New Media, Marketing and Entrepreneurship

This is one of the best wins of my social media/ Internet career and I am feeling amazingly excited today. So here’s the story. The last blog I wrote on MakeMyTrip.com’s customers posting negative comments on their official fb page, got some interesting feedback.

And Here’s the Experiment

So, what I did was simple. I reached out to 3 people who had left negative comments on the MMT facebook fan page. When I say I reached out, I simply went to there fb profiles and sent them a message. A message which clearly said that I am not a MMT employee/ representative but someone who is amazingly passionate about customer service and obviously about creating a great organisational structure, which is driven by the customer WOWness.

After sending the message, I waited for them to reply and so the reply came, of 2 gentlemen, who had faced genuine problems in their respective cases while transacting with MMT.

And so came the reply

When I received the reply it was all about sharing by these gentlemen about how they faced problems and what solution would suffice them and what suggestions they have for MMT.

The reply was forwarded to relevant people at MMT and they Swung into ACTION

I forwarded the reply to the relevant people at MMT and wallah, they swung into action. Interestingly I was not even aware what was happening, till I got this ping on fb by this gentleman who said, Paritosh thanks, my issue has been sorted out and I have my refund from MMT. The issue was taken care of within hours of you reaching out to me.

I had and still have no Interest whatsoever in this story

Why did I do all this? Well, I have no personal interests. Neither am I being paid by anyone here, just that MMT is one company I have always respected, especially for the leadership it has in the form of Deep Kalra, someone I deeply respect. I personally could not see it going down like this and hence took the step of trying to get it right.

Social Media and Brand Reputation

People talk about social media and brand reputation (ORM), well, here’s a simple example of how a customer who was utterly negative about MMT, finally wrote a wonderful, thanking comment on the official MMT fb page

There’s no magic here, just pure passion for customer service and to see MMT from great to Greatness! I am happy that it all worked out well and that this experiment created an actual POC and a roadmap of what one needs to do. You don’t need to invest shit loads of money into your social media, you have to be passionate about your customer and the service.

Lets see if I do get a recommendation by MMT now he he..

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There is much talk around how is social media influencing actual transactions. Is there actual commerce happening around? A recent study by Adobe Social Marketing, the Digital Index Social Report suggests how marketers are still lacking in terms of the credit they ought to give to social, which is influencing buying behavior.

Interestingly Adobe gives a great emphasis on the first click attribution, the discussion suggests that marketers mostly use the last click attribution model, to really assess the impact of social on their website traffic and further, the customer engagement with the content, commerce etc. on the website.

What is attribution: lets simplify things

To simply put, attribution is nothing but a fancy term given to the basic activity which marketers do, which is of understanding how various methods of outreach are adding ROI. In further simple language, attribution is like giving the right credit to the right source, just as it happens in real life.

What happens online?

There is so much for businesses to understand and track online, that most of the times they lose track of what is happening and what is it finally leading to. Take a case of a small and emerging business. These are businesses which cannot afford to have large in-house teams and cannot hire large agencies as well. So how do they track what’s happening online and how are they being impacted?

If your customer is searching for you on a search engine, from which he clicks a paid advertisement he sees OR that he moves onto a social network and once again sees your brand there and clicks on the same, reaches to a landing page on your website, where he sees a call to action and transacts.

Now what would you attribute the transaction to? The search engine, the paid ad, the social network, the content, the call to action on the website?

In my view

In my view, its a mix of all. Obviously you can always track, which keywords did your customer land onto your website from, if he lands from a search engine and using similar keywords (or better) you create powerful content and target paid ads. Its first click attribution in this obviously makes for an interesting number to see and track, but it has to be a mix of the first click – the call to action and the last click.

Assessing the fact as to which stage of the process of engaging with your brand is the customer taking an action and changing, is difficult, till the time the customer actually suggests, what attracted him/ influenced him and at what stage OR that you are focusing only on a single medium heavily, then you would obviously be able to assess what’s happening and how.

The key elements

To engage your TG in the relevant conversation and drive them to take an desired action, I strongly believe, what you require is powerfully engaging content. This content then has to be “distributed” the right way across channels, which are relevant to your business. To keep things simple, I consider paid media as a form of content distribution only.

The trick here is to optimize your content and the distribution and keep strong checks at every level, to understand where is the customer most responsive and when and based upon the response, the transactions happening online.

So is it the first click OR the last click?

They both combined are still inadequate. I believe the right model is, first click + last click + touching your customer in the offline world. Once there is a transaction, go touch your customer in the real world, with a phone call/ a visit (I understand this will always not be possible) OR meet your customer at events/ gatherings. Take feedback. Real Feedback.

This will give you the real sense and cut the non-sense.

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Okay, enough about which is that one site which is breaking all traffic records, is making everyone go gaga and crazy about the meteoric rise. I am not going to write all the stuff which has already been said. No point.

Lets look at some interesting trends

Interestingly, I have realized over the past few days/ weeks that I have been on Pinterest, how people in my network have started following me and my own trends of following people (how am I reacting to the information around) and sharing trends.

Here’s what I realized!

Almost every 10 minutes that I spent on Pinterest, I have shared (re-pinned) more pictures from my network than I have shared my originals. The similar is the trend which I have seen of my followers. I keep getting many repeated pictures from many in the network. One other trend I am seeing is, people are fiercely commenting on “objects”. Example: Cars, Flowers, Bags, Jewellery.

I see that people are not sharing thoughts here. Even if you follow the comments of a pin, you will find, people are expressing their views, like a customer to a product. More like a product review happening socially.

Interest based social networks: the future

Am I being futuristic in my thought by saying Interest based social networks are the future, absolutely not. Its anyone’s guess. But what is sure going to matter as we go ahead, is the way information is presented.

Content: which human sense are you touching!

In my view, what has always been said from the very beginning, that content is the key. I have a way to share this. Whenever I create content, I ensure that I ask myself and my client, the question, as to who are their customers and how are the customers going to be most touched about the proposition. Its really about which of the human senses are you touching with your content?

Is is the sense of sight, the sense of sound? In my view, the next level, is all about how do you create content, which is simple, yet moving. It might not be a WOW video, but something that actually delivers an ‘object’. The thought is to create content which in a single shot convey the message of what is it all about. Eg: a model wearing a dress, is effectively about either photography OR the dress. Simple.

The basics remain the same still!

The basics of internet still are the same. Bring the information to the customer in as less clicks as possible. Make sharing and gathering user’s views, like a simple handshake, this has already been enabled by great UI. The future clearly is greatly going to be driven by Static Images, Short videos and ‘mood oriented’ music.

Well, and closing with the Pinteresting thought, follow me on Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/paritoshsharma/

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As announced earlier, www.paritoshsharma.com is a dedicated content partner with Social Bakers. We are publishing India specific statistics which can give you insights into what are various social networks doing in India. Here’s an update on facebook and YouTube this time!!

Keep plugged into this space for  more interesting numbers!!

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I am excited to announce a partnership with SocialBakers, one of world’s biggest social media statistics portal. Sometime back, while SocialBakers was looking to partner with leading bloggers and publishers in various parts of the world, www.paritoshsharma.com was quick to partner with them, under the category New Media and Marketing. The blog is officially listed under the blogger partner section of SocialBakers.

As part of the partnership, www.paritoshsharma.com will be presenting interesting social media statistics from India as a geography. The first in the series is the graphic below which gives some pretty interesting figures on facebook users in India and the brands which are making waves.

Its interesting to note that Reliance Mutual Fund has been the highest on Response Rate. Being a fund house in such volatile market conditions, talking to their customers on fb is sure an interesting deal.

www.paritoshsharma.com and SocialBakers will keep coming up with more exciting statistics which will sure give you exciting insights into what’s happening in the social media domain in India. Keep plugged!!

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All right. So the word is out and I have to start this post with a clear thought that if you are proud of being an “Active on Social Media” business, then you are being plain simple dumb!

Don’t make any assumptions about what’s next in this post after reading those words above. I have been hearing so much of the word “social” lately, that I feel the buzzword is nearing its exhaustion in the usage of the context. Businesses are just lining up to be social. I have seen so many companies who are “wanting to be social” int he recent times, that I strongly feel, they don’t even have their basic customer understanding and service right.

What I want to clearly deliver to businesses is, that being social is not about something drastically different! Its just another extension of being there. The ultimate goal of the business is to serve the customer is the best possible manner and being social won’t replace this.

Set it In Your Culture!

Being social is not simply a marketing function. Its the mindset, I strongly believe. Its one thing having a great facebook fan page, a great looking YouTube channel with many hundreds of views, but its a whole different game to have “engaged audience”, for the same. In my view its a simple black is black and white is white proposition. If you understand your customer bloody well and are serving them in the manner they expect from you, well, then, being social will automatically fetch you engaged and active fans. You will not have to pump in those many hundreds of marketing dollars and then start a cycle of engaging your fans to make them from mere listeners to active contributors.

Are You Sure You Understand and Know Your Customer Bloody Well?

Most of the companies that I work with, while creating their social media strategies, my first thought simply is to understand the audience. And NO, I DON’T look at the audience from the mindset of a salesman. I clearly and simply look at understanding, who is the influencer, who is the decision maker, who is the ultimate consumer and what all do they expect from the business!

To me its simple, if you have not been able to create a satisfied and engaged customer, someone who listens to when you communicate, well, you will always keep fighting for engaged fans on social media as well.

So many businesses today are leveraging the digital medium to present a proposition, what they are missing is a very critical and powerful point. Everyone online today has the power and freedom to express by creating content and hence if you promise something and don’t stand upto the experience, well, you will one day be written about and that day aint too far!

Connect With the Core Human Motivation to Do Things!

My personal view is that social is no different from the usual way of connecting with your customer. For a while just think of a world which was a few decades back. When businesses used to communicate and reach out to customers in a ‘now rudimentary’ format of physical letters etc. the call to action was simply based on exploring the customer motivation and delivering the same as an incentive.

Going social though has made companies lose out on the understanding the customer’s basic motivation bit. Most businesses outsource the social part to agencies who again are working with limited manpower, with more constrained knowledge of the still nascent digital media. And these agencies well, many customers can share their personal experiences!

For God’s Sake Campaigns Won’t Fetch You Actively Engaged Fans!

I must speak it out loud, marketing folks please understand, if your objective is to create a buzz, great campaigns work. Yes they do. If its about creating actively engaged fans, well, a short-lived, time constrained campaign might not be the right approach. You might be successful in acquiring a fan through a campaign, but will that fan be actively engaging in future. I have serious doubts and have examples to share from my own experience.

Understand Your Customer, Do the Basic Right and You Will Win!

All you need to do to win the social world as well is to do the basic right. Ensure that you are reaching out to your customers and creating active touch-points with him/ her, which enable you to collect critical data about the customer. His/ Her preferences, Likes/ Dislikes/ Motivations etc. Once you have this existing, you will be able to develop a far stronger strategy to reach out to the set of people online who would have the highest probability of converting for you as an actively engaged fan.

Remember, A Real Smile is Anyday Better Than a Smiley!!

As I always say, a real smiley is always far more effective than a digital one. Create powerfully engaging and NOT SELLING touch-points with your customers in the ‘real’ offline world. Once your customer comes in your communication and listening range, then create the motivational pulls online!

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Social networking has been around since sometime now. There’s much content around. There’s a lot of sharing, caring, love and what not. What was missing still, as I said it before, was the real understanding of the ‘Human Behavior’ by the social network. I am not referring to the real Artificial Intelligence, that might also happen one day, but social networking has a real face to it. Its more human really than technology.

Interestingly facebook, recently did couple of interesting changes in the UI and especially how they are evolving their brand pages. The entire concept of brand pages is essentially to provide an online space for brands to reach out and engage its target audience OR as I believe, targeting is the second level, first its about attracting just the available audience.

Look below your fan page likes

Recently facebook added something interesting below your fan page likes ‘number’. They added something called the People Talking About! This number essentially represents the number of people who are talking about your brand (mentioning you in comments, liking updates) etc. in a week. As an obviously logical extension to the thought, the more the number of people talking, the more is your brand reaching out to the relevant target audience.

Word of mouth

Now don’t feel as if I am traversing to a whole new topic. Interestingly what I feel is, there is a lot that facebook is doing to model the real world online. I find this very interesting. For me, since I have known social networks, I have always said, a successful social network is the one, which can understand the human behavior well and model it. And facebook is doing just that.

The number of people discussing your brand on facebook, is now visible to you, which is pretty much like the word of mouth which is one of the strongest ways of brand marketing in the real ‘offline’ world.

Social Network and the Human Behavior

I strongly believe, the future of social networking and hence the success of a global super social network really will revolve around the fact as to how well would the network understand the basic human nature and behavior and then model the various products and services around the same.

Make the platform effortless to engage with.

Statistics will always matter to businesses and Insights always help

One of the strongest advances which facebook has made in the last few days are to strengthen their “page” insights. Any brand which can intelligently gather data points and make worthwhile inferences from them, can leverage the free insights to better their understanding of the customer they are engaging with, online.

These are interesting times and such small yet powerful productized services from social networking platforms will surely change the game for everyone around.

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There has been much talk about Social Media. Though at nascent stages and just like many other posts, this one may also be looked upon as another future teller, trying to make a guess work and predict something, like the magician gets the rabbit out of the hat put on fire!!

