Branding, social media, and content marketing presentation by Susan Gunelius, President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc. (www.keysplashcreative.com) and author of 10 marketing-related books, and delivered at the January 16, 2013 Quarterly Meeting of Florida Main Street (a part of the Florida Department of State Division of Historical Resources).
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A brand is a promise.
• A brand promises something to
consumers.
• A brand sets consumer expectations.
• A brand meets those expectations in every
consumer interaction and experience.
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3 Steps to Brand Building
1. Consistency
2. Persistence
3. Restraint
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Strong brands develop over time.
• The strongest brands own a word or
phrase in consumers’ minds.
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What word does your brand own?
Inexpensive
Reliability
Luxury
Performance
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Know Your Competition
• It’s not enough to know what you’re doing.
• Research your competitors and know
them as well as you know yourself.
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If brands were people, who would
you rather hang out with?
There is a reason the Mac Guy vs. PC Guy
commercials were so successful.
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Take the
Brand Perception Snap Shot
• What 5 words do you use to describe your
brand today?
• What 5 words do your customers use to
describe your brand today?
• What 5 words do you want consumers to
use to describe your brand in the future
(i.e., your ultimate brand goal)?
Find the gaps and fill them!
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Building Brands Externally
Remember,
consumers build brands,
NOT companies.
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Building Brand Loyalty
1. Develop consumer perceptions
2. Meet consumer expectations
3. Build consumer confidence and trust
Confusion is the #1 brand killer.
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Brand loyalty can evolve into a cult
brand.
Cult brands are loved by specific groups of die-hard brand loyalists
creating a sub-culture of society.
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Cult brands can grow into
relationship brands.
• Built on experiences.
• Fill a void.
• Consumers self-select how
they want to interact with
the brand by choosing from
brand experiences.
• Often experiences are
shared among groups.
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People look for new ways to experience
and share relationship brands.
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People talk about
the brands they love.
• Emotional connections with the brand
and each other
• Word-of-mouth marketing is powerful
• Social media and content give every
brand access to consumer
conversations
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Positioning Pyramid
Reason to Believe
Points of Differentiation
Emotional Needs
Rational Needs
Target Audience
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ALL Businesses and Organizations
Can Benefit from Social Media
1. Get entry points!
2. Get found!
3. Get traffic!
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What Social Media and Content
Marketing Can Do for You
INCREASE
• Awareness • Audience engagement
• Recognition • Media coverage
• Website traffic • Relationships
• Sales • Brand loyalty
• Word-of-mouth • Long-term, sustainable,
marketing organic growth
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What Social Media and Content
Marketing Can Do for You
DECREASE
• Rumors
• Inaccuracies
• Distrust and uncertainty
• Brand confusion
• Misaligned brand perceptions
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Gary Vaynerchuk of
WineLibrary.tv
New Jersey Wine Store
Social Media
$70 million in sales per year
and
50% of sales from the Web.
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Shift from Marketer to Publisher
• Media and publishers provide content
readers want and need.
• Marketers provide sales copy.
• It’s not about you!
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Traditional vs. New Media
Marketing
• One-to-many • One-to-one
• Interrupt Traditional vs. New Media • Enhance
• Repeat • Engage
• Push • Pull
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The 80-20 Rule
Me, Me, Me!
20%
Engage
80%
For every 20% of self-promotional
content you produce,
create 80% that is not self-promotional.
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Step 1: Set Your Goals
• If you just want to sell more stuff, you’ll fail.
• Why are you on the social web?
• What do you want to get from it?
Goals Social Media
• Raise awareness • Blog
• Customer service • Facebook
• Feedback • Foursquare
• Publicity • Twitter
• Marketing • Flickr
• Reach younger • YouTube
demographic • Livestream events
• E-newsletter
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Step 2: Research and
Benchmarking
• Customers and
competitors
• Look outside
your industry
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Step 3: Brand Yourself
• Promise: unique value proposition
• Position: differentiators
• Message: customer perceptions and
expectations
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Brand Consistency
• Logo, color, name, etc.
• Increase awareness, recognition, and recall
• Build brand perceptions and reputation
• Examples:
– Blog design
– Avatar (gravatar.com)
– Facebook Page design
– Twitter cover image and background
– YouTube channel
– Forum signatures
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Step 4: Find Your Best
Audience
• Listen
• Join How to Do It
• Engage • Stalk competitors
• Share • Hashtags.org
• WeFollow.com
• Topsy.com
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Example: Cakes for Occasions
• Pictures
• Real-time promotions
• Picked up by Boston Media
• Testimonials
• Business grew 25% and
saved $10,000 in marketing “We learned our audience
expenses in 1 year thanks was on Facebook, so
that’s where we went.”
to social media. - Kelly Delaney, Owner
Cakes for Occasions
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Step 5: Find the Influencers
• Find the people online who already have
the eyes and ears of your target audience.
• They’re trusted and shared.
• They’re powerful sources of word-of-
mouth.
