practitioners guide to social influencer engagement

Copyright © 2012 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights Reserved.

eBook

The Practitioner’s Guide toSocial Influencer EngagementA collaborative work of industry peersB r o u g h t t o y o u B y P r N e w s w i r e

The ideas and suggestions expressed in the content of this eBook are those of their respective contributors and are not necessarily those of PR Newswire.


TablE of conTEnTS

iNtroDuCtioN

By Sarah Skerik, Vice President, Social Media, PR Newswire ................................... 1

ChAPter 1 – what’s an influencer?

the influencer Next Door, By Malcolm Atherton ........................................................ 2

Mass & Niche: A Deadly Combo, By Chad Lio ............................................................... 4

the evolution of the 800 lb gorilla, By Todd Price ....................................................... 6

Listening equals influence, By Sebastian Rusk .............................................................. 8

ChAPter 2 – Finding & gauging influence

Choosing the right influencer, By Noemi Pollack ........................................................ 10

Measuring your social Brand and optimizing your score, By Yael Even-Levy.... 12

the three “V’s” and how you Can use them, By Sudip Chakraborty &

Brianna Harney ......................................................................................................................... 15

Creating your Perfect Blend of influencers, A summary of PR Newswire’s

Targeting Influencers in the Sea of Social Media video ............................................. 17

ChAPter 3 – engaging influencers

three essential rules for influencer engagement, By Ruth Fine ............................ 21

Five ways to Build strong Bonds with social Media influencers,

By Margot Heiligman .............................................................................................................. 23

10 strategies for ultimate influencer engagement, By Steph Russell ................. 26

how Not to Pitch a social influencer, By Howard Greenstein ............................... 28

twitter as a Luxury Marketing tool to reach influencers, By Megan Sterritt ... 31

the Conversation is the Platform, By Christy Belden .................................................. 33

ChAPter 4 – turning influence into Brand Advocacy

how to Make an influencer want to sing your tune, By Anne-Marie Kovacs ... 37

turning influencers into your Brand’s Voice, By Tom Bishop .................................... 39

Building a social Media & Marketing strategy for influencer engagement,

By Lee Anne Forbes .................................................................................................................... 43

the Cadence of influence, By Vatsala Isaac .................................................................... 45


ChAPter 5 – Measuring influence & Maintaining relationships

Measurements that Matter, By Jared Hendler .............................................................. 48

Measure and Maintain relationships, By Adam Blitzer ............................................. 51

what My Daddy taught Me About social Media-how to Be A giver online,

By Andrea Walker ..................................................................................................................... 54

understanding and growing From Advocate insight, By Matthew Clyde ......... 57

wiLDCArD ChAPter 6 – A Little extra Food For thought

optimizing your social Media for search (sso), By Christy Belden ....................... 61

how to really engage your influencers with gamification,

By Toby Beresford ...................................................................................................................... 64

CoNCLusioN

By Sarah Skerik, Vice President, Social Media, PR Newswire ....................................... 68

1Copyright © 2012 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights Reserved.

eBook The Practitioner’s Guide to Social Influencer Engagement

InTroducTIonBy Sarah Skerik, Vice President of Social Media, PR Newswire

the terms “social networks” and “social media” make it easy to forget that

people – more than a billion of them worldwide – are the means by which

conversations propagate and ideas spread. smart communicators factor the

human element into the communications plans they develop and the content

they create.

every group of people, whether you’re talking about an informal cluster or

people conversing via hashtags on twitter, a private group on Facebook or a

coffee klatch at a local café, has its own influencers. respected and quoted

by many, influencers are the members of the community who sway opinions

through a combination of personal expertise and social connectedness that put

them at the center (and often at the start of) many conversations.

influencers exist for every imaginable topic. they might be hobbyists,

academics, journalists, professionals, or simply the person next door. each brings

a unique point of view to a conversation, and developing relationships with

them is important for brands building a connected digital presence.

in this paper, we delve into the different kinds of influencers you’ll find, their

role in shaping online conversation and how brands and organizations can

build valuable relationships with key influencers within their markets and as

well as become influential themselves, ultimately driving their audiences and

influencers to them.



Chapter 1

What’s an Influencer? Who Are They?

ThE InfluEncEr nExT doorBy Malcolm Atherton, Account Manager, PR Newswire

One of my favorite cartoons of all time is from the New Yorker. one dog is seated

in front of a computer and is looking at another dog. Computer dog says to the

other dog, “on the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.”

Makes me laugh every time. Now, look around. Do you see an influencer? i’ll

wait…

(pausing for effect….)

i was thinking of Mark schaefer’s excellent session at september’s Content

Marketing world on influencers and, in real life, nobody knows you’re an

influencer.

Ask 10 people to define “influencer” and you’ll likely get 10 answers. Celebrities,

thought leaders, folks with high influence scores (see Klout, Peerindex, et al.),

and so forth are likely to be uttered. Finding and targeting influencers is the

goal for many an internal Marcomm team and/or agency as part of ongoing

strategies. so, who are these people… these influencers? Chances are that you

walked by one today. the new influencers is ‘the every(wo)man.’

According to Mark, you can identify who is influential in a variety of ways

without Klout & Friends.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog


CHAPTER 1 What’s an Influencer? Who Are They?


• Are they writing meaningful content?

• Are they providing consistent engagement?

• Do they have a relevant audience?

• KEY Does their content MoVe (shared, commented on, etc.)?

influencers can ebb and flow. your next door neighbor may be consistently

influential about a topic today but the neighbor across the street may be

influential about a near and dear topic tomorrow. they are moving targets but

the payoffs can be substantial.

Consider Mark’s tale of Calvin Lee, an unmarried 42 year old who is painfully

shy and owns a design and brand strategy company in Los Angeles. oh yeah, he

posts over 200 times a year and has over 80,000 followers on twitter. Calvin is

active online, authentic, and has developed a large and loyal following of folks

who likes what he has to say and moves his content.

some groups you may have heard of – Audi, house of Blues, south by southwest

– have provided Calvin with cars to live with for a while, concert access, trips etc.

because they know that he’ll create tons of content (pictures, videos, blog posts,

tweets, etc.) and they’ll gain access to his followers. win. win.

how do you find your Calvin? research, listen, and identify folks who have the

rite content (relevant, interesting, timely, entertaining) that resonates well with

audiences relevant to you. And when you see your neighbor and you give that

friendly wave, just ask yourself…..“influencer?”




MaSS & nIchE: a dEadly coMboBy Chad Lio, Digital Marketing Manager, The Hoffman Agency

it’s an age-old marketing question that must be re-imagined for social media: do

you publish content for the masses or target a specific niche that provides the

most value to your brand? the truthful answer is both. But how do you go about

this, while still promoting growth in your online community? Let’s break down

each market.

Mass Media

Numbers don’t lie in social media. it’s inevitable that a potential subscriber/fan/

follower will look at your brand’s fan base to help them decide whether to like,

follow or subscribe to your brand. As much interest as they may have in your

brand, the fact that you have a limited initial following may deter them – and,

therefore, become a hindrance to your brand’s mass visibility.

Benefit: generating content for the masses gives you a wide-open approach.

your content will more than likely connect with fans that you never knew were

out there. you remove your brand’s limitations by introducing yourself to a large

community base. Publishing to such a large crowd, you’re bound to accumulate

fans specific to your brand in a given social media platform.

Drawback: when marketing to the masses you may spread yourself too thin.

your brand contributes hours upon hours of creative and passionate content to

share with the world, but let’s face it: a lot of the world is not interested. is it

worth the expense, time and energy to create content when much of it will be

ineffective by falling on “deaf ears”? is it useful to publish content to markets

that are not specific to your brand or your location?

Niche Media

what’s a better way to promote your message than connecting with the

community that appreciates it the most? Although relatively smaller in




numbers, you want the biggest advocates on your side marketing your brand.

they engage, they influence others; but most importantly, they are loyal.

Benefit: you have a truly passionate online community. they consistently voice

their opinions of what your brand can change or achieve more efficiently. they

have no problem taking the time to share and spread the reason why you

created your brand.

Drawback: Although the loyalty will always be present, you tend to appear small,

thus not as influential as major brands. Brands that market to the major masses

may not grow a community that is as passionate, but their visibility becomes

a catalyst for large numbers of impressions. the larger you become, the more

opportunities your brand has to become “the top dog.”

How to use both for a successful community

often, building a community starts with mass media. As you publish engaging

content to the masses, keep note of specific fans/followers/subscribers that

consistently engage and share your content. Create a separate list of these

advocates – it will eventually evolve into your niche market. once your numbers are

significant enough that they will increase organically, create an advocacy campaign

for your niche market. these can be special offers, exclusive content, or anything

that reassures that they are part of something special and should be appreciated.

you’ll find that balancing the two markets will drive greater growth than would

be possible by catering only to mass media or niche media.




ThE EvoluTIon of ThE 800 lb GorIlla By Todd Price, Director of Business Development, Yellow Dux

on June 29, 2012, the up-and-coming rock band Dirty Americans headlined

Michigan’s “Bike Fest on the grand” festival. the next day, 1980s rock god skid

row closed out the festival. how is it possible that a rock group you probably

never heard of can share the same stage with a band that has sold out arenas

and made three multiplatinum records?

the answer lies in that music, like social media, revolves around consistently

delivering fresh content that is relevant and valuable to your audience.

while the story of these bands is nothing new (one on the way up and one on

the way down), the parallel between their experiences and the social media

landscape is striking. in social media, someone with high name recognition but

little substance can be matched or outweighed by a niche influencer whose

frequent and relevant words on certain subjects carry the discussion topic

forward at an alarming pace. For example:

• rush Limbaugh hosts a nationwide radio show, authors several books and

does numerous tV spots. twitter followers = 232,411.

• Maria Popova filters web stories and creates a daily digest for all relevant

items in the internet world. twitter followers = 196,235.

• Justin Verlander is the reigning MLB American League MVP from 2011

and doesn’t engage much with social media. total Facebook Likes = 3,176.

• John Axford is a middle reliever pitcher for the Milwaukee Brewers who

consistently uses social media to reach out to fans. total Facebook Likes =

13,973

it’s easy to see that social media is changing the nature of the 800-pound gorilla.

in fact, there aren’t many of those left. Due to social media, the old notion of the




megastar – or mega brand – is being replaced by a larger number of 300-pound

gorillas who are building solid followings by creating good content, and then

maintaining their name and their mark by continuing to provide value on a

consistent, long-term basis.

Dwayne Johnson (also known as the rock of wwe wrestling fame) has said you

should only put forth items of value in social media. to become a leader in your

field, you must continuously provide value and consistently good information

on the topics you enjoy. if you just fill the air with random posts or promotional

information bits, your message will eventually fade into the background noise,

unnoticed.

try to follow comedian Dane Cook for a week and time yourself when your refresh

button explodes. As someone who tweets eVerythiNg he does, the idea of

bringing value to the audience is lost. think of your social media as an announcer

at Kmart. if you keep making irrelevant announcements, everyone will eventually

tune you out. By bringing forth value in what you post, your message will

eventually get you from passive engagement to active engagement to influencer

in the social media realm which you hope to dominate.

to bring the message home, let’s go back to music. Jimmy Buffett released his

first nine albums during the 1970s. But he also released four new studio albums,

10 live albums and two compilation albums all spread over the last 10 years.

twitter followers = 605,364.




lISTEnInG EqualS InfluEncE

By sebastian rusk, Ceo/Founder, socialBuzztv.com

Listening seems to be almost non-existent in today’s marketplace. sadly, many

brands have been misled into believing that social media platforms exist as an

advertising tool. Brands believe they can pitch their product and shove their

message down consumers’ throats. the reality is, “push” strategy is yesterday’s

news; social media makes it all about “pull.”

so how does a brand focus on the pull of its audience? it starts with something

we should have been taught when young: listening. the simple idea of listening

to your customer gives them a voice. social media gives your consumers an

outlet to let their emotions fly. whether they love your brand, hate your brand

or feel anything in between, they turn to social media to express it. this in turn

allows you to better understand your brand.

the sales cycle has been completely reversed now that word-of-mouth

popularity is at an all-time high. From a business standpoint, social media

platforms enable you to achieve three objectives. the first is to build an online

community where you don’t currently have a presence. the second is to provide

that audience with valuable, tangible content and information. the third (and

perhaps most valuable to your brand) is to engage with the community and get

a true sense of what they want. this is the time and place to forget about your

needs; it is about the customer. once you become the “go to” source for your

audience they will, by default, want to do business with you because you have




provided them with valuable information. they know you genuinely care about

them and what they think – that goes a long way.

All of this is causing a rapid shift in the meaning of “influencer” today.

influencers used to be celebrities – those in the stardom spotlight. Now,

influence is moving to those online personalities with a large following.

Bloggers and youtube stars, etc., now have the power. All of these “modern day”

influencers have one thing in common: they listen! they don’t try to pitch or

come up with some transparent strategy to sell an audience. these influencers

care about what their community wants and says, to which they respond

accordingly and their success shows.

the most exciting part about this amazing shift is that anyone can become

an influencer. why? Because we are all capable of listening and sharing our

passions. Most times our passion becomes the brand. there has never been an

easier time to start a business or build a brand because it is so easy to figure out

what the community wants. the online tools available to us today didn’t exist

eight years ago, but today they are in abundance and many are free. the only

thing left to do is to take advantage of them.

utilizing the simple idea of listening allows your brand to realize and embrace

the fact that it’s not about you or what you want to tell the customer, but rather

about what they want. once you clearly understand what your customer wants

and make sure they get it, you are now influencing them. you have now added

them to your voluntary army of ambassadors for your brand, not because you

asked them to, or persuaded them to, but because you listened. you showed

them how much you genuinely care, and they chose to do business with you.

want to be an influencer? start listening.



