It’s getting harder and harder to find real value and new insights from the plethora of webinars on social media these days. Fortunately, time was well spent yesterday, with Sirius Decisions (”a benchmark and advisory firm” for B2B marketers) and their research director Jonathan Block offering up a good overview of social media’s relevance to B2B companies, encouraging at least baby steps if you want to stay in the game. He made some great points — I’ve picked my top three and paraphrased below — and I would add three more big ones to a successful strategy.

Three of Jonathan’s observations:

1. Realize that blogs, social networks, wikis, and communities are not going to directly impact demand creation — so don’t expect them to. However, social media tactics and social networks can make big contributions to awareness, reputation and brand, and word of mouth.

2. It’s not about the technology. Widgets and new platforms are sexy and fun — but being relevant to your audience and driving business are even better. Understand what your customers or other key audience are doing online — gauge their interest in various social media activities so you know how to engage them in a realistic and valuable way — with the right tools. (But he did not say how to do this…)

3. We need to move from web analytics to KPIs (key performance indicators) to make social media strategies and investments measurable and accountable in meaningful ways. (He gave a few examples, e.g., rather than counting pageviews or clicks, see if sales prospects move through the funnel any faster if they are touched via a blog or community or podcast download. More work needed here.) [BTW, Beeline Labs is co-developing an ROI model now with two clients. Ask me about it if you’re interested.]

Janet’s adds:

1. What you talk/write about is as important as where and with whom you do the talking. Corporate speak and bland informational content doesn’t cut it in the real time, conversational world of social media. As we say around here, “to get more interest, be more interesting.” What works is actually what’s most authentic and central to the business: what do you believe about what’s important and where things are going? What have you learned that will help others succeed? Time to morph your messaging machine into one that shares opinions, advice and stories that turn people on not off.

2. Developing social media capabilities needs to be owned at a senior level, and that someone will need to make some changes. (Yes, everyone can “do” it, but it’s too important to exist as a thousand uncoordinated tactical efforts across the company.) One of the aha’s that surfaced in the Beeline Labs/Deloitte/SNCR “Tribalization of Business” research on how businesses are using and learning from online communities is that CMOs themselves should take on the role. After all, if marketing is in the customer creation business, what’s more important than capturing attention, nurturing relationships, and creating customer preference by being more involved where, when and how is most meaningful to them? (And CMOs — get ready to make talent, organizational and process changes to transform your operation from command and control marketing to participation marketing.)

3. Social media is not a new line item or added expense — it’s an amplifier. Because it’s a new mindset and habits as much as anything, “social media” makes everything you’re already doing much more efficient and effective, and renders obsolete a whole host of traditional sales and marketing efforts. In fact, I would venture to say you could scrap at least 30% of last year’s programs, spend less and accomplish much greater results by shifting to more involving and conversational approaches.

Some timely thinking for entering the 2009 planning season — we should all be asking ourselves: What are we willing to start doing and stop doing? What are the best new bets and changes we can make?

A recent Forrester survey of 189 companies found that 38% rated blogging marginal to marketing and 15 % said blogs were irrelevant. My experience is that many who get into blogs have unrealistic expectations, set irrelevant measures and “ROI” goals, and view blogs as a campaign tactic, which they most definitely are not. (Another observation: many quickly run out of things to blog about, often a sign that they’re not passionate or knowledgeable about their field.)

The bigger point is that people today expect a more social, casual style of business communications. In writing style. And in being able to post a comment or talk back.

The value of blogging done right is that it breaks the old corporate speak iceberg. Soon there will no longer be a corporate Web site and separate blogs. Good business Web sites will be blog-like in style and the ability for people to comment.

However, this means that businesses need to be more interesting, provide more valuable content and ideas to people who take the time to go to their site/blogs, have a point of view on trends in their industries, and thoughtfully respond to comments.

It also means that many, many communications and marketing people have to relearn communications skills.

But if all this change helps customers more quickly get to know your company — making it easier for them to make a decision and buy — it’s well worth the change. And that’s where the marketing real payoff comes in.

