Our Insights on Social Media Marketing

Clearly for many, the Super Bowl's attraction lies in the new commercials aired during the game. This year though, with social media starting to hit its stride, will we see interest in watching the game wane? For example, Pepsi, one of the more notable companies that traditionally sprung big time for a Super Bowl ad campaign, has decidedly forfeited any airtime slots (costing between $2.5--3.0 million per ad). Instead, Pepsi has taken a liking to a social media campaign, "Pepsi Refresh," in which they will give away $20 million in grants.

Nicole Bradley, a spokeswoman for Pepsi, explained why Pepsi wouldn't be participating, "In 2010, each of our beverage brands has a strategy and marketing platform that will be less about a singular event and more about a movement." The idea is to be bigger than the Super Bowl, while allowing consumers to still appreciate Pepsi.

While Pepsi may stand alone among the giants in replacing Super Bowl airtime with a social media event, for now, many companies seem to be tying the two together. Look for commercials this year to be far more interactive, with more calls to action that direct audiences to Facebook and Twitter. With all the ability to connect television campaigns and social networks, many companies will try to make their 30-second spot go viral, as well.

Vice president of global sales for Facebook, Mike Murphy, seems to be on the same page as Pepsi. He said, "Instead of getting 30 seconds to connect with their customers, they're getting 30 days." This seems to be what Pepsi understands as their new campaign does not involve Super Bowl airtime.

Is this just the beginning of big companies choosing to go with a social media campaign opposed to the Super Bowl commercials? Will Pepsi be a trendsetter or find themselves buying up valuable airtime next year? If this is the wave of the future, will casual fans who watch for the ads still look forward to the big game like they do now?

MicroArts Creative Agency is leveraging social media as part of overall branding campaigns like never before. It's working for companies like World's Best Cat Litter--products trying to break into and make a bigger impact in already noisy markets. We're keen to see how the giants do it. Being big doesn't necessarily translate to being nimble or even right. But it does mean we'll begin to see some real dollars tossed into the arena.

We would love to hear your thoughts.

To many users, this seems very new, as it sort of hid in the shadows for a while. The way it works is by showing people you may know, usually friends of your friends. More importantly it uses your contacts from various e-mail and messaging services to seek out those on Facebook you know, but may not be connected with yet.

Now this may not seem applicable to casual Facebook users who mainly use the site as a way to keep in touch with old friends, but to those who use Facebook for socially networking themselves or their business this is a great way to expand. Now that most businesses are creating Facebook pages, usually one in search of fans rather than friends, they are now being reminded that they can utilize their e-mail contact list to generate a larger following on Facebook which in turn keeps a lot more people connected and updated with them.

Regardless of how you use it, the people at Facebook are really making a push to encourage growth among all accounts, personal or business orientated. This only seems to make Facebook a more reliable source in a world that is being transformed by social network technology. Of course there are some lingering questions about the "friend finder", but the most important ones are about the future. What is next for Facebook? Are they still working on figuring out an even easier way to connect to people you may already know? One thing that is most certainly for sure, Facebook is not done figuring out new ways to stimulate their seemingly endless growth potential.

Have you extended your brand to the world of social media? Contact MicroArts to learn where to begin!

But why engage the blogosphere you ask? Did you know that 90% of consumers trust recommendations from people they know and 70% of them trust consumer opinions that are posted online, as found by the Nielsen Company in their latest Global Online Consumer Survey? That's right, nearly 3/4th of consumers online trust the opinions posted online by other consumers which is higher than all other traditional formats like editorial content, TV, newspapers, magazines and radio. Still not convinced? Here are some compelling facts supporting the value of blogger engagement:

1. Brand mentions on the Internet are the best way to get users to visit your site to learn more about your brand. In a recent study by ARAnet, it was shown that the most likely source for Internet users to read and take further action was seeing your brand in an article format.
2. Ninety-five percent of the top 100 US newspapers have reporter blogs¹
3. Four in five bloggers post brand or product reviews, with 37% of them posting them frequently¹
4. There were 94.1 million US blog readers in 2007²
5. 184 million people world wide have started a blog³
6. Seventy-seven percent of active Internet users read blogs³

Now that we've established the immense potential value of engaging the blogosphere, we would like to share three simple principles for success.

