By Josh Bernoff

It’s a truism in the marketing world that you don’t, in general, talk about your competitors. The apotheosis of this was reached in those silly old soap commercials that compared the company’s product to “Brand X” which it beat hands down. As a consumer, your reaction was “who is this brand X? Of course you’re better than them – that could be anybody. Show me you’re better than the brand I actually use!”

In the social world, and especially among social technology Purists, the wisdom is the opposite. You’re supposed to stop pretending you have no competitors and talk about them whenever they do something interesting. My colleague Jeremiah Owyang (though he’s hardly a Purist) calls this one of the “impossible conversations” in the groundswell and explains that not talking about competitors is "welded deeply into nearly every corporate culture." 

Here’s my problem. One of the other sacred tenets we’re supposed to uphold in the groundswell is to “be authentic.” I strongly agree with this – pretending to be something that you’re not is a big mistake, because you will be found out, and there will be a backlash. But what if you authentically believe your company’s products are the best? Shouldn’t you say so? Why give props to the other guys?

This is real dilemma, especially as more corporations start building social strategies. It’s an archetypal example of the Purist/Corporatist spectrum, with the Purists holding up their competitors and the Corporatists saying “we’re not gonna give those other guys free publicity.”

As usual in these debates, I try to find an appropriate middle ground. And the principle here is “Don’t try to prohibit conversation about your competitors – you’ll lose out. But when speaking yourself, you don’t need to bring up the competition. Just don’t always behave as if they don’t exist."

For example: you run a community of your customers and similar people. People in your community insist on talking about your competitor’s product. What should you do? Certainly, don’t shut them off – they’ll just bug out and talk about the competition somewhere else. Instead, join the conversation, and respectfully offer your perspective.

You write a blog. Should you blog about the competitor’s products or announcements? You don’t have to, but if everyone is talking about it, you might be better off. That’s what HP blogger Eric Kintz did in response to Jonathan Schwartz’ blog post about HP.

Should you twitter about the other guy? Again, only if you’re trying to make a point of your own. 

I agree with Jeremiah (I asked him about this in an email) that talking about the competition shows confidence. People will respect that. But if you really think their announcement isn’t worth commenting on – and nobody else is talking about it either, then don’t bring it up. But if they are talking about it, you'll look silly if you don't give them credit for what they do well, then articulate your own position/

And I think that’s a position people in real companies can live with.

by Charlene Li

In my work, I often find that companies eager to create a social strategy often struggle with how to get started. One of the key recommendations we have in the book is to find the spark, champion, and evangelist within the company -- the person who is most passionate about forming a relationship with your audience, be it customers or employees.

You probably already know who this person is within your organization. It may be the technie who brags that she's been blogging since 1999, or the corporate communications person who loves to talk with customers on external bulletin boards. This person is probably also a bit a thorn in the side of management, constantly agitating for under-represented customers who are suffering some sort of injustice at the hands of management that just "doesn't get it".

As Shel Israel and Robert Scoble put it so nicely in "Naked Conversations", these radicals constantly push against the corporate membrane, stretching it close to the breaking point.

Well, it's time to get these radicals turned into revolutionaries. Let me explain by telling the tale of two Thomas' -- Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson.

Thomas Paine wrote Common Sense in 1776, which advocated for American independence from Great Britain and stimulated colonial fervor toward independence. He was the spark that lit the American revolution. But Paine never really settled down and after the American Revolution was over, he headed off to France and its revolution, got thrown in jail and almost executed. Prominent Americans interceded and he was released to return to the US. Back home, he cast about for a role, but the revolution was over. He was a man without a cause, and when he died only six people attended his funeral. One obituary read, "He lived long, did some good, and much harm." Paine was a radical, agitating for freedom and challenging authority.

Thomas Jefferson, in contrast, was a revolutionary. A writer and scholar like Paine, Jefferson was chosen to write the Declaration of Independence. But it wasn't just his writing skills, but also his ability to forge compromise and consensus that won him the job. Through the hot summer of 1776, Jefferson worked with the Second Continental Congress to draft the Declaration. It took time and effort to put together the framework and the process to bring about the revolution. He forged relationships with the other members of Congress, and brought them to the table to sign the document. There was fear about the consequences, but the Founding Fathers leaned on each other for support. Jefferson went on to become the Governor of Virginia and third President of the US.

