dna13

Toyota Raises Eyebrows with its Questionable New Twitter Strategy

The past few months have seen auto power-brand Toyota on a crisis merry-go-round, with news of recall after recall making headlines worldwide. The crux of problems plaguing affected models is safety, which seriously maligns a brand whose image is built on durability, reliability and ... well, safety.

While Toyota's response to the crisis has been an ongoing process, its most recent strategy involved a tool communications professionals know all too well: Twitter. With the help of Federated Media, last week Toyota launched an official channel on TweetMeme, a service that allows users to aggregate tweets by specific topic. Dubbed Toyota Conversations, the channel features news stories and videos tweeted about the brand, as well as tweets from Toyota's own Twitter and AdTweets accounts.

While the company's strategy of tapping Twitter to manage the maelstrom of negative conversations is on point, many are criticizing its specific approach on the grounds that TweetMeme channels can be programmed to pick up selected news sources. Translation: Toyota can choose to aggregate sources that have been less critical in their crisis coverage, and to leave out its most vocal opponents. In fact, as TechCrunch reported, Toyota Conversations' top stories are strikingly positive in comparison to the Twitter sentiment app Tweetfeel's overall analysis.

While there is no off-the-shelf solution to any crisis situation, especially one of this magnitude, it's interesting to see the steps Toyota is taking to mitigate its own catastrophe. The judge may (or may not) still be out on the TweetMeme tactic's overall effectiveness, but early responses have been skeptical.

Do you think Toyota's Twitter tactic is strategic, or is the fact that it can control news sources a deal breaker?

Google Conviction Challenges the Future of User-Generated Content

The recent conviction of three Google executives (the Chief Legal Officer, Global Privacy Counselor and the former Chief Financial Officer) has raised some profound questions about the future of user-generated content and the global online platforms that host it.

On February 24, an Italian court found the executives guilty of violating privacy laws based on their failure to immediately identify and remove a clip uploaded to Google Video of students bullying a handicapped child. The video was online for two months in 2006, and was removed as a result of an official complaint by a nonprofit that represents the interests of individuals with Down Syndrome. During the trial, according to reports, Google lawyers argued that the company doesn't have editorial responsibility for content on its platforms, and that it removes offensive material when it's brought to the company's attention via the appropriate channels.

The conviction, which Google intends to appeal, essentially deems Internet companies responsible for content generated by third-party users. If the decision is upheld, the freedoms of speech and expression facilitated by online platforms could be seriously impeded, as these platforms would be forced to establish procedures for vetting, monitoring and filtering content in real time.

While the long-term effects of the case remain to be seen-especially given the impending appeal-it certainly points to how strong of an impact the rise in user-generated content has on the status quo, both at home and abroad.
Do you think the court's decision will be felt globally, or will it be shut down by the larger implications? Naturally, Google representatives are committed to the latter, stating that, if the verdict is allowed to stand, "the Web as we know it will cease to exist."

Enterprise 3.0: "Real Time" Redefines Collaboration Tools

Following up on last Monday's post about social CRM, Salesforce.com's CEO Marc Benioff wrote a guest post on TechCrunch this past Wednesday that offers some additional food for thought on the subject. In the column, titled "The Facebook Imperative," he notes the question he remembers asking himself in 1999-"Why isn't all enterprise software like Amazon.com?"-and draws a parallel to the question he asks himself frequently today: "Why isn't all enterprise software like Facebook?"

"Everything I care about and need to know is pushed to me-and it requires no work on my part. What does the social revolution mean for business, though?" he writes. "So far it hasn't meant much. Currently, our methods of collaboration are defined by Lotus Notes or Microsoft SharePoint, but these tools haven't kept up with the changing times."

Benioff goes on to discuss the mass proliferation of "real-time," noting that, "Market shifts happen in real time, deals are won and lost in real time, and data changes in real time"-all of which have profound implications on businesses. Though he says enterprise collaboration tools haven't evolved in-step with the so-called social revolution, that is changing as communications management and workflow solutions become more sophisticated. But in order for these tools to reach their fullest potential, steps must be taken within organizations to eliminate inefficiencies that still exist from the "analog" times of yore. For example:

• Share the love-and the data: Failure to share data among Sales, Marketing and PR departments has been an age-old problem. Should it continue, it will be one of the biggest impediments to the degree of strategic alignment required to fully leverage the power of "real time".

• Make the workflow solution part of your daily routine: One of the most commonly heard complaints regarding social media adoption within corporations was that executives, "didn't have the time." That excuse has lost steam as it became clear that social media had the ability to save time when implemented strategically, but it continues to be heard during conversations about workflow solutions. While there is an initial time investment up front to learn the system, these platforms actually save time by eliminating redundancies and inefficiencies. However, if they aren't used widely within the enterprise, they don't do the job they're intended for.

Ultimately, Benioff sums it up best: "We are on the precipice of a major shift in our industry. It stems from a change we badly needed and the once-in-a-decade question we had to ask. And this time, we are all ready for the answers."

Are you?

Aligning Sales, Marketing and PR through Social CRM

As social media's proliferation added new dimensions to standard customer relations practices, companies began responding accordingly, even going so far as to appoint "Community Managers," people whose sole (a deceptively understated descriptor, given the complexity of the job) responsibility was managing these online conversations. By 2010, the number of companies with Community Managers titles was high enough to officially make this a mainstream corporate position (as evidenced by this list, compiled by the Altimeter Group's own Jeremiah Owyang).

The Community Manager role's formalization is a step towards bridging communications, marketing and even sales, as the conversations these executives moderate have implications on each business function. Likewise, the increasingly robust analytics they can access through an array of online tools are capable of advancing each of the threes' strategic direction. In essence, Community Managers embody the new generation of customer relationship management: social CRM.

Customer relationship management, or CRM, became popular in the 1990s following the emergence of database marketing in the previous decade. Borne out of the need for a scientific approach to automating sales activities, CRM matured over time to encompass other consumer-facing business departments, including marketing and customer service, but sales data remained its primary engine.
As we all know now, social media and digital technologies would ultimately upend such standardized processes by shifting the balance of power from organizations to their consumer audiences. At the same time, the elements that defined its three core pillars-customers, relationships and management-changed drastically:

• Customer: from people to communities
• Relationship: from processes to conversations
• Management: from data to content

Suffice it to say, CRM underwent major recalibrating to transition from analog to digital, which brings us to its present, "social" iteration. However, with newly adjusted organizational structures (hence the normalization of Community Manager roles) and digitized CRM to match, who owns the ever-growing pool of data? And, perhaps more important, what needs to be done with it to maximize the new opportunities it can create, and the bottom-line results it can deliver?

The short answer, unfortunately, isn't so short. From an outside-in perspective, who owns it-sales, marketing or communications-doesn't really matter because, as Owyang put it, "Customers do not care what department you are in." However, from an inside-out perspective, we know that unaligned, out of sync or feuding departments don't translate to positive results in the modern business environment.

More than that, though, is the realization that, for the first time, CRM data actually stands to close the proverbial loop and ensure the sales, marketing and communications functions are all working within the same pipeline. Indeed, as consumer data collected on the marketing side becomes more sophisticated and, in turn, can analyze characteristics like influence and intent to buy, there will be a major push to actually sync up with the sales pipeline to identify, monitor, prioritize, triage, engage and report on individuals' brand interactions. Likewise, the communications activities taking place in social media generate robust metrics that can assess consumers' preferences and consumption habits, and inform engagement strategies at their moment of interest.

As far as HOW social CRM will bridge communications, sales and marketing, the complete answer remains to be seen. However, communications management vendors are taking steps in the right direction with real-time monitoring services and workflow synchronization capabilities. At the same time, sales solutions are integrating collaboration tools directing into their CRM systems, as evidenced by Salesforce's recent roll out of Chatter. The key will be finding a meeting point where both data sets can be merged and applied to holistic solutions-surely the new "Holy Grail" of the modern communications era.

Too Fat to Fly?

The Southwest Airlines/Kevin Smith Debacle Underscores the Importance of Listening

Over the weekend, all hell broke loose for Southwest Airlines when a passenger named Kevin Smith launched a Twitter tirade against the company after he was allegedly kicked off a flight for being "too fat." Within hours, the airline-a perennial customer favorite and digital darling, to boot-was in full crisis mode as the story became headline news online and off.

So, how did the situation escalate so quickly?

Smith posted his first tweet on Saturday, February 13 at approximately 8:50pm PST (he was flying from Burbank to Oakland, CA), which read: "Dear @SouthwestAir- I know I'm fat, but was Captain Leysath really justified in throwing me off a flight for which I was already seated?"

First, let it be said: Southwest Airlines has a clearly stated policy addressing "customers of size," which the pilot would have followed to determine that two seats would be required to safely accommodate Smith. What's more, Smith had in fact purchased two seats for a later flight, but ended up changing his plans and going standby. The problem arose when the flight he boarded only had one available seat, according to Southwest representatives.

Now, most companies know how quickly issues can escalate in social media, but Southwest had the distinct misfortune of ejecting a passenger who also happened to be a famous film director (Smith's past films include Chasing Amy and Clerks) with-wait for it-more than 1.6 million Twitter followers. Which brings us to the crux of the crisis: As is standard practice for the company, Southwest's communications team was monitoring the tweetstream when Smith lodged his initial complaint, but six hours elapsed before it came across their transom. By then, the incident was a topic of conversation on the Web.

While the legitimacy of Smith's gripe is up for debate (his recent blog post reveals that his weight wasn't actually the issue after all-which the Southwest rep admitted she learned after the fact during a phone call with Smith-but that he was removed to accommodate a non-standby passenger who purchased two seats; Southwest's own post detailing that conversation didn't confirm that theory), the issue DOES underscore the importance of real-time social media monitoring. The reported six-hour lapse between Smith's first tweet and Southwest's response could have been caused by any number of things (sorting through a fire hose of tweets to identify critical issues can take time), but a universal best practice remains addressing customer service complaints ASAP.

Southwest Airlines was smart to try to take the conversation offline as quickly as possible, as evidenced by the following tweets:

• @ThatKevinSmith hey Kevin! I'm so sorry for your experience tonight! Hopefully we can make things right, please follow so we may DM!
• I've read the tweets all night from @thatkevinsmith - He'll be getting a call at home from our Customer Relations VP tonight.
• @ThatKevinSmith We called you on the number you had on file in your reservation. If you prefer a different number, please DM me. Thanks!

 

What about you-how do you think Southwest handled the crisis, all things considered?

Toyota’s Global Recall Woes Spread, Underscoring the Importance of Synchronization

Late last month, we applauded Toyota’s decision to suspend sales of many of its most popular models after problems with breaking/acceleration mechanisms forced the company to recall more than 2 million vehicles. At the time, Toyota seemed to be proactively preemptive of potentially catastrophic safety issues, underscoring its brand commitment to durability, reliability and quality.

However, in the two weeks since that announcement, the beleaguered automaker’s reputation has hydroplaned after news of additional recalls in markets around the world broke on a near-daily basis. Most recently, Toyota President Akio Toyoda announced the global recall of more than 400,000 of the 2010 hybrid models, including the Prius, due to problems with the anti-lock braking system. He acknowledged the quality quagmire during a Tuesday press conference, saying, “We do apologize for the inconvenience and concerns we've given to the customers. Quality is our lifeline for Toyota.”

The mounting recalls are problematic enough for the brand, from a communications perspective, the disjointed messaging and conflicting reports are even more worrisome. The company was initially criticized for remaining tight-lipped as additional recalls were announced. Then, last week, the company admitted a problem with the software that controls the anti-lock braking system of the 2010 hybrid models, saying it had found a solution for cars that rolled off the assembly line in January. It was too little, too late for most customers, especially given the lack of a solution for dealing with the hundreds of thousands of affected cars already on the road.

Toyota’s current crisis is a quintessential example of how easily communications can go awry when an issue affects multiple brands in multiple markets, each of which is managed by its own communications team. In this case, the company as a whole failed to activate and respond to mounting concerns. As regional leaders finally began to address the problem publicly, they still failed to present a salient solution. Conflicting messages at home and abroad also fueled customers’ confusion.

Given how entrenched Toyota is in the crisis, the brand has a long and bumpy road ahead. However, companies can learn from Toyota’s mistakes, many of which center on the lack of synchronization.  

Crisis or not, the increasingly fragmented communications environment makes synchronization critical to consistent operations across the organization. We approach synchronization in four phases:

• Synchronize plans
• Synchronize relationships  
  
• Synchronize tools
• Synchronize messages

For more strategies and best practices for effective synchronization, check out dna13’s latest whitepaper, “Strengthening brands and reputation through synchronization.”

dna13 announces winter*twentyten release featuring social media

Today dna13 announced the release of a significant upgrade to its software platform, which now includes streamlined monitoring and communications management capabilities in one fully integrated solution.

The release certainly comes at an opportune time, with issues surrounding workflow management and social software getting tons of play recently. Numerous research reports have confirmed what communications professionals already knew: Emerging social media platforms and technologies are upending traditional enterprise models, and sidelined communications activities-listening, engaging, collaborating, etc.-are becoming central to effective strategy execution. As a result, communications management/workflow is becoming relevant across the organization.

