What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks?

Categories: Social NetworkingPosted on February 19th, 2008

Many brands are considering it, some have done it. Done what? Marketed on social networks (Facebook, Myspace, or private label social networks).

Why? Social Networks are attractive because consumers are connecting with other consumers and the trust tends to be higher. Secondly, there’s a tremendous amount of buzz from the media for this newest form of marketing. Lastly, there’s lots of folks using social networks (about 2/3rds of all North American youth use it daily, and about 1/3rd of NA adults use it as least once a month –data From Forrester Research, Q4, 2007)

[What "Makes or Breaks" a social networking campaign? Is there an attribute(s) that makes social networking marketing campaigns a success?]

Sadly, many brand are going to do it wrong, by wasting resources, or embarrassing their brand with a campaign that doesn’t fit the needs of a community. To help marketers do it right, and to save users from dealing with more bad campaigns, I’m going to do some research on the topic.

I’m a laaaazy (or is it efficient?) analyst, I use social media (what I cover) to help me with my research. Besides, the social collective is far smarter than some big headed analyst.

The following attributes are what I think are often found in successful social networking campaigns, but don’t let me be the judge, I want your input.

Marketing Campaigns on Social Networks share the following attributes:

Meets a business objective: First and foremost, any marketing campaign or activity should match with a business objective, regardless of the tools being used.

Supports Community Goals: Every community is different, and each has unique goals (from supporting products, to each other, or to just be entertained) the campaign focus should therefore meet the needs of the community, before the needs of the marketer. Effective campaigns will first understand the core drivers, interests, and rituals of the community and learn how to meet those desires. (Expanded by Laurel Papworth)

Encourage Member Interaction: The most successful social networking campaigns and efforts involve the audience.

Quickly scale: Social networks are designed for information to quickly move from member to member, so campaigns that lean on these capabilities perform the best. These attributes known as Velocity, Viralness, and Spread are key.

Utilize Media: In some campaigns, the best way to get members to return is to offer them media. Depending on demographics and community needs, this could be audio, videos, or demos

Foster self-expression or communication: Members in social networks like to communicate with each other, or self-express. As a result, campaigns should satisfy these needs with the appropriate tools

Offer a satisfying User Experience: This encompasses the overall experience of the campaign, the content and navigation items should be where expected, the language familiar to the audience, and overall look and feel of the site appeasing.

Provide longer term utility: Successful campaigns have a longer term value, rather than a short term ‘disposble campaign”. These campaigns add value by being a useful application to the members, rather than just quick dose of entertainment.

Enhance Value as Community participants: As more people contribute or interact with the campaign, the value is increased. This can be in the form of content that is created by the community, contests, voting, or games.

Integration with other marketing activities: Successful marketing campaigns aren’t single channel, in fact they utilizie multiple channels and mediums to enhance the overall activity. The same thing applies to marketing campaigns on social networks, those that are promoted from other locations such as (corporate websites, email newsletter, blogs, podcasts) outside fo the social network have a great chance for success.

Maintain agility during the campaign: Social networks are living, breathing organisms made up of real people connecting with each other. Marketing campaigns also should share these attributes and show be flexible to change in-flight, yield to legitimate requests or complaints of the community. Those campaigns that reflect the same dynamic behavior as human interaction have a higher chance to be interacted –and accepted –by the community. (Submitted by Graham)

Company Participation: In some cases, companies that participate in the discussions or conversations will yield to a more successful marketing campaign. Activities can range from recognition, company interaction, or attention to members perhaps from a community manager (Submitted by Whitney McNamara, Esther Lim, Crimson Consulting, Warren Sukernek)

You add your attribute: Please leave a comment below, I welcome and respect your opinion. If you’re from a vendor in this space, feel free to leave your company name or email so I can properly credit you.

If you contribute something that I end up using the report, I’ll cite you in the research report as a source (and you’ll get a copy), so leave your name and company in the comments, besides this is a great way to demonstrate you ability –with real practical knowledge. In a recent report I referenced Shel Israel on my recent report on online communities, who helped me sort out a definition of online communities)

Update Feb 21st: I’ve thoroughly read the many responses in here, wow this who social media/crowd sourcing thing actually works! I’ve credited those that have added new attributes that I didn’t have, or those who have added additional thoughts to my attributes. For those that made it by providing something I didn’t already have, they’ll get a copy of the report (as a thank you) and I appreciate everyone’s dialog into this topic. I find that crowdsourcing is great for finding the initial ideas (or those that have them) but the real work begins as I head into the research phase and take a deep dive into each of these attributes.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 19th, 2008 at 3:25 pm and is filed under Social Networking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Mr. Owyang, I would have gauged the success of Thrifty.com (for instance) on a couple of measurable factors: Trial of the site; Consummation of a rental; Enrolling in the frequent renter program; and, most importantly, repeat business. Each of those have a very definite and measurable value.

In my next venture the metrics will be no different. If a particular online “social” doesn’t pull sufficiently… I’ll move the effort to other richer fields. Sure, I’d love to be earning positive word of mouth. I won’t be on the social graph for any other reason than to get trial and earn repeat business (all measurable).