Chapter 2

Gauging Influence

chooSInG ThE rIGhT InfluEncErBy: Noemi Pollack, Founder and CEO of The Pollack PR Marketing Group

Nielsen reported recently that consumers trust “real friends” and “virtual strangers”

over newspapers, tV, magazines or ads.1 this trend, coupled with the increased

value of third-party endorsements and positive word of mouth, demonstrates a

fundamental need to earn trustworthy endorsements from influencers in today’s

increasingly consumer-driven environment. the challenge for brands, however, is

not just finding an influencer – it’s finding the right influencer.

the brand influencer waters must be carefully navigated because there are risks

in engaging them. Brands should consider three important qualifications: how

much influence the influencer has, whether or not he or she influences the right

target audience and, finally, the degree to which an influencer is consistent with

the brand image. if an influencer is speaking to the wrong audience or their

personality conflicts with your brand, then trusted consumer advocacy will not

be effectively earned.

Measuring Influence

influence is a commonly used word with a very broad definition. without dissecting

the etymology of the word, suffice to say it refers to the act of compelling someone

(or a group of people) to a particular opinion or behavior. in other words, a

successful influencer would be one who can incite others into converting, whether

that means purchasing a product/service or agreeing with an idea.

http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/consumer/global-advertising-consumers-trust-real-friends-and-virtual-strangers-the-most/



CHAPTER 2 Gauging Inflluence

since influence is more than merely being heard, one must look beyond

metrics such as audience size, friends/fans/followers, website visitations and

impressions. there should certainly be a baseline expectation of a person’s

network size, but that should not be the only metric. influencers should be

weighed more in the quality of interactions they have with their audience, the

amount of responses they earn with their interactions and, perhaps most telling,

the evidence of positive conversions.

For example, looking at the number of Facebook friends is not enough. Do the

friends interact and engage with the influencer? how many comments/likes

does an influencer produce with each post? is there evidence of conversations

in which the influencer has swayed the opinions and/or behavior of audience

members? this information can be found through an influencer’s blog, through

twitter mentions and any other platform on which he or she is active.

Qualifying the Influencer’s Audience

Determining whether or not a person is influential is not enough, alone. your

brand advocate could have sway over millions of people all over the globe, but if

those people are not the right people for your brand, that influencer may as well be

shouting in a vacuum as far as you are concerned. Age-old market research tactics

can ensure that the right person is saying the right message to the right audience.

Vetting a potential influencer’s audience need not be time-extensive and costly.

one can simply research his or her online network and view their profiles. what

types of organizations do they like/follow? Do they respond in a positive way to

brand messages similar to yours? would they buy your product or be influenced

by your ideas? the influencer’s offline audience can be researched as well. what

organizations is the influencer involved with? Do their affiliations and offline




activities support or conflict with your target audience? if you had the budget,

would you pay to advertise to this influencer’s audience?

Aligning Personalities

if you are engaging an influencer to become a brand advocate, or even if you

are paying them to be, be clear that on many levels you are relinquishing

control of your brand to this person. therefore, it is paramount that the

influencer personality and the brand personality be aligned. if the influencer’s

communication style, general personality or personal opinions greatly conflict

with your brand, then you could have tremendous exposure and heightened risk

of negative word of mouth.

in essence, influencers behave as brand spokespeople – but unlike real

spokespeople, brands don’t have direct control over their message. so a brand

should be comfortable with an influencer’s voice, style and public positioning.

In a Nutshell

when actively pursuing influencers, take the time to gauge their level of

influence, as well as their target audience and public persona. when there is a

perfect match, then brand advocacy is effective and far-reaching.

1. Nielsenwire. 2009. “Global Advertising: Consumers Trust Real Friends and Virtual Strangers the Most.“ Retrieved from http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/consumer/global-advertising-consumers-trust-real-friends-and-virtual-strangers-the-most/

ManaGInG your SocIal brand and oPTIMIzInG your ScorEBy: Yael Even-Levy, PhD, Instructional Design & Technologies Manager,

PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP

social media is here to stay; it is no longer perceived as a passing trend. Many

companies are using social media both internally and externally to improve their







outreach and external reputation, and many have teams that monitor and

evaluate its impact on their corporate brand (e.g., public online identity). the

same concerns that companies have about their brand apply to individuals as

well. After all, unless you assess your efforts, how will you know if your

messaging is effective and impactful?

here we focus on you, the individual, and provide you with best practices

for measuring your influence and optimizing your social brand. All tools

mentioned here are free, and you do not need to be a social media guru or a

programmer to use them.

Utilizing Social Media Analytics

the most useful social media analysis tools go beyond number of followers,

likes or page views to validate that your messaging is working by measuring

your online influence.

the tool PeerIndex uses algorithms to measure the speed with which you

find and share content on any specific topic, and the volume of your sharing

on twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and other social media sites. it gives a total

score ranging between 0-100 based on three key components: your Authority,

Audience and Activity. if your content is re-tweeted or commented on a lot

by others, for example, your Authority score will be high. A total score of 20

is average. A score of 40 or above is high to very high. you can influence your

score by sharing more content and with greater velocity, but you have to keep it

relevant and high-value in order to get comments and re-tweets. Keep in mind

that many will not follow you if your score is low.

Another tool is Klout. it measures your influence based on your ability to drive

action on a scale of 1 to 100 by using data from twitter, Facebook, Linkedin

http//PeerIndex.com

http://klout.com/




and Foursquare. it measures how many people you influence (e.g., true reach),

how much you influence them (e.g., amplification) and how influential they

are (e.g., network score). in addition to your score, Klout provides you a score

analysis and visual graphs. Klout also offers perks and badges based on your

score. these are exclusive products, coupons, or experiences that you earn based

on your influence. Apparently, some influencers have earned perks like laptops

and airline tickets. if you’re using a Chrome browser, you can add Klout to your

twitter account and view Klout scores next to names of friends and followers.

Optimizing Your Score

improve your social media ranking by implementing three easy steps: validate,

improve and interact. when you validate, you unfollow those who do not follow

you back after a while. unfollow those with very low peer index scores and

keep your inactive friends to a minimum. use SocialBro to see who your news

followers are, and follow them back if their peer index is high or their profile is

similar to yours. Check “recent unfollows” and unfollow back if applicable.

when you are done validating, you are ready to improve your score by ensuring

that your friends with a low follow ratio are kept to a minimum. these are the

people that have very few followers. Keep your own follow ratio high so that

you’ll have more people following you than the number of people you follow. My

preference is to keep my ration as close as possible to 2:1, so for everyone i follow

i have two followers of my own.

of course, none of this matters if you aren’t interacting with your friends

and followers and saying something worthwhile! to become a social media

influencer, ask yourself why should others listen to or follow me? it all comes

down to engagement and the quality of your posts or tweets. Post only

meaningful content, reply to questions and re-tweet tweets of others. Ask

questions, and make sure to respond to posts/questions by influential and

famous users that follow you. Also, add relevant hashtags (#), participate in

trending topics, create twitter lists that focus on a specific topic. And above all,

have fun and enjoy it.

http://www.socialbro.com/




ThE ThrEE “v’S” and how you can uSE ThEM By: Sudip Chakraborty, President/Founder, Xypress LLC

Brianna Harney, Data Analyst, Xypress LLC

while analytics – the practice of extracting meaning from data – can seem

overwhelming at first, its value is immeasurable when properly used. Analytics

can help you identify key influencers among people already in your network,

reveal an understanding of the behavior patterns of the groups that these

people influence – and allow you to build your marketing plans accordingly. the

well-known “three Vs” of big data analytics (volume, velocity and variety) can

help you do all this. they provide a highly valuable framework for evaluating,

identifying and ranking influencers in the social media world.

Volume

start by capturing the volume, or quantity, of information provided by social

media users to identify influencers. the magnitude of material generated by

someone could be an indicator that this person is someone to whom others will

pay heed. For instance, with bloggers, take into consideration specific counts for

volume: how many posts they create per a certain time period, the number of

words in each of these posts and the amount of comments per post. similarly,

for twitter, capture total followers and tweets, retweets by followers and the

sum of interactions occurring with other followers. using these numbers to

measure volume will provide insight as to which users are covering the most

breadth, and could potentially be influencers due to their high volume of posts,

tweets, and/or comments.




Velocity

Volume alone, however, is not enough to determine if a user has substantial

influence with others. Consider the notion that, for example, twitter-user A has

500 tweets and user B only 200. But A completed these tweets over six months’

time and B did so in one month. therefore, A is tweeting at a rate of about 83

tweets per month compared to B’s 200 per month (a 41.5 % higher rate). this

example shows how velocity is also critical to your analysis.

Velocity is captured using rates of volume-over-time, such as the rate of blog

postings or tweets (as described above). By analyzing velocity for specific periods

over time (such as monthly over the course of six months or a year), these rates can

show whether a user’s volume production is accelerating, constant or decelerating.

Acceleration is ideal, though it’s important to keep in mind that acceleration is likely

to eventually plateau or even decrease even for the most influential users.

Finding users who have accelerated at a constant rate can help you identify ideal

influencer candidates, because these consistent users have a high likelihood of

gaining followers or commenters steadily over an extended period of time. high

velocity means new material is being produced constantly, which can translate

into a continuous increase in number of people influenced.

Variety

this final “V” is different than the previous two in the sense that higher volume

and velocity is always good but “more or less” variety is not essentially “good

or bad” – that depends on your marketing needs. For example, a potential

influencer who covers a wide variety of topics will likely impact a broader

range of people – ideal if you are planning to broaden your customer base. A

lack of variety, however, could mean the potential influencer is a specialist in a

particular area. even though that person does not cover a wide array of topics,




he/she could have extensive knowledge in one field that makes results in a

trusted source who influences others very deeply. so, when assessing the variety

of potential influencers, keep your objectives in mind to decide whether more or

less will be a greater asset to your marketing plan.

Verdict

Although this is not one of the “Vs” of data analysis, the verdict here is this:

to find influencers among people you already know you must analyze the

three “Vs” to identify social media users who have a high volume of material,

produced at a rather quick velocity and cover either a wide variety of topics or

concentrate on a topic of interest to your marketing needs. once you find those

who meet your criteria, use the framework to evaluate and rank the influencers

in a way most applicable to your goals. For your objectives, volume (or reaching

the highest number of people) may be the key priority. or, perhaps your goal

is to market to a broader customer segment, so variety is your top concern.

regardless of your preference, rate the influencers by what you feel is essential

to your marketing campaign.

After you reach your “verdict,” you will have pinpointed the influencers among

people you know, thus opening up valuable marketing opportunities.

crEaTInG your PErfEcT blEnd of InfluEncErSA summary of PR Newswire’s Targeting Influencers in the Sea of Social Media video

social media has taken the world of public relations in entirely new directions –

far beyond traditional media outreach and into new realms online. the ocean of

information and conversation gets deeper and deeper.

to navigate this sea of social media communicators need to focus on influence.

More specifically, you need to scale your brand and your brand messages to all

of the new breeds of influencers who are making waves in social media.

Who Are They? Which Ones Will Work Best for Your Brand?

experts talk about the 1-9-90 rule of social media. it’s an important way to think

about the big, medium and small fish in the sea of information and influence

known as the social sphere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBxsdo7zcaM




The Pros and Cons of Targeting Big, Medium and Small Influencers

the big influencers, the big fish – the 1s – are not hard to find. if you’ve been

targeting traditional media, you may already be on a first-name basis with some

of your biggest influencers as they have moved onto Facebook and twitter.

the social influence scorekeepers have them on their radar. But, they’re harder

to engage, because everyone wants a piece of them. And while their reach could

be in the millions, that might not get you very far. studies show that people turn

to their real friends, not the biggest influencers, when they are deciding, joining,

purchasing – in a word, actually acting on your messages.




what’s more, the risk of targeting the biggest influencers can be high if they have

negative things to say about your brand, yet the potential reward is equally high.

the 9s are easier to engage than the biggest fish, and should be more influential in

your sphere. Many of the digitally born 9s are deeply knowledgeable about what

interests the people in their networks, and their devoted audiences know it.

however, the 9s are not always easy to find. Many social media monitoring tools

can help you identify them, but a bit of data digging is also required, as you’ll

likely uncover a few false positives along the way.

the 9s are equally influential in getting their audiences to act, and not act based

on their recommendations. But this risk does not necessarily eclipse the reward!

establishing a connection with your 9s can give you access to a powerful group

of influencers – and the loyal audiences who follow them.

And what about the 90s? these small fish are really hard to identify. After all, we

are talking about real friends, and real friends of real friends.

they can be time-consuming to engage, and clearly, have a limited reach. still,

small can be very powerful. Consumers like what other consumers have to say,

and that could mean a huge opportunity for you.




to reduce your risk of wasted time, start with the most valuable and easy-to-find

90s – the most active users in your own social sphere. – and make them your

superstars. As for cultivating additional 90s out there, being visible is key. By

giving these fish food for thought through active, ongoing communication, you

can help plant the seeds to grow these relationships and your time investment.

the fish in the social media sea are not created equal, but they all have value.

in the end, your own communications strategy and objectives will help your

formulate the right mix of influencers to target.

your strategy will help you determine how to weigh the potential for quick

wins with medium influencers versus the long-term proposition of courting the

biggest influencers and how to consider the cost/benefit ratio of pursuing the

smallest fish. there are metrics and analytical tools that can help you calculate

all this and more.

