by Josh Bernoff

Even thought it's actually been available for a weeks, today is the "official" publication date for Groundswell. That means it's in stores all over the US and on iTunes and Audible as an audiobook.

We created this book to help people take advantage of the social computing trend. But is it actually useful? Only you can answer that question -- and we'd like to hear your answers.

We love bloggers reviewing the book, but you may not have a blog, or have time to write a few paragraphs. So why not make it easy. Twitter your review.

Start your review with "@Groundswell" and keep it to 140 characters. Why? Because it enforces some discipline on your thinking. And because it makes it easier for the rest of us to read all the reviews.

If you're not on Twitter, you can certainly write a 140 character review in the comments below.

Or you can leave it on our wall at Facebook.

Want to see what others are tweeting, use this Summize link or this Tweetscan.

(If you haven't read the book, what are you waiting for? Buy it here or here.)

Around May 15 we'll highlight the most interesting ones in a post on this blog, and we'll be retweeting them from @Groundswell on Twitter.

Looking forward to hearing your ideas!

by Josh Bernoff

In February we published research based on our expectation that interactive marketers should continue their investments in social applications with a recession potentially coming.

Today we published the results of new research that shows that many interactive marketers actually plan increases in the face of recession. (Forrester clients will be able to see the whole report, others will see a summary when clicking on the link.) We asked this question:

Assuming the economy is in a recession in the next six months, how would you change your investment in interactive marketing overall?

Of 333 interactive marketers surveyed, 26% plan to increase their interactive marketing investments, and 46% will maintain them at current levels. (13% plan a decrease and 15% aren't sure.)

Where is that money going? Here's a chart from the report.

Social networks will get the largest number of increases, over 40% of those using it, along with user-generated content, blogs, and that old standby, email marketing. Every single form of online marketing we surveyed had at least half the marketers increasing or maintaining their investment (online display ads fared the worst; based on this sample it could see more decreases than increases.)

Note that the variation in N reflects the varying number of people familiar with or using each type of marketing. But for all the major technologies we got more than 100 responses.

Are these typical of marketers in general? Remember, the respondents are interactive marketers at large and medium-sized companies and ad agencies, so you can expect a little more optimism. But I believe these results reflect a real commitment to the power of interactive marketing over traditional advertising, which always suffers in a recession.

This is also evidence that in contrast to the bubble of 2001/2002, this housing-driven downturn hasn't spread to depress all investment in new ideas. People are recognizing that in a recession, social application investments are relatively cheap and deliver measurable results, despite their newness.

Our advice to marketers, as describe in the report, is this: measure what you do, so you can justify it when the axe comes. And build assets, not campaigns, it's a better use of your money.

Marketers reading this -- do you agree with what our panel said?

by Charlene Li

Today I tried out Starbucks' new customer feedback and idea generation site at mystarbucksidea.com, which is powered by Salesforce Idea (it's the same product that's behind Salesforce's own Idea Exchange and Dell's Ideastorm).  Josh and I feature these two sites in our Groundswell book, as an example of how a company can execute an "embracing" objective.

On these sites, people like you and me can "share" an idea. Then other people can "vote" for them, and the ideas with the most votes float to the top.  People can "discuss" an idea by adding comments, and  finally, to close the loop, Starbucks will provide feedback and status reports on the most promising ideas.

The results: Starbucks "launched" the site on March 19th. The top idea as of today is for Starbucks to offer a "punch card" to provide a frequency discount or free drinks. It has 29,410 points, which means that 2,914 people have voted for it (each vote counts as 10 points). The site's "Ideas In Action" section has a post (sorry, no permalink!) has an entry on March 24th saying that this particular idea is being reviewed and will be incorporated into the Starbucks Card Reward program.

The reason why I was so intrigued with the Starbucks site is that I'm a loyal user of Starbucks, so I have plenty of ideas on how they can improve their service. Just how much do I use Starbucks? It's my default place to work on weekends (the empty office is too depressing and having spouse/kids at home is a recipe for non-work) and my remote office when I'm traveling. As a result, I know where the electrical outlets are at all of my local Starbucks and bring along an extension cord. I also have a list of Starbucks stores bookmarked on my phone browser.