Transactional players will be looking for the ROI.

Who knows what the branding players will be measuring, if anything. Such will not be my concern.

Posted by Gerald Buckley on February 19th, 2008 at 4:06 pm

Mr Buckeley

Thanks! You can call me Jeremiah however. Are those metrics of success or the actual attributes that would make success?

I’m not as concerned about ROI as I am finding out “What makes or brakes a social networking campaign”

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 19th, 2008 at 4:13 pm

To paraphrase some content you recently pointed to on Twitter, a successful social networking campaign will result in added value to the user’s offline life.

Posted by Beth Dunn on February 19th, 2008 at 4:21 pm

Gerald begins to hit it. Measurement and accountability on any marketing campaign are essential and especially when you put it in a social environment. We tend to track back to either increasing revenue or decreasing costs. Otherwise why do it (kind of :-))

Another important key to success is social does NOT always equal the web. In marketing, you need to interact when, where and how your target audience wants to participate. this leads us to Mobile as not many people carry around their laptops everywhere, but everyone always leaves the house with their wallet, keys and yes their phone. We did a campaign for adidas that resulted in a 20x increase in any other one day store sales in history. http://www.neighborhoodamerica.com/video.asp?videostart=2 Now that’s ROI!

Posted by JasonBreed on February 19th, 2008 at 4:22 pm

JasonBreed

Ok, I’ll give you that, measurement is needed, but does every successful campaign have measurement?

(I buy it, but I’m trying to find limitations)

Checking out your video now…it loads slowly.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 19th, 2008 at 4:26 pm

Ref: “To be specific, I’m trying to find out what ‘makes or breaks’ a social networking campaign. is there something that works every time?”

Come on, now — is there something that works every time for *any* campaign, anywhere?

The biggest issue I see right now is that company-directed marketing (as distinct from “pure” brand love) is seen as being at odds with what people want out of social networking tools.

A traditional brand campaign is focused on pushing a particular message; while the message is likely not explicitly stated in any given instance of the campaign, the goal is still to move the perception of a brand towards a specific company-defined image.

In the context of social networking this means limiting expression: “you can forward this specific creative to your friends,” or “you can ‘friend’ our shiny new presence on this SN platform.”

Because this (at best) usually leads to users being forced to speak with a voice that isn’t their own in a forum that knows and respects their actual voice, Bad Things occur much of the time.

I find myself unfortunately but inescapably drawn to the word “conversational” here…while I haven’t seen any examples that I can recall off the top, I think that successful social networking campaigns are going to be far more iterative than their traditional/offline counterparts.

A successful SN campaign will involve figuring out what inputs the brand needs to provide to end up with the desired output. Rather than providing a set message, a successful campaign will over time discover the tools and cues that SN users can exploit to talk about the brand using their own voices.

Posted by whitneymcn on February 19th, 2008 at 4:42 pm

By campaign, I assume you mean an activity with a fixed duration as part of an ongoing strategy of engagement. You did? Oh good

Campaigns often work well when they integrate Rituals of online communities. Perhaps Flickr treasure hunt games during Talk Like a Pirate week. Valentines, Easter, anything that could see or tap into a viral spiked activity. Of course this gains membership in short bursts, retaining them is another matter.

Most communities are not horizontal - they love their Leaders. Identify brand evangelists, key content creators, super-bloggers, welcomers, mentors, ‘cops’, all the roles. Give them titles, attribution and self-identification. At least count the quantity and quality of their input and make it measurable for themselves. This puts ’social texture’ in the campaign. And gives the user generated component something to aim for, to aspire to.

Establish boundaries. Too many media types think that social networks are right and they should be listened to, in fact obeyed. That is ‘not’ an equal relationship. Guidelines include what social media will and will not be included, appropriate behaviour, etiquette statements. Too often forgotten or ignored as too hard. If the social network you want to use has poorly articulated and enforced rules, Don’t Use Them. SNs are not blogs, and each and every member has the right to feel safe and protected (Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs).

I could go on, but it’s not appropriate on a blog to write a toilet roll. Perhaps a wiki?

Posted by Laurel Papworth on February 19th, 2008 at 4:47 pm

D’oh — re: last paragraph of comment above, assume that I acknowledge that the tools and cues provided by the brand are intended to direct user conversation towards the desired brand image, rather than, say, making it easy to trash the brand on the SN…

Posted by whitneymcn on February 19th, 2008 at 4:54 pm

Esther Lim
Crimson Consulting

Hi Jeremiah,

I think your list is good but needs to expand to include a few points that can make or break a campaign:

Maintain an active interest in the community: A thriving community requires more attention from the company not less. Successful campaigns consistently introduce new ways to engage members either through contests, games or UGC to ensure a continued level of interaction that members come to expect.

To Laurel Papworth’s comment above re: Communities loving their leaders, this would also be a key point:

Implement recognition programs that foster positive member behaviors: Acknowledging positive member actions and/or interactions through a reward and recognition program goes a long way towards breeding loyalty and trust.

