Edison Research is launching their “Twitter Usage in America 2010″ report today with a live webinar. The report is part of their full Internet & Multimedia Study and includes some quality data. Here are some of the highlights:

But, for a campaign that can get people to the internet pretty easily, their integrated social media, if you [...]]]> I really enjoyed the Cottonelle “How do you roll?” commercial when I first saw it last week, asking people how they prefer to present their paper, over or under (apparently the answer is over).

But, for a campaign that can get people to the internet pretty easily, their integrated social media, if you can call it that, reminds me more of any empty roll that needs to be replaced.

Yes they have two of their commercial’s characters on Twitter, and a Facebook page, and the poll itself with a nice map of results. But these small efforts are social for social’s sake with very little thought toward tying it all together. They even went out and interviewed folks on the street to add to their actor interviews and put all of it on Youtube, but check out the views on those videos. There is obviously nothing being done to promote them.

It smacks of a brand or agency that thinks social media is suppose to be cheap and easy. I see a multi-million dollar traditional ad campaign and a dollar store social media effort.

There is no effort to engage the consumers, whose attention they are buying with some major TV spots, in a long term way. I am sure the media buys will produce a short bump in sales and if that is all Cottonelle wants, then fine, good show.

But in 2010, pointing people to a micro-site that does not extend the relationship beyond the length of a media buy, is traditional advertising and less effective. The opportunity is to build a community, to engage the consumer in a way that creates a longer term relationship (meaning more money), to ask questions of consumers, to answer questions, to get the people they are pulling in with a clever, simple question, and convert them into spending more time with their brand. Consumers want dialogue.

It is a cute campaign Cottonelle, but perhaps you should consider building consumer relationships with a longer shelf life than say, I don’t know, a roll of toilet paper?

Presentation Transcript

For some perspective, the highest rated American prime time TV [...]]]> Google put up a blog post today about how they monetized the viral video hit Jill Peterson and Kevin Heinz’s wedding party dance(below). This video was posted on July 16th and has generated over 12 million hits in 2 weeks.

TV Numbers

For some perspective, the highest rated American prime time TV show during that time was America’s Got Talent with 13.2 million viewers. TV has long been light years ahead of any online numbers.  This example shows that the gap is closing. Truly remarkable content is beginning to reach large viewership numbers online in shorter and shorter time spans. And it is not always professionally produced.

And the gap is only going to narrow. The online audience will continue to grow larger. The information is moving faster and faster. And more and more people are becoming savvy content creators.

Who is Making the Money?

Google is, the content middle man, the distributor. The distributors hold a lot of the power moving forward. Think iTunes on the music front and Amazon on the book front. The “rights holders” to the song in the video, Forever by Chris Brown, were also able to easily monetize (I assume his label or manager). The song has shot up to the top 5 on both Amazon and iTunes.

A Workable System

This did not happen overnight. Youtube has been a battleground for some time now, with entertainment industry giants facing off against Google on profit sharing. Google has been working voraciously behind the scenes to make this process easy for the rights holders. Instead of deleting every piece of copyrighted material, the entertainment industry can overlay an amazon download link for the song and Google Adwords in the sidebar. Everyone is happy.

Of course it would also be nice if after a certain viewer threshhold the video creator got a peice of the action as well. No word on that from the Google blog as of yet.

Appearing to tape over some key vowels really gets your mind moving… “did someone have to censor this ad?” or “was it a mistake?”

Making people think about something or feel like [...]]]> I don’t even drink coffee, but this tempts me to try some to make sure I still don’t like it.

Mystery Engages

Appearing to tape over some key vowels really gets your mind moving… “did someone have to censor this ad?” or “was it a mistake?”

Making people think about something or feel like they are breaking a rule will always engage them.

At the Enterprise 2.0 Conference last week in Boston, I was talking with a new friend about how she got some stickers from one of the vendors but was told “not to tell anyone or give any away”. Even though she saw right through the reverse psychology, it still got her talking about them. Be clever, be mysterious, and engage the mind.

