JitterJam® Social CRM

The popularity of summer has never dwindled, and I’ve always believed that it’s well deserved. Summertime means rising temperatures, more hours of daylight, and the probable release of numerous blockbuster movie titles. However, many often forget one of the most enjoyable mediums of summertime entertainment . . . books!

Reading lists, like all to-do lists, grow far too quickly and shrink too slowly. Unlike most to-do lists though, these lists are actually fun to work through. With a little effort, summer can be the perfect time to start making progress on your list. All you have to do is set aside a few hours each week, and you will be finishing books in no time. If you have trouble finding the motivation, choose a day when the weather is nice and head outside. Reading outside is usually more relaxing and the pages are likely to pass more quickly.

Another reason to start working through your reading list in the summer is all of the new books on social business that have just been released, or will be shortly. Here are a few that I have on my list:

Enchantment – Guy Kawasaki reveals what it takes for a brand to enchant its customers; sharing his insights on customer experience, influence, and brand loyalty. As the previous chief evangelist of Apple, Kawasaki’s insights on building brand experience are second to none.

Smart Business, Social Business – Michael Brito shares his knowledge and understanding of the social customer for businesses to learn from. In addition to getting a great book, purchases also support the Not For Sale Campaign, an organization fighting human trafficking around the globe.

Launch – Michael Stelzner educates readers on the art of sustaining a successful business through valuable content and relationships. For those of you that want a quick preview, the first chapter of this book is available for free here.

What are you waiting for? Grab a comfortable lawn chair, your favorite beverage, the first book on your reading list (or your eReader), and head outside! What books have you already read this summer, and would you recommend them? If not, what other books are you looking forward to reading this summer?

Photo Credit: Svilen Milev

Here in Bedford, NH we’ve been lucky enough to have numerous new faces come through our office this summer. Some are new full time hires, while others came in from other offices to help out for a week or two. Regardless, each new face brings something different to the table and makes the office more enjoyable for everybody. The following are just a few of the many fun advantages to having fresh faces in the office!

Staying on Your Toes:
Each individual brings a different perspective and set of experiences to the office. Leveraging different perspectives creates new ways to look at problems or scenarios, which can help keep everyone’s mind sharp. When everybody is on their toes and working as a team, there’s a better chance of finding an innovative and more successful solution to a problem, which is certainly more fun for everybody.

Learning about Different Regions:
Whether from the west coast of the United States or a European country overseas, all geographic areas have many unique aspects. You’ll likely agree with me that it’s much more interesting to learn about an area’s culture from an actual resident than from the corresponding Wikipedia page. It’s also likely that each new face will have experience in more than one location or culture, so you can learn even more!

Office Get-Togethers:
New or visiting employees are the perfect opportunity to pull the trigger on your company summer BBQ, which you’ve been “planning” for the past two months. When business is going well it may be hard to find time to plan a company get-together, and when business is slow it may be the last thing on your mind. In any case, gathering employees away from the office can boost company morale and will be fun for everybody. These get-togethers are a great way to get to know new employees, and cement important relationships with employees from different offices that are only in town for a few weeks.

In the past three months, our office has (only) welcomed Kevin, Sam, Chris, Bob, Poonam, Adarsh, Yasir, and myself. And while we aren’t all Bruins fans, somehow we’ve still managed to have fun together!

When was the last time your office welcomed a new hire or visiting employee, and how did your office benefit from the experience? What’s your favorite part about having new faces in the office?

Photo Credit: JayLopez

Photo Credit: Mabroukeh

This Idea Spark blog post is the result of the discussion during our Friday morning Creativity Coffee. If you’d like to join us (in person or via web/phone conference), please sign up here. There’s no charge or obligation. We just love ideas and open discussion!

During our previous two Creativity Coffees, we continued the discussion about online communities by drilling down into the Voice of the Brand. We talked about whether or not it matters if an individual’s personality shines through a brand in Voice of the Brand—Who is Talking as well as about What is Your Brand’s Voice, that is, how businesses should determine the “social voice” of their brand on Twitter, Facebook, etc.

In this week’s discussion, we focused on an issue that has been bouncing from blog to blog–Who Owns Social Marketing in a Company? In fact, I recently read a blog post that emphatically claimed that PR should wholly own social media in a company since it’s a PR function to speak to the public. Given that there are many ways that social media is being used in businesses, is this a viable stance? Who owns the strategy behind the tactical use of social media? How should companies go about creating different social accounts for different purposes? These are real problems that businesses are facing as they become more engaged in social marketing, and we thought it would be a great topic for thought and discussion. Here are the ideas that came out of our Creativity Coffee.