While I know this seems obvious, it’s a nice segue to my final point:

Exercise common sense. Social marketing isn’t rocket science. It is simply applying the social etiquette we use unconsciously on a daily basis in an online context.

Posted by Esther Lim on February 19th, 2008 at 7:03 pm

The economics of community building suggest that a low cost to participate relative to value received is a key driver of success.

I believe that the lower the cost ($, time, hassle, difficulty to do, etc) is for users to create something they care about the greater the probability of success. I would wager that almost all social web successes are rooted in some breakthrough in lowering participation barriers or costs.

Myspace made page customizing easy, Facebook turned activity into content, Twitter makes asynchronous chatting painless, Last.fm made listening a way to contribute. All have made participation extremely low cost, if not a complete by product of the user getting the value they wanted.

Lowering the cost to participate is key to increasing the ratio of creators to observers, and if you can break the classic one percent rule (http://ta.gg/12k) then you are quite likely to have a successful social endeavor.

Posted by Alex Nesbitt on February 19th, 2008 at 7:14 pm

Jeremiah,

As usual, very thought-provoking. Good successful community campaigns/projects need:

- Well defined goals and objectives.
- Ability to measure goals.
- Bottoms up approach, not top down.
- A feeling of peers/collegiality such that the members feedback is solicited, encouraged, and shown that it is appreciated. In other words, it is peer to peer.
- A dedicated community manager in place.
- Focus on community not the technology (forget about the new toy or shiny hammer as you call it).

Posted by Warren Sukernek on February 19th, 2008 at 7:38 pm

I’d like to think that Malcolm Gladwell would have loved to contribute and drop a copy of ‘Tipping Point’ here but more and more I’m beginning to suspect that SocNet success can very well also be like ‘Black Swans’ of Mr. Taleb, too.

What about ‘time investment’, Jeremiah! The fact that things like community do take time and that social marketing starts way before the product becomes a reality. It isn’t hard sell but yes, social etiquette within online context.

Posted by Alain Yap on February 20th, 2008 at 12:36 am

Quite frankly, all that you’ve said seems true but way too hazy. You should offer us a case study of something that was intentionally designed the way you described it, and that led to success.

Otherwise, it merely resembles a compilation of obvious facts.

Posted by xavierv on February 20th, 2008 at 1:47 am

Jeremiah - All good points above (so I’ll ruin the run here). Let’s say you’re a consumer product brand: Pepsi or Coke for instance. Perform the following Google search “site:twitter.com pepsi” or “site:twitter.com coke”. Coke has more than three times the mentions of Pepsi! So, if I were Pepsi… I’d mount a campaign to shore that up. Not just based on mentions. But, that WOULD be the key measure that got me going on the program. And I wouldn’t go about it like the Truemors bot on Twitter. Real person dispensing real free product coupons specifically for Twitter audience, another for AIM, another for Orkut, etc. That tees up feedstock programs into the more mature/understood permission/opt-in marketing programs like email or direct mail.

It HAS to come back around to measurability/ROI. Otherwise, they’re just experiments with no purpose, no longevity and little executive sponsorship/cover.

Posted by Gerald Buckley on February 20th, 2008 at 5:13 am

Display ads on Facebook UK ‘breaks’ a campaign in my opinion. Often banner ads appearing on my profile pages have absolutely no connection to my interests. Or if they do, Facebook’s sophisticated contextual ads server is picking up on something someone’s said on my Wall - which is often Blah, Blah, as I call it. That said, the ads have been so bad that I’ve noticed them! So much for

Posted by kenobi on February 20th, 2008 at 5:24 am

[How odd - the rest of my comments disappeared!}

...So much for

Posted by kenobi on February 20th, 2008 at 5:26 am

[One last time...]

So much for 0.05% recognition of banner ads.

I prefer profile led marketing. As with E4’s Skins campaign on MySpace (which gave members an exclusive preview of an episode before appearing on TV), if done right, users set aside any worries of being sold to and buy into the campaign. There has to be something worth returning for on a regular basis (eg blogs). I doubt users would be so quick to set aside their concerns if it was a tangible brand or product that provided little benefit while online (ie a drinks brand). Unless, again, they offer exclusive vids or music etc.

A good starting list of attributes but I suspect that the foremost reason for the failure of any social network based marketing is a lack of agility on the part of the company.

Businesses who dive into the social network ‘thing’ often find themselves astonished by the level and variety of response - both positive and negative.

It is at this stage that a marketing consultant shows his or her mettle: can they overcome the traditional conservatism of the corporate mindset and the bureaucracy with which it protects itself and convince management to change tack, follow through on the existing campaign, or, in some cases, actually change the way they do business?

So, the additional attribute must be flexibility or agility or some term to convey the need to let the network determine your next steps and even change the original goal.

Posted by Graham on February 20th, 2008 at 5:29 am

Kenobi

I see your comments live, and I’ve not done anything to remove them as I think you add a lot of value.

Speaking of adding value, I added a new attribute based upon the feedback from this thread.