I tell these stories because companies are in the midst of a social revolution -- specifically, one being led by their customers and employees. The question becomes how do companies deal with it, but more importantly, how do they tap into the energy of potentially disruptive radicals and channel them into being revolutionaries who can lead positive, lasting change?

This was the gist of the speech I made at SXSW last week (slides are available). I believe that:

Making revolution stick will require frameworks and process

The POST method provides much of that framework and process. It's a blueprint, and starting point for the revolutionaries in your organization. They need to know that executives are bought into the process, and they need to know what the goal is. After that, I suggest that you let them do their thing -- stand back and watch them revolutionize and transform your organization.

by Josh Bernoff

Months ago, I signed up for my.barackobama.com just to check it out. I've been getting emails from the candidate's people regularly, including notices about his appearances in Massachusetts, where I live. Yesterday I got one that started like this:

 

Dear Josh,

Yesterday, supporters all across the country responded to Barack's request by making more than 300,000 calls into crucial March 4th primary states.

We reached our goal of one million calls much faster than expected, so we're setting a new goal: 1,500,000 calls to voters by Tuesday.

Use our online phonebanking tool and start making calls right now:

http://my.barackobama.com/call

There's no easier or more effective way to keep building momentum for this campaign than making calls to likely supporters.

And there's no more important time to get involved than right now.

The primaries in Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island, and Vermont this Tuesday, March 4th, could be decisive for this campaign. Reach out to voters in these states, listen to what's important to them, and share your reasons for supporting Barack.

The online phonebanking tool is easy and fun to use. Here's how it works:

1. Choose a state you'd like to call.
2. Log into My.BarackObama.com and get a list of 20 names that only you will receive. (If you don't have a My.BarackObama account, creating one is fast and easy.)
3. Click on a name and you'll be led through a simple script, question by question.
4. Start making calls.

There's lots of talk in politics about "energizing the base." my.barackobama.com is the base for Barack Obama. I still feel there's a flaw in this social network of Obama supporters -- I've seen no evidence that Obama is listening to anything they say. But terms of taking a base of supporters and turning them into a force to accomplish your goals, this may be the most powerful example there is.

Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton is zooming all over Ohio and Texas, shouting herself hoarse. I know Obama is doing the same, and I know Clinton's people are engaged in plenty of get out the vote activity. But Obama has this asset: thousands and thousands (millions?) of volunteers he's never met, using phone banks he set up.

Some of those phone calls will be "off message" -- but many will also be passionate personal word of mouth. Could this make the difference?

And the question I really want to know. If Obama wins in November (or even if somebody else does), how could this technique be used to improve the work of government?

P.S. This post is about Obama's and Clinton's techniques, not their positions. Please think a moment before trying to post policy-based comments -- this is not the place to try to win people over to your candidate.

by Josh Bernoff

Interested in our report "Objectives: The Key To Creating A Social Strategy?" The report describes the POST method in detail (see previous post).

I'll send a review copy to the first 100 bloggers to email me at groundswell@forrester.com.

Include your blog's URL with your email. Looking forward to hearing your take on this.

by Josh Bernoff

What do most companies do wrong when they enter the social world? No, it's not that they're being fake, or don't "get it." It's that they don't really know their objectives.

Is your company doing its social strategy backwards?

If you started by saying "we should do a blog" or "we should create a page on a social network" or "we should create a community" the answer is probably yes.

In any other business endeavor we start by figuring out what we want to accomplish. Social technologies are not magic. They accomplish things, too. It's time to stop doing social because it's cool. It's time to start doing it because it's effective.

To help clients with this fundamental idea, we invented a little acronym called POST. It's been one of the most popular ideas we've ever created, even though it's so simple and commonsensical. If you were at our consumer forum in October you saw it (and many of you who were there contacted us afterwards for help with your strategies). It's at the heart of our book Groundswell. Now I'm sharing it with all of you.