1. Adoption of social media/social marketing is usually driven by a specific initiative within a company; that drives “ownership.”
• While social marketing is starting to be “baked in” to the marketing strategies of large brands and companies, we’re mostly hearing about brand “initiatives” that utilize social media channels. The genesis of the use of social marketing within a company is usually through a single initiative that generally drives the initial “owner” of social marketing within a company.
• However, marketers within a company are recognizing the potential value of social marketing and are already baking resources into their budgets. HOW this budget is used, and the strategies behind these resources vary wildly from company to company.
2. There are not many stories of company-wide implementations of social marketing—YET.
• However, companies like Best Buy have integrated social marketing into their corporate strategy and culture and many groups and individuals have “ownership” and responsibility for social marketing.
• BestBuy’s @twelpforce is actually a collective account with individuals registering and then tweeting with the hashtag #twelpforce. They have clear guidelines for tweeting for twelpforce and are driving personal interest in social media into the corporate strategy for customer service and differentiation.
• BestBuy has driven social media to be a part of their corporate culture. But HOW do you go about incorporating social into a corporate culture? Does the prevalence of use of social media by your employees drive you to integrate that into your culture, or do you try to spur the early adopters in your company to lead the charge (and drive others to get involved)? How do you separate the personal from the brand’s voice? BestBuy used a technical solution (retweeting anything with a specific hashtag sent by one of their registered employees), but how do you manage the policies and procedures. Lots of food for thought.
3. It’s hard to pinpoint who owns social marketing in a company—or who SHOULD own it.
• Initiatives drive initial owners
• Initiatives within different departments can drive further implementation and Use Cases
• There is no RIGHT answer for all businesses; “It depends” reigns again; each business has different goals and needs
4. There are clear “points of origin” and use cases—and multiple owners.
• Marketing: Lead generation, brand awareness, brand analysis, performance marketing, commerce, community development, customer loyalty, customer engagement, customer referral
• Public Relations: PR and News, Press relations
• Product Management / Marketing: Community development, product development and innovation
• Customer Service/Support: Customer service, customer feedback
• Sales: Lead generation, revenue generation, sales promotion
5. Favorite quote of the day: “Search marketing and social marketing are like lobsters and pandas. They are both animals, but they are VERY different.”
• Search = Transactional
• Social = Referrals

All this talk about different points of origin and use cases for social marketing got our gears turning. We’ve decided that we’re going to have a series of discussions around Social Marketing Use Cases. our next Idea Spark Creativity Coffee marks the beginning of this series. The first use case we’ll discuss is Using Social Marketing for Lead Generation on Friday, October 22. Given the goal to generate more leads, how can social marketing help businesses achieve that goal? How will social channels add to that goal? Which social channels should businesses use? Join us for a lively discussion!
 
Photo Credit: mwookie

This Idea Spark blog post is the result of the discussion during our Friday morning Creativity Coffee. If you’d like to join us (in person or via web/phone conference), please sign up here. There’s no charge or obligation. We just love ideas and open discussion!

Businesses are looking to engage consumers talking about topics that relate to their markets. Some companies have taken the initiative to host their own online forums and communities to enable peer-driven support, to collect customer feedback and to drive customer engagement and loyalty. But today’s public social networks have enabled individuals to create and participate in loosely organized, organically formed social communities surrounding topics of individual interests. Should brands and businesses try to form their own communities or join the existing and new user-created social communities? This was the topic of our Idea Spark Creativity Coffee. Here are the ideas that came out of the discussion.