Take, for instance, the results of the Gartner's 2010 Global CIO survey, which revealed a striking shift in priorities away from cost-based efficiencies and towards social technologies, including virtualization, cloud computing and Web 2.0. Most interesting to communications professionals, however, are the top 10 business priorities these surveyed CIOs identified for 2010:

• Business process improvement
• Reducing enterprise costs
• Increasing the use of information/analytics
• Improving enterprise workforce effectiveness
• Attracting and retaining new customers
• Managing change initiatives
• Creating new products or services (innovation)
• Targeting customers and markets more effectively
• Consolidating business operations
• Expanding current customer relationships

Look familiar? Indeed, these business objectives mirror those of communications professionals in so many ways, especially in the context of social technologies' effects on the enterprise. With the enhanced platform, dna13 has addressed many of these organizational needs, facilitating consistent messaging and strategy deployment among executives throughout the organization-critical advantages given today's complex communications environment. Plus, the platform continues to support communications activities with:

• A fully integrated real-time monitoring service of both traditional and social media, which now includes microblogs, as well as the ability for clients to register RSS feeds and additional content sources.
• A secure, collaborative environment that allows users to select specific issues or campaigns - as well as the people, teams or organizational units that need to be involved - and provides access to the most current key messaging, FAQ information, media lists and other related assets to help align all key stakeholders, all in a single location.
• Reporting that allows users to see, in a graphical and tabular format, the coverage they've received across all mediums, by issue or campaign, region and/or business line.

As the business environment continues to evolve in the face of changing priorities and demands, enterprises must remain agile in order to manage their reputations and relationships. For more information on dna13's enhanced platform and thought leadership content, please visit www.dna13.com.

Social Graph Optimization (SGO)

While the Web's economy operates in the currencies of links, conversations and content, the ultimate driver of these transactions is so obvious, it often goes unnoticed: the search engine.

It's commonly said that Google is the new universal homepage, and research repeatedly confirms that it-or its search counterparts Bing, Yahoo, etc.-is the starting point for the vast majority of online users, be they consumers, media, investors, employees ... you get the idea. Thus, a company's placement in the top search results can be the deal maker or breaker for any type of communications effort, from marketing and media outreach to crisis management. Search engine optimization (SEO) strategies evolved accordingly as it became clear that this was the best-if not the only-way to exert some control over what content audiences found first.

With the rapid socialization of search, though, even the most advanced SEO strategies are proving ineffective. As an increasing amount of social media content is incorporated into search data through the likes of Google Social Search, the ultimate optimization Holy Grail is sure to be SGO-that is, Social Graph Optimization.

That's the term used during a Social Media Week panel discussion in NYC yesterday, in which panelists David Berkowitz (Senior Director of Emerging Media & Innovation, 360i), Seth Sternberg (CEO, Meebo), Mark Ghuneim (CEO, Founder of Wiredset and Trendrr), Hashem Bajwa (Head of Digital at Droga 5) and Anna O'Brien (social media enthusiast and data analyst) discussed how brands can reach and influence consumers through their increasingly robust social graphs.

But first: What is a social graph, anyway? According to the panel, it's the online representation of our relationships (business and personal) in social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook. The obvious next question, then: What is Social Graph Optimization?

The answer, courtesy of panel coverage: "Social graph optimization = increasing your visibility in social graph, like SEO optimization does for search."
"Search has been great traffic driver," Sternberg said. "Now social media drives [traffic] and needs to be optimized."

This new iteration of optimization has implications on every facet of strategic communications, especially listening to, evaluating and measuring the impact that online conversations have on your brand, reputation and bottom line. While the best practices for SGO are still emerging, the panelists did make a few points that will surely be fodder for future discussions:

• "Shareability" is the crux of SGO: "Create natural messaging for your users to make their friends want to click," Sternberg said. "If you get 1% of daily visitors to share, you are doing well." "Bottom line: if you do something well, it will be shared. Quality gets shared."- Ghuneim
  
• Learn the tools before you use the tools: "Education is key," Sternberg said. "We're failing to teach the tools that are necessary to succeed in this new media environment." As for some of those tools, Meebo and Facebook Connect were both topics of conversation.
  
• Balance owning your content and leasing it: "You want to publish where your users are, but don't give up your own home." -Sternberg
  
• Start segmenting audiences according to strength of relationship: "It's no longer ‘Everybody is friends,'" O'Brien said. "Moving from "everybody is friends" in SM to diff types of friends and groups that need to be targeted."

The kicker came from Ghuneim, who urged the audience to reconsider their definition of optimization:

"When I lose a follower, I consider that optimization," he said. "They weren't listening and weren't relevant."

NYC’s Social Media Week: ROI & Client Expectations

 

February 1 marked the first day of the second annual Social Media Week, during which time conferences occur simultaneously in cities around the world, from New York City and Berlin to Sao Paulo and Toronto. The common goal: advancing the understanding of social media in the corporate, public and nonprofit sectors.

