The growing list of online social media sites makes choosing the right channel complicated. From Facebook to Twitter to LinkedIn and beyond, which social media outposts will net the most bang for the buck in terms of customer communication, brand exposure, traffic, and SEO?

The CMO’s Guide To The Social Media Landscape is a great guide to print and pin up! It helps to identify the right channels to use. Great work!

A CMO’s Guide To The Social Media Landscape –

Microsoft’s Mel Carson and all round good guy, has released an excellent Social Media White Paper this week.

Mel works within Microsoft’s Advertising Community Team, which has been engaging with online advertisers through social media since 2006. The document entitled, “Learn and Earn” tells the story of how the Advertising team embraced social media to connect with the advertising community. Well worth reading.

During my time at Microsoft, I modelled the MVP Award Program Facebook Fan Page on the Microsoft Advertising Fan Page! So thank you Mel and team for the inspiration!

Read the document in full below.

Learn and Earn – Social Media White Paper – Microsoft Advertising –

Andy Serovitz posted a very interesting blog post on how Coca Cola have devised a new set of social media principles. Coke have developed 10 “Principles for Online Spokespeople” which make good sense for other brands to follow.  You can read the main set below.

1. Be Certified in the [Coca Cola] Social Media Certification Program.
2. Follow our Code of Business Conduct and all other Company policies.
3. Be mindful that you are representing the Company.
4. Fully disclose your affiliation with the Company.
5. Keep records.
6. When in doubt, do not post.
7. Give credit where credit is due and don’t violate others’ rights.
8. Be responsible to your work.
9. Remember that your local posts can have global significance.
10. Know that the Internet is permanent.

Watch Andy’s interview with Coca Cola’s Adam Brown, on how they developed the social media principles.

Coke’s complete policy document can be found below. At three pages, I like this a lot!

Coca Cola’s Online Social Media Principles –

Twitter has launched a new site dedicated to helping businesses to become au fait with the microblogging service. Twitter 101 A Special Guide is a great online resource that I would highly recommend to anyone looking to use Twitter as part of their social media mix.

Of particular interest are the getting started guide and the case studies from companies such as Dell, JetBlue, Etsy and others who share their insights of using Twitter. Also, of notable interest are the best practices guidelines.

Download the PDF deck here

Over the past few months, Twitter has experienced explosive growth, attracting celebrity users such as Oprah, and a growing mountain of media and blog coverage. However, many new users are falling foul of Twitter etiquette. In many cases, unfiltered tweeting could be dangerous to your Twitter health – you could end up losing your followers fast!

As such, Patricio Robles builds upon the original Twitter 10 Commandments with an updated list below:

