It would probably have been useful if the organisers had determined the definition of social media before the debate begun, as this was the main part of the whole debate and its aftermath.

There were a few interesting questions that came up during the debate though; if you pay for viral is it still viral? If you pay for social, have you really earned it? Are social media users, and more importantly bloggers, really in it for the money, or for increasing status, their passion and personal expertise?

For sure, the social platforms are all out there, open for any user or organisation for free. But there is a huge benefit from getting help from people who knows the drill. The debate took silly proportions as there is no way of neglecting the value time and money spent on social media brings to businesses. Social media management is a long-term investment that requires people’s time. The pay-offs are amazing though.

At the end of the event all present took a vote, and it became clear that over 65% of the audience thought that social media could or should be paid for – and thereby got Neoco’s sign of approval!

October Espresso Briefing: Global PR leaders Porter Novelli present their latest WOM case studies

Rosen press cut

On 8.30am Wednesday 7th October, Emmanuel Rosen talks about ‘The Anatomy of Buzz (Revisited)’, the newly updated version of his WOM guide which topped the bestseller lists in 2001 and became an instant international classic. Drawing on his own experiences in high tech as well as hundreds of interviews with consumers, researchers and marketing executives, Emmanuel will discuss proven techniques for stimulating buzz. It’s another morning session lasting until 10.30am at Ogilvy.

We have a few guest seats available for Neoco clients so do get in touch if you’d like to come along for FREE! You’d have to sit with Benn Achilleas (elected member of the Word of Mouth UK council) though  heehee

Weak Ties (in Word of Mouth)

Word of mouth spreads through people’s connections with each other. The looser those connections are, the faster and farther it can spread…

In 1973 sociologist Mark Granovetter published what is now regarded as one of the most influential and cited sociology papers ever written. ‘The Strength of Weak Ties’ explores the idea that society is held together by weak and strong bonds that exist between people. Crucially Granovetter pointed out that most advantage is conferred through Weak Ties – as he, at the time, proved by demonstrating that most people found new jobs through their Weak Ties, rather than through their Strong Ties.

What are Weak and Strong Ties?

Strong Ties are the relationships we have with close friends and family which have more bearing on our identity. They are our support system, the relationships in which we invest more of our time and energy. Weak Ties are the more distant, functional relationships we have with colleagues, friends of friends, or people we may have met through an activity, interest or online that have less bearing on our identity. The two types of tie have very different functions. Strong Ties provide our emotional safety net, they are our social glue. Weak Ties help us with social mobility, they are our social oil.

With regard to word of mouth Weak Ties are an important part of what makes someone influential. To explain why we must first look at how information travels. Clearly information spreads from person to person, but when a social network consists of a large number of Strong Ties information can become trapped. This is because the lack of Weak Ties in the group reduces the opportunity to transfer information to another social network. For the same reason members of very close friendship circles based on many Strong Ties tend to be exposed to fewer new ideas. The absence of Weak Ties in their network impacts on their ability to connect to other social circles where different information is being discussed. Weak Ties act as the conduits for new ideas, helping information to move from group to group.

This means that Weak Ties are essential for word of mouth and influence. They are the channels through which people access information and resources beyond those available in their own social circle. It follows, therefore, that people with a greater number of Weak Ties are more exposed to new ideas and are in a stronger position to inject those ideas into otherwise unconnected networks.

Weak Ties increase massively in a digital context. People who actively participate online – in terms of social networking, social media, and the maintenance of their relationships through email – are able to sustain many more Weak Ties than they would otherwise achieve offline. Moreover, because of the functional nature of Weak Ties (i.e. largely informational rather than emotional transactions), people who use review aggregation sites, pay attention to peer rating systems and follow threads effectively establish a Weak Tie with every contributor. This exponential boost to the volume of an individual’s Weak Ties also increases their access to new information and their ability to spread word of mouth to new networks of people.

Information flows more easily, traverses a greater social distance and reaches a greater number of people through Weak Ties. Weak Ties are a key component of word of mouth.

We suggest going over to the site and reading up on the other content too.

There is also a PDF report that you can download:

Guardian Word Of Mouth report – Word of mouth is a very big topic, and one that is being discussed by many brands and agencies across the world at the moment. Read on to find out how we have built on existing theories and developed a new way of understanding and identifying influential people…

How does it relate to you?