Graham, good one on agility, let me think that through, while I agree this is a needed element, I’m not sure that it’s always the case in social network marketing campaigns as it could be outsourced to an interactive firm.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 20th, 2008 at 5:43 am

I’m with Kenobi. I haven’t yet seen how Facebook or MySpace banner ads can even be part of a campaign like this.

I’d like to see it, though. How would you use them effectively?

Posted by Josh Bernoff on February 20th, 2008 at 5:57 am

Thanks Josh. I see advertising as supplemental to marketing efforts, rather than a stand alone effort.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 20th, 2008 at 6:17 am

I’m going to post some links to some campaigns I’m seeing:

Cyworld reaches to Asian Americans with a film club: targeted and encourages interaction.

http://us.cyworld.com/club/common/club_main.php?clubid=208000007127

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 20th, 2008 at 6:18 am

Thanks - I think my comments were being cut off because I added a less than symbol. A glitch.

Anyway, building a social network from scratch is a real tough one, if you don’t have the volumes coming in from an existing website or web magazines (one of the best places for a bolt on social network - given that all users have a shared interest). There’s nothing worse than a network that looks empty or appears to have little activity going on - as with the now defunct MTV Flux.

Personally, unless you have this captive audience / volume, I advise clients to explore existing platforms and avoid reinventing the wheel. Setting up a group dedicated to bringing back Wispa chocolate bars is great fun. Users join the group as a badge of honour. It also gets major coverage in the press, particularly London’s free daily newspapers.

It’s not rocket science, but get it wrong and it can fail miserably - ie gain no user interest at all, which is a shame if you’ve built a bespoke platform of your own rather than going down the Facebook / MySpace route.

Posted by kenobi on February 20th, 2008 at 8:07 am

Hi Kenobi,

I really like your comments but I have to disagree with your last post at 8:07am. I don’t think building your own network and participating on existing networks is an either/or proposition.

Often times we will recommend both to our clients but only when the client is fully committed to dedicating the time and effort into building their own. By this I mean they have to be willing to:

- Participate actively and take an interest in their community
- Introduce content on a regular basis (content is afterall king), at least until UGC takes hold
- Put into effect mechanisms that encourage and reward user generated contributions
- Dedicated themselves to consistently improving the community features to further engage their members
- Most importantly, promote the community internally and externally via outreach to existing communities, syndicating all content via social sharing, hyperlinking etc.

We (Crimson) have built a number of communities for our clients from scratch and they are growing steadily with happy and engaged members.

Posted by Esther Lim on February 20th, 2008 at 9:08 am

I would like to add to your “Meets Business Objective” bullet. I believe that, for a social media campaign to be effective, it must also drive a focused, specific action of the community. For some campaigns, that may be as vague as “engagement”; for others it may be “visit our store” or “donate”. The more focused the action, the easier it is to measure and (I argue) the more likely it is to be accomplished.

I hope to have some examples for you from the political space within a month or so…

Yet another wonderful conversation - great work!

Posted by Brandon Thomas on February 20th, 2008 at 9:09 am

Thanks Esther - I agree with you. You missed my point / post. It’s vital to ensure that sufficiently attractive content or features are in place to pull users in (as per my comment on the Skins campaign).

Also, be clear where those participants are going to come from - be it an existing / sister website or via marketing on external social networks and sites.

Launching your own platform is brave in 2008. There are only so many social platforms users will sign up to - as MTV Flux and Trouble TV’s Homegrown proved. There’s even more noise with the likes of Ning.com.

In response, you’re seeing brands like Ben Sherman go one step further and aggregate social site content.

Posted by kenobi on February 20th, 2008 at 9:32 am

I think the most important thing for companies to realize is that sticking a video on youtube won’t get results automatically.

Fist off, instead of making something and trying to convince people to buy it, marketers should listen to what consumers want, and then make it.

Social media marketing works when it is built around a community that already exists. The goal is not to market to an individual but to market through a community (I think Seth Godin said this).

Social media needs to excite people, if the product/service isn’t amazing than the marketing won’t help/ Consumers are not stupid.

Scarcity is the new ubiquity. By standing out and targeting the small group of people that matter, you will eventually spread.

Check out Blendtec on youtube (type in “will it blend”) and see what I mean, or how about “you suck at photoshop.” These are remarkable videos, they are one of a kind, scarce; and because of that, they are getting millions of views.

Posted by Jacob Morgan on February 20th, 2008 at 10:15 am

Buy In & Trust Helps: here is my blog in dealing with this.
-jen

Posted by Jen Harris on February 20th, 2008 at 10:34 am

The will it blend ipod video keeps coming up. Not exactly something Apple would want to build on though is it? Ho, ho.

Posted by kenobi on February 20th, 2008 at 10:42 am

Jeremiah - I love the focus of this post and the thoughtful discussion that has ensued. Two points I’d like to make:

1) kudos to you for working to change the analyst establishment i.e. partnering with your community to create research and being willing to share that research back with those that have contributed in a thoughtful/useful manner.

