Businesses: Raise your hand if you barely cared about Google+ until your SEO consultant called to say now you just have to. While the disproportionate weight Google is placing on + driven results may be unhealthy for SERPs in the short term, opening a relatively easy + door to bomb Google SERPs serves the function of enlisting SEOs to goad businesses into participating in Google’s fledgling social community.

Google’s strategy is brilliant, sort of like a sardonic dominatrix forcing her ambivalent quarry to capitulate with promises of immediate pleasure, ultimately resulting in long-term frustration for the poor S.O.B. that surrendered. Trust me, it won’t stay this easy to participate your way into SERPs via + as businesses flock to grab their share and mega authority profiles are grown by brand gorillas. Long term, true socialization will likely benefit SERPs. For now, one thing is sure: The SEO world is changing in radical ways. While (of course) we’d love you to hire a specialized consultant to counsel you on what to do next, here’s an awesome start without having to fork over mucho-sheckels. Read on as SEO industry pundits weigh in with gobs of actionable insights and tactics.

Google has tried to go social before. From the ill-conceived “Wave” to the “Buzz” debacle, they’ve failed  and gloriously to impel its throngs of users to take the leap to socialization in a Google environment. Conventional wisdom is that Google users don’t traffic Google to be social. At first, + was interesting but looked like it could be another ho-hum. That’s all changed now. SEOs like you and I are giddy lemmings, flocking and falling all over our feet, telling businesses that they too should participate in the land rush. Sadly, it’s true! “Calling all businesses! For the next 15 minutes Google organic prominence is easier than usual!”

Here are 32 totally free Google Plus Your World SEO Resources. From the greatest minds in the industry to niche trade pubs, have a gander:

• Google’s Results Get More Personal With “Search Plus Your World”, Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineLand
• Why Every Marketer Now Needs a Google+ Strategy, Rand Fishkin, SEOmoz
• Rank for Anything You Want on Google Search Plus Your World, Miranda Miller, Search Engine Watch
• When Search & Social Act Like Children, Users Lose, Lisa Barone, Outspoken Media
• Webmaster Reaction Towards Google Search, Plus Your World, Barry Schwartz, SearchEngineRoundTable
• Google Introduces ‘Search, Plus Your World’: Is Your Business Ready to Get Personal?, Jessica Bates, MasterGoogle
• How Google Search+ Your World Influences SEO Laurie Sullivan, MediaPost
• Real-Life Examples Of How Google’s “Search Plus” Pushes Google+ Over Relevancy, Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineLand
• What does Google’s social search mean for SEO? We ask the experts,  Nancy Messieh TNW Blog
• Twitter: Google+ Integration In Google Search Is “Bad” For Everyone, Matt McGee, Marketing Land
• Google+ for Business: 5 Things Marketing Professionals Should Know About Google+,  Ashley Zeckman TopRank, Online Marketing Blog
• What Google Personalized Search plus Your World Means for Marketing – SEO Tips, Lee Odden, TopRank Online Marketing Blog
• How Google Search Plus Your World Affects SEO, Sean, SEOHacker
• 5 Ways Google Search Plus Your World Impacts SEO, Jacob Stoops, Agent
• SEOGoogle’s “Search Plus Your World” Gets Personal, SEOHaus
• Google+ SEO AJ Kohn, Blind Five Year Old
• How Google Search Plus Your World Will Impact SEO, Marcus Taylor, SEOOptimise
• How Does Google’s Search Plus Your World Impact Adwords and Other Forms of Online Marketing?, Joe Mangum, SEOmoz
• How To Rank On Page One Of Google’s Personalized Search, SEO Philosophy5
• §  Harsh Truths About Google’s ‘Search Plus Your World’ Update, Obaidul Haque, SearchEngine Marketing Group
• Google Search, Plus Your World: Where Google Plus and SEO Converge, Jannette Pazer, Dragon Search
• Search Plus Your World: Google’s SEO Game Changer, Stephanie Cain, The Right Click
• ‘Google Search, Plus Your World’ – An SEO’s Perspective, Mike, Digital Marketing Blog
• Google+ for SEO? Don’t Focus on Your Brand Page!, Eric Wittlake, B2C
• Building Authority and Influence in Google, Kaiserthesage
• Three Reasons Google Search Plus Your World Will Change Your World, Vocus Blog
• Google Rocks SEO With Search Plus Your World, OptimizeThis
• Get Yourself Featured in New Google Search Plus Your World Personalized Search, Mark Traphagen, Virante Orange Juice
• Google ‘Search Plus Your World’ Brings Google+ Into Search Results, Michael Liedtke, HuffingtonPost

Additional Resources, Added “Post” Humously

• 30 Hands On Google Search Plus SEO Techniques for Getting Personal, Tadeusz Szewczyk, OnReact
• eBook from our friends at SearchInfluence, Using Google Plus For Business

Imagine my surprise to see my daughter on television this morning! Her school’s choir was singing on the local CBS affiliate’s Sunday morning news show. There she was! The show featured choirs from a number regional school systems. Awesome! My kid was on TV. I reached for my cell phone and started calling local family and friends.

“Tune in now,” I encouraged! “She’s on TV!” My fatherly buttons were bursting as I called, tweeted, DM’d and otherwise recruited viewers for the local weekend morning news show, realtime. Then it hit me!

In 1995, in my job as Creative Director of the very same CBS affiliate, KDLH, I conceived and produced the first show in years that assembled local choirs to sing at holiday time.  The memory is vivid, of the 1995 conference room crew as I pitched the show to the station’s General Manager.  My thinking was that, if we invited a half a dozen choirs from around the DMA, each singing group would have at least 10 kids in it.

For each kid, there would be parents, grandparents, sisters, brothers and friends who would tune in.  The schools would take pride also. Teachers, fellow students and the entire school system would likely take note. Videos would get recorded on VHS and Betamax, Christmas and Hanukkah video gifts would get shipped to interested friends and family and the entire event would generate buzz that helped promote and brand our station. I called it “Vanity Bait.” Little did I know that more than 15 years later, long after I worked in television, that I would get hooked by my own vanity bait!

What Is Vanity Bait?
Social media is about reaching out to communities in meaningful ways, that engage to such a great extent that others evangelize content for you. A classic route to such results are to give the community great reasons to do so. Vanity bait is about appealing the the sense of what’s important in circles where there is potentially fanatic motivation to spawn viral rebroadcast. Of COURSE I called folks I know to brag about my daughter. Of course I did!

The same thinking holds true with many social media content conventions.  Think about link roundups. Whether daily, weekly, monthly and no matter the vertical, systematically highlighting content that summarizes any topical space engages the creators of the content. These creators and their followers are very likely to promote the roundup that features their content.

Interviews work the same way. Interview someone on your blog or podcast and you engage the entire community that surrounds the interviewee.  Reviews, editorials, and featuring other organizations are fantastic tactics. In short, the best way to be successful with social media content is to be..well…social! The best way to motivate others to support your efforts is to actually engage them, with content that has an inherent second degree of engagement. Create content with legs and just watch the results.