Now, go fish!



Chapter 3

Engaging Influencers

ThrEE ESSEnTIal rulES for InfluEncEr EnGaGEMEnTBy: Ruth Fine, President, Social Icing, LLC

one of the first social media questions many companies ask is, “What kind of

content is appropriate to share on my social media profiles?” to answer this

question, you must first understand that one key to the success of any online

campaign is to consistently provide information that is relevant, up-to-date and

useful to your intended audience. that’s why successful online social media

campaigns follow three essential rules captured in these words: dialogue, value

and party – as in inclusion of third-party content.

Let’s discuss these three elements in detail.

1. Dialogue (vs. Monologue)

to be successful in your efforts, remember that communication is a two-way

street. to engage influencers, your social media presence should be engaging.

Posting tweets, status updates or other “monologue” communications should

be in proportion to dialogue actions such as re-tweets, mentions, shares

and comments. in other words, make sure each social channel offers multi-

dimensional communication.

if you spare effort in this area, your twitter, Facebook and Linkedin accounts

can end up falling flat and looking spammy – a quality that any online brand

manager should seriously avoid. remember, your social media channels are an

extension of your brand: make it count.



CHAPTER 3 Engaging Influencers

to start off on the right foot, consider what kind of information your subscriber

wants to know. For instance, if you’re a plastic surgeon, your audience may be

interested in makeup and other cosmetic products. in that case, you’ll want to

create your content around this topic, eventually branching out to other health

and beauty topics. if you’re an accountant, perhaps the latest financial news may

be interesting to your subscribers. once you’ve identified the type of content

that makes sense for your subscribers, it’s time to share it. this is the surprisingly

easy part. A daily tip or suggestion, a comment on a recent news headline

or even a quote of the day can be a great way to get going. start off small:

anywhere from one-to-four daily tweets, status updates or comments is all that

it takes to get your social media campaign up and running.

2. Value

the concept behind any social media campaign is to provide value for your

audience. For example, there must be an incentive for subscribers to follow or

like you online. enter blogging, coupons and specials. Just like any other major

campaign, you’ll want to map out an editorial or marketing calendar for your

online communication strategy.

For instance, if your company sells children’s items, you’ll probably want to pencil

in an online special in the months of August and september just in time for

back-to-school. or, if you’re a professional, consider offering a free consultation,

coupon or any other kind of special to your subscribers for liking your Facebook

page or for following you on twitter. there is always something you can offer to

your audience that adds value.

Blog on relevant information that your audience will find useful. Keep current in

your industry and let people know what’s happening in your world. Adding your

spin or slice of advice to a hot topic in your industry not only creates authority,




but it adds value to the subscriber who is already interested in what you have

to say. And, hosting the blog on your website can also boost your website

performance in terms of search engine optimization (seo). you never know who

will discover your blog post and become your latest customer or client.

3. Inclusion of third-party content

No subscriber wants to be bombarded with constant commercial messages

from your brand – that’s one reason why it’s essential to include third-party

content as part of your communication strategy. third-party content refers to

articles, news stories, photos, videos or other multimedia sourced from websites

that do not belong to you.

For example, sharing a relevant article from the wall street Journal or the New

york times – or any news source for that matter – is a great way to include

third-party content on your social media platforms. Not only will you retain

your existing audience, but your chances of growing your influence – and your

audience – also increase significantly. Pepper in an occasional article or video

and you’ll create the type of social media profile that subscribers look forward to

joining, in addition to upping your influencer engagement.

5 wayS To buIld STronG bondS wITh SocIal MEdIa InfluEncErS By: Margot Heiligman, Director of Solution Management, SAP

Five years ago, my role at sAP was business influencer marketing. we had a

three-pronged approach that worked soundly:

1. iDeNtiFy the influencers who are involved in “deals”

2. eNgAge influencers in engagement models which produce a two-way-

street relationship

3. LeVerAge influencers into marketing programs




this approach is still valid today, however, the opportunity that social media

influence brings extends beyond marketing. today, social media monitoring

enables us to identify influencers on a topic, brand or product. it also provides

sales, marketing and service professionals ways to segment social engagement

into selling, marketing and serving actions, respectively.

Sales – which influencer is the right person to support a prospect’s question

in a pre-sales scenario? An example: we had a prospect find us on twitter and

ask if we knew of a reference customer who had the same needs and use of

our solution. A customer-influencer was perfectly suited to contribute in this

scenario, and we brought him into the conversation.

Marketing – An influencer who blogs and promotes content to a wide following

may be your best marketing influencer.

Customer Service – An influencer who is using your product and monitoring

for questions/issues may be the best to advocate and support you in an online

community. there are numerous examples of companies who do this very

well – such as giffgaff, the uK-based telecommunications company. giffgaff’s

influencers handle nearly 100% of customer questions.

we engage with social-impact influencers and look (on a real time basis)

at which social channel conversations represent sales opportunities, which

constitute marketing content, nurturing, or offers and which represent

topics around customer service – such as product use questions or issues.

At sAP, we have deployed solutions to enable social selling – including sAP

Sales OnDemand – in order to bring collaborative selling to our own internal

“sales warriors.” to monitor for influencers and to engage customers who are

having conversations about using our solutions, we use SAP Social Customer

Engagement OnDemand. we are monitoring the conversations taking place and

benchmarking the way social influencers can have an impact.

often, conversations around “finding” social media friendly influencers that

business customers or digital customers value segue into deciding which online

tools – like Klout or Kred – should be used to measure an influencer’s impact.

individuals such as Pr professionals, influencers, customers, prospects, marketers

and call center agents all play an influential role – they are creating conversations

and seeking thought leadership around your products and services.

http://www.giffgaff.com

http://sales.ondemand.com

http://www.sap.com/solutions/technology/cloud/social-customer-engagement-ondemand/index.epx

http://www.sap.com/solutions/technology/cloud/social-customer-engagement-ondemand/index.epx

http://www.klout.com

http://www.kred.com




so how do you build a lasting engagement with the right social media-friendly

business influencers relevant for your business customers today?

1. Participate in the trending topics – Check out google trends or

HashtagBattle to ensure that your topic has a voice in the social web and

that you sit squarely in the center of it with those who hold court there.

2. Personalize – Ask yourself if the influencer content you are sharing is of

value to your customer. An influencer can be a customer, a social network,

an association, a news site and more. if their words are relevant and of

value to your customers – share.

3. Engage proactively – Follow the social thought leaders’ tweets and rss

their blogs; use (at a minimum) google Alerts or other social media

management tools to find relevancy and share insights.

4. Show that you are human – Don’t be afraid to add your initials or name

to tweets or social messages to influencers. Acknowledge mistakes and

correct them. Pick up the phone if you’ve built enough of a rapport.

Follow through.

5. Take the high road – Know that how you engage with influencers and

customers will define your reputation. Be trustworthy, and an exemplar

of openness.

Foster two-way-street relationships with socially engaged influencers. Do your

homework, using social tools to identify influencers who cover various segments.

include influencers who are cross-topic and multichannel so that customers can

find them. Be sure to understand the strengths of the influencer: will they assist

in your sales approach? will they promote your products, solutions and services of

value to their followers? which influencers like to provide helpful tips, training or

answers to inquiries about your products?

http://www.hashtagbattle.com




Monitor, listen, moderate and foster engagement. enable your cadre of social

influencers to participate in your social sales, social media marketing and social

customer service opportunities. And you’ll be ready to identify, engage and leverage

the next key social influencer who speaks to, and benefits, your customers.

10 STraTEGIES for ulTIMaTE InfluEncEr EnGaGEMEnTBy: Steph Russell, Online Marketing Strategist, Pulled

having a blog, whether it’s your main site or a complement, is a crucial part of

your online marketing to build relationships with your influencers and your

customers. in particular, it’s important that you play up your blog to your

influencers, who stand to make a big impact for you and spread the word about

your content to their loyal listeners.

By building a strategy around your blog to encourage and reward your

influencer’s engagement beyond basic content, you can begin to reap greater

brand recognition and build stronger relationships with your influencers.

10 Actionable Strategies for “Ultimate Influencer Engagement”

1. Blog or Forum Moderators

Find the influencers who are most active in your blog

comments or forum and invite them to moderate. they’ll help

get conversations started.

2. Guest Posts

if you know who your influencers are, offer them the chance to

guest post. you and your influencer will both walk away with

some great exposure and a new relationship.




3. Private Members or Press Area

establish a private member area within your blog where

influencers can be the first to read new content, recent press

releases, hear about news before everyone else, look at new

products or even vote on the new products they like the most

and want to see featured.

4. Hire Them

influencers usually know a good amount about your brand

or the industry/category that your brand falls into, so much

so that they are capable of making a big impact. in some

instances they may know more than you do. these are the

influencers that you want to be a part of your team … hire

them!

5. Opinions

everyone has an opinion. if you find an influencer who

expresses an opinion about your product, acknowledge it

on your blog. even a bad opinion can often be made right by

addressing the influencers’ issue.

6. Photo spread

what better way to show off how great your product is than

by featuring its influencers? Do a photo spread on your blog of

influencers who are loyal fans using your product.

7. Product recommenders

use your blog as a means to find, write about and recommend

similar products and services in your industry. Put together a

team of product recommenders made up of your influencers.

8. Testimonials

if you know that an influencer is a user of your product, ask

for a testimonial from them. or better yet, ask everyone to

contribute reasons why they love your product and then

select a small number of your biggest influencers as feature

testimonials on your blog or website.




9. Blog columns

send a special invite to an influencer and invite them to have

their own column on your blog.

10. Host an Event

every one loves a party! hosting a physical event for your biggest

influencers is actually a fabulous way to show your appreciation,

showcase new products, take part in seminars and network at

the same time.

these are only some of the many strategies you could use to build relationships and

engage with your top influencers. Above all, the relationship and trust you build

with your influencers is what will ultimately keep them talking about your brand.

how NOT To PITch a SocIal InfluEncEr By Howard Greenstein, President, Harbrooke Group, Inc

i’m not really an influencer in my daily life, but i play one on the internet. As a

blogger for over 10 years with a solid following on twitter and a regular column

in a well-respected online site of a business magazine, i reach an audience

companies like to target.

i’ve also been on the blogger outreach side, trying to make friends and influence

people to get coverage for my own clients. while i have your attention and can

influence you a little bit, here’s a few rules on how NOT to pitch me and a few of

my influential friends.

HOW NOT TO PITCH RULE #1: Ignore My Content and Audience

i write a column for start-ups. it says so on the column masthead. At least once

a day i get a pitch from a company who wants me to cover a large enterprise




tool, a solution for “sMBs with 100-500 employees,” or a 27-year-old firm. if you

can’t be bothered to look at what your outreach target covers and what their

audience cares about, your outreach target probably won’t bother to reply.

Automated tools and lists are great, and they can really help give you guidance

and direction for an outreach target list. But once you’ve gotten that list, go to

the urLs, read the content and confirm that you have the right person. i do that

for every outreach campaign i work on. Does it shrink the list? yes. would i do it

any other way? No way.

According to Melanie Notkin, founder and president of Savvy Auntie, the lifestyle

brand designed for cool aunts, great-aunts, godmothers and all women who

love kids, “the most common DoA error a publicist makes is referring to my

brand as something mom-related, or pitching why moms will love the product

or service. savvy Auntie is the lifestyle brand designed for the nearly 50 percent

of Americans who are not (yet) mothers but love the children in their lives. the

fact that the publicist did not care enough to learn what my brand is makes the

decision to not spend time caring about his or her client’s brand pretty easy.”

By the way, Melanie’s influence creds include being a “top 100 Most Powerful

woman on twitter” and at the time of this interview, having over 80,000

Facebook fans.

HOW NOT TO PITCH RULE #2: Assume I Will Do What You Ask, The Way You Ask, When You Want It Done

stefanie Michaels, Ceo of Adventure girl holdings, inc. (known to her 1.5 million

twitter followers as @AdventureGirl), targets an audience that is all things

lifestyle, with a heavy lean on travel. she points out that, “Pr people assume

that you will automatically tweet, share, write about their clients.” what’s the

worst pitch she’s ever received? “i had a company send me a press release with

the tweet they want out there (complete with hashtag) in their header, then

throughout the content. it’s like begging, a sign of desperation and a total

turnoff. we finally have our own voice to use as individuals, so don’t put words

in our mouths – let us use the content you send out, and come up with our own

way to say it. that is, if we even want to, after a pitch like that.”

http://savvyauntie.com/

https://twitter.com/AdventureGirl




Notkin adds, “Any pitch that is not actually editorial but promotional and

expects me as a publisher to do it free of charge is a bad pitch. when those

pitches come from billion-dollar businesses, they are among the worst. why

would i spend time promoting a brand’s sweepstakes free of charge? i am a

publisher first, editor second. i did not build a highly targeted and influential

audience of PANKs® (Professional Aunts No Kids) with discretionary income

and time relative to moms, to promote products and services free of charge –

especially when there is no editorial connection between the product and my

audience. with the exception of toys, i do not assign writers to write content

about random products for sale.”

HOW NOT TO PITCH RULE #3: Build Influence Not Relationships

the best pitches come to me from communications professionals and company

leaders who have created relationships with me because they know they’re

providing value to my audience – not feeding me stories. they don’t seek to

influence as much as to enlighten. the content they pitch relates to the things

start-ups need to know to improve. that makes them valuable allies, not

influence peddlers.

