“Why don’t I get comments on my blog?”

This is one of the most common blog-related questions I receive.  My recent post on re-thinking community engagement — especially on B2B blogs — received a lot of attention.  In addition to a vibrant comment section, I received emails, DM’s and phone calls with more ideas from the majority of folks who are meaningfully connected with companies and blogs, but don’t engage in a traditional sense.   I wanted to pass on some new  ideas on why comments may not be the best measure of “engagement,” especially for B2B companies, courtesy of the {grow} community:

Comparisons to traditional consumer behavior

Brian O’Kane and I had a lengthy Skype call on a range of topics, including the fact that most people just don’t feel comfortable commenting … on anything.

“Conventional businesses have no way of knowing how many engaged customers they have,” he said. “Think about traditional brands.  A very tiny percentage of people would actually write in to express their loyalty or displeasure with a brand yet they know they have thousands or millions of loyal consumers.  We somehow expect a higher degree of personal interaction with social media .  Because you blog or make a comment, you may expect people to comment too. But consumer behavior is still the same — most people are just happy to read and enjoy and be engaged that way. For me, I would be less concerned about the intensity of the level of engagement and more focused on the long-term business objectives.”

Engagement outside of the blog

In my post last week, I mentioned GE as a gold standard of corporate blogging but they rarely attract a reader comment.  GE’s Community Manager Megan Parker provided her take on why:

“For GE reports, we have an active and interested audience, and they tend to show us their enthusiasm or concern, as the case may be, when one of our stories really strikes a chord. We don’t have an expectation that people will comment daily or even routinely, but we do make the option to comment available every day. We’re currently fielding a survey about GEreports.com to understand what we’re doing well and not so well now that GER is about 18 months old (barely a toddler).

“We also do not look at GE Reports as just one site but more as a news and information “system” with key extensions on Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, email and RSS.  So the commenting, interacting, downloading and sharing extends beyond the orbit of GER.com and out into this constellation of sites from GE.”

Emotional connection without sharing

Josh Kashorek told me he has been reading {grow} for about a year but had never commented.  “I still feel engaged with {grow} while I’m merely a listener, ” he said. “I think it boils down to a combination of authenticity, and time. I know that sounds a bit cliche but I don’t think having an authentic voice is so much about standing out as it is about allowing readers build their own connections. The more you show me who you really are the more ways I can find that we are similar and the more similarities I find the more engaged I become. For example, we both have a strong focus on business/capitalism. This gets me more engaged because many in the social media space are still talking only about puppies and unicorns.”

Technology and policy hurdles

Jeremy Victor called me to say the post had him thinking and offered a very practical reason why comments are few and far between on B2B blogs: “Studies show that more than half of company employees aren’t even allowed to access the social web from their computers at work and  even if they can, they may not be allowed, or enabled, to comment.” So you need to consider your core audience — do they even have the ability to make a comment?

I would also add that competitive considerations may prevent many people from commenting on a company’s public blog site.

The empty restaurant

Brian compared one psychological aspect of commenting to walking into an empty restaurant.  Some would be more inclined to only take a seat if other people are there. Commenting in an empty comment section might be similar. You don’t want to be the only one putting your neck out.  It’s easier to add a comment when somebody else has been there.

… and the crowded restaurant

“Another reason I don’t comment is if I see too many comments, ” Brian said.  “I saw one of your blogs had 53 comments.  I figured if I commented, nobody will ever see it.”

These interactions, and your generous comments on the post last week, have helped change the way I look at engagement, especially on corporate blogs.  Like many of you, I’ve been guilty of falling into the “it’s all about the conversation” myth without stepping back and looking at practical business realities, traditional consumer behaviors, and other ways people can feel connected to a blog without the tangible presence of engagement.

What do you think?  Does this change your view of the social media “conversation?”

Illustration: Ciudadano Poeta

A recent research study by IBM indicates that micro-blogging sites like Twitter can be a powerful internal workplace communications tool.

The study said that despite the inherent simplicity, microblogs are evolving into a richly-nuanced medium for maintaining awareness, building relationships, and finding and sharing valuable information from internal and external sources.