The Context

I recently attended a high profile conference of some of the best known brains in the Media and Entertainment industry led by Shri. Kapil Sibal, Hon’ble Minister of Human Resource Development, Communications & Information Technology. The conference really was focused towards creating a solid framework for talent development for the Media and Entertainment industry in India, aptly titled: “National Vocational Educational Qualification Framework for Media and Entertainment Industry”.

Coming from the thought, interacting with many established media people across the table and taking their insights, I realized the following:

• Businesses are increasingly looking at a new breed of managers who are evolved and informed to lead Social Media in-house
• Only a few specialized top performing agencies with clear vision and a strong case studies will finally be ruling the roost in the Digital Media space
• There will be a major need for trained and skilled manpower in the Digital Media space, this will become a basic expectation from the future marketing managers

Businesses are Increasingly looking at a Smart Future: Digital Ready managers

My interaction with various industry experts revealed that large businesses are actually looking at creating a strong and smart marketing team. While the entire Digital Media space is evolving as I am writing this post, we are talking of businesses leveraging the medium as they are growing and getting a hang of the same. Marketers today are expected to come equipped with the knowledge of Digital Media at least at a basic level, which enables them to be powerful contributors in the process of creating a solid Digital Media strategy for their organizations.

Lack of skilled professionals: the current situation

As discussed with key people from the industry who have seen the Digital Media space grow right in front of their eyes in India and have experience of how things are moving internationally as well, the sense is, there is a lack of skilled manpower currently and various businesses are doing their bit, though in an un-organized fashion to train employees and so are the educational institutions, by collaborating with leading entrepreneurs/ digital media companies to produce future ready managers.

What does it mean?

In my view, in a couple of years time (3-5) Digital Media will essentially become an integral part of the marketing function within organizations and agencies will essentially play a supporting role, while working very closely with these organizations. Also, only a handful of “specialized” agencies will be leading from the front.

This will further create a major demand for trained and skilled manpower, future ready managers, who are well versed with the Digital Media.

This emerging business need will surely fuel many entrepreneurial fires. This is sure a golden opportunity to step into the education part of the Digital Media business and especially makes all the more sense for established digital agencies, as it helps them churn and place more professionals in the market, at the client’s end, who then become prospective business generators!

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YES!! YOU GOT IT RIGHT. The title of the post says: Warning: The Air You Breathe Here is Charged Up With Entrepreneurial Particles!!

I am talking about nothing other than The TiE Entrepreneurial Summit 2010, undoubtedly one of the largest extravaganza, year 2010 witnesses. A perfect setting for the end of a decade.

TES marks the Enterprising India’s largest gathering of some of the most exciting souls on earth, a class, a breed called: entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneurship is not just a word, its a way of living, its a common passion which binds enterprising minds together who come on board with a common aim of creating and delivering value. People who dream of a future not just for themselves but create opportunities for many others, who become a part of success stories.

And without a doubt, India as a country is blessed with great minds. We have had some of the best enterprising ideas right from the bottom of the pyramid, from the rural parts of the country of over a billion people to the well networked metros. Starting from a global success story of a man who did not have food for 5 days and traveled on a goods train after being left by the security saying that he is from a friendly country India, this man decided to build an institution we know as Infosys today. There are many such inspiring stories of grit, determination, hard-work, hanging on and creating dreams.

At TES we are going to bring forth such stories while creating an opportunity and a strong ecosystem for many more to flourish. December is going to bring with it a whole new wave of energy which is going to create many new directions for many more achievers to come.

Be a proud part of the largest entrepreneurial extravaganza while the decade ends.

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Social Media Marketing – are your kidding me?

Yes Sir, I am asking this question. Being the CEO of a fast emerging Social Media for Enterprise company, I am asking you this question, are you kidding me, when you say, Social Media Marketing?

Social Media – When Did it Become All About Marketing?

Well, its been a little over 3 years and Iv been hearing a buzzzzzzz word (yes the buzz has been longer than I expected it to be) called: Social Media Marketing. I know of so many small and large companies who are making hay while the sun shines by doing something called: Social Media Marketing.

But Marketing – That’s it?

Is it all about just marketing? Is it? I have seen this media grow and its effects and the various ways which companies have leveraged this media in. From plain simple blogging to Viral campaigns, all’s been said and done.

There have been some pretty major campaigns which found their place under the sun and in the hearts of people. There were funny videos of Ghazal Singers Selling Microsoft Software to Online gangs of the fair sex selling beauty products.

Time to Learn!

Social Network: a social network is nothing other than a network group of people who may have multiple objectives to join the same.

When did it Become All about Marketing?

Well, when did Social Networks become all about marketing? Where did the whole aspect of a knowledge economy go? When did real knowledge collaboration take a back seat?

