Eric Schwartzman

Corporate social media policy development has become increasingly important as organizations realize that social networking is more powerful in the hands of many than the hands of a few. 

In many cases, employees not serving in official spokesperson roles may, in fact, have more weight influencing corporate reputation than more conventional channels like public relations and marketing.

Rather than ask, "Should companies use social media?" organizations are asking "What is the most responsible, effective way for us to use social media and should we house a set of social media corporate guidelines so that everyone understands what the boundaries are for social media usage as employees?"

In this episode, we discuss many aspects of corporate social media policy, social networking policy, social media guidelines and best practices for social media policy development initiatives inside organizations.  

Our guest is Chris Boudreaux created a website that is no longer online to provide tools and resources to leaders and managers who want to get the most from their social media and social application investments.

Chris is a consultant who works with business and technology professionals to improve their marketing, sales and customer service capabilities through social media governance. 

He is a former product development and business transformation specialists, and a former United States Navy officer.  

This is a joint interview by Paul Gillin and me. We are collaborating on a book about B2B applications of social media communications titled "Social Marketing to the Business Customer.".

SHOW NOTES  

01:58 -- The business case for empowering employees to make smart decisions through social media policy.

03:34 -- How specific social media policies need to be.

05:06 -- Strategic approach to social media policy development.  

07:13 -- Just because a company is blocking access to social media sites from its network does not necessarily mean that that company is going to take longer to develop a social media policy.

If you are developing a social media policy for an organization, your first order of business is to understand why the company is blocking access, because it may be they are doing so because social media tools do not allow them to comply with laws or regulations.  

In the insurance industry, for example, many companies are simply on the lock down because the penalties for making mistakes are severe.

08:40 -- Organizations can and do turn on and off access to social media sites quickly, so don't assume that because a company may be blocking access to social media sites that they are in some way  going to take a longer to educate and bring up to speed over the course of a social media policy development initiative.

09:27 -- Organizational complexity, rather than an organization's size, has a bigger impact on how long it takes to develop a social media policy for organization.

The more business units there are, the variety of subcultures that exists, have the potential to exacerbate the development of a social media policy.

10:45 -- The concept of having more than one social media policy, the first being a broad policy that covers all employees in the latter being a more specific policy for employees focused on social media communications.

13:22 -- Just as no one department within the organization owns and polices all corporate policies, all managers responsible for a group within the organization that is using social media for unique purposes should also be responsible for providing guidance and oversight of how a corporate social media policy applies to those efforts.

17:44 -- It is leadership's responsibility to think ahead of its employees and to try and anticipate what kind of trouble they could get into so they can establish policy to protect them.

Those protections are even more important if the employee is using social media as part of their primary job function. So leadership needs to establish clear-cut boundaries for employees and then make sure everyone knows about them.

It's irresponsible for leadership to steer clear of providing guidelines because they don't know what they should be yet.

At the same time, Chris Boudreaux does not advocate that all organizations should empower their employees to use social media, particularly financial services organizations and other regulated entities, because social media tools may not allow them to comply with the current regulations.

20:49 -- The biggest challenge that organizations face with respect to social media engagement is that many of the technologies simply do not comply with current regulatory requirements.

So either the regulations need to be changed, the various social media channels need to be improved to support audit trails or regulated companies in particular need to be careful when they use social media.

22:50 -- Like American linguist William Lutz, featured on an earlier episode of this podcast about the dangers of doublespeak, Chris Boudreaux agrees there's not much sense in a policy if the people it's designed to guide can't understand it. 

Policies should be written to be understood without legal counsel.   Since many companies make their social media policies public it may also be a good idea for those charged with writing the policy to collaborate with the marketing or public relations departments to ensure its accurately reflects the characteristics of the brand.  

25:03 --  Regardless of the nature or legalities of any social networking group or service in which a company employee they participate, such as racially insensitive or hate speech sites, employers do not necessarily have the right to dismiss employees for participating in these types of distasteful conversations, unless they are occurring in full public view.

However, if the site in question was password-protected, invite only and employer obtained access through coercion and then discovered its employees were involved and fired them as a result, they could be guilty of wiretapping charges.

So the method by which an employer discovers private information on the Internet plays a big role in to the legalities of the situation.

28:55 -- There's a big difference between laws that are permissible in a state and terms and conditions an individual migrate or bye-bye to do business with the company.

Nondisclosure agreements provide a functional means for individuals to forfeit certain rights in exchange for the right to gain employment with the company and subject to the terms and conditions of what is and is not permissible in any of the 50 United States, is not necessarily unlawful for an organization to ask an employee to forgo certain rights to free speech exchange for a job.

33:31 -- Social media policy needs to support the leadership style of the organization. For example, if the organization is inclusive and collaborative in its management style, that will lead to one type of social media policy.

On the other hand, if you're in station is commanding control, like say Apple Computer, that will lead to a different type of social media policy. It may be naive to think you can change an organization's leadership or management style through social media policy.

It is the responsibility of those charged with developing a social media policy to create one that supports the company's objectives in a way that is compatible with their existing business.  

"You or I may not like a lot of the answers to a lot of leaders arrive at. But we have a choice to not work for those people," says Chris Boudreaux.  

35:35 -- It is always helpful when social media policy initiatives are sponsored by upper management and here's why.  

"The best policies are born out of a desire to utilize social media in a way that advances the corporate objectives, and to both protect the employees as well as the company.

And that takes an understanding of the business which is is usually strongest among the folks who are running the business," says Chris Boudreaux.

37:14 -- End

Photo by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash

Scott Hanson and four other technologists manage the Dell TechCenter, an online community that helps enterprise IT professionals unravel the thorniest problems that occur when trying to integrate technology from multiple vendors.  

Dell conceived of the community in 2007 as a way to enhance loyalty among its largest customers.

Members share advice and ask questions of Hanson and the other engineers, who dispense it for free. The community is open and fully searchable, although only registered members can submit articles and comments.

The point isn’t to gain sales leads but to become an indispensable source of advice. And it’s working: In 2008, about 100 people visited the site every day. By early 2010, the count was over 5,000.

Active members gain status in the community, and access to information about new products.

A core group of 40 to 50 very active members have been designated "Masters," which means they get special recognition, advance information and even the occasional T-shirt. “What our users really want is to be noticed,” Hanson observed.  

Hanson and colleagues Jeff Sullivan, Kong Yang and Dennis Smith are celebrities of sorts in the community of enterprise customers, who frequently seek them out for meetings at trade shows and during visits to the company’s executive briefing center.

Their fame has paid off handsomely for Dell: Hanson won’t let us reveal specifics, but Dell has estimated that the TechCenter is indirectly responsible for many millions of dollars in sales each year.  Suffice to say that Hanson’s job security is insured for years to come.  

