors attention. The clips are terrible — deliberately so. The camera wobbles, the lighting is too dark, the film is overexposed at points, the screen is pixellating at points and the subject is self-absorbed in her own exploration. Which is precisely what makes it so watchable.

The navigation information is pushed to the bottom or upper left corner, leaving a clean, unobtrusive viewing experience. Goldfrapp, centered at the bottom of the frame looks more like a signature, reminding me of a true canvas brought to life with interactive components: video, color, music, text, and so on.

The site eloquently exemplifies the philosophy of Jakob Nielsen (another Brit and web design legend in my book, although not all share my opinion):  all designs work in three main ways: visceral, behavioral and reflective.  The visceral level is the way the site looks.  You can love it or hate it, but either reaction means the design is working.  On the behavioral level — actual use — the site also scores pretty well. Information is straight-forward and easy-to-find.  As for the reflective level — what does it say about the brand (or in this case the band)?

Speaking of indie bands & web sites, check out the artists on the Ghostly label. If you are a design geek like me, there is a marvelous variety of web site landscape inspiration.  And the music is great too.

<Hat tip to my buddy, Dan Sicko for the info on this hot indie label.>

I’ve been awake since Wednesday chasing 65-year old divorced Grandmas around Las Vegas casinos.

Odd as that sounds, it’s part of an original approach to understanding consumer behavior.  I’m working through a fascinating experience called Camp Organic as both observer and participant in the surreal surroundings of Las Vegas.  Exceptional experiences are grounded in understanding the decision-making process and psychological baggage each of us has acquired through our lifetime.  Camp Organic is a a three-day ethnographic exercise to help people truly understand and experience customer empathy firsthand.  Will post more on the process and debrief after I’ve completed them later on today.

Grab a copy of your company’s organizational structure. I don’t care if there is one employee or 100,000 — are customers even noted on it?

If they are, where does their ‘box’ appear? At the bottom of the page? At the top? How about in the middle — where the entire organization can focus on them?

Think about it — if your company isn’t in the business of meeting the needs of your customers, you don’t have a business. Or you won’t for much longer. Because that is the new reality for institutions when they collide with social media.

Right now I am suffering through one of the worst service experiences an American consumer can face: travel. From the moment I checked in online using Northwest’s (Northworst) system, which will only let me confirm seating for the trip within 24 hours, but not the return trip scheduled for later in the week, to the boring looong flight where I was asked to pay for my food and not even offered the option of entertainment for a 4 1/2 hour flight to the 45-minute wait for my luggage which seems to be the defacto time in any airport in the US, to the 30-minute wait in the scorching hot desert sun while I waited for a cab that reeked of smoke that drove way too fast to the hotel where check-in that stole another 30 minutes from my life. Then I was summarily told that the room wouldn’t be ready for at least 4-5 hours…and this is normally what we all experience whenever we travel. Now think about how much a typical business trip or vacation costs and compare it to other experiences that cost much less money yet deliver far greater satisfaction.

There are millions of message boards, forums, blog posts and comments that all support the singular fact that there is a substantial problem here, yet no company is rushing to fix it. Because they are still working with the old organization chart model in mind that doesn’t wave red flags and tell them they have a problem. But for a nimble competitor with a service-based mentality, this situation represents a game-changing opportunity and deliver a truly exceptional experience for consumers.

Love that companies like Zappos are incorporating Twitter into their social media plan. Even the evil Comcast has a sad little messenger taking heaps of insults from the twitterati. And, since I live nr the Motor City, just a little frustrated that the car companies are like deer caught in the proverbial headlights. It’s a conversation — just start talking. Eventually someone will respond, even if to tell you to ‘shut up’.

Which led me to thinking about why companies are experimenting with social media at all. For some, like Zappos, it will result in sales. Their corporate ethos is that they are a service company who happen to sell shoes, so their Twitter strategy makes perfect sense.

If the same logic were to apply to Comcast (e.g. “We’re a service company who happen to ‘sell’ access to communication), I’d wonder why they were on Twitter. Pls note that Comcast and I have been in an exclusive relationship for 8 years and my bitterness is born from all the times Comcast stood me up for our dates, never calling to apologize but instead, prompting me to call and to reschedule my life…again. Comcast likes to think its dependability is a strength, but more often than not I’m disappointed by its inability to perform. And Comcast is EXPENSIVE — more than a car payment every month!  Because I have Comcast in every room with at least 7 screens.  If I could file for divorce, believe me, I would.