1. What are the types of social communities?
• Organically developed. Organic social communities develop through a meeting of individuals who share a mutual interest. They can be created as a destination (website, Ning), be informally formed by and driven by a single person’s interest (LinkedIn, Facebook, Yahoo or Google group), or even form and exist without little to no organization (Twitter discussions, trending topics, lists). These organically created groups can be temporary or permanent. Membership can be open or some membership and moderation required.
• Sponsored. Sponsored communities are created, hosted and monitored by the brand or business. “Super users” are often invited to become moderators to help drive advocacy and user-generated content.
• Hybrid. These communities may be hosted on other sites (LinkedIn, Ning, Yahoo, Google), but they are managed and driven by brand affinity. While they are public and may be open to anyone, the community is driven by the brand and any consumers who join understand that they are engaging with a community that is monitored and sponsored by the brand.
2. How can companies tap into these communities?
• Innovate. If you’re Apple Computer, you can announce a new social network (Ping) and have 1 million people join within 24 hours. With 160 million iTunes account holders and a huge fan base, Apple’s move into creating their own social community was a natural part of their product evolution. Not many companies can create a community by “simply” announcing its existence; Apple is in a category of its own.
• Launch and market your sponsored community. It often makes sense to launch your own community if you have a product that benefits from additional company or peer support (technically-oriented product), encourages interaction (multi-player gaming), encourages user-generated content (reviews), or provides a basis for additional products (marketplace). The trick is being able to provide enough resources to build, launch and market your community, staff and moderate it, continue to develop features, etc. Some consumers may never find your community or may be reluctant to join and give up their “personal data” to participate in the sponsored community. However, the ones who do join are doing so specifically due to your product/service and are looking to interact with you and/or other members. There’s a clear path to engagement with these consumers; but remember that the rules of proper engagement STILL apply here!
• Find, join and participate in existing communities. Search through different social networks, groups, etc for existing organic and hybrid communities that pertain to your brand, products or market. Start by monitoring the conversations and note the content, tone and conversations of the community. Join in the conversations by becoming a participant—NOT a marketer. Content is king, and the more value you add to the community, the more your participation will be welcomed by the community members. The benefit of an existing community is that it exists. People have gathered because of a mutual interest. By joining and participating in communities relevant to your brands market, you have the opportunity promote your brand identity and ultimately attract new customers by being an active and productive member of that community.
3. How can businesses add value to these communities? How do they participate without offending the members?
• Content. Bring useful and valuable content. In the example of a bicycle manufacturer joining a biking enthusiast’s community, sharing information on great bike trails, common bicycle maintenance, bike race information, great biking videos and more WITHOUT touting their own brand’s capabilities will ensure a positive brand image amongst community members.
• Don’t hide who you are. If businesses wish to join existing communities, they should do so under their own brand (or have an individual do so AS a spokesperson for their brand). Hiding an “ulterior motive” will alienate community members and destroy your brand image. Be up front about who you are and mindful of the content and voice you use. Be genuine, and ensure that the people who are representing your voice are equally as enthusiastic about the community’s topic of interest as its members.
• Develop goals, rules and policies. Make sure that you have specific goals in mind regarding your participation in social communities. But don’t let ROI be the primary answer. ROI is a down-stream goal; don’t let it make you focus your efforts on pushing marketing through these communities. Enable people to engage with you (make sure you have links to your website and permission system on your profile), but let the first touch with new contacts be soft. Make sure you have social marketing policies and procedures in place to provide all your employees with the guidance they need to be successful.

What communities have you joined? How are you managing your external “voice” in those communities? Let us know!

Your current clients are the foundation of your business. Without them your business would not exist. Your client base can be the biggest advocate for your company. Make sure you show your appreciation for their business and you will help to develop advocacy and goodwill–and potential referrals for new business.

Client appreciation doesn’t have to be in the form of extravagant events; they can be as simple as sending a card to a customer on their birthday or a bottle of wine to thank them for doing business with you.

The following ideas can help you drive customer retention, advocacy and referral.

1. Greeting Cards. Sending greeting cards is one of the least expensive ways to show appreciation to your clients. It is true when they say, “It’s the thought that counts!” Sending a card to your client on their birthday, when they get a new job or promotion or even if they become a new parent could mean the world to them! Don’t forget to show them that you are thinking about them in the sad times as well; sending sympathy cards when they have an unfortunate event in their family is also another way to show them you care.
2. Books. Choosing a birthday gift for a client can be hard. When you’re strapped for ideas, try sending them a book that had a lot of meaning to you or you thought was a great read. You can even personalize it by sending a golf lover a book of different golf courses across the country or someone who loves cooking a popular cookbook. Make sure you write a special note inside the cover to tell them why you chose this book for them and wish them a “Happy Birthday!” This not only shows them you were thinking of their birthday but also you have listened in the past when they mentioned their hobbies or interests.
3. Gift Baskets. Everyone loves getting gift baskets! The greatest thing about gift baskets is you can personalize them! If you have a client who loves chocolate get them the chocolate lovers basket. Do they like wine? Give them the wine and cheese basket! Gift baskets are a little more expensive so this is something you can give to your top clients around the holidays. If someone lives locally why not deliver the basket to their house so you can wish them “Happy Holidays” in person?
4. Client Appreciation Events. These events can take shape in many different forms from casual to formal. Your clients have different tastes, so you should have several different kinds of events throughout the year to make sure at least one event appeals to each customer. Host a wine tasting at a restaurant or an open house at your office for a more formal (adults-only) event. Don’t forget about the children either! In the summer, host a family fun day at a state park. Including spouses and children is a great way for your clients to see that you are family-oriented as well. The informal setting enables your clients to get to know you on a more personal basis as well.