That’s despite the fact that Dell TechCenter doesn’t sell anything. The site carries no advertising and the member list is never used for promotions.

The Dell TechCenter team is adamant about that. “The last thing IT people want when they come to a technical resource is an ad asking them to buy a laptop,” Hanson says.

In this interview, he talks about the philosophies that underlie the community’s success.   This interview is guest hosted by Paul Gillin of Paul Gillin Communications. 

SHOW NOTES:

3:30 Why Dell Tech Center was started

4:40 What’s unique about Tech Center; why customers would come there in the first place

7:30 How Dell built awareness for the community; adding Technology Center links into every product.

8:45 Why content is openly available and not hidden behind a registration wall: “We really don’t want to use this as a vehicle to collect sales leads.”

9:45 Growth: From 100 to more than 5,000 daily visitors

10:45 How monitoring conversations guides administrators toward appropriate content

11:30 The content that resonates well: ‘Anything that makes the IT admin’s life easier.”

14:00 The Dell Masters Program raises the visibility of the top 40-50 participants

15:40 Who are the characters on the site and why the chemistry is important

17:20 Calculating the ROI of the Dell Tech Center; the team touches a lot of customer spending each year (specifics withheld at Dell’s request)

19:10 The importance of personality in makin the Dell connection: “It’s probably the most important thing.” A single Dell Tech Center ID didn’t resonate as well as giving individual administrators their own presences.

22:15 The importance of not trying to sell to members of the community

23:30 The nature of customer relationships on Dell Tech Center: “These people a friends.” How business relations create personal connections.

Photo by Liane Metzler on Unsplash

Sales cycles are different when we research purchasing decisions on behalf of companies and this podcast is devoted to explaining why, how and what it takes to search engine optimize your B2B content marketing.

We discuss B2B SEO agency tactics like keyword discovery, B2B website SEO and how B2B sales cycles impact search optimization strategy, aligning keyword selection with marketing strategy, how to leverage off-message search phrases and much more with Lee Odden, president of Top Rank Marketing.

SEO for B2B Tactics Discussed

01:37 – B2B SEO tactics are quite different from B2C SEO tactics, according to Lee Odden.  The B2B sales cycle is often much longer than B2C sales cycles. 

When business buyers are researching an intended purchase, the keywords they search online tend to be much more exploratory, general and broad, as they educate themselves about the procuring a specific service, product or solution. 

And as they drill down and get closer to making an actual decision, their search queries get much more specific and focused.  

03:32 – Attract customers at the beginning and end of the sales cycle by examining the marketing and public relations activities that are already underway, and look for opportunities where you can apply search engine optimization. 

For example, if a company identifies and creates original content on its website based on broader, research oriented terms, and starts to acquire inbound links embedded against those terms as anchor text on other websites, their website is more likely to get found through search when a potential customer starts getting educated to make a purchase and that’s how they’d SEO their website to get found at the beginning of the buying cycle.  

04:40 – “At the same time, maybe that same company is publishing a blog, and there are a mix of keywords that represent more long tail or niche terms that are more specific. 

And the content strategy, or the content plan for the blog, can make sure that it creates content using those niche keywords over time. 

And, of course, each of those blog posts that’s about a niche topic would link back over to the product page so that people who discover that topic or that content through search can click-through and arrive over on a sales page to interact with a call to action like download a whitepaper, sign up for a webinar or contact us for a consultation,” says Lee.  

06:14 – Keyword selection should be consistent with marketing objectives, messaging and demand. 

If a company’s marketing strategy is to undercut a premium brand on price, we might try adding modifiers like “cheap” or “discount” to the search phrase to see if people are actually searching those phrases and if they are, optimize the website content for those terms, get links and try to rank for those affordability-related versions of the more general, broader keywords. 

If a category isn’t well known, if there isn’t much demand for these types of keywords, that’s where companies might apply convention PR and advertising to generate more demand for those queries.  

09:09 – Sometime the high volume keyword that people associate with a particular concept biased. 

For example, the impact of carbon emissions on the environment might be described as climate change or global warming.  The demand for global warming versus climate change is more than two to one.  But climate change is considered a more politically correct, safer phrase. 

Search engine optimization is about embracing popular language, but according to Lee, it’s very difficult to convince clients to embrace popular language when that language conflicts with their existing brand messaging. 

As I write these show notes, my thought is a company that cannot embrace the lexicon by which it has come to be known in popular language is a company in denial, because its image is misaligned with its perception.  

09:15 – But if clients are adverse to embracing the terms by which they are known, incorporating that language in blogs, tweets and status updates that link to them is one way to SEO their website for alternative messaging that’s inconsistent with their existing brand message. 

In this type of scenario, the content on a blog might be intentionally written in a more informal tone, so as not to compete with the more formal brand messaging on the company’s corporate site.

For example, you might create a blog post that’s an argument for the use of “climate change” over “global warming” which would require the use of both terms, and which could be optimized for the latter term.  

11:07 – When you’re doing keyword research for search engine optimization, you use tools that quantify the search demand for and competitiveness of a certain phrase. 

But you also need to validate those keywords in social media, to see if the phrases people use when they’re searching for something are the same ones they use in social media when they conversing with others about that subject.  Don’t assume those phrases are the same.  

12:15 – Ultimately, keyword effectiveness is validated by the sites analytics.  Are the keywords you’re working to draw traffic against listing on your web stats?  Are people visiting your landing pages and tasking the intended action?  

14:45 – SEO newbies tend to try and cram all the keywords they can into their text, thinking that by saying the same thing a bunch of different ways, their page will be seen as more relevant. 

But readability is more important than repetition. If you’ve keyword stuffed your document to the point that it reads silly, you’ve lost because even of that page does wind up ranking high, it’s going to have a very high bounce rate. 

Instead, Lee prefers to map keywords according to website categories. 

He creates a long list of phrases that’s organized according to popularity, competitiveness and relevance, and then decides which pages on the website those terms should be linked to. 

Then, he varies the usage of the those terms evenly across whatever content gets SEOed and that way he can still use all those terms, but without cramming them into a single document.  Lee cautions users about going after just high volume keywords. 

Instead, focus of those words and phrases with the greatest probability of conversion. The objective is B2B lead generation.  

17:59 – Matching up the keywords with the analytics is how you validate keywords and phrases. 

Analytics will also reveal trends and show you the seasonality of your phrases. 

And just as media relations pros attempt to position press releases as riffs off the popular news of the day, SEO consultants can take a similar approach, and your analytics show you were those potential opportunities are. 

If relevant terms lack significant volume, keep in mind there are other activities that can drive search demand, so when you’re launching a new product, use your mainstream sales and marketing to drive demand and be careful not to sacrifice relevancy for volume because you’ll be tapping into traffic that unlikely to result in sales.  

19:16 – Ultimately -- and particularly in B2B SEO -- keyword relevance is more important than popularity, because relevant terms and phrases have a greater probability of conversion.  