New York City's Social Media Week kicked off yesterday with a panel of PR professionals discussing the uses of social media within their industry. Among the topics of conversation were social media's implications on client relations and, not surprisingly, ROI. Though the two topics were not formally linked during the panel itself, panelist comments pertaining to each underscored a number of critical best practices for executing communications initiatives with an emphasis on ROI:

Define expectations up front: Whether you are working for a client as an external PR partner or within an organization's communications department, managing expectations from day one is essential, especially in the context of social media. From the client management side, often expectations are too much, too fast; they expect to see social media deliver results instantly, and their judgment is clouded as a result.

According to panelist David Teicher, Social Media Manager at McCann Erickson, "Clients don't have accurate expectations of social media. People need a reason to be engaged."

Danielle Mancano, Account Manager at SHIFT Communications, supported Teicher's comment, saying, "Clients often lack goals. [It's] important to listen first and pay attention, [and then to follow up] with action."

Making listening a core part of measurement: Piggybacking off Mancano's statement, listening to social media conversations is not just one step in measurement/evaluation, but an ongoing process that must inform strategies throughout the duration of the initiative. Not only does this maximize ROI, but it also helps to optimize the PR budget - a huge benefit in today's challenging economic environment.

Tie measurement back to the original expectations and objectives: The Social Media Week panel addressed social media ROI in the context of the various metrics that are at executives' disposal, including:

• # of retweets on Twitter
• Google Analytics
• "Likes" comments on Facebook
• # of Twitter followers
• # of Facebook status updates
• # of Facebook fans

These metrics are all pieces of the ROI puzzle, but they need to be put into context-that is, there need to be benchmarks from the outset of the initiative that can be cross-referenced against changes over the duration. Otherwise, ROI is calculated in a vacuum, and PR workflow is stunted as a result.

Stay tuned for more reactions to the various Social Media Week events taking place in New York City ...

Drivers of Trust and Reputation Are A-Changin’ - Just Ask Toyota

Thanks to the rapid collaboration of disparate forces, including the emergence of social media, widespread corporate malfeasance, economic turbulence and media fragmentation, the importance of intangibles like reputation and trust to organizations' bottom lines has increased exponentially. Likewise, the drivers of these intangibles have changed markedly, especially as external stakeholders find more and more ways to influence corporate outcomes.

The results of the 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer, released earlier this week, underscore this reality, revealing a significant shift in the factors that global opinion leaders believe are most important to driving corporate reputation and trust. One big difference between 2006 and 2010: the role financial returns play in determining reputation, which fell to the bottom of the list this year after ranking 3rd in 2006 (the questions were worded differently-see image below). 

What is important to corporate reputation, according to the report: transparent and honest practices (83%), trustworthiness (83%), and high-quality products and services (79%).

Now, consider these reputation drivers from Toyota's point of view. A perennial customer favorite, the Japanese automaker just announced its decision to suspend sales of several popular car models following a recall of more than 2 million vehicles due to problems with their acceleration mechanisms. According to reports, the eight suspended models account for 57% of Toyota's U.S. sales, and news of the suspension prompted a 7.7% decline in the company's share value.

Suffice it to say that dealers and investors are not too happy at the moment. But, from a reputation management standpoint, Toyota's decision was spot on. After all, the company's brand is built on durability, reliability and quality - three values that cannot be sustained if their vehicles' safety is in question. To continue selling potentially affected models for the sake of short-term stock movement would be to put shareholders before customers, which, judging from Toyota's actions, is not something they are willing to do.

"Helping ensure the safety of our customers and restoring confidence in Toyota are very important to our company," said Group Vice President and Toyota Division General Manager Bob Carter in a TIME article. "This action is necessary until a remedy is finalized. We're making every effort to address this situation for our customers as quickly as possible."

With Toyota's current crisis and the Edelman Trust Barometer findings as a backdrop, communications executives should consider these reputation management take-aways:

• Communicate early and often: Frequent communications was the 4th most important driver of corporate reputation, according to Edelman's Trust Barometer. For Toyota - or any company in the midst of a crisis - the best thing to do is stay out in front of the news by constantly giving updates and responding to media inquiries.
• Communicate via multiple channels: Trust Barometer findings showed that multiple information sources enhance a company's credibility. In this vein, Toyota is communicating updates via all its online assets, including Twitter, Facebook and its online newsroom.
• Listen and respond: Reputation is most at risk during a crisis situation, so it is especially critical to not only monitor conversations in real-time, but to also respond to stakeholders' concerns, even if it is only to direct them to the most up-to-date information. Doing so most effectively requires identifying the most important conversations, managing volume, and synchronizing messages and responses across the organization.