What's impressive is that I'm feeling more connected with other Starbucks fans, especially those craving healthier breakfasts, automatic ordering with my Starbucks card (mine is a simple Grande decaf), and my pet peeve, more power outlets.

But Starbucks, please don't let this engagement end! I want to subscribe to your Ideas in Action "blog" via RSS so that I can find out more about what's new -- and to see if my favorite ideas are being implemented. I want to comment on your blog too, to let me know that I'm happy/not happy about your future decisions. Close the loop, and you've not only got me hooked, but I'll walk the extra block in NYC or drive the extra mile to go to you rather than another coffee house.

Update: It hit me that I'd like to know your experience with Starbucks Ideas. What do you like/don't like about it, and more importantly, what brands/companies would you like to see adopt something similar? I'm curious to see if you would participate and contribute more to personal, consumer brands like Starbucks, or if there's also an affinity to business-oriented companies like Salesforce.

by Charlene Li

On Monday, I gave the kick off speech for the Graphing Social Patterns West conference on the topic, “The Future Of Social Networks” (slides are available on SlideShare, summaries available on News.com, ReadWriteWeb, and allfacebook.) Note that this is still ongoing research, so I welcome your comments.

I set my time frame for the long term – five, even ten years out. That’s because unless we know where we want to end up, how could we ever craft a strategy to get there? For inspiration, I thought about my grade-school kids, who in ten years will be in the midst of social network engagement. I believe they (and we) will look back to 2008 and think it archaic and quaint that we had to go to a destination like Facebook or LinkedIn to “be social”.

Instead, I believe that in the future, social networks will be like air. They will be anywhere and everywhere we need and want them to be. And also, without that social context in our connected lives, we won’t really feel like we are truly living and alive, just as without sufficient air, we won’t really be able to breathe deeply.

There are four components of what I’m calling this idea of “ubiquitous social networks”: 1) Profiles; 2) Relationships; 3) Activities; and 4) Business models. These aren’t new -- I wrote about the first three in my original report on social networks back in May 2004. But in the context of ubiquitous social networks, they will develop into the following: 1) Universal identities; 2) A single social graph; 3) Social context for activities; and 4) Social influence defining marketing value. For more detail on each of these components, see the extended post (warning: it's really long!).

The ubiquitous social network isn’t going to happen overnight – in fact, it’s going to take five+ years to come to fruition. This is part of the continued evolution of open platforms, starting with walled garden services like Prodigy, Compuserve, and AOL that evolved into the major portal aggregators like Yahoo!, MSN, and AOL. This gave way to the “search era” where Google et. al. made all of the Internet easily accessible. Today’s social networks are a throwback to those early closed platforms, and they will be opened up by new “entrants” into the social space – namely, Yahoo!, Microsoft, Google, and AOL – who will leverage their deep, daily relationships with online audiences.

In the end, there are two essential things that have to present for this all to happen. The first is technology -- ubiquitous Internet access and the servers to enable real-time social graph access. Given the pace of technology development, I'm pretty sure this will happen. The second is much harder -- trust has to be present, between people, between social networks, marketers, and developers. This is what is going take a lot of time, effort, and patience, but the optimist in me thinks that it will come. That's because people will press for it, demanding that sites and applications adhere to a Bill of Rights for users of the Social Web.

So what is a social network, marketer, or developer to do? Here are my recommendations:

• Create linkages between services based on individually-controlled identity federation
• Compete on creating the most compelling social experience, not social graph lock-in
• Develop social applications that have meaning
• Integrate social networks into existing activities
• Design business models that reflect the value created by people’s social network

In the extended post (click on "More" below) is a more detailed explanation of how I see each of the four components of ubiquitous social networks developing.

As I mentioned above, this is ongoing research and I'm far from done. So if you have ideas, comments, criticisms, or examples, let me know via comments below or email at cli at forrester dot com.

by Josh Bernoff

Forrester's interactive marketing group is research attitudes among marketers towards different marketing channels. We'd love to hear from you. If you or one of your colleagues is involved with interactive channels (e.g. email marketing, search marketing, display ads, social networking, blogs, widgets, mobile) take the survey here. 