23:29 --  Enquiro research suggesting that while people may go move from broad phrase to niche phrase research as they progress through online buying cycle, they often go back to broad phrase research before they make their final decision, to confirm their intended purchase. 

And for this reason, Lee says you can’t base a B2B SEO strategy on just broad or niche terms. 

You need both.  

Follow up question:  Is there any research out there suggesting that in the case of considered purchases, buyers are more likely to revert to broad phrase search at the end of their online research phrase? 

Also, are the broad phrases keywords they revert to the same ones they started with, or do those broad phrases tend to change as they become more informed about the category they’re researching?  

24:05 – But website design and content strategy also impact purchasing decisions.  More often than not, B2B products and services are not one-size-fits-all. 

The buyer may need technical information or product specifications to select a compatible, interoperable product to meet their specific needs. 

A website that makes it easier to choose the right product by having that information available and easy-to-use may wind up landing the sale over a higher-ranked website if that website hasn’t invested the time in making that content accessible online.   

24:15 – “Increasingly, the social web comes into play, because there are many more opportunities to develop relationships, where search is the initial discovery mechanism, [which is different from] what B2B marketers were using search for in years past.  

25:00 – Whether for B2B or B2C, there are different types of research to be done.  There’s keyword research, which is identifying phrases based on the audience you’re trying to market to. 

Competitive research is about understanding who is currently ranking for the phrases you want to rank for, and determining whether or not they’re vulnerable to being toppled. 

Not all of them will be real world competitors. 

In the B2B space, there are a lot of academic and government institutions with top ranks that topically, might compete with your commercial website. 

There’s also research on link building and link acquisition to determine who’s linking to top ranked sites so you can see who’s propping up those influential websites with inbound links.

There’s also content archetype research, which endeavors to determine what type of content tends to travel in your category,

What begins as a discussion about B2B marketing applications of online video quickly spirals into a geek-out session about how to create live webcasts, online video streaming, production, editing, search engine optimization, archiving and file management.  

If you're interested in coming up to speed on the tools and technologies available for producing live video streams, this episode featuring online video specialist Steve Garfield, author of the new book Get Seen is for you.

01:04 -- Steve Garfield explains when it makes sense for B2B marketers to use video, and when doesn't it, and according to Steve, many organizations have become interested in the use of online video to introduce visitors to their websites to the people and culture inside companies.

02:11 -  For watching larger news events, Steve still prefers television. But the use of short, bite-sized video clips on an organization's website can be very effective.  In terms of the state of online video, Steve says we've come a long way from the days when excessive buffering caused such extreme latency that videos were unwatchable.

04:09 -- The majority of consulting work that Steve provides today involves training people within organizations to use online video equipment, editing software, streaming services and video aggregation services.  In the past, organizations had brought in huge production companies to create their video but according to Steve, "It just became a huge production." Today, they are looking for solutions that will allow them to communicate autonomously with video.  

05:05 – Common applications of online video for B2B marketers is the use of video to show what it's like at a product rollout or “about us” type of videos that seek to humanize an organization, but since it's easier to watch than it is to read, the use of online video on an organization's website can be a competitive differentiator.  

06:50 -- Steve discusses how video could be used by doctors, professional service providers and even hairstyles on their websites to give you a chance to get a feel for their personalities when you're considering who to hire.

08:27 -- Steve talks about the concept of  situating all the video in a specific section of an organization's website, using Channel 9 as an example, where Robert Scoble provided the video component of that early, branded social network.  But he also mentions the Zappos website, which provides access to videos from product pages, rather than in a separate, video section of the website. Steve declined to give exact numbers, but suggested that the use of video can significantly increase e-commerce transactions.

11:53 --  Even enough your video is just talking heads, the benefit is that your audience gets the chance to attach a face to a voice. Initially, particularly online, someone may launch the video and just watch it for little while, and then put the window in the background and multitask while listening only to the audio.

In retrospect, as I write these show notes, I can see Steve's point because particularly when it comes to business-to-business communications, there is real value in being able to recognize someone's face after you've been listening to them online.

12:37 -- Video is an excellent way to get to know someone a much deeper level than through just audio and certainly from their text.  Businesses are looking for ways to try and connect with their customers and video provides a practical solution for making that happen.  

15:03 -- A discussion about the benefits of live streaming online video, as opposed to video on demand, for extending the reach of live events.   16:39 -- At the bare minimum, all you really need is an Internet connection, a laptop with a built-in WebCam and a Ustream or LiveStream account.

Steve talks about a new premium application from UStream called UStream Producer that runs locally on the Mac or PC which provides better streaming video quality which he used at WCBS-TV in New York to produce a live stream of his appearance on a recent episode of their Saturday morning show.

The UStream desktop application also records and archives your video And provides options for live text chat and social media sharing.  

19:13 -- From a gear standpoint when it comes to choosing a camera that can be mounted on a tripod and used for streaming, Steve recommends the Canon HV20 or Canon HV30 with a Manfrotto Tripod. For microphones, Steve likes the Audio-Technica AT2020 USB mic and lavalieres he recommends the Audio-Technica ATR3350.

The reason Steve likes the Canons is because many of the streaming sites require a FireWire connection, and most cameras have essentially replaced FireWire with SD cards and USB 2.0 ports, which is a file transfer activity.  

21:30 --  Using UStream Producer mentioned earlier, it is possible to set up multiple camera's and create a live stream that cuts seamlessly from one camera perspective to another, however the free version only accommodates a single camera, while the premium version of the app accommodates multiple cameras.

If your computer has two FireWire connections, the recommendation is to install an external FireWire card to bring multiple cameras into your computer.  

22:25 -- Using LiveStream, which is Ustream's competitor, multiple cameras on different computers can log into a master account which can be out a live stream from any video camera that is currently logged in to the master account.

This service also allows you to bring in YouTube and other on-demand video sources. This can be achieved with the free version of LiveStream.  

24:09 -- If you're using a Mac, and want to do screen capture, Steve recommends the new version of QuickTime screen capture that's built into OS 10. however, if what you wanted to is cut to a computer screen in the context of a live stream, that can be achieved with UStream Producer or LiveStream.

27:12 -- Steve and Eric have a pretty hard-core geek out discussion of how the logistics behind live streaming a panel with four people, all mike of wireless level layers, and multiple cameras.

28:52 -- Steve mentions NewTek's TriCaster, which is the coup de grace high-end solution used by a lot of professional production companies for producing live video feeds.

33:09 -- A discussion about the bandwidth requirements for sustaining a watchable video stream online.

36:29 -- Whether it's a live stream or more feature oriented video content, organizations have the opportunity to manage viewer expectations of production quality.  

Nevertheless, the dear required to produce an exceptional video stream online has come down in price so significant way that it is possible to create a video stream that is as good as could be produced with professional gear using store-bought, consumer grade equipment.