Same As It Ever Was
Today I reached out across more than 15 years and hooked myself, concerning my own child, and I became an evangelist for a television show that was inherently viral by design. The concept of being “social” and engaging communities has been around a lot longer than “social media.” Remembering to put the “social” in social media is a classic concept that transcends the Internet and today’s viral channels.

IU basketball fans must be among the most engaged on earth. Just watch Twitter. Last week Indiana University’s Hoosier Nation was totally screaming, abuzz at IU’s stunning upset of (previously) #1 Kentucky.  I saw some retweets among my community that highlighted an incredible reality: These days sports fans don’t just yell at the players in the stadium or at their television sets. They yell at each other on Twitter, at the speed of rabid emotion!

I’m watching IU/Notre Dame game now. Literally, the Twitter stream has been moving at an incredible pace. At it’s height and during intense plays,  the tweets come at the rate of about 5 per second.  They are passionate, descriptive and provide a total play by play, second by second snapshot, including what the announcers are saying.

Just think of the people mining that is possible, surrounding college and professional sports. Wow! from now on when I watch television coverage of any sport, I’ll open TweetDeck to gain the incredible extra layer of insight available by crowdsourcing thousands of frenetic fans all over the world, including those in the stadium tweeting pictures. It’s a whole new experience.

For Twitter marketers, just THINK of the people mining available along themed lines of conversation.  For now, rock on IU. We’ll see you on New Years Eve because I’ve got tickets to the game at Assembly Hall, Bloomington, against Ohio State. Watch for my tweets.

Sometimes it takes a grownup, in physical life, to remind us the basics of online community management. Celia Cohn was handling Ambassador duties at the front entrance of the Westin™ Kierland Resort, the official #SMX Social Scottsdale hotel. Her job is to greet guests in the hotel lobby, guide, engage and support.

She greeted me as I walked by, “Mr. Weintraub, how did your speaking go today, or is it tomorrow?” The familiar greeting surprised me, as I did not remember engaging with Celia prior.  Best practice number one: She did her homework. I did not realize until after the conversation that she had scoped out my #SMX Badge, which has my name on it and flags me as a speaker. She also knew that the conference was two days. I was so much more interested in the conversation because she had taken careful notice and engaged me along lines I care about, my speaking. Nice work Celia! This lady executes the basics, really well. (Author’s Note: I think we’ve also proven that Celia is great at link-building, as evidence herein .)

Best practice number two: Celia also engaged with a question. We suggest this to clients all the time, to engage by asking for an answer back.  I ended up talking to Celia for quite a while, quite a fascinating lady. The Westin™ Kierland Resort is lucky to have her.

While SMX Social Media Scottsdale was a fantastic conference, my interaction with Celia offered terrific social media takeaways. After all, we interact with people in social media. Sometimes it takes a mature person, handling community outreach in the physical world, to remind us of what’s important: Research your customer. Engage with a question that matters. Rock on Celia!

Welcome back to aimClear’s coverage of #SESCHI! After two cups of coffee on this second (and way chillier) morning, we headed to the Social Media Signals in Search session. Moderated by Rob Garner, vice president of strategy for iCrossing, and featuring Andrea Fishman, VP of Global Strategy & Managing Partner of BGT Chicago, BGT Partners, and Jim Yu, Founder & CEO, BrightEdge, this team was dishing out top-shelf insight on the ever-expanding influence of social media on organic search rankings.

Last week at #PubCon Vegas, aimClear blogged a session that also focused on social media signals in search, though with two very different speakers and considerably different types of insight. Interested in presenting a variety of expert-level advice to the readers at home, we decided to blog this sesh as well- a nice contrast and compare type-deal. Read on for more juicy details as captured by yours truly, @meganlichty.

Andrea took the stage first, noting that there have been a lot of tools and changes to the market recently, such as Google Pages and Google +1, to name a couple. The evolution is just beginning; tablets, apps and mobile are also blowing up in the market.

So, what does that mean for search? Well, it changes the dynamic of how you create content. There are new ways for people to engage with your content, and there are many, many different drivers coming onto the scene.

The Social Paradigm
Marketers are creating and optimizing the content, then publishing. It is the understanding of the content, distribution of content, and how it will be found in search that are really important. The audience is also in the driver’s seat… now more than ever. It’s essential to understand how others share your content, how it is seen and who is it seen by.

Sharing channels are very popular, such as Facebook and Twitter. We are no longer asking people to consume; we are asking them to do something with the content we share. It is now more than ever a two-way street. We need to understand how users see our content, and really delve into where they play.

Web Analytics and Social Monitoring
Ask yourself: What is the lifespan of our content? And, as a business, what does this mean? Understand your audience and how they discover: Consuming and sharing your data is key.  Thinking differently about how people engage with your content is a big shift. We need to:

• Establish objectives
• Increase brand awareness
• Increase conversions
• Build social connections
• Improve customer service
• Drive traffic
• Drive registrations

Understanding the goal of your content extremely important. Andrea highlights that 57% of digital marketing impact is derived from SEO, and 68% of marketers have generated leads from at lease one of the three major social media platforms.

Optimize for SEO and Social media
The first thing  to do is focus on what channels you want to be present on. Twitter, Facebook, Google + and Bing are all options and all very different platforms. Understand the impact of  each channel and how to optimize your content to fit that channel the best.

Fun Facts:

• 140 million Tweets are sent per day
• 4 billion things are shared on Facebook each day
• 3 billion searches are conducted per day

How do you get your content to perform well in the HUGE web world? Analyzing whether your content and website is findable, readable, understandable, actionable, and shareable are great starting points. Then, you need to think about engaging with users, which is channel-specific. I.E. How you show up on LinkedIn is very different than YouTube.

Create content for short-term social media sharing and for long-term search.

Measure Based Objectives

• Listening: brand awareness and share of voice change in sentiment
• Engaging: views, likes, re-tweets, friend, followers, time on site
• Business: conversions, leads generated, and sales

Don’t get too caught up in the tool. Find what is most important for your content.

Continually Optimize for your Audience
Andrea used an example of the company ADT. They needed to think of new and creative ways to engage with their audience. Their team leveraged infographics as one tactic, which worked well for them. ADT also needed to reach out to influencers in social media to keep their content topical and interesting. Andrea stressed, “Make sure you tell more compelling stories because your audience is able to drive your SEO.”

Andrea left the audience with a few goodies to be gnawing on everyday:

• Understand your audience
• Establish objectives
• Use historical data and research
• Optimize your content and website
• Engage customers
• Measure based on objectives
• Continually optimize for audience

It is not just anyone of these tactics; use all of them. In conclusion, get the right content to the right people.

Next up, was Jim.