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Example: Roger Smith Hotel
• Connected and engaged with influencers
• Special Twitter discounts
• Twitter kiosk in hotel
• Special hotel welcome to guests who
come from social web
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Step 6: Establish Your Core
Branded Online Destination
Sample Business Social Media Presence
SlideShare
YouTube
Page
Groups
Profile
Page
Facebook Blog LinkedIn
Instagram
Answers
Ads
Groups
Twitter Ads
Pinterest
Twellow
Lists
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Step 7: Content is Key
• What you say:
– Useful and meaningful
– Avoid excessive self-promotion
• How you say it:
– Human, honest, and transparent
– Tell stories
– Give something extra or exclusive
– Leave jargon and rhetoric out
• Quality trumps quantity
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Example: NakedPizza
• Twitter discounts lead to
direct sales.
• 68% of single-day sales
have come from Twitter.
• Twitter integrated into
point-of-sale system. “Direct mail is sent to a single
• Twitter kiosks set up in address but there are multiple
people in those houses. We want to
stores. maximize and extend our marketing
reach, and Twitter helps us do this
• No more direct mail – in leaps and bounds.”
all Twitter. -- Jeff Roach, NakedPizza co-founder
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Types of Content
• News • Videos
• Interviews • Tips
• Research • How To
• Promotions • Lists
• Warnings • Commentary and opinion
• Images and photos • Step-by-step instruction
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Popular Content
1. “Wow” factor visuals: positive or negative
2. Controversies: elicit opinions
3. Buzz topics: everyone’s talking about
4. Feel-good stories: Cute, funny, and touching, moments
5. Quirky and intriguing stories: Impossible not to read
6. Celebratory stories: Things to cheer about
7. News stories: Affect the local area
8. Breaking news: Big impact to the audience
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Writing Headlines that Get
Noticed
• Promise something
• Be plausible
• Answer “what’s in it for me?”
• Be intriguing
• Be relevant
• Be useful
• Be specific
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Headline Samples
• 10 Mistakes to Avoid …
• The Secrets of …
• 5 Ways to …
• Tips for _____ the Pros Don’t Want You to Know
• Why I Never …
• 10 Lessons from …
• What You Need to Know About …
• Top 10 Best/Funniest/Weirdest/Worst …
• 5 Reasons …
• 20 Things You Might Be Missing …
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How to Write Content People Want
to Read
• Start strong
• Benefits
• Emotional triggers
• You not me
• How and why
• Promise reward and deliver on it
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Writing for a Digital Audience
Inverted Pyramid
Conclusion (most important point)
Most important supporting info
Less important
supporting info
Background
info
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Starting Strong Tips
• Share a personal story
• Ask a question
• Offer immediately actionable help
• Cite a relevant piece of research data
• Evoke emotions
• Tap into nostalgia
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Get Content Creation Help
EXERTS & CONSULTANTS FREELANCERS CROWDSOURCING
Beyond In-house Budget Friendly Free and Paid
• AmEx OPEN Forum • Elance.com • Crowdspring.com
• Huffington Post • oDesk.com • 99Designs.com
• Guru.com • SloganSlingers.com
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Step 8: Integrate, Cross-
Promote, and Automate
Streamline
• Publishing
• Promotion
SAVE TIME & MONEY • Monitoring
EXTEND CONTENT REACH
• Analysis
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Get Help and Tools
REPURPOSE CURATE AUTOMATE
Don’t Reinvent the Wheel Don’t Start from Scratch Don’t Waste Time
• Twitter • Curalate • Hootsuite
• Facebook • Storify • Monitter
• LinkedIn • Paper.li • Google Alerts
Blog Post • Google+ • Scoop.it • Twitterfeed
• Pinterest • CurationSoft • TweetDeck
• YouTube • Intigi • SocialMention
• Infographic • XYDO
• SlideShare • Curata
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Step 9: Analysis
• Quality not quantity
• Focus on trends
• Soft metrics vital
• Engagement, sentiment, and
conversions
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Tracking Performance
Examples of What to Track: Measure Against:
• Unique site visitors • Sales
• Page views • Click-throughs
• Referrers • Online mentions
• Incoming links • Online sentiment
• How visitors travel through site
• Returning visitors
• Comments
• Followers and connections
• Retweets and @mentions
• Social shares and likes
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Analytics Tools
• One tool isn’t enough
• Human analysis is essential
Fee-based Tools Free Tools
• Radian6 • Google Analytics
• Sysomos • Google Webmaster Tools
• HubSpot • Hootsuite.com (also a paid version)
• KissMetrics • Tweetdeck.com
• Brandwatch • Bitly
• SocialReport • Facebook Insights
• InboundWriter • LinkedIn company page statistics
• Trackur • Klout
• Alterian SM2 • PeerIndex
• AwarenessNetworks • Twitalyzer (also a paid version)
• Unilyzer • SocialMention.com
• Lithium • Viralheat (also a paid version)
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Step 10: Let the Conversation
Flow
3 Cs of Social
Media Marketing Wrong (Failure) Right (Success)
Conversation Stop it. Let it flow.
Copyright protect
Content it or put up a Share it.
barrier.
Control Hold it tightly. Give it up.
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But What if They Say Something
BAD?
Use the 3 Fs of Social Media Reputation Management
You have three choices:
FLIGHT FLOOD
Ignore it. Bury it.
FIGHT
Join it.
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Get in Touch
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