1. Tech Talk: Social Media Optimization and What Gigya Brings to Passive Content Discovery

    Tuesday, 6 Jul 2010 4 Comments Posted by:

    Companies today invest countless hours, not to mention thousands of dollars, trying to organize content and develop keywords that improve search engine page rank and increase web traffic.  The fact of the matter is that boosting organic web results through search engine optimization (SEO) and creating contagious content is not enough. While these techniques do successfully improve active content discovery and organic referral traffic, what if your customers aren’t actively searching?

    How do you use Social Media Optimization to increase passive content discovery?

    In this age of infomania, where most of us have Tweetdeck or Facebook up on our screens during the day, passive content discovery is increasingly prevalent. While we aren’t actively searching for content, when something interesting gets populated into our social stream, we typically click on the link and check it out. Oftentimes, it doesn’t matter if we were doing something else. Links, referrals,  images and recommendations from our friends and family typically receive first priority. That’s why optimizing web content to get information into as many social feeds is more important than ever.

    This week’s Tech Talk post features Gigya, an on-site social optimization technology that enables content discovery through social channels by aggregating social API for single API access.  For users, Gigya allows for a seamless experience connecting into third-party websites through social platforms and provides an easy way to share content they’d like to recommend to their friends. For businesses, Gigya builds the pipes between social platforms (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) and corporate websites, helps lowers the friction in the registration process through single sign-in registration, delivers insightful reports about web traffic by platform — all the while, gaining access to a user’s social graph and friends through sharing.

    We’ve provided two videos (from Gigya) that illustrate how easy Gigya can be used to share content and drive engagement.

    Gigya for Sharing Content

    ESPN Using Gigya Sharing from Gigya, Inc. on Vimeo.

    Gigya for Engagement – Live Chat

    Gigya / PGA – Social Live Chat Plug-In from Gigya, Inc. on Vimeo.

    Another business use case for Gigya is the tool’s ability to deliver granular analytics about user interaction and web traffic by platform. With Gigya, businesses can aggregate analytics from multiple social platforms – Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace Google and Yahoo into one user interface. Through these types of reporting, it’s easy for companies to measure and compare which content gets shared most frequently and on what platform. Other possible metrics include: total connected users, new users, new connections by platform, newsfeed posts, newsfeed posts by platform, status updates, messages sent, messages sent by platform, referral traffic and referral traffic by platform.

    Right now, we’re just skimming the surface of Gigya, I’d highly recommend poking around the Gigya website for more information. Special thanks to Ben Pashman, Senior Vice-President of Business Development at Gigya for the interview.

    Next up for Tech Talk review is Klout. Do you have any questions you’d like to ask about Klout, the “standard for influence?”

  2. Customer Feedback: Breaking Down the Silos in Your Organization. Part 1 of a 3-Part Series

    Friday, 7 May 2010 4 Comments Posted by:

    What do busted computers laptops and broken guitars have in common? The answer…broken customer feedback and busted support channels.

    When Jeff Jarvis complained about his Dell computer in the infamous “Dell Hell” blog posts and when Dave Carroll chose songwriting over suing United Airlines with his wildly viral “United Breaks Guitars”, they gave the companies ample warning that they planned to talk. They were subsequently ignored and then proceeded to unleash a storm of negative sentiment that significantly impacted both companies’ reputations and bottom lines.

    busted laptops_broken computers

    In Dave Carroll’s case, he spent nine months contacting United Airlines, including talking to flight attendants and gate agents the very day the issue occurred. His last exchange with the company, before he created the now-famous video that potentially dropped United’s stock price by 10%, was with a Mrs. Irlweg who said “United would not be taking any responsibility for what had happened and that that would be the last email on the matter.”

    In Jeff Jarvis’ case, he was so dissatisfied with the performance of his laptop and with the service, or lack thereof, that came with it, that he unleashed a storm of negative sentiment through his Dell Hell series of posts on his blog.

    When I’ve chatted with folks about these examples, the conversation often revolves around dealing with the storm. Responding is an important topic, but, in my view, the big opportunity is to prevent the storm in the first place. Why wait? You probably already know what the busted computers or broken guitars are in your organization. Your biggest detractors are already talking to you. They are using every available channel, which sadly, are often silo’d from one another.

