I’ll be speaking at the next Zone 5 event and the topic is customer engagement through social media. Customer engagement seems to be the new buzz word but it’s something that is hard to achieve for most businesses.

Traditional marketing was about one generic message that was sent to all customers through controlled channels. Social media has now changed that model and enabled the sharing and customization of the message via many channels. The biggest change is the loss of control of the message.

Since there is a lot of emphasis on B2C and endless examples and case studies I thought that I would focus the discussion around B2B. My goal is to challenge status quo and inspire the audience to make their message/content engaging.

For further details on this event check out the Zone 5/OCRI website.

I was asked to talk about LinkedIn to a group of job seekers today.  Since I only had a couple of hours to present I had a huge challenge on my hands. LinkedIn has evolved to be a very powerful social network for professionals. It is feature rich and is evolving daily. Most people don’t use it to it’s full capacity Free or paid.

The other challenge is the fundamental philosophy of sharing from the younger age demographic to the “privacy” issue of the older age demographic.

So when I actually thought about it I realized that “you are nobody if you can’t be Googled”!!!

Personal branding is becoming more important daily and there are many ways to achieve this given the tools that are available today.

So here’s my perspective from a LinkedIn perspective.

We had a great discussion and there were a lot of relevant and great questions that were asked. There was a common theme amongst the audience of sitting in front of a computer and applying for jobs!! I was quite taken aback by this as I thought that everyone knew about the hidden job market!!

I asked if anyone had tracked the time they spent looking for jobs online and the ROI of this and it seems that no one is measuring their success. I bet you if this were to be done it would be very apparent quickly that the ROI of this activity is not very high.

So if anyone out there looking for a job wants to try this experiment I would love to hear the results.

Traditional forms of job hunting, resume writing, job postings

vs

Branding online using LinkedIn, informational interviews through reverse company checks on LinkedIn, engaging in the community.

Is anyone up for the challenge?

What are your thoughts on this? Do you have a LinkedIn success story that you would like to share with us?

Tweet. Meet. Give = twestival

Ottawa will join over 184 cities across the globe in bringing people together through twitter to raise money and awareness for charity.  The charity of choice is Water – a non-profit organization bringing clean, save drinking water to people in developing nations by funding sustainable clean water solutions in areas of greatest need.

When:Feb. 12th 2009

Where: Suite 34, 34 Clarence St.

Time: 7pm

For those with small donations under $100 you can purchase tickets. So come on out and have fun for a good cause.

Yup you read correctly, the Vatican is going social media.  Wow, that’s amazing.  One of the oldest institutions that is very much into traditions is now embracing this method of communicating.

They do have a website….

and they have launched their own YouTube channel.

You will now be able to get daily updates from the Vatican.  Rumour has it that they might go facebook as per the Vatican’s Social Communication’s Chief.

“I’m thinking about it. We have opened a discussion about it but we haven’t decided anything yet.” said MsgrClaudio Maria Celli, President of the Pontifical Council for Social Communication.

There are more people from that Vatican on Facebook like  Cardinale Crescenzio Sepe.

The nun who launched the Vatican’s Web site is at work on a MySpace for Catholics

Back in 2006, Sister Judith and her team were responsible for the re-design of the Vatican website and starting a MySpace page.

It’s apparent that the Vatican has been on the social media journey for a while now as they approved the iphone app by called iBreviary. The application, which is a virtual version of the Catholic liturgical book, was created by an Italian priest, Reverend Paolo Padrini, and is available in Italian, English, Latin, Spanish and French, with German and Portuguese coming in the next version.

Jesus in also on facebook as well but not sure which person or group set this up.

There is a Jesus Facebook application.

iphone…

It’s just the begining …..

With an unlimited budget you can have a very solid web and social media strategy.  Here is an analysis of one of the many social networks and how it was customized towards the audience on this site.

Facebook Applications

There were many Facebook applications e.g. Barack Obama supporters, Barack Obama for President, Barack Obama fan, Barack Obama – Yes, We Can, Obamagrams,Obamarama …..  Some were developed by his campaign team and the rest by others because they have a lot of time on their hands.

A custom FB application called Obama was created.  This application lets you share the news items, blog posts, speeches, videos that most inspire you to support Barack Obama.

The official facebook page has the Obama application button installed with the call to action button”find out where to vote now”.  It also offered favorite stories and videos targeted at this audience.

Facebook Page

Numerous facebook pages all linked together.  His official page had 3,667,117 supporters.  So every time any information was listed here it was easily accessible to 3 million people!!!

Favorite Pages

His team was very open to various groups taking his logo and adapting it towards their needs.  These special interest groups were linked to his Facebook Page via the Favorite Pages option thus providing one stop shopping.

YouTube Box

This application posted the relevant videos fromYouTube here.  Not all videos where here but targeted videos by his team.

Notes

Updates on where Obama was going to be on various TV shows, venus etc..updates on issues, policies, guest posts, inspirational posts to raise further funds.  Fun items like update your profile pictures.

On voting day a link to the polling application was posted here.

Photos

Numerous photo albums highlighting not only his personal life but his campaign trail starting in Springfield.  This is well done as it shows his policital side as well as his more human side.

Now who’s not gonna love this…  check out the comments….

Posted Items

Before his Election Night speech, Barack sent out a message to his supporters.

“I’m about to head to Grant Park to talk to everyone gathered there, but I wanted to write to you first.

We just made history.

And I don’t want you to forget how we did it.

You made history every single day during this campaign — every day you knocked on doors, made a donation, or talked to your family, friends, and neighbors about why you believe it’s time for change.

I want to thank all of you who gave your time, talent, and passion to this campaign. We have a lot of work to do to get our country back on track, and I’ll be in touch soon about what comes next.

But I want to be very clear about one thing…

All of this happened because of you.

Thank you,

Barack”

If you are just an ordinary citizen the chances of the President elect sending a personal note are close to none.  With his FB channel he was able to thank everyone for voting for him.

Supporters

Over 3 million supporters on facebook alone!!!!  All these people gave their feedback, posted videos, photos etc…

Events

Select events were posted here, not a whole lot but enough to generate interest.

His online presence  was similar in the other social networking sites with targeted messages going out in these channels.  This form of communication where the barriers are broken down and the average joe can provide their feedback is very powerful.

These various sites are still being used my his team during the transition and it remains to be seen how they will morph as he takes office soon.

I have mixed feelings about this, on the one hand I am thrilled about thise social media channels.  On the flip side I have a bit of concern that they could be used to push his agenda.  So the other politicians and special interest groups should take the time to also participate in this space so that the American people are getting a well rounded picture and not that of a sole individual.

As I look back on 2008 there were many interesting happenings in social media (new media).  There were many achievements with the steady growth of various social networking sites and launch of new sites.

However, the most important use of social media had to do with the past election down south, which caused quite a stir not just nationally but globally. People couldn’t stop talking about the election and wherever you were on the internet you couldn’t help but see Barack Obama. His ability to raise money and the large voter turnout was something that no other politician was able to achieve before. One of the biggest reasons for this was a very good web and social media strategy.

The basis of any web or social media strategy is to link specific goals to the interactions on the website and the social spaces. Integration of the internet into a hub, barackobama.com

Goals

The three major goals of the campaign were

• Fifty State Strategy
• Targeted the dissaffected center
• Focused on small donations

These goals were tied into the web strategy, new media strategy, traditional media and all three were interlinked very well.

Barackobama.com

A well designed and concise website making all campaign material very easily accessible to everyone. Great attention to logo and branding in general. The logo was designed by a company that did not traditionally design political logos, hence a fresh and clean look.

Call to action button, please donate, was easily found on the website regardless where you navigated, thus enabling small donations.

Downloadable campaign music, logos and tag lines, website and chat, widgets for updates to websites, posters and signs, support tools, flyers and documents, videos, desktop backgrounds and campaign forms.

MyBo

MyBO offered online tools for instant local organizing. This enabled people setting up campaign offices to do so very quickly and effectively.  This gave the opportunity for people to co-create and evolve the brand.  For example there were some fun events organized by people like a “yes Wii Can” Wii party and voting machines haloween event.

Personal Fundraising

The most notable feature of the website was the ability to raise micro funds. Small amounts of donations from many people. Thus the campaign did not have to rely solely on the large donations that were the norm in a traditional political campaign.

People prefer to donate to friends more than to charities and the website addressed this emotion.  Personal fund raising pages for people to keep track of the funds they raised.

Obama Mobile

GPS to find the nearest field office.  Custom ringtones.

iPhone App

iPhone application was sheer genius and had quite a few iPhone features.

Call Friends – a volunteering tool for talking to people you already know.  Your contacts are prioritized by key battleground states, and the abilito to make call sand organize results in one place

Call Stats – see nationwide Obama ‘08 call friends totals and find out how yoru call totals compare to leading callers
Get Involved – find and contact your local Obama for America HQ
Receive Updates – receive the latest news and announcements via text messages or email
News – browse complete coverage of national and local campaign news
Local Events – find local events, share by email and get maps and directions
Media – browse videos and photos from the campaign
Issues – get clear facts about Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s plan fo ressential issues facing Americans

Obama Store

A lot of swag.

Blog

On February 8th 2007 Joe Rospars announced that he was the new New Media Director and that he would be using the blog to communicate about the campaign, evolution of the website and more.  This particular post received 194 comments!!!

The Blog was hosted on the website which lends to a more personal touch. People could set up their own blogs on barackobama.com to chronicle their campaign experiences.

This blog became very popular quickly and it focused on the issues as well as the more personal side of the campaign.  You Tube videos as will as flickr photos were integrated into the Blog.

Posts that responded to what was being said in the blogsphere.

BarackTV

Videos of all off line events, debates, speaches that were posted on YouTube were easily accessible here.

Digital Landscape

Barack Obama had a presence on numerous social networks where a common look and feel was maintained throughout each of these sites .

It also has a RSS at multiple locations for those that like their RSS readers.

I will discuss his Social Media Strategy in detail in the next post.