P is People. Don't start a social strategy until you know the capabilities of your audience. If you're targeting college students, use social networks. If you're reaching out business travelers, consider ratings and reviews. Forrester has great  data to help with this, but you can make some estimates on your own. Just don't start without thinking about it.

O is objectives. Pick one. Are you starting an application to listen to your customers, or to talk with them? To support them, or to energize your best customers to evangelize others? Or are you trying to collaborate with them? Decide on your objective before you decide on a technology. Then figure out how you will measure it.

S is Strategy. Strategy here means figuring out what will be different after you're done. Do you want a closer, two-way relationship with your best customers? Do you want to get people talking about your products? Do you want a permanent focus group for testing product ideas and generating new ones? Imagine you succeed. How will things be different afterwards? Imagine the endpoint and you'll know where to begin.

T is Technology. A community. A wiki. A blog or a hundred blogs. Once you know your people, objectives, and strategy, then you can decide with confidence.

This may sound simple to the sophisticated readers of this blog. But it works. Try it. Think your strategy through. Even if you're just clarifying your own strategy, this should help you explain it to your boss.

Or, feel free to ask us for help. it's what we do.

Thanks to all the bloggers who've posted after our presentations and encouraged us to get this out there.

UPDATE: Free review copy of the report to the first 100 bloggers who email me at groundswell@forrester.com with your blog's URL.

By Jeremiah Owyang, insight from Charlene Li and Shar VanBoskirk.  This is also being cross-posted on the Jeremiah's Web Strategist Blog and the  Forrester Marketing Blog. 

Executive Summary
Both Facebook and MySpace have launched profile and network targeted advertising and marketing products. As they both use member interests and the communities which they are part of, trust continues to become key in adoption as information is passed along the network. The sheer size of MySpace’s member base, as well as the thriving local business membership will lead to success. Facebook, which brings a unique solution evolves advertisements to endorsements and encourages members to subscribe to a brand in what we are calling “Fan-Sumers” (an evolution of the consumer). As consumers share their affinities, brands can advertise using trusted social relationships.

Data: Highest trust comes from friends or acquaintances

(Left Graph: Consumers trust their friends and acquaintances far more than any other sources –Report: Leveraging User-Generated Content, 2007)

Trust is and will continue to be one of the most important attributes in the decision making process. 

Communities form online, trust develops
How we get information continues to evolve as communities form online organized by individuals with similar interests. Just like in real life, we identify our interests, and are often influenced by opinions and experiences of trusted peers in our communities. For many, social networking sites embody these relationships and influence how trusted decisions are made.

MySpace: Brands have a home and can hyper-target ads
The already active MySpace platform is leveraging their already active member profile pages, encouraging the many small and medium businesses to setup a online storefront and providing tools to make it easy to self-serve advertisements to their customers. It’s easy to make the case that demand and inventory are present.

Webmaster not needed: MySpace profile for businesses
Small businesses can continue to build their online profile on MySpace (many of them already have), but now, because of their familiarity with self-marketing (restaurant, nightclub, and other local businesses and their customers) on Myspace.

Self-service ads remove middle man
When friction is removed, efficiency is created. With MySpace’s “Self-Service” ad network small businesese can target ads across a variety of affinities (over 300) and deploy ads on users’ profile pages. These ads, which should (by theory) be relevant and contextual to a user who has self-populated their profile page will have these ads displayed.

Advertising balance required in already busy MySpace
With marketers already with a strong presence in MySpace this could continue to erode away at early adopter “cool kids” from embracing MySpace. But as cycles have shown, where communities form, marketers follow.

User experience continues to be free-form
These ads, which will conform to IAB advertising standards (sizes) will give advertisers the freedom to create the ads in the style accustomed to the network. Yes, expect more blinking text.

To watch: OpenSocial
As OpenSocial starts to be deployed across MySpace and other partners, expect profile ads to be tied to widgets and vice versa; a fabric of links. I’ve already outlined How to explain OpenSocial to your executives.