2) one item that I’d add to your list of “What Makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks” is a willingness to “try and fail.” What I mean by this is that many companies who are willing to test a campaign put all their eggs in one basket with one campaign. If that test fails, rather than going back to the drawing board, they chalk it up to “social media/SN marketing doesn’t work for us.”

Best,
Aaron (@astrout)

Posted by Aaron Strout on February 20th, 2008 at 11:34 am

It seems aggresiveness and interactivity are the key components to success. Should companies basically say “come with us and play…we know what is good for you!”?

Right now, we utilize a blog (http://writtenbyallof.us/) vimeo (href=http://www.vimeo.com/slackbarshinger)
and flickr (http://www.flickr.com/groups/slackbarshinger/pool/)

Is purely existing in the social realms enough for us to gain loyal and purchasing “friends?”

Posted by b2b marketing on February 20th, 2008 at 1:21 pm

Great stuff Jeremiah. Thanks for sharing.

I’ve learn something precious out of Obama’s election campaign online. (Not trying to stage a propaganda here. If you check out his profile page at http://tinyurl.com/2snx77 you’ll see how nicely he ran his campaign through social networks. On the ‘Obama Everywhere’ section below the page, there is a smooth integration with major social networks that he left his footprints at. The consistency in messaging and branding was richly implanted. Supporters gather and get updated on his Facebook fan page and emails. They are involved in his campaign, he is not running it alone.
The mobile integration is seamless. Users get to download accessories for their phones as well as subscribe to specific updates on the candidate. Use of rich media just beautifies the entire campaign. And the result saw over 500,000 Facebook members on the fan site.
Beyond the proposition, the key here is the seamless integration of digital mediums and social networks. They made it easy for people to get involved.

One other thought on my mind tells me that the success of a social networking campaign will vary across geographical regions even if the same strategy is used. It is mainly due to cultural and behaviorial differences among internet users all over the world. What I am not sure of is how differently the Asian view and use social networks as compared to their western counterpart. It would be interesting to check out on.

Joanna

Posted by Joanna Teo on February 20th, 2008 at 8:07 pm

[...] “What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks?” - Web Strategy by Jeremiah [...]

Posted by StickiWidgets » Successful Marketing Campaigns and Widgets on February 21st, 2008 at 12:20 am

What really is important for me is approachability. I mean we are talking about communities here. I’m not interested in an abstract company running a campaign that tries to sell me a dream or stuff. I’m observing that I’d rather buy the product of someone I like or who’s a friend then the product which might be better. So my advice would be to accompany the campaign with being visible in the community, asking for feedback, being a human person with friends and opinions.
I like the sneaker application on Facebook because the developers also run a blog on Facebook where they talk about the development and react to feedback. I can even add them as friends and see what the rest of their lives look like.

Posted by Johannes Kleske on February 21st, 2008 at 12:25 am

Good list Jeremiah,

I like Graham’s suggestion on agility, especially when it relates to negative feedback. A campaign, at least, should have proactive mechanisms to channel negative expressions into suggestions the product/service being marketed will be focusing or considering soon; negative reactions should not come as a surprise.

One additional thing to consider is live/dynamic segmentation inside a community, social networks have influencers and although it is not easy to predict how the campaign will evolve, some grouping around trails and engagement could be predicted by analyzing the influencers and groups in a online community.

My last suggestion is related to considerations around the social contract in the community - if there is any - to stay compliant with what members have agreed when joining the community and what the social network provider expects.

Posted by Alberto Saavedra on February 21st, 2008 at 4:02 am

This is a really great post, and there’s some excellent replies. For me, social media is all about building engaging communities which then drive long term value. Many brands have gone into social networks like Facebook with pages or applications, but they’re still just making ’statements’, or they try and get into social media by allowing user interaction - without realising that they’re just facilitating ’statements’ between users (and then wonder why these don’t become amazingly successful).

A lot of people say that social media is about ‘conversations’, and this is true - but these conversations are already happening. Creating a branded social network or an application won’t create conversations, any by itself won’t even allow you to affect these conversations. The only way this can happen is if you actively create and/or engage with communities of users who are relevant to your brand.

MySpace initially became succesful because it allowed communities to form easily around common interests, bands, music tastes etc. Facebook grew quickly because it facilitated real-life communities (first student campuses, then workplaces). Twitter has grown quickly among techie/social media-ites because it allows large community discussions among people in the industry.

Brands should follow the same route - recognise what interests bring together your market market and either join or create communities based around these interests.

Josh

Posted by Joshua March on February 21st, 2008 at 4:59 am

Thank you ALL for the incredibly insightful dialog. I read comments several times and have incorporated ones into the main post that I thought were excellent –and credited those that did.

Crowd sourcing is efficient, more accurate, and fun. But now on to the hard work, where I do more deeper analysis, scoring, and research to each of the above mentioned bullet points.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on February 21st, 2008 at 5:22 am

[...] business would you get if there is a successful campaign with these social networks? This is very nice analysis done by Jeremiah Owyang who is a Web Strategist at SF Bay Area, USA. He tells you about the factors [...]