Notkin’s take on this: “influence is about relationships. Brands are about

promise. the two work seamlessly well together. invest in the equilibrium and

the world will go ‘round.” As Michaels notes about the way she communicates

online, “stop ‘seeking to influence’ – just be honest in your thoughts and what

you like, and share as if you’re talking to a friend, find your passion and have

your own voice. After all, (and thanks to my heroes – the founders of twitter), we

have one, so use it. For companies: be real people, not machines, listen to your

consumer, respond and don’t be afraid to misstep, that makes you human.”




TwITTEr aS a luxury MarkETInG Tool To rEach InfluEncErS

By: Megan Sterritt, KWE Partners, Principal & Director of Account Services

with continuous discussions of a sluggish us economy in 2011 and media

portrayal of Mexico as an unsafe destination for travelers, Mexico’s tourism

industry suffered a blow. the luxury sector was hit especially hard as many

consumers found it difficult to justify nonessential travel.

After developing a “personalized luxury” marketing concept and a series of mini

indulgences, Marquis Los Cabos resort in Mexico, recipient of the AAA Four

Diamond and member of Leading hotels of the world, and Kwe Partners, the

resort’s agency of record, needed to successfully launch the campaign, designed

to appeal the importance of value to the wealthy.

Harnessing the “know, like, trust” of industry social media influencers plays an

integral part in launching campaigns and disseminating news to consumers.

one of the main objectives of any campaign is to reinforce the resort’s luxury

image. this reinforcement is vital to the continued success of a luxury brand.

support for this luxury image can be garnered from partnering with other

brands of a similar cachet as well as tapping into individual influencers. twitter

users tend to skew towards educated, upper income individuals, the very groups

that luxury brands intend to entice. it is important to target these individuals,

and essentially go where customers are. in today’s social-media world,

leveraging the current twitter craze was essential in order to kick-start social

media buzz about Marquis Los Cabos’ personalized luxury approach, as well as

its new mini-indulgences concept. Another main objective to the team was to

increase the number of individuals following Marquis Los Cabos in advance of

scheduled twitter flash sales. Finally, the team needed to focus on shedding a

positive light on Mexican luxury tourism, cognizant that a large part of Marquis




Los Cabos’ success relies on the strengthening of Mexico’s reputation as a safe

destination among social media influencers in the travel industry.

So what did KWE Partners do for their client, Marquis Los Cabos, in order to achieve the aforementioned goals?

• initiated an international ‘tweet up’ event for travelers’ Night in (#tNi)

– a fast-paced tweetchat of travel experts and avid travelers. the

community responds to the questions, sharing experiences, ideas and

new strategies.

• themed the event as a “Mini-indulgences” remote #tNi weekend at

Marquis Los Cabos, inviting top twitter influencers with large followings

to give the event maximum credibility and create a compelling reason for

#tNi participants to be particularly drawn to that week’s #tNi

• Created a series of events for influencers to generate more coverage and

highlight the hotel’s different indulgences. events ranged from private

shopping tour of sponsor Luxury Avenue Los Cabos and treatments

from the mini spa indulgence menu to a fine leather passport cover

from sponsor hartmann luggage. A sample of the resort’s famed $1,000

tequilas Premium Clase Azul tequila popsicle with gold flakes, considered

the world’s most expensive tequila pop (a Kwe “invention”) was delivered

during #tNi to maximize impressions

• secured other luxury brands as co-sponsors, to benefit from their halo

and contribute to added chat content – Virgin America, hartmann

Luggage, Luxury Avenue Los Cabos

• Built twitter buzz before and during the #tNi by

» encouraged tweetup participants to tweet about their excitement

about visiting the resort before the event

» encouraged participants to post images of the resort and its

amenities before and after the event to keep buzz levels up

• Formulated 10 #tNi questions for tweeting travelers around the globe,

including:

» Favorite hotel amenity

» Most impressive hotel service




» Fantasy travel experiences

• steered #tNi discussions around the topic that Mexico as a safe and

family-friendly vacation destination and Marquis Los Cabos as the

premier resort for affordable indulgences

• Created industry research/intelligent Pr angles for print media after the

tweetup to generate offline media coverage

overall, the #tNi tweetup was a great success! During the #tNi tweetup, over 14

million impressions were cast, corresponding to 1.4 million+ unique impressions,

a record-breaking number for the #tNi tweetup. Close to 4,500 tweets were sent

during the 90 minute event. this reinforced Marquis Los Cabos’ luxury brand, and

generated positive social media buzz surrounding the resort, as well as successfully

launched the resort’s customized luxury marketing program. Capitalizing on

twitter influencers reach, and luxury brands’ cache proved to be an effective way to

strengthen Mexico’s reputation as a safe and family-friendly destination.

ThE convErSaTIon IS ThE PlaTforM By: Christy Belden, VP of Media + Marketing, LeapFrog Interactive

in the digital space, if a conversation can be had, a social media platform

exists. As marketers, we need to be a part of the conversation to help facilitate

brand engagement. Capturing where and when these conservations take place

is a challenge.

Determining a social media platform is a crucial step in developing your social

media strategy. Facebook has moved from a college-only platform to one you

could almost call “mass (social) media.” this may work for some brands, but the

cost of entry into Facebook is getting higher and higher, with a need for more




resources and content. yet having only a Facebook presence may not be the right

social media strategy for your brand.

social media platforms such as Pinterest and Path are having success among

social media users because they offer a different experience than Facebook. even

twitter, which traditionally has taken a backseat to Facebook, is experiencing

more rapid growth of late.

what this tells us is that consumers are looking for a multitude of online

experiences. Creating a social media strategy around a single platform will likely

alienate customers, miss customers or not engage with them in the way they

want. worse, it will do all of the above. A multi-channel social media platform

strategy will help create meaningful engagement points with consumers and

lead to greater roi.

with the many conversations occurring, assessing the effectiveness of social

media platforms at reaching your target audience can direct you to maximize

your efforts. in choosing your social media platforms, the following questions

will help you determine which are best for your brand.

What are the business goals you want to accomplish by using social media?

it must be a priority to understand why you are engaging in the social media

space. social media is valued as low cost or even free. however, there are a

considerable amount of hours and resources involved in effectively executing

a social media strategy. Many companies have chased trending, “hot” social

media platforms without a clear understanding of their expectations from the

engagement. thus, when the platform does not perform the channel is deemed

unworthy. understanding the business’ goals for social media will help steer you

in determining the right platforms.




Who is your audience and where do they “live” in social media?

understanding who your audience is, and where they are currently engaged

online will impact your social media platform selection. if you want to reach

Millennials, twitter may be the platform to use. women 55+ are the largest

growing segment on Facebook, whereas women 18-34 dominate activity on

Pinterest. Video sharing platforms such as youtube, Metacafe or Vimeo are good

sources for reaching the ever-elusive male 18-34 audience. Linkedin is good for

reaching B2B. whatever your target audience, understanding where they are in

the social media space will dictate social media platform adoption.

What type of content does your audience respond to?

social media allows a plethora of content types to be distributed and

consumed by audiences. Content types can vary from a white paper to a

blog to a 140-character tweet, or from a picture to an infographic to a video.

understanding the content affinity of your target audiences will help you

navigate the social media waters.

Which platforms can support your content needs?

upon review of what types of content your audience is engaging with, a review of

the capabilities of the platforms is a must. if your audience values video, a platform

like twitter would not be the best option. if you have fans who are heavily invested

in the brand and discuss the brand at length, then a forum may be the best

option to house those in-depth conversations. social media platforms cannot be

everything to everyone so choose the best one to fit the expected content.

What are your resource capabilities?

An honest assessment of the skill set and time it will take to execute on your social

media platform is important. some platforms allow you to schedule content. if

you are pushing out a significant amount of content, then this may help manage

the flow. other platforms are image-heavy and require photography and creative

assets. writing needs also will vary depending upon the platform. in addition, staff

or a third-party vendor should understand the platform and the appropriate ways




to interact with customers on it. For example, it is commonplace to use hashtags

on twitter but not appropriate in Facebook.

What is your burden of proof?

some social media platforms have evolved to include proprietary analytics,

whereas others do not offer, or have very limited, analytics insight. if your

organization is data driven, this may drive which social media platform is

adopted. understanding what the platform can provide ahead of time will go a

long way to determine the success of the social media strategy.

if you are fortunate and have a big enough staff or outside vendor to assist you,

then you have the capabilities to be in the “Big 4 Networks” (Facebook, twitter,

google+, Linkedin) and even extend outside into niche platforms. however,

companies with limited resources may be forced to choose fewer platforms.

Analysis and planning of your needs will lead you down the correct path.

these questions should not appear new. they are similar to, if not the same

as, the questions traditional media has been asking for many years. traditional

media buyers and planners have had to select from different radio stations, tV

outlets and various print publications. it is the same process in selecting social

media platforms. we must tackle social media with the same due diligence we

apply to traditional media.

A social media platform exists for every audience. A true analysis, using the

criteria above, will help you determine your needs and allow you to make the

best decision for your business.



Chapter 4

Turning Influence Into Brand Advocacy

how To MakE an InfluEncEr wanT To SInG your TunEBy Anne-Marie Kovacs, Principal, BOOMbox Network

here’s the must-ask question if you are going to work – successfully – with

influential bloggers: “What’s in it for the Influencer?”

Bloggers, once seen as media pioneers, vocal consumers, freelancers and

experimenters are now media darlings, valuable influencers and thought

leaders. But even with their new position as “influencers,” bloggers (unlike

traditionally paid journalists) don’t have a research team or other infrastructure

to support them. And, until they get to the magic page view volumes that

generate advertising revenue, most are not paid for the writing that earned

them their influence and loyal followership. they depend on their own ingenuity,

time, objectivity, opinions and passions to get a story published. that is what

creates the authenticity their readers love and trust. this is the environment that

a top brand wants to be a part of.

My Recommendations for Engaging with Such Influential Bloggers

Make it personal: you’ve read a lot about this already. ironically, even in the

age of twitter and tumblr, you want to go the old-fashioned route. it’s about

relationship building. this means, no more generic blanket emails. it means

doing your homework to know who you are talking to and why. it means picking

up the phone or setting up a meeting and talking live. unless you care enough to

take the time to reach out to these influencers directly and in a personal manner,

why should they care to talk about your brand?



CHAPTER 4 Turning Influence Into Brand Advocacy

Make it worth their time – monetize the relationship: offer paid compensation.

standard rates now range from $25 to $150 per blog post. the most valuable

bloggers will not accept anything below $100. Anything less is not worth the

time, research and care it takes to compose a quality, relevant and appropriate

blog post. (Note on samples: that “room freshener” sample is research material,

not compensation! unless the product or service has a high retail price point

($150 and above), consider free samples as perks at best.)

Make them feel privileged: Create opportunities for your selected influencers

to be the first to know – about new products, new features, new anything!

Consider ViP-type events. these can be a very successful way to introduce

influencers to your brand AND provide them with a meaningful experience, a

unique brand story to tell and remember.

Make it long-term: take the time to build the relationship and maintain it on a

long-term basis. if this influencer was important enough for that one post you

needed, you’ll want to maintain that relationship for all your future updates,

news and launches.

Make it easy: that means providing as much background information as

possible to save influencers hours of research and ensuring that they will have

the correct info and data. Make it easy to read, easy to find and relevant.

Make it reciprocal: you want influencers to promote something of yours? they’re

in business, too. how can you help promote them, help them build their network

and business reputation? that is mutual value and it provides more incentive

for influencers to want to work with you. But, you must first understand

their professional goals. Consider your best influencers as spokespersons or

ambassadors.

Make them your eyes and ears: influencers have their ears to the ground and

their fingers on the pulse of their own areas of specialty. you’re paying many




thousands of dollars to research your customers, so throwing a few questions

to your ambassadors is a really inexpensive way to get information and insight.

hire them to collaborate on market research or in developing customer-facing

projects or events.

we are in a communications era where messages spread by influencers hold a

resonance and credibility that traditional advertising does not. And, depending

on the channel, these messages will have long tails and a long shelf life. in fact,

a blog post lovingly dedicated to your brand or product may have a perennial

online presence. with the simple steps mentioned above, you can create

goodwill and encourage your chosen influencers to be enthusiastic and eager to

sing your brand’s praises.

TurnInG InfluEncErS InTo your brand’S voIcEBy: Tom Bishop, Director of Marketing and Communications,

KnowledgeVision Systems, Inc.

After several months of experimenting with social media and learning the best

practices, you’re finally doing everything right on your brand’s social pages.

you’re posting regular updates and videos, creating conversations and gaining

followers. your audience is full of influential people who share your posts and

help your social presence expand. you’re a social leader, the kind we’re all trying

to emulate. Congratulations! you’re ready for the next step: driving revenue.

unfortunately, this is the step where most brands stumble.

the problem at this stage goes beyond the fact that social media is different

than every other trackable marketing activity you can pursue. it’s that the

difference is both subtle and profound and, therefore, difficult to grasp and

implement. in social media, natural behavior is paramount. this changes

everything about your marketing approach. Let me break it down this way:




• with most branding avenues, you are trying to use an activity to drive a

specific behavior.

• with social media, you use natural behavior to drive buying activity.

Let’s say you sell backpacks. when i buy a backpack, i actively search, study and

explore the options available to me, using whatever resources i can find. Most

of those resources are created by the brands themselves, and they are designed

to funnel my research activity toward a purchase by creating a specific path that

ends at their shopping cart.