We’ll send you a copy of the research when it becomes available. And the results will be quite a bit more definitive than our Super Bowl research.

Thanks for your help.

by Charlene Li

(Note: this was originally posted on Harvard Business Online, which is part of Harvard Business School Press, the publisher of our upcoming book).

As an analyst, I’m often asked by people why they should bother with services like LinkedIn, Facebook, and MySpace, both from a personal as well as corporate perspective.

Let’s start with a fundamental premise – that all business is social and personal. Business involves people and communications and we all prize “networking” skills and opportunities. Businesses don’t strike deals with each other – people do. And we build bonds by talking about everything from sports teams and the weather to our families and hobbies.

So we as business people already engage in social networking every day, primarily through phone calls, emails, meetings, and events. The same activities take place on social networking sites – people share tidbits and moments that build relationships.

Yet, many people when they first go and experiment with a site like Facebook, don’t find it relevant to their professional lives. There are two reasons for this: 1) Your professional colleagues are likely not actively using Facebook; and 2) Most of the applications today aren’t designed for a business context.

Let’s take the first problem – you may not have many friends in these social networks. This was my problem – it was only this past spring that people I actually know started using Facebook. My friends are posting links, book reviews, the events they were going to, and suddenly, I now find myself at a near addiction with Facebook. I went to an event because five friends said they would be there. And when I saw them at the event, I congratulated them on closing a round of financing and asked about their recent vacation – all of which had been shared on Facebook. What’s the business value of staying on top of your network? As we know from experience, priceless.

Now for the second problem. Business applications on services like Facebook have yet to take off, which is why people like Tom Davenport have a hard time seeing the business value of social networking sites. I don’t blame him – after all, the most popular applications on Facebook today include such frivolous things like playing Scrabble and Vampires (where you “bite” your friends – don’t ask). That’s because these applications are being designed by 20-something developers for their 20-something friends.

But remember: The notion of creating social applications is only 6 months old – we are in the early days here. Business-oriented developers are just now waking up to the possibilities, and the audience that would use these tools are just discovering social networking. It’s going to take some time for these two sides to find each other and develop an ecosystem for business applications.

Here’s an example – LinkedIn described to me a new social application that would show events in your industry that are coming up – and who in your network is going to them. It will also show you people in that city that you could connect with. So if you know that colleagues, suppliers, partners, funders, customers, etc. are going to be gathering, you’re going to want to be there too.

There’s one final business value that companies are already seeing – and that’s reaching the people who are using social networking sites. Advertising on social networking sites won’t work well – but communicating with people, talking with the “fans” of your products on Facebook makes a lot of sense. Victoria’s Secret has badges that its enthusiasts can download on MySpace on put on their profiles for their friends to see. Ernst & Young (yes, an accounting firm!) answers questions from college students on Facebook – people they are trying hard to recruit.

So don’t write off social networking sites as merely social playgrounds for the young. Your customers, prospects, and employees are exploring and extending their relationships there. Some of you will be bolder in creating business value in these networks while others will wait for the pioneers to carve out the paths. But ignore these new communities only if you believe your customers are not there – and there are few instances where this will be the case.

Does your business embrace social networks? Or is it taking a hands-off approach?

Tags: Facebook , MySpace, social networks,  Forrester Research, Groundswell

Add to del.icio.us

by Josh Bernoff

We recently got the chance to interview George Wright, Director of Marketing for Blendtec, the company responsible for the video you see here. The reason I'm telling you about it is that Blendtec is that unusual phenomenon: a company that has managed to make YouTube into an effective marketing tool.

Blendtec makes commercial blenders that you might see in a Chili's or other chain restaurant. The Blendtec blenders use a computer-controlled direct hookup between the motor and the blade. Although the product costs $400, the company wanted to find out: was there a consumer market for such a powerful but high-end blender?