Posted by 11 Factors for Sure Success with social networking campaigns | Tech2view.com on February 21st, 2008 at 5:35 am

[...] Web Strategy - What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? A great look at what succeeds in [...]

Posted by Loving Links « The Rosemont Loving on February 21st, 2008 at 8:29 am

Is it too late to be considered?

My social network, Iowa Avenue, which focuses on gaining a healthy lifestyle via weight loss and weight management, just started a conversational marketing campaign by inviting other healthy lifestyle bloggers to participate in the Healthy Lifestyle Bloggers group. So, any blogger who feels that part or all of their blog relates to gaining a healthy lifestyle, can participate. A cool badge linked back to Iowa Avenue is the only requirement. I’ve put several pageflake pages together to highlight the various bloggers. I only started this 3 days ago, so it’s still very much a work-in-progress.

Thanks for the opportunity to share.

Lisa

Posted by IAAdmin on February 21st, 2008 at 10:23 am

Your posting and the associated comments have been useful and provocative. Thanks.

As a neophyte coming at this issue from the public relations side, we think in terms of campaigns. Like a political campaign, our work involves a start and a finish (although rarely with the definitive finish that comes with an election). That’s the mentality we bring to the table.

Yet, it seems to me that this is the wrong mentality to apply to social networking work in the business sphere. If a company is going to make an effort to truly engage a target audience (via social networking) I don’t see how this can be done with the idea that at some point the campaign ends and the company stops “engaging.” That’s why “campaign” seems like the wrong word for this type of work.

Posted by Lou Hoffman on February 21st, 2008 at 11:12 am

[...] What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? [...]

Posted by Liberate Media » Blog Archive » New Liberate Media, social media and web 2.0 rescorce map links for week ending 22nd Feb 2008 on February 22nd, 2008 at 7:13 am

[...] What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? “Sadly, many brand are going to do it wrong, by wasting resources, or embarrassing their brand with a campaign that doesn’t fit the needs of a community.” [...]

Posted by Dan Blank: Publishing, Innovation & the Web » Blog Archive » News of the Week on February 23rd, 2008 at 5:27 am

Key issue that needs to be addressed is social residue… how much damage do you put on an entity when there is a recording of the interaction? Do we really want biz on the Nixon tapes?

Posted by Noah David Simon on February 23rd, 2008 at 8:54 am

[...] Jeremiah Owyang, Sr. Analyst at Forrester Research, recently crowdsourced answers to the question What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? In an Update to the blog post he said I’ve thoroughly read the many responses in here, wow this [...]

Posted by CrowdsourceThis.com » Blog Archive » Jeremiah Owyang Crowdsource’s His Research on Social Networks on February 23rd, 2008 at 10:16 am

[...] Social Network Marketing Campaign Strategies for Success “Many brands are considering it, some have done it. Done what? Marketed on social networks (Facebook, Myspace, or private label social networks). Why? Social Networks are attractive because consumers are connecting with other consumers and the trust tends to be higher. Secondly, there’s a tremendous amount of buzz from the media for this newest form of marketing. Lastly, there’s lots of folks using social networks (about 2/3rds of all North American youth use it daily, and about 1/3rd of NA adults use it as least once a month –data From Forrester Research, Q4, 2007)” A well-written breakdown of key areas to consider in terms of running marketing campaigns on social networks. [...]

Posted by Things Worth Talking About: Social Networking, Social Media Marketing, Web 2.0 & Everything Else » Blog Archive » Social Networking’s Latest Headlines on February 25th, 2008 at 4:59 am

Jeremiah thank you for addressing this subject. Great post. We are very active in the social media marketing space and have just published a case study showing the ROI metrics we achieved for the Santa Barbara Film Festival http://www.mediatrust.com/casestudy_sbiff.html and also posted a great resource list on the 50 social media sites for business and marketing that we use for our SMO initiatives.Hope everyone finds these helpful in relationship to you article http://www.relevantlyspeaking.com/rs/2008/2/6/social-media-marketing-essential-50-sites.html

Peter

Posted by Peter Bordes on February 25th, 2008 at 4:53 pm

[...] What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? (tags: social media marketing reference list) [...]

Posted by links for 2008-02-26 on February 26th, 2008 at 4:24 am

Thank you for this article as I do my research on implementing a viral marketing campaign for my 20 minute narrative film that I am producing/directing. I was fortunate to get permission to make the short film based on Richard Wright’s short story, Big Black Good Man. I am trying to build awareness of the project and to build an audience for potentials viewers. Also, I am trying to raise funds to get the project produced.

I believe that doing the viral marketing within my friends in facebook and myspace will allow a word of mouth campaign to reach my goal of 500,000 members in my group. I will provide the link: :http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=15352295900, if you would like to track my progress in this grass roots endeavor.

Thank you for the information and the building of my confidence for me to attempt this marketing campaign.

Posted by Lou Charles on March 22nd, 2008 at 4:31 pm

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Posted by Handheld gps. on April 10th, 2008 at 2:58 am

Hi Jeremiah!