But on a social platform, where i have been talking about backpacks with others,

i might receive a shared link from a friend who is a fan of your brand. it is my

choice whether to check out the link. in this case you are not driving my friend’s

behavior or mine; you are offering a resource (the link my friend is sharing) that

meets the needs of our current natural behavior.

so my friend is your influencer, and what you’re trying to do is turn his natural

sharing behavior into my activity path. thus the first profound difference in

social media is that influencers are not necessarily the targeted customers.

instead of trying to sell, you’re trying to lower the threshold and sweeten the

incentive for my friend to share your link with me.

since you’re doing everything right, you already know my friend is an influencer

and you now know that he’s shared a link with me. how can you encourage him

to keep influencing, and me to convert to a customer?

Let’s Establish a Few Ground Rules

1. the influencer is not necessarily the customer. this means you must

appeal to the differing needs of two people, not just one.

2. it is easier to keep an existing customer than gain a new one. this means

my friend may need less of an incentive than i will.




3. on a social platform, i’m not actively seeking to buy, but i am following

up on my friend’s share because it’s in the moment.

4. your goal is not to make a sale today, it’s to make me an influencer.

that’s right, the goal on a social network is to attract me to your brand through

my influencers. it is widely believed that the reason display advertisements on

social platforms don’t work very well is that the behavior is different: shopping is

active, while social networking is passive. As a brand, you’re best approach is to

get noticed by me, by appealing to my friends for a little help.

Key Ways to Use Natural Social Behavior to Drive Activity

Gamification Rewards

game rewards are not about discounts or giveaways; they

appeal to a user’s interest in raising his own credibility.

influencers are influencers because they like to be needed,

so give my friend points or let him unlock levels the more he

shares your posts. you can highlight people who reach certain

levels on your own page. you can share their photos, posts and

comments. they can unlock and post icons that indicate they

have expert knowledge of your product.

Team Programs

unlike “refer-A-Friend” campaigns, where you reward

influencers who send you names you will manage in a central

database, a team system lets your influencers manage their

own referrals. social media is all about giving the users control,

so encouraging them to build and lead a team is perfect for

social platforms. Many charity organizations manage their

fundraising events this way, and if you think about it, they are

at the forefront of using influential supporters to generate

interest using the team model.




Exclusive Memberships

enable certain people to become part of exclusive programs,

where you use email to send them updates about your

company, pre-release software, advance promotions and

event passes. Communications to these people are not about

discounts, since the primary draw is how good it feels to be an

influencer. the goal is to invite them to get their friends into

the member group so they can become insiders too.

Discount Programs

Stay away. i mean it. Discounts are great for shoppers who have

actively searched and are nearing the end of the sale process,

but need a nudge to click “Confirm Purchase.” with social

media, you are spreading the word about the value of your

brand and inviting people to be associated with it. that brand

association is meant to last; discounts are best for driving a

single sale, not a long-term relationship.

Brand Advocates (a.k.a. Rock Stars)

this kind of program is for very special people who are influential

beyond the realm of social media. these are people who regularly

blog, speak at events and conferences and entertain. the model

here is that you are sponsoring them in return for touting your

brand in the popular venues they operate in. For sponsored

advocates, it often means giving them free or deeply discounted

products and services. Above, i mentioned staying away from

discounts – and i still mean it. so these should be people who are

already deeply committed fans of your brand, and who meet a

certain threshold of popularity. they are the people everyone in

your industry has heard of and respects.

the guiding principle behind all of the above is that the purpose of influencers is

to bring more people to your brand, and the point of making people influencers

is to raise the likelihood of a sale when the opportunity arises. who is more likely

to buy from you when they decide to actively make a purchase? those who have




never heard of you, those whose friends told them about you or those who have

created a relationship with you?

social media contains a massive population of people who have freely given a

lot of information to businesses, whether they like it or not; 900 million people

are on Facebook alone. you can’t communicate your brand’s value to all of them

without a lot of help. Finding influencers and appealing to them is not only a

great way to build your brand on the web today; it’s the only way.

buIldInG a SocIal MEdIa & MarkETInG STraTEGy for InfluEncEr EnGaGEMEnTBy: Lee Anne Forbes, Marketing Manager, Micro Strategies

once you have identified your targeted group(s) of influencers, it’s time to roll

out your message-delivery platforms, messaging, mechanisms and timelines –

in other words, a marketing plan for each new campaign or event. you may have

defined several groups or types of influencers and they may each require a

different set of messages, timing and platforms.

For example, if your influencer is an it coder – let’s call him Fred – and you want

to let Fred know that your company has just released code updates, there are

multiple ways to get your message out to him and encourage him to share it.

you may even release the code to Fred ahead of time, if he promises to test it and

blog and tweet about his experience with it, and the benefits he has found. you

can have a whole group of “Freds” do the same thing.

Strategic Outreach

outreach can include email to Fred; you can post to the blogs that he reads, you

can tweet to the accounts that he follows, you can update your website, Linkedin

and Facebook pages. you can even deliver location-based marketing (LBM)

incentives for Fred to share the fact that the new code has been released. you can

re-tweet within reason and rework the messaging on various platforms to make




sure Fred (and the like band of merry men and women) has gotten the message.

you can invite Fred via Facebook and Linkedin and emails and your website to an

onsite “New Code release Demo event” and use an LBM tool like Foursquare to

incent Fred and friends to tweet their location and activities while at your event.

you can highlight customers who contributed to the new release. highlight

them on your blog, in press releases, on your website and in your tweets.

“ABC Company wishes to thank Fred from DeFg Company for his insightful

suggestions that helped shape our latest code release.”

Just as traditional marketing communications programs rely on more than

one platform to reach audiences and deliver the correct messaging multiple

times, so too the social media strategy you employ should incorporate a variety

of message structures and platforms. you will note over time which platforms

your favored users frequent and on which ones they “lurk.” speak to the users

and the lurkers and incent them to add their voices. the users may engage in

conversation with you, the lurkers may not.

youtube provides a great way to showcase Fred and the group at your demo

event, testing the code and sharing snippets of their excitement about the new

release. the video link can be tweeted, blogged, put on websites – and so on.

the possibilities for engaging your influencers and encouraging them to spread

the word are endless. All you need is some newsworthy activities and an

ongoing, evolving plan!




ThE cadEncE of InfluEncE By: Vatsala Isaac, Independent Marketing Consultant

recently, i’ve become something of a masochist. i get thrashed every weekend

– on the squash court, by my husband. New to the game, i struggle to keep pace

with my uber-competitive instructor. the advice flows fast and free, until it

reaches a deafening crescendo of the phrases, “steal the t, be the t, return to the

t.” For the uninitiated, the ‘t’ is at the center of a squash court, formed by the

half-court line meeting the short line. Allow me to illustrate:

Always the first to mix work with play, i notice an interesting parallel between

managing social media influencers and the delicate equation that is two

players in a confined space fighting for the attention of an agitated, beady-eyed

squash ball. what players do in this t-zone is similar to how competing brands

currently engage with an influencer, which too often is more about a mad bid

for attention than a considered strategy. Jostling for space to coexist, aiming

for the attention of the same pair of beady eyes, trying to learn the best time to




strike, hoping like hell that you’ve packed enough punch into your shot and that

the ball will return for more, not fizzle out after it dings the tin … sound painfully

familiar?

Let’s put our rackets down and discuss my four-point squash strategy for

engaging with influencers.

1. Location, location, location: “stealing the t” in squash means staying front

and center, at the receiving end of all the action. staying in the eye of the

storm allows a player with average-sized limbs to volley by stretching and

spinning around the court. At any point in the game, you are as close as

you can get to the ball. the moral for social media influence? once you’ve

decided on the influencers you want to target, shadow them at all times,

staying close enough to strike – comment, retweet, post – at a moment’s

notice. the nimble nature of the squash game closely resembles today’s

business ecosystem, where reacting instantly to key events is critical. to

empower yourself to do so, you’ve got to be there, when and where the

action is … and to do that, you’ve got to steal the t!

2. It don’t mean a thing, if it ain’t got that swing: the incredible Khans are

synonymous with the game of squash, and their advice to beginners is

simple: keep your eye on the ball and practice hitting it as hard as you

can. Do this for an hour every day, till you can feel the lactic acid build

up in your arm. in social media, influencers love a hard-hitting piece

of communication: flamboyant yet backed by substance. in Tamar

Weinberg’s interview series about what gets the attention of the who’s

who of influencers, the responses don’t come as a surprise: do something

epic, do something interesting, provide information that is relevant and

useful to the influencer and keep doing it, be differentiated, make noise,

amaze us… the list goes on, but you get the point.

http://www.squashsite.co.uk/squash_tips.htm

http://www.squashsite.co.uk/squash_tips.htm

www.techipedia.com/2010/influencer-attention/






3. The winner’s standing tall: As a newbie at squash, i’m often frustrated by

how much running i do – and how little my husband does. i’ve even been

called an “average workout!” turns out, the better you get at squash the

more you learn to control the ball’s pace and direction.

McKinsey, in a report outlining the consumer decision journey, shows

how pull marketing trumps push in a world of empowered consumers.

when targeting influencers, the easy way out is to spoonfeed them the

information you’d like covered. resist. influencers are inherent news junkies

and love the thrill of a chase. A case in point: Le Perrier did a a great job of

building multiple return customer visits into their strategy in the Le Club

Perrier video (which was ranked No.1 among videos tweeted not long

after it launched). the video introduces users to a club scene – and gets

raunchier the more you share it. Just the thought of it now and i need a

cool sip of bubbly water … oh! i see how this all worked out for Perrier!

4. Influence, not interference: oftentimes, dominating the entire squash

court and getting in the way of your opponent’s shot is mistaken for

stealing the t. this could injure you and your opponent. the truth

remains that there is a time for each shot of publicity as much as there

is a place. Monitoring your opponent’s moves like a hawk lets you

watch his shot, time your own strike, and position yourself right before

you reach for the ball. so it is with targeting an influencer who is at

the receiving end of multiple calls to action. sure, your campaign may

need to adhere to an editorial calendar. But if your fiercest competitor

has just announced a groundbreaking product, don’t interfere unless

you can concretely add to the conversation. or vice-versa, in the case

of the arrival of the iPhone 5. when news of an upcoming release on

september 12 got out, Nokia, Motorola, samsung and Amazon made

sure their own announcements came out a week in advance!

timing your communication, and accenting it right is key to engaging with

influencers. it really is a mating dance. And god knows, there isn’t a dance

without a cadence!

http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_consumer_decision_journey_2373



Chapter 5

Measuring Influence & Maintaining Relationships

MEaSurEMEnTS ThaT MaTTEr By Jared Hendler – Executive Vice President, Global Director Digital & Creative, MWW

Measurement is hardly a new concept. we’ve been measuring our progress since

the dawn of time, when cavemen hunched over their latest kills, comparing who

brought down the biggest mammoth. everyone inherently understands the

value of measurement, but not everyone has the training to do it effectively,

particularly when it comes to social influencer programs.

what follows is a brief overview of what measurements truly matter in your

influencer programs, and how you can turn those metrics into actionable,

sustainable engagement that provides long-term value to your brand.

Analyzing Outcomes

in order to assess where you are, you have to know where you were aiming to

be. At this chapter in the book, you’ve already defined your strategy and moved

forward in the planning phases of your engagement process. you should have

defined relevant, actionable and measurable objectives.

Key to the measurement process is ensuring you have planned for outcomes

relevant to your efforts. And that means aligning the outcomes you’re looking

to achieve with some sort of action, whether it is driving a purchase, increasing

web traffic or getting more individuals to recommend your brand to a friend.

Let’s be clear. Making a comment on a blog post is not an outcome – it is an

output. Contacting 50 mommy bloggers is not an outcome – it is outreach. the



CHAPTER 5 Measuring Influence & Maintaining Relationships

outcome is what these efforts produced for you. how your efforts took today’s

situation and brought you closer to where you want to be.

What to Measure, and the Tools to Do It

there are many metrics to measure ranging from industry relevance to media

volume, reach and sentiment as well as a lot of tools to consider – but no ready-

made tool is a silver bullet. here are a few we use and recommend:

• TRAACKR: use it to understand if your influencers are relevant and

identify new influencers in order to conduct additional outreach. we use

trAACKr to find noteworthy individuals in almost any industry, including

very niche markets. At Mww, we’ve used trAACKr to compile influencer

research related to even the most granular of topics – do-it-yourself

home improvement, solar panels, immigration reform, you name it.

we’re often asked to keep track of influencers in particular industries –

sometimes as many as 50 at a time. trAACKr can not only help you with

the quantitative monitoring; it can lead you in the right direction to make

qualitative decisions for your brand’s engagement strategy.

• NetBase: we employ its semantic analysis capabilities to derive purchase

intent and primary brand perceptions – offering the opportunity to

benchmark and evaluate your efforts on these key points when required.

• Build your own: No campaign is exactly the same and no measurement

approach covers every situation. At Mww, we help brands increase their

relevance – but we felt that no tool explicitly measured this relevance

for us. so we developed our own tool, Netrelevance, to answer the

fundamental question: did we help our client matter more? in other

words, have we helped them create and maintain relevance? to measure

the relevance of a client, campaign, or message, our algorithms account

for the breadth, depth, and intensity of dialogue. Netrelevance helps

us not only understand who shaped the conversation (a top-tier news

outlet vs. a twitter influencer), but also how the conversation – and the

relevance of the brand – changes. with your own analytics tool, you can

analyze industry insights in ways that other tools may not allow. For

example, we recently used Netrelevance to examine the differences in

how consumers watch video content on mobile devices versus tablets,




and uncovered clear insights that help our clients determine what kind of

content is most likely to build relevance on either platform. Netrelevance

has shown us that if you can dream it, you can build it.

So You’ve Measured – Now What?

once a campaign begins, it is your responsibility to continuously engage with

users. Monitoring and evaluation can continuously add value to this effort by

uncovering themes that drive quality engagement. in fact, properly managed,

the active listening and engagement phase can become a wellspring of insight.

this is where the true power of social influencer engagement really begins.