The study analyzed more than 5,000 microblog posts from a group of IBM employees who used both a proprietary internal tool to post and Twitter to post externally. The internal IBM micro-blog, called BlueTwit, has many of the same features as Twitter except it had a limit of 250 characters instead of 140 and could only be used internally.

Some key findings:

Real-time Information Sharing and Awareness — IBM heard repeatedly from employees that the value of Twitter was to get access to good information sooner than through other sources. It provided access to thought leaders without having to know them personally. For instance one person said:

“As far as Twitter is concerned the value is two-fold: learning much of what is happening in the marketplace, picking up trends, and picking up news… get a lot of news items earlier that way than any other way… With Twitter I know it’s a human who has selected the information and is saying that you should read this article. RSS feed is robotic selection for topics while Twitter is human selection based on the quality of my network”

Collaboration and Connection — Reading BlueTwit allowed employees to become aware of what their colleagues were working on in areas of the company they would not normally access.   BlueTwit was also used for social purposes. For example, some people used BlueTwit to broadcast lunch and dinner plans asking others if they were interested in joining. An important side effect of microblogging is that mobile and remote workers felt more connected to the company.

Employees  equated interaction on BlueTwit as “family conversation.”  Users could engage in constructive criticism of company products since all discussion was internal. They would avoid doing that on Twitter because they did not want to give the company a bad name.  Contrary to a common perception that microblogs are really just for posting messages about personal activities, IBM found that workplace employees are mostly using the tools to post business information and to engage in brief directed conversation with other employees.

Political expedience — Microblogging can increase the visibility of a topic compared to discussing it over email or instant messenger. Since microblogs are generally public and searchable, more people have access to it. Some employees reported using microblogging intentionally when they wanted to get more visibility on an issue. “Value as an employee is to be visible inside the company,” said one employee.  Another participant mentioned, “If I only ask questions then people will see me as someone who only asks questions. But if I answer, people will see me as someone as who knows and who can help.”

Crowd-sourcing — The report mentioned that one of the benefits of microblogging that has not received as much attention is its use for “crowdsourcing”.  Participants said they got a more rapid response to questions because more people beyond their normal network, including many technology experts, were awares of their problems.

Confidentiality — There was no ambiguity about posting confidential information; all participants exercised common sense and were very clear that they would never post any information that might be construed as confidential on Twitter or even BlueTwit.

Negatives:

• Participants mentioned that the sheer amount of information on Twitter can get overwhelming, and not all of it is useful.
• Some users had concerns about spending too much time wading through various pieces of information. Finding intelligent ways of filtering information in microblogging tools such that only information relevant to an individual user is visible is needed for widespread use of microblogging in the workplace.

IBM found opportunity in using micro-blogging with employees.   Is it happening in your company yet?  Why or why not?

Illustration: Scott Hampson: “Twitter Bird In Real Life”

Wanted to let you know that I am one of the contributors in the new book Age of Conversation 3: Time to Get Busy, which will be published in mid-April.

I think you’ll enjoy this book because like {grow}, it looks at social media beyond the hype.  It also examines the practicalities of the social web and implications on business practices.

None of the contributing authors or editors are making any profit from the book — all the money is going to the Make-a-Wish Foundation.  I’ve listed the authors below. You’ll recognize some of your favorite bloggers like Beth Harte,   Trey Pennington, and Michelle Chmielewski plus some new names that will add a fresh voice to the conversation.

You’ll probably be hearing some more buzz as we get closer to publication time but I wanted to give you the inside scoop on what should be one of the most popular business reads of the year!

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Last week I was a guest at a formal black -tie dinner at a yacht club.  This is not a picture of me, but it is a very, very close proximity. Really : )

The dinner was filled with wealthy, silver-haired, impeccably-groomed white men and their sequined spouses.  The former leaders of the yacht club, the “commodores,” wore their commemorative jackets, which looked like a hand-me down from an Ivy League fraternity. We ate aged steak, drank fine wine and danced to a wedding band from Atlanta.

And this is what I thought: “This is so pretentious.  This is SO not me. If the people on {grow} saw me like this they would have a fit.”

Isn’t that weird?  I have internalized you. What does this mean???

Can you imagine being in charge of marketing and watch your product become the first-ever “viral” success story? 

It was just five years ago. YouTube was brand new.  Facebook was just being opened to the public.  And performance art with Mentos “geysers” became the world’s first video viral sensation.  If you haven’t seen some of this amazing fun, push play above!  Here’s an interview with Pete Healy, who saw it all happen on his watch as vice president of marketing for Perfetti Van Melle USA, makers and distributors of Mentos …

Mark: Pete, it’s hard to imagine a world without the social web. Tell us how the whole Mentos viral event evolved.

Pete:  It was something that could have come and gone in two weeks, but it ended up lasting nearly a year.  To be honest, we didn’t start the “Mentos Geyser Craze” of 2006, but I think we did a good job of inviting people everywhere to participate in the goofy fun. The fountain effect of dropping a Mentos into soda was already known and used by Steve Spangler and other science educators, but in 2006, the performance art duo “Eepybird” decided to make it theatrical by dropping Mentos into 100 bottles of soda simultaneously, with spectacular results.  They posted the video titled “Experiment #137″, an homage to the Bellagio Fountains in Las Vegas, and it immediately started getting attention–including ours.  By chance we had just re-evaluated the personality of our Mentos brand; and thinking metaphorically, we had decided that if Mentos were a celebrity, it would be Adam Sandler.  What better match than Adam Sandler and shooting off bottles of soda?!

 I’m passionate about building “brands that captivate,” and that means that every time a consumer is pleased by contact with a brand, they should have the chance for additional contact or “touchpoints.”   This approach led us beyond supporting an Eepybird sequel to a “DIY Mentos Geyser” video contest microsite, a chance to hang with the street team of the Mentos Roadshow tour, an opening video segment for a Blue Man Group national tour, and “Party with Mentos” photo uploads during Spring Break 2007.  The craze culminated in the first Guiness Book of World Records “Mentos Geyser” event at Fountain Square in Cincinnati, when 504 bottles of soda were “shot off” at once.  It was a hot day, so that soda splashing down on all the volunteers who turned out to help was kind of fun!

 When we talk about “viral” what did that really mean in terms of views or whatever?

The impact was amazing to us, especially since we were still figuring the social web out. Ultimately there were more than 7 million viewings of the first Mentos Geyser video and it took only five days to hit 1 million views of the sequel, “Experiment #214.”  From the standpoint of User Generated Content, there were more than 10,000 videos created and posted by people doing their own Mentos Geysers; the comic effect of the ones done indoors tended to offset any aesthetic shortcomings!  For our own “official” video contest, we had to pick a winner out of 200 entries.

While you facilitated the viral event, you mentioned to me that Coca Cola, the other piece of the geyser formula, reacted in a much different way.

Yes, the difference came out early on when the Wall Street Journal called me to ask our feelings about the spread of the first geyser video.  I could genuinely say that we were delighted by the creativity, fun, and whimsy of the effort. After all, Mentos is candy — fun by definition. The WSJ reporter told me that, in contrast, Coca Cola’s first reaction had been that this whole thing didn’t fit the Coke brand, although they later seemed to change their thinking.

It’s remarkable to me that you had the foresight back then to let the thing roll and disconnect it from a traditional marketing perspective.   What were the results?  Where you able to connect this event to sales in any way?

For better or worse, I guess my approach was the result of my own personality, along with my previous work at Jelly Belly, another fun brand with a lot of passion behind it.  My years launching and building Jelly Belly in international markets–including countries where people had no idea what a regular jelly bean was, much less a “gourmet jelly bean” selling at a crazy-high price, led me to a marketing approach that mixes a “why not?” attitude with some very carefully defined measures of progress.  In any case, the Mentos Geyser craze resulted in a year-over-year sales boost of 20%; this eventually dropped to a 15% y-o-y gain, but that’s still not too bad.

You’ve had a wonderful career in traditional marketing and are now at the forefront of the social web. What challenge do you see as these two worlds collide? 

Great question, and one I sometimes struggle with. There seems to be so much froth and frenzy over social media that I worry about marketers getting distracted by “bright shiny objects” to the detriment of making their brands truly more meaningful.  Until the day we’re all chained to computer screens 24/7,  consumers will continue to want contact with brands in many different ways and places, from in-store sampling to event marketing to fantastic customer service to active support for charitable causes. 

The social web clearly has the power to amplify the total brand experience; but brand marketers will be hurting themselves if they put all their eggs in that basket, either from infatuation or peer pressure.  

Pete, final question. In your career, you were also behind the amazing Jelly Belly marketing effort. If you had to describe me as a jelly bean candy flavor, what would it be?

Well, I’d have to go into the Jelly Belly flavor archives and say…Espresso!  Straight-ahead, high-octane, great balance … one of my all-time favorite flavors. 

Additional reading: Business Week article on how Coke finally embraced viral marketing.

Pete Healy is currently the director of Crowbar Marketing in Cincinnati, OH.

The comment sections in some blogs, and many online community newspapers, is becoming a cesspool of bigotry, sexism and intolerance. Nobody has struggled more with the idea of online community than the American press. 

I’ve wondered why newspapers, who have so staunchly defended the integrity of the published word, would suddenly open the floodgates of stupidity just because the forum has moved to the Internet.  My conclusion: Bigotry must be good for business.  My friend Jack Lail disagrees.  Jack is the much-respected News Director of Innovation for the Knoxville News Sentinel and a pioneer in online media.  He’s re-thinking the newsroom in the context of the digital era and dealing with these difficult issues every day.

Jack and I sparred on his blog recently and he has agreed to a point-counterpoint format for {grow}.

Mark’s point:

If I submit a letter to the editor of the newspaper and comment on a news story or issue, it has to come with clear proof of who I am, and even then might be subject to editing for appropriateness. Why then, would the same newspaper allow the public commentary in their online versions to turn into a virtual free-for-all of hate?  It just doesn’t make sense except that if the newspapers didn’t allow that liberal allowance for sensationalism, another media outlet or blog will — and there goes the readership and the page views that drive advertising revenues, just when traditional media need it most.

Nothing drives page views like controversy, and nothing drives controversy better than a redneck pissing match fueled by the anonymity of an online comment forum. 

Some newspapers have justified this practice by explaining that our country has an important tradition of anonymous dissenters like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine.  But the irony is, serious dissent found on an op-ed page would require editorial identification, while the ugliness in the comment section goes unabated.

I believe the press has applied their standards inconsistently for economic reasons. They fear the anonymous comments (and readership they generate) will go elsewhere if regulated online. True?

Jack’s counterpoint:

The short answer is Web site operators don’t have the same legal liability in online comments as print publishers have with printed letters to the editors.

Yes, I believe comments increase the “stickiness” and time on site and a sense of community that articles alone can’t achieve. Anecdotally, I often hear people say the comments were better than the story (maybe in an entertaining if not enlightening way).

But basically, I don’t view comments as “letters to the editor.” I often find them more akin to callers on talk radio, where people are identified as “Jim” or “caller from Knoxville.” (If you applied the “same rigorous identification standards” to radio call-in shows, they wouldn’t have any callers.) The dynamics of online story comments are similar to what happens in forums and fairly open mailing lists.

They are, I think, a participatory experience unique to the online medium and whose benefits outweigh its negatives. That said, we’re still grappling with ways to minimize the negatives without stifling the speech.

Do we have story comments merely to generate additional page views? Maybe, but I suspect the cost of managing comments negates nearly all of the additional revenue. A page view on a news story is worth at best just a couple cents.

As Google’s economist Hal Varian recently said: “The fact of the matter is that newspapers have never made much money from news.”

Where does the {grow} community come down on this issue?   Over to you …

This dialogue was inspired by a post that originally appeared on Jack’s excellent blog, Random Mumblings. His original post also contains many important references on this issue.  For another timely perspective on the subject of hateful comments, read Jeff Jarvis’ blog post this week.

Every company is getting into blogging it seems but somany people seem to be struggling with it   What would you guess the biggest problem is?

Not enough content?

Not enough budget and/or resources?

Poor writing skills?

No, not usually.  These are the obvious aspects of the care and feeding of a blog but many organizations overlook the ORGANIZATIONAL requirements to successfully execute a blogging strategy. Your company has to have the right culture to sustain a blog. 

If your company blog is floundering, keep reading. You might see something familiar!  Some signs that you company may not be built to blog:

• Corporate culture mis-match — You need to build your strategy around the realistic capabilities of your company culture.  As grandma used to say, you have to deal with what is, not what you wish for.  If your CEO simply is not going to blog, deal with it.  If he is not going to tweet, forget it.  Move on.  That doesn’t mean you can’t be successful, you just have to adjust. Your culture is your culture. Your blog isn’t going to change it.  But your blog can probably conform to your situation and still have an impact.
• Lack of executive sponsorship– On a related topic, if you’re counting on a “grassroots” effort to establish a company blog, you’re setting yourself up for problems.  To be successful in the long-term, you must have support from the top. Why? That’s the person with the purse strings and resources. That’s the person setting the strategy.  And if a blog doesn’t fit in the picture, you’re vulnerable. If you need to sell your boss on the concept, you might start here.
• Lack of executive engagement — To really build community, you need your executives to be involved in the planning of content and engagement of your audience.  Some executives will relish this opportunity. Others will hate it. If your boss is in the second group, you need to lower expectations. I’m not saying executives actually have to blog … but they have to be involved.
• Unwieldy politics. Every organization has politics.  But when everybody is trying to own a piece of your blog, watch out. If you find that Legal, HR and the janitorial staff demands to approve your blog, it might be a sign that your company is just not built to blog. Remember, the beauty of the social web is an ability to react.  Pages and pages of blogging and content guidelines might be a sign of trouble.
• Unrealistic expectations — … and her brother “impatience.”  It takes time to connect and build an audience.  If your boss is making your employment contingent on the number of blog comments you get, it might be time to leave : )

Any of this sound familiar?  What are your experiences with corporate culture and blogging success?

Illustration: toothpastefordinner.com

One of the most pervasive mantras of the social media hype circus is that it’s “all about the conversation” with your customers.  But if you look at what’s really happening out there I think you can conclude this is a load of hooey.

To understand the shortcomings of “conversation” on the social web, let’s look at what happens in the old-school format of the focus group.  The focus group is one of the most popular qualitative methods for determining consumer wants and needs because it’s a relatively inexpensive and quick way to get feedback and ideas.  There are many formats, but generally you get a group of consumer volunteers together and, with the help of a skilled facilitator, conduct a “conversation” about the company, product, service, etc.

The biggest downfall of the focus group is that is nearly  impossible to get feedback that represents the true views of your target consumers. First, a lot of people simply aren’t interested in participating in these groups and second, the feedback tends to center around the most dominant members of the group. A real danger is that feedback of an entire group can be influenced by the forceful opinions of the brash few.

In most cases, the social web does not represent a true “conversation” with customers.  It is, at best, an un-moderated, non-representative focus group dominated by aggressive personalities likely to complain and force their view on others. Are you really having a “conversation” with your customers and prospects  if …

a) It’s only in English?

b) It’s only with people who have time to be active on the social web?

c) It’s with the minuscule percentage of people who are likely to engage on a subject?

d) It’s with people who may not even be the core users of your product?

e) It excludes people who are simply shy or quiet?

Experienced marketers can see this trap. We can also look at the wonderful opportunities of the social web and put them into proper context.  But I’m afraid the “social media conversation” is another over-hyped sound bite from the new age gurus eager to play on the fear of somehow being left out. If I hear “it’s all about the conversation” one more time I think I’ll lose my cookies.

Look, there are TREMENDOUS opportunities presented by the social web and there are lots of ways to have social conversations that are meaningful. The {grow} community on this blog is an example.  Tapping into real-time sentiment is another. Every marketer should be immersed in this channel to figure out what really makes sense for their company and brand. But don’t check your brain at the door because you’re afraid of being left out of this “conversation.”

It was a beautiful sunny spring day and I had just taken my nine-month-old son on a walk in his stroller.  He was a chubby, healthy, happy baby and I loved to make him giggle and gurgle. He was just getting old enough where it felt safe to let him crawl around in the grass and play around in the sandbox.  Every day was a new adventure as my little boy grew before my eyes.

When I laid him down in his crib for a nap after our trip to the park, he seemed to be acting strangely.  More than tired. Something else.

I checked in on him in an hour and he wasn’t sleeping. He was lying on his stomach just staring blankly. How very strange that he hadn’t conked out after our day in the park.  I asked him playfully why he wasn’t sleeping and he just stared.   I made a funny face to make him laugh. Nothing. I picked him up and he was like a rag doll. He was completely unresponsive to any stimulation.

My wife and I rushed him to the hospital.  The doctor looked very grave and said he suspected that my son had spinal meningitis and that they were going to do a spinal tap immediately. He took my baby from my arms and told me he would bring him back when he was “cleaned up.”

I was 27 years old.  I had been promoted three times in three years as I clawed my way up the corporate ladder. I was focused on being in the right places and meeting the right people and saying the right things to get to the next job grade. I had just bought my first home and was embroiled in a nasty lawsuit with my builder. My wife’s parents were going through a messy divorce that had cast a cloud over our daily lives.

But at that moment, all I wanted was my baby.  You could have my job. You could have my house. You could take my very life. Just give me back my little boy, safe and sound.

This story has a happy ending.  He didn’t have spinal meningitis … he didn’t have anything they could detect at all. In a few days he perked up again, the victim of some mysterious virus that never showed up again.

But that day changed everything for me.  My priorities shifted for good. I know I became a better man, husband and father after that scare.  I lived with less anxiety and fear because I knew nothing I ever faced in my life could be as bad as the moment my son was in danger.  When I face trouble in my life, I think, is it as bad as that day?  The answer has always been “no” and things settle back into perspective.

Today I see many of my young friends and students filled with the same piss and vinegar I had at that age …  life priorities determined by money, fashion, gadgets, and now, “followers.”  My wish for them, and for you, is that you don’t have to have  a life tragedy to re-set priorities.  My hope is you can just imagine what it would be like if the thing most precious to you were ripped away … then live your life with the grace, kindness, compassion and urgency of knowing that everything could change in the span of one, single heartbeat.

Translation: "Reading this blog makes us don native costumes and dance with exuberance"

Do you have an “in-the-moment marketing strategy?”

If you don’t, you could be missing one of the biggest opportunities of the social web!

I had lunch recently with a marketing manager for a major TV cable network and we talked about the evolution of social media marketing at his company. He had a couple of quotes that illustrate the importance of reactive, or in-the-moment marketing …

“When I started working in social media marketing, it was basically just me.  Now everybody wants a piece and there is a battle over ownership. I feel like I have three bosses right now.”

“I gather data on our social media activities and the executives want it in a nice shiny report they use to plan programming for the next season.”

“The lawyers are getting nervous about so many people participating. They are working on regulations on who can be on the web and exactly what they can say.”

“We have a huge Facebook following for the network and I’d like to create individual efforts for different programs but just don’t have the resources to address it.”

I’m sure some of these growing pains sound familiar, but there is also a common theme here and a potential storm cloud for my friend that may not be obvious to him.

One of the hallmark characteristics of marketing on the social web is the reactive, opportunistic nature of engagement.

Traditional media: Take out an ad and hope customers buy stuff.

New media: Watch real-time customer, prospect and competitor behavior and react as it is happening. This requires people to be tuned in and provided with the authority to take action as they see an opportunity. For example:

• Authorize employees to solve a customer Twitter complaint on the spot
• Watch for complaints about competitors and act aggressively and immediately to fill the gap
• Listen for un-met and under-served customer needs and adapt accordingly

So let’s get back to that storm cloud at the cable TV network.   Sure, there are the inevitable politics at work — and they’ll sort out — but this marketing organization doesn’t realize that they’re sub-optimizing their reactive marketing system:

• Fight over “ownership” of social media marketing will muddy accountability and authority.
• A big shiny report will only end up sitting on a shelf someplace, and even if management actually reads it, the market could have shifted dramatically by then. Why not monitor progress and reaction episode by episode?
• A social media policy is necessary but burdensome legal approvals could crush in-the-moment innovation.  Allow for some mistakes.
• One way to have more resources for individual celebrities and programs is to deputize more people and get them involved to interact on their own without the marketing department’s intervention.

Is your organization still in traditional command-and-control mode or are they adopting to the new opportunities of the real-time social web?