Risky? Yes

Yes it will still piss some people off, and it is a risk, but some of the best marketing takes big risks. It goes up to an edge, implies gratuity, but does not cross over. It messes with you a little, and if you are not too uptight will likely make you laugh.

They are obviously not marketing to a family audience with this sign, they want to shock the poor tired schmo that is walking by, trying to drag himself through another long, dry day. The sign alone, while subtle at first, might just smack the tired off your day. Imagine what the coffee will do. It does not send the wrong message for the audience they are after.

Cocky Can be Cool

Most ads are careful. Most ads are safe. When an ad or branding steps our of the normal, it gets noticed. Most ads are not cocky, this one is, and it makes you wonder why. It is no universal solution, but it is fun when done well.

Does your brand take risks with its marketing?

image via Shiny Things

When Jason asked me to answer this question, my first reaction was he had it backwards. Shouldn’t the question be, “What can advertising [...]]]> Guest post by Edward Boches, Chief Creative Officer at Mullen. Find him on Twitter at @edwardboches

Can social media professionals learn
anything from the world of advertising?

When Jason asked me to answer this question, my first reaction was he had it backwards. Shouldn’t the question be, “What can advertising professionals learn from the world of social media?” I mean consider that the consumer has become the medium, the distribution channel, and in some cases (think Don Draper on Twitter or Coke’s fan page) the content creator. Isn’t it the ad practitioner who needs to learn about social media, to understand how conversation has become the new marketing? What can outdated ad guys possibly teach social media types?

But as I thought about it, it’s obvious that both disciplines (I actually predict they’ll soon be one and the same) can learn from each other. Ad agencies and advertisers can learn new ways to listen, engage and take advantage of emerging tools and platforms for the distribution of their content. At the same time, perhaps social media types can take advantage of what advertising professionals know.

So here are three things that every social media person might want to learn from advertising folks.

1. Good advertising tells you what a product does and why you should buy it. Great advertising expresses what a brand stands for an invites you to share in its beliefs.

The best advertisers and agencies know that consumers buy into a brand’s values as much or maybe even more than the individual products. Nike advertising doesn’t push shoes; it encourages, inspires and promises individual achievement. Monster.com doesn’t tell you how easy it is to explore job options; it reinforces your right to a fulfilling career. Coca Cola doesn’t talk about what’s inside the bottle, it brings to life what’s outside the bottle: joy and happiness. You can see this over and over again in the best advertising.

What’s the lesson for social media? Don’t push a product. Don’t generate content that’s limited to offers or coupons (like some retailers do on Twitter). Instead, demonstrate what you stand for through the content and utility you offer and the community you nurture and inspire. Think Zappos, which stands for customer service and practices it using Twitter. Emulate Whole Foods, which expresses its belief in health, nutrition and the enjoyment of good food, evident on Facebook and Twitter. Model your approach on WalMart, a retailer proving its commitment to value by aggregating and generating useful content through it’s Mom blogger program. These are brands that aren’t saying what they stand for, they’re living it in a way that invites participation.

2. Elevate your creative before you increase your budget

The great agencies and the best advertisers all know this. A big creative idea is the ultimate competitive advantage. You can always buy presence, but you can’t pay for memorable. Think of ideas you’ve seen that you’ll never forget: Absolut Vodka’s bottle art, Budweiser’s Wassup, E-Trade’s Chimp, Monster.com’s When I Grow Up, The Milk Board’s Got Milk? These are all campaigns from years gone by. But chances are if you saw them just once you remember them always.

Or consider more recent efforts. Cadbury’s drum banging gorilla. Or even my own agency’s recent campaign for the Boston Bruins. The latter two had virtually no media dollars behind them at all. But they had the creative power to attract attention, become viral, and worm their way into the current culture.

The fact is it’s only a matter of time before every brand has a Facebook fan page, a presence on Twitter, and a YouTube channel. Simply being there won’t be enough. What will separate one brand from another will be the quality and creativity of the content, the program, and the experience. Consumers will want experiences that aren’t just relevant, but interesting, entertaining and inspirational.

