WHEN SOCIAL MEDIA & AR COLLIDE:

METHODS, MADNESS & METRICS

Joshua Reynolds

Global Technology Practice Director, Hill & Knowlton

Presented to Gartner EMEA AR Forum, November 2009

AGENDA

How does AR drives sales

in a down economy?

How are social media & AR colliding?

How does all this impact AR Metrics?

What is the future shape of AR?

WHAT COMMS CHANNELS DRIVE SHORT LISTS IN A DOWN ECONOMY?

Q16: Thinking about the process you and your company use to identify a short list of companies to buy technology products or services from,

please indicate which of these are the most important sources of information or media that regularly influence you with this process?

Among US, UK, Canada Tech Decision Makers

43

51

55

51

Word of Mouth

WHAT COMMS CHANNELS DRIVE REPUTATION AND IMAGE?

Q17-23: What influence would you say the following sources of information have on your perception or image of the

product or service or company that sells the technology product or service? For each, please use a 5-point scale

where 1=no influence at all and 5=extremely strong influence.

Top 2 Box Among US, UK, and Canada

ANALYSTS JUSTIFY TECH BUDGETS, NOT JUST SHORT-LISTS

Top 2 Box Among US, UK, and Canada

Q31: Which part of your purchase decision does an industry analyst influence most (either through verbal consultation or published

report): Justifying spending budget on the product in the first place; Creating a short list of vendors to consider; Deciding which vendors

to invite to a final pitch; Finalizing the purchase decision?

18

16

16

47

26

10

17

30

51

26

19

18

26

53

28

17

17

24

51

27

All of the above

Finalizing decision

Deciding finalists

Creating short list

Justifying budget

Total

US

UK

Canada

DIGITAL CHANNEL REACH: UK

Q41: Which, if any, of the following digital channels do you regularly interact with?

Among UK Small/Medium Enterprise and Large Enterprise

Digital Channels

% Who Read Regularly

Total UK SMELarge

Enterprise

Digital versions of traditional

newspapers and magazines 49 44 59

Vendor-generated web sites 44 37 59

Personalized emails from a sales rep

(not part of a mass mailing) 36 44 19

Videos, images, demos and

interactive online experiences 35 31 41

RSS News Feeds 33 22 56

Social Networks 33 30 41

Blogs 30 30 30

Don’t know 7 7 7

DIGITAL CHANNEL CREDIBILITY: UK

Q42-48: How credible do you find each of the following digital channels? For each, please use a

5-point scale where 1=not credible at all and 5=extremely credible

Digital Channels

% Who Read Regularly

Total UK C-Suite IT Managers

Digital versions of traditional

newspapers and magazines73 82 63

Videos, images, demos and

interactive online experiences58 59 57

RSS News Feeds 56 66 43

Vendor-generated web sites 56 66 44

Personalized emails from a sales

rep (not part of a mass mailing)47 50 43

Social Networks (i.e. online

communities of people who share

interests and activities)

40 54 24

Blogs 29 43 13

Top 2 Box Among UK C-Suite and IT Managers

BLOGS: NOT YET MAINSTREAM FOR B2B TECH DECISIONS

36

32

27

4

30

38

22

7

21

39

29

11

27

37

27

8

Never

Infrequently

Frequently

Always

Total

US

UK

Canada

Q49: How frequently do you turn to blogs to help you make business purchase decisions?

Among US, UK, Canada

More than 1/3 of Tech Decision Makers turn to blogs always or frequently to help them make business purchase decisions

RESEARCH, INQUIRY & DIGITAL:UK CHANNELS OF AR INFLUENCE

Q35-40: What influence would you say the following sources of analyst insight have on your perception or image of the

product or service or company that sells the technology product or service? For each, please use a 5-point scale

where 1=no influence at all and 5=extremely strong influence.

Top 2 Box Among UK C-Suite and IT Managers

35

57

47

Analyst speech at a conference or trade show

22

50

37

Analyst quote in collateral or on comany site

RESEARCH, INQUIRY & DIGITAL: US CHANNELS OF AR INFLUENCE

Q35-40: What influence would you say the following sources of analyst insight have on your perception or image of the product or service

or company that sells the technology product or service? For each, please use a 5-point scale where 1=no influence at all and

5=extremely strong influence.

Top 2 Box Among US C-Suite and IT Managers

DIGITAL AR METHODOLOGIES

INTEGRATED PLANNING TEMPLATE: AR + PR + DIGITAL

Ultimate

Decision

Comms

Strategy

Decision

Maker

Trusted

Influencers

Channel of

Influence

Message

& Data

Risk

Pre

ssure

Bias

Need

Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration, Insight, & Expertise

H&K Premise: Communications strategies work best when they are reverse-engineered from the

moment of truth when a real-world decision is made. Two-way AR dialogue is relevant at every step.

Histo

rySp

in

Apathy

Myth

12

DIGITAL AR PROCESS

Listen and learn from online analyst conversations

„ Ascertain total conversation

„ Identify the missing piece of the discussion

„ Define your rolein the online discussion

Leverage digital to createcontent

„ Ask questions on LinkedIn

„ Begin Twitter conversations

„ Blogs and comments

„ Social bookmarks

Leverage digital to distribute content

„ Facebook Fan Pages

„ Twitter handle

„ LinkedIn presence

„ Podcasts

„ Webinars

„ Whitepapers

„ Event Information

„ Blog postings

„ YouTube Channels

Set up keyword searches and measure pull-through

„ Benchmark frequency of keywords, share of voice

„ Define metrics for noise in social media

„ Gap analysis

Offer a POV on key issues

„ Prioritize topics

„ Focus on thought leadership

„ Take analyst debates offline

„ Move back online once you’ve won

„ Questions are more viral than assertions

CONTENT

CREATIONCONVERSATIONS &

DISTRIBUTION

ISSUES

MONITORING &

MEASUREMENT

ISSUES

INFLUENCE

LISTEN &

LEARN

AR LIFECYCLE: THE DIGITAL HANDOFF

Long Lead

Consult Message

Develop/

Test

Competitive/

Market

IntelAnalyst

Pre-Brief

Media

Reference

Announcement

Day

Follow-Up

OutreachCustomer/

Investor

Reference

Sales

Engagement

AnnouncementInquiry Pre-Announce Conversion

Number of Analysts Engaged

Inbound & OutboundOutboundInbound

Digital Mode:

Monitor

Digital Mode:

Engage

Digital Mode:

Measure

EVENT BEST PRACTICESTwitter Live Blogging Content Aggregation

„ Announce live blogging

coverage in advance and at

event

„ Assign blogger to write posts

„ Blogger should become

familiar with event schedule

and background/bios of VIPs

„ Check Internet access before

event begins

„ During event, blogger should

take notes in the style of

“meeting minutes”:

‟ Only post most interesting

and provocative points

‟ Blogger should add brief

insights or reflections to

provide readers with a

POV

„ Before event, consider which

activities will make great

content

„ Think:

‟ Photos for gallery on Flickr

‟ Video for YouTube

channel

‟ Audio clip / Webcast to

feature on blog or Web

site

„ Assign owners to capture

content

„ Aggregate and distribute

content across platforms:

‟ Twitter feed should

hyperlink to Facebook

page, which has portals for

picture gallery and video

archives

„ Anticipate hot topics and

prepare your responses

„ Create @Twitter handle

„ Create short, descriptive and

memorable hashtag for event

„ Begin promoting Tag and

Handle in advance of event

„ Solicit responses and feedback

via Twitter in advance and at

event

„ Monitor and respond to replies

and tagged Tweets

‟ Assign owner to monitor

the activity on Twitter,

responding and reporting

it to key presenters in real

time

‟ Retweet interesting

content from the

community

PERSONAL VS. BUSINESS PERSONA

PERSONAL BUSINESS

Repu

tation

Personal authenticity†

be yourself, but avoid

over-sharing

Focus on interests and

events, not business

You always represent

your employer and clients.

Use the “Mom test.”

Corporate authenticity†

stay on message, but be

transparent in your role

Focus on business outcomes,

not personal topics

You always represent

your employer and clients.

Anticipate topics and be ready.

METRICS

AR METRICS: OPTIONS

„ Spoken word analyst audits

„ Message resonance in analyst research

„ Analyst quotes in articles and press releases

„ Number of “Analyst Champions” secured

„ Frequency and caliber of analyst interactions

„ Analyst satisfaction surveys

„ Internal satisfaction and AR impact surveys

„ Internal testimonials

„

SPOKEN WORD AUDITS

“Question: On a scale of 1 to 5 (1 being the lowest score and 5 the highest score) please rank each of the following vendors for ability to sell, likelihood of

short-listing, and relevance of message .”

0

1

2

3

4

5

Vendor 1 Vendor 2 Vendor 3 Vendor 4 Vendor 5

Ability to Sell Short List Relevance of Message

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

Q30

6

Q40

6

Q10

7

Q20

7

Q30

7

Q30

6

Q40

6

Q10

7

Q20

7

Q30

7

Q30

6

Q40

6

Q10

7

Q20

7

Q30

7

Q30

6

Q40

6

Q10

7

Q20

7

Q30

7

IDC

Gartner

Forrester

Vendor 1 Vendor 2 Vendor 4Vendor 3

FAVORABLE POSITIONING IN PUBLISHED ANALYST REPORTS

DIGITAL AR METRICS: REACH

DIGITAL AR METRICS: PROMINENCEInfluencer Index

Scott Belcher 24.9

Hugh Taylor 23.5

Richard Blumenthal 22.9

Beth Daley 21.6

Michael B. Farrell 21.1

Heather Patisaul 21.0

Heather B. Adewale 20.9

Wendy N. Jefferson 20.9

Hong-Sheng Wang 17.3

Robert Carey 16.6

Aaron Lohr 16.5

Janet Raloff 16.0

Charles Gelman 15.6

Martin Philbert 15.6

Norris Alderson 15.6

David Gutierrez 15.5

Dan Shapley 14.6

Andrea Gore 14.5

Liz Szabo 14.5

Margaret Hamburg 14.1

Twitter User Index

DropGuard 27.9

GeneRef 21.9

mednewswise 20.7

seacali 20.7

snblogs 20.7

wilsondasilva 20.7

pregnantmom 20.0

mae37 19.4

BuyVemma 18.6

canadadrug 18.6

Drugmart 18.6

heartdisease 18.6

MonavieMoney 18.6

VemmaMLM 18.6

vemmanutrition 18.6

lovessecret 18.4

AR METRICS: COMMON MISTAKES

„ Not mapping to business and

marketing objectives

„ Measuring output more than outcome

„ Measuring sentiment over service level

„ Focusing on quantity vs. quality

„ Failing to benchmark progress

„ Failing to normalize results

PREDICTIONS AND TRENDS

INFLUENCER RELATIONS IN 2010

„ Boundaries blur, job titles morph

„ Skills keep constant

„ Listen†Think†Talk†Measure

„ Analytics thrive

„ Measure impact on sales and

corporate valuation

„ LinkedIn as AR tool

„ EMEA leads Digital AR evolution

FOR MORE INFORMATION ...

Joshua Reynolds

Global Technology Practice Director

Hill & Knowlton

415-856-5102

joshua.reynolds@hillandknowlton.com