While pondering how teeny little Blendtec could get the word out, Wright popped by the development lab, where there was sawdust on the floor. Mystified, he asked and was told that the developers were grinding up 2x2 lumber as a test. The demonstration was dramatic -- so dramatic that he decided to use his in-house video resources (mostly used for training before this) and put it up on YouTube. I'd tell you the rest of the story, but while we were preparing this post the rascal managed to get himself in the Wall St. Journal.

To see the results, see the blendtec channel on YouTube, or just go to www.willitblend.com. Once the first video, of a Coca-Cola and a chicken, caught on through getting featured on digg, it was clear that YouTube marketing was working for Blendtec. They went through marbles, cubic zirconia, and tiki torches, but the most popular so far has been the iPod obliteration with almost 4 million views.

Forget the views. The question is not "Will It Blend?" but "Does It Sell?" And the answer is: Yes. According to Wright, consumer sales have increased five-fold since the videos went up on YouTube and Revver.

Despite your prurient interest in seeing home electronics and random food items turned into a puree, I know you read this blog to learn about the uses of social technologies in business. So you may be wondering, can I try this at home? No, I don't mean blending, I mean marketing with YouTube. Of course you can. But first here are a few reasons why BlendTec succeeded -- reasons you ought to pay attention to before trying it yourself:

1. It's funny. It's visually arresting. It's short. These are three qualities your videos must possess. Here's another company that also succeeded with a visually arresting video: Ray-Ban.
2. It's authentic. These guys are geeks. Wright told me the CEO -- Tom Dickson, who's featured in the video -- is an engineer. It comes across. This stuff ain't slick, folks, and if it were it wouldn't work. (I love the proud and cheesy smile while he watches his company's blender reduce some object to dust.)
3. It's original. Figure out what your unique value is. Then film it and put it up there. Don't copy Blendtec, or Ray-Ban, or Dove. This may be the hardest part.
4. It actually connects to the value of the product. You see these videos and you can't help saying "Can that blender really do that? Maybe I should get one." And many people do. You could be a hit on YouTube with a video that doesn't connect to the value of your product, but that will help your ego a lot more than your sales.

Blendtec is now generating revenue from views on Revver. It's making custom videos for corporations (they did one for Novell). But this stuff doesn't matter, any more than the news that the Geico cavemen may get their own TV series. These are all consequences of a successful campaign. The campaign is the key, not the consequences.

All the articles about Blendtec focus on the $50 that it cost to do that first video. But the hard part -- the priceless part -- is thinking it up. That takes brains. And one heckuva blender.

Tags: YouTube, Blendtec, Revver, www.willitblend.com, bernoff, Forrester Research, Groundswell

Add to del.icio.us

by Josh Bernoff

I call people out when their marketing is lame. Now I'd like to show you the best pitch I got in the last six months.

Four years ago I rented a villa in Provence for a few weeks for my whole family. If that sounds great, well, it was. I have very fond memories of the time I spent there. I found the property on a site called rentvillas.com and yes, I'd use them again.

Rentvillas' problem is this: their customers may not think of going back to them again, since it's typically years between visits. So they sent me this email.

Now our email expert Shar Van Boskirk could tell you all about what email works -- how frequently you can touch people, what kinds of things to say, what kinds of software to use, all of that. But this email is somehow different.

1. It's completely different from every other sales email I've ever gotten since it doesn't go right at the problem.

2. It taps into the uneasiness every American feels about vacationing in a foreign country, and reminds us that that's part of the adventure.

3. They send me maybe three emails a year, so they don't tax my patience -- they're timed just right for people planning a vacation.

But somehow, this marketing email actually managed to stimulate the nostalgia I had for that trip, and generating an emotion like that from an email is just spectacular.

As Nikki HootonHootman, who wrote this email, told me, "The interesting thing is that we actually tried a much more "professional" looking format with a very nice visual element... but we discovered that people treated it like a mass mailer you might get from Amazon.com or another huge company. When we just use plain text and a photo or two, people consider it much more personal."