3. Recessions are the best time to make a move

It’s been proven definitively that companies willing to spend on new programs, acquisition and advertising during recessions far outpace companies that make big cuts. Kellogg’s Rice Krispies raced past Post Cereal in the early 1930s by doubling its ad budget. According to McKinsey, companies that took equally aggressive approaches during the slowdowns of 1981-82 and 1990-91 enjoyed similar results. Why? For the simple reason that when advertising is scarcer, the brands that do advertise benefit from a greater share of voice and visibility. Yet despite all the evidence, most brands fail to take advantage of this time-tested approach. Perhaps it’s because it’s hard to think about building an addition when the house is burning down.

But there’s a huge lesson here for social media. This new approach to marketing is still in its infancy. The first ones to get out there will grab a much larger share of attention in relationship to their effort than they will in another two or three years, when the social media environment is far more cluttered and consumers will have even more content to sift through and communities to choose from. It’s a chance to do what Kellogg did. Establish yourself when there’s less competition.

So there you have it. The value of shared beliefs. The power of creativity. An understanding that timing is everything. Maybe there is something you can learn from the world of advertising. Can you think of anything else?

SERIES Social Media Skills — Advertising, SEO, PR, Graphic Design, Copywriting, and more…

Nielsen reported last week that the retention rate of new Twitter users was pretty bloody, with only 30-40% of new users returning a month after joining.

More than 60% of US Twitter users fail to return the following month. Twitter’s retention rate is about 40%. For most of the past year, pre-Oprah, Twitter [...]]]>

Nielsen reported last week that the retention rate of new Twitter users was pretty bloody, with only 30-40% of new users returning a month after joining.

More than 60% of US Twitter users fail to return the following month. Twitter’s retention rate is about 40%. For most of the past year, pre-Oprah, Twitter has languished below 30% retention.

Many have pointed out these numbers do not take into account third party clients like Tweetdeck. For the sake of this post I am assuming that no matter the percentages, Twitter needs to improve the experience for new users and retain more of them. The fact that so many new users do not “get it” right away is not surprising (@’s and #’s be damned).

Twitter is not doing much to improve that intake process.

Weak Suggested Users

Twitter’s only big push to improve these numbers has been the suggested users list they started 2 months ago. The suggested users, in its current state, provide little value to a new user. Twitter defines these suggested users as:

a bit like your local book store’s staff picks. (We) developed a program that scans active Twitter accounts for a bunch of key ingredients such as how much of the profile is filled out

Where is the relevance to me personally?

Much of the value of Twitter comes from the personalization, shaping the information to be as relevant to our personal needs as possible. Random popular users are more novelty.

Below are some of my suggestions for Twitter.

Higher Relevance

• Location - Suggest users within a certain distance and create better location search options
• Industry - Allow users to define their industry with keywords,  suggest users accordingly
• Interests - Mine a new user’s bio and ongoing tweets,  suggest users accordingly

Show me people connected to me in these ways and I have something to talk about with them right away. I also have an immediate group of highly relevant tour guides and ambassadors to teach me how the game is played.

Ongoing Suggested Users

Keep these suggestions coming. List them in the sidebar or send an email or anything that gives suggested users a higher profile and does not depend upon new users discovering it on their own. I may miss it at signup. I may give you more information that improves the process.

A Real User’s Guide

I remember being pretty confused by Twitter when I first signed up. The basics are simple: type message and send. The breadth of the service, however, is quite complex. A couple short and simple video demos would do wonders for explaining to new users the potential the service holds.

If I see Twitter me this and Twitter me that on CNN and my local radio station, I might go sign up, but the people are what makes me stay. Finding people that provide me with information, entertainment, and relationships creates user investment. Once Twitter learns how to quickly provide that value to new users, their retention rate will rise accordingly.

None of It Really Matters

I would like to see Twitter make their intake process a little more user friendly, but at the end of the day, they don’t need to. I am sure their investors are eager to see retention rates rise, but Twitter already has insiders from tech, media, and Hollywood signed up and passionate about their product.

Twitter is a different type of service and can easily fail to appeal to the masses in the same way as Facebook, Myspace, or even LinkedIn. The important fact remains that Twitter has a rabid and influential customer base in their corner, and that is very valuable.