Car companies have the opportunity to be manufacturers of the American dream, who happen to make cars. Yet, every single car brand’s message is so splintered and disingenuous, adding another ‘channel’ like Twitter, is just another line on the media plan’s excel spreadsheet. Which is ironic, given that the bulk of Madison Ave media money is donated by the automotive industry.  And we all know that the big media business model is broken.  More channels means less money for the dominant players in an industry dependent on scarcity for survival.

The first car company to truly embrace — I mean from the C-level throughout the entire global business — that all they need to do is support the passionate relationship that often already exists between their owners and their brand — and let THAT core belief dominate messaging, will reap the rewards.  This isn’t about the democratizing of business.  It’s about responding to what customers want because they ultimately hold the future of (your) business in their hands.  In order to understand how brands ARE communities, social media channels should be utilized to listen and learn.  And then join the conversation.  Find neighborhoods online where are conversations are already happening and start sharing, listening to feedback AND communicating frequently.

Yes, the brave new media is much harder but the payoff is much greater in terms of loyalty.  And the money that has been wasted for decades on media can be reworked into the economy through contracting work from millions of stay-at-home moms, students, wounded heroes — Americans, in other words, who would love to be paid for being online and doing what they love to do.  It takes courage to lead companies in a new direction, but the payoff is there for those souls brave enough to take on the challenge.

P.S. Reason #704 why I love Twitter…in an exchange yesterday, Jeremiah Owyang, Forrester Sr Analyst and über blogger on the topic of social media + corporate institutions posted a link to this wiki listing companies with a presence on Twitter. For the most part, follow them and they will follow you.  You can keep track of their activities and, if you get tired of their barrage of press releases, you can unfollow them after a while.  By the way, the password to access the wiki is on the Home page so you can edit pages and add your company name + twitter account.

I posted a couple of months ago about friendfeed — the killer app that lets you be a voyeur on steroids. Now there is a site called Grouply that lets you aggregate all your Yahoo Groups AND Google Groups communications in one message or in one place.

It also has a calendar feature so you can see all the dates being posted by the community — helpful for networking groups. AND like all good social media, it offers connectivity to people who share similar interests.

Sounds great, right? I was hooked right up to the point I saw the big red box asking about the rumors I might have heard…and then when they asked for the Yahoo ID and Password.

<double-take> Whaaaat?

One click search told me who was behind the site and if the TechCrunch and TrustE badges were for real. They are; however, I’m not the first to question their credentials.

The Grouply business model seems to rely on trust — go on, give them your password that may also be the key to the credit card information you keep on your Yahoo ID to access their stores, any finance information if you use Yahoo to watch/trade stocks or funds, your personal contacts, possibly your flickr images and community…the list goes on and on. I’m posting this to also highlight the dark side of social media that often gets buried.

Benefit: all your groups nicely organized in one place.

Risk: spambait and compromised identity.

I’m thinking the risks outweigh the benefits on this one.

Influencers.

Chris Anderson’s Long Tail is a foundational theory for digital marketing. Perhaps you’ve heard the term and vaguely understand what The Long Tail means, but why is it important and how does it change marketing and business?

See where the dinosaur’s head is located?  Those are the generic places online that capture a wide cross-section of audience: Facebook, Google, YouTube, eBay, etc.  The tail refers to the more niche sites, for instance within social networking it may be bookworms who want recommendations by friends or cyberfriends they trust at Goodreads, so if you are in the publishing business, joining the conversation both at the head (e.g. Facebook — create a bookswap group) as well as a niche site like Goodreads means you are working both the folks who might have a more casual interest in your brand as well as the influencers who can catapult masses of people into your brand with a few lines in a post or comment.

Where do you find the long tail communities like Goodread? Mashable posted this great list of 350 social networks by interest, which is a good starting point. From there you may find people who blog on more specialized subjects. You’ll also find links to forums and other information in users’ profiles once you join the networks that are closely aligned to your brand.

Happy Hunting!

<image of the Long Tail for this post comes from Left Click, a NZ-based SEO and usability firm>