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Any business can become King of social media, not just burgers

29-Jul-10 13:42

Facebook reached 500 hundred million users worldwide a few weeks back. That's rather a lot by anyone's estimation.

Even more staggering is that 50% of active users log on every day, and average internet users spend more time on Facebook per day, than on Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia and Amazon combined!

With such an active consumer base brands are jumping on the Facebook bandwagon to reach customers. But are they doing this effectively?

Research from the Altimeter Group revealed that brands fell short, and nearly half reviewed did not fully leverage Facebook to activate word of mouth.

It's interesting that even though The Society of Digital Agencies reports that 45% of senior marketers named social networks and applications their top priority for 2010, so many businesses are behind the curve in using these channels effectively for their marketing and PR.

It's even more perturbing when you consider the impact some recent Facebook campaigns have had.

Tourism Queensland's "The Best Job In The World" campaign was a PR and viral marketing phenomenon with 336,000 Facebook-referred website visits, and over £5.5 million worth of exposure generated.

Last year Burger King created a Facebook application that encouraged users to remove Facebook friends, in exchange for a free Whopper.

This was a brilliantly creative Facebook campaign that saw 233,906 friends removed by 82,771 people in less than a week. It also generated great PR, with Burger King and the advertising agency applauded for their out of the box approach.

These examples show that brands like Burger King that get their online strategy right can really reap the rewards from social media.

There appears no reason for other businesses not to follow the same route, as simple but innovative idea's spread through social media networks and their community of online users can prove to be a powerful free branding tool.

Saying that, I'd still choose a Big Mac any day of the week...

Mark

 

A company blog is not about self praise....

29-Jul-10 10:11

...or for telling the world all about the great things that a company is doing. But today I'm breaking the rules.

When things get busy at work, and busy times lead to challenging times, it crosses my mind to ask what I'm doing here. Let's be honest, it happens to the best of us.

But we're very lucky at Ascent PR as, once a quarter, we get a chance to take a day out together to look at what we've achieved and think about our hopes and plans for the future. What's more, we get to spend some ‘quality time' with our colleagues and generally take a break and enjoy ourselves.

Our latest ‘Qwerm' (the name assigned to these days, it's a long story) was no different. We joined the rest of our colleagues from Ascent PR (part of the Berkeley Communications Group), for a day of treasure hunting and boating on the Solent. All organised by the lovely Charlie at Seriously Cool Events.

Splitting into three teams, we spent the day competing to take the best photos, make the best hats and cross the Solent the quickest on RIBs, while doing our best not to fall in. The photographic evidence tells the story.....we had a ball.

It's these kind of events that make all the difference to me. The knowledge that a company invests in its staff to reward hard work and bring some light relief to our busy working lives, is something that keeps me going when we're under pressure to generate results for clients and motivate our teams.

Helen