38:43 -- The great thing about the Mac, according to Steve, is that they will pretty much play in the light at it any video codec. For editing, Steve uses iMovie 09 which supports QuickTime and AVCHD. 

Before you purchase a camera, Steve recommends opening the software on your computer and checking to see what type of video codec it supports. As a last ditch effort, it is possible to download applications which will convert codecs, but of course, that adds another step to the process and decreases productivity.  

42:09 -- The real challenge of producing HD video at this point, is the file size and processing power required to edit HD clips. On cameras that provide an option, Steve typically sets his camera to shoot in 720P over 1080P, just to reduce the file size and make them easier to deal with.  

44:29 -- Storage requirements for archiving online video.  

45:38 -- Video archive management tips.

48:09 -- The use of titles, transcripts and metadata to search engine optimize online video. The use of MacSpeech Dictate to create text transcripts of video files.

As a footnote, the show notes were written using MacSpeech Dictate, but rather than use the program to create a raw text transcripts of the actual words spoken, I prefer to editorialize and summarize what was said to make it easier for the reader to get the gist of the discussion if your words.

50:30 -- If organizations are interested in booking Steve Garfield for an in-house online video training session, visit www.SteveGarfield.com.

52:43 -- End 

Photo by Sticker Mule on Unsplash

In the battle to get found online, organizations are using social media to wage information warfare to win the trust and confidence of their constituents.

Former DoD analyst Mark Drapeau, Ph.D, who is currently an online public diplomacy director at Microsoft, explains how to dominate your information spectrum with lethal generosity.

This is a recording of a presentation he delivered at my Social Media Master ClassSHOW NOTES

01:24 - “ Mark talks about his experience prior to joining Microsoft at National Defense University, which is affiliated with the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the U.S. Department of Defense, where he studied emerging technologies and their impact on national security. His mandate at Microsoft is to create proactively social content that engages communities, including state, local, and federal government offices.

03:31 - Nature abhors a vacuum. Empty spaces will be filled by something. And so, if you work in fashion, or you work in IT, whatever you do if there's a niche, it will be filled by someone's content.

When you search for a topic, fashion, shoes, or computers, is someone finding your stuff?

That's the premise I start with, says Mark.  There's an information war taking place by organizations who want to get found online.

But what's more important than analyzing your traffic, according to Mark, is understanding your audience, what they want, and how to engage them.

In his case, if someone is searching Government 2.0 he wants to make sure people are finding his content.

05:01 - “ For organizations, Mark sees new media communications as a form of public diplomacy that can be used to educate the marketplace and increase the receptiveness of Microsoft's customers to their policies, products, and services.

Public diplomacy is the act of influencing, engaging, and activating the public softening the battlefield and it is used by government agencies and companies to help their organizations achieve certain goals.

07:23 - The convention protocol by which information moves from organization to individual is inefficient. Based on the various layers of approval corporate information needs to clear before it winds up reaching the customer. The press release is an excellent example of this. But what's happening is by using social media to communicate with others, what's happening is that a lot of people are bypassing official company channels in the process.

They're not official spokespersons, but they're reaching people. So while organizations struggle to clear official information through the various layers of approval, unofficial voices in social media are filling the vacuum.

Because in most cases, big organizations are slow, and cycling information through their chain of command simply can't keep pace with open-source information.

And whenever there is a significant gap between information that can be crowdsourced via open source, and the organization's own, online presence, that organization loses the trust of the community.

People are sharing information and educating one another through Twitter and Facebook.  Sharing information with your online social network has become a social norm, and by contrast, organizations that fail to behave this way are seen as antisocial.

The important thing to understand about social media is that it's more about being social than it is about understanding media or technology.

It's not about the tools; it's about interacting with other people.

09:21 - What's amazing to me is that if you go into the marketing department, or the PR group at a government agency and you ask them. Can you name 5 customers or 5 fans of our company they will have a hard time answering that question.

Because, at the end of the day, they are not being social with the kind of people that actually care about the organization, says Mark. Being social means really caring about a community of people who care about your organization, or topics in which your organization has a vested interest, and that distinction is important because people are more likely to join an issue-specific community than they would be to join your company's community. People are passionate about issues like sustainability and clean water, and they'll follow a Facebook fan page about that topic, but they're going to be much less enthusiastic about your company's own Facebook fan page.

11:21 - Social media engagement should be proactive, not just reactive.  Mark uses the Transportation Security Administration blog as an example of a social media program that is excessively reactive.

It's better than nothing, he says, but he'd rather see them blogging about broader issues like the future of transportation security and how the international community is addressing them.

And Mark says this is because big organizations are afraid to be the first to take a public position on issues, for fear of being wrong.

So they're always playing defensive rather than offensive. The best offense is a good offense, he says. Be out there in front.

12:38 – Mark acknowledges that being out in front is risky, but no risk, no reward, he says. As an example, Mark references Peter Shankman's book "Can We Do That?" which contains a lot of good examples of various client engagements where his PR firm took a risk.

Be careful with the crazy ideas you come up with. You just might have to do one of them.

14:14 - Mark discusses the article The Message is the Message by Jennifer Senior about the online ubiquity of Obama's presidential campaign. He was everywhere, and the Republicans couldn't keep up with him.

If you are filling those vacuums, and you're dominating your community's information spectrum – everywhere someone's looking for stuff there's something by you: guest postings, you have an article in a magazine, video content, whatever it is – if you can dominate that information spectrum, sometimes it doesn't even matter what you actually say, because people will recognize you as thought leader if you just have a presence and it's decent, says Mark. It's got to be decent, but it doesn't necessarily have to be outstanding if you're a consistent contributor all the time.

Obama was perceived as dominating the presidential race and leading the news stories because he was everywhere.

15:32 - Mark shares Gary Vaynerchuck's line Content is king, but marketing is the queen, and she rules the castle, meaning great content's not enough.

You also have to get it out there.  You have to know where your community is and how to get to them.

MySpace may be out of favor with social media pundits, but the research shows MySpace users tend to be in red states and less likely to be college-educated, so trying to reach that audience through Facebook is going to be far less efficient.  Figure out where you're audience is and focus on those social media channels most likely to reach them.

19:53 - Rather than focus solely on the numbers is an indicator of a social media program's effectiveness, Mark gauges success by whether or not his efforts are delivering value to his community.

He counts thank-yous, not click-throughs. He knows he did a job last year with social media not by reviewing his bit.ly click-throughs, but by the number of Christmas cards he receives from people he originally met online than he did the previous year.

21:22 -- A course delegate tells Mark that the only thing that speaks to her superior is metrics, so she can say she's adding value or getting Christmas cards, but at the end of the day, he approves her budget.