Showing your clients you appreciate them can be what sets you apart from your competitors. Not only are these ideas a great way to generate referrals, tp increase customer loyalty and to possibly spark a new sale, they can also help you build a relationship that could last a lifetime!

Many of us try to be as “green” as we possibly can in our homes and in our personal lives. We may recycle, turn off lights in rooms we are not in or even rooms we are in, we buy Energy Star appliances and have some sort of water filtration system so we do not have to buy bottled water. If we can make these changes at home, how come when we walk into our workplace, all of that goes out the window?

We can bring our green lifestyles into the word place in cost effective and simple way. Here are a few simple ideas to bring green into your office environment.

1. Recycle. Bring a recycling bin into the office. Let your co-workers know that it is just for plastic and glass items. If there isn’t recycling pick-up at your company, have a different person volunteer each week to bring it to the local recycling center.
2. Reduce the Use of Paper/Plastic Dishes and Utensils. One of the largest amounts of waste in offices are styrofoam coffee cups or bowls,  plastic utensils and paper plates. Start by promoting everyone to bring in their favorite mug from home that they can wash and take home everyday or simply leave at the office. Buy an inexpensive set of utensils and dishwear to leave in the office kitchen, with this make sure you have an office policy that states everyone must wash their dishes after using them or at the end of the day. There is not a magical fairy that comes and cleans the dishes at night after everyone leaves for the day. If there is a dishwasher in the kitchen make sure it is an Energy Star appliance but regardless if it is or not you should not be running it every day. If there is an office party and you have a large amount of dishes, fill it up and run it. Otherwise employees should still be washing their dishes after use.
3. Turn Off the Lights. In most offices the lights are constantly on regardless if anyone is in a particular room or not. If there is no one in the conference room, turn off the light. Make sure employees turn the lights off in the kitchen area when they leave the room; the kitchen or break room should only have a lot of traffic in the morning and during lunch and break hours so there is no need for the light to be on all day. For offices that have cubes and a lot of natural light, discuss possibly turning off some of the the overhead lights near the windows to save on energy. Also let employees know that they can purchase a desk lamp if they are in an area that does not get a lot of light, just make sure to provide them with CFL or LED light bulbs so you don’t negate the energy savings of reducing overhead lighting.
4. Shut Down Your Computer. This has an added bonus! Your computer is not in use at night so turn it off when you leave the office for the day. If it is attached to a power strip make sure you turn that off as well. Do you ever wonder why you have to reboot your computer everyday? That’s because it is running all night and possibly still have applications running. If you starting closing down all applications and shutting down your computer properly, your computer will most likely run faster and will be less inclined to crash. This may not seem like a lot of wasted energy, but every little bit helps.
5. Use Online Document Sharing Services. Why print out employee manuals or internal documents? Save them in a file sharing application such as Google Docs or Dropbox. Everyone that you give access to can then open up these items right on their desktop and they will always know where to find them. If you must print something try and print on both sides of the sheet of paper and refrain from using colored ink. Make sure you only buy recycled paper and if you printed something with a mistake, recycle the misprints or turn them into note paper.

These are five simple ways to promote a green environment in your office. They may seem like little things, but a little bit goes a long way when we are trying to protect and preserve our planet! What green practices have you implemented in your office?

This Idea Spark blog post is the result of the discussion during our Friday morning Creativity Coffee. If you’d like to join us (in person or via web/phone conference), please sign up here. There’s no charge or obligation. We just love ideas and open discussion!

Last week’s Creativity Coffee focused on Social Marketing Business Objectives. One of those objectives was to identify and develop advocates. A large part of that group of social advocates are the influencers—those people whom others follow, engage and seek out for advice, information and even entertainment. A mention, endorsement or positive review from an influencer can go much further than an advertising campaign; this kind of endorsement is seen as more credible, spontaneous and genuine by the social public. Brands are trying to bring those influencers into the fold—to engage them with their brand and to provide them with a positive brand experience. But how do they identify which individuals are key influencers? We originally touched on core characteristics of influencers in an earlier discussion and blog post, but we wanted to dive deeper into the subject. That was the topic of this past week’s Creativity Coffee, and here are some ideas that came from that discussion.

