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Archives for 2011

How Twitter Psychology Affects Consumers and Brands

It’s not a revelation that brands should have a presence on Twitter. Consumers spend a great deal of time on the most popular microblogging site, so it makes sense for brands to spend time there, too. It’s a perfect place to engage, share useful information, and build relationships that lead to brand loyalty and brand buzz. But did you know that you might be doing some things on Twitter that are destroying your brand’s chances for success?

WhiteFire SEO created a great infographic that highlights the psychology of Twitter so you can get a better understanding of the activities that interest users and the activities that annoy users. You can see the infographic below.

According to the infographic, over-tweeting is a big turn off. The reasons people unfollow other people (or brands) on Twitter are:

  • They tweet too much = 66%
  • Their tweets seem automated = 58%
  • They share the same link multiple times = 47%
  • They don’t tweet = 38%
  • They tweet about themselves all the time = 34%

It’s interesting that people are more likely to unfollow a Twitter user who tweets too frequently than they are likely to unfollow someone who doesn’t tweet at all. This is an extremely significant statistic because it supports what social media marketers tell companies all the time. If your Twitter updates sound like corporate rhetoric or sales pitches or if your updates are entirely self-promotional, no one will want to follow you. Instead, successful brands on Twitter are the ones that provide useful information to their audiences, share their audiences’ content, interact with their audiences, and do so in a personable voice.

When it comes to tweeting too much on Twitter, the Twitter psychology infographic shows that 36 or more Twitter updates is too much. Of course, this isn’t a rule, but when in doubt, it seems that tweeting less frequently is a better strategy than tweeting more frequently.

Another interesting fact is how people find other people (or brands) to follow on Twitter. Most find people to follow through a retweet or @mention from someone else that they already follow. Here are the specific details related to why people follow other people on Twitter:

  • See a retweet/mention from someone they follow = 55%
  • Follow back someone who follows them = 42%
  • Found by searching for related interests = 32%
  • Suggested by Twitter = 16%
  • Recommended in a follow Friday tweet = 13%

According to the infographic, most people follow other Twitter users when they see those other people in retweets or @mentions by others in their Twitter streams. That means brands need to get retweeted! 9 out of 10 people will retweet useful information and 8 out of 10 will retweet humorous content. Other ways people will retweet content on Twitter is if that content is published by a personal connection or celebrity. If your brand doesn’t have personal connections yet or a celebrity relationship, then offering an incentive is likely to get 3 out of 10 people to retweet your content.

La Rentrée

Today is finally – finally! – back-to-school day here: after a 7-week summer holiday. I’m sure summer was never that long when I was younger…

The French have a great word for it: la rentrée. It applies particularly to back-to-school, but there is also a political rentrée, as everything starts afresh after the holidays; and again the same is true for business people as they return refreshed and revitalised.

So the significance includes a clean, fresh start, or renewal. Advertisers have been, naturally, making a big deal out of it, choosing to use la rentrée, and new resolutions, as themes.

Even on the autoroutes as we drove north at the weekend (yes, we were on holiday), the gantry displays were trying to persuade us to make new resolutions to keep your speed down, or your seatbelts buckled up, for la rentrée.

So, since many of us greet September enthusiastically, with its freight of clean pages, new pens and fresh faces, I thought I’d ask what you were planning to change on your corporate website for la rentrée?

After all, new resolutions don’t have to be restricted to 1 January…

When CSR meets culture – India | CSR Around The World

India has been on the lips of just about every economist and businessman in recent years.  Its booming economy is growing at over 10 percent a year and the country is ranked among the biggest, fastest growers by the IMF.

You’d think there’d be little room amongst all this capital-intensive activity for CSR, but you’d be wrong.

The Indian government has arguably tried to be a trailblazer in introducing CSR into its governance structures.  In 2009 a new Companies Bill proposed that every company with either a net value of Rs 5 billion (£66 m), a turnover of Rs 10 billion (£13.2 million) or a net annual profit of Rs 50 million (£ 660,000) be required to spend at least 2 percent of its profits from the preceding three years on CSR projects (as defined by the company itself).

Perhaps unsurprisingly the move was deeply unpopular and earlier this year the government backed down from making the proposal mandatory and has has opted for non-regulatory guidelines instead.

However the intention is clear so to try and understand a little more what was going on India I turned to Akhila Vijayaraghavan, founding director of the international CSR consultancy The Green Den.

[Read more…] about When CSR meets culture – India | CSR Around The World

Marketing Brands as Social Groups – Why It Works So Well

Its a fundamental human desire to want to be part of a group. People seek camaraderie and a sense of belonging. Some brands are marketed in such a way that people want to be part of the group of consumers who buy that brand. For example, do you want to be in the Mac social group or the PC social group? Are you a Pepsi group member or a Coke group member?

People want to connect with other people, not companies or brands. That’s why brands that are successful at becoming relationship brands (like Apple) have a loyal and vocal band of brand advocates cheering them on. It’s not because the relationship brand is so important to them but rather, it’s because of the relationship those people feel like they have with the other people who buy and use the brand.

The social web has enabled people to come together in groups to share branded experiences and conversations in a way that brands couldn’t even dream of 10 or 20 years ago. The trick for brand managers is to shift from marketing their brands at consumers to marketing brands with consumers where consumers feel like they can choose whether or not the social group that uses the brand is the right group for them to join.