Ah, the Evolution of Internet Marketing
In the 90s, pages and banners and broadcast were used to try to drive people to our sites. In the last decade, search-wise we have been able to see more clearly what users want. We are able to understand users interests with much more precision. Now, there is a new shift. They are going to “Like” our products page, read and give reviews and Tweet about deals on Twitter. There is an explosion of signals online and we need to understand and drive marketing in this shift that is occurring online.

Nowadays, Users Have A Lot More Control
On Facebook, Twitter, and Yelp, users can express their intent, driving this paradigm in marketing. This is an unprecedented opportunity with the amount of users today:

• Google- 1 billion users
• Facebook- 750 million users
• Twitter- 250 million users

Search and social are seriously influencing each other today. Jim explained that he and his team took a look at 10,000 keywords across many different industries and saw that businesses that are ranking in the top 10 positions have a lot of social signals. Meaning there is a lot of social engagement happening. Search and social are really influencing each other, and we need to understand this to be successful. Channel level and market level are coming together, which is a huge opportunity.

How Can You Achieve SEO and social success
Tip #1: Your social SEO, start measuring the impact of each channel and how they are interacting with each other.

• Do you have a Facebook, Twitter, Google + presence?
• Is useful content being posted regularly to the accounts?
• Are your social media pages ranking in search results?
• Are you doing SEO for your Facebook page?
• Are you measuring the impact of social on search?

Tip #2: Add social media widgets to your website. Example: Levis saw a 40x increase in referral traffic two weeks after adding social widgets to their webpage.

Must-have top five Facebook social widgets:

1. Like button
2. Like box
3. Activity feed
4. Recommendations
5. Login button

Seriously Consider Open Graph
Marking up web pages with open graph titles and images makes it so you can easily drive more engagement. A page has been marked correctly when it has an image, great headline, and optimized meta description tags. Many marketers still are not aware of this, and it is extremely important to enhance visibility. You should familiarize yourself with Twitter Widgets, Profile widget, Search widget, Faves widget and List widget and use them for ultimate success.

Instant Follow Button
If you don’t have that, get it. Embed that directly into your site. You are reducing the number of steps that your audience has to go through to like your page.  People are lazy sometimes; make it as easy as possible for them to engage. These widgets are an easy way to drive more engagement on your site.

Tip #3: Optimize your Facebook page for SEO. But… how do you optimize your social pages for SEO?

1. Link to your Facebook page from your home page
2. Use brand name in wall posts and tweets
3. Push for engagement through likes and shares (signals for SEO)
4. Add plugins (facepile, Fan box)

Tip #4: Go Deeper! Your homepage needs to be linked to your Facebook property. Start to parallel your structure and cross optimize.

Tip #5: Consider Facebook ads. Optimize the feed correctly and there can be a cascade effect in your paid spend. Ads are and easy way to get started in the social side, you need to jump start your fan base somewhere. Also, consider promoted Tweets. Amplify the reach of your tweets with targeting options.

Jim ended his presentation with some really great key takeaways:

1. Don’t be left behind- your industry is already leveraging social media for SEO, so measure SEO and Social together
2. Add social widgets and open graph to maximize social engagement
3. Implement simple best practices to boost your Facebook page rankings in search
4. Go deeper: place share and social plugins on deep website pages, and interlink your directory and social media pages
5. Use Facebook and Twitter ads to jumpstart and amplify
6. Make sure your SEO and Social Media teams are working together.

Great big high-5 to Rob Garner, Andrea Fishman, and Jim Yu for an amazing session brimming with top takeaways and helpful tips. Check back in aimClear blog for more coverage from #SESCHI, and keep up with @meganlichty @ericasendros and @merrymorud for more goodies straight from the show.

Photo credit: chicagoceli

Welcome back to aimClear’s coverage of #PubCon Vegas 2011! After an inspiring opening keynote with Leo Laporte, the morning of Day 1 launched in warp-speed fashion towards the first round of sessions. Salon B of the lux Las Vegas Convention Center housed a special treat for those interested in the crossroads between search and social, an intersection of increasing value and significance to any serious online marketer.

Search engines are some of the granddaddies of the Internet, and social media, once (arguably) perceived as the trendy-edgy-nose-pierced-teen-punk on the block, has blossomed into a sophisticated, powerful, influential and beloved friend. Savvy to the global use (and continued growth) of social media, search engines get that they have to pay mind to social media if they want to continue to be relevant to users. If search engines recognize this, you better, too.

John Ellis,CEO and Owner, Crescent Interactive, and Michael Gray, President, Atlas Web Service joined forces to dish out tip-top tactics, techniques and best practices for making sites more SEO-friendly social media friendly. aimClear live-tweeted this session via @beebow. Read on for the full scoop.

First up – John.

Search Engine’s Have Gotten More Social Over the Years…

• Google introduces iGoogle
• Google introduces Google Friend Connect
• Google introduces Google Wave…
• Google introduces Real Time search (2009)
• Google introduces Buzz (hmm, a Twitter competitor?)
• Bing search engine integrates with Facebook
• Google’s relationship with Twitter ends, google.com/real time redirects to homepage, Google rolls out Google+

John points out that Google is putting all its efforts into Google+. Just last month, Google scaled down other apps in an effort to really focus on Google+. Even if you don’t use Google+, it will come to you by way of some other app you use.

News alert: Google+ business profiles just rolled out yesterday (11/7/11). I foresee continued growth.

Current-ish Market Share, According to Hitwise:

• Google – 66%
• Yahoo – 15.25%
• Bing – 12.99%
• Ask – 3.31%

How do you optimize different areas within social?

• Author highlighting
• Establish social authority in Google
• FB optimization
• Brand saturation
• Google + optimization

Author Highlighting
It’s all about implementing rel=author, so Google can give props / influence / authority to a given author:

• Step 1: From author name on blog post, link to author page of blog. On that link, add rel=”author” to that link.
• Step 2: On author page, create link to your Google+ profile. Tag link with rel=”me”.
• Step 3: On Google profile page, create link to author page of your blog. Be sure to check “This page is about me” box.

Social Authority in Google
Factors to consider:

• Number of replies / comments
• Automation vs. manual…
• Relevancy of messages (how often does your account stay on topic with what you want Google to know you as?)
• Stay on topic, but be social! t

Tips for gaining authority:

• Automate minimally
• Associate with people who will share
• Mix up the sharing. Don’t look predictable. Don’t always RT– mix it up, share someone’s post originally. Don’t overexpose the message.
• Meet IRL! Meet the people you connect with online at networking events.
• Keyword focus – like anything with SEO, remember what your KWs are, what you’re going after, stay KW focused.

Facebook Optimization

• Optimize status updates & page elements with KWs you want to rank for in Google

Brand Saturation

• Dominate the SERPs for your brand terms! Ties back to basic brand reputation management.

Google+ Optimization

• What you publish as a public post will show up in SERPs
• Link to other profiles
• Stay fresh
• Use and optimize every field
• Use your name multiple times
• Content is still king!