Inaccurate user profiles could result in mis-targeting of ads
We know that many members do not make their profiles accurate which could yield inconsistencies in how and where ads are displayed. While MySpace has assured they’re accounting for rogue outliers, expect some inefficiencies in advertisements.

Our Call: Sheer mass will yield success
We think this to be a win for MySpace, given their great reach, there are millions of users with active profiles, and there’s also plenty of inventory as many small and local businesses that are present will be comfortable deploying ads where their community already exists.

Facebook: Rise of the Fan-Sumer
Going beyond just profile matching of advertisements, Facebook allows consumers to self-identify with brands and becoming fans. In turn, brands can use these “Fan-Sumers” as endorsers to their own trusted networks, resulting in trusted word-of-mouth. Brands can also self-manage their own campaigns, and there’s some unique opportunities for eCommerce widgets or applications to be part of this formula.

There are three major components to today’s announcement, they include the following:

1) Facebook Pages: Brands get their own profile
For the first time, businesses will legitimately be able to setup profile pages, much like MySpace’s business profiles feature. Next, Facebook members will add these brands as ‘fans’ (much like friends) and this will produce a connection between the parties. Members will self-identify with brands in what we are calling “Fan-Sumers”. Furthermore, this service, called “Beacon” gives third parties the ability to share information on the newsfeed and provides lots of unique opportunities. Sponsored groups will start to evolve into this new form brand profile as this system gets adopted.

2) SocialAds: Endorsements at the friend level lead to eCommerce
Once a member has indicated they are a fan of a brand, that brand can choose to purchase SocialAds (from Facebook Sales or via a self-service platform). A unique endorsement of a product or brand will now appear on that individuals news feed or banner or skyscraper ads. Advertisers can purchase social ads target by profile demographics and profiles, as well as by activities done in Facebook. Payment is an auction-based system available to marketers via both CPM and CPC pricing.

3) Use “Insight” for control and flexibility
This self-service dashboard called Insight gives the marketer detailed knowledge how their advertising campaign is working on Facebook. It’s expected that advertisers will have flexibility, control over the type of ads they deploy, in what quantity, and the demographics they want to target.

A likely scenario:
Shauna, who enjoys Revlon products, indicates she’s a fan of the brand and becomes a Fan-Sumer. Marketers at Revlon can then purchase SocialAds, which will then display on Shauna’s newsfeed or on ads on her profile. If Shauna purchases Revlon makeup from Amazon, her newsfeed could indicate an eCommerce links recommending it to her 100 trusted friends, resulting in further sales.

Implications for Facebook:

Members have more control over ads
Facebook users can opt to turn off social ads, and friends of that user can ‘dial down’ endorsements they see using preferences. We believe that Facebook is attempting to respect the rights of users by giving control to members to ‘opt-in’ to become a Fan-Sumer.

Quest for Fans will cause brands to beg
Since social ads only work if a member has indicated they are a fan, brands will be working to earn and buy fans to accept them as members. Expect a lot of noise to be generated from this activity as brands run campaigns to encourage members to add them as fans through discussion boards, banner ads, and special offers.

Hard to qualify a “business”
Facebook is limiting these features to ‘real’ businesses and organizations. Expect an entire team to be crawling and dealing with this qualifying the issue. As recent member accounts have been disabled from Facebook, expect businesses and organizations to encounter same issues.

Limited ad supply to raise prices
Because Facebook members will see only two social ads per day, we expect the supply of ads to be in scarce supply and thus raising prices and not matching the value. This could shift ad buying to large brands who have experience buying and managing search and direct response ads.

Our Call: Brand affinity leads to community endorsements and more trusted marketing.
We see this as a win for Facebook, this highly targeted system isn’t just about web advertising but about brand affinity and hooks into what’s really important, trusted endorsements from people in a network. This truly is the next generation of advertising. Facebook tells us that the worst case it will be 2 times click through rate over the performance of (existing is 4-26%)

Next Steps For Brands

Experiment: Because of the control and flexibility, we recommend to brands that are currently on either of these social networks to experiment and test.