Marketers, my advice is not to emulate what rentvillas did. My advice is to emulate how they think, tapping into the emotions of your customers with whatever is special about your product. And if nothing is special about your product, quit and find a better place to work.

From: Rentvillas.com
To: Josh Bernoff
Re: Rentvillas.com -- My lunch hour crisis

Joshua,

As I wander through the picturesque main street of tiny Castellina-in-Chianti, I find myself a bit dismayed. It's 2 PM, and I'm famished. In America this wouldn't be a problem, but here in Italy I'm faced with empty streets and closed doors. That's right: lunch is over, and everyone is fast asleep.

Where was I at noon? I was photographing Podere Cristina, the most family-friendly accommodation I've ever seen. Younger guests are welcome to play with the outdoor toys and splash in the pool, while adults will appreciate the window screens (rare in Italy) and terrace views. Everyone who visits raves, which is why I was assigned to bring back some better shots. Check out Earth, Air, Fire, and Water-- believe it or not, there's still some availability for this year.



Back to Castellina. Eureka! At a corner grocer's, I find an open door. The proprietor, a middle-aged woman with a farmer's rough hands, takes pity and puts together a crude Panini. I point to some olives bigger than my eyeballs and she adds them to my bag. I take my "American" lunch hour on a bench in the sun, grinning as an old Italian gentleman ambles by and, seeing my impromptu picnic, laughs. So what if I'm stuck on American time? I'm still having fun!

After lunch, I realize that the directions to my next destination didn't make it into my bag. So I start driving. Four kilometers out of Castellina, a sign flashes by. Is that what I think it is? I pull over and turn around. Hallelujah! It is! Lago Antico, a brand new addition to our catalogue, is a cluster of medieval-era buildings-- complete with two-foot-thick walls, pigeon-hole windows, quirky corners, and a subterranean barrel-ceiling wine cellar. Here, the view is unique: forested mountains, completely untouched, extend as far as the eye can see.

That evening, I sit in the rustic kitchen of Lago Antico Uno, chatting with the manager as Stefano (a local chef) prepares one of the best meals I'll ever eat, using award-winning organic olive oil made right outside. Turns out he's not just a culinary genius; he's a pacifist too: several wasps have managed to sneak in, and one by one he captures them and frees them outside.

In spite of my lunch-hour crisis, this is one of the most satisfying days of my trip. The icing on the cake comes the next morning, when I wake up and peer outside. Dawn is just breaking, illuminating mountaintops and casting a pink glow on the mist-enshrouded valleys below. The world is silent. Bellissimo.

Until next time,

Nikki Hootman
Writer/Editor, Rentvillas.com


P.S. Here are a few more properties you might want to check out if you're still looking for availability this year:
- Our favorite apartment in Florence
- A fully equipped villa for family or friends, south of Siena
- An Italian lakes villa with a picturesque terrace
- Lemon-scented sea views at this Amalfi Coast villa

P.P.S. If you'd prefer not to receive any future communications from me, please un-subscribe [link deleted].

Rentvillas.com
700 East Main Street
Ventura, CA 93001

ph: 800-726-6702
ph: 805-641-1650
fx: 805-641-1630
www.rentvillas.com

"Providing unique accommodations for authentic European experiences."

Tags: email marketing, bernoff, Forrester Research, Groundswell

Add to del.icio.us

by Josh Bernoff

Dan Buczaczer of Denuo (a Publicis unit) and his client, DuPont had a problem. How do you take a corporate brand with a 200-year history and remind consumers what it stands for?

DuPont is responsible for brands like Teflon, Kevlar, Tyvek and, as you can see in this clip, Nomex, which helps prevent firefighters from overcooking. These are ingredient brands -- you don't buy them, you buy stuff that incorporates them. And these brands already have decent name recognition, but DuPont has a lot less. You could do a bunch of TV ads like GE and BASF do, but that's expensive. And if you remember DuPont at all -- if you're over 45 like I am -- you may remember "Better Things For Better Living Through Chemistry," a tagline that has developed some unfortunate resonances in the last half-decade.

