Talk the talk, and walk the walk

One of the toughest things for a manager to do is give up control.

It’s easy to want to do it all yourself, to assume that you know better. Imagine the dire consequences of promoting open communications among employees: ceding even a bit of authority can feel a little like handing the asylum keys to the inmates. Allow them the freedom to talk without you in the room, and the next thing you know they’ll be staging a company-wide revolt!

 

But authors Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff insist that trusting your employees to engage in conversation is exactly what a good manager does. The measures they outline in “Groundswell” to enhance a company’s bottom line by engaging and energizing customers will prove useless unless the employees believe in those same initiatives. That’s why Chapter 11, “The groundswell inside your company,” is so crucial to understanding all the precepts that come before it: remove employee buy-in and you’ve disturbed the critical Jenga piece that keeps the structure standing.

 

I loved the authors’ example of Best Buy’s Blue Shirt Nation, the army of frontline sales associates who employ their own network to exchange ideas, support one another, and suggest efficiencies — all which ultimately benefit the customer. This was a brilliant move for a large, far-flung company whose stores weren’t talking with one another. Best of all, it was a bottom-up idea that began with lower-level employees, rather than a top-down dictate from the CEO (Groundswell, 217). Let’s face it, having the big boss orchestrating employee conversation is a little like having your parents plan your dates

Some experts note that engaging employees at work improves their lives outside the office, which is a reasonable assumption. Being valued at the place where you spend (at least) eight hours a day can only have positive ramifications on your home life.

Bell Canada’s ID-ah! (great name) initiative of having employees select the best ideas generated from within their ranks smartly employs the let’s-vote-on-everything culture exemplified by “American Idol” (Groundswell, 225), but it only works because the company makes clear that each vote matters. That’s no small thing: consider in this, or any, election season the vast number of people who stay away from the polls because they believe they have no voice. Local elections often struggle to generate single-digit participation from the electorate, despite the fact that local politicians have more direct influence on our lives than their counterparts in Washington.

 

ID-ah! only works because employees’ suggestions are actually being used. In the first year and a half of ID-ah!, 6,000 Bell Canada employees voted on ideas, 27 ideas were “harvested” and 12 were implemented (Groundswell, 225). Not only did management listen, but they acted — they energized their internal groundswell so that the company can better energize the groundswell occupied by its customers. That’s truly transformative.

In Chapter 12, Bernoff and Li describe a prototypical shoe company marketing executive accessing the groundswell in nearly every aspect of her day. Some of their scenario is speculative, given that the book was published in 2008. Today in 2012, we know they nailed it — from the woman’s reliance on the newest technologies, to the way she gauges public input before launching a new shoe color.

In their description of this person’s typical day, the authors have her going offline only long enough to grab a lunchtime sandwich. This may be the one instance where they’ve got it wrong. Now that it’s been launched, the groundswell stops for nothing. Not even lunch.

 

What's the buzz about Clark?

Warning: Many of these screenshots are difficult to read. I have been wrestling with Blogger for much of the night and morning, and Blogger is winning. No idea why I can't size these images -- none of my techie coworkers can figure it out either. For some reason my computer will not talk to the program. My apologies for the poor visuals.


Choice of subject

Clark University is ripe for an examination of its social media strategy. I’ve chosen Clark as the subject of my study for a number of reasons. First, Clark’s success in attracting and retaining students is in part linked to how well those students — all of them raised in the digital age — are communicated with via social media, and how they communicate back to the university. Second, our outreach to alumni and the cultivation of Clark’s reputation in the media also contribute to raising the university’s profile and inspiring folks to give to their alma mater. The challenge here is that alumni are not universally inclined to seek out social media platforms to remain connected, especially older alumni who continue to express a preference for print vehicles such as the alumni magazine.

And third, as a member of Clark’s Marketing and Communications team, part of my job is to help ensure a robust presence for the university in social media circles — so this project is, in a sort of curious way, an act of self-preservation. No, my job doesn’t hinge on it, but I’m hoping that I’ll be able to stand back a bit, objectively assess what we’re doing well, what we can do better, and put those lessons to practical use by recommending effective change to the vice president of MarComm.

Where we stand

Clark University makes use of the typical social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, and student blogs known collectively as Clark Diaries. Examining the activity surrounding Clark on social media, I’m seeing some patterns emerge.

Clark has a reputation as being a serious place, which may explain why when we Facebooked the appearance of Ali Fedotowski ’06, best known as “The Bachelorette,” when she spoke on campus a couple of years ago, the post received about 70 responses, most of them from alumni complaining that her notoriety for such a frivolous pursuit diminishes Clark’s reputation. That being said, in the last month, this item about Clark’s new Quidditch team received 46 comments, by far the most of any other post within the last few months.

The bottom line is “frivolity” sells. As I look over our Facebook postings it’s clear we’re churning the site to remain fresh and relevant, but the posts about professors’ research or students’ academic accomplishments, as valuable and as necessary as they are, seem to earn little interest. Too many posts receive few or no comments, and maybe a handful of Likes or Dislikes at best. The hard truth is that the “softer” items revolving around pop culture or life on campus inspire engagement. To continue protecting our brand as a serious academic institution while cultivating active participation for the fun stuff going on at Clark will require us to be committed to posting a variety of items that are as diverse as our audience.

Clark is making some inroads on sites like Pinterest, including for our pioneering education model known as Liberal Education and Effective Practice (LEEP). The inroads are tentative right now, but I see potential on this site.

 

If you look at this graph from Google Trends charting the online traffic for Clark over the last few years you’ll notice two spikes—in 2005 and in 2009. I’m investigating the reason for the earlier spike, but I think it’s safe to assume that the 2009 peak relates to the worldwide attention the university received that year for the 100th anniversary celebration of Sigmund Freud’s lectures at Clark, his only United States speaking engagement.

 

Can we make more hay of our historic association with Freud?

 

 

 We use a number of social-media platforms at Clark, including our own YouTube channel. Here are the stats over the course of the last month. I’m inclined to believe that 7,214 views and 10,300 minutes watched are impressive, but I’m disturbed by the engagement stats which are, to be generous, paltry. Two total comments in a month! Our videos are being passively viewed, but not inspiring reaction. We need to be more dynamic.

Drilling down even further reveals a gender disparity in our viewership: 67.3% female, 32.7% male (enrollment is 59% female to 41% male). Which leads me to this question: Are we neglecting men when we choose our video topics, or are we just being true to our student ratio?

One critical take-away is under the category “view referrals,” which finds that 60% of Clark YouTube viewership came from mobile apps and direct traffic.

Clark’s following on Twitter (@ClarkMatters) is about 2,000 people, a nice solid number. But with only 1,741 tweets sent out by the university in the 3 years since it’s been on Twitter, there clearly needs to be more engagement.

The Clark student demographic — young, educated, social-media savvy — makes it an ideal source for feedback. One of the most invaluable resources is the twice yearly Online Buzz Report compiled by our web team, which monitors 15 different sites like collegeconfidential, yelp, cappex, and unigo for chatter about Clark. Rather than get into too much heavy detail about what students perceive as the university’s strengths and weaknesses, I’ll simply say that we rate highly on academic quality and for having a friendly and accepting student body, but we do poorly in the areas of location and personal safety. To be blunt, the Main South neighborhood is a marketing challenge (no, I did not say nightmare). Check out Clark’s grades on CollegeProwler.com.

B+  Academics C-  Athletics B  Campus Dining A-  Campus Housing A  Campus Strictness B-  Computers B+  Diversity C+ Drug Safety C  Facilities B-  Girls

N/A  Greek Life B  Guys C-  Health & Safety C+ Local Atmosphere B  Nightlife A   Off-Campus Dining B+ Off-Campus Housing A  Parking B- Transportation D+  Weather

Predictions/recommendations

We are in the groundswell, where transparency rules. So a comment like this:

“Clark has the most incredible and dedicated professors EVER!” (collegeprowler.com)

Can easily be followed by a comment like this:

“Clark’s campus is small and in the middle of a nasty dirty city.” (studentsreview.com)

No amount of social media expertise will finesse opinion in your favor. But that’s okay. Nobody can control social media; we can only enhance our presence on it and increase our engagement with users.

While this isn’t the final report for this project, I have come away with some early recommendations:

·         Increasingly, we have to fashion our social media presence for mobile users.

·         Think viral. Yes, our videos, blogs and tweets are in service to the institution — but they don’t always have to be so institutional. We could be a little less safe.

·         We need to market Worcester better. Yes, we must be honest about the strengths and weaknesses of the city, but we can’t let the conversation get away from us.

·         Tweet more. Make our Twitter feed a “destination.” Also, bloggers shouldn't just be students, but faculty as well, including the president.

Look, our social profile is not nearly as strong as it could be, judging by our stats on Social Mention.

I am encouraged by Clark’s efforts to get the conversation started among incoming students, and with the university, before they arrive on campus, such as with Facebook groups targeted to each new class.

Now that we’ve got them for four years, we have to figure out how we can best continue the conversation once they leave.

It’s beginning to look a lot like … No, not yet!

    Please don’t hate me for the topic of this post: Christmas.

I know, I know … TOO SOON! We haven’t even made it through Halloween. (I’m a purist. Don’t even mention Christmas until after the Thanksgiving turkey’s bones have been picked clean.)

But here’s the truly scary thing. Yuletide decorations are already being spotted in some stores, and the marketing fever to attract holiday shoppers, well, that’s practically become a year-round pursuit.

Take, for instance, Christmas.com. Not only is the site teeming with gift ideas for every human being based on personality type and interest (and wallet size), but it also includes options for charitable giving. When I visit this site — trust me, for research purposes only — I can’t help but wonder if some enterprising person snatched up this url when it first became available and held it for ransom to the highest bidder. Merry Christmas, suckers!

Are we in the spirit yet?

Marketing Christmas used to be simple in a brick-and-mortar world. Drape some tinsel on the display cases, pass out the Santa hats to staff, turn on the Nat King Cole, and fling open the doors on Black Friday. Today, the process is much more complicated, and a little delicate. Smart business owners must pay attention to their SEO presence and decide on a social media strategy to make sure that folks are led to their wares. Macy’s department store, the granddaddy of holiday shopping, shows remarkable restraint on its home page, but plug “Christmas” into their search engine and you’re instantly traveling their “Holiday Lane” site.

Those who, like me, don’t want to think about Christmas until December probably don’t own a retail business. It’s easy to be a Grinch when your livelihood doesn’t rely on making the majority of your sales in one relatively compressed span of time between the fourth Thursday in November and December 25^th.

 

If I was a retailer who wasn’t social media savvy, I’d start with the basics by sending my preferred customers season’s greetings through a social media platform like Twitter and advertise my best deals. Yes, there’s still nothing like receiving a paper greeting card through the mail, but the practice is declining (the trees thank you) and much to the U.S. Postal Service’s chagrin people eventually will veer to online-only correspondence.

Today, even Santa Claus is receiving advice from social media experts. And, apparently, he's getting pretty adept at it.

 

Old-timers like me have to reconcile our distaste for “early Christmas” with the reality that it’s a necessary evil for retailers. Social media actually makes the process a little more palatable. It’s so much easier to click away from an online site than it is to avoid a shopping mall with “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” playing on an endless loop for a month or more.

Like it or not (and I suspect you don't), Christmastime is here.

 

You gotta have faith

Is a person’s basic nature “angelic” or “devilish”? In other words, when faced with the opportunity to do the right thing, do we indulge our best instincts or succumb to our worst?

 

 

Sorry to get so deep here, but much of what Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff observe in “Groundswell” is predicated on the notion that people are, for lack of a better word, good. As Exhibit A I give you Jeff Stenski (Groundswell, 159), an avid Dell computer user who spends his free time helping folks solve their computer problems on a community support forum. Why? “I actually enjoy helping people,” Stenski told the authors. And thanks to his efforts, he also saved Dell an estimated $1 million in service calls (as of the book’s writing).

Tapping the power of the groundswell requires a leap of faith -- the conviction that the human race will come through for you. Li and Bernoff call this "psychic income" (Groundswell, 160), which they define as rewards in the form of “good feelings from altruism, validation and belonging to a community.”

 Well, what do you know! Aren’t these the same reasons why people go to church?

 

Companies that rely on the best natures of their customers to do the work for them are the corporate equivalent of Tom Sawyer convincing his friends to whitewash his fence. Again, returning to Dell. The company was faced with an unpleasant reality— horrible publicity from technical failures and a history of poor service — and instead of heading underground, the chief executive, Michael Dell, played Tom Sawyer and recruited the public to paint Dell’s fence through blogs and the Idea Storm initiative (Groundswell, 211). Rather than alienating the public (which they had been doing masterfully), they recruited the public to be part of their team, instilling in them a sense of ownership at no cost.

Brilliant.

(I'd rather see a Dell computer explode than 

watch these kids act, but you'll get the point.)

That’s not to say the groundswell doesn’t bring out the worst in some people. As Joseph noted in his recent blog, there have been clear abuses on some review sites like Yelp. Imagine the temptation for a restaurant owner to trash his competitor’s place.

 

Anyone who spends time online knows anonymity is a mixed blessing.  It gives some writers the confidence to be honest, and others the courage to be complete jerks. But the fact is, if you’re going to expose yourself to public scrutiny ...

... or if you choose to improve yourself through crowdsourcing (Groundswell, 187) you have to learn to take your blows. Fortunately, the groundswell also has an amazing ability to police itself from some of the most heinous trolls.  

Li and Bernoff advise business owners to embrace the groundswell with this caveat: “When it comes to collaborating with your customers — really bringing them into your development and innovation processes — the one real truth is this: it’s challenging.” (Groundswell, 182).

Here's another. Do it poorly and you're left wrestling with the devil. But do it the right way, and you've got an angel on your shoulder.

 

 

 

 

Nearly a billion served

Are you stunned when you learn that someone doesn’t have a Facebook account? How could these people choose not to be connected with about a billion others who use the service? After all, that’s a billion potential friends.

But what are they really missing? Do they need to know, for instance, that you’ve just made a grilled cheese sandwich ?

Or that you’re settling in to watch "Dancing With the Stars"? The answer is “no” and “no.”

 

How about other social media? Is your blog so brilliant that their refusal to read it is tantamount to a crime against humanity? Do they really need to log on to Foursquare to learn your exact location at any given moment. Um, nope.

And Twitter? Do your pithy 140-character comments about how lousy the Red Sox are this season provide meaning, enlightenment, or any sort of tangible benefit? Again, you know the answer.

 

Some call these social-media teetotalers Luddites, but I just respect them as savvy consumers. They’ve surveyed the landscape and determined which products and services will add value to their lives, and which they can safely disregard as mere clutter.

 

These people are typically private by nature, and see no reason to share personal details with a worldwide audience. They also clearly view the narcissim inherent in social media as just this side of grotesque — a desperate, unhealthy desire to be noticed.

 

I tend to agree, but I can also step back and see why social media appeals to people’s craving for attention. My perspective on this is somewhat unique. Over the course of my journalism career I wrote hundreds of newspaper columns about my kids, my relationships with neighbors, my views on all sorts of subjects — anything that struck my fancy on a given day (I often went for laughs, with mixed results).

But in the old media, I and other print journalists were the only game in town. We were fortunate to have a vehicle to spew our thoughts. The rest of the population who wanted to tell a story had few outlets to do so — maybe you wrote a long-year-end holiday letter to friends and family, or, if you were talented and lucky, perhaps you got an essay published in one of the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" books.

It occurred to me recently that the voracious participation in sites like Facebook and YouTube, as well as the blogosphere, is simply an unleashing of all that pent-up need to share personal testimony with a wider audience. True, some go about it with more eloquence than others, but ultimately I believe everyone’s primary motivation is best summed up in the same three-word statement defining a typical Foursquare user.

I am here.