• Thou shalt not use DM autoresponders. More often than not, DM autoresponders are used poorly. Unless you have a good reason to use them and know what you’re doing, consider avoiding them altogether.
• Thou shalt not beg for retweets. If your content is good, other Twitter users will retweet it. Asking "pls RT" makes you look desperate.
• Thou shalt not autotweet. Unless your followers followed you to get automatic updates (eg. they know your account is tied to a content feed), autotweeting is usually a bad idea.
• Thou shalt not tweet in bunches. You know the guy who always sends out a couple dozen tweets in rapid-fire succession? Don’t be that guy. Sending lots of tweets in a short period of time is just downright annoying.
• Thou shalt not take your followers on a trip to hashtag hell. Hashtags can be extremely useful but they’re frequently abused by spammers, marketers and applications. So choose which ones you use wisely. Hint: hashtags relating to body parts, private matters, illegal activities and words you wouldn’t use in the presence of your grandparents are usually the ones to avoid.
• Thou shalt not sex up your avatar. Everyone loves a pretty face but when it comes to your Twitter avatar, make sure that pretty face is your own. Using a photo of a beautiful woman or a studly man to attract attention is suitable only for the lowliest of spammers. And don’t forget to keep your clothes on; your rock-hard abs may be worthy of exhibition on the beach but you probably don’t need to show them off in Twitter’s public timeline.
• Thou shalt not oversell. This is ‘social‘ media. Just as nobody likes the person who is constantly selling vaccuum cleaners at the cocktail party on Friday, nobody likes the person who is selling via tweet 24×7. So even if you’re using Twitter for business purposes, don’t go overboard with the pitches; providing value with your tweets will do more for your selling efforts than 140 characters of hard pitch.
• Thou shalt not overfollow or autofollow. If you have 500 followers but are following 5,000 people, something is wrong. Some people have sophisticated beliefs regarding follower ratios; I don’t. But common sense is in order: there are plenty of reasons not to follow other users and you should only follow people who you find interesting. As it relates to autofollowing, if I told you I was jumping off a cliff, would you follow me over the edge? Hopefully not. Consider applying the same logic when it comes to who you follow on Twitter.
• Thou shalt not sell out. Tweeting a message for a company for a chance to win a free laptop may be a good deal for the company but you’d probably ask for more if you were selling your soul and not your Twitter account. Even so, by tweeting marketing messages for compensation (or a chance at compensation), you send the message that you’re easily bought and sold. That’s probably not a message you want to send.
• Thou shalt not tweet before thinking. You are what you tweet. So think twice before saying something dumb. From retweeting a fake news story to crudely voicing a opinion that makes you look like a jerk, there are plenty of ways you can put your foot in your mouth in 140 characters. So keep your shoes on and your feet on the ground by thinking before you hit ‘update‘.

I recently finished reading, “Innocent – Our Story and Some Things We’ve Learned”. A great insight into the culture of Innocent Drinks. The book provides an excellent overview of the history of the company and the ethical and environmental stance the business takes in sourcing its ingredients. The book also offers lots of practical business advice for entrepreneurs. If you are a fan of the drinks, this is a must read book!

The video above summarises the Innocent story in under ten minutes and features co-founder Richard Reed.  He discusses five areas in which he believes has made Innocent Drinks a success. These areas include:

1. The nature of things made – 100% natural, 0% concentrate.

2. Procuring ingredients in an ethically and environmentally conscience way.

3. Producing packaging with a lighter foot print  (recyclable/biodegradable).

4. Conserving energy – (refusing to air freight fruit and sourcing locally produced produce).

5. Sharing profits – 10% of profits are donated to good causes.

Overall, by following the guiding principles above, Innocent is building a business which is “net positive”.

UPDATE

Take a look at the video below for a tour of Innocent Drinks at Fruit Towers in West London.

Fantastic.

IAB Social Media Metrics Paper – Get more Business Documents

H/T To Paul at Blending The Mix.

This document specifies standard definitions for Social Media Metrics. With the rapid growth seen in the Social Media space in recent years, many publishers and vendors are offering supplemental performance metrics to their clients as additional ways of gauging ad effectiveness. This document defines these supplemental metrics in more detail in an effort to stimulate growth by making the reporting of metrics for agencies and advertisers across multiple media partners more consistent. The IAB hopes that all players in the Social Media space will coalesce around these metrics to encourage growth through consistency.

Social media speaks to a new way of understanding how individual users are interacting with branded content via online publishers, social networks, blogs, and applications. Before the proliferation of social media, the primary way for users to receive advertiser information was one-way. Social Media has changed the paradigm of how people consume online media.

The most profound difference is that Social Media has added a participatory element where an individual not only receives information but has the ability to take part in the creation and distribution of content. Furthermore, social media tools have enabled a dialogue and discovery around this content.  It is the combination of these unique and appealing aspects that defines the true value of social media. 

Value is derived not only from the primary distribution of branded content but also the additional interactions that result as users share, participate with, and propagate advertising content. In the end, social media adds another layer of value through its ability to engage users and create additional reach.

The current Social Media landscape can be broken into three distinct categories:

• Social Media Sites
• Blogs
• Widgets & Social Media Applications

You can download the complete paper here.