Get The Cliffnotes of #SXSW

Feeling guilty about not attending South By Southwest (SXSW)? Dont! If you follow any event’s #hashtag you will receive the following:

1. Cliff note quotes
2. Slide decks via Slideshare
3. Recordings, video and podcasts of the event sessions
4. White papers and PDF’s
5. Invaluable new Twitter and LinkedIn professionals to follow

Honestly, outside of the networking and vendor showcase, I rarely feel the need to attend any event, including SXSW. Would it be cool to attend SXSW? Yes and I probably will, but ultimately I dont feel like I am missing out. Look at my right RSS feed for SXSW…follow the giant green arrow! See it?

Follow that RSS and check it about 2 weeks after SXSW. Everything you could possibly want will be there to get you caught up. If I am wrong, let me have it.  😉 As for other events, I encourage you to try this with events you cant attend, but want to. Just be sure to keep an eye peeled for session #hastags. Most them will have sub hashes- so be aware of that.

A Nine Inch Nails Social Media Strategy Plan- Don’t Give Up Yet Trent!

Trent Reznor’s (from Nine Inch Nails) recent announcement that he is leaving Social Media because of trolls sums up the need for all business to- “have a plan”. Whether you are a musician or a corporate giant – a Social Media marketing strategy with a clear map to real business objective is necessary.

Reznor (@trent_reznor )says:  “The reason no record label knows how to market anything to new media is they don’t live there. They don’t get it because they don’t use it. What you’ve seen happen with the marketing and presentation of NIN over the last years is a direct result of living next to you, listening to you, consuming with you and interacting with you. Directly. There’s no handlers or PR people here, it’s me and my guys – that’s it. There’s no real plan, even – it’s just trying to do the right thing that respects you the fan, the music, and me the artist. That’s the goal – a mutual and shared respect.”

He is right! In a perfect world he could engage his fans transparently and be free and clear of negative sentiment. But the fact remains- transparency will lead to as much negative as positive. But to combat it, businesses need the resources to answer to both the negative and the positive. Reznor’s comments are nothing more than a call for help- not a white flag!

Here are 5 action items that Trent can do to remedy his troll problem and create a solid foundation fora  true Social Media Strategy Plan:

1. Hire a Social Media Director – I am sure there are a great deal of recent college grads that would kill to put Nine Inch Nails Social Media Director on their resume. I am also sure this person would work on the cheap! They would be in charge of monitoring, responding, engaging, and consistently push/pulling relevant content to Nine Inch Nails. Essentially being the overseer of the NIN brand in Social Media channels. Instead of Trent doing it, this person will carry out  tedious tasks and put the most important content in front of Trent daily to respond to. Everything between the good ideas to negative sentiment!  This essentially removes the trolls and lets Trent focus on making great music. Lastly, this person will work under NIN’s PR folks.
2. Purchase a Social Analytics tool– these tools help track, reply, document and recognize real ROI. For $500-$750 per month a business can have a birds-eye view of their social media presence. I recommend Techrigy – although the marketplace is becoming flush solutions. I would suggest demoing several and deciding what would work best for a music artist.
3. Migrate to Modlife: Because Modlife is fee service for fans to join, it eliminates trolls and allows musicians to create almost their own safe market research community. They can share, test, and interact with passionate fans. My suggestion is to utilize Modlife as a musicians center location, and use Myspace, Twitter, Facebook and Social Bookmarking sites to push information, take information- but most importantly to draw in the “real fans”. The innovators if you will- NIN’s very own market research community. Look no further then what Angels & Airwaves have done here: http://modlife.com/angelsandairwaves Perfect for NIN!
4. Create a Recognition Rewards Program– Use meet and greets as a way to build a group of online body guards. Dangling a “meet Trent Reznor opportunity” is a stellar reward for being a pro-NIN presence that pushes the band in the social channels. This is enabling and empowering and can be done with nothing more than a bit of organizing and a brief shining of the spotlight on these do-gooders electronically. It is amazing what a simple tweet from rock star can do from an ego perspective.
5. Build a Content Schedule & Engage– Start doing chats on TinyChat. Conduct monthly webinars and podcasts where fans get to hear new material or offer feedback on what artists NIN should tour with. The content schedule should be focused on the business goals of  fan feedback and innovation to their voice. When you give your customers what they want, you will win their business repeatedly. Once again, the content schedule is geared towards enabling, empowering and organizing NIN’s own market research community. It is no different then what Barack Obama did to get elected.

My life as a social media consultant consists of creating plans such as these-although much more in-depth than this blog. But every business is different in their needs, desires, and objectives. In fact, how each business measures ROI is vastly different.  In Trent Reznor’s case, his ROI is to be able to engage Social Media effectively so he can listen to his customers (the fans) and innovate his music based on their feedback. His desire is no different than a billion dollar corporate empire- to be able to go direct to consumer with new products-thus lowering marketing churn, while having a product that is created based on the voice of the customer. Trent just needed a strategy plan….

Technorati: hjfhkfu8v5

How TinyChat Is A Business Tool

There are a host of blog posts that speak to the “how” of TinyChat. What I have not seen is a blog post that speaks about the “why” of  TinyChat. It is a huge business tool if used right. Here are a few ideas:

• Business Communities: Use the correct keywords for your community to create an embeddable chat page. Set a chat schedule of at least one chat per week. This helps make business communities sticky. Plus, chat is considered safe for newbies to Social Media. Not to mention the ability to chat with your webcam helps put a face to the voice-a very valuable feature for business communities as they evolve. The business benefit is more reasons to utilize the community and yet another channel to communicate.
• eStores: Many eStores already have a chat tool. But think about the ability to chat with peers about the products on the eStore. Having a list of buyers to chat with in order to make an educated purchase will drive sales like never before. It is one thing to talk to a store associate that is paid to speak to the customer, it is quite another to have a face to face conversation with willing peers. This will take planning and a Recognition Rewards program for the eStore staff. But the long term ramifications are huge is executed correctly. The business benefit is quicker decisions to the buy!
• More Effective Webinars & Podcasts: The premium fee is worth it with its screen share functionality. Simple and effective! This tool could shirt many users from WebEx and Skype to this one universal tool. Note: Only hardcore Skype users would actually pay for the differences.
• Peer Supported Customer Service: Simply create a page on your branded website where peers can help each other out, real time. Again, at the outset this will take planning on the part of the business and a recognition rewards program to empower members to help each other out. But the technology is easy enough to use it on a per need basis. The business benefit is reduced customer service costs.
• Authors: Having writers block? Invite your readers to help you brainstorm your way out of the writer’s block. Or, let it be an innovation opportunity for future writings.
• Product Innovation: Is your company at the key phase of a new product and you wanting real time beta feedback? Bingo!

These are just a few of the ideas I have, I could chirp all day about the different uses for this very innovative tool. I am happy to talk to your organization about how this and other Social Media tools can be utilized to recognized real benefits and ROI. For now, think about how Tinychat can be used to help your organization recognize its current business objectives. Expect to see me start using it regularly…please excuse me while I finally bend and get a webcam.