DuPont's solution, which I like, was to hire Amanda Congdon (ex of RocketBoom) and a bunch of indie film types and make some mini-documentaries they call "DuPoint Science Stories." I don't even know what to call these things -- they're not quite ads, not infomercials, hell, you can shoot me but maybe brandumentaries? (Ick.) Anyway, they're entertaining enough to watch for a few minutes, especially with the bits of retro footage they unearthed from the lab.

The key from here is, they were smart enough not to take the astroturf route and pretend this stuff was homegrown. Instead, they're actually paying for ad space on blogs like Boing-Boing. But these fun little bits will doubtless get picked up by other blogs (like this one), cross-posted on YouTube, and develop a second little life beyond the site where they live, stories.dupont.com. This only works if they get spread around.

Now like the Chevy Tahoe folks, DuPont is going to be in for some spoofs -- there's plenty of parody potential here. But the next step is when Ad Age or the Wall St. Journal starts writing about the strategy behind the idea. Which will get people looking at and spreading the videos. Which will boost DuPont's association with these "miracles of science." Which is what they were looking for in the first place . . . without spending $10 million for ad avails on CBS or Fox. Nice work.

Tags: DuPont, brandumentary, DuPont Science Storiesonline video, Denuo, bernoff, Forrester Research, Groundswell

Add to del.icio.us

by Charlene Li

You may have noticed that the tag line for this blog has changed – a key goal is to help people do their jobs better, to “win” so to speak with social technologies.

To that end, I thought you’d like to know about a few upcoming boot camps Forrester is running. These events are different from large scale conferences – they are typically 1-2 Forrester analysts with a small group of participants, usually around 20 people. We spend an entire day discussing the strategy and tactics needed to win with new technologies. And I personally love the format because it’s a great way for me to immerse myself in the day to day issues that people are facing.

So here are a few highlights of upcoming boot camps – there is also a complete list of all boot camps being offered. I hope you can join us, and please contact me if you have any questions.

Emerging Interactive Marketing Channels Boot Camp
Wednesday, March 21, 2007 in Cambridge, MA 
Analysts: Brian Haven & Christine Overby

This Boot Camp will introduce new marketing channels and provide techniques for successfully exploring and leveraging the marketing opportunities that each offers. Marketers will learn how to determine if each channel is right for their brand and develop a plan for how to get started.

This Boot Camp will include:
•    Interactive sessions covering how consumers have adopted each channel, how marketers use each channel today, and how to best leverage each to target consumers.
•    Sessions covering rich media (video, podcasting, gaming), user-generated content, social media (social networks, wikis, widgets, tagging, etc.), word-of-mouth marketing, mobile marketing, and others.
•    Examples of how marketers, agencies, and public      relations firms have used these emerging marketing channels.

Social Computing Boot Camp: Tapping Into The Power Of Connect Consumers
Tuesday, April 10, 2007 in Miami, Florida
Analysts: Charlene Li & Brian Haven

New technologies like blogs, social networking, and RSS are changing the media and marketing landscape. This Boot Camp will not only introduce these new tools, it will also move you quickly into being an active participant in social media and marketing. You'll go home with a better understanding of how to use social marketing — and more importantly, a workable plan for what to do today. Marketers will learn when it is appropriate to use these tools, how to overcome internal resistance to deployment, and how to measure the results.

This Boot Camp will include:
•    Interactive sessions on consumer adoption and behaviors toward blogs, RSS, social networking,      word-of-mouth marketing, and podcasting.
•    Examples of how marketers, agencies, and public relations firms have used social marketing — and how to avoid the pitfalls.
•    Hands-on training on how to create blogs and RSS feeds, as well as podcasts. In addition to a      technical overview, the training will include best practices on how to manage the internal process of setting up these social marketing tools.
•    A best practices panel of marketers, agencies, and technology providers.

Blogging Fundamentals: Building A Business Strategy
Friday, April 13, 2007 in Miami, Florida
Analysts: Charlene Li & Brian Haven

Blogs are evolving quickly as a communication medium and influencing the development of communications and marketing strategy. With more than 27 million blogs being written today, it is impossible not to find a niche community that can influence customer perceptions of a brand.