Social Media/”Consumer Generated Media”, although fairly new compared to other forms of online communication is the third most popular way to spend time online, in fact 1/5 of all time spent online, in the UK is spent on Social Networks. Added to this is the perception, among the more traditional among you is that Social Networks are there just for younger audiences that just spend most their time on Facebook/Myspace/YouTube. Yes these are key sites, and yes young people are still in these spaces, but there is a huge space online that is inhabited by all ages, in fact between April 08 – April 09 18-34 age group lost a 8.3% share of online user composition, in community member sites. There is almost an equal share between 18-34 and 35-49 age groups, if you then add in 50-64 group, the share held by 18-34’s is looking rather small.

Once you take away the big sites I have mentioned above, naming another 7 Social Media sites which reach over 3m unique users (in the UK) per month might be a bit of stretch and no Twitter isn’t one of them! But this just points out there is huge untapped market, where you can interact, it doesn’t have to be through the initial channels that you would think of.

So basically, pretty much all age groups are using Social Media, you know their interests, age group and where they live. For Marketers, this is a dream, as all over the internet users can be talking about your brand, doing some of the leg work for you.

Who rules online?

This would be fantastic if everything being said was positive, however as we all know, this is not the case! What has happened is that control has been taken away from brand’s and instead given to the public. A scary thought indeed, but you can help even the balance through buzz monitoring, such as Neoco’s PoNo service. But added to this you can interact with disgruntled consumers in a very public place and can in fact turn negative publicity into a very positive outcome. Toyota did this in the states with one of their best selling car’s, the Camry. They opened a dialogue with key bloggers who were unhappy with the product, helped improve the product and in front of a huge audience of readers solved the problems for them. This was great PR, and was widely praised in blogs. For organisations who do latch on to this new approach to marketing, that sometimes you do make mistakes, but you are happy to rectify them, its a huge step forward and can forge trust in a brand that cannot be repeated elsewhere.

One thing you need to think of before approaching the world of social media is planning. With both negative and positive outcomes in mind, knowing how to react to them before they come. Having key set of objectives and KPI’s in place so you can track how well your campaign is doing, whether this is brand awareness or ROI. When it comes to planning and experience Neoco are digital experts, so please drop us a line to find out how are tools and services can help you.

Thanks to the guest speaker Alex Burmaster, from Nielsen.

join the debate

Make sure you catch the next WOMUK Espresso briefing in May as it’s gonna be a good one. Nielsen are hosting “Key Trends for Riding the Wave of Social Media”.

Some of the Neoco team will be down (well our director Benn Achilleas is part of the leadership committee) so let us know if you want to come along or intend to be down. Failing that we can send you an overview.

More info here

Rich and Judy

This week, Neoco attended a WOMUK Expresso Briefing about why marketing should now be aimed at finding and engaging the “adfluentials”. The starting point of the discussion was a consideration of effective marketing in an environment where the brand-consumer relationship is increasingly complex. For one thing people are discerning between products and services with reference to new sources of authority. Online, peer reviews are becoming more important than any direct marketing. Even in traditional media people are listening to TV personalities for non-expert guidance. Publishers need to understand the Richard and Judy effect as much as fashion lines need to understand what Gok Wan will do to their industry. In terms of digital, however, these new sources of credibility are even more important for two reasons; firstly advocates and detractors a-like can get their voices heard easily, without regulation; and secondly they can be more easily engage with by brands, creating a real two way conversation.

To effectively get a message out there marketers need to identify and work with the people that have the greatest potential to influence others but who also are passionate about the brand or at least the sector.
These are the “adfluentials” and they already want to be found. Engaging with adfluentials in the first instance should ensure a more natural, relevant word of mouth reach. This allows brands to reach
their target audience in an organic way. From these ideas the issue that arises for me, someone starting out in marketing, is how active agencies need to be to achieve this. Surely working with influential brand advocates is about listen – taking a more passive role to empower consumers. And at the end of the day isn’t
this just a case of handing over more power to the consumers. Great if you have a cool brand, or a really solid product, but potentially a way to come across as pandering or directionless or even a way to open up
to more criticism. If this model becomes the predominant way of approaching marketing campaigns, agencies will have to consider brand strength and whether a product will genuinely stand up to scrutiny
before working with it.

Maybe we are generally moving towards a more honest approach to what the customer can add to the discussion. What is more, empowering people that want to have a dialogue with your brand doesn’t have to mean tipping the balance away from internally driven vision. Listening, after all, really means listening to the right people – finding ways to align brand vision and consumer needs. Involving highly targeted people
in the first stage of a campaign has certainly proved successful for Neoco’s clients, and even across brands that don’t have an immediate ‘coolness’ grab. It also seems that this approach is a great way to dissipate negative word of mouth.