As I was reading through this post, I kept scrolling back up to the top to reread the title. I kept thinking you were talking about how to effectively market a social network or other community-based site. It’s amazing because the very same things that work for marketers looking to leverage the benefits of this fairly new medium also work for the social networks. By day I’m the Community Administrator over on WikiAnswers (www.wikianswers.com) - at night I’m a social network research fanatic. The whole premise of this new world of connecting online fascinates me. At the end of the day, what it comes down to is community… it’s key. If a brand doesn’t bow to the wants, needs and expectations of a particular community - it will fail miserably. One of the best approaches is to get personal. Reach out to community members via their message boards or post a thread on a group forum. Take part in community activities and always remember (as you stated so eloquently) the goals of a community. My best advice to any marketer is to do your research. You may have succeeded in the past having people conform to your standards - but this won’t work in the social networking space.

Crystal Williams

Posted by Crystal Williams on May 22nd, 2008 at 3:35 pm

Jeremiah thank you for this post.Great Work!I am very active in the social media marketing space
and think this is a wonderful piece of information. I also think the best way to succeed in this arena is to get personal with community as well.

Thanks again for this informative post and I will be looking for future additions.please and check out my facebook,myspace or yuwie pages and http://profits2wealth.com

Kathy Baka

Posted by Kathy Baka on July 4th, 2008 at 3:30 am

[...] Maintain agility during the campaign Web Strategy by Jeremiah [...]

Posted by Social Media Made Street Artist Famous on July 11th, 2008 at 2:26 pm

[...] research methodology, for example, I asked the 12,000+ readers of this blog (and 9000+ on Twitter) to help define what they think are success metrics for campaigns, some of this was factored into the scorecard requirements. At Forrester we serve different roles, [...]

Posted by Forrester Report: Best And Worst Of Social Network Marketing, 2008 on July 22nd, 2008 at 1:37 pm

Attribute:
Because many brands have successfully marketed on social networks, organizations may feel pressured to keep up with the latest trend and not be left behind. Some may decide to jump right in and start a blog, set up a Facebook page or other similar approaches to establish a presence in social media. The problems with rushing into it are 1) not addressing needs of the community (only relieves the anxiety of marketers –temporarily, until they realize it’s not working); 2) marketers-wanna-be-bloggers have not observed the community at length to learn what is relevant to the group and the dynamics of the community; 3) the content provided is of poor quality, not relevant, and likely not needed; 4) no contingency plans for a variety of issues that could arise –once something is posted, it has the potential of spreading far and wide and fast, and it may be difficult to rectify a mistake; 5) lack of a corporate policy to provide direction to staff on how to establish and manage content on social networks; lack of focus: the organization must have specific goals for marketing on social media, and “because everyone else is doing it” is not a valid goal; 6) lack of vision –what is the immediate plan for social media marketing? One year plan? Five year? As with anything else, much needs to be spent on the forefront and come up with a solid plan to successfully (or at least not totally busting it) enter the world of social networks.

Posted by Eva Kennedy on August 7th, 2008 at 11:51 am

[...] a Jeremiah Owyang, quizás una de las voces más respetadas en este mundillo. Así, hace ya tiempo publicó una serie de puntos que toda campaña de social media en redes sociales debería tener en cuenta si quería tener [...]

Posted by eTc :: El blog de Marketing en Español » Blog Archive » Ejemplos de campañas de marketing en redes sociales on August 8th, 2008 at 3:08 am

Posted by EL AUDIOVISUAL » Blog Archive » Ejemplos de campañas de marketing en redes sociales on August 8th, 2008 at 4:53 am

Posted by FreshNetworks Blog » Blog Archive » Social Media Beginners: Lesson 2 - Know your blogs from your networks on August 23rd, 2008 at 4:06 am

In an effort to keep up with emerging technologies and the latest trends, way too many companies are jumping into Social Network campaigns without first understanding the Social Network landscape and how it relates to their customers. Many companies begin campaigns without even knowing if their customers are active in the social networks. And with new Social Networks popping up every day, it can be difficult to keep tabs on all of them. In order to develop a successful campaign, marketers must first:
1. Establish that their customers are online.
2. Identify which SNs their customers are active in.
3. Understand how their customers differ from the average US adult.

Posted by LJ on August 23rd, 2008 at 7:51 pm

Posted by Qué hace ser exitosa a una campaña de marketing online on August 25th, 2008 at 6:30 am

Posted by The Success System That Never Fails | Streamxy - The #1 Blog On How To Start Your Own Blogging Business on September 23rd, 2008 at 7:15 am

[...] Jeremiah Owyang, uno de los gurús más respetados en analizar campañas virales, ha realizado un estudio de marcas de gran reputación para puntuar su éxito o su fracaso. Este personaje es una especie de crack analizando el comportamiento de los usuarios de redes sociales y en crear metodologías que nos sirvan para cuantificar estos fenómenos. Su última publicación ha sido “Best and Worst of Social Network Marketing, 2008” en las que analiza y puntua las estrategias de marketing en redes sociales de 16 grandes compañías, en base a 8 criterios, tales como “¿motiva esta campaña a la interacción entre usuarios?”, o “¿ofrece esta campaña contenidos valiosos que ayuden a los fines de la comunidad?”. (Os enlazo su página web: http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/02/19/what-makes-a-marketing-campaign-on-social-networks-suc...) [...]