The Dynamics of Marketing and How Online Media has Affected Them?

There are major theories being written and shared all across the world. I agree no less, there’s definitely a fundamental shift which has taken place overtime, since people have started connecting globally with each other. Its really about empowerment. People today feel empowered with the sudden freedom of speech, sudden freedom of connecting globally, sudden expansion of vision and opportunities.

And since these people play various roles in their normal course of life: parents, students, employees, bosses, employers, buyers, sellers etc. hence each one of them see these social networks as a way to connect with like minded people globally, they feel empowered.

Are You Mar-Kidding?

I ask the marketers now, are you Mar-Kidding? Yes!

There is a whole new set of aware, jazzy, savvy customers online, so obviously they have to be tapped into. Lets become a Social Media Marketing company and help our customers connect with their prospects online. Great thought! And no doubts, businesses are investing into this media.

But let me share in my experience of why many businesses do:

• Part of an experimental marketing budget

Businesses are yet to really see the powerful nature of this media. And why do I say that? Because let me go and ask how many of them can really quantify the results and how many of them really had clarity on their business objectives before even stepping into this mode and exploring the New Media as a marketing option!

• My competition is there and they are somehow successful, I want to be as well

Let me put it straight and I actually put it the same way for my customers as well. If DELL made couple of million dollars in revenue by executing a solid strategic thought on the Social Media, leveraging channels like twitter and the concept of community building, well, yes it did. But that ends right there. There is no point creating a parallel.

• I have to be online

If I am not online, I am lagging behind as a business. If nothing else, at least I would get more interesting insights about my business online.

I HAVE A PROBLEM WITH ALL THIS

My problem is: many businesses, and when I say businesses, I come from experience across the board from Small and Medium enterprises to Large Enterprises, which operate globally. Many of these businesses are really not fully decided upon what their business objectives are for leveraging the Social Media.

And before I go ahead, my disclaimer is, just like in every domain there are good and bad both, hence I am not generalizing every company, but many run of the mill Social Media Marketing companies (who have normal Bcom pass graduates who may have never read what a brand really is, taking about branding) as their resources to save cost and increase margins, go to these businesses and tell them its about Marketing boss.

Your customers are here! They are already talking, you are missing the bus!

And even before the customer can actually sit and deliberate, he says, what the heck, let me just start with a small amount and rope this company as my vendor and test waters.

THIS IS RUINING THE MARKET

Today, I personally know of business owners (who are good friends), who invested quite some money into the Social Media and after 6 months said: okay I am here there everywhere, but I dont really get how my business got affected?

When you have inexperienced lots working with enterprises, you are actually delivering a cake which is half baked and which will eventually burn out. Its as simple as a Chinese Specialist trying an Italian Cuisine while writing on his LinkedIn profile, I am an Expert in Global Cuisines.

Why Are Majorly All Social Media Marketing Companies Saying: The Indian Customer is Not Able to Appreciate our Services

Well, this one is a common sentence and though many people may shy away from saying this in public, but Iv heard it from the horses’ mouth, owners of Social Media Agencies saying: Indian Customers are not paying us as much, they don’t appreciate these services as much.

I agree to Disagree.

Show the customer value and he will pay

– this has been my thought process since the very beginning and even today as I am running an emerging company, I know how far have we come and how fast have we actually evolved, all thanks to some fantastic mentors we have on board who come with a global perspective and insight.

A Practical Example

Since I like taking examples to effectively communicate with people, let me put across the story of Until ROI in few lines. We started as a run of the mill Social Media Marketing company but soon realized that being just another one would be NON-SENSICAL.

There is no point being a fish between sharks already there and more fishes mushrooming at every nook and corner.

That is when we decided to take help of mentors who come on board with over 100 + years of cumulative global experience. And well, we changed and changed for the good.

But what did we do?

• Invested in people – we have a small but smart team of people who have relevant experience and sure we pay not just at par, in some cases, better than companies at least 20 times our size
• INNOVATE – INNOVATE – INNOVATE – we came up with a whole new thought process for leveraging the New Media for businesses
• Value Driven Solutions – our existing clients who needed more as they kept getting more insights into their businesses, we have been flexible enough to learn from their requirements and wallah, we have come up with some fantastic process based solutions

What’s been the result?

As a simple answer, we are a: Social Media for Enterprise company today with happy enterprise clients.

Final Word!

I would like all Social Media Marketers to actually help businesses help create strong processes, both Internal and External and help them bridge the gap with not only their customers externally (who pay) but also the customers internally (employees, management).

We must help businesses understand the dynamics of being Social and how and why must a business actually go towards going public and not let it become a small paying experiment.

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