Day one of Social Media Week London kicked off for the Ketchum UK team at the National Gallery where Rob Blackie of Ogilvy presented on, “5 things to add social value to your customer journey.”
Social, according to Rob, is a layer on top of which sits invaluable user experiences for brands and businesses alike to tap into to make all elements of the customer journey better.
From Awareness through Ambassador Reach, social filtering with likes and interests from the open graph, social selling with financial data integration and social customer service, it all comes down to the data collected and how it can add flavor and context to enhance the the user experience.
Our second event on day one took us to Lexis on Bermondsey Street for a talk on the Red Bull Stratos jump with Tessa Barrera, head of social at Red Bull.
A few of her key lessons from the experience included:
- Get up high (metaphorically of course) to see how small you are and stop thinking from a brand perspective, essentially stop thinking people want to hear from you and understand that in social they want to hear from each other – a great reminder of a human-centered experience and an ‘Audience First’ approach that should be applied in social at all levels of planning, through to activation.
- Apply the 40:40:20 rule. 40% amazing brand content, 40% user generated content and 20% promotional content.
- Social at events is about a deep understanding of the ‘friction points’ and barriers in the user experience that make people engage, share and take part in the conversation.
- Open up the access to professional photography and video to give people awesome things to share freely – no watermarks, it’s like marking something with your name in the fridge in a shared house, people won’t touch it.
- Entertain people in their downtime at the event. Understand the touchstones of your event – what’s the winner in terms of crescendo of engagement and how can you tap into it?
Everybody at Red Bull was given a part to play in the process of establishing and activating the Red Bull Stratos. They wanted the event to be the next moon landing, and it didn’t fall short.
They even broke their own rules – responding and replying to user commentary on a one by one bases. Brand guidelines flew out the window and this worked to improve results further.
Our final day one event took us to the IBM offices on South Bank for a seminar offering the latest in mobile advertising and marketing.
The five person expert panel included: Nick Pestell/Facebook, Mick Rigby/Yodel Mobile, Matthew Candy/IBM (*cl) and Mark Challinor/The International News Media Association. All panellists brought their insightful POVs on how mobile is impacting social interaction and content sharing – and presented how to use social most effectively for any mobile marketing acquisition.
Among the more interesting stats shared by the panel were:
- 63% of Facebook’s revenue is driven by devices that didn’t exist a decade ago.
- 80% of mobile time is spent on social.
- 60% of social media time spent on phones and tablets.
- Brands have on average 15 opportunities a day to interact with Facebook users.
Among the more interesting insights shared by the panel were:
- The key to winning on Facebook is to create the perfect balance of art and science. Story telling is key to a successful page along with strategic optimization and a sprinkle of creativity.
- Facebook will be introducing public view count on videos in next few weeks.
- Start with 30% of your mobile budget then test, implement and learn.
All speakers concluded that ‘mobile is an extension of ourselves’ meaning, people depend on their phones to manage their lives, interact with brands and conduct commerce. Anyone with a smart phone has the opportunity to become an advocate for a brand so it’s our job as communicators to put the right content in front of the right audience and make sure we provide something worth sharing!