Learn how to efficiently manage your campaigns. There’s clearly a trend towards self-service, which provides efficiencies for both businesses and the platforms.

To know: Marketing has changed, advertising is no longer a sole-solution. Marketers must also learn how to be part of communities, engage with them, and be part of the conversation.

To know: Marketing is now distributed, brands must embrace communities where they currently exist, rather than solely driving them to their corporate website.

This digest not only explains what is happening, but why it matters to you. If this was helpful, please pass it on. Love to hear your thoughts, please leave a comment, even if you don’t agree.

by Josh Bernoff

Today at the Forrester Consumer Forum we announced the winners of the Forrester Groundswell Awards.

As I mentioned after receiving the entries, there were some fascinating and, more to the point, highly effective social applications in the 78 entries we got. It wasn't easy to pick the best, since there were so many good ones. But, of course, we did. While we used several criteria, the most important was: did the application prove it delivered on business value.

To see the complete list of winners and finalists, click here.

Listening. Schwab's Money and More Community of Gen Xers empowered by Communispace

By Schwab and Communispace

In January 2007, Charles Schwab worked with Communispace to launch their “Money and More” private online community made up of 350 25-to-40 year old Generation X non-Schwab clients. Based on insights from the community, Schwab lowered account minimums to $1,000, introduced Schwab’s high-yield Investor checking account with a high yield, and developing an online landing page specifically for the Gen X target. Schwab has added 32% more Gen Xers YTD when compared to similar timeframes last year.

Talking. Aveo Livin' Large Campus Challenge

by Chevrolet and Weber Shandwick

Chevrolet, along with Weber Shandwick, set out to support the launch of the 2007 redesigned Chevy Aveo with a focus on college students. They created a contest: two students on each of seven college campuses across the nation were selected to see who could "live the largest" inside a Chevy Aveo for five days, only leaving the car for class and 10-minute bio breaks while documenting their entire adventure online. The students embraced the idea enthusiastically, creating YouTube videos, MySpace and Facebook groups, photos, blogs, and other realistic expressions of their experiences. Result: in just five days, the Aveo Livin' Large Campus Challenge generated 217 million audience impressions through online, traditional, grassroots and campus media. Over one million students were actively engaged in the Challenge through the Aveo web site and links in each team's Facebook and MySpace accounts.

Energizing. Netshops Social Merchandising featuring PowerReviews

by NetShops and PowerReviews 

NetShops is a specialty online retailer of home and lifestyle products with 156 separate online storefronts. It launched tag-based customer reviews from PowerReviews in November 2006 on all 156 websites. Within 6 months, the sites featured 19,500 customer reviews and a 26% increase in sales.

Supporting. Nike's Jordan Brand Breakfast Club

by Nike and Blast Radius

Jordan Brand’s Breakfast Club is an interactive online training community. Customers can select pre-built workout curriculums or create their own. The self-built programs incorporate a social component through peer assessments. 120,000 consumers signed up, and when the Training Tool for the Breakfast Club launched in August 2006, 100,000 more unique visitors came to the site than the previous year. Visitors spent an average of 6 minutes on the site.

Embracing.Salesforce.com Idea Exchange at ideas.salesforce.com

by salesforce.com

Salesforce.com built an “ideas market” -- like Digg for customer feedback and product innovation -- that allows members of the community (customers, partners, industry watchers) to submit, vote and comment on new product features. Salesforce.com's Idea Exchange generated 4500 ideas and over 82,000 votes in its first year. Half of salesforce.com's new features now come from suggestions on this idea exchange. Two of the suggestions were also turned into new products by third-party salesforce.com developers within weeks of the being highlighted on the Idea Exchange.

Managing. Avenue A Razorfish wiki

by Avenue A Razorfish

Online development company with 1900 employees developed an internal wiki to run all of its projects and increase efficiency. 987 of the 1900 employees visited the wiki in June. Page views have gone from 6,000 to 27,000 per month in six months, while page edits grew to 25,000 cumulative. There are 6505 pages of content and 2000 blog posts on the wiki. Projects are now faster and people far more responsive and collaborative.