Properly defined metrics set up the opportunity for outcome-oriented insights

that help drive and refine engagement efforts while increasing efficiency and

maximizing engagement roi.

But don’t let metrics dictate your voice. engagement should always remain

authentic and personal. it is important for influencers to know you are listening

in good faith and that they can truly help shape your brand. get to know your

influencer base and engage with them on an individual basis. Metrics and

measurement help you identify them – but the worst mistake you can make is

to treat them like a number.

Follow Up

while things may fall through the cracks every once in a while, sustain

momentum by closing the loop on any correspondence between your brand and

your key influencers. Just because you didn’t secure the engagement you initially

wanted on your first try doesn’t mean that an influencer won’t be receptive to

your brand’s message the second time around. if the situation is reversed and

you initially missed an engagement opportunity, a late response is always better

than never, particularly when your goal is to indicate value for these influencers

and brand ambassadors.




Go Forth and Be Influential

ultimately, any influencer engagement program should sustain influencer

relationships in a meaningful way for as long as possible. the best influencer

relationships are those where the influencer feels passionately about your

brand. But this passion can’t be accomplished overnight.

influencer engagement programs need to be extremely well-strategized and

thought out, and your brand’s relationships with these influencers must be

managed carefully. Always use a combination of analytics and experience to

your advantage when developing an engagement approach to any influencer,

whether their sphere of influence is large or small. your approach to creating

and maintaining relationships can have major impacts on your brand – positive

or negative. By following these guidelines, you can ensure that your approach is

always optimized and thoughtful.

MEaSurE and MaInTaIn rElaTIonShIPSBy: Adam Blitzer, Founder and COO, Pardot

your social media relationships, like your personal and professional relationships,

need to be cared for and nurtured or they may slip away from you. once you’ve

established your network of social media influencers, you need to calibrate and

maintain your network to ensure continued returns on your hard work.

Maintaining relationships with your influencers is all about continued value.

Value is not only the return your business is getting from your social media

efforts, but what you are providing your followers. it may sound intuitive, but

it’s surprising how frequently social media managers fail to recognize how

important it is to reward your influencers. relationships depend on mutual

value. Maximizing this value for both parties is the key to maintaining your

influencer relationships.




Maximizing value for both parties does not have to be a time- or resource-

intensive process. Completing four simple tasks, a few times a year, is all you

need to keep your influencer relationships healthy and providing value.

Pay Attention

the power of attention cannot be understated when it comes to relationships.

everyone appreciates being noticed. After all, this is why you built relationships

with influencers in the first place! taking small, extra steps to show you care can

go a long way toward maintaining influencer relationships.

read your influencers’ blogs as often as you can. if there is a post relevant to

your company or industry, leave a comment. Follow them on twitter and reply to

interesting posts there as well. invest a little time in a response and it will mean

a lot more. Avoid “friending” them on Facebook, however, unless you are closer

than the average business associate.

Marketers today are often overwhelmed by the volume of social media data

available and how to respond to it. it is impossible to read all of your influencers’

blogs and follow their streams of countless tweets without forsaking all

productivity. you can make it easier by adding them to your rss feeds and spot-

checking their blog posts and tweets when you have the time.

Add Value

only thinking about others when you need them is an attitude that will undermine

any relationship, and your relationships with influencers are no different. you

should always keep an eye out for opportunities to provide additional value to your

influencers. Any consumer-facing or sales-side employee will tell you that even a

tiny bit of added value makes a big difference in building relationships.




if you are working on a piece of content, whether it is just a case study or a larger

project like an infographic, reach out to your influencers for quotes, interviews

and insight. your influencers will be delighted to enhance their credibility by

contributing their knowledge, making the content creation process that much

easier for you. this very ebook is a great example of what this exact strategy can

do for both groups!

Feel free to look beyond your content to other potential opportunities as well. if

your influencer is hosting an event, why not offer to be a sponsor? having an event

of your own? Comp a ticket or provide a discount for your influencers to attend.

Both of these are relatively inexpensive options that can help you provide additional

value, meet your influencers in person, and move your relationships forward.

Measure and Adjust

Fortunately for marketers, the rise of social media and influencer strategy has

been accompanied by the rise of the best tool for managing such strategies:

sophisticated data capture. it is now more possible than ever for marketers to

track and monitor the sources of their company’s web traffic and marketing roi

in great detail.

services like Google Analytics will allow you to monitor your inbound links and

determine the exact amount of traffic being driven by your influencers, for free.

if you are using a marketing automation service, you can take this insight even

further. Companies like Pardot allow you to not only see how much traffic your

influencers are driving, but how qualified that traffic is and whether or not it is

contributing to your business’ bottom line. through various online tools, data

like age, demographics, occupation, location and more are all available to you to

assess the quality, needs and interests of your influencers.

having this level of insight into the performance of your influencers allows you

to make more informed adjustments to your strategy. Content type, format and

audience can all be optimized for each influencer to ensure you are maximizing

performance. if an influencer is dramatically underperforming, don’t be afraid

to move on to other sources. sometimes it’s best to simply break up – not all

relationships work out.

http://www.google.com/analytics/

http://www.pardot.com/




Provide and Encourage Feedback

we’ve all heard the age-old adage that the best relationships are based on

honesty and trust. while too much honesty is not always the best tactic,

whether in business or personal relationships, being open with your influencers

can be tremendously beneficial.

you shouldn’t shy away from discussions about optimizing your influencer

strategy. if influencers aren’t representing your company or brand in the best

possible way, you should bring this to your influencers’ attention. Most of the

time, influencers will be happy to receive the feedback and more than willing to

make adjustments for you.

Also, try reaching out to your top influencers a few times a year to ask if you or

your team could be doing anything else on your side of the relationship. while

this may seem like an invitation to a lot of additional work, it will more likely

result in valuable and actionable feedback. otherwise, you may never know

if you are aggravating your influencers or missing opportunities to push the

relationship further.

Make an effort to pay attention to your influencers and discover small ways to add

further value for them. Be vigilant about measuring your influencers’ impact and be

honest about making changes or adjustments. Following these steps will ensure a

mutually beneficial relationship for you and your influencers for years to come.

whaT My daddy TauGhT ME abouT SocIal MEdIa – how To bE a GIvEr onlInEBy Andrea Walker, Senior Project Mgr/Digital Strategist, Panorama Public Relations

the word “social” is in social media for a reason. the key to success in using social

media doesn’t lie so much in the technology but in building lasting human

relationships. For several years, companies including start-ups have built software-

as-a-service models and enterprise software designed to accumulate “social data”




on people in your network and use that data to target those people with relevant

content. while these tools are useful for marketers and business development,

they don’t eliminate the fundamental desire for people to connect with people.

My father, “a good ole southern gentleman,” provided a perfect example. he

held the door open for both men and women. he would politely place his

napkin over his plate when he was finished with his meal. More importantly, my

father was the type of person who knew how to strike up a conversation with

someone that would make a lasting impression. he wasn’t a savvy salesman

nor did he have any savvy tricks in getting people to trust him. he was just

himself and he genuinely cared for people. My father died before social media

became a household name. however, i look at companies and people that have

become success stories in social media marketing and they all have one thing in

common: they use the principles my dad taught me when they’re building and

maintaining relationships with people.

Be True to Yourself

Being true to your real personality and polishing an online “persona” are two

different things. even though your personality is rough around the edges, at

least you hAVe something unique to offer. use social media to make your voice

distinctive and find people who like you for you. it’s hard to act like somebody

else on social media so don’t try. People are attracted to real feelings, causes or

even your gripes.

Don’t Ask For Anything In Return

sometimes the best reward you can have with social media is doing unto others

without expecting something in return. if people are inspired by your knowledge

or cause, then strive to help others and even connect like-minded people. it’s rare

nowadays to think about others, but social media allows you to make an impact

on other people’s lives. when my father died, he was remembered more for his

generous spirit than what he did for a living.




Be a Leader

easier said than done, right? well, being a thought leader on social media

doesn’t mean necessarily taking charge or voicing your opinion proudly and

loudly. A true leader knows when to listen as well as learn from others. there’s a

wealth of information on social media that can strengthen your knowledge and

imagination. A true leader also recognizes other thought leaders and selflessly

promotes these leaders on social media. For example, my father never talked

about his accomplishments but instead congratulated his team and colleagues

on jobs well done. he mentored his employees and made sure their needs were

met before his own.

Respect Yourself and Others

Believe it not, this is probably one of the easiest principles to follow but the

hardest for people to remember to do online. think of social media as being

at a 24/7 networking event. is it wise to spend all your time griping about

other people, your spouse or even your job? Probably not. instead, you strike

up friendly conversations with people in order to get to know them and their

company better. Don’t engage in petty arguments online or try to insult

someone. everyone can’t be happy all the time, but remember, your actions are a

reflection of you – good or bad.

Finally, ask yourself this question: what lasting impression do i want to make on

people? social media gives you the capability to reach a lot of people, including

potential customers. ultimately, people didn’t necessarily do business with

my father because he had the best product or the savviest sales pitch. People

wanted to work with my father because they liked him. My father looked for

opportunities to provide value in people’s lives. As i said before, the best way to

succeed on social media is to be the person that everyone wants to get to know.

And ultimately, that will help you succeed.




undErSTandInG & GrowInG froM advocaTE InSIGhTBy Matthew Clyde, President & Chief Strategist, ideas*Collide Marketing

Communications

we are living through an important cycle in the evolution of marketing strategies.

Although this is a pivotal point, the marketing practices implemented by today’s

most successful brands still have at their core similar values to those that have

transcended generations. to quote the Beatles and their 1964 classic: you “Can’t

Buy Me Love.” Powerful marketing strategies have been formed through the keen

understanding of this philosophy. the best-loved brands have been bold enough to

build a personal relationship with the customer. they have evolved and matured,

and like an old friend they have grown with the customer while continuing to be

relatable. so, what steps are today’s brands taking to leverage social tools in

achieving these kinds of relationships with their customers?

Engaging the User

the public nature of social media makes understanding the wants and needs of

the customer easier than ever, and opens the door for brands to directly engage

with the community to start a conversation. however, not all conversations will

be engaging. But a competitor will inevitably undercut the brand whose success

depends entirely on limited-time offers and closeout sales, and the brand’s fickle

friends will immediately abandon it to save a dime. social media users have a

sixth sense for cheap tricks, so while they may interact with shallow offers these

will not cause them to commit to the brand. Any business looking for long-term

success knows to view social marketing as more than a tool to garner new

customers; but rather as a way to develop brand advocates.

Brand advocates view themselves as stakeholders in the success of the business.

Brand advocate engagement is at the core of today’s most powerful marketing

campaigns. even in a large company, communicating with your customer on a

personal level will allow for powerful insight to rise to the surface. Following




consumer insight and engaging in relevant, meaningful social conversations can

lead to the edification of meaningful campaigns that directly “speak” to your

constituents’ needs or preferences.

Moreover, these insights can help a company improve its product or address a

service gap. your Facebook page, twitter feed or Pinterest account is the new era

of multi-level research. For one client, a global hotel chain, we observed a trend

that prompted the company to do more qualitative research. the content from

social and the enhanced research led to a breakthrough insight that was then

integrated into a key promotional period for their membership rewards program,

which then delivered back exclusively to their Facebook community. Because

the idea was generated within this influential social circle, the community

immediately embraced it and the results delivered an overwhelming 2,500%

lift in awareness, conversation and sharing. More importantly, the promotional

results achieved a 20% yoy revenue increase from the previous year.

the content and application tools developed became successful not because

the brand had altered the positioning of its rewards program, but because they

discovered a solution to a real problem personally affecting the lives of their

customers. Continuing natural conversations about the customer’s point of view

and a well-integrated promotional feature kept the idea developing and being

shared and adopted further.

Enabling the User

we have found many companies for which social media is a terrifying prospect.

Around the clock, millions of users have the ability to publicly post their opinions

regarding the service or product that a company offers. Many companies will

try to filter negative comments from the front page, sweeping them under the




carpet. these companies fail to see social media for its full potential. More than

just tallying a high number of fans, social media offers an opportunity to gather

information on both strengths and weaknesses, and simultaneously analyze

reactions to solutions given to the customer. A decade of using social media has

essentially turned a company’s homepage into a worldwide focus group where no

one feels intimidated or nervous that their interviewers or peers will judge them.

the information gathered from these pages can be sorted and assigned to

categories within the company. For any given month, we can sort comments into

positive, negative and neutral. then they can be sorted into areas of the company,

such as locations or departments. Contrasting the information found from social

media with other forms of research can even open our eyes to the effectiveness of

promotions and practices at a local, national or even international level.

responding quickly and publicly to complaints and compliments will go a long

way in generating positive Pr. in fact, any company brave enough to nurture this

kind of atmosphere on their page will quickly find their brand advocates coming

to the rescue. Brand advocates will be the first to respond to questions and will

consistently offer the most insightful solutions to any concern posted.