As customers increasingly tune out traditional advertising and turn to new communication channels to fill the void, companies must learn how to join in the conversation. Moreover, besides connecting companies and their customers, blogs are also becoming an invaluable collaboration tool within companies to facilitate knowledge management and cross-functional communications.

This Boot Camp will focus on the fundamentals of blogging from a corporate perspective, helping companies develop a blog strategy and implementation plan, including discussion of policy, technology, and process. It will have a heavy focus on hands-on exercises that will complement in-depth presentations on these issues.

by Josh Bernoff

We got briefed yesterday by Anheuser Busch and BlueLithium, the creator of the minglenow social network, on their new alliance.

Here's the deal:

Minglenow is a social network dedicated to nightlife -- partying, bars, and restaurants. It  has 300,000 members and is aiming to get well into the millions. While I don't drink (and some people would say I'm no fun at all), I can understand the appeal -- people form friendships and networks around nightlife, and this is a way to extend the connection, especially around photos of the people you were hanging out with having a good time. And hey, if you drank so much you didn't remember much, those photos could help remind you who it was you had your arm around last night and why his red, monogrammed hankie was left in the backseat of your car.

Now, imagine you are Anheuser Busch. You own the beer market -- your market share is around 45%. The real competition is wine and cocktails -- hence the "Here's To Beer" campaign which celebrates beer and doesn't mention any brands at all. You've already committed $30 million to create bud.tv, an extensive online video site about your brands. Why not spend (and we're guessing here) another million or so to try out social networking?

So "Here's To Beer" is sponsoring the "Clink" portion of minglenow, where people post photos of themselves clinking glasses. The branding on the site is subtle -- as Tom Shipley of Anheuser-Busch told us, "Beer doesn't have a name recognition problem." More interesting is this: A-B has tapped its 600 distributors and 300 other non A-B beer distributors to get kits out bars and other locations to generate interest in this activity.

OK, so let's assume after all this effort that minglenow takes off. Let's assume that people in bars all across America want to take pictures of themselves and upload them and become part of a "nightlife community." This might get people to go out more. It might get them to drink more beer, but I don't see how. I agree that an Anehuser-Busch "Budweiser" community probably doesn't make sense -- what do Budweiser drinkers have to talk to each other about? But what's the point of all this activity?

On the other hand, maybe I am thinking to much like a media analyst. Once you have a few million partyers in a social network, what would you do with them? Maybe this will all pay off down the line somewhere. Given Anheuser-Busch's market share and ad spend, why shouldn't they find out?

Tags: beer, minglenow.com, Anheuser-Busch, social marketing, bernoff, Forrester Research, Groundswell

Add to del.icio.us

by Josh Bernoff

This is Isabel Martinez. She's one of the Beacon Street Girls. Now the question is: how can you get every 9-to-13 year old girl in the country to love her?

Isabel and her friends are the creation of Addie Swartz, a dynamo CEO now on her second company, B*tween Productions. I met with her yesterday to talk about how her business could take advantage of social marketing.

Beacon Street Girls is a series of books (they're up to 10 now, with 6 more in the pipeline plus merchandise) that delve deep into the angst of being a tween. They're upbeat and wholesome -- Swartz created them because of the dearth of positive media for girls in this age group. But girls who read them seem to love them (including my daughter Rachel, who's 11). Ordinarily a bunch of enthusiastic consumers is a prescription for an instantly buzzing social network, but the age thing is a problem here. The COPPA law severely restricts collection and use of personal information about young people. I suggested putting Isabel and her friends on MySpace, but even as fictional characters they're too young (12) and beside that parents of kids this age don't want their daughters looking on MySpace.

BSG's financial resources are limited -- they can invest, but not like a big media company. Media partnerships are fine, but they'll get a better deal if they get big and popular before they take on a powerful media partner. I shared some ideas with Addie, but she's a little shy about revealing them to the world before they get put into place. So I ask you, blog readers -- how would you use social media to turn 10-year-olds into viral marketers?