    Your job as a S.P.I.C.Y. leader within your organization is to get ahead of the busted computers and broken guitars and break down the silos. In Part 1, let’s spend time on how to connect the customer feedback silos in a way that’s meaningful to your organization and your customers. Parts 2 and 3, coming soon, will be about what to do with the feedback once you’ve got it.

    Part 1: Connecting Customer Feedback

    • Audit your existing “voice of customer” channels: How many are there? What are they capturing? Who’s monitoring them and what’s being done about the feedback? Are they survey-based only or are there data analytics and social web monitoring included as well?
    • Map your customers’ end-to-end experience: When I was a S.P.I.C.Y. leader myself at Intuit, I was part of a cross-functional team that mapped the experience from the moment a small business owner lost the ability to get business done to the moment she got back to business. We also identified the key “moments of truth” in that experience – which things really mattered to the customer not just which ones mattered to us – by using our own data first and then interviewing customer to validate the moments or adjust them based on the interviews.
    • Overlay the moments of truth with the feedback channel audit: Where are the gaps? Where do the channels overlap? What feedback has come through to show how you’re doing against the key moments of truth for the customer?
    • Establish a baseline of customer experience and priorities to improve: Based on the audit, mapping and overlay work, you’ll likely have a clear picture for where you’re doing well on customer experience and where you need to improve. From the baseline, in alignment with your company’s objectives, you’ll want to create measurable priorities to improve the experience.
    • Establish a regular process for reporting: You’ll have a couple of levels of reporting. You’ll have ground level, emerging issues reporting that is much more real-time. You’ll also want a report-out that should go as high as you can in your organization where hard, longer-term decisions can be made. In some cases, decisions can be made quickly that have a big impact on customer experience, like Southwest Airlines going back to black & white text on their online boarding passes based on customer feedback about the cost of printing in full color. In other cases, the decisions are harder and more complex.

    You’re probably asking…now that I’ve done the heavy lifting of connecting the feedback, what next? Part 2 in the series will cover how to measure the value of customer feedback and Part 3 will cover closing the loop on the feedback, even in heavily regulated industries.

    I’d love hear more from all of you. How are you connecting customer feedback channels today? What’s working? What’s not?

  3. Wanted: a S.P.I.C.Y. Leader at Intuit

    Tuesday, 20 Apr 2010 13 Comments Posted by:

    Okay, I had to start my first blog post at Ant’s Eye View with a funny headline. In all seriousness though, as someone who’s just left a social media/community leadership role at a large company and was part of the interview team for my replacement at Intuit, the right person to lead a social media team is S.P.I.C.Y.

    Being a S.P.I.C.Y. leader is about successfully transforming corporate cultures to focus on customers while achieving company goals. It’s not about how many followers, fans, connections or Word with Friends’ games you have running. S.P.I.C.Y. attributes are:

    • Smart: Do you use good data to make decisions, and is the data fairly obtained and applied? I’ve seen a lot of snake oil, internally and externally, around data, or the lack thereof, and the social web, so smarts are required to make sense of it all. Smarts are also required to do the hard work of connecting the dots between customer success and your company’s success. Last but not least in the smarts category is rigor around the data. Are you rigorous in setting real business objectives or you do chase after shiny objects? And, if you’re someone who’s rigorously set priorities, then how do you adjust as you acquire new information?
    • Passionate: If you aren’t interested in talking about your products and services, then who the heck will be? It’s okay to care passionately about your products, services, company and, above all, your customers. In digital media, true passion, not smelly promotional passion, cuts through noise. Passion also cuts through the noise internally, especially when combined with the smarts mentioned above.
    • Interested: Are you naturally curious about the world around you, your customers’ lives and your products or services? Do you take a systematic approach for learning new “cultures” and new projects and, most importantly, then apply that learning to constantly improve on your teams and your work. And, my deep belief is that naturally interested people are naturally humble. We’re all learning our way here, and being humble goes a long way when operating in new cultures and partnering with internal teams. Speaking of…do you do more to recognize others than to gain recognition for yourself?
    • Caring:  A deep, enduring commitment to customers (and soon-to-be customers) is the hallmark of a S.P.I.C.Y leader at Intuit. Thanks to amazing folks like Roy Rosin and Scott Cook, I learned early on about the importance of caring for customers and prospects by learning from them directly – through follow-me-homes, Net Promoter studies and listening and responding to them on the social web. And, then taking that learning and doing something about it, even if it hurts.
    • Youthful: No, this isn’t when I tell you to hire someone who is 20 and has been using some form of digital device since birth. Not that there is anything wrong with those folks! In fact, what’s exciting about being youthful is the belief in the power of change. Change is a constant on the social web and in large corporations. Driving change, not be driven crazy by it, is the key to success in this role.

    Most importantly, spicy or no, be a leader. Whether you’re going to manage a large team or influence other teams, leading is key. Leadership encapsulates all of the above attributes with the critical addition of being willing to make tough decisions, stand up for your team and lead what is often significant change in a large organization. Leading is also about understanding that you can hold standards and goals high, while supporting your team and internal partners to make it happen. All too often, I’ve heard folks say that “you can’t do “x” because this is all new.” Well, if there was anything I learned from Battlestar Galactica, leadership is even more important when facing the unknown.

    Here are some examples of job descriptions for social media leaders, including the one I wrote for my replacement. And, in the great minds think alike category, here’s an excellent post from Christine Morrison, social lead at Intuit’s TurboTax on leadership qualities for social media folks inside companies.

    I’d love to hear about your experiences either hiring for social media/online engagement leaders at your organization or about trying to get one of those jobs. What did I miss? What’s off base?

  4. Is your Brain ready for Great Customer Service?

    Tuesday, 22 Dec 2009 No Comments Posted by:

    Great customer service starts with a healthy brain. I believe if your employees are happy, informed, engaged, and energized; then they produce better products and deliver great service. If your employees have negative feelings, this clogs the Prefrontal Cortex in the brain,  where empathy and reasoning reside.

    I attended a great workshop from the Hand in Hand organization (a non profit started by Patty Wipfler). Hand in Hand is a parenting resource, but I saw many parallels to adult business relationships. Hand in Hand’s approach is based on the principles of respect, listening, leadership development and the importance of interpersonal connections. The way to break thru the negative emotions is to Listen on a personal level. Bad behavior can be a request for help.

    Case in point: American Airlines – I have flown over 30 segments with American Airlines in last 6 months and have been paying a lot of attention to the flight attendants, gate agents, ticket counter agents, and pilots (greet you at end of the flight). My service experience has been either great or terrible. Why? It comes down to the employee’s attitude– some are enjoying their job and others hate it. Unfortunately over the last 30 flight segments, about 75% of my observations appear to be hating/regretting showing up for work. This comes across as some rude behavior in boarding and in flight service (“HURRY UP take your seat”  “we can’t take off because YOU are not seated”, “Turn off your device NOW”). December 3,  I was on a flight from AUS to DFW, they started loading the plane 12 minutes before scheduled departure, then complained that the passengers were holding up scheduled departure. The reason was the late arrival of the plane (inbound to AUS) and late loading delayed the departure. Compare this to stories of Virgin America or Southwest – customers talk about the positive experiences. I met one business traveler in San Francisco that has changed his schedule to fly Virgin America over other airlines. So I asked why? What does Virgin America do differently? Answer: “they are nice to me, say hello, they smile”.

    People smile when they are happy. People are happy when they are informed, empowered, and energized. Management has a lot of jobs and get dumped on a lot. A management philosophy I followed (while in the U.S. Navy and at Dell, Inc.) was to listen to my team, remove roadblocks, praise in public, and counsel when necessary. If you take care of your team, they take care of you. What is yours?

    American Airlines: if you happen to read this, I would be interested in discussing some ideas to improve your customer service. As a frequent flyer, it is in my best interest (along with millions of other flyers to improve the status quo).  I believe your employees are not the core problem. Improved communication and engagement can help.

  5. A Strategy that Worked

    Wednesday, 9 Dec 2009 2 Comments Posted by:

    I walked away a little confused after reading Isn’t the Value of Social Media What Business Is All About? in the Huffington Post yesterday.  Manish Mehta, VP of Social Media and Community at Dell Inc., wrote an excellent article about the importance of connecting with customers in the social space. The confusion comes down to the last sentence: “No strategy necessary.”

    What’s that now? Manish isn’t serious, is he?? 

    Don’t get me wrong, I like the concept of having a ‘Mom and Pop’ shop approach to building relationships with your customers.  Having solid customer relationships are a big win and a solid reminder of how to do business. But let’s not forget that half of small businesses fail before their fifth birthday. 

    And why? In my mind, it’s largely (but not only) because of a lack of strategy and clear direction.  Of course you need a strategy. 

    Ironically, most of what Manish talks about in this article actually is Dell’s strategy.  After Jeff Jarvis’ Dell Hell series educated everyone on Dell’s opportunity to connect with their customers in 2005, Dell built a strategy to do just that.  A clear direction was outlined, to listen and connect with their customers, and IdeaStorm, Direct2Dell and online customer outreach ensued.  A social strategy will define the direction and scope of your activities through objectives and goals, and ultimately drive resources to the environment (tactics, tools, processes, etc.) that will benefit stakeholders.

    Give yourself some credit Dell, your strategy has been effective!

  6. Social + CRM

    Friday, 6 Nov 2009 5 Comments Posted by:

    This year there have been a lot of online discussions on Social CRM – what is it? can it work? who is doing it? Now is the time to hear from the informed and thoughtful on how Social + CRM enable new business opportunities.

    The Ants are proud to be a sponsor at the Lithium Social CRM Virtual Summit on Tuesday, Wednesday, November 11 – the largest online conference for Social Media and CRM professionals. The Social CRM Virtual Summit is a five-hour online conference, which includes webcasts by industry leaders in an interactive exhibit hall, a resource center with extensive materials for download, and a virtual networking lounge to chat live with speakers and prospects.

    The virtual event is featured in two time sessions on November 11th.

    • 5am to 10am PT / 8am to 1pm ET / 1pm to 6pm GMT, or
    • 10am to 3pm PT / 1pm to 6pm ET / 6pm to 11pm GMT

    Social CRM Virtual Summit Agenda

    The social media revolution has changed everything, including how customers choose to interact with companies and each other online, and where they turn for trusted information. This virtual summit comes at a time when companies are starting to see tangible financial results from deeper online engagement with customers, and will explore the current capabilities of and future for Social CRM.
    At this five-hour live, virtual summit you will experience:

    • Webcasts by industry luminaries such as Mike Fauscette (IDC), Bill Johnston (Forum One), Jeremiah Owyang (Altimeter Group), and Ray Wang (Altimeter Group) in a virtual auditorium
    • Scheduled live chats with industry experts and practitioners from companies including Barnes and Noble, Lenovo, National Instruments, Redfin, Best Buy, Juniper Networks, and T-Mobile
    • Keynote speeches from CRM thought leaders, Paul Greenberg (The 56 Group) and Brent Leary (CRM Essentials)
    • An interactive exhibit hall with dynamic sponsor booths, including Genesys, ON24, Ant’s Eye View, Forum One Communications, CRM Media, Cognizant, and Liveperson
    • A resource center with dozens of valuable white papers, podcasts, and presentations for download
    • A virtual networking lounge to meet other like-minded professionals through live chat

    image During your time at the Social CRM Virtual Summit, please stop by the Ant’s Eye View booth that will be hosted by Caitlin Angeloff. Caitlin will share the “how” aspects of making your brand promise a reality.  She will step you through our methodology for guiding organizations through the process of transforming customer experience and brand engagement by activating and embedding the customer voice in to every aspect of your business. 

    Register now. It is free and requires no travel budget.

  7. What conferences are worth your time?

    Thursday, 22 Oct 2009 No Comments Posted by:

    I get asked often “what conferences should we attend?”. Easy, short answer is any conferences that bring together Great Content and Two groups: Peers and Captivators Why two groups? You learn different things from different people.

    Peers help you by sharing current business examples and provide you with good feedback and validation. The output is ideas which are usually adaptable back in your office when you return.

    Captivators are thought generators. They introduce you to something new – a new concept or fresh perspective on an established problem. They provoke thought, provide with you a lens to go back to your office and evaluate your operation and get you thinking.

    Now which conferences have these types of people? Well almost every single one. So now how do you filter the good from the mediocre? I look for conferences that are organized for ways to develop some immediate relationships that I can keep active once the conference ends. Marketing Profs Digital Mixer does a great job on this front. I am currently attending this event, and this is my second year – best testament for events is repeat customers.

    Some other events I enjoy attending: WOMMA Summit, Forum One, plus select company events like Bazaarvoice’s Social Commerce Summit

    Travel budgets and time are tight, so you have to make choices. Conferences can be valuable to instill new ideas back into your business. What conferences or summits have you attended and recommend? Why?

  8. Ant’s Eye View Growth Report: Welcoming Steve Alter

    Monday, 5 Oct 2009 16 Comments Posted by:

    Steve3.JPG

    When a research firm like Gartner writes about one of your projects as “a milestone in the maturity of crowdsourcing-based support models”, you know you’re doing something right. And Steve Alter, the Product Manager for the Microsoft Answers support community knows that feeling… since Gartner was writing about his project.

    Answers was launched in 2008 to support Windows Vista and now has nearly 50,000 solutions to users questions, with 80% of the answers coming from the community participants. The site is a giant, generating more than 13 million page views and more than 4 million unique users last quarter alone! Needless to say, Steve knows community.

    Which of course meant that we knew we had to add him to the Ant’s Eye View team! Please join me in welcoming out latest Ant, Steve Alter. Steve starts at AEV today as a Social Business Strategist, based in our Seattle office.

    Steve’s background is impressive and diverse. In addition to Steve’s work on Answers, he also managed engagement opportunities between Microsoft and community influencers through the Microsoft Valuable Professional (MVP) program, driving feedback, advocacy, and participation in peer-to-peer support to achieve business results.

    And of course he’s the only Ant with a background in the theater. Steve has always claimed that his passion for community and crowdsourcing was forged during a decade as a producer and director in professional theaters across the country.

    Please help give Steve a warm welcome to the Anthill!

    UPDATE: If you’re going to be at Community 2.0, Steve is a speaker. Say hi and it’s likely he’ll buy you a drink.

  9. Focus on what made you successful

    Monday, 28 Sep 2009 No Comments Posted by:

    Consistent, moderate growth and profitability can be boring to some. But what some great, sustaining companies do is remain focused on the successful, core elements of their business. They wash, rinse, repeat (and improve) basic functions of their business model and cautiously  add to the business model. Costco is a company I admire because they offer great merchandise at good deals. I pay $100/year just to shop there. But what I get is great merchandise at competitive prices, friendly staff, and risk free return policy. Costco manages to a smaller number of skus and product categories than other large retailers. If they followed some of the bigger retailers, I expect their focus would shift and risk the core customer engagement they have built over decades. Costco has customers that emotionally connected to the brand.

    I had dinner in Chicago last week with a leader from an online infrastructure company. Our dinner conversation included a small business office supplier. This office supplier started in retail and is well known for excellent customer service and product selection. The type of customer service that people repeated positive stories about how well they were treated. As this office supplier moved into online commerce, the core successes became impacted by trying to copy online competitors. So the office supplier started to execute many processes poorly instead of a few core tasks exemplary. 

    Why does this happen to good companies? As company’s growth rate slows (economic conditions, competitive shift), business leaders look at competitors or industry metrics as their premier yardstick. Changing your yardstick can risk focus on internal core functions and when customers notice, your existing business revenue is at risk. Too often business try and convince themselves that dialing back customer service or product quality will not make a difference with customers or just a few customers will notice.

    Before you change your focus, ask your customers why they choose your company over a competitor or substitute.

  10. Word of Mouth and Small Business

    Thursday, 18 Jun 2009 No Comments Posted by:

    Having successfully made it to Seattle, I’ve been caught up in the haze of work, two year old, and unpacking. What better time to point out a guest post I wrote a while back over at the GasPedal blog. Since it’s summer, it’s time to talk smoothies.

    —

    The medical community might tell you that blended fruit and ice don’t actually contain any addictive qualities, but I’m not convinced. I’m physically unable to pass a new smoothie shop without stopping to sample the wares. I can’t see “smoothie” on a menu without feeling a longing.

    Last week I downloaded the Yelp.com iPhone application and tested it by… you guessed it… looking for local smoothie shops. To my extreme pleasure, I discovered Icey (http://www.yelp.com/biz/icey-garland), a new shop that had just opened down the street. Within hours, I was inside ordering my first smoothie. (It was far and away the best I’d ever had)

    As I walked out of the store, tasty smoothie in hand, I found myself wanting to do whatever I could to ensure their ongoing existence. Horror stories abound about the failure rate of small businesses, and this simply can’t happen to Icey. Where would I get my fix if they close the doors??

    If they ask (I’ve already volunteered), here are 6 points I’d share with them about how they can build Word of Mouth for their incredible business.

    Tell a story

    Icey isn’t just a “smoothie shop”. They’ve created a menu that includes Bubble Teas, Sweet Ices, and a range of non-traditional items. Why this menu? What makes it unique? Give me something I can learn, then in turn share with others to show how smart I am. For instance: “Sure Icey doesn’t have the boost powders like Jamba Juice, but that’s because they offer such fresh ingredients, they don’t need to”. (I’m making that up, but you get the point.

    Help me decide

    When I see a new menu item that I don’t understand, I’m more inclined to revert to my old standby than I am to try something new. With pictures, descriptions, samples, and encouragement, help me branch out. When I have a teacher, the shop is my classroom. And a classroom inherently encourages frequency.

    Drive repeat visits through awards

    A friend of mine has been on a quest to achieve the coveted “Gold Plate” status at a local pub, the Flying Saucer (http://www.beerknurd.com/). You see, the pub has hundreds of beers available, and when you’ve tried all of them, you are immortalized by having your name put on a gold plate, hung on the wall. Not only has this program given my buddy a reason to come back regularly, it’s also given him an incredible knowledge of beer. The more Icey introduces their customers to the full menu, the more likely they are to come back. And the more knowledge these customers have, the more likely they are to bring a friend with them that they can show off their in-depth knowledge to.

    Do something to stand out

    When the Icey staff hands over your hand crafted drink, it comes in a plastic cup with a sealed sheet of plastic on top. So sealed, in fact, you can turn the cup upside down without the slightest risk of spilling. The way you actually consume this drink is to punch a hole in the top with an oversized straw. If the drink really is “unspillable”, why not hand over the drink upside down?

    Brand everything

    While I was walking around the shopping center, tasty drink in hand, I noticed that the cups didn’t have any sort of logo on them. How were people to know that this delicious looking concoction was created by Icey and not Starbucks?

    Have a web site

    This may be a bit obvious, but build a basic Web presence with your location info, a bit of your story, and an overview of what you serve. This doesn’t need to a complex, data heavy site, but it should look great. The primary goal is creating a destination that can be emailed, blogged, and generally shared. (You’ll notice I had to use the Yelp.com link to get you to them in the beginning of this post) The incredible cupcake bakery, Sprinkles (http://www.sprinklescupcakes.com/) launched with an incredibly lightweight site, which even helped them create an ambience of exclusivity.

    —

    UPDATE: One more point I’ll make that wasn’t part of the of the original post…

    Listen to experienced professionals

    Seriously, this seems basic but when you’re getting freebie consulting from high paid, highly experienced professionals you might want to considering following their advice. I’ve been talking to a number of small business owners locally since the original post went up about their marketing efforts. The one piece of advice I’ve consistently give each and every one of these small business owners is simple: Buy Word of Mouth Marketing , read it, and then we’ll sit down and talk about how to implement the principles of the book.

    You know how many have both bought and read the book? None.

    As a small business owner, I know how difficult it can be. I understand how many hours go into running the business. But if you’re not always, and I mean ALWAYS thinking about how to drive your business to the next level, you’re failing. There’s are plenty of reasons a vast majority of small businesses fail, and lack of forward planning is big one.