 |
 | Contact Us | Bulldog Europe |
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Learn how to make them fresh, simple and effective. 
BtoB marketing professionals answer the question, "Does your company have a social media strategy?"
| | Return to MWJ Home |
|
|
|
||
 |
March 2008, Issue 49 |
 |
SXSW 2008: What We Learned
By Bulldog Solutions Employees
It was a "Perfect Storm," but in a very good way.
- There's a four-day festival focused on the most exciting and interesting trends in interactive marketing and communications.
- This festival takes place in early March right in Bulldog's headquarters city of Austin, Texas.
- With the exception of one rainy day, the weather cooperates for a perfect "Austin" experience.
Be Authentic or Pay the Price
By Amy Bills, Senior Manager of Field Marketing
What I Learned: Rohit Bhargava moderated a session on "10 Easy Ways to Piss Off a Blogger." Most of the participants were dedicated bloggers themselves, so it was part information and part therapy, really. But the exchange was a good refresher for the marketers among us who were there for insight into how to connect in a mutually beneficial way with bloggers.
There were many, many references during the four-day conference to the importance of authenticity, and that really came through in some of the tips. Don't pretend you're a regular reader of a blog when you've only discovered it 12 hours ago. Don't send bloggers information that has nothing to do with their space. Don't falsely represent your company or yourself just to spark interest or to hide something the blogger might find relevant. Really good stuff, and straight from the source(s).
I Recommend: Reading these 10 tips.
Let the Community Roar
By Kristin Farwell, Campaign Manager/User Experience Enthusiast
What I Learned: We talk a lot in the abstract about building communities. At SXSW, I saw it in action. Two of the keynote addresses presented perfect illustrations of how quickly a community can lift you up, or take you down.
- At the Mark Zuckerbrg keynote I witnessed the smackdown of an audience unhappy with the tone and content of the interview. They expected more and were vocal about it.
- Conversely, Frank Warren, the founder of PostSecret, delivered a great keynote the following day. PostSecret invites people to mail in anonymous secrets, which are then posted for the community to read. At the end of the session, an audience member asked the community to post comments on a blog written by her sister, who is very sick and is cheered up by engaging with people on her blog. There wasn't a dry eye in the room.
I Recommend: Get involved in your world. Next time you're lurking on a blog, leave a comment!
R-E-S-P-E-C-T: Find Out What It Means to Our Social Media Communities
By Kim Haynes, Director, HR
What I Learned: HR professionals habitually keep their employees very close. It's not in our nature to expose them to situations where they might be poached. So social media, which at its core is about becoming involved and engaged, is a daunting prospect for HR!
But I've long been one of the proponents here at Bulldog of using social media to build our corporate and personal brands. And SXSW was a real validation of that. I attended a session with the creators of Dogster.com on "Keeping Teams Motivated, Productive and Happy" that gave some tips you could apply to any growing company:
- Don't bounce all over the place
- Make sure everyone in the organization knows what's going on
- More than anything, people just want respect
One Step at a Time
By Chris Parisi, Director, MIS
What I Learned: SXSW is valuable not only as a learning experience—the average IQ in the convention center must have been off the charts, there were so many really smart people there—but as a validation of what you're already doing.
In several sessions, speakers reiterated a concept that I think is very good advice for any small company: Don't over-engineer. If you build an enormous infrastructure to support your business, you risk spending all of your money on systems you'll never use. Our approach is one I'd recommend to other agile companies like ours, whether you're in Marketing or other fields. Build your technical infrastructure in stages. You'll be much more flexible.
I Recommend: Listen to the podcast of "How to Bankrupt Your Startup in Five Easy Steps" when SXSW makes it available later this year.
Technology Isn’t [Always] the Answer
By Kamran Shah, Vice President of Products
What I Learned: This must sound strange coming from a techie, but a point about technology not being the answer to all our problems was reinforced in many sessions. We often hear about the need for a blog, wiki or social network. But we need to resist the urge to put the cart before the horse.
The "POST" approach presented by Charlene Li during her "Social Strategies for Revolutionaries" session provides a structure to decide what to do when braving the world of social media.
- People: Access your customers and their social activities.
- Objectives: Decide what you want to accomplish.
- Strategy: Identify how your customer relationships will change or need to change.
- Technology: Determine the right technology at the end.
I Recommend: Reading Charlene’s book when it’s available.
Know colleagues who would be interested in this topic? Send them this newsletter, and if they subscribe, you could win Garr Reynolds' new book, Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery.
Marketing Watchdog Journal is a monthly newsletter from Bulldog Solutions, a lead optimization and lead management company dedicated to helping our clients generate more, better leads and turn them into revenue. We welcome your feedback on this newsletter's content and design, and encourage you to share your ideas for topics you would like us to cover in future issues. Please send your comments or questions about Bulldog Solutions to Amy Bills, senior manager of Field Marketing.
 |
HOME | PRIVACY POLICY | CONTACT US © 2008 Bulldog Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved. |