Graywolf (Michael Gray) was up next. Appropriately, on the menu: SEO & Social Media. “Conversations and community building have value,” Michael begins, “but you cant pay the rent with them.” (This comment was met with some pushback from SEOmoz’s @jennita .)

Michael went on, “You need to find a balance between those efforts and actions that help SEO strategy with links, social signals, and attention.” He dissed whinny marketers who claim:

“There is no ROI in social media, wahhh!”

If you identify with this complaint, you’re just not being creative [enough] about the way you leverage social media.

Link Building, Content Marketing, & Why They’re Essential
“Link building is probably the biggest thing that will bring you results,” Michael stressed. Regarding social media and link building, your goal is to generate attention for your brand and your website. This converts into links and social signals.

Regarding content marketing, your  goal is to push out good content that solves problems, is entertaining, makes ppl laugh, cry, think, angry…  in short: BE EXCEPTIONAL.

“I love making people angry. When people get angry, they lose control, they don’t think rationally. They write a rant on their blog and link to you. I’ll take that link.” -Michael Gray

BLOGS, & Why They’re Essential

“It’s 2011! I can’t believe people are still asking, ‘Do I need a blog?’ Do you need links? ‘Yeah.’ Then you need a blog.”

Michael points out that a blog is a super easy way to get links, not to mention - blogs are still the best platform to push out this type of content.

Tips for making the most of your blog content:

• Use social buttons on blogs, for Twitter, FB, StumbleUpon, Email This, etc.
• Have short, catchy titles that get the point across (avoid verbose titles). You want your title to reach through the screen, grab you by the shirt, slap you in the face. Sacrifice KWD value for viral attention grabbing quality.
• Folder, subdomain, or separate domain?
  • For building link equity, trust and authority to your site, a subfolder on your main domain works best.
  • If you have security or IT concerns, a subdomain is the second best solution.
  • DO NOT use a different domain UNLESS you have a reputation management issue you need to solve.
• Keep URLs as short as possible. Again, sacrifice KWDs for “viral-ness.”
  • If piece has long-term value to drive traffic, links, etc. – keep content intact, add links to commercial pages of your site.
  • If piece is a “throwaway,” DO NOT 301 to another page – search engines don’t dig it. Revise content to make it commercial.
• Regarding blogs and dates, most blog systems pull date on pages and those dates will appear in SERPs. But keep in mind, people don’t like clicking on blogs with “old” dates.
  • Remove or reformat dates you don’t want Google to show.
  • Update post with new info and change the date.
  • HIGH RISK TACTIC – forge the dates. But remember: “You want your zombies to look as natural as possible.”

Tweet Tips: The Social Push

• Tweets have a lifespan of 3-5 hours
• Tweet for maximum visibility
• RT if yourself for max value
• Stagger your self tweets
• Stagger your friends’ RTs

One retweet from a real trusted account is more valuable than 1,000 retweets from zombie drone accounts.

What We Can Learn From Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga’s lifestyle is all about gaining attention for unique or bizarre behavior. Her mentality: “If I wear slabs of meat, the media will talk about it, everyone will talk about it!” And guess what, we did. But if she only did it once, we’d forget about her quickly.

Social media attention is brand building – you are competing for attention and mind-share. You need to repeat the attention-grabbing on a regular basis without getting boring or repetitive.

Would you know “Will It Blend” Blenctec guy if he only ever blended one thing? Nope.

Key Takeaway: With Social media, your goal is not to make sales! It is to:

• capture attention
• build brand awareness
• build links
• build social signals
• inspire people to start searching for YOUR BRAND KWS, sending those signals to search engines

Last Minute Gems From the Q&A:

• “If you buy a gray evening gown and want to show it off, you have to go out to a club. You can’t stay home and watch What Not To Wear. Trust me. I know.” -Michael
• “You’re never gonna make a shot you don’t take.” -Michael
• If you have a brand new blog, brand new company, what’s a good strategy for getting links? Come up with editorial calendar, schedule for when you will push out fresh content, look for seasonal or timely things you can leverage. -Michael & John
• There is no magic number for how often you should blog. You should blog in the interval that you’re able to be good. Putting out 30 blogs each month that suck are not as good as one post per month that is super deep and rocks the universe. -Michael
• “Something that’s exceptional is always going to give you more value than something that’s not.” -Michael
• Use FB to drive the traffic away from FB and to your homepage. -Michael
• Google+’s impact on the SERPs will definitely happen… eventually. (While not many of us in the audience are on Google+, next year – we might be.) -John
• Your audiences across social channels differ a bit – consider pushing out different content for each, or at least tailoring the content differently for each community. -Michael

Big thanks to John and Michael for a primo sesh! Tune into the #PubCon hashtag for more live-coverage comin’ atcha from Vegas!

Photo credit: ykanazawa1999

Welcome back to aimClear’s coverage of #SMX Advanced!

As well it should be! The term was only recently coined by Kleiner Perkins internet visionary, Mary Meeker. She’s already begun referring to the next five years as the era of “SoLoMo,” or Social, Mobile, and Local for you n00bz out there (present company included…), and she’s not alone. This powerful intersection represents a serious market revolution to some, a natural evolution of the industry to others. Regardless of the perceived degree of influence, it is noteworthy statistic that for the first time ever, smartphones and tablets are outselling personal computers, emphasizing the fact that people want to be online now, instantly, without lugging themselves over to the other side of the room to boot up the ole’ family PC.

A stacked panel consisting of Kelly Gillease, VP Marketing, Viator, Jennifer Grappone, Partner, Gravity Search Marketing, Daniel Lemin, Founder & Principal, Social Studio, Mac Ling, Director, Mobile, iCrossing, and Nicola Smith, VP, Business Development, Performics, not to mention moderators Greg Sterling, Founding Principal, Sterling Market Intelligence and Michael Martin, Senior SEO Strategist, Covario, Inc. were ready to examine this behemoth trend as well as the opportunities and impact it carries for marketers.  Read on for an in-depth look.

Nicola, up first, began by discussing the evolution of purchases from purely transactional to transactional and greatly conversational:

Purchases Have Become Conversations | Statistics

• 42% of 18-34 year olds connect or enjoy sharing their purchases via social media
• Services are popping up, like Blippy & Swipely, that sync up bank accounts with social profiles, and allow users to share records of their purchases online
• 400% increase in the number of searches via mobile in the last year
• 74% of people use their mobile phones to search while running errands
• 63% of people use mobile search before purchasing offline
• 59% of people use content to share content with a family member or friend while shopping

Local, mobile, and social as a combined entity offer a really amazing benefit to brands: hyper-targeting of your potential customers, i.e.: you can reach the right person, in the right place, at the right time. This is different from any other medium we‘ve ever used. An additional benefit of using SoMoLo – it’s changing the face of marketing metrics and brand currency.