Posted by Cara y cruz del marketing viral « Treintaytres’s Weblog on November 9th, 2008 at 1:45 am

Hey Jeremiah,
Thank for this informative post. Great Work!

I am very active in the social media marketing space
and getting really great traffic for my websites and I must say your post is really a wonderful piece of information.

Posted by Singapore Property on November 21st, 2008 at 12:55 am

Jeremiah, thanks for a very informative and useful post. I work full time in the technology business and am developing a band sawmill business as a passionate side line.

I am interested in learning how to use social networking as part of my marketing strategy and will be basing my web site on the WordPress platform.

I don’t yet have anything of value to add here other than letting you know that I am working to apply the latest Internet, Web 2.0 and social networking strategies to an industry that has not yet embraced such strategies.

I’m probably running the risk of using too many buzz words while clearly not knowing what I’m talking about but since my sawmill operation is brand new and I’m not relying on it for an income I have the liberty of figuring out how to apply those buzz words to an industry sorely in need of a technology refresh to help rejuvenate itself.

I’ll be following your blog and will hopefully have more useful input as my experience with my own sawmill blog site progresses.

Cheers
Jeff

Posted by Jeff Klaubert on December 7th, 2008 at 8:34 pm

Thanks Jeff!

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on December 8th, 2008 at 7:17 am

Social Marketing has so such potential to be THE solution I’ve seen a lot of evidence that businesses are intimidated. But many b2b companies who rely on education to market their products/services have had big success. Some have even transformed the concept of brand advocate to customer service representative! The parellel for consumer brands is not immediately evident. But the possibilities exist. Especially if one considers that Social Marketing may be the renaissance of “brand adoption.” This once ubiquitous objective in marketing plans in the 1960’s and 70’s became unachievable with today’s more fickle consumers with zillions of choices.

Posted by Katherine Warman Kern on December 9th, 2008 at 2:54 pm

Its amazing how powerfull these social networking sites are for marketing, and not many people realise this..

good write up

Jason

Posted by Jason on January 25th, 2009 at 3:16 pm

How will this mode of marketing address the geographical and cultural diversity of the people in the network?

Posted by Ram on January 31st, 2009 at 8:20 pm

[...] What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? - Jeremiah Owyang na swoim blogu opisał kilka spraw związanych z sukcesem kampanii marketingowych [...]

Posted by Nowa kategoria: odnośniki | Reklama po korekcie on February 15th, 2009 at 10:52 am

Some really informative points but what are the different ways and means by which SN’s can be used to market your product/business/brand?

Through viral marketing on communities,targeting specific communities to gain brand prominence and banner ads.

Besides these,are there any general ways of marketing through SN’s without targeting specific communities?

Posted by Abhishek on February 17th, 2009 at 9:02 am

[...] - cet article dans la langue de Shakespeare devrait être une parfaite continuité à ce que nous vous avons présenté : web-strategist.com [...]

Posted by Verre du vendredi #15 | Cherry and Cake - Entertaining Advertising on March 6th, 2009 at 10:15 am

[...] - dat dit artikel geschreven in ware Shakespear-taal een perfecte aanvulling moet geven aan wat we gepresenteerd hebben: web-strategist.com [...]

Posted by Een glaasje op vrijdag #15 | Cherry and Cake - Entertaining Advertising on March 6th, 2009 at 10:28 am

[...] What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? (tags: web2.0 socialmedia marketing) [...]

Posted by links for 2009-03-20 | Brandialog on March 20th, 2009 at 5:02 am

[...] http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/02/19/what-makes-a-marketing-campaign-on-social-networks-suc... Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Establish a Consistent Social Media Campaign - Part 1What Makes the Different Social Networks Tick?Social Networks May Be the Oldest Profession –Think About ItSocial Networks More Popular than E-Mail, Nielsen Says [...]

Posted by What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? « Jaime Marin’s Blog on April 7th, 2009 at 4:40 pm

[...] "Marketing Campaigns on Social Networks share the following attributes: Meets a business object… - %extended% [...]

Posted by del.icio.us bookmarks for May 11th through May 12th | on May 12th, 2009 at 6:02 am

[...] a great article that points out how to create a SUCCESSFUL social network marketing campaign. What makes a Successful Marketing Campaign on Social Networks? Be sure to read the comments left be readers as well. A very good and educational read. [...]

Posted by Social Networks AND Marketing « Apothecary on June 10th, 2009 at 7:33 am

[...] to help rather than hinder the discussion, here are Jeremiah Owyang (Forrester’s Research) features of a social media marketing campaign. Marketing Campaigns on Social Networks share the [...]

Posted by Social Network Marketing Campaigns: Features Attributes | Laurel Papworth- Social Network Strategy on June 10th, 2009 at 9:55 pm