The Takeaway

indeed, love can’t be bought, nor can it be measured on traditional scales. But,

once it’s earned there are measurable means by which this new relationship

with an army of brand advocates can be developed. the internet has become the

world’s primary source of insight and information. in order to draw the customer

in, you must appeal to them personally. empathetic thought engenders

profound conversation, which will provide the client and marketing team with

the insight needed to launch highly effective campaigns.




every brand ought to carefully inspect its agenda with regards to its social media

strategies and ensure that they are placed properly among the priorities of its

customers. recognizing the worth of each customer’s post and putting the

power in their hands to direct conversation can be the scariest thing a marketer

does. But sincere social media interaction and innovative measurement is the

next great secret to effective research in today’s modern market.



wildcard Chapter

A Little Extra Food For Thought

it’s safe to say that we’re operating in a brave new communications world. how

people consume and share information has changed forever – and that change

is continuing at a rapid pace. New rules are made – and broken – each day, keep-

ing pace with marketplace shifts and emerging technology. in that spirit, we in-

vited “wild card” contributions for this book, to help us imagine the unimagined,

and be prepared to capture opportunity when it appears before us.

oPTIMIzInG your SocIal MEdIa for SEarch (SSo) By Christy Belden, VP of Media + Marketing, LeapFrog Interactive

traditionally, digital marketing teams’ social media and search people have been

in opposite corners of the ring. And they have gone to battle many times. yet

now the two sides are being somewhat forced to take off their gloves and work

together.

search marketers are tasked with driving traffic and leads through carefully

targeted keywords. they must infer the intent of a user – informational,

transactional or navigational – by the keywords a user selects. “Buy a couch” has

a different intent than “Looking for a couch.” this exemplifies how the difference

between keywords implies where a consumer is in the purchase funnel: “buy”

is much further down the funnel than “looking.” understanding the nuances of

keyword selection allows search marketers to optimize content to drive traffic,

and business, to a website.

social media strategists are concerned with the conversation engaged in with

their target audience. they create opportunities to engage with consumers and

are brand stewards. they do not have to infer purchasing intent. social media



WILDCARD CHAPTER A Little Extra Food For Thought

strategists can ask a consumer whether they are purchasing or buying. or, they

can listen to existing conversations to monitor what consumers are doing with

the brand. in addition, social media strategists typically create a lot of content.

Blogs, social posts, photos and videos are all tools social media strategists use to

engage their audience.

But search marketers and social media strategists are now being forced together

by search engines’ recognition that social media generates an abundance of

relevant content. search engines are placing increasing importance on social

media signals in their algorithms.

By combining the plethora of content existing in social media with search

marketers’ knowledge of written (key) words, these marketing channels can

come together to create socially optimized content. this content can work more

effectively to engage users with the brand and provide keyword roi by driving

traffic back to the website.

A strategy of utilizing content, search intent and social media engagement

ensures a consumer can find what they need from your brand. enter social

search optimization (sso). executing social search optimization requires taking

existing tactics and modifying their execution to create an overall strategy.

Create engaging content: if there was ever a time content needs to rise above

the clutter, it is now. Content needs to interest a person at the right stage of

searching and persuade them to act – preferably with your brand. engaging

content is shareable. when more people share your content, more links are sent

back to your website. it becomes a type of numbers game. the best content

“goes viral” or, in seo terms, becomes link bait. the art and science of social

search optimization can help increase your chances of quality content sending

significant traffic to your site.




Distribute content: the phrase “build it and they will come” does not exist on

the web. Messages are too fragmented to hope someone happens upon your

content. For our purposes, the saying is more like “Post it and they will find you.”

you must push optimized content out to the various social media platforms so it

can be found. Audiences use social media differently. spreading strategic content

among various social media platforms increases the likelihood of reaching your

target audience. in addition, it allows the opportunity for content to be indexed

by the search.

Optimize social media posts: Not all posts are created equal. A post should

have the intent to engage and be keyword-optimized for search. Don’t fret,

copy writers, this does not mean stuffing the post with keywords. the keywords

should flow with the context and goals of the post – not be a hindrance or

annoyance. Keywords help users understand how to find your business. By

teaching your audience how to search for your business, they will know what

keywords to use when they have a need. when that time comes, your business

will be what appears within the search results. Voila!

Link back to your website: this concept is hard for social media marketers.

typically, they don’t like social posts to link back to the main domain website.

Most social media marketers are hesitant because they want conversations to

occur in the space of the post, not take them away where they may lose the

opportunity to engage. remember, links can drive traffic to a website where

clear CtA’s exist. Although many social platforms nofollow their links, it does not

negate the traffic driving opportunities.

engaging, optimized content that links back to your website and is distributed

across platforms is the ideal. the days of search marketers and social media

experts working in silos are over. the two need to walk hand-in-hand to create

engaging conversations, which maximize your brands potential to increase

business. And sso is going to make it happen.




how To rEally EnGaGE your InfluEncErS wITh GaMIfIcaTIonBy: Toby Beresford, Founder, Leaderboarded.com

gamification is the art of applying game mechanics like points, badges and

leaderboards in non-game situations – such as influencer engagement.

in fact, gamifcation techniques can lead to surprising levels of engagement,

as Anthony rowbottom found when he created a leaderboard of the top 40

influencers in healthcare on social media. traditionally, a leaderboard is simply a

display showing the leaders in a competitive event.

rowbottom, who is membership relationship manager of start-up Clinical

Current, a social network for doctors and other clinicians, created a leaderboard

that became a significant subject of discussion among influencers in healthcare

social media circles. some reposted it on their blogs and some re-tweeted their

position (or lack of it) to their followers. while not all influencers agreed with the

way the ranking was created, everyone found it interesting and engaging.

“in terms of driving new customers to our site and generating interest in

our brand, our ‘#hCsM (healthcare social Media) Leaderboard’ exceeded all

our expectations,” says rowbottom. rowbottom took a typical Pr and social

media campaign approach (influencer identification via social media) and used

gamification to turn it on its head.

Key to gamification’s impact is that adds an element of fun. it also points

customers in the direction you want them to go by making it obvious what you

want them to do. For example, by awarding them a digital badge for visiting a

part of your website. Done right, it can drive deeper engagement and stickiness.

And nowhere is engagement more useful than in our attention-deficit world

of fast-moving social media. to stand out in the social media marketplace,

campaigns need to leverage some of the techniques game developers have

already perfected. that’s where gamification comes in.




in rowbottom’s case, he used Leaderboarded.com to create a leaderboard of social

media influencers based on multiple variables. the main variables were their

volume of tweets on the hashtag #hCsM combined with their Klout score (a more

general indicator of influence generated by Klout for everyone on the web).

Lithium, another social tool provider, uses gamification in its product, where

companies are engaging in conversations with their customers. it is often used to

encourage customers to help each other out, such as on their customer support

forum. skype, for example, uses Lithium in its own customer support community.

Much of the gamification technology within Lithium is invisible. As a customer,

you might not be that aware of points for answering queries correctly, but

you might have a sense of ‘progression’ as you rise through community levels.

here the levels allow the most committed customers on the forum to become

moderators themselves and tidy up the posts of others.

giffgaff, the mobile virtual network, has gone one stage further in its use of

gamification. it gives financial rewards and incentives to community members

who help each other out. you can get a significant mobile phone bill credit each

month just by being an active contributor to community forums.

Vincent Boon, chief of community at giffgaff, is quick to highlight, however,

that it’s not the gamification that makes the community. No, the community is

already present and actively engaged; the gamification just adds the scoring and

perks, so adding fuel to the fire.

For Pr professionals, the opportunity to use gamification is only just becoming

available. For example, at live events, monitoring and channelling digital

engagement can sometimes feel an uphill struggle. Digital distractions via mobile

phones, tablets or laptops make it all too easy for attendees’ minds to wander.




Mediatel execs were facing this problem when setting up its Media Playground

event in June 2012. with such a media crowd, finding ways to maintain

engagement was critical. using another leaderboard, this time being shown

on a large monitor near the coffee, the Mediatel event team leaderboarded the

top tweeters according to how often they mentioned the conference hashtag.

the tweets were made visible on the big screen and the animated leaderboard

counted down from 40 to 1.

the engagement was a hit; some took photos of the leaderboard with

their mobile phones to enable them to repost their position to friends. the

leaderboard resulted in an upsurge of tweets about the conference and the

leaderboard winner was invited to be a panellist at next year’s conference.

in order to ensure that participants weren’t rewarded for simply spamming

their followers, the leaderboard used scores from Kred, another influence

ranking system, to weight players according to how influential their tweets

were, not just the volume.

using social media data in an intelligent way, by mashing together data from

multiple sources, brings higher quality and more accurate influencer information.

For example, rather than simply know who are your top twitterers, the option to

mix in tweet volume with number of blog posts, or more importantly, the number

of blog post comments, can make the difference when gamifying your community.

British company Datasift is at the forefront of this trend towards leveraging

the use of social media’s “big data.” its platform, one of only two in the world to

provide access to the full twitter “fire hose” of a data feed, offers any company

the ability to mash up (or “enrich,” as Datasift prefers) its social media data with

multiple other sources such as Klout.

the opportunity now for savvy marketers is not just about using social media

data to track influencers and then hope to reach out to them by traditional




means. No, the opportunity is to present influencers with their social media data

in interesting ways, such as a leaderboard or a gamified community, and engage

them to behave in ways that promotes your brand at the same time.

the tools and techniques of gamification can be an effective way to do this –

and we might all have a bit more fun at the same time.



concluSIonBy Sarah Skerik, Vice President of Social Media, PR Newswire

the very phrase “social influencer engagement” is a little daunting, we know.

it’s freighted with meaning – and tactics. since you’ve made it this far, you

know that social influencer engagement is truly the combination of a variety

of important behaviors and strategies, blending a keen awareness of the

marketplace with real-time input and very human interaction. Done well,

influencer engagement opens up a realm of possibility for the connected brand.

By connecting with your influencers, you can build relationships that lead to the

development of an attentive, receptive audience for your message, creation of

an army of enthusiastic and invested advocates and access to candid, honest

and productive feedback and up-to-the-minute intelligence. Follow the guidance

of your peers in this book, and you will be well on your way to developing your

own valuable relationships with your industry’s influencers and realizing your

greatest brand ambassadors.

And remember, you, too, can become a sought after influencer. By acting with

agility and streaming a consistent flow of relevant, interesting and multi-format

content, you will amplify your brand’s voice, become more visible across multiple

channels and ultimately recognizable to your key audiences. in time, you will

organically attract and draw your influencers directly to you, bringing the

process of engagement full circle.

interested in learning more about creating a strategic content marketing plan to

start elevating your own influence? Click here to let us know and a Pr Newswire

representative will give you a call.

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ModEraTor

Sarah Skerik Vice President, Social Media, PR Newswire

skerik’s responsibilities include product development, managing Pr Newswire’s social media programs and blogging for the Beyond Pr blog, where she writes about digital Pr, social media and seo. in previous roles with the company, skerik has managed the core wire service, including seo, content syndication, audience development, media relations, customer reporting and targeted distribution products.

skerik is a frequent and well received speaker on the subjects of social media, search engine optimization and Pr measurement. A graduate of Miami university in oxford, oh, she also earned an MBA from Notre Dame.

.

conTrIbuTInG auThorS

Malcolm AthertonAccount Manager, PR Newswire

Atherton is an account manager with Pr Newswire, responsible for a portfolio of business in Arizona and Nevada.

Additionally, he is responsible for orking with internal staff and external groups throughout the southwest on emerging media topics and trends.

Prior to joining Pr Newswire, Atherton spent over 7 years working within the corporate communications, social media and marketing space with Businesswire and thomson reuters where he helped companies and agencies of all sizes realize their investor and marketing communications /Pr goals and objectives.

Atherton lives in scottsdale with his wife, daughter, Lab and weiner dog.

eBook Contributors



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Christy Belden Vice President of Media & Marketing, LeapFrog Interactive

Belden is the Vice President of Marketing + Media for LeapFrog interactive Agency.

she has 12 years of experience within the world of PPC, seo, social media, email, mobile and traditional marketing and she’s loved all of it. Belden holds her own when it comes to having a wellrounded and clear perspective on the ever-changing digital space, and she’s happy to share her knowledge. this year alone, Belden has managed to conduct a series of speaking engagements for local marketers, get published in various digital publications and win awards on behalf of LeapFrog interactive. her core responsibilities at LFi are to develop sound strategic direction on behalf of clients for their media and marketing programs, so her knowledge of the digital space is paramount. Belden is a proud mother of two and an avid athlete.

Toby BeresfordFounder, Leaderboarded.com

Beresford is Ceo and founder at Leaderboarded.com, an online tool to engage your tribe all powered by

social data. An inspiring presenter and web entrepreneur, he has sold a social media business, won a Mark Zuckerberg hackathon, provided incisive commentary on social media for sky News and is also a new parent. his latest startup Leaderboarded.com turns the humble high-score-table into a verb, by letting companies create their own social data leaderboard of influencers, employees and even event delegates. recently used by MtV at a blogger breakfast it contributed to a successful day, where their #VMABlogfast hashtag trended globally, reaching hundreds of thousands of people. watch out or you might be the one to get leaderboarded soon...

Adam BlitzerFounder & COO, Pardot

Blitzer is the Co-founder and Coo of Pardot, a marketing automation provider. he is responsible for product management, marketing, and operations, as well as a frequent speaker at industry

events such as Dreamforce, sugarCon and American Marketing Association panels. Blitzer has been named to BtoB Magazine’s annual who’s who list for two consecutive years.



EBOOK CONTRIBuTORS

Tom BishopDirector of Marketing & Comm, KnowledgeVision Systems, Inc

Bishop is Director of Marketing and Communications at KnowledgeVision systems in Lincoln, Massachusetts. he is an experienced Marketing Professional focused on brand strategy, content marketing, social media, campaign management, market segmentation, research and data analysis, and business development. Bishop brings a great deal of experience in start up companies that are positioned for rapid growth. he received his MBA from Boston university in 2002.