PS - Thanks to my friend and Israeli management consultant Dov Gordon for the heads up on the Forrester study. Check out his new article, “Spitting in the Wind: A Single Obvious Insight to Sharpen and Focus Your Strategy.”

A big part of SOCIAL media is being more social as companies — online and in the real world. But many executives have asked me, “how do you measure sociability and friendliness?”

In a 48-hour experiment with blackjack dealers at Ameristar Casino J.D. Power & Associates found that a highly social, outgoing blackjack dealer collected 13 percent more money at his table than at the serious table where the blackjack dealer held to the standard, “don’t talk unless spoken to” rule.

In explaining the experiment Chris Denove of J.D. Power and author of “How Every Great Company Listens to the Voice of the Customer,” told a group this week that there’s no reason to believe that the same relationship doesn’t hold true in other business environments. Why? People like spending time with people who are likeable.

Forget conventional wisdom when it comes to managing corporate reputation. In fact, transparency matters the least in building stakeholder trust (employees, customers, suppliers, investors) and can actually erode trust, according to a fascinating new study by Harvard University’s Michael Pirson and Deepak Malhotra, published in the summer issue of MIT Sloan Management Review. (”Unconventional Insights for Managing Stakeholder Trust.”)

The authors studied four different organizations to find out what matters and to whom. Highlights:

• Transparency is over-rated. In fact, transparency can diminish trust depending on what is disclosed. Also, it has little relevance in terms of building trust.
• Integrity is important, but. Stakeholders close to a company (employees and customers) need to feel that the company genuinely cares for their personal well-being. Integrity alone doesn’t cut it if people feel the company is being fair but “callous.”
• Trust is built on different types of competencies. Employees and investors look for management competency. Customers and suppliers more concerned about technical and quality competency.
• Shared values is hugely important to all stakeholders: All stakeholders want to associate with organizations with values they identify with.

“We have found that that although value congruence matters most to employees, it is also an important factor for every other stakeholder group we studies. In other words, stakeholders of all types are interested in associated with organizations with whom they can identify — and with whom they perceive a match in values.”

This study has interesting implications for marketers and corporate communications professionals.

• Trust means different things to different stakeholders.
• Marketing needs to focus more on two key trust-building factors: the company’s genuine interest in their customers’ success and well being, and the company’s technical ability to deliver quality products and services.
• What beliefs? It’s essential to clearly articulate the company’s values and beliefs. (Maybe even help uncover them. ) In my experience few organizations — especially marketers — focus on these beliefs, or even know what they are. But as this study shows they are critically important to building affinity and trust with customers.

This is my first post. Why haven’t I gotten on the blogging train before now? Maybe because there’s 100 million blogs out there already. Seemed like enough. Or because I’m doing something else. Curious about my own motivations and questions, I have become a student of Why People Blog.

Reason #1: Because it’s fun! Last week AdAge reported on the recent BlogHer and Compass Partners research pronouncing that blogging is now “mainstream” among women. What’s inspiring them?

• 65% do it for fun
• 60% to express themselves
• 40% to connect with others
• 34% blog as a personal diary
• 26% to give advice or educate

The reasons women read blogs provide good advice for marketers seeking to attract them:

1. Make it fun and entertaining (46% read because it’s fun and 26% for entertainment)
2. Provide useful information (41% are seeking information)
3. Make it timely (34% want to stay up to date on specific topics)

And as blogs morph into more participatory communities, we’ll see shifts in motivations, with a rise in giving and getting advice and accomplishing a common purpose.

More to come on Why People Blog and what makes good posts.

PS You know a trend has crested when there’s a book list on it. Check out these 10 books about blogs and blogging from The New York Review of Books.

