Social Media Strategy and Internet Marketing

There are two tools that I think people need to use more often when writing posts. They make life easier by helping you find topics to write about, and other blogs that have also written about the topic. So what are they? Simple: Google Alerts, and Google Custom Search.

Google Alerts, lets you setup keywords to track. For example, I might track “Left The Box” to see if anyone references this site. When Google indexes, or finds something with the term “Left The Box”, they send me an email to let me know. Google Alerts helps me monitor my online presence.

This is the most basic of ways to use it. To take it further we’ll play around with the basic options we get. When you create an alert you get the choice to be alerted at the moment something is found or daily; which opens up a host of possibilities.

If you’d like a recap of what people have said about “Social Media” for the day, just create a daily Social Media Alert. This way I can think of new topics for posts, see what others are saying, and stay one step ahead of other bloggers. I might never have found a majority of the blogs in my RSS Feed without these alerts.

The next step is to take the fundamental idea and extrapolate it more. When I write a post, for example “Social Media Transparency” which spoke about about honesty in online PR, I create an alert based around the idea of the post. This way I can see what others are saying about it, and maybe send them an email with my post to tell them to see what I’ve written. Sometimes they’ll link back, but if they don’t at least I’ve made a contact. In the future they might read my blog, and maybe link to another post.

The second tool, Google Custom Search, is great for bloggers because it allows you to search niche engines. My friend Dave from Huomah.com created an awesome engine for Search Engine Optimizers, called Search SEO Pros. If I’m researching a post, I’ll use the niche search engine to search niche specific sites. It makes it easy to remove the spam, and find only what I need.

The custom search engines are also great for finding posts to link out to. Just search the topic you’re writing about in your post and you’ll find a number of other posts you can reference.

These are just two of the many tools I use when writing a blog post. I’ll write about more in the future, so look out for that.

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If you don’t think the Internet can make or break your reputation online, you’re sorely mistaken. In the age before social media, each consumer’s didn’t have their own soapbox. Now, that’s changed and people are able to share their worst experiences with everyone else.

Check out these corporate problems that made it to the front page of Digg.

Comcast is an Evil Corporation that Sucks:

After complaining to Comcast about not getting information about a rate change, this blogger decided to call to complain and inquire about why he had received no notice. In the end he was forced to cancel the $140 service, but had the last word when he posted his article and it went hot on digg.

He said there was no other way they could have notified us. I told him lots of businesses I work with mail out announcements as individual letters notifying their customers of changes. He seemed completely baffled by the idea and chided me for not getting my bills in the mail, blaming the whole misunderstanding on me.

Sprint Refuses To Cancel Dead Brother’s Cellphone:

This sad story highlights how bad some employees need a PR seminar. When the writer’s brother past away, everyone but Sprint was understanding. They told “M”, the writer, that the most they could do was put the account on vacation and charge $5.95 until the contract had expired, or “M” would have to pay early termination fees.

My brother passed away suddenly in December. I have been dealing with his estate since. Most creditors have been easy to deal with and have even offered their condolences. Sprint is an exception.

Verizon still doesn’t understand fire:

Network World columnist James Gaskin had a huge problem with Verizon when his in-law’s house was burned down. They had called Verizon to ask that their phone number be transferred to their temporary living quarters. Apparently Verizon can’t do that, but what they can do is forward you’re calls. Too bad the small obstacle is that you have to do it, and if you don’t have the original phone you’re SOL.

We can’t do (the forwarding), said the Verizon reps; only you can do it. Get this: They were told to call from their old phone to request the forwarding service. Yes, the phone in a house that burned down. Yes, calling on phones that had turned into lumps of melted plastic with metal bits sticking out.

Enterprise Tells Post-Op Patient To Drive 400 Miles On A Faulty Tire:

Bad press is one thing, but putting a customer’s life in danger is another. Enterprise might want to take a look at how their employees conduct themselves, especially since they have a “promote from within” only policy (yes one of the employees in this story might one day become an Enterprise executive).

This enterprise customer had noticed that one of the tires in the car she had rented looked like it was low on air. She called to Enterprise to find out if they could replace the car, and explained that she couldn’t drive right now because she had just undergone surgery. After a run around and lots of bureaucracy, she realized that Enterprise would be no help and decided to complain online.

I explained the situation, and was connected to what I believe was the Manhattan office, though I was never told. However, as I was trying to explain that I could not drive to another branch because of the anesthesia, the representative became confused and hung up on me. I called customer service again, and was again disconnected.

Microsoft tester fired after talking about Xbox 360 defects:

A lot of us gamers were disappointed with this turn of events. Ars Technica covered this story perfectly, and portrayed Microsoft in a light that I agree with. The story goes that Rob Delaware, a tester for Microsoft publicly spoke about issues with the Xbox 360 unit, notably the “Red Ring of Death”, and found himself without a job because of it. If Microsoft wants to pull itself back to its former glory, it could use some PR help. The fact that the Xbox 360 had issues is not something to cover up. You should be investing time and money into making your product and customer service better, instead of firing good game testers.