1. Respect - you might think this is simple and straightforward but in blog outreach respect can take shape in many forms. Here are a couple manifestations of respect in the world of blogger engagement:
   • Treat every blogger equally
   • Treat each blogger as the expert
   • Take at least 10-15 minutes to read their bio and a few posts
   • Don't talk above them
   • Encourage transparency
   • Expose yourself, don't hide your real personality in the shade
2. Delivery - bloggers are connected. Sometimes stuffing an email down their throat isn't the best way of going about things. Try to figure out the optimal communication medium for connecting with them whether it be commenting on a relevant post, Twitter, Facebook or even picking up the phone (that's right ... phones still exist :).
3. Transferable Value - notice how the word "incentive" or "pay-off" isn't used here? Bloggers aren't a gumball machine you drop a quarter into. Instead, offer them something that is of relevant value. You should be talking to them because they are of relevance. Therefore, the product , service or development you are sharing should be of interest. Why not send them a package in the mail with your product and a thank you letter, or invite them to your private beta, or Tweet about them to your followers. Be creative here.

Serious about doing some blogger engagement for your brand? We would love to go a step further and work on a customized blogger engagement program for you. Feel free to give us a call or better yet connect right here by leaving us a comment!

Brand Transparency
Brands now live in an on-going conversation about themselves whether or not they join in or not, and the truth WILL BE set free. As a result, the trend WILL BE what I'm calling "brand transparency". Brand transparency is the pinnacle of truth in marketing behaviors. These behaviors go well beyond inaccurate marketing communications. Brand transparency is when a brand welcomes the world in to understand exactly how their product is manufactured.

Truth in the Serum
For example, brands like Kleen Kanteen® and Sigg® marketed BPA-Free water bottles. Revenues spiked as the Nalgene® "BPA plastic bottle" business jumped off the cliff.

Nicely done. Or so everyone thought ...

As it turns out, the Sigg brand had not been completely transparent with its BPA content.

The result? Patagonia terminated their Sigg partnership.

In reality, the amounts of BPA in their water bottles would never cause any human harm. They had fixed the problem [after millions of dollars sold], but weren't forthcoming with both consumers and partners [including Patagonia]. If Sigg had engaged in brand transparency, their behavior and communication could have played out in a proactive way (instead of the reactive CYA efforts they were forced to take that fell short), with something like this:

We are very sorry to announce that we missed a trace amount of BPA in our water bottles. It is so incredibly small; our scientists simply did not see it. It is an honest error and we took immediate actions to correct it. Please understand these are such trace amounts they will not hurt you.

Nevertheless, if you like, please do mail your bottle back to us and we'll send replace it with your choice of our new bottles. If you don't want the hassle, since the bottle you have is safe to use, please still accept our apology for this oversight. And, we invite you to please download a "50% off" coupon for our new bottles.

We hope this has not caused any stress or inconvenience in your day. Thank you for your loyalty to Sigg branded products.

Sincerely,

[Founder's Name]

This turns a broken brand promise of BPA-Free into an opportunity to communicate what isn't broken, the brand's values.

Brand Strategy Trends
Total and utter brand transparency is one of the next major trends in brand strategy. Social media will expose your broken promises. Believe it—and brand transparency is the only answer.

In fact, we are launching a new consumer brand in 2010 that takes brand transparency to the max. We are still in super stealth mode, so I can't even share the product category we're aiming to dominate.

Starting with filming the day all the partners met for the first time in Vegas to discuss the brand strategy, brand values and, as a result, the brand's opportunity, we will tell the story of who, what, where, why we are building the products the way we do.

We are 100% transparent with the World, identifying what is not ideal about the product and ask our customers for fresh ideas on how to improve it. Most importantly, we will carry on these communications, these relationships, in the wide-open forum called Internet social media. If you are an organic, all-natural, green, environmentally friendly, totally-safe-for-humans brand, you best have a brand transparency strategy that is as honest as the way you do business.

The first brands to take on this strategy will be handsomely rewarded in the form of unsurpassed customer loyalty, customer evangelism, blogosphere ubiquity and, ultimately, shareholder value.

Get brand transparency right the first time. Contact MicroArts to learn more about how to infuse your brand with truth.

PS: Truth in marketing may not apply to ski areas just yet. Downpouring rain will still be referred to as "mixed precipitation." Unless, you are Alta's weatherman. So many times last year, Alta reported 4" of fresh snow whereby as I was walked toward the Wildcat lift in boot high powder. They under promise and over deliver! They report only 4" when they get 8" - How cool is that? Love Alta.

Let's start with Facebook. A recent report published by Virtue SRM indicates that Monday through Wednesday are the optimum days to post to maximize your click-through rate (CTR) on Facebook. Thursday through Saturday were significantly lower, though interestingly Sunday stood out with a relatively high CTR.

So, as a starting point, if you have a blog post or link that you want to share and you want to ensure it gets the highest CTR then be sure to share it on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. But you should treat this only as a starting point and track your own CTR and see what days are most effective for your own Facebook presence. Ours actually has highest CTR Wednesdays through Friday with Monday and Tuesday being the low points, atleast for now. As the makeup of our Facebook network changes, so could the CTR rate change - so we will continue to test- as should you.

Now with regards to Twitter, we don't have any Twitter-wide specific data on click-through rate but, thanks to great people like Dan Zarrella, we do have data on ReTweet rate (ReTweeting is when someone shares your Tweet with their followers). This data does provide some useful guidance towards when you should Tweet to maximize click-through rate based on two factors: the data shows what day of the week Twitter is being used most and also shows when ReTweets happen the most. From this we can infer when your Tweet is most likely to be seen by the most people and also when it has the best chance of being shared with the most people.

Based on Dan Zarella's data it appears that Twitter is almost the opposite of Facebook: Wednesday through Fridays are top ReTweet days. Based on that a good starting point to ensure maximum CTR would be to share your links later in the week on Twitter. As before, use this data as a starting point and keep track of your own CTR information - our own data also indicates that Thursdays and Fridays have the highest CTR for us, but every network is different and will change over time. So keep testing and refining to maximize your sweet spot.

As to what time of the day is optimal, data indicates that daytime sharing on both networks, rather than early morning or sharing at night, will maximize ReTweet and click-through rates. As a starting point you might try sharing during lunch time, which some have dubbed "the new primetime" - atleast for video consumption, but it's a useful indicator as a starting point. This is something again to test with your own network but good to keep in mind.

In sum, the best practices for when to share blog posts and links on Facebook and Twitter are: Start by sharing during lunchtime for both. Start by sharing on Facebook early in the work week. Start by sharing on Twitter later in the work week. Lastly, you should be testing your own CTR over time and adjust accordingly. Need help testing CTR or just want to ensure maximum success with your overall social media marketing efforts? Give us a call today, we'd be happy to help!

It's now almost 2010 and, although direct mail campaigns have proven to be successful in the past, does any of this hold true today, now that everybody's mailboxes are inundated with direct mail pieces? Do people even look at direct mail? I never did, at least I never thought I did, until recently I found myself clipping a coupon I received for a buy-one-get-one-free offer. Progressive Grocer announced that coupon redemption rates are up 19% in 2009 compared to 2008. Direct mail has also proven to show a 1-3% return. Is this something we should turn our heads to now that we're seeing very high returns with Internet Marketing?

Today, everybody's talking about search engine marketing, social media, Facebook, Twitter and other essential, Inbound Marketing tactics. Hubspot reported that 37% of lead generation budgets, on average, are dedicated to Inbound Marketing. Inbound Marketing allows you to effectively reach your target prospects. You can even test marketing through A/B testing strategies. Why bet the farm on a particular message, call-to-action or creative design that you think will generate leads when you can quickly and easily A/B test all of your messaging, creative, call-to-actions and be certain you're generating qualified leads?

Now that we're leveraging these great tools online with Internet Marketing, does this mean we should disregard traditional, seemingly more expensive marketing mediums such as expensive tradeshows, traditional public relations and even direct mail? Absolutely not. Rather, we should leverage what we know with Internet Marketing to make our traditional marketing efforts even more successful, especially direct mail marketing.

By leveraging Internet Marketing, we can prove our messaging, creative and call-to-actions BEFORE sending out our direct mail campaigns, thus increasing the likeliness of effectiveness.

Here are some important direct mail tips to keep in mind as you craft your campaign:

• Post office regulations [http://www.usps.com/] - Make sure to double-check the post office regulations prior to sending out a postcard or letter to make sure you're not violating any regulations. A reprint can be costly!


• Gold database - Make sure your database is solid. Without a database that targets the right people, with the correct contact information, it doesn't matter how effective your messaging is.


• Test your messaging - Leverage Internet Marketing techniques to test as much of your direct mail piece as possible. Do A/B tests on the headline, subhead, image, call-to-action, offer, layout, etc.


• Don't look like junk mail - If your envelope looks like junk mail, it is not likely going to be opened. Make sure the envelope you send your piece in has an "openability" appeal.


• What's in it for me? (WIIFM) - It's important that the recipient of the direct mail piece knows immediately, WIIFM? This will increase readability.


• Coupons - Make sure your offers are something you can stand behind. I recently saw a coupon for a FREE Papa John's Three-Topping pizza, effective on one day, through online ordering. Coincidentally, on that same day, the online ordering for the locations offering the coupons was down, along with the phones.

Have an upcoming direct mail campaign? Call MicroArts, a creative agency.

Although barcodes are in use everyday at retail stores, prominently placed on retail packaging designs, barcode technology has evolved drastically over the past few years. Nowadays we're leveraging barcode technology to a new form of the barcode, the two-dimensional code, the Quick Response Code. Invented in 1994 by the company Denso-Wave, the Quick Response code, known as the QR code, was launched in Japan, where it is still a popular medium today. Although QR codes are not yet mainstream in the United States, they are popping up all over the place, not only in Japan but around the world, in advertisements, on billboards, on buses, at tradeshows, and on corporate collateral. A QR code is a two-dimensional barcode that allows users to take a picture, using their cell phones (although only certain phones are compatible, view a complete list of compatible cell phones), to quickly access a URL. By taking a picture with your cell phone, you're decoding the QR code and interacting with the creator of the code, by instantly accessing the code's URL. Many marketers are leveraging this new marketing medium to reach their consumers, in a non-traditional way. For example, you'll notice a QR code featured at the top of this blog entry that links to the MicroArts Twitter page.

I imagine the technology will continue to gain traction and become more mainstream in the United States, especially as additional phones become compatible.

Many companies are incorporating QR codes into their upcoming marketing plans. Just this week, while attending a social media presentation at Firebrand's community conference, they had a QR code on their event poster. I also noticed a QR code while attending the movies last week, and was surprised when I noticed someone taking a picture of the QR code as I walked by.

QR codes are easy to generate and a great way to interact with your consumers. If you're looking to create a QR code, here are some easy sites that allow you to generate codes quickly and easily:
http://qrcode.kaywa.com
http://zxing.appspot.com/generator
http://www.snapmaze.com

Remember, it's not only the QR code that you need to worry about, make sure to have an effective landing page that pays off the message within your QR code.

Need help staying on top of the latest and greatest new technologies being used with Internet marketing and traditional marketing? Contact MicroArts, a brand strategy company.

Here is what I learned:

• Two out of 25 companies have a documented Internet Marketing Strategy for 2010. In both companies, they did not have a "documented" Internet Marketing Strategy in 2009, beyond pay-per-click (PPC) search engine marketing. Both companies ballparked that in 2010, >25% of their total marketing budget was allocated to Internet marketing and social media. Although neither company would divulge the size of their marketing budget, based on my understanding of marketing budgets for brands of this size, I would confidently estimate their Internet Marketing and social media marketing budgets are >$1 million for 2010. Both companies have an agency like MicroArts to lead them in their Internet Marketing Strategy. Both brands engage their customers (the actual pet owner) in online conversation, on a daily basis. A primary objective for both companies is to double their customer contact (pet owners) databases from >100K to >200K. Because I appreciate their candid conversations with me and understand their strategy is a major competitive differentiator for them, I will keep their identities to myself. I will say, however, that one was a long time brand leader in the Pet Industry and the other is a young, fast growing company.
• Fifteen of the 23 companies that did not have a documented Internet Marketing Strategy for 2010 did not even understand the question. I went on to define the benefits of Internet Marketing but it most cases, it didn't help.
• In fact, on five occasions, the response was, "the pet owner is not our customer, we sell through distributors." I'm sure the look on my face was priceless. In all five cases, these companies owned multiple brands. And the only customer contact (pet owners) database in all cases was a rewards program that seemed to give them all a headache to talk about. Four out of five of these companies have brands selling in Target®. Honestly, I left these booths perplexed. Normally, in these situations, I'd leave the booth thinking, "hey, this could be a great client for the MicroArts Internet Marketing Team! But, these five companies clearly attributed "little value" to Internet Marketing and also felt it was the responsibility of their distribution partners.
• Three of the 23 companies became interested with Internet Marketing and didn't want our conversation to end. One company had ear marked 20% of its marketing budget towards Internet Marketing because they knew it was important, but hadn't taken any initial steps.
• Five of these 23 companies believed, in fact, that they did have an Internet Marketing plan because they had a Facebook page and a Twitter account.

In sum, the Pet Industry is a sleeping dog and appears to be settled into a long nap. Which I'm happy about, selfishly, I say, "let sleeping dogs lie." Kudos to brands that will profit from Internet Marketing and Social Media Marketing efforts, your brand deserves every penny of it.

If you found this blog because you did a search on "Internet Marketing in the Pet Industry" or "Social Media Marketing in the Pet Industry" ... Good Morning!

To engage MicroArts in a discussion about your brand strategy, brand design, Internet marketing and social media marketing in the Pet Industry, ping me, Peter Getman.

Question from the group:
I think Facebook and Twitter are more community based and sense people check in more frequently on these sites to see or post status updates, etc. LinkedIN appears to be more of a networking tool. Do you have any suggestions on how to strategically use each of these sites differently for a business? I could see posting the same information to each site (in my case, real estate listings), but I am trying to figure out the best use of LinkedIN for our real estate business (thinking it is to network with industry contacts such as realtor organizations, home builders, appraisers, mortgage brokers, etc.) Any ideas?

Answer to the group:
Let's start with LinkedIN -- The first thing I'd recommend doing is familiarizing yourself with the LinkedIN Learning Center - http://learn.linkedin.com/ - a great resource, especially if you are new to LinkedIN. You'll want to use that as a guide for your experience on LinkedIN -- secondly you'll want to setup a company profile within LinkedIN - following these best practices: http://blog.linkedin.com/2008/11/17/creating-company-profiles-on-linkedin/

Now, within LinkedIN there are many different opportunities to grow your business. For now, let's focus on four:

1. Networking, the base of LinkedIN


2. Groups (like this one)


3. LinkedIN Answers


4. Service Provider directory

1. Of course with networking the idea is simple- examine your contacts' contacts for relevant, compelling connections. Ask for an introduction through your common contact or introduce yourself, you never know what kinds of opportunities exist within your own network's network!

2. Groups, like this one, are also another great opportunity. As a domain expert within Real Estate you should search for LinkedIN groups that relate to your business and join them and contribute your expertise to the discussion. By contributing thoughtful and helpful comments to ongoing discussions you will establish yourself as a leader within the space and earn respect and business as a result. Speaking in general though, if there is not a group within LinkedIN that reflects your domain expertise, then you are facing a great opportunity ... you could create your own discussion group and invite others to connect with you to discuss accordingly.

3. LinkedIN Answers is another great way to connect with contacts and establish yourself as a domain expert. This section of the site contains a wealth of opportunity for you as an expert to answer peoples questions within your domain *and* ask questions to experts in related domains or in other areas of business. In both cases you establish yourself within the greater community, but answering questions provides the best opportunity to gain respect and new business through LinkedIN. Further, participating in the LinkedIN Answers portion of the site can earn accolades for your LinkedIN profile that are seen by others - if your answer to a question is selected as the best answer by the question asker, your "best answer" award gets posted to your profile.

4. Finally, be sure your agents are established within the Real Estate listings in the service provider directory within LinkedIN. This again can provide access to new business because LinkedIN members can browse the directory and find service providers that are connected to their personal network, enabling people to find service providers that are recommended by their contacts, a valuable tool. As a service provider, after setting up shop within the directory, you should be sure to reach out to your network of contacts and ask for recommendations. These recommendations appear within your profile and also can help drive business and referrals to you through LinkedIN.

• Use Flickr Advanced Search with the "Only search within Creative Commons" and "Content to use commercially" checkboxes checked.
  
• Use Google Advanced Image Search with the "Labeled for commercial use" filter turned on to find imagery and photos to use in your blog.
  

• 10 Sure Fire Headline Formulas That Work
  
• 7 Reasons Why List Posts Will Always Work
  
• How To Write A Killer How To Post That Gets Attention
  

From Twitter's inception, through its early days of expansion and extending all the way through its extraordinary and unprecedented growth period, one core delivery has remained the same—simplicity.

When you think about it, very little has changed. Just recently, Twitter launched a new homepage that more tightly integrates Twitter search. Over the years, there have been some subtle changes in the interface; but for the most part, the game has remained the same.

I'm not trying to say Twitter should deviate from its proven model of simplicity. But I do have some suggestions. Here, we are about to share a few things that, if Twitter were to mix it up, we would like to see integrated into their offering. Or, perhaps an enterprising API developer can beat them to the punch (if the apps don't already exist!). We challenge you to think ahead and share any ideas on Twitter features that you would love to see too!

If these features weren't built into Twitter's actual interface, maybe they could be contained within an email. The current "new follower" emails don't contain a lot of intelligence on your followers except some baseline statistics. As you read these, imagine some of the features being included in your next follower email!

#1: Tweet Beat - Building a quality base of people you follow on Twitter can be tricky. How much time do you really have to look at the person and/or company you are about to follow? One minute? Two? Five? If you have all the time in the world to sit there and sift through tweets, I congratulate you! But, if you are like me and the rest of the world, you can't sit around in your sweatpants and analyze every Twitter user before you follow them. With this in mind, we could all use a tool to help us sift through the clutter. Tweet Beat would be the heartbeat of your profile in the form of an intelligent aggregator that analyzes all tweets, re-tweets and activities on Twitter. This could evolve into something more complex, but here is my take at a version 1.0.

Tweet Beat would share three principal categories of data in the form of a nice looking pie chart of each user's activity:

• The percentage of original content a user tweets—would you follow someone if you know they never actually contribute any original content?
• Re-tweet Ratio - the number of times you re-tweet divided by overall number of tweets
• Engagement Ratio - average number of actual clicks vs. total impressions on links shared. This is a Bitly/Co-tweet Plugin that shares this data with Twitter.

#2 Geo Tweet - This one is real simple. Within the Twitter interface enable users to see what geographic locations their "Tweets" are reaching. Using this information you might want to follow someone that has good visibility in part of the world that you don't. Also you might be able to write some posts or make some Tweets that are tailored to a specific location. Got any followers in the country you are about to visit? If not, maybe you should get some!

#3 Tweet Potential - You may have already heard of a tool called TweetReach, if not we totally recommend checking it out. TweetReach enables you to see how far a particular tweet has traveled by delivering the overall number of impressions. This tool is awesome!

But what if you could click on a user directly and see someone's Tweet potential? Tweet Potential would enable you to see the potential reach of your tweets as well as the reach value of everyone who you follow. This number would go beyond estimated impressions that are equal to a follower base. Instead, what if there was a way to calculate how often your followers read your Tweets? You can't just assume that all of your followers are going to see your Tweets, right? That is impossible! If this number was truly available you could get an average percentage value of the number of followers that actually are exposed to your Tweets. It seems like Twitter should be able to provide this number by the enormous amount of user data they must be collecting every day.

How does this manifest into a calculation? Example below:

Tweet Potential Example
MasterTweeper (made this up) has 27,555 followers.

His Tweet Realized Impression Rate (made this up, too!) is 15%. That is, 15% of his following base on average sees his tweets.

MasterTweeper's Tweet Potential is approximately 4,133 (27,550 X 1.5)!

How does this number apply to you? Well, if you can get good old MasterTweeper to re-tweet you, you can gain an estimated 4,133 impressions! Not bad huh?

In reality, these types of features and analytics are probably a long way away. But, you have to wonder how long will it take before Twitter users start asking for more—or worse yet for Twitter, how long it will be before a competitor creates a more intelligent interface.

Time, as always, will tell. In the meantime, happy tweeting to all!

It didn't take long before everything from cleaning products to airlines were dipping a toe in the murky "green" water. Look on any grocery store shelf and you'll see buzzwords such as "natural," "eco-friendly," "free-trade," and "organic" float across product messaging like the cure-all snake-oil claims of generations past. This is called "greenwashing" (originally in reference to the practice of hotels trying to make higher profit by not washing towels or bedding daily and passing it off as conservation) and consumers are quickly becoming wise to these often misleading baits.

So how do you highlight the very real environmental benefits of your product or company without sounding gimmicky or insincere? Consider these three best practices:

1. Focus on your unique selling points (USP). Be specific about these points in your brand positioning strategy. Check out CockadoodleDOO, E-cloth, and Nature's Remedy in our portfolio for examples of using specific characteristics of your brand positioning strategy to back up claims of environmental responsibility.
2. Create a graphic badge. Once you've honed in on the USPs of your brand strategy, create a graphic badge highlighting these USPs for quick recognition on your product packaging design. The badge we created to highlight the whole-kernel corn used to make World's Best Cat Litter™ is instantly recognizable on the product packaging, website, brochures and other collateral. This badge is effective because it quickly communicates a brand message about whole-kernel corn that is easily understood.
3. Start a conversation. Foster a dialog through inbound marketing with your customer. Recently, Dell declared they wanted to build the "greenest PC on earth". The company launched IdeaStorm as a platform to solicit "direct feedback from, [its] customers, suppliers and stakeholders" on how to do just that. Shell and General Motors have incorporated similar inbound marketing tactics which have lead to increased visibility on connected social media and blogs. These consumer and expert voices add increased legitimacy to any "green" claims. Our own success at this is being proven through the Social Media Marketing and Blogosphere Engagement efforts for World's Best Cat Litter™ and the Greenopolis community for Waste Management.

If you can achieve this trustworthy image of a green company through highlighting your environmentally friendly USPs, official badges, and real (honest) unstructured branding communications, you will be well on your way to joining the ranks of Tom's of Maine, Stoneyfield Farm, and Patagonia.

Interested in crafting your green brand strategy without running into the "greenwashing" trap? Give MicroArts a call.

So how does engaging in social media create, support and strengthen brand loyalty for companies, organizations and brands? To explain, let me share a simple example.

You are looking to buy a new set of skis. After much online research and due diligence, you have nailed down the exact model and size you are looking for. You don't want to pay for shipping and therefore look for retailers in your area where you can by them in person. After doing some local searching you find two shops within similar distances from your house.

You can't go to either Store A or Store B until they open tomorrow, so you go ahead and visit their websites to see which store opens first. Not surprisingly, you find out they open at the same time but something during your experience is significantly different from one store to the other.

Store A - You find the typical website... standard navigation, standard content, standard product info and a standard story. There isn't really any additional insight as provided by the employees or management on this store website. This does not bother you though because you feel like you know what you want and you are happy with your choice, right? You go to their "Contact Us" page, grab their directions and print them out for tomorrow.

Store B - At first, it appears you are in store (no pun intended) for a similar website and experience. But, something on this page is drastically different from Store A's website. This homepage feels connected, personal and alive. In fact, there is a big area on the right hand side that says "Connect with Us". Under this heading there are icons for Facebook, Twitter and a Company blog.

You click on the company blog and see a new post of the "Best of 2010" carving skis by the owner of the store. You begin to read. After several paragraphs you realize the skis you thought were a great fit for you weren't on this list. You begin to second guess your choice. You wonder if the owner is credible or not and notice a link in the blog that leads to Store B's Facebook page. You click the link, and see a new video posted on the wall. There he is, fully sponsored and shredding it up at a regional downhill event. Wow, he's good.

You browse around Store B's Facebook page for a little longer and eventually return to their website. Store A is starting to quickly fade to the back of your mind. You are beginning to feel like you know Store B and you can expect good service there. You go back to the main website. You see the icon to follow Store B on Twitter. You click the link and start reading Store B's latest Tweets. The very first one is a Tweet from the owner saying he will be in bright and early tomorrow at 8 am and is doing a demo on a new brand of skis that just arrived. Upon reading this Tweet you crumple Store A's directions.

Hopefully this example made it crystal clear how social media can create, support and strengthen brand loyalty on the spot. Really, social media done right is value-adding personality. If you can get your visitors to feel like they know what your company, organization or brand is all about and leave them excited and intrigued then you are going to get more people knocking on your door. Not to mention, by using social media you are able to sustain brand loyalty over time by being connected where your customers or end-users are connected.

If you don't feel like you are up to speed, we invite you to connect with FINT, a simple way to get your brand immersed in social media. Or better yet, connect with us to learn how social media can be the number one driver of loyalty for your brand.

People are already talking about you online. If they aren't yet, they will soon. We've entered an age where conversations take place online. It's important to understand that this conversation will take place whether or not you have a blog; people will post product reviews, tweet about customer service experiences, discuss your brand in forums and so on. As a business, it's beneficial to be a part of those conversations as part of your overall internet marketing strategy. By creating a blog and entering the "blogosphere" you join in the conversations and give your company a "digital voice" to promote, discuss, and perhaps defend your brand. This gives your customer a way to directly engage with your brand by allowing customers to communicate both to you and now, thanks to your blog, with you. Thus establishing a dialogue that otherwise may not have existed.

Still not convinced? A recent HubSpot study found that small businesses who blog get 55% more website visitors. This study also found that small businesses who blog receive 97% more inbound links and 434% more indexed pages. Essentially, this means a blog increases your chances of being found by search engines. A blog's search engine optimization value alone is worth the effort.

Now let's recap. If your company has a blog you can: start (and participate in) conversations around your brand, increase your site visitors and improve your site's search engine optimization. Are you blogging yet?

If you are blogging then great! Please share your blog with us in the comments; we'd love to review it. If not then give MicroArts a call to learn more about blogosphere engagement as part of your overall internet marketing strategy or leave a comment, we'd love to hear from you.

Today someone might use Google to search for a solution your company provides and see your website content well positioned within the results. They'll click on the link and land on a landing page to learn more about how your company addresses their particular problem. But next year they might just search Facebook instead, and they'll see that a friend of a friend had a similar need for that solution and went with Company X. This will be more valuable because they can connect directly with this friend via their friend's connection and discover more about their personal experience with the company. They might also see a post on Company X's Facebook page within the results discussing this particular solution, further solidifying Company X as a solutions provider candidate.

• Radio: 38 years
• Television: 13 years
• Internet: 4 years
• iPod: 3 years