Think of it this way — when consumers decide to follow a brand’s Facebook page, they’re considering two primary factors in the decision-making process: what’s in it for me if I follow this brand’s Facebook page (i.e., discounts, exclusive information, and so on) and do I want all of my Facebook friends to see that I’m part of the group of people who follows this brand’s Facebook page?

Now, consider a couple of powerful relationship brands that already have large social groups of consumers supporting them. For example, it’s fairly safe to assume that a loyal Harley Davidson customer would be proud to follow the Harley Davidson Facebook page. In fact, Harley Davidson customers who use Facebook would probably feel left out if they didn’t follow the Harley Davidson Facebook page.

Therefore, you need to get creative and start thinking of how you can create a perceived us against them mentality that positions your brand against the competition through the lens of social groups. Make sure consumers understand what your group offers and means to them, and then let them decide if they want to join the group or not.

Image: bradleygee

Mobile and Online Video Advertising Grows Quickly for U.K. Audience

In a new study by comScore, both mobile advertising and online video advertising growth rates were analyzed. The results show that both mobile and video advertising are growing and reaching a particularly large audience of younger consumers between the ages of 15-24.

For online video advertising, 63.1% of U.K. consumers (who identified themselves as computer and/or smartphone users), were exposed to a video ad during the month of June (21.2 million people). Interestingly, the number of video viewers has remained fairly stable in the U.K., but the number of people who saw video ads is growing steadily and was up 15% for the second quarter of 2011 versus the first quarter.

Mobile advertising is growing even faster than online video advertising with a 28% increase from the second quarter of 2011 to the third quarter. 25% of U.K. smartphone users remembered seeing a mobile ad during the third quarter of 2011, which equates to 25% of mobile users. The frequency with which consumers recall seeing mobile ads is growing even faster. The third quarter of 2011 saw a 28% increase in the number of people who recalled seeing a mobile ad at least once per week. The number of people who recalled seeing an ad almost daily rose by 52%

Online display advertising is still the powerhouse when it comes to online advertising with 40 million U.K. Internet users seeing online display ads during the second quarter of 2011, which equates to a 95.3% penetration rate. There are a couple of reasons why online display advertising is still so popular. First, companies already have budgets set aside for online display advertising. However, marketers are still fighting for budget dollars so they can make a shift to include more mobile and video advertising in their marketing plans. Second, there are a lot of online display ads for people to see each day simply because that’s where advertising budgets are being spent.

It’s safe to predict that mobile and video advertising are going to continue to grow in the future. In fact, we’ll probably start to see faster growth rates for both than we’ve seen in recent years. With more people using smartphones that enable them to view both mobile ads and video ads, there is no doubt that more companies will start to recognize the opportunity to connect with consumers through their mobile devices, and budget investments will increase.

Is your company already investing in mobile and video advertising? Leave a comment and share your experience and thoughts.

Image: stock.xchng

Steve Jobs Resigns as Apple CEO Marking the End of an Era

Steve Jobs resigned as Apple CEO today via a letter which was published on Apple’s website. Later, Apple published a press release stating that Steve Jobs would stay on as Apple Chairman of the Board and Apple COO Tim Cook (who has been marked as Jobs’ successor for some time now) will take the role of Apple CEO.

This announcement is not a surprise to anyone who has been following the Steve Jobs and Apple story over the past few years. In October 2008, I published a post here on the Corporate Eye blog called The Brand Champion Exit Strategy – Lessons from Steve Jobs and Apple where I talked about how a false report that Steve Jobs had a heart attack sent Apple’s stuck plunging. I ended that post by saying, “You never want one person to hold so much power that your brand’s short or long-term success becomes dependant on him or her.  Ensure your brand can stand on its own with brand champions helping to push the brand in the right direction for strategic growth.”

Then in January 2009, I wrote a post called The Brand Champion Exit Strategy Redux – Lessons from Steve Jobs and Apple where I talked about a second reactionary plunge in Apple’s stock after rumors broke that Steve Jobs would not attend the popular Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas due to health reasons. I ended that post by saying, “The lesson to learn is this – develop brand champions but don’t put all your eggs in one basket.  And most importantly, put together a succession plan before your primary brand champion exits.”

Again, Steve Jobs’ resignation is not shocking. The financial world has been waiting for it for years, and while Apple’s stock is feeling the effects, financial analysts aren’t overly concerned. One of the main reasons they’re not worried is the fact that Tim Cook has been being groomed as Steve Jobs’ successor for some time now. As Ian Sherr of Dow Jones Newswire wrote today, “[Analysts and investors] say Apple will continue delivering hit products because of the culture Jobs has created at the company. ‘Tim is molded after Steve,” said Colin Gillis, an analyst at brokerage BGC Partners, who recommends buying Apple stock on the dips. “If they got an outside CEO, there might be concern.'”

Of course, Steve Jobs isn’t leaving Apple completely nor is he leaving his role as brand champion. In fact, his move from the role of CEO could have a positive effect on Apple after the resignation buzz dies down. It’s no secret that Jobs runs Apple with an iron fist (check out this article on Wired.com and this article from the Guardian Technology blog to get some juicy details about Jobs and the Apple culture).

What do you think? What’s next for Apple after Steve Jobs leaves the role of CEO? Leave a comment and share your thoughts on the changing of the guards at Apple.

Image: Apple Press Info