Traditionally, marketers have paid mind to awareness- offline media and attention; with the advent of social media, we started looking at participation and engagement – the number of tweets, blogs, comments, etc. Now we’re looking at proximity, and ways to track it. Being able to track and measure loyalty is the holy grail for marketers.

How can you start to build loyalty around a brand using SoLoMo?

1) Expand the Check-In! Consider the variety of check-in services:

• Location based check-ins, such as Foursquare and Gowalla
• Content focused check-ins, such as Miso and Filo (you can “check in” to a song… whoa)
• Brand / Product Conversation, such as “Chicken” (a German-based service), allows users to check into a conversation about a brand or product

Takeaway: The check-in phenomenon is evolving and expanding well beyond location-specific check-ins.

2) Combat Fragmentation. There are tons upon tons of social channels out there. Consider leveraging Local Response, which aggregates check-ins across services and allows the brand to respond via Twitter.

3) Simplify the Process. Sometimes, even logging into a service to manually check-in is too time-consuming. Consider leveraging ShopKick, a service that offers a reader which registers when users enter a store – when you know a person is physically in their store, grant them points (Kick Bucks) at the register. Kick Bucks can be redeemed for discounts, or even transferred for Facebook credits. Whoa. Different forms of digital currency transferred across digital platforms.

4) Instigate Repeat Purchases. Groupon is hot, right? Sure, but their model is geared towards getting people in the store for one purchase. After that, they’re rarely seen again. Level Up, brought to you by the same folks who developed Scavenger, is like Groupon on steroids.

• Level 1 – Same deal as Groupon, pay $10 for $20 worth of goods. But with Level Up, as soon as you achieve level 1, you… level up… to…
• Level 2 – $10 for $30 worth of goods. Then, level up… to…
• Level 3 – $10 for $40 worth of goods. Neat!

The value in a model like this is you get someone in your store multiple times –hopefully by the third time, they’re a brand advocate, i.e.: repeat customer. Another perk – you don’t pay for level 1, so if people don’t level up, i.e. don’t show signs of becoming a repeat customers, it’s no harm on your wallet.

5) Make it Fun! Location is about more than just place. Consider this case study: eBay teamed up with Shazam, and now, every time a user searches Shazam for a song, for example, eBay will make product suggestions that align with that song, artist, mood, etc. They call is Inspiration Shopping.

Takeaways:

• Loyalty + Proximity = Currency. The value of currency is currently undefined.
• Purchases have become conversations
• Think beyond the location based check-in
• Combat fragmentation – helps in regards to investment dollars
• Simplify the process; the easier you can make it for a user, the more likely they are to engage
• Instigate repeat purchases
• Make it fun!
• Explore content other than offers and deals!

Next up was Kelly, set to tackle the paid side of social media & mobile marketing .

A Look At Facebook

• Targeted paid ads, not just for external sites, but to grow fans on Facebook.
• Amazing targeting: interests, affinities, demographics, associations and more.

BUT…

• On the social side, growing fans and likes via paid marketing is a massive, largely untapped opportunity.
• “Like” building is a contact list for email, building fans on FB grows an audience for important launches, offers, messages, etc.

Social necessitates a shift in content delivery behavior – companies need to provide content where their audience wants to be; don’t rely on them to visit your site.

• Ads for external sites have mixed results, but ads to grow fans, or sponsored story ads involving fans, are largely positive.

• • Sponsored Stories – an ad endorsed by a friend. Pick a page like or a page post or a post like to promote, will target friends of connections
  • Page Like – when people like your page, their friends see a story about it
  • Page Post – when you post an update on your page, your fans sees a story about it
  • Page Post Like – when people like your page post their friends see a story
  • Great for contests, sales, but also growing fans
• Facebook sweepstakes with Wildfire
  • For example, an iPad 2 giveaway – you can grow fan base (“Like us to win!).
  • Several advertisers have tripled fans with a sweepstakes such as this

A Look At Twitter

• Promoted accounts & promoted tweets
  • Promoted Accounts – paid placements to promote a twitter account with the goal of gaining followers
  • Promoted Tweets- select a tweet to promote to drive engagement, retweets, followers
  • Promoted Trends – promote a trending topic. When clicked, shows a promoted tweet from advertiser. Very expensive.
• Don’t forget the opportunity to include a video.
  • This is something Kelly doesn’t see too often, but it’s really great. In the new Twitter UI, you can view the video in-screen, don’t hve to navigate away to YouTube, etc.

How to Value a Follower or a Fan?

• Track direct revenue from FB & Twitter for both paid and unpaid placements
• Track paid placements with campaign codes, then subtract from overall Facebook or Twitter as referral source for unpaid
• Track followers and fan totals – then, calculate per follower and fan values based on total sales and total followers or fans
• Example: Twitter follower value / Total twitter revenue / # of Twitter followers
• Very basic, but valuations are higher than you might suspect
• Can skew with campaigns to quickly scale fans or followers (like a wildfire contest)
• Valuation aids in allocating appropriate spend for paid media in these channels
• Click to call ads – if you’re not participating in mobile search, you should be!

Paid Ads for Mobile Apps

• Support mobile app launched with paid campaigns on mobile networks
• iAd – Apple only, mainly iPhone, iPad in beta
• AdMob
• JumpTap
• m.youtube Takeover – must schedule far in advance

Facebook and Twitter Takeaway: A coordinated effort with unpaid channels is key for success to achieve higher rankings at initial launch, coordinate email, PR and site side promotion.

Next up was Daniel Lemin, who introduced his 3 SoLoMo concepts:

• Point of engagement – brand awareness, affinity
• Point of sales – local and mobile
• Convergent metrics

The SoLoMo Purchase / Conversion funnel:

• Awareness / familiarity / opinion = social
• Consideration / one make model intention = mobile
• Shopping / purchase = local

Point of Engagement

• The dinner party analogy
• WOM rules the air
• People are just casually talking about products, not driving sales
• Infiltrate these conversations by way of social technologies, get in there, might help lead people into a more serious look at your product leveraging mobile and local
• Driving awareness, testimonials, recommendations, interactions

Local and mobile have a beautiful link to POE!

• Direct line to purchase
• Drive loyalty, incremental sales
• Improve margins

Consider this M&Ms case study. M&Ms hosted a Find Red campaign in Canada. The objective was to help the M&Ms find the Red M&M, who was lost somewhere in cyberspace. This campaign leveraged a trifecta of SoLoMo technologies, mostly offline.  Interesting. Leveraged Google Maps API, QR codes, and other offline technologies that helped give users clues to where Red was. KPI was engagement, not purchases.

Point of Sales
Many companies struggle with social and struggle to understand why they’re putting money into it. This grey area can become black & white when you leverage SoLoMo, and help create a direct line to purchase.

What are some metrics to consider?

• Business metrics – margin, COGS, acquisition cost, lifetime value
• Convergent analytics – engagement rate, sentiment, conversion funnel analysis, events / conversions
• Platform metrics – Twitter influence, page views, check-ins, interactions
• By its nature, SoLoMo is convergent. Therefore, so must the analytics.

