Building Public RelationshipsThrough Social Media

Greater Kansas City PRSA

Jeff Risley

May 14, 2008

2

3

4

“Markets are conversations.

Conversations are fire.

PR/Marketing is arson.”

5

We are arsonists

(and sometimes firefighters)

6

Social media are

matches & gasoline

(and sometimes water!)

7

8

Social Media Strategy

1. Look for smoke (Audit)

2. Watch it smolder (Monitor)

3. Throw on gasoline OR water (Engage)

4. Tell the authorities (Measure & Report)

9

Audit & Monitor

What

� Quantitative � How many blog-post

mentions, comments,

video-tags, photo-tags,

message-board

discussions

� Qualitative� Tone of the conversations,

perceptions, sources

How

� DIY� Google Alerts, Yahoo Pipes,

Technorati, Icerocket,

AllTop, Digg, Reddit,

Del.icio.us, Summize, Topix,

Epinions, Blogpulse,

Boardreader, Boardtracker,

CoComment, iTunes

� Outsource� Spiral16, Radian6,

SocialRadar, Nielsen-

BuzzMetrics, NMS,

Cymfony, Brandimensions,

Factiva, Biz360, Trackur,

Umbria, Scherer Cybrarian

10

11

Engage

UGCUser-Generated Content

Social NetworksMulti-Media Sharing

12

Engage

UGCUser-Generated Content

Social NetworksMulti-Media Sharing

Indirect

Direct

13

UGCUser-Generated Content

14

Example: Indirect Engagement: Build-A-Bear Workshop

� Post appeared in monitoring

� High-traffic, authoritative

blog

� Story began to

spread

15

Analysis

� How influential is the originating blog and/or blogger?� Technorati Authority & Rank

� Do they Twitter? Number of followers

� Facebook friends, LinkedIn contacts (i.e., their Network)

� Youtube profile? Flickr?

� What is the velocity of spread?

� Who else has picked it up? How influential are they?

� How damaging is the meme?

16

Characteristics of a Good Response

� Be quick – timeliness matters

� Response should come from a person � Use first person singular� Include personal POV

� Disclose your relationship

� Be polite – anything you say may be used against you

� Be real – avoid canned responses

� Invite conversation and clarification

� Request correction of misinformation

� Choose your response mode – email, comment, post

17

Our Response

“ . . . you’ve got to be impressed by a company that responds so quickly, directly, and receptively to criticism; I am, anyway. Dave had no problem with my posting our email exchange in its entirety, and you’ll find it after the jump. The upshot is I gave him several suggestions as to how I thought the situation could be improved, and he told me they "will definitely take [my] suggestions to heart," and "will review this information with [their] privacy committee." So, the company gets big points in my book for listening and responding to the conversation . . .”

18

Example: Direct Engagement: Stonyfield Farms

� One of the first corporate blogs (April

2004).

� Discusses subjects

broader than just their

products (only mentions yogurt 3-

4/year).

� Success measure:

reader comments.

19

Social NetworksMass

Niche Corp

Private

20

Example: Direct Engagement: HouliFan

“We clearly made a mistake taking fajitas off the menu-so many of you have told us via letters, emails, boycotting and generally having a ‘fajita freakout.’ There were lots of ALL CAPS and !!!!! symbols in your notes. You told us our fajitas were ‘waay better than any Mexican restaurant;’ you pleaded for the marinade recipe; you signed off as ‘DESPERATE!’You called us idiots.Uncle.

We didn’t know how absolutely impassioned people were about our fajitas. We didn’t know we’d literally be breaking up as in Adios Amigos. We are sorry. They are back. And we hope you will be, too.”

21

22

Multi-Media Sharing

23

Measure & Report

� Outputs

� Outcomes

� ROI

24

Measure & Report

Output

� Conversation Index (for blogs)

� Conversation volume, tone, location

Blog Posts

Comments + Trackbacks

<1 = Good

More conversation than speech

25

Monitoring/ReactiveOutreach

ProactiveBlogger

Relations

26

Number of blog mentions:

Breast Cancer 3-Day vs. Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

1/15

/200

81/

22/2

008

1/29

/200

82/

5/200

82/

12/2

008

2/19

/200

82/

26/2

008

Week Ending

Nu

mb

er

of

Me

nti

on

s

Breast Cancer 3-Day

Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

* This line represents the 936 new Breast Cancer 3-Day blog mentions since 1/1/08

*

27

Number of posted photos and videos:

Breast Cancer 3-Day vs. Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

924

64

493

130

200

400

600

800

1000

Photos Videos

Totals as of 2/26/08

Breast Cancer 3-Day

Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

28

5,102

12,293

0

2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

10,000

12,000

14,000

As of 3/31/07 As of 2/26/08

Nu

mb

er

of

Me

nti

on

s

Total Breast Cancer 3-Day mentions

in MySpace, Yahoo 360 and MSN

Spaces

An increase of 141% since 3/31/07

29

393

28

924

64

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Photos Videos

Totals through 3/31/07

Totals through 2/26/08

Number of Breast Cancer 3-Day photos posted on Flickr and Smugmug has increased 136% since 3/31/07

Number of videos posted on YouTube, Blinkx, Google Video and Yahoo Video has increased 128% since

3/31/07

30

Measure & Report

Outcomes

� Website traffic

� Requests for Information

� Perception changes

� Relationship changes

31

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

160

180

Blogs MySpace Facebook

As of 2/21/08

RFI

Walkers

* Source: 2008 Source Report

32

33

http://www.gapingvoid.com/

Thank You

Jeff RisleyEmail: jrisley@barkleyus.com

Blog: http://risleyranch.blogs.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/RisleyRanch

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffhrisley

Del.icio.us: http://del.icio.us/RisleyRanch