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Take-Aways from Social Media World Forum

Social Media World Forum

The Social Media World Forum, in Santa Clara this past Monday and Tuesday, focused on how big brands use social technologies to engage customers. Representatives from brands like Coca-Cola, Nissan, Intel, and GM presented on recent marketing campaigns employing social technologies. It was a first of its kind conference for me – and it was great to see established brands experimenting, learning, and sharing their lessons with the community. Here are my favorite moments from the conference:

Michael Brito, formerly of Intel, talked about actionable listening over active listening. That is, listening with the goal of improving the customer experience in concrete ways. Michael discussed how Starbucks successfully did this with its My Starbucks Idea customer community. Last year, Starbucks launched its Splash Sticks, “plastic plugs for sip holes” which prevent spillage, an idea which came from a customer on the site. (See pic and USA Today story here.) Michael also described the “Intel Star” campaign, which he was personally involved in while working at Intel. The campaign ran a hilarious ad about Ajay Bhatt, the co-inventor of the USB. You’ve got to see it, especially if you have any love for geeks. The spot was so popular, Intel added an accompanying t-shirt contest and built a contestant community. In Michael’s words, “Sometimes little things you do that create valuable customer experience.”
Jeff Parent, VP Sales and Marketing of Nissan Canada, talked about a grass roots marketing campaign for Nissan’s new Cube. Knowing it was a niche product, Nissan targeted a younger demographic which tended to be early adopter, socially connected and skeptical of traditional marketing. They opted for 100 percent social media driven campaign, inviting 1000 “people on the street” to enter to win 50 Nissan Cubes. 100 of these invitees were shortlisted and given a blank canvas to share why they deserved to win. Contestants created 35,000 YouTube videos, posted 30,000 Tweets and 10,000 Flickr photos, and organized Tweet-ups and dance-offs. What was most interesting about Jeff’s presentation is that Nissan conducted a pure social media campaign, and now has a baseline with which to compare future hybrid campaigns. How much awareness did Nissan raise with this campaign? In March, 12% of their target market had heard of the Cube, by May – 23%, and by July – 32% of their target market, and 52% of Canadians of all age groups. More importantly, sales of the Cube are on target with forecasted goals.
Christopher Barger, Director of Social Media at GM, delivered an honest and funny presentation about engaging in social media as GM was about to file the biggest Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US history. He joked about being “the most hated brand in the US” at that time. While others thought he was “nuts,” he believed that the only way to “rejuvenate a brand and get through a crisis was to be as open as possible.” GM created a temporary social media team to listen, respond, and interact with customers during the crisis. GM’s CEO posted a video to thank the 12,000 dedicated supporters who had joined GM’s Facebook fan page at the peak of the crisis. GM brought in its most vocal critics to receive and act upon marketing and customer experience feedback. All the while, GM made sure that their employees received the appropriate training to engage directly with customers. They took a “thousand flowers bloom” approach, fostering dialog and learning throughout the company, where even engineers, finance, etc. were joining the conversations. Members from GMs communications and marketing teams worked for an entire year in the social media department, learning new skills and diminishing others, and then returning to their teams and dispersing the knowledge they’d gain. In GMs words: “Immerse and disperse.”
Finally, check out this video presented during the conference and created by one of nearly 35,000 contestants in last year’s Queensland, Australia “Best Job in the World” campaign (This particular contestant didn’t win, but it’s great nonetheless). Chris Chambers, Director of Digital Marketing at Tourism Queensland, spoke about the wildly popular contest, which awarded one lucky contestant a 6-month job on the Great Barrier Reef with $150,000 AUD salary. The contest received extensive mainstream media coverage, including a spot on Oprah, and raised global awareness of Queensland as a holiday destination.