What are some advocacy metrics?

• Loyal customers spend more
• Better connections with core customers
• SEO implications
• Intangibles, press and awards

Jennifer was up next. She spent a fair amount of time on a Justin Beiber case study, which I morally could not capture. So. Onto the case study about ice cream.

Coolhaus started very small, one ice cream truck, one city. Cool factor they had/have going from them, no pun intended, was they offered/offer a fantastic product… ice cream. Yum! Also, they were/are rocking a pretty righteous SoLoMo marketing effort.

SEO sidenotes: The Coolhaus site isn’t/wasn’t very usable, not well optimized in a traditional sense. But that’s okay, because the life of the brand’s marketing activities take place in social channels, not on their site.

Photo Share = Success

Jennifer shares an example of one customer sharing a photo of his/her yummy ice cream experience. You’d think Coolhaus would spend a lot of money encouraging people to continue to share photos – but mostly, people just do it on their own. Coolhaus is of limited resources, so they decide to spend their funds trying to get things to happen that might not happen automatically, such as customer loyalty, getting on front of new customers, etc.

Typical day in the life of Coolhaus

• Share location information
• Share coupon codes
• Localized strategies

Geotargeted Flattery
Coolhaus doesn’t have swagger everywhere. So they turn to the people who do. A few days before they pull up in a city, they do research of who’s there, and reach out to the social influencer in the local area. “Hey, @LocalInfluencer, your name is our coupon code for today! Please spread the word!” (Author’s note: Incredibly smart. Vanity baiting IRL.)

Co-Marketing with Competitors
Coolhaus doesn’t have a problem with tweeting at @BigGayIceCream. Lesson: don’t be afraid to tweet with your direct competitors to build a sense of commodity

Takeaways:

• SoLoMo is not magic
• Make it easy to share
• Cross-sell with your competitors
• Open your mind to breaking SEO rules
• Know your audience

Next up, Mac Ling. Topic of discussion: SoLoMo Business – Today and Tomorrow. So… we know there is an intersection between social, mobile & local… now, what do we do with it?

The Spectrum of Online Communication
From group messaging to Twitter to invite-only discussions to photo sharing and location sharing—the technology of online communication is nothing new. For the younger generation, though, privacy has become a ticket to the experience. If you walk into Facebook, your willingness to share info about yourself is the ticket into the doorway of this community. As you give more information about yourself, you’re able to participate more in these communities. This is where the shift is.

What we’re doing now is creating groups that have social aspects to them. Smartphones are the cornerstones of what make this possible. It’s a freakin’ PC in your pocket. Longevity and engagement provide deeper insight into customers and these groups.  Parse info from the streams, connect the dots between what you’re trying to sell and what someone else is in need of.

This connection is the Holy Grail (apparently another one) we all search for – we all have more information than ever before to be able to make that connection happen

However – relevance has a shelf-life, so we have to be nimble enough to communicate to consumers in the decision stage of the purchase funnel.

What do we have?

• Group with shared interests
• Location info
• Contextual info
• Immediacy of fulfilling a need
• AKA: A qualified lead!

How do we use this?

• Provide targeting offer to pod
• Future group buying deals
• Merchants can bid for this groups patronage

Is this the SoLoMo revolution?
Not as much of a revolution as an evolution of the tools. We’re now starting to see, as with the Internet we have a new medium, a new way of talking to customers. We’re using the same fundamental marketing concepts with new tools to achieve similar goals. It’s simply the next iteration of the marketer’s toolbox.

Top Takeaways from the Panelists:

• Mac just spoke, so he passed.
• “Have a mobile website. Make sure it’s optimized.”  - Kelly
• “Know who your audience is, what they’re using, what they like.”  -Jennifer
• “Experiment – this is a constantly evolving space, if you’re not prepared to take a little bit of a chance, you’ll be behind the curve. Always.” –Nicole
• “Don’t look at SoLoMo as a massive thing – just try it. There’s very little incremental cost with tools, if it doesn’t work, at least you know.” – Daniel

That wraps up the SoLoMo session, which, all the while, I’ve wanted to call “Slow-Mo.” But that’s probably because my brains have practically turned to mush. Yes, this truly is an… advanced conference. More coverage coming at you right here in aimClear blog & via my tired fingers @beebow. Until then, cheers!

photo credit: ianwedlock

Well friends, it’s that time of year again.

SMX Advanced means two days jam-packed with top-shelf sessions, but even when the main event wraps up, we’ll rest easy knowing there’s still a ton of awesomesauce in store. aimClear’s Facebook Marketing Intensive Workshop is back on the SMX landscape, and we’re looking forward to hosting marketers for a full day of soup to nuts training in all-things Facebook. From organic optimization hacks to paid Facebook advertising, and harnessing Facebook’s massive online community to achieve KPIs, it’s an all-you-can-eat brain chow buffet. Read on for a closer look at what we’ll be serving up…

With a pulsing user base 700 million strong, Facebook represents a seriously fertile playground for cutting-edge marketers ready to get in touch with their social sides. Unparalleled targeting capabilities and reasonably cheap CPCs fuse together, making this social network an exciting Wild West of marketing and branding opportunities. Our panel of accomplished international Facebook marketers are ready, willing and eager to share hot tips, tactics and best practices for superior Facebook Marketing.

Before we look at our schedule, let’s meet the cast of characters:

Now… onto the agenda.

Demographic Research & Guerrilla Targeting Tactics
Get waist-deep in Facebook’s Ad Tool and discover myriad persona segments for every marketing campaign under the sun. Marty will make sure attendees walk away from this module with a keener understanding of who they’re serving ads to, factoring in careful combinations of music preferences, favorite brands, political views, perversions, afflictions, professions, interests as well as other predictions and affinities. We’ve assembled a sweet pot of bite-sized segments to share while we explore social synonyms that open dozens of new targeting doors. Are you ready to step outside of your targeting comfort zone? Better be.

Establishing Facebook Marketing KPIs
Marketing 101: You can’t achieve goals unless you establish them. Marty will teach how to establish realistic Facebook KPIs (key performance indicators) that encompass external channels such as PR, YouTube, Twitter, search engines, blogs, and more.

“Buying Friends” and Organic FB Analytics
From Search Influence, Will Scott (@W2Scott) will share intensely awesome tactics to target customers and identify authority users, cull deep competitive intelligence on truly engaged friends and use all the info to your benefit. It’s time to learn how to capitalize on this insight for organic friending and aggressive Facebook Ad targeting.

End-to-End Facebook Ads
This is truly end-to-end… aimClear’s Merry Morud (@MerryMorud) will soar through creating ad accounts, tips for compelling ad creative and images, setting budgets, and of course,  hardcore tactics for optimizing ads to help ensure prolonged success.

A Day in the Life of a Community Manager
This mammoth 6-part session will provide anyone in charge of community management with invaluable insight. In fact, this module  is so gigantic, it warrents a bulleted list.