Sudip ChakrabortyPresident/Founder, Xypress LLC

Chakraborty founded Xypress with the vision of helping companies grow profits by applying sophisticated analytics to big data. he and his teams have partnered with companies to apply analytics to customer data for both marketing and credit risk purposes. in particular, he has been a pioneer in the area of analytics in the B2B space – especially, in integrating consumer data with small business data to identify profitable opportunities.

Previously, Chakraborty was Co-Founder and Principal of inductis, which was acquired by eXL service (NAsDAQ: eXLs) in 2006. while at inductis, he advised several

Fortune 500 companies in the areas of information management, marketing analytics and credit risk analytics. in one of his projects, Chakraborty led a multifunctional team to design and develop an approximate text matching algorithm for which he obtained a us patent.

Chakraborty received his education from iit Delhi, georgia institute of technology, and Massachusetts institute of technology.

Matthew ClydePresident & Chief Strategist, Ideas*Collide Marketing Communications

Clyde began his creative career at the age of 19 when he received the sundance institutes young writer’s Award. the experience launched his creative career which has taken him on creative assignments from New york to Costa rica, Arizona to hawaii.

over his diverse career, Clyde has worked in Fortune 500 organizations, small startups and prestigious New york ad agencies. he has created award-winning marketing campaigns and videos, been at the fore-front of internet marketing, consulted top-authors, chefs and Ceos and launched his dream of having his own agency—ideas Collide, inc. his



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agency now serves clients worldwide including power-house brands such as intel and Vitamin water.

in 2007, ideas Collide partnered with Best western international to launch a social media program which has since garnered extensive media coverage, loyal followers and multiple recognitions from travel weekly and usA today. recently the hsMAi recognized Clyde with the prestigious “top 25 Mind’s in Marketing” Award. his passion for life can be seen best through the amazing adventures he experiences with his wife and 3 children.

Yael Even-LevyInstructional Design & Technologies Manager, PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP

even-Levy (@Joelleyalin) is a manager of instructional design & technologies at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC). with over twenty years in learning & development, she has worked in a variety of industries including aerospace & defense, software, professional services, and academia. even-Levy’s expertise is in cutting-edge learning technologies and innovative delivery aligned to key Performance indicators (KPis) and corporate goals and her passion is for social media tools & analytics, eLearning, mLearning, immersive Learning simulations (iLs), and virtual worlds.

even-Levy holds a doctorate and master degrees in interdisciplinary studies and a second master in software engineering

from Brandeis university and is also certified in itiL and roi. she is an active judge at the Brandon hall group’s excellence Awards in Learning.

Ruth FinePresident, Digital Strategist, Social Icing, LLC

social icing is a public relations agency focusing on web content production and social Pr. As president, Fine has a few simple philosophies that keep her going: 1) be authentic, 2) do well by others, and, when all else fails, 3) keep it simple, stupid. she’s a writer at heart, and she loves the art and craft of a well-written word. Fine gives a grateful nod to the necessities in life: coffee, cats, sincerity, and veracity for life. she lives for the feel-good factor, and dies for all things creative.

“style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn.” ~gore Vidal

Lee Anne ForbesMarketing Manager, Micro Strategies

Forbes is currently a social Media & Marketing evangelist at Micro strategies a systems integration Company based in the Ny Metro area. she has a B.A. in humanities from Providence College and an M.A. in



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Corporate and Public Communication from seton hall university. she is has a certificate in Program Management from stevens institute of technology in partnership with Lucent technologies.

Forbes began her career, in trading rooms in the stock and commodities markets working for employers such as L.F. rothschild, unterberg, towbin; Drexel Burnham, Lambert and Aig. she also worked for a variety of ground-floor startup efforts.

she then moved on to the high technology world of At&t, Lucent technologies and hP. in high-tech she held a variety of domestic and international management positions ncluding, Program Management, Product Marketing, Market intelligence, global events and internal Communications Manager.

Howard GreensteinPresident, Harbrooke Group

greenstein is a marketing technology strategist and President of the harbrooke group, which specializes in helping ompanies communicate with their customers using the latest web technologies. he has a deep understanding of both the technology and marketing worlds, and sits at their intersection. he has worked with clients from small businesses to the Fortune 500, Cable Networks, and wall street, as well as major advocacy groups, helping them

create their online presences. greenstein also teaches courses on social media at the heyman Center for Philanthropy and Fundraising at Nyu sCPs.

greenstein’s career, prior to starting his own firm, has spanned corporate and not-for-profit organizations such as the twin towers Fund, Microsoft, JP Morgan, and New york university, as well as several start-ups. he has worked on events and programs for the New york New Media Association, Ny software industry Association, social Media Camp, PodCampNyC, and the supernova Conference, from moderating panels to coordinating pre- and post-conference panelist interviews, managing media coverage, logistics, streaming media and more.

he is currently a blogger for inc. Magazine, writing the weekly startup toolkit column. he is president of the NyC Chapter of social Media Club. howard earned a B.s. from Cornell university, and a MPs from Nyu’s interactive telecommunications Program (itP). he lives Northwest of NyC with his wife, 2 kids, and a very smart hamster.

Brianna HarneyData Analyst, Xypress LLC

harney graduated from rutgers university in May 2011. she now works as a Data Analyst at a New Jersey company called Xypress.



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Margot HeiligmanDirector of Solution Management, SAP

heiligman is Director of solution Management at sAP in the area of CrM, sales, Marketing, service, support, web channel, eCommerce and social business.

she has been managing social strategy at sAP for over four years, including influencer marketing, community engagement, blogging and thought leadership content development. Prior to sAP, Margot ran business development for B2B at swisscom both in the us and n Zurich, switzerland. she was global product and alliances strategy at CrM provider: wishbone systems.

heiligman is passionate about working with companies who innovate in new markets and new products by taking their industry structure to the next level.

Jared HendlerEVP, Global Director: Digital, Social & Creative

hendler brings over 20 years of creative management experience in branding, advertising, digital media & technology forged from over a decade in the corporate world along with having founded and managed 2 new media startups.

At Mww, hendler directs digital, social and creative strategy across all practice areas. As digital continues to democratize media, Mww recognizes the need for it’s clients to leverage the power of digital and social strategy, content creation, distribution and measurement.

Prior to Mww, hendler worked with Katalyst Media. Founded in 2000 by Ashton Kutcher, Katalyst was named top 10 in advertising and marketing by Fast Company, Katalyst is a studio for social media that connects entertainment with technology and brands.

Prior to Katalyst, hendler was the worldwide executive Creative Director for edelman Digital. he directed creative strategy with a focus on digital engagement. expertise included everything from web site builds, Facebook programs, e-kits, online media relations, online promotions and partnerships, to email marketing and mobile campaigns.

hendler’s entrepreneurial spirit was grounded with 10 years of experience within the wPP family at grey Advertising. hendler was the executive Creative Director and co-founder of g2 at wPP from 1992 and grew the group from 2 people to over 100+ in Ny, while spearheading the development of over a dozen international offices around the wPP network.

hendler is the author of a digital media blog, a prior board member of the Art Directors Club, a Blue ribbon Judge for

the emmy Award’s broadband category and is an advisory board member of social Media week. he participates at industry events such as: Adtech, Digital hollywood, Adage 2.0.



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he is a graduate of the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA and resides as their east Coast Chapter Chair.

Vatsala IsaacIndependent Marketing Consultant

isaac is a marketing and communications consultant for corporations and small businesses in the greater seattle Area. For six years now, isaac has specialized in marketing strategy and communication, sales enablement and employee relations.

when she isn’t creating a riveting campaign for her clients, she can be found head bobbing to steely Dan and resisting french fries.

Anne-Marie KovacsPrincipal, BOOMbox Network

A classically-trained marketing professional, Kovacs’ experience also includes more than ten years specifically in the online marketing arena. As a creative strategist, she leverages traditional marketing and branding fundamentals with digital technologies to develop truly integrated multi-channel strategies for her clients’ brands and services. Also an avid lifestyle and trendwatcher, she has her finger on

the pulse of developing consumer and social media trends, which information she uses to benefit and advise clients. Additionally, as founder and blogger at thesucculentwife.com, she has unique insights and the inside track with women consumers and bloggers.

Chad LioDigital Marketing Manager, The Hoffman Agency

Lio (@CJLio) is the Digital Marketing Manager of the hoffman Agency, an advertising and digital agency in Jacksonville, FL. his experience in the digital realm comes from almost six years of seo and PPC Campaigns within the vacation rental industry. After joining the hoffman Agency over a year ago, he now focuses on the use of social media as well as mobile technology in elevating brands within healthcare, hospitality and B2B services.

Noemi PollackFounder & CEO, The Pollack PR Marketing Group

Pollack, Ceo and Founder of the Pollack Pr Marketing group (PPMg) in 1985, has extensive experience in consumer marketing communications, trade,



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business-to-business, professional service, community outreach and corporate public relations. the sum of her professional experience includes both agency and in-house corporate positions. her strengths lie in developing clients’ strategic directions, counseling as to corporate positioning, clarifying and crystallizing message points, developing strong branding programs – all geared to establishing desired perceptions among clients’ various publics, resulting in positive marketplace behavior changes. under her guidance, the agency has grown into a full service agency, servicing from start-up firms to Fortune 500 companies in their Pr/marketing communications needs, regionally, nationally and internationally. Clients have included such companies as Brita, inc. (a Clorox Company subsidiary), rain Bird Corporation, interCasino.com, eclipse from Fujitsu-ten, Altra Biofuels, the sage group, inter-Cal Corporation, trident Data systems, whAM-o, inc., among others.

Additionally, her background as a graduate of the Juilliard school, has enabled the agency to add a focus on performing arts organizations and related organizations. Pollack serves on a number of organization’s Board of Directors, has been featured in roundup stories within her industry, and published numerous articles in publications such as the Los Angeles Business Journal and the Business handbook.

Todd PriceDirector of Business Development, Yellow Dux

Price has been involved in health care for the past 8 years, most recently serving as the executive Director of the American red Cross. Previously, Price has worked to promote hospice services within the community and throughout the state.

some of the projects he’s had an impact with are the ‘except for six’ documentary, ‘have you had the talk’ campaign, st. Luke’s south African hospice outreach and the new us Veteran’s hospice education service. in addition, Price actively serves

on numerous groups within the state and nation in terms of shaping health care direction. Michigan society for healthcare Planners and Marketers, American College of healthcare executives, society for healthcare strategy and Market Development and Aging services of Michigan are some of the groups with which he works.

Currently, Price is working through the consulting group, yellow Dux as a health care thought leader to hospitals and national product accounts. his Ph.D in information systems Management is focused on e-commerce applications in a health care retail environment.

Formally a Chippewa undergrad from Central Michigan university, he went onto eastern illinois university for his Master’s



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of education and has recently finished his Master of Business Administration from Ferris state university. outside of healthcare, he also teaches evening and on-line classes for Montcalm Community College and Baker College.

with whatever time is left in the day easily becomes consumed with three children (ages 10, 8 & 7), two cats who act like the babies of the family and a beautiful wife of 12 years. sometimes one can see Price on the local golf courses donating balls to the area’s trees and water holes.

Sebastian RuskFounder & CEO SocialBuzzTV.com

rusk (@sebrusk) has developed a very unique approach to creating buzz and making noise for brands via social media. his ability to influence those around him and his forte of being able to make his crazy ideas a reality, are what make socialBuzztV.com a reality today.

think of him as “a walking billboard.”

socialBuzztV.com was conceptualized by Founder & Ceo rusk. with 12+ years of experience in Marketing and online Ad space, he has a real knack for not only ‘thinking outside the box’, but showing there can be reasonable thinking iNsiDe that box! rusk has a passion for social Media, creating “buzz” for brands and spreading the word on the power behind this different kind of technology; which

has been the driving force to launch socialBuzztV.com (bow tie and all)

in addition, rusk is the host of socialBuzzoNAir on 880AM the Biz here in south Florida. the show focuses on social Media news, discussions and interviews with influencers within the social Media space. it airs LiVe on Friday’s at 5pm et.

he was previously the President of Kayne Consulting Corp (www. KayneConsulting.com), a boutique marketing consulting firm based in Miami, that serviced small to mediumsized businesses with direct marketing campaigns.

rusk resides in Miami, FL, and is a fulltime dad to 10 year old daughter Kayla.

Steph RussellOnline Marketing Strategist, Pulled

russell is the founder and Ceo of Pulled, an online marketing strategy company. As an internet entrepreneur herself, with over 12 years of expertise, russell works with entrepreneurs and businesses to educate and inspire them to create the life and future they’ve always wanted, by utilizing creative online marketing strategies that bring in the cash and create more freedom.



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Megan SterrittPrincipal & Director of Account Services, KWE Partners

sterritt is Principal and Director of Account services at Kwe Partners, a Marketing and Public relations agency specializing in luxury travel, hospitality and real estate. she is involved in all aspects of strategic positioning and creative services, while also managing the firm’s hospitality and lifestyle accounts, supervising events, promotions, traditional media and social media.

sterritt is a member of the greater Miami & the Beaches hotel Association and NFte (Network for teaching entrepreneurship) – Miami young Professionals Committee. she writes a locally syndicated blog and counts among her passions coaching a high school lacrosse team. Megan received a B.s. in Public relations and Psychology with a minor in Marketing from the university of Miami (FL).

Andrea WalkerVice President Client Relations & Digital Media of Panorama Public Relations

walker is a digital media planner, social media strategist and technology industry expert. she manages the firm’s seo client projects, social media measurement and management, and implementation of new technologies. she manages key client relationships, is a writer-blogger, and is responsible for identifying trends and techniques for developing social media strategies. she can best be reached at [email protected]


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