Social impact. "Design Your Portion of the Border Fence"

by Brickfish

Visitors to this site are encouraged to create graphics for a section of the US/Mexico border fence, with the objective of encouraging people to be more thoughtful about this issue. Visitors can review and vote for the entries they like. The site attracted over 1,000 entries, 8,000 reviews, 300,000 views, and lots of press coverage.

Company transformation. Dell.

We created this new category to capture the powerful changes happening across all functions at Dell. The Dell Customer Advocate program, which pursues fast resolution of support problems, decreased the negative share of online comments about Dell by 25%. Direct2Dell, Dell's frank and informative blog, generates 3.5 million page views per month. Ideastorm, Dell's innovation community, tallied 500,000 votes for over 7,000 ideas and generated a new product, Dell PC's with Linux pre-installed. And Employee Storm, an internal idea community, has generated 2,700 ideas and seen visits from 22% of Dell's employees.

Tags: Groundswell awards, Schwab, Communispace, Chevy Aveo, NetShops, PowerReviews, Nike, Blast Radius, salesforce.com, Avenue A Razorfish, Brickfish, Dell, Forrester Research, Groundswell

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Apologies for the short notice, but I'm going to be giving a free Forrester Webinar on the use of Social Technographics (explanation is available in this post) on Wednesday, September 26th at 11am EST. Here's the description:

Don’t yet believe or don’t clearly see how social technologies can apply to your industry? Or perhaps you’re currently struggling with prioritizing across a vast array of social technologies and need to identify how your audience uses social technologies and how it will evolve over time.

We invite you to join us for a complimentary Forrester Webinar "Know Your Customers’ Social Technographics And Craft The Right Social Marketing Strategy " on Wednesday, September 26 at 11 a.m. Eastern Time (5 p.m. Central European Time).

This Webinar, hosted by Vice President, Principal Analyst Charlene Li, will emphasize the necessity of understanding your target audience’s attitudes and behaviors towards social technologies in order to craft a truly fruitful social marketing strategy. Forrester will elaborate on the concept of Social Technographics and demonstrate that it is possible to reap the fruit of consumer power by knowing their profiles, social technology usage and motivations. Not only is that critical for today’s social engagement with your customers, but it is also paramount for an anticipatory approach of tomorrow’s usage shift and audience maturation. 

This Webinar will address:

- How are consumers using social technologies?

- How are marketers using social technologies to reach their customers?

- How do social technologies integrate with interactive marketing?

Register for the complimentary Webinar here.

Hope to see you there!

Tags: social technographics, charleneli, Forrester Research, Groundswell

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by Josh Bernoff

Prof. Lynda M. Applegate at the Harvard Business School writes:

[D]isruptive changes . . . can be viewed from 2 very different perspectives—as an opportunity or as a threat. In fact, entrepreneurs often view disruptive change as a source of opportunity. When they see a disrupted business environment—whether that disruption is from new technologies, new business models, or new regulations—they ask, "How can I leverage these changes to create value?"

But established companies often approach innovation and disruption much differently. Having worked hard to align strategy and organization to support the current business, they develop tunnel vision, encouraging employees, customers, suppliers, and partners to work together to deliver today's business results. Even when disruptive opportunities are identified, tightly aligned organizations, business models, and industry relationships make it tough to respond quickly and effectively. As a result, executives in established firms often frame disruption as a threat. When they see changes happening, they work to defend their existing business model and ask, "How can I insulate against these disruptive threats and preserve my current business model?"

Prof. Applegate's point is interesting in the context of the groundswell. The groundswell is full of threats since you are no longer in control of your brand -- your customers are. Seeing this as an opportunity takes guts.

I have just decided this is what the next 12 months of my life is about -- helping you to find opportunity, not just threat, in social technologies. It's harder than it looks.

Tags: Lynda Applegate, Harvard Business School, bernoff, Forrester Research, Groundswell

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