1. How do influencers emerge in a group?
• Teamwork dynamics. Taking an analogy of teamwork exercises, leaders naturally emerge from a group based upon their characteristics that make them a fit for specific roles. The organizer. The leader, the idea person. The doer. Typically, people are drawn to the roles they play in other aspects of life in which they have skill and recognition.
• Personal characteristics. A role is most effectively filled by the person whose intrinsic characteristics—charisma, attention to detail, sensitivities, intellect, ability—are the best match with the requirements of that role.
• Influencers in the digital social community are like those in teams. Online communities are made of loose associations of people talking about common interests. How do influencers emerge on the Social Web? Similar to the team dynamic, natural leaders emerge. Charisma, expertise, organizational skills, problem-solving skills, diplomacy, engagement and involvement of others, and even humor help the natural leader drive the growth and health of a digital community.
• Presence is also key. Involvement, presence, frequency of participation, value of content and persistence within the community also drive people to emerge as the core leaders and influencers in the digital space.
2. How do you identify the influencers on the Social Web?
• Look who’s talking. Which individuals are the most vocal in a specific community? But that shouldn’t be the only measure. Just because someone talks a lot doesn’t mean that others see value in what they say.
• Engagement is key. Do others respond to an individual? Are they engaged in conversation? Do they comment on the person’s posts, links, content, questions, comments? Does the person’s style have an appeal to your target audience? Is that appeal appropriate for your brand? You’re looking for someone who resonates with your target market.
• Don’t discount charisma, personality and ethics. Trust and influence go hand in hand. Even though someone may be engaged and vocal, they can be so in a way that may be more controversial than productive. Make sure to evaluate how the individual’s personality has a positive or negative influence on others. Are they engaging or are they complaining? Do they “play nice” or are they trying to stir the pot? Jerks may attract people due to their controversial nature, but is this someone you want engaged with your brand?
• Your personal experiences can guide you. Think about the communities in which you are engaged personally. Which individuals are the key positive influencers—that emerge to organize the group, that you go to for information, whose opinion matters to others. Ask yourself why that person influences you. Now think of another leader or active member of that organization that is less influential; while engaged, that person’s opinion has less weight because of their personality, ethics or lack of positive impact. We all know how to identify those influencers to target and those to avoid. “Everything you need to know, you learned in 4th grade.”
3. How do you find these influencers?
• Search and Listen. Make sure you’re searching across Twitter, Facebook, blogs, email lists, and other social communities for people talking about your product, your brand, your market or items related to your target customer (events, topics, people, news).
• Evaluate Influence. Look at the depth and breadth of reach—friends, followers, blog subscribers, etc.—as a first indicator (JitterJam’s Jitterater does a great job at this). Dig deeper using some of the characteristics mentioned above to determine potential fit with your brand’s identity. Look further than the last few postings; see how long they’ve been in the social space, how often they engage others and how others respond.

So now that you’ve identified an influencer, how do you start a dialogue? We’ve posted some ideas on Starting a Dialogue with a Consumer that might help you. Have you identified the key influencers in your market? How have you done so, and how are you engaging those individuals? Let us know!

Image Credit: svilen001

This Idea Spark blog post is the result of the discussion during our Friday morning Creativity Coffee. If you’d like to join us (in person or via web/phone conference), please sign up here. There’s no charge or obligation. We just love ideas and open discussion!

It’s no big news that more and more businesses are diving into social marketing—500 million Facebook users are just too hard to pass up! But aside from the obvious audience potential, businesses need to set clear objectives for their social marketing activities in order to develop measurable value for their effort. What are the core business objectives for social marketing? What should businesses be striving to accomplish?

1. Brand awareness.
• Basic objective. It’s a common and basic objective for a brand or business to want to increase brand awareness through social marketing.
• Measurement. Brand impressions are the core measurement, based upon the social following and tangible results from those brand impressions, including web traffic and SEO.
2. Grow the social community.
• After the brand or business has established their social presence, the next objective usually is to grow that follower or fan base. The same metrics apply—number of friends/followers, brand impressions, web traffic and SEO.
3. Identify and develop advocates.
• Inexpensive marketing, sales force. It’s less expensive to develop brand advocates than to run advertising campaigns. Additionally, brand advocates voices are seen as more “genuine” to consumers than the brands themselves.
• Product claims made by brands are met with resistance.“No one believes advertising; we live in a time of disbelief.”
• Consumer brand advocates provide an authentic voice. Authenticity is key. Brand advocates speak to their target segment(s) and enable authentic messages that resonate with their peers. You can’t create and run enough ads and messