Why “Social Business” Matters...

Is the term “Social Business” relevant, or just more jargon? Geoff Livingston posed this question on Twitter recently and suggested I blog about it when evidently I was the only taker in favor of the term. I am a huge fan, and here’s why.

Social strategy can operate at different levels within an organization:

“Social media” strategy suggests that social plays a small, supporting role — just another media channel. This mentality is from whence where one-way “push” messaging and lame Twitter promotions are born.

“Social marketing” conveys that social has a more significant seat at the table — could impact product plans, pricing, distribution, not just promotion.

“Social business”, at the highest level, communicates “This is an organization that gives a damn. Social responsibility and social communication are at the heart of what we do.” This might not be exactly how others are defining it, but this is how I think it should be used.

Now, take three brands/companies, one functioning at each level. Which do you think is going to have the greatest success using social media channels? BINGO. The one that actually gives a damn.

Take Ben & Jerry’s as an example. Even though they are owned by Unilever, they have, in my opinion both as a consumer and as a marketer, retained their soul. Here’s a nice video interview of Walt Freese, the company’s Chief Euphoria officer, talking about how they have done so.

Instead of having one trite mission statement, the company has three – product, economic, and social – that ring true. This is their social mission: “To operate the company in a way that actively recognizes the central role that business plays in society by initiating innovative ways to improve the quality of life locally, nationally and internationally.”

So, when a true Social Business like Ben & Jerry’s launches a Social Marketing or Social Media effort – like changing the name of Chubby Hubby to Hubby Hubby in celebration of Vermont gay marriage (Mashable article on that here) what happens?

Magic. Because it’s strategic. It’s real. It’s talkable. It’s legitimately social, not faux or contrived social.

Best Buy’s Twelpforce is an example I have seen used to define “Social Business”. And while I think their Social Marketing programs like Blue Shirt Nation and Twelpforce are solid, I do not truly think of them as a Social Business. They are doing Social for Marketing purposes, not doing Business with a Social purpose. Likewise, Dell, Zappos, other organizations where social marketing runs through the veins and arteries of the organization, but social values don’t really lie at the heart of it.

The definition of social business – where the line is – is highly debatable. I’m still thinking that through for myself and would value your thoughts. But personally, I do not think whether or not Social Business matters is all that debatable.

Having fun and brand personality matter, too. Stop by Ben & Jerry’s website. There are an awful lot of brands out there that could learn a lot from this one, on many many levels.

On hospital “patient experience” and m...

I’ll tell you right now, this post has little to do with anything remotely marketing, strategy or social media related. It is tangentially related to customer experience in a healthcare setting, but that is not why I am writing it.

It has to do with being human. And with gratitude. Which, I would argue, are slightly more important matters.

My 85-year old father had surgery yesterday. He’s been my best friend since I was a little girl. He let me dance on his feet. He blows bubbles like a little kid on the beach, and swims even when it’s so cold that no one else will. He payed my way through college. He supported me when I dropped out of college and moved to California briefly. And when I came back. And every day since. He worked at a concert venue until he was over 80, and digs the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And, as if that’s not enough, he was a navigator on bombing missions over Germany in WWII.

As a hospital patient, he is a total pain in the behind.

He doesn’t follow important medical instructions. He won’t accept help getting around, even when he needs it. He threatens to take out his own IV. He jumps to every possible worst-case scenario about his health, when none of them appear to be true. He complains about the bad communication, when really, he just can’t hear because he is too stubborn to get digital hearing aids. He rants incessantly about the cost of healthcare to the people who are just in the trenches, busting their butts to try to help people.

The nurses, however, are saints.

They understand, with coaching from Scott-the-very-kind-hospital-chaplain, that my very beloved pain-in-the-ass of a father is reacting to the total loss of control that he is experiencing. They remain firm and calm, even when I am yelling at him to stop being mean and leave his IV alone. (I am not mean, but sometimes yelling is all he responds to. It gets his attention, at least.)

In a setting where I have long questioned why the patient experience is so lacking, I now realize: the nurses ARE the “patience”, the glue, that hold all of it, and all of us, together when times are tough. They are so kind, so caring, that everything else about the patient experience that often fails us really must be kept in perspective.

The pre-registration mix up that’s too convoluted to attempt to explain here. The near miss on giving Dad antibiotics to which he is allergic. The doctor who “didn’t know” that I was anxiously waiting for news long after the surgery had ended, and who never came out to give me so much as the time of day. The broken telephone in my Dad’s room, so when family was trying to call him after surgery, he wasn’t getting any calls. The conflicting information received from doctor and nurse about what was happening the day after the surgery.

None of it matters all that much, compared to the quiet acts of heroism that are happening the whole time.

I work for an advertising agency, integrated marketing firm, brand strategist blah blah blah. And sometimes I am under the illusion that it is difficult. It is not difficult.

It is a walk in the park compared to what Nurse Debbie and Nurse Lori at Elmbrook Memorial Hospital did today.

Thank you, to all the nurses.

Enough with the pointless Twitter promotions. Get ...

Sure, the #moonfruit promotion, in which anyone who tweeted #moonfruit got entered to win a Mac a day for 10 days, got plenty of play. And according to Marketing Vox, they claim their sales spiked. That’s fantastic, and I’m sure because of that, a lot of people will disagree with me. But, how many of the people who tweeted #moonfruit even know what it is? Much less anything specific about why it’s good, better, different? How much more might their sales have gone up in the short term or the long term if their promotion or content was actually…gasp…RELEVANT? What would the reported ROI look like if something had been shared regarding what the brand stands for, or at least what the product IS and some interesting feature of it? Something that I, the would-be consumer, would actually care to hear about?

Same goes for this new @MarriottHawaii “Tweet Yourself To Hawaii” promotion. You can enter to win a trip to Hawaii, or, if you send in a video, you might win a Hawaii tweetup for you and 11 friends. Yeah, yeah, I know we’re talking about it, so in their mind, or their agency’s mind, it’s probably a raging success right now. And general response to it from the Twitter community seems to be mostly positive. But in my opinion as a strategist, it’s a big “SO WHAT?” What do we know or feel about this brand that we didn’t know a few days ago? Absolutely nothing. Just that it exists.

Is it enough that people talk about you if all they are saying is that you EXIST? Really? Is “we exist…pass it on” a strategy? Mmm…NO. OK, it IS, but most of the time, I say we can do more. Isn’t there an intersection between branding and social media communication in which you can tell a story about your brand and still promote it – move the needle – at the same time? I believe there is.

Now, I’ve only been on Twitter for about nine months. But in that amount of time (during which I have been spending waaaay too much time on Twitter, mind you) I have encountered so little strategically relevant content that I am frankly a bit stunned. It seems awfully hard to brands to figure out what to do with this tool. The most notable exception is the Ford Fiesta Movement. I’m not saying that every strategic execution needs to be that elaborate, either. Just tell me something, anything, about what the heck you want me to take away about you.

Tom Martin proved in his experiment “How One Man, an iPhone and Twitter Changed Consumer Perception of Mardi Gras.” that twitter can be used to effectively reposition a brand. So I asked him to weigh in on this discussion. Tom, am I just a brand strategy geek that doesn’t get this, or what? Do you think this type of “tweet-to-win” promotion is a strategic, effective use of this tool? (I will post a link to Tom’s post here when he responds.)

How about the rest of you? What do you think? Is “we exist…pass it on” enough? Or is it time for brands do better? If you have seen other strategic exceptions, please share them; I actually hope to be proven wrong on this one. Maybe I am just missing all the good stuff.

Peace Pause: enjoy your successes...

I was recently in a twitter conversation with a prominent marketing and social media character (resisting use of “guru” or “expert” here) that we all admire very much, and who has recently achieved something really special of which anyone would be enormously proud. Yet, he confided that he is in fact not enjoying his success. Because he’s already looking for “the next big thing”. This has been on my mind a lot, because if he, of all people, can’t pause and go “Damn. I did good.” then who among us can? When is it enough? How high is up?

Most of us here, myself included, can absolutely relate to that type of drive and ambition. There’s some sort of rush that comes from accomplishment that is hard to match. It’s like the crash that happens after a big, exciting new business pitch. “Now what?” “What’s next?” “I need to perform at that level again.”

But. Here’s the thing, people. Life happens in moments.

Your life, like it or not, is happening NOW. And NOW. And NOW.

Tomorrow may come, and it may not. Sorry to be a downer, but face it, it’s true.

So, I ask you to ask yourself, if you are not enjoying it NOW, what’s the point? If not now, when?

Today – stop for a minute. Just a minute. Or five. Or ten. And really, REALLY take in all that you have done. Meditate on it, even if you’re not a “meditation kind of person”. Absorb it like a sponge. Let it flow through you. And just for a moment – let yourself be ENOUGH.

I hope you don’t mind me going all Zen on you today. I write what I feel. Now get back to work and go like hell

Photo credit: Brett Rogers http://www.beatcanvas.com