Put a Name on that About Page

Posted by: on Aug 10, 2009 | No Comments

Perhaps one of my biggest pet peeves is when I come across a small agency or company that either completely lacks an “About” page, or if they have one, speaks in vague terms about who is behind the company without naming names.

Why hide it? The lack of identifiable people behind an agency or company instantly makes them less credible in my mind. Are they really a one-person shop (like Social Mallard is) but are going for the “better to look big” approach? Maybe this is a side gig for them, and they don’t want their “real” employers to find out just yet? Perhaps they aren’t particularly confident that their credentials will stand up to prospective customers, so they hide behind elaborate marketing copy? Or maybe they view this project as a slightly shady effort which they don’t want to attach their personal online brands to (“make money online” niche, I’m looking at you)?

Whatever the reason, it leads to questions you simply don’t want prospective customers to have to ponder, and lays a shaky foundation for any future relationship that may develop.

Be up front, show who you are, where you blog, and what you’ve done. If you’re small or just starting out, don’t hide it, turn it into a positive. Providing profiles of the individuals behind your company provides an instant connection to prospective clients, and shows that you are proud of who you are, you believe enough in the company or products to put your name to it, and you trust your visitors to make their own informed judgment as to your qualifications.

So start off on the right foot, and proudly show off who are. Your customers and prospects will appreciate the honesty and trust.

Photo from Mick O Doesn’t Know on Flickr via CC License.

Thankful Gestures, Earnestly Given

Posted by: on Jul 30, 2009 | One Comment

Yesterday while on one of my all-too-frequent Starbucks runs, I was reminded of just how powerful small gestures of thanks, given earnestly, can be. After receiving my drink I took the time to look the barista in the eye and say “thank you” and “have a wonderful day!” The surprise in her eyes told me how infrequently she gets this sort of acknowledgment, a slightly sad bit of insight.

That moment got me thinking about some other examples from throughout my career:

  • The senior executive who took the time after a large, cumbersome, and painful conference call to personally phone the junior staff who did the work to make it happen, and say thank you.
  • The event I hosted with contributors from all over the company, where I sent a simple bottle of wine and a nice handwritten note to the event planner to show my appreciation, and her genuine shock and delight at the recognition.
  • The small, inexpensive yet nicely personalized thank you card I received from one of my favorite consumer brands, unconnected to any campaign, call-to-action, holiday promo, or expectation.

With all the talk about social media strategies, influencer engagement, affinity networks, customer rewards, and so on, the power and potential impact of small gestures of genuine thanks often gets lost. To be effective they tend to be personal in nature, which means they’re hard to scale and as such fall off grand marketing plans when budget time comes.

Never discount their impact however. A small gesture, an honest thank you to some of your passionate user evangelists, a valued partner or vendor, or especially the too-often-ignored small customer, can go a long way towards creating a true emotional connection to you and your brand.

Don’t tie it to a marketing promotion. Don’t wrap it up in a shiny new affinity program. Don’t mass produce it with [insert value customer name here] obviousness. Don’t do anything to cast doubt on the genuine nature of your appreciation.

Just connect with you customer, your partner, your vendor directly and deliver a heartfelt “thank you” for being part of your world. If you haven’t been doing it already, the shock or suspicion might take a while to wear off. But you, and your company, will be better off in the long run.

Photo by vernhart on Flickr via CC License.

Sponsoring tweets boils down to integrity and tolerance

Posted by: on Jul 25, 2009 | No Comments

Integrity: yours and the brands. Tolerance: your audience’s.

Brian Solis, he of PR2.0 fame, has an excellent guest post up on TechCrunch diving into the ongoing debate about the utility, proper format, and appropriateness of sponsored or ad-based Twitter tweets. (for more commentary, see the Techmeme threads). With the rise of ad-based Twitter networks such as TweetROI, Twittad, and IZEA’s latest, plus pending FTC guidelines for disclosure around sponsored social media, not to mention Twitter’s own search for a valid business model, the issue is rapidly coming to a head.

Brian points out some possible solutions: using an “AD” prefix or “#ad” suffix, the word “sponsored” somewhere in the tweet, a disclosure landing page, or even color coding of affected tweets directly from Twitter. All have positives and negatives, and I’d invite you to read the TechCrunch article and comment section for more on the subject. Whatever the end solution, before you consider incorporating sponsored tweets into your own Twitter activities, either as the Twitterer or sponsor, you must consider the impact they could have. And I’m not talking about “OMG HUGE TRAFFIC!!!”

Ignoring spammers and explicitly commercial Twitter accounts, Twitter is still all about trading on integrity. Your followers – your audience – builds up a certain level of trust in you and what you tweet. Tear that down via a lack of disclosure about sponsored tweets, and watch your audience disappear (along with your value to your sponsor…bad for all involved).

For the sponsor, a lack of disclosure also begins to wear at trust in your own brand’s integrity. Look shifty, look sneaky, appear as if you are trying to secretly “buy” access to a community, and be prepared to suffer a loss of trust in your brand among your current and prospective customers.

Even assuming all sides are open and up front about the sponsored tweets and use explicit #hastags or prefixes, you also have to judge carefully your audience’s tolerance for the ads. Too many, and again watch follower counts and general goodwill towards the Twitterer and sponsor move in the wrong direction. It is incredibly easy to unfollow on Twitter, just like there are zero costs to unsubscribing from an RSS feed in the blogosphere. For both the sponsor and the Twitterer, it pays to be hyper sensitive to the ad tolerance of your audience.

Sponsored tweets are here, as Brian rightly points out, and will likely rapidly grow as more people and companies discover the power of Twitter as a community and broad communications tool. It’s hard to argue that the best form of marketing via Twitter is via Earned Tweets, but it’s also hard to discount the potential of paid tweets. Personally I tend to dislike paid tweets, and unfollow (or at least DM peeved) those who run them, so I advocate shooting for earned tweets every time.

But if done right, with full, explicit disclosure on every affected tweet and a keen eye for follower fatigue or blowback, they likely could be a very effective marketing tool.