• aimClear’s Lauren Litwinka (me…) will kick things off with content aggregation tools and tactics.
  
• Marty will reappear to share some insanely effective holistic befriending tactics along with Lisa Buyer (@lisabuyer) of the Buyer Group.
• Lisa will also detail a community manager’s typical work day, geo-targeting technology and Facebook Places, the PR side of Facebook pages, as well as branding with Facebook.

• Lauren (… me again) will finish things up with a tour through holistic cross-promotion (integrating Twitter with Facebook), and managing social media crises.

Facebook SEO and Organic Visibility Hacks
Black-box by nature, it seems, Facebook’s ranking algorithm remains a hot topic for many. We’ve got secret-sauce tips for increasing organic visibility in FB search, and we’re ready to share. aimClear’s Matt Peterson (@Matt_Peterson) will offer up a bevy of Fan and Interest Pages, Groups, Events and Apps and learn why they rank so well for topical keywords or… don’t.

Reputation Monitoring in Facebook
Matt will also deliver a crash course in the latest and greatest techniques and tools for keeping track of Facebook buzz, and keep your reputation intact.

Site Clinics
Three site clinics will be interspersed throughout the day for attendees interested in participating. It’ll be lightning round 6 minute sexy social audits for those brave enough to enter the gauntlet. Community Management, Paid Ads, and SEO and Organic Visibility are the options on the table -and we’re ready to dish up recommendations and general feedback.

Sound like your cuppa tea? There’s still room to join the fun! Register today for your ticket to ensure a seat in Mama’s kitchen (you know… the workshop). Already signed up? See you in Seattle . Travel safe, y’all!

Is your business listening and responding appropriately to those who reach out? Last February our post, 6 Superb First Social Media Tactics For Business caught some buzz and conversation. We discussed the importance of listening and offering unconditional service to new friends and customers, when they obviously seek to engage

The more I travel the world, broadcasting experiences as I go, the more this basic tenant resonates. I’m always surprised by who’s listening and who’s not.  In the last 36 hours, I’ve had revealing experiences with two iconic Minnesota brands, Mall Of America and Mayo Clinic, that illustrate this crucial social media fundamental splendidly. One brand got things really right, the other was not listening. No matter whether your customer’s channel of choice is Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or a lesser known community or forum, answering the call of users who want to engage is key.

This version of the ah-hah moment started innocently enough. Visiting the Mall of America, I tweeted a picture of the 2 story Lego robot on my way to find some pistachio ice cream.

After a few minutes, I was happily surprised that a MOA community manager reached out in thanks and offered more information about the Lego sculpture. Cool!

My first reaction was professional. I wanted to understand the social media monitoring and community manager corporate structure that led to such a terrific and welcoming response.  When customers reach out in mainstream channels expressing a willingness to engage, businesses must be there to listen and respond or an opportunity is lost.

I love way the Mall Of America Twitter profile is wired. The avatar is a picture of the MOA building and the handle is transparently @mallofamerica. The community manager goes by the initials -lg. There’s no way to determine whether it’s a woman or a man. Because I’m me, I read female into to conversation. Wonderful! Great business avatar concepts are fully transparent in their commercial intent but, like a great song, leave users enough space to build their own human inferences into empowering experiences. Maybe during the week the CM is -MW or -EF, it does not matter. I love it…great concept. MOA community managers are interchangeable and human-feeling, without compromising transparency. 

Then it hit me: This CM person, was ready to support.  At the time -lg engaged me, I was unsuccessfully looking for pistachio ice cream.  Hmmm

I reached out.  I was curious as to whether -lg would be politically correct and suggest several MOA ice cream shop options, or give me a true read on what ice cream is best in her/his opinion.

He/she did not disappoint. Looking around I saw that I was right in the vicinity. My mouth was watering. Paciugo was straight ahead, walking out the mall door of Macy’s.

I headed on over.

There it was, blessed, creamy, tasty ahead. MMM, pistachio almond gelato in all its twitlicious splendor.  I tweeted that I thought a blog post would come out of this, andsome darn good frozen treats.

It was a little taste of heaven in the mall. Of course, I tweeted a picture.  The CM engaged again. That was smart. When customers engage, keep the conversation going as long as they want to continue so long as the timbre is appropriate and sentiment positive. After all, the customer is advertising your business for free.

When Brands Don’t Listen
Then this morning I was at Mayo Clinic for my annual checkup.  I was taken by the magnificent architecture of the famed Gonda Building, and tweeted a picture in the early morning light.  I love Mayo, as 5 years ago they saved my life. However, every time I return to Mayo, moved, broadcasting, the incredible art collection, thoughts about their blessed mission, Mayo’s brand, heartfelt, they ignore.

Maybe some attorney told Mayo that the HIPAA Privacy Rule, which provides federal protections for personal health information, somehow applies to answering a guy like me broadcasting grateful pictures of the hospital.  That sounds like bunk to attorneys I’ve talked to. There’s no private information here being transmitted here. What are they thinking, that they can’t reveal I’m here? Dude, I tweeted first! How difficult would it be for @mayoclinic to simply welcome tweeting visitors to the campus and wish them the best? #FAIL.  That’s no way to make friends.

Brands that don’t listen come across as deaf. Broadcast-only is not social media. Social media is about being social, two ways.

Maybe now that Mayo is opening an outpost at Mall of America, they’ll get into the swing of things. Are they going to ignore social media users broadcasting about the new Mayo mega mall satellite?

It’s always surprising who’s listening and who’s not.  Social media best practices certainly means to monitor mainstream and salient niche’ channels and being there to respond, as appropriate. Those are the basics we all learn in kindergarten. Here’s sending out a hat tip to @mallof america and a sad, was-almost-nice-talking-to-ya’ to Mayo Clinic.

Is your business listening?

Welcome, fellow community managers, to the first installment of aimClear’s tips for lowering blood pressure, keeping cool, and effectively engaging irate customers in cyberspace, also know as part one of The Community Manager’s Guide To Intra-Community Bloodshed.

We unveiled this series last week with a sympathetic yet motivating  20,000 foot glimpse at the utter crud conflicts some of us as community managers have to deal with… trolls, haters, spammers; negative reviews on products and service; comment threads rife with false accusations; spiteful backlash from sharing benign stories; community member pitted against community member pitted against brand for reasons not even Dr. Phil could comprehend. Crises galore. But hold on a tick… are these in fact crises?

The short answer is: No. Not really. While the examples before the jump were somewhat vague, their unifying theme and cause was most likely anger (or baseless stupidity), sparked by disappointment in a brand experience. The cause was not chaos. Negative reviews left on a brand’s Facebook Page, tweets from @SocialSally blasting Company X for botching a shipping order, Joe & Jim arguing in a comment thread for all the world wide web to see—these things suck and must be addressed, but they are not social media crises. So then… what is?

