According to the coordinators of the first international social media marketing awards, The Bees, submissions are indicating smaller agencies are most influential in the burgeoning discipline.
The awards have attracted submissions from companies worldwide, providing a barometer for the increasing use of social media campaigns in business and communication.
Significantly, although 63% of entries for the awards come from large brands, the organisers say 70% of entries come from specialised agencies; adding that small fast growing agencies are making social media marketing their focus and as a result are obtaining key brand accounts.
The Bees Awards will take place in San Francisco on 9th November. The deadline for entries is 1st October 2010.
To share expertise with other professionals in the industry, some companies have allowed their entries to be presented as case studies. This one from SANKO Partners Inc./777 interactive, based in Tokyo presents a case study of a campaign which resulted in a great return on investment for a well known Japanese manga character.
While brand awareness is the key brand management objective for brand marketers in 2010, most corporate brand executives believe they are better served by online communications and traditional PR activities to reach consumers according to a new survey.
The research conducted by KRC Research for MiresBall, in the 2010 State of the Brand Report, indicates that more than two-thirds of surveyed brand marketers (68%) say online communications, is key for generating awareness and brand loyalty among consumers, citing their own websites as the main vehicle for reaching consumers and building loyalty.
While 52% of brand executives say social media provides an opportunity to build brand awareness amongst customers previously unreachable, opinions are divided on the marketing effect of social media: 35% say social media is making it easier to create customer loyalty, and 30% disagree that building customer loyalty has become easier because of social networking. More »
A Frenchman may now be the fastest man in Europe over 100m but it seems French winemakers are slower off the blocks when it comes to social media.
Reuter’s Leslie Gervitz created a bit of a storm this week suggesting that French winemakers were a bit antisocial when it comes to social media, compared to their New World counterparts. ‘When it comes to social media, most [French] winemakers prefer to drink alone’ she wrote.
The comment was based on research by My Social Winery who discovered that although 95% of French wineries export their wine, 91% have no Twitter account, 87% no blog, 85% no LinkedIn account and 57% no Facebook page.
Furthermore, only 37% offer an English translation of their website. Respondents said they are both too busy and know not enough about social networks to be on them, though only 15% dispute their value.
For this reason perhaps, 44% of the 500 wineries surveyed said they were considering integrating social media into their overall marketing activity. It seems, like good wine, social media will take time to mature in this most traditional of industries.
The latest survey of lead generation channels by CSO Insights, via eMarketer shows design & content to be the place most marketer’s will be increasing their investment in contrast to Direct Mail which will see further decline.
Email marketing runs a close second, with 54%, followed by New Media (blogs, podcasts, mobile marketing). It’s not clear whether social media is included within content or New Media however but we’re assuming the former.
The number one aim of this realignment in spend was new customer acquisition, with 91% of companies seeing this as the priority, up from second in 2007 when the survey was last taken.
Based on the quantity and quality of leads generated, companies said email was their best lead generation program, followed by live events, website registrations and webinars.
Fascinating interview via SMI with Alexandra Wheeler – Starbucks’ Digital Director of Strategy on how the company has executed its market leading social media strategy. Ideas are surfaced internally, buy in is from top to bottom and the result looks more like core brand philosophy than mere marketing tactics.
Mattel are doing a social media treasure hunt in four US cities starting today. Clues will be posted on Twitter & Foursquare and if you can find Barbie’s ‘street team’ in their secret location, and show them a Foursquare login for their current location or ‘something pink’ you win a Barbie video doll worth $50.
Now I don’t know the ins and outs of this social media campaign but a few practical problems seem apparent. To start with, it won’t be the world’s actual Barbie fans, aged 5 to 8 running around with air tickets and iphone on their own – they’re going to have to bring an adult.
OK so it’s down to mum to make it happen – a tech savvy mum at that. But what smart mum would take their daughter on a Barbie hunt across the city knowing only one Barbie is available in each location. The inevitable tears of disappointment, not to mention exhaustion would mean she’d have to buy her one anyway and presumably they’re not in the shops yet so she can’t.
And if by steely ambition you did manage to get there first by dragging your child across six lanes of traffic, eyes glued to your maps app, why would you then bother to check in on Foursquare if you’re standing in front of the ‘street team’ anyway?
A Regus survey of global businesses has found small companies are doing better than large ones at using social media to attract new customers.
44% of small companies have successfully acquired a customer through social networking compared to 36% for medium sized companies and 28% of large businesses.
The most popular use of social media is keeping in touch with business contacts – 58% of respondents globally declaring they use networks in this way.
By sector, Financial Services (26%) lags behind the Media/Marketing and ICT sectors (48% & 46%). By country, India is the leading nation, followed by Mexico and Spain. More »
Following the viral success of their YouTube videos starring former Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Isiah Mustafa, retro aftershave brand Old Spice has taken their social media experiment a step further, inviting questions via Twitter that Mustafa then answers on YouTube. One answer to a question from eminent Hollywood blogger Perez Hilton has clocked up 169K views on its own. Inspired.
Curbside Cupcakes, a Washington DC mobile cupcake vendor has customers queueing down the street for its products, having dropped the traditional press release for Twitter and Facebook marketing.
Freedman International implements marketing campaigns worldwide for leading consumer brands, specialising in bringing new levels of efficiency and innovation to the global marcomms process. Headquartered in London, they employ over 150 staff with overseas offices in New York, Singapore and Atlanta, working for well known global brands including Electronic Arts, InterContinental Hotels Group and Philips.
The Challenge
Disillusioned by previous PR experiences that had delivered piecemeal coverage and failed to prove value and with an international marketing customer base that had no clear media routes to it, Freedman were unconvinced that a PR solution could work for them at all.
What they needed, if it indeed existed, was a PR campaign that could cross international borders and convey a complex, but compelling narrative of their work direct to global marketers, encouraging engagement, raising profile and reputation and ultimately generating new leads.
Following an article on online pr, that Freedman CEO Kevin Freedman had read in a Furlong PR email newsletter, he invited in the company to discuss online pr strategies. More »
According to the coordinators of the first international social media marketing awards, The Bees, submissions are indicating smaller agencies are most influential in the burgeoning discipline.
While brand awareness is the key brand management objective for brand marketers in 2010, most corporate brand executives believe they are better served by 