Based on research in the field of virtual communities, most business thinkers will agree that there are 4 fundamental pillars to successful communities - content, members, member profiles and transactions. If managed properly, these 4 dynamics can lead to economics of increasing returns that characterize most successful communities. The more members you have, the more content they will create. That in turn will increase the value to the community members and attract more members. If you capture information about your members and you make it easier for them to find stuff in the community based on their profile, the higher the value of the community to the members and the more members you will attract. It’s easy to understand the workings and to get the benefits of the dynamics of increasing returns that happen in successful virtual communities. Many of those were first described by business thinker and management consultant John Hagel in Net Gain more than a decade ago.

There are other aspects that drive and define communities, such as the social and technology infrastructures of communities as well as the business processes that they support. But none of those characteristics have the power to create the positive value creation loops that the original four can.

While most successful communities will have a mix of all of the ingredients - we can characterize communities by their dominant dynamic.

First there are content-based communities, where members interact with one another primarily in the context of content - either consumer generated or licensed/acquired. News sites or blogs are communities that would fall in this category.

Then there are communities that are primarily member-based. Member-driven communities can take on many different forms. Brand communities like the Harley or the Ducati communities are clearly member-centric communities, even though some companies mistakenly think that the brand is at the center of those communities, and not the members. Networking communities like LinkedIn and Facebook are clearly communities that have members at their core. Many developer communities in the tech world also fall within this category.

Lastly there are transaction-centric communities. eBay and Amazon.com come to mind when talking about those communities.

Of course, all of those communities have content, and all have members, and most have transactions - it’s just that they are more heavily tilted towards one of the community ingredients than another. And in some cases communities with the same end-goal can take on very different forms. Brand communities could also be set up as content-centric communities or as transaction-centric communities. Customer support communities or developer communities could also be started as content-centric communities - and perhaps evolve into transaction-centric communities.

The reason it’s important to understand the different types of communities is because of the requirements to get them started. You cannot start a member-centric or a transaction-based community without a critical mass of members or offerings - something most companies do not have. Without a critical mass of members or offerings, there will not be enough content generated (i.e., customer reviews, etc.) in order to make the interaction for the community members valuable. So if you have a total potential number of users ranging in the hundreds, you will never be able to set up a vibrant customer support community as Intuit. Microsoft or Apple can. That does not mean that you cannot leverage customer support communities, it means that you have to start them up as content-driven communities. Instead of relying on the community members to re-write your manuals and to create meaningful FAQs, you may have to hire a few people to kick-start the process on a for-hire basis.

While the economics of increasing returns may be somewhat diminished with a smaller number of members and some hired guns, they are still very much present. Most likely they will handily beat the economics of diminishing returns that most business practitioners face when trying to interact with customers and prospects in the old-fashioned interrupt-driven way.

Some of these thoughts have been triggered by the many conversations I have had the pleasure to have as part of the Community Effectiveness Study that we are conducting with Deloitte and the Society of New Communications Research. Some of the preliminary results of this study will be discussed at the Society for New Communications Research Forum in two weeks and more detailed results will be unveiled at the Community 2.0 Conference in May.

As a senior research fellow with the Society for New Communications Research I can extend a special discount to some of my friends who want to attend the forum. Email me if you want to attend at a special rate (francois [at] emergencemarketing [dot] com). Note that there are also 1/2 day flex passes available for those who can’t attend the full event.

What is the candidates’ language saying about them? This excellent CBC story provides some in-depth analysis. Here are highlights:

Using his text analysis software program University of Texas professor James Pennebaker, says that:

• Barack Obama, through his use of language, appears cognitively complex, socially skilled, genuine and sensitive, though he appears more emotionally volatile than the other two candidates.
• Hillary Clinton and John McCain seem more emotionally stable than Obama.
• McCain comes across as quite optimistic.

Using his model that determines the amount of deception and spin in candidates’ language, Queen’s University computing science professor David Skillicorn believes:

• Obama is the king of spin.
• McCain is the most forthright.

• Clinton speaks more or less candidly, although lately, she has been using more and more spin.

The language analysis science is fascinating. The question, however, is whether voters will detect the same conclusions as the software and how it will influence their decisions.

(Hint: It did in the last U.S. presidential election, as this post explains.)