What Is A Social Media Crisis?
Earlier this year, Brass Tack thinking posted a tight post that explored 3 Identifying Elements of a Social Media Crisis. By dissecting the literal definition of a “crisis” according to our friends at Merriam-Webster, co-authors Amber Naslund & Jay Baer boiled down the true indicators of an “OMG Call The Authorities!” social media moment. To surmise, social media-fueled crises are unstable, involve decisive change, and yield a highly undesirable outcome. In other words…

Social media-fueled crises can be characterized by:

• Instability & Uncertainty
• New Issues Inciting Change in Opinion of the Masses
• Potential to Affect a Large Portion of Target Audience

Let’s dig into each of these a bit deeper, along with sample scenarios. We’ll use these identifying elements to help recognize sticky social media conflicts vs. serious social media crises.

Instability & Uncertainty
As the social spokesperson for a brand, it’s the responsibility of a community manager to be informed and up-to-speed on, well, pretty much everything brand-related, at all times. Especially when sh– snot’s going down. When an issue pops up & explodes on the social media scene, you have to be prepared to react. And guess what? If you are, relax. That generally means it ain’t a crisis.

“If you know all the facts and can respond to each person coherently and assuredly,” Amber & Jay wrote, “it’s not a crisis. If you’re in the middle of the ‘fog of social media’ and you don’t really know much more than the critics, it’s definitely a crisis situation.”

Sample Scenario: Snack Food Company X unknowingly distributes a shipment of snacks that contained a tainted ingredient, and five consumers get food poisoning. The net gets wind– news stories, blog posts, YouTube video rants, angry tweets, and Facebook Wall posts amass in droves all while Snack Food Company X is just getting first reports of the events. Crisis or Conflict?

Crisis. Even if this mishap did not cause physical harm, when brand conversations about an event not yet fully understood permeate at a rate faster than the company is able manage, it’s red-level crisis. Thick in the “fog of social media,” Snack Food Company X is under the gun to get the facts, craft brand messages, address the masses, dispel inaccuracies, convey the truth, and undertake serious damage control, all in a hail of social media arrows that fly 24/7.

New Issues Inciting Change in Opinion of the Masses
It’s not always fun to dig up the past, particularly when the past is messy. Less fun is when the past is dug up for you. Thanks to the tremendous power of the Internet, doing so is fairly easy, and social media makes re-spreading the message simple, fast, and capable of viral dissemination. Resurgence of an unfortunate company incident, or reiterations of a negative perspective of a brand, can be bummers and buzz-kills. But do they suggest a crisis?

Not necessarily. Brand-bashing sucks, but if the mentality is nothing new, and mass opinion is more or less “unchanged” (one way or the other), the situation can be managable. Recommendations: thick skins and supportive PR as needed to dilute negativity. Conversely, Jay & Amber note that a “crisis is under way when a new issue emerges and the conversations around that issue spike far above the baseline level.” In other words, if more and more voices join a fresh argument or complaint against a brand, it suggests a crisis on the horizon.

Sample Scenario: Taco Bell. It’s fast food, people. It’s not gourmet. The argument surrounding this tex-mex chain’s questionable meat is nothing new. That said, it’s still alive and kicking. (The argument, not the meat…) Negative tweets, blog posts and Facebook statuses attack the percentage of real meat in Taco Bell’s concoctions on a daily, even hourly basis. That’s a lot of bad press. Is it a crisis, or a conflict?

Conflict. More of an obstacle than a conflict. But not a crisis. (Unless the world up and decideds to kick Taco Bell to the curb for want of better beef.) Taco Bell is one of a few household names in the fast food biz. It’s only natural that brand conversations, whether positive, negative or indifferent, pour in with moderate frequency. So long as that frequency remains at baseline, it’s manageable, predictable, and not lethal.

Potential to Affect a Large Portion of Target Audience
“Someone not getting the scone they paid for in drive-thru isn’t a crisis,” Jay & Amber wrote. Perhaps a “personal crisis” for the melodramatic scone-scarfer, but if that customer rants about a poor brand experience on Facebook, it’s not a crisis for the community manager on the other end. The magnitude of those affected by a given event is a dependable metric by which to distinguish a crisis from a conflict. Is the majority, or an increasingly large portion of your online community and target audience up in arms over what’s going on? Assess this as you prepare to move forward.

Bear in mind that intra-community uprisings aren’t always caused by a bunch of people feeling wronged. One person with one uniquely terrible brand experience can garner a sympathetic mob. On that note, more useful questions to ask include: “Does this single story have the potential to go viral? Could the virility cause lasting brand damage?” If the answers are yes, a crisis could unfold.

Sample Scenario: Hotel Chain Z has over a 50 hotels along the East coast. A customer had a poor experience with one hotel in particular, and ranted incessantly on Twitter. The customer happens to have decent sway in social media. Despite reaching out to resolve the issue, customer continues to tweet negative sentiments about Hotel Chain Z. Crisis? Conflict?

Conflict, with potential. Depending on how bad the experience was (did a deranged hotel employee try to kill him, or was his bed sorta lumpy?), a situation like this has the potential to evolve into something more serious if not dealt with swiftly and successfully. Otherwise, it’s conflict. Issues that occur on a local-scale are manageable in a way that “crises” are not.

So, brave community manager… as you march onward into cyberspace, consider these questions when the social snot hits the fan:

1. Do I know more than the community?
2. Am I capable of responding to the nature of the complaints?
3. Is this a resurgence of old news?
4. Are new, expanding groups of people upset?
5. Has there been a major shift in brand opinion?
6. Is this happening on a local or global scale?
7. Does the conflict have the potential to go viral?

Some Final Words of Advice…
Relax! Keep cool. Most of the time, what you’ll be dealing with won’t be a true social media “crisis.” Quickly assess whether it is or not. If not, toss that creepy term out the window. It will only cause added stress and anxiety as you try to do your job, which is to mediate, curate, participate and monitor any and all conversations surrounding your brand. In good times, and bad.

—

Bonus Scenarios of Encouragement: Misfiring Tweets from Brand Accounts
@RedCross. @ChryslerAutos. Both brands victim to salty tweets accidentally fired under brand accounts. Crises? Conflicts? I’m leaning towards the latter. Horribly humiliating, of course. Possibility of brand damage. But no one died. The world didn’t implode. And as we’ve seen, one brand’s PR nightmare is another brand’s clever marketing bonanza.

Takeaways? Be calm but swift. If you misfire a tweet (my worst nightmare, one that’s come true once… or twice…), delete it, then promptly create and deliver a response to the situation. The Red Cross crafted a memorable tweet that balanced apology with humor, yielding tons of positive publicity, not to mention donations. We can’t all expect such an amazing outcome for our own social media slip-ups, but if this examples shows nothing else, it’s that a cool Dogfish head can go a long way.

See you next week for aimClear’s next installment of The Community Manager’s Guide To Intra-Community Bloodshed, when we tackle Establishing Code of Conduct & Crisis Protocol.