Over the past year, some of the most powerful marketing lessons I’ve learned haven’t come from a book, a guru or a webinar. They’ve come from Chandra Michaels.

Chandra is an Austin-based entrepreneur and artist who hasn’t just created an audience of customers, friends and followers for her Sugarluxe brand –  She’s created a MOVEMENT.

Chandra has skillfully used the social web to connect to fans around the globe with an amazing spirit of community, devotion, and authenticity.  In the difficult business world of art, she now receives about 40 percent of her total sales through Facebook and has turned up in the pages of leading magazines such as Life, Us, and InStyle. Her artwork has been featured in places as diverse as the MTV Awards to a permanent installation in San Francisco’s famous Hotel Des Arts.

I feature Chandra’s marketing style and success prominently as a case study in my college classes and now I want to introduce this visionary businesswoman and exceptional friend to the community on {grow}. If you’re an entrepreneur and want to learn how to leverage the social web as a marketing channel, pay close attention to one of my marketing heroes:

Chandra, what’s the recipe for your secret marketing sauce?  What would you tell others trying to emulate your success of igniting a movement?

Well, I’m convinced that you and I share the same secret ingredient.  A heaping spoonful of sugar!

Being kind to others, finding and sharing something you admire or appreciate in them, connecting with someone on a personal level — that’s at the core of who I am and how I do business.

It’s what drew me to you instantly because you have such a truly caring and captivating personality.  The way I’ve watched you connect with your readers, clients and students comes from a place of genuine concern, passion and a love for what you’re doing.   People are very smart.  They can spot a phony.  I think success, at least in part, comes from being real, risking being vulnerable, and reaching out to build lasting relationships with the people who believe in what you do.

As an entrepreneur, how do you specifically use the social web to fuel your business success?

First, and I can never say this enough, it’s about Quality over Quantity!

I don’t ever let myself get sidetracked by a desire to accumulate big numbers to impress people. The number of fans, followers and friends I have is essentially irrelevant to me.  What matters most is the quality of interaction and participation.  A lot of businesses simply don’t get that.

Word of mouth remains one of the MOST powerful ways to market. I’m very dependent on it.

Even though my collection is sold by major retailers, the lion’s share of money in these situations, goes to those entities. We have a multitude of revenue streams, but the only way for me to really make profit is to sell direct.

I view my visibility in the retail sector as getting paid to advertise. We make everything here locally (mostly in-house), the cost of goods is high and selling wholesale is not very beneficial to the bottom line.  My hope is that if someone discovers my work in a big box store, they are curious to know more about me.  Then, maybe they will search for the Sugarluxe name on Google, find our website, and if I’m really lucky they tell their friends about me too.  Knock on wood, it’s worked pretty well so far…

How has your marketing strategy evolved?

I learned a long time ago that I can’t just build it and they will come. It’s amazing how many people subscribe to this myth. But seriously, and as you already know Mark, it takes so much strategic planning and effort.

I write every single word on our website.  I work methodically to optimize my copy for good search engine placement. On our accessory lines, Sugarluxe is on page one, if not on the very top, for most our key search terms. And I’ve never paid for keyword advertising. Heck, I’ve never paid for any advertising. It’s time consuming, but I’m competing with so many choices out there. Small businesses MUST do this themselves or hire someone who can.

Also, I have to go where my buyers are.  When they were on MySpace, I was there. By the end of 2008, most had migrated to Facebook. I was reluctant to follow suit because it felt so much more personal than MySpace. Until that time, most clients and customers didn’t even know my real name. But I set up a business/fan page on Facebook last year and it quickly paid off.

Getting out from behind the comfort of my canvas has helped me to better understand the people who buy my work — so that I can continue to evolve as an artist. My participation in social media and (although inconsistently) writing on my blog has not only helped my business grow, it has helped me grow and learn as a person.

You told me that Twitter has been a challenge for you. What’s up with that?

Twitter’s cool – I use it occasionally, but I prefer Facebook. It feels like a real community to me. In my view, Twitter handed out what amounts to millions of virtual megaphones. Everyone is shouting into them at the same time, and because it’s so hard to hear, very few are able to really listen.

And getting people to listen is critical.

In order to tend to your life, business and art, you’ve taken big chunks of time away from your social web activities. What are some of your time management challenges, and when you step away, do you find it disrupts the momentum of your online community?

What a great question!

Everything about time management is a challenge for me. I don’t have a particularly healthy work/life balance yet. But I’m getting better.  And if I’m good at anything, it’s interviewing, hiring and training people. It’s part of what I did in my early corporate career.  So when I started hiring for Sugarluxe, I was experienced at finding the best and brightest candidates. Committed, passionate employees can make a huge difference.

In terms of stepping away from the web?

I worried about this very thing when I decided to take a little “social” break.  The amazing thing is … this month has been our very best month in the history of my company and it’s typically a slow time. But you’re right – for 6 months – the marketing part of my business has been on auto-pilot. I’ve been working like mad behind the scenes, but I had to retreat from the public eye.

I went through some personal turmoil and I just couldn’t give of myself for awhile. Going back to my earlier comments about being genuine … I can’t feign interest or happiness.   I felt empty for a little bit.   I wasn’t going to pretend to be something I was not.  And I was afraid my business would suffer for it.

But in fact, it did the exact opposite. It gained more momentum. Credit is entirely due to loyal friends and fans. They kept it alive for me so that I could recharge.  I’m so incredibly lucky that I’ve been able to cultivate this type of environment and surround myself with such amazing people.

To many of your fans, you’ve become more than an artist. What has it been like transitioning from a young, struggling artist to role model and a celebrity in your field?

I wish you could see me in person. You just made my cheeks so red.

When I was young, I always imagined I would be published as an author long before being published (or possbily even recognized) as an artist.  Not that I’m a great writer, but I have an overwhelming urge to tell people they’re not alone in their struggles.  It wasn’t until much later that I discovered I’m much better conveying my thoughts with images than I am through words alone.

Like anyone else who reads this, I’ve encountered some bad people. Their marks could have been indelible.  But I refuse to let those people have permanence in my life.

I want to focus on what’s good, what’s right, and what’s wonderful. I’m a sensitive, artsy type. I could get so down if I allowed myself to wallow in all that’s wrong with the world. Instead, my work is an ongoing study in optimism and its cumulative effects on life.

How I live is so basic. I try to see the glass half full. But I’m not so myopic that I can’t see pain and suffering. I try to be very open about my experiences — both good and bad. Many times I feel vulnerable and exposed. But it’s the risk I’m always willing to take if it means it could help someone else.

And as much as I hope to help others, the way I’ve benefited most in my business, is realizing how much they’ve helped me in return.

I was told by my grandmother that I have good features. If we allow for a little airbrushing, do you think I could be the next Sugarluxe model?

Your grandmother sounds like my kind of girl!  And since you clearly exemplify a desirable combination of beauty AND brains, I’d say you’re my perfect muse!

To learn more about Chandra and how she establishes her marketing movement, I highly recommend that you observer her in action on Twitter, Facebook and her blog at www.sugarluxe.com

I’ve been a skeptic about Foursquare but this guest post from small business-owner Helen Wilkinson (above) describes a new perspective on a monetization activity with benefits for all. Enjoy!

At precisely 7.52 pm on August 12, 2010, a hearty cheer rose up from our small tea shop on the south coast of England.

“It’s a swarm, it’s a swarm!” people shouted, merrily clinking glasses of champagne.

Not just a swarm … but the first successful ‘swarm party’ ever in the UK, as the Press Association reported the next day (adding enthusiastically that the Foursquare event significantly boosted sales during the hour people checked in at our little shop, Metrodeco).

“So what?” you might ask. “How can one day’s good profits make a solid foundation for business growth? And who cares whether it was the first UK swarm party? We’ve been holding them in the States for months.”

Well, I think the answers to those questions should interest businesses everywhere.

First, the fact that Foursquare swarm parties are now happening here in the UK – and there are suddenly many more planned across the country – has a global significance that should not be underestimated. When we tentative Brits embrace a social technology and it spreads beyond the early adopters, history shows it is probably well on its way to becoming a multinational phenomenon and is here to stay. This is exactly how it went with YouTube, Facebook and Twitter: first success in the US, then in the UK, then years of world domination.

Watch during the next few months as Foursquare ratchets up millions of users in Australia, Estonia, Iran, South Korea and many other nations. I’ll eat one of my teapots if I’m wrong.

Second, I think you will find that businesses benefit from swarm parties way beyond the money that they make on that day.

At Metrodeco, we’re certainly not measuring success by looking at the bottom line for this single month. Yes, we doubled sales on the day of the swarm and in the run up added maybe 15 new repeat customers as a direct consequence — a result not to be sniffed at when you’re a small business.

But the real Holy Grail of any business’s digital strategy is to influence the influencers so they become brand evangelists. And this is because all the research shows that customers who come to you because of word of mouth are likely to be more loyal than those who are there because of traditional marketing programs.

We think we achieved this conversion.

How? This is key: Social media influencers in any area love meeting each other face-to-face, hence the success of ‘tweet-ups’. But what a Swarm Party now adds to this mix is the opportunity for people to collaborate in a joint endeavour, to achieve something together, to stand shoulder-to-shoulder and say “We are a community and we work better as a whole than as individuals”.

If half of the 50+ people at your party feel this sense of success through co-operation, you’re going to have to do something pretty bad to lose their good will. And that will probably mean months, if not years, of good word-of-mouth marketing. This, of course, leads to closer relationships with your customers, a bigger and better reputation, greater buzz and, eventually, more money!

What do you think? Is swarming in your future?

Helen Wilkinson is the co-proprietor of Metrodeco, a tea room in Brighton, UK.

{grow} Community Note: Coincidentally, yesterday Knoxville publicist Zane Hagy staged a similar event at a local pizza restaurant.  To attract a Foursquare swarm, they offered free cheese pizzas all day. Well, 2,603 free pies later, they had their swarm, and had also doubled their average sales for the day. You can read about it HERE.

I think I “get” Foursquare.  I really do.

I understand there could be significant business benefits and opportunities to build customer loyalty.

But I really wonder if Foursquare can reach critical mass to be a widespread consumer social media platform. To find out, I conducted  …

The World’s Greatest Foursquare Experiment.

In fact, it might be the world’s only Foursquare experiment : )

The much-hyped Foursquare is similar to Twitter in that you provide short status reports based on your geographic location.  As you visit more businesses and “check-in,” you can earn virtual “badges” and become “mayor” of a location.  You can also find friends, see reviews, ads, and coupons from nearby businesses.

I decided to give it a rigorous test by trying it in a village (Abingdon, VA) a small city (Knoxville, TN) and a metroplex (New York City) over a period of six weeks. I’ll provide my bias upfront: I’m concerned that people are becoming de-sensitized to the information they are feeding into “the machine” and should draw the line at reporting personal location and behavior patterns.  However, I’m starting to get Foursquare questions from my students and realized I needed to give it a fair shot. So I did…

Early buzz

The interface was easy to figure out.  Pulling out my smart phone became habitual as I was eager to earn badges and see what the hype was about.

The first problem was that it became annoying to me, and whoever I was with, when I fumbled around connecting to Foursquare at each location. The app doesn’t always know precisely where you are. In a “medium” town like Knoxville, I usually received a list of 10 nearby businesses and could easily select my location. However in the small village, about half of the businesses did not exist on the grid so I had to manually enter my spot. In NYC I had just the opposite problem. Can you imagine the number of suggested spots I had to scroll through while standing on a corner of Park Ave.?

Umm… Who the hell are you?

When I joined Foursquare, I started getting friend requests from dozens of random people including the city of Reading, PA.  Not knowing any better, I accepted them. Now, if I report where I am, I’m letting a lot of complete strangers know my whereabouts. In hindsight, I was not too bright with this move.

Call me Mr. Mayor

One part of the experiment was becoming a mayor. I wanted to see what happened when you were crowned king of a location.  This happened fairly quickly when I was the first Foursquare visitor to a local barbecue joint. “How sad. This location has no mayor” it reported.  So the next day I went back and became the mayor. Great for the restaurant but what did I get out of it? An electronic award. Hmmm.

Gaming the system

Did you know if you walk down the street you can check-in at every location you pass?

True value

I had heard some cool stories about people getting instant coupons upon entering a location. This never happened to me.

I did get a few on-the-spot restaurant menu recommendations but they were from strangers so it didn’t mean too much.

Finally near the end of the month I actually saw that a Foursquare friend (and somebody I knew!) was in the same location as me. That was pretty cool but since I was at a family celebration, I really didn’t want to interact and hoped they wouldn’t come by.

I think the biggest benefit of this service could be finding friends at a conference in a big city. I saw the app used this way extensively at SXSW and it makes sense.

The balance of cost versus reward

During the experiment, I had tweeted out some of my experiences and concerns, especially about privacy. One friend suggested that I simply turn-off the online reporting function … meaning I wouldn’t connect with friends, wouldn’t be alerted to deals, but still could earn badges. Huh?

Am I really doing this to earn electronic badges? Is that enough reward for me to continue using this application? No, I don’t think so.

While Foursquare could be a potential goldmine for businesses, it holds very little tangible value to consumers right now … at least in my experience. But that will undoubtedly change. In fact it HAS to change.   For this to really take off beyond the geek circles, it has to offer much more value to consumers than the silliness being delivered now.

I’ll continue to use this selectively so I can stay on top of continued innovations and benefits but I don’t see it becoming part of my regular social media diet.

And by the way …

I still have my concern.  Why are we helping the crooks do their jobs by providing our location and teaching them our buying behaviors?

I guess people will do anything for a coupon?

{grow} community alert: Gregg Morris did a great job expanding on these Foursquare ideas in his blog post

The web comments about the announcement that Twitter will have ads on their searches (as a start) were about evenly split between “ho hum” and “disgust.”  This comment is pretty typical of the disgust category:

“Once Twitter starts inserting ads into my feeds will be the day I turn twitter off for good.” – “Nick”  NYT comment

I guess this is the opportunity I’ve been waiting for to pontificate about making money on the web …

Folks, it isn’t working.

Remember a time not long ago when people actually PAID for stuff?  Then the web came along and everybody ripped everybody else off.  Music, books, art, whatever. This used to be called a crime. Now it’s called sharing on the social web.

The ripping off became so widespread that it is accepted as fact, and a generation of people grew up feeling entitled to OFS (only free stuff).

But the Internet futurists told us back then, “Hey, everyone! It’s OK, because NEW business models will emerge to compensate all these companies, musicians and artists who are now forced to give away their goods and services without compensation.”  Well guess what?  It’s been about 15 years and it hasn’t happened. I’m pretty sure that means it isn’t going to happen.  And I think we’re in trouble.  Oh yes, I’ve read the book Free.  I still think we’re in trouble.

The only sanctified, protected work on the web today is advertising.  Rip off an ad, you’re in court. Rip off a music album, it’s cool.

So look, unless you want to have a paid subscription, stop whining about Twitter (and every other web platform that needs to advertise) and give them a break.  This is their only likely step toward a sustainable business.

We created this mess, now we have to live with it.  From now on, it’s an Ad, Ad, Ad World.

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.

1. Feature blog-only special offers and discounts — This can also build readership if you can condition customers and prospects to look to the blog site for exclusive deals.
2. Post product ads somewhere on your blog — This doesn’t have to be in your face and ugly. For example SAP routinely offers ads for their training programs on their blog. Why not? That’s a smart thing to do and also helpful.
3. Involve sales in the blog chats and comments — Why not use the engagement in the comment section of the blog to let your sales folks build connections?
4. Give away something away that requires an opt-in — Many blogs feature product samples, or eBooks that allow the site to collect info for the company CRM.
5. Add a feature for customers to opt-in for specials and eNewsletter — Do you have other communication touch points customers might like to know about it? An opt-in for newsletters creates a sales lead.
6. Write blog topics that feature helpful uses for your products and services that encourage people to buy more stuff.  That’s what we want them to do. “Grow”  … remember?

Any other ideas?  Have you seen any great best practices out there?

It’s uncommon to see much written about individual personalities on the social web — in fact it’s taboo.  However, it’s important to occasionally look at Chris Brogan as a living social media business case study for two reasons:

1) It’s hard to comment on the state of the nation without mentioning the president.

2) Chris Brogan is a pioneer. The issues and opportunities he faces are instructive to all churning in his wake. As Lisa Foote once wrote, Chris is the canary in the social media coal mine.

Chris has created a tremendous amount of value and popularity through his tireless engagement but has also stirred up more controversy than any social media personality, whether through his aggressive use of “sponsored” posts or his apparent sponsorship “flip” at last year’s Consumer Electronics Show.  As I said, he is plowing new ground.  Sometimes you hit a rock.

But last week might have been his biggest buzz-killer when he revealed he charges $22,000 for a day of his services and then subsequently posted (and dropped) an appeal for un-paid interns for his company.

Just to be clear, I’m not in the whiney camp that thinks everything Chris does should be free.  I’m probably the most capitalist, business-driven blogger out here. I like it when people make money. I like it when Chris makes money. I think he should take advantage of his white-hot celebrity, celebrate it, leverage it, and roll in the dough. I hope he can double his consulting fees.

So making money is good.  But from an academic view, it would be useful to look at the “how” — the dramatic shift (or perhaps evolution) in strategy that is enabling Chris to become a money-making machine.

For years, Chris has built his core brand promise on:

• Passionate audience-building through authentic helpfulness
• Relentless nurturing of that audience through tireless engagement
• Putting the audience above personal business needs
• Never, ever “selling”

In one video from last summer, he literally screamed at an audience “This is NOT about YOU and your STUPID COMPANY!”  That effectively sums up his mantra, and the “brand” Chris built around himself.

Around the time of his book release last year, Chris flipped this philosophy upside down and took steps to aggressively monetize his audience.  He explained this change by saying that he had been giving stuff away for a long time and that it was time to make money.  Selling of his products, services, companies, book, affiliate links, and paid sponsors became a common theme. He transformed into the social web’s most visible and highly-paid pitch-man, the Billy Mays of blogging.

Chris also increasingly put himself at the forefront of his topics, including video documentation of a day in the life of himself, photos of himself with near-celebrities, announcements of his new business ventures, and detailed explanations of how hard he works to achieve his success.  As you would expect, some readers expressed disappointment with these changes, and they were sometimes categorized as “haters” instead of “creators” and implored to “get over it.”

In other words, Chris has disassociated himself from that core brand promise to his audience.

In the business world, this would be tantamount to Disney opening a Tia Tequila-themed ride, or Nike doing a fitness cross-promotion with McDonald’s.  When a brand becomes incongruent by building a reputation communicating one thing and then executing another, it can be a recipe for disaster.

In the near-term, Chris and his ubiquity seem to have a limitless ability to capitalize on the goodwill of his audience (heck, loyal customers even bought Toyota cars after the first recall).  From a traditional business perspective, one might predict that if Chris doesn’t practice what he preaches and take steps to return to his core competencies, his brand and his ability to monetize will be increasingly vulnerable.

The furor over the posts last week were not the first signs that people have noticed the new Capitalist Chris.  If it persists, negative outbursts from loyal fans might eventually call attention to the problem with his sponsors and erode his brand and his value.

Or will it?  Another possibility is that Chris is going to be just fine losing some — or even most — of his core followers because he is developing a new audience of corporate folks who don’t care what his brand promise WAS as long as he can deliver results to their bottom line NOW.

In any event, the Trust Agent as we knew him is probably coming to an end as he transitions from social media folk hero to mainstream business consultant.  It will be fascinating to watch the results.

What do you think about this strategy shift?

What are the risks of jeopardizing his core audience for launching a new stage in his career?

With the new demands of the business and publishing worlds, is it possible for Chris to be successful at holding on to both constituencies? If so, how?

Illustration: www.chrisbrogan.com

In all of the posts I’ve read about social media measurement, very few address the possible role of qualitative research — measuring when you don’t have data — so let’s take a look at that today, shall we?  This will not be boring, I promise.

To make sure we’re all on a level playing field, let me quickly review the difference between QUANTITATIVE and QUALITATIVE data.

Quantitative marketing research is descriptive and conclusive.  It addresses research objectives through numerical measurement and statistical analysis.  In the social media world, this means data you can easily collect and measure like tweets, page views, comments, and perhaps even sales.  These are the facts and figures that get all the headlines. 

Qualitative Research is more, well …  touchy-feely.  It uses small samples and may involve focus groups, interviews, and behavioral observation.  Although it does not lend itself to statistical analysis* it can still be a quick and effective way to tell a story.

Because of all the free and voluminous data available through the social web, most of the attention is on the sexy quantitative side, but it might not be the best way to show value or tell your story.

Story time

Let me give an example from my own experience …

In addition to marketing and management, I also have a background in organizational development.  On one of my projects, I was delivering a training program to help correct dysfunctional management-union dynamics in a large company.  The people who went through the program raved about its effectiveness and had concrete examples of how it was dramatically improving the workplace.  The company’s top managers — who would not go through the program — were very skeptical about any progress and, lacking measurable results, were leaning toward cancelling it.  Like most managers, they demanded quantitative measurement … and I didn’t have it.  Sound familiar?

At the next employee training session, I mentioned that the program was probably going to be cancelled. The result was an out-pouring of outrage by both union and management participants. I had a video camera nearby for a training exercise and said, “Excuse me, but would you mind if I just turn this thing on to record your views?”

The group proceeded to tell story after story about the benefits of the training and also scolded upper management for not attending.  I edited the video to conform to the 5-minute executive attention span and played it during their next meeting. The managers sat dumbfounded and impressed as their employees passionately talked about the tangible benefits of the training. By the end of the meeting they all committed to attending the training themselves and expanding the program — without one pie chart!

Apply this to the social web

I use this example because like PR, marketing, or social media programs, training is very hard to quantify on a nice, neat spreadsheet.   This situation was a perfect time to use stories — qualitative data — to define value in a very different, yet compelling, way.

When you’re struggling to measure the value of social media marketing in your company don’t overlook the possibility of using qualitative stories from customers, employees and other stakeholders.  They might be showing up every day in comments, reviews, and customer meetings.

The technology of the social web offers unprecedented ways to capture and display this qualitative output.  And you know, sometimes all it takes is ONE story to provide more new insight than a dozen graphs!

What are your ideas?  What are some of the ways we can use stories to demonstrate the value of marketing through the social web?

*Michelle Chmielewski wrote in a {grow} comment that values can indeed be assigned to qualitative data to create numerical analysis. In effect this is how sentiment analysis is conducted. However, I was just trying to keep it simple today! : )

There is an argument around the blogosphere that is DRIVING ME CRAZY.

When it turns to the topic of measurement and social media marketing, many “authorities” flippantly rely on the “double standard” argument — If you’re trying to measure the value of SM, you might as well measure the value of a cell phone, the company car and the receptionist.    One popular blogger and author recently said if your manager asks for the ROI of your social media initiative, you should ask him for the ROI of his pants.  Their point is that you just need to accept the social web as something ubiquitous and necessary, so why worry about it?

This is lunacy.  Here are three reasons why this “no need to measure” view is an irresponsible position:

1) Never get caught with your stats down

Let’s examine the argument that you don’t measure the value of a company car, or email so insisting that we measure social media is a double standard.

Even if you don’t directly account for the on-going value of these items on a spreadsheet, there is an implied economic value to cars and cell phones and all this everyday stuff.

Part 5 of a series

Writing a series of posts on Twitter scams has been pretty depressing.

I found there is a thriving subculture of deceivers that is bizarre and disturbing. The scammers exploit the elderly, the vulnerable, the under-educated, and the desperate.  This is typical: A Twitter page of a friendly looking man who is a “Husband, Dad, Blogger and Entrepreneur” peddling this product: From Food Stamps To 7 Figures Online Free Video.

The scam sub-culture blogs about dodging regulations and adjusting tactics to capitalize on loopholes.  “Best practices” spread at the speed of light and the pyramid schemes can vanish behind the social web’s cloak of anonymity, free access and fake accounts. The scum has become more powerful through the recession, persistent unemployment and evolving technology that feeds their need to deceive.

The mere fact that I wrote articles containing the words “MLM” attracted automated spammers that nearly snowed me under with deceitful tweets.   I am sickened by the vast resources devoted to tricking us into clicking.

What can be done about it?

On a macro-level, very little.   Most regulations or policies could also hurt legitimate enterprises.  We have to take the fight to the streets.

Here are some ideas to help you fight back and at least take control in your part of the blogosphere.

Use Twitter “report for spam” option.  Any time I am spammed by porn-peddling, teeth-whitening, Trump Network sludge, I hit the report for spam button. Twitter seems to be processing at least some of these requests manually to avoid mob-rule against legitimate but unpopular tweeters, so I don’t really know what it takes to get people kicked out.  Just do your part. If enough people take the time to do it, it is in Twitter’s best interest to figure out a way to handle it.

There’s an app for that? — There is a new app called Stop Tweet that may provide hope to the idea of automatically blocking some spammers.  This utility allows you to tweak your personal settings to block and report people based on two tell-tale characteristics – no or low number of tweets and a high following-to-follower ratio.  It can also show you who among your followers who is a known spammer.  I tried this app out and unfortunately it did block several legitimate small businesses just starting Twitter accounts.  Play around with the settings and let me know what you think.

Separate email addresses — I have one email address I try to keep “pure” for correspondence with real people and another one I use for ANY app, service, or website. I even use my “spam” address when posting comments. Face it, it is only a matter of time before a database is hacked and all your identification and passwords violated. Minimize this inevitable risk by containing it to one account.

Mind the basics — You know the routine. Use strong passwords that are long, a mixture of letters and numbers, and nonsense words unrelated to any personal information. I just did research for a client project that showed the number one password for elderly people is “password.”  Help educate your loved ones, too.

Ignore them — Don’t be tempted to do what I did and explore the spam underworld. Don’t visit their sites or ask for more information, even in fun. If you respond to their spam, you’re encouraging them to continue, and they only need a tiny response to be profitable. Take my advice based on experience — ignore them completely!

What are YOUR strategies for dealing with the spam tsunamai?  What could Twitter do to step-up to the problem?

Part 1 in the series on Twitter’s Biggest Scams: Multi-level marketing

Part 2:  The teeth whiteners

Part 3: The Twitter follower scam

Part 4: The Trump Network