Working closely with Dean Takahashi at VentureBeat, Delaware walked through the sordid history of the Xbox 360 defects. The warranty replacement policy, which sees refurbished units sent out to those with failed consoles, is fingered as largely the result of Microsoft’s decision to hurriedly get the Xbox 360 onto the market.

Way to Spot Suspicious Activity Bank of America:

This article was really interesting to me because not only do I read Chris Hooley’s blog, but because he’s a smart guy and a lot of other people read his blog too. So when Bank of America let an identity thief take about $40,000 of Chris’ money, it was not going to end well. Chris quickly wrote a blog post after the incident, letting everyone know what had happened and over-all just venting. Bank of America probably should have done some better customer service and maybe even just apologized for the problem, some swag goes a long way too.

A quick review turned up 5 suspicious transactions. Two were deposits, and three were withdrawals. All five transactions occurred *inside* five different Bank of America banking centers. What amazed me most is the final two transactions. A withdrawal of 26k. And later that day, another withdrawal of 12.5k. Way to spot suspicious activity Bank of America. They handed the guy almost 40k in cash in one day.

A Quick Note From Idaho (And Why I Hate Wal-Mart):

Yeah, Walmart sucks and I’m clearly not a fan of them. But this story takes the cake. This blogger was driving to Chicago when he stopped in Idaho to get the oil changed in his car. 30 minutes and $24 dollars later he was told the oil had been changed. Too bad that was a lie. In the end after being lied to by both the mechanic and receptionist, the oil was finally changed. But that didn’t stop the blogger from writing about the horrible customer service, and highlighting just how much Walmart sucks.

She called in the mechanic and in front of me said to him “why didn’t you change the oil?” Clearly she either forgot, or just didn’t care that she had already told me that she had done it.

His response was “You told me to just pull it into the lot, you didn’t say anything about an oil change.”

I was on the mechanic’s side for a minute until he looked at me and said “When we get these foreign cars in here, sometimes it gets confusing.”

Best Buy Cancels Your Order As You Stand There Shouting “Stop!”:

Usually I’m a huge fan of Best Buy. It’s an technology fan’s playground, and a place to check out some pretty cool gadgets. Regardless of how cool the store is, their customer service definitely needs some help. After stories of a hidden website and two tier pricing had been uncovered, I had hoped it would be the end of bad PR for Best Buy. Once again, I was mistaken.

Best Buy didn’t want to honor the sale price of the 2GB flash drive Matt ordered through their website, so when Matt arrived to pick-up his purchase, the store’s assistant manager called customer service and, pretending to be Matt, asked to cancel the order.

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Often, with some larger businesses, the marketing department feels the need to make the company look infallible (which obviously isn’t the case, we all make mistakes). They also try to show that someone’s connected, everywhere.

In the social media field this might mean ghost writing blog posts or pretending to be the client on twitter. The truth is that these campaigns often fail, and most social media consults won’t offer a strategy to a client that’s not willing to be proactive.

Social media is not a purely passive marketing scheme, it requires upkeep, the willingness to track reputation, and the effort to continually fix it.

So how can you show honesty in social media campaigns?

I have two examples, the first is Britney spears. Recently, there’s been a lot of hoopla over her creating an account on Twitter. Most Twitter users would think it’s not her on the account; assuming, more than likely it’s a hand holder or marketing intern updating on her behalf.

Britney’s staff thought of a relatively ingenious way to use Twitter, and highlight when it’s Britney and when it isn’t. They end each tweet with “posted by” or “~…” to highlight who left the message. Sometimes you’ll see then posted by Britney, but more often you see members of her staff giving updates to Britney fans on Twitter.

The second example happens to be another celebrity. Lil’ Wayne has started writing blog posts on ESPN, and when I read it I was truly blown away.

It is obviously written by him, and he wrote very eloquently. But because he wrote it, and because it’s clear that he did, Lil’ Wayne has used social media to show another side to him, and probably convinced a new demographic to check out his music.

Social media users are amazingly efficient at sniffing out fakers, and quickly stomping them out. If you’re not willing to become a part of social media, it might be that this new media marketing is not for you.

Do you have any other stories that highlight honesty and transparency in social media marketing?

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I’ve released the first version of an “About Me” widgets for bloggers.

The widget displays your name as the title, allows you to input a url for your profile image, and links to all your social media profiles.

It’s simple to use, and I hope to add on to it based on your suggestions.

This is what the widget looks like on your blog:

This is what the admin panel looks like:

You can download the widget here:

Social About Me Widget

Feel free to leave suggestions, or ask for support here, or contact me.

I’ve added a link back to me for creation of the plugin, you’re welcome to remove it from your footer, but I ask that you put it somewhere else. I won’t be able to track who does what, but all I ask is for good will. Hope you enjoy it!

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