Mark responds by saying that if you get good content out through social media, it's going to wind up reaching people over your superior, and it's going to get back through their social network that you're adding value by filling the vacuum with your organization's messages.

Focus on delivering genuine value to the community, and your superior will see that value through other channels.

23:50 - Determine who the experts are in your organization and figure out how to get them out there.  If you're a marketing or PR person, you're just a conduit.  They're the real experts, so use social media to expose their expertise to a broader audience.  And consider the degree of trust people have for your brand as well.

If you don't have trust, you've got to figure out a way to get it, or your social media communications will be disregarded.

25:03 - Mark talks about Shel Israel's Lethally Generous blog post, which uses Jeremiah Owyang's ascent to demonstrate how lethally generosity can effectively dominate an information spectrum by filling the vacuum more frequently than your competitors. By giving, you become trusted and that trust affords you business opportunities that didn't exist before you became lethally generous.

You end up not just feeling the pulse. You become the pulse because you're not just putting information out there, you start receiving information and opportunities back as well. And that's a very valuable and defensible position to be in.

28:42 - In some ways, being a catalyst for social media engagement inside the organizations is about identifying who the experts are, and then determining who is good at which types of communications.

If they're desk-bound and too busy to write but good on camera, can you set them up with a webcam and YouTube account  If they're on the road, how can you equip them with the right mobile social networking tools that will work within their existing professional life?

31:08 - Mark shares a quote by Craig Newmark that says Customer service is public service. And thanks to social media, this really has become the case, because when you help someone via social media, you do so in a public forum where other people can see, and if you do a good job, you wind up earning the trust of the community through your actions.

This special episode, recorded at SXSW in Austin features Twitter founder Evan Williams announcing the new app platform @anywhere and Mashable Editor-in-Chief Adam Ostrow discussing the latest location-based social networking news, changes at Digg, and what's coming next at Google.

SHOW NOTES

00:52 -- A summary of the news from this year's conference, including Twitter's @anywhere announcement, the rivalry between location-based social networking start-ups Foursquare and Gowalla, big changes in store for Digg.com and Google Buzz in the aftermath of the controversy surrounding their decision to integrate their new social network, a public-facing system, with Gmail, a system that has always been very private.

01:31 -- At the Diggnation party, Digg CEO Jay Allison unveiled new.digg.com, a new alpha site available through invitation only, which expands trending news stories beyond just digs to include tweaks, Facebook status updates, personal preferences and your social graph.  Mashable Editor Adam Ostrow calls it Digg's attempt to become the ultimate aggregator.

02:20 -- Google Buzz is in a challenging position, given the public and the media's reaction to their launch, but Adam has confidence that they will ultimately overcome those initial missteps.

By DonkeyHotey - Evan Williams - Caricature, CC BY-SA 2.0

He thinks Google Buzz will be a lot more exciting when they launch an official API so that third-party applications that already integrate with Twitter and Facebook will be available on the service.  " I think the product might have been released a little too early in Gmail. 

I think there were a lot more things they maybe should have considered before launching it," says Adam Ostrow. But he also says don't count them out.  Google has more than 20 employees devoted to developing its Buzz product.  "It's clearly a very high-priority projects there," he says.

03:11 -- On the target market for Google Buzz, Adam Ostrow says, "The way they explained it to me, not dissimilar to Twitter and Facebook, they're really looking at both consumers and brands. 

Right now, I think there's a lot of issues that really make it prohibitive for brands and news organizations to really use the tool effectively. I think first off, it needs to be a standalone site, not just Gmail, which is in the works. So you'll be able to use it if you're a Hotmail user, a Yahoo user or whatever. 

But I also think they have some namespace issues. I think, obviously if you've had your Gmail account for four or five years and your username might not be your business organization name, it's very tough to transition accounts. So there are some issues they need to overcome.

We've been using buzz pretty heavily at Mashable and I think it has the potential as a tool for brands and media organizations but they have a lot of work to do to get there."

04:07 -- Regarding hot new products this year at SXSW, Adam Ostrow says it's all about Foursquare and location-based social networking. 

But he thinks the imminent arrival of UK-based Spotify in the US market could make it a hot product at next year's SXSW.

06:01 -- A discussion of the panel session titled "How Not to be a Douche Bag at SXSW" featuring blogger Violet Blue who used "PR people" as stereotypical examples of how not to behave at this conference. According to Adam Ostrow, the key to not being a "PR douche bag" is simply being respectful of other people's time and, obviously, knowing who you're talking to and what they cover.

But Ostrow has a positive attitude towards public relations.  "PR people are important to what we do. They do provide us, sometimes, with relevant stories and people we need to talk to," says Adam Ostrow.

08:45 -- Eric Schwartzman tells Adam Ostrow about Jeremy Pepper's blog post entitled "I Don't Do SXSWi," recaps the conference highlights for him which includes Chris Messina's presentation about why activity streams need to evolve beyond the Facebook newsfeed, Danah Boyd's keynote on dealing with privacy in online spaces that are public, Joi Ito's talk about advocating intergovernmental information sharing and Kaiser Kuo's update on the trials and tribulations of Google in China. 

Eric asks for Adam's opinion as to how he derives tangible business value from a professional conference that is seen by many as nothing more than a debauchery fest.

09:48 -- Adam Ostrow uses SXSW mostly as an opportunity to cement relationships initiated online in the physical world. "I love to get that face time and really know who they are," says Adam Ostrow, who benefits from the personal relationships he develops at SXSW through as yet unknown story opportunities and potential business development deals. 

"For people in social media and the consumer facing web, it's the best place" to network. 11:09 -- The Mashable party at SXSW was intentionally designed to afford attendees the opportunity to network and party at the same time. The split level venue was divided into a section with a live bands and another section for networking.

12:51 -- Through a joint venture, Mashable is currently doing the content marketing on the American Express OpenForum.com website. 

They create similar coverage to what runs on Mashable.com, but for a small business community, primarily about how they can use social media to market to their customers, which may be other businesses, or many consumers.

13:06 --  When it comes to B2B marketing, how you set your organization's presence up online, how you respond to customers, and devoting adequate resources to listening is key. "That's the point of being there. 

You can be there and just broadcast company news, and I don't think that's too interesting.  It's a way for people to keep up with you.  But the way we use it as a brand, and the way small businesses we like are using it, is to interact" with customers says Adam Ostrow.

14:50 -- Evan Williams announcing their new app platform @anywhere for integrating Twitter into websites. @anywhere will allow website visitors to follow Twitter users from any website. 

Hovering your cursor over a Twitter ID on any website using @anywhere will reveal a pop-up window that allows you to follow that account in just two clicks.  You can also control how receive information from Twitter without every going to Twitter.com or a Twitter client. 

@anywhere can also be used to allow Twitter users to use their Twitter account to sign in to a website.

Thirteen different websites have been selected to beta @anywhere, including Amazon, Ebay, Yahoo, Bing, YouTube, The New York Times, Digg, Salesforce.com and others.

16:30 -- "The main thing that @anywhere does is reduce friction," says Twitter founder Evan Williams, who admits he's not sure how developers will ultimately wind up using the new technology. 

One of the more obvious features include the ability to tweet links directly from a participating website. But a bigger advance is the ability to follow a Twitter account directly from a website, instead of having to click through to Twitter.com and log in if necessary to follow the account.

Discovery is one of the hardest challenges because of the sheer volume of content that's out there.  So putting the ability to follow in the context of the individual or organization your following reduces some of the friction that's currently present in discovery.

17:47 -- The benefits of @anywhere to website operators is a connection to users that you didn't necessarily have before and a way to keep them coming back. 

"We hear from sites all the time that Twitter drives them tons of traffic.  It should result in more followers for a site just sending out links. 

It should also probably result in more people who are your fans, who are your audience using Twitter, talking amongst themselves and talking about your content, so hopefully it becomes a richer experience.

18:54 -- @anywhere also brings user tweets into your site and gives the ability to create a whole community or sub community in your own site. 

The goal of Twitter is to help people and organizations build stronger relationships, and @anywhere is about lowering the barriers to achieving that.  The keynote interview was conducted by Umair Haque, director of Havas Media Lab.

20:43 -- End

Photo by Kon Karampelas on Unsplash

The article is about a telling, one-on-one interview I did with Pete Cashmore, the CEO of Mashable, at SXSW 2010 in Austin.

In the exclusive, Pete Cashmore maps out how Mashable disintermediated mainstream news media competitors, opening his playbook on:

Mashable's rise and transition from niche to mainstream news media outlet

The impact of the iPad on the print publishing industry in the news business

How to make online advertising CPMs (cost per thousand impressions) profitable

How they adapted to the changing media landscape and social media newsfeeds

Pete Cashmore also shares insights into the potential of the iPad as a platform for paid content and the need for traditional media outlets to embrace digital transformation or risk being overtaken by social media.

As a public relations agency leader focused on helping my clients build visibility and credibility through implied, third-party news media endorsements, I have acutely tracked the rise of digital media and how it has cannibalized the mainstream media.

So before you listen to my podcast with Pete Cashmore or review the takeaways from our discussion below, here are my thought on how the digital transition impact the business of public relations.

Digital Transformation Empowers PR Agencies to Embrace Content Marketing and Engage Directly with Stakeholders

The need for traditional media outlets to embrace digital transformation or risk being overtaken by social media has empowered public relations agency leaders to use content marketing as an effective way to speak directly to stakeholders. Here's how this transformation has occurred:

Shifting Media Landscape: As traditional media outlets have faced challenges in maintaining their audience and relevance in the digital age, the landscape has shifted. Many consumers now turn to social media and digital platforms for news and information.

Decline in Traditional Advertising: Traditional advertising in newspapers and magazines has seen a decline as readership has dropped. Public relations agencies recognized the need for alternative avenues to reach their target audiences.

Direct Access to Audiences: Content marketing allows PR agencies to bypass traditional media intermediaries and communicate directly with their target stakeholders. They can create and distribute content via digital channels, such as social media, websites, blogs, and email newsletters.

Content as a PR Tool: Content marketing has become a powerful tool for PR agencies to tell their clients' stories, share valuable insights, and establish thought leadership. This content can include articles, blog posts, infographics, videos, and more.

Engagement and Interaction: Social media platforms enable PR agencies to engage with stakeholders in real-time. They can respond to comments, answer questions, and build a community around their clients' brands, fostering stronger relationships.

Measurement and Analytics: Digital platforms provide robust analytics tools, allowing PR agencies to track the performance of their content marketing efforts. They can measure reach, engagement, conversion rates, and other key metrics, enabling data-driven adjustments.

Targeted Content: PR agencies can tailor content to specific audience segments, ensuring that the right message reaches the right people. This level of targeting was more challenging with traditional media.

Speed of Communication: Digital channels allow for rapid dissemination of information. PR agencies can respond to events and trends quickly, which is essential in today's fast-paced news cycle.

Cost-Effective Outreach: Compared to traditional advertising and PR methods, content marketing through digital channels is often more cost-effective. It allows PR agencies to achieve broader reach with smaller budgets.

Global Reach: The digital landscape provides PR agencies with the opportunity to reach global audiences without geographical limitations, expanding the reach of their clients' messages.

In summary, the digital transformation of the media landscape, along with the rise of social media, has compelled public relations agencies to embrace content marketing as a means to communicate directly with stakeholders. This shift has offered PR agencies more control, interactivity, and cost-effectiveness in conveying their clients' messages while adapting to the evolving media environment.

Pete Cashmore on Social Media Guide and Content Marketing

00:45 -- Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore talks about his online social media guide, which is designed to provide information to those focused on social media marketing, individuals looking to get the most out of tools like Facebook, Twitter, and Foursquare hands how to use social media tools and services as utilities.

01:36 -- Mashable was founded in 2005 by Pete Cashmore at 19 out of his house in Scotland.   Fueled by his interests in the Internet and a hunch that blogging seemed as good a way as any to get started, he decided to launch the site with no real connections to anyone in social media at the time and the belief that he could run by doing.

Since then, Nashville has grown to 20 employees and over 50 writers working part-time.  But Pete maintains a grounded perspective by spending most of his time out of the social media bubble in his home country, the UK, where he can focus on creating great content.

02:52 --  Given the doldrums of the ad-supported media business, Pete has managed to buck the trend by focusing on delivering niche content to a premium audience, which provides high CPMs.  As brands look for ways to get people to pay attention to what they're doing on Twitter and Facebook, Mashable presents a highly targeted advertising opportunity.

03:22 --  Pete sees the iPad as a potential savior for the print publishing industry. By presenting publishers with a viable, practical alternative to the printed page, Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore says that since people are somewhat comfortable paying for content on their mobile phones, he believes that comfort will extend to the iPad. 

"It's essentially a device that lets you package media.  I think it might even break the cycle of people expecting news for free on the web. And we might see that people are used to paying for content with devices like the iPad and the iPhone. Believes could be channels where people are prepared to pay for media," says Cashmore.

04:15 -- Regarding how much a magazine publisher might charge for an iPad subscription, Pete says the numbers vary widely. But his guess is an annual subscription might go for around $10.

05:46 --  Pete Cashmore discusses what he considers a good CPM for online advertising: anything over $15 for online display ads and as much as $20 for online video.  For publishers with really focused content, he has seen them get as much as $30 per thousand impressions.  Google AdSense, on the other hand, provides much lower CPMs of $1-$2.

Cannibalization and Media Transition

06:36 --  There's a cannibalization that needs to take place, says Pete.  We are seeing traditional publishers resist the transition. They're trying to keep the cash cow alive. The written word in print may be more profitable currently than online, but obviously, there will be a transition.

On how the mainstream outlets are doing so far, Pete believes many of the major newspapers and magazines are transitioning to digital quite well. And those who don't leap will disappear by attrition. 08:07 --  Commenting on Marc Andreessen's recent comment that mainstream media outlets need to "burn the boats," Pete says "The rule of cannibalization is you either cannibalize yourself or someone else is going to do it for you."

08:30 -- To drive his point home, Pete talks about how Apple cornered the music industry with iTunes by making it easier to pay for music instead of just suing people. 

Through ease-of-use and accessibility, they became major players in the music business simply because the music business stayed focused on milking their cash cow, leaving themselves open to cannibalization, which is precisely what Apple did. And now, the same risk exists for print publishers.

Blogs have sprung up, and if print publishers don't leap, they, too, are vulnerable to being cannibalized.  That cannibalization is well underway in the tech space, where consumers are early adopters of technology.

10:45 -- Pete thinks all media companies should be open to a variety of formats. But Mashable's expertise currently is creating excellent text. Rather than divert his focus at this point he is steering clear of audio and video. Nevertheless, he can foresee approaching those opportunities through media partnerships.

Mashable's Coverage in B2B and Analytics

12:16 -- Mashable does not currently cover B2B extensively. However an example of a company he believes is serving the interests of B2B marketers is CoTweet, which makes it easy for multiple authors to collaborate on a brand's Twitter account.  

The other area of B2B that Mashable covers are the analytics firms that monitor, measure, and evaluate the effectiveness of social media marketing initiatives.

14:16 -- In terms of people who Pete associates with social media marketing, he mentions Chris Brogan who speaks about how brands can command and communicate well with audiences.

Pitching Social Media Story Ideas to Mashable

15:15 -- For those interested in having their social media products or services featured in actual, the best way to pitch is by sending e-mail to [email protected] which is staffed 24/7.  For best results, keep it short and to the point.

Photo by Brian Solis.

If part of you're at a PR firm trying to sell digital marketing campaigns to your clients, you don’t want to miss this episode with Brian Solis, released on the eve of the SXSW conference in Austin, Texas.  

Over the last few years, Brian Solis has shot like a rocket to the top on the social media influence pyramid.  His Conversation Prism has become the de facto graphic for appraising social media channels. 

His first book, Putting the Public Back in Public Relations which he co-wrote with Deirdre Breckenridge made the argument for social media engagement, and his just released new book Engage provides practical guidance for piloting social media initiatives inside organizations.  

Winning Buy-In for Digital Marketing Insights

01:24 – Brian talks about the “ah-ha” and “uh-oh” moments, which usually crystallize the perceived need for social media engagement inside organizations.  

02:49 – Using the Conversation Prism to collect meaningful research by searching the each of the different social media channels to uncover where the hot spots are for any given organization.  And based on the findings from those queries, Brian Solis talks about designing social media initiatives that address tangible business needs.  

03:31 – Without the research that comes from a thorough investigation of who’s saying what where about a given product, brand or service, there’s no way to ask the right questions to have the “ah-ha” moment. 

According to Brian Solis, it is important to understand that conversations are constantly occurring online that drive all kinds of business decisions.  And unless we actually seek out and gauge in the right conversations by listening through filters those decisions will be made without us. It’s the realization that there are not just conversations taking place across the social web.   

03:46 – “There are not just conversations taking place across the social web.  There are influential decision-making steps and processes and considerations that are taking place that are transpiring right now, without us. 

And when you can demonstrate the exact cause and effect of what’s transpiring and to what extent, then that “ah-ha” moment is pretty profound,” Brian Solis explains.  

05:54 – Successfully implementing social media initiatives inside organizations requires that the projects lead ultimately transition from champion to diplomat, because it is critical to raise awareness of what needs to be accomplished and the required resources to pull it off among the executives who can fund pilots, and who or may not be directly involved in the initiative.  

06:33 – “What’s going to be important to these folks [decision makers with P&L responsibility] is that we apply information to them in a way that they’re used to measuring it.  Even though this is new medium, we have to help them learn by speaking their language, and then ultimately teaching them something new, almost like learning a new language through immersion,” says Brian Solis.  

07:12 – Much as when ad agencies bid accounts on spec, in order to make the case for a social media initiative, it is necessary to invest the time and resources to figure out where the relevant conversations are taking place, and to try and determine which departments of the organization are most impacted by these conversations. 

Are the conversations surrounding customer service issues, engineering issues or marketing-related issues?  The idea is to collect and attribute online conversations to the specific business units or departments inside the organization that they apply.  The key to winning buy-in is research, but once he’s got it completed, he’s still not done.   

08:01 -- Brian takes all his research, puts into a snazzy PowerPoint deck and presents it to the C Suite business decision makers to win buy-in.  It’s important that the presentation be distilled to the point where it’s not overwhelming. It must provide clear overview as to the opportunities that exist, and provide tangible suggestions of what can be done to address them and then how those efforts will be learned over time.  

09:43 – When it comes to the argument about whether or not it’s necessary to justify the ROI of social media engagement, Brian takes the high road.  “Change isn’t always something that’s easy to embrace.  Maybe the demand for metrics or ROI is stall tactic, because there’s this fear of change or what have you.  But whatever it is, don’t spend your energy and resources debating it.  Just work with it,” says Brian.  And social media can be measured more effectively than old school marketing and public relations.  

11:21 – When it comes to measuring social media, Brian likes to establish the cost per action because in his mind, that’s the most tangible metric for determining the value of a conversation. In other words, what happened as a result of the conversation? 

Whether its click-throughs, links, registrations, shares, downloads or sales, cost per action focuses on the outcome of the conversations, rather than the conversation itself, but it’s important to note that sales are not the only measurable transactions that have real business value to organizations.  

12:18 – The most common question Brian gets from stakeholders inside organizations about social media implementation is, “What is that we’re going to accomplish? 

How many people is this going to take?  And what’s going to cost? And then, what does success look like?  I hear that in every single conversation,” says Brian.  And one way to get those answers is through research, which he has a blue print for conducting.  

13:01 – By documenting, categorizing and quantifying the results of your research by issue and the part of the organization impacted, you build the business case.  Based on the formula Brian lays out in his book Engage, finding relevant conversations, engaging whoever’s behind them, monitoring for their response and then following up  takes roughly 25 minutes of someone’s time. 

So if you’re going to try and measure cost per action, it really comes back to the amount of time you’ve invested in a conversation to try and stimulate that action. 

So if it’s 25 minutes per action, you just look at the research and evaluate which conversations the organization has the organization has the most to gain by engaging, count up the number of conversations and multiply by 20 to 25 minutes per engagement, and that will give you some idea of what kind of resources you need to address that opportunity.  

15:14 – In terms of where the pockets of resistance for social media engagement are inside most organizations, Brian says it’s different every time.  But a lot of it has to do with where the champions for social media inside that organization are.  “The thing that I’ve learned is this. 

If there aren’t already champions there -- and based on the research you will find that there are multiple opportunities, you just have to prioritize which one it is that you pilot based on the data that comes back – everyone has concerns, or they also have incorrect perspectives with respect to what can be accomplished through social media.  So there’s a lot of education there. 

So having answers to all the skeptical questions that you could possibly get before you go into that meeting is going to be extremely helpful because people will ask you more questions that will postpone doing it the right way. 

So having those answers is what it’s going to take to get at least some, initial level of support,” says Brian. 

You might not get enterprise wide acceptance from the get go, but that’s okay.  Focus on getting the resources for the pilot program and use that as an opportunity to demonstrate value to others inside the organization.  

16:42 – When Brian is doing his research, his uses the Katie Paine method of coupling words indicative of a bad customer experience with the company’s name inside all the search boxes of all the social media channels in the Conversation Prism.

So he takes words like suck, or die or hate to surface those conversations with the greatest sense of urgency.  Brian says this is a very powerful way to raise eyebrows and incite action.  

18:43 – According to Brian, you can’t bill for educating customers to reorganize for social media.  “There is a general misperception that social media is centralized.  And it’s not. 

Because when you do the research, when you do the listening aspect of it, you will find that the more meaningful conversations directly align with divisions of your organization,” says Brian. 

“You can always map it perfectly to HR, sales, marketing, the executives, PR, what have you.”  Brian recommends creating a chart that shows the percentages of conversations that apply to the different divisions, so the stakeholders have a sense of which parts of their company are most under siege. 

In order to win the support you need across the entire organization, they have to see who it impacts.    20:30 -- “The conversation takes place online.  If you aren’t there to hear it, did it really happen?  And once you can show that it did,” says Brian. 

And once you show those opportunities that were missed, you can show them what they could be doing to turn those conversations into measurable business gains.  “The only reason you have skeptics and push back is because they don’t know what’s taking place. 

And if you can show them not only what’s happening, but what the opportunities are that lie within, you can start to bring people to the table in a collaborative format,” continues Brian.  

21:15 – “Every business is going to become more not just socially but socially engaged and that is, any division of a business that’s affected by outside activity is going to have to pay attention to what’s going on,

Social networks have been mainstream for less than five years, but HR.com has delivered much of the same value to its members for over a decade.

Founded in 1999, the B2B content site today serves nearly 190,000 members, most of them human resources professionals. Its jewel in the crown is an active calendar of webcasts that attendees can attend to earn professional certifications.

The site also has many contributions in the form of blogs and expert articles.  Like any site that's been around that long, HR.com has had its share of twists and turns. Originally founded as an online magazine, its site was recast as a community when social networking became popular.  

Today, the Ontario, Canada-based company employs 32 people, is profitable, and has a successful model in which members contribute all of the content.  A diversified revenue stream includes advertising, events, and webcasts; speakers pay $3,000 for a chance to get in front of the site's coveted audience.  

Debbie McGrath calls herself the Chief Instigator of HR.com. A serial entrepreneur with a background in computer science, she founded HR.com in 1999 after selling her previous venture, The CEO Group, to the Washington Post Co..  

This interview is guest-hosted by Paul Gillin of Paul Gillin Communications and was conducted in association with research for an upcoming book on B2B applications of social media to be published later thia year or early next year.

Digital Content and Community Management Topics Discussed: 

0:35 How HR.com was started 1:05 The evolution from magazine to community

2:00 The most popular features with the audience are in learning and education. About 30 sessions are webcast each month, with an average attendance of about 400 people. Contributors can get certification credit for what they learn in the webcast.

3:00 Why experts pay to give webcasts: “They get to showcase their expertise, be a thought leader in the space, and for lead generation in some cases.”

4:15 HR.com’s primary revenue sources include events, advertising and subscriptions

5:25 Requirements for registration.  Anyone can register if they agree to receive one ad per week.

6:15 How forms are administered

6:50 Debbie had no prior experience in VB communities.  She discusses how the characteristics of different professional communities make the learning process a constant challenge.

7:20 Surprises of managing communities. “There seems to be no relationship between quality of content and attendance.” People who charge $60,000 for a one-hour keynote seem to draw no better than unknown speakers.

9:45 The role of HR.com's surveys and the goal of creating product and service guides. “We believe the Forrester/Gartner model is flawed.”

11:10 The upside surprises of running a community. "I'm shocked at how many people come to us from all over the world."

12:25 Guidance to would-be b-to-b community organizers: unique domain experts and it's really hard to get started in today's crowded market.

13:15 How HR.com runs virtual events

14:25 HR.com’s revenue mix: events, e-mail, PPC advertising, events

15:00 Memorable moments in HR.com’s industry. It was the first site in its industry to do webcasts. Internal resistance to the transition to a social network model.

17:30 Plans for the future: making events more self-service and profitable

19:30 Strictly regulating webcast content. “If presenters gave sales pitches, attendance wouldn't be as good.”

20:00 Gaining permission to work in the certification program. A large association charges for the same basic information HR.com gives away for free.

Photo by Perry Grone on Unsplash

Richard Edelman discusses what the results of the 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer mean for B2B focused organizations. 

This interview was conducted as part of the research for an upcoming book about the B2B applications of social media that I am writing with Paul Gillin, which will be published by Wiley later this year.

02:14 - Richard Edelman on how broadly B2B marketers should be looking to engage stakeholders, who the most credible spokespeople and the new keys to corporate reputation.

03:02 - Disappearance of the boundary between brands and corporate reputations.

03:39 - Richard mentions how Edelman client ITT Corporation's Watermark marketing program is focused on a mosaic of stakeholders including state and local agencies, politicians, NGOs and end customers.

04:12 - Why B2B communications is no longer a "solitary soldier."

05:11 - Richard Edelman on how B2B focused organizations should go about selecting social media channels to engage through by focusing on issues that have a social impact, remaining conscious of government's increasing role in regulation and finding ways for your expert employees to be heard.

06:31 - Richard explains why trust in financial analysts remains high, despite the fact that they failed to accurately predict one of the most precarious financial situations in US history.

07:26 - Richard Edelman and Eric discuss Ken Auletta's new book "Googled," the importance of trust and the lesson for B2B marketers from the 2010 Trust Barometer.

08:32 - The importance of tracking more than just a company's financial data in the age of transparency.

09:10 - Employees as the new credible source versus the CEO.

09:47 - How realistic is it that businesses really will start putting purpose before profits?

Richard uses Edelman client GE Ecoimagination as an example on an organization that is putting sustainability at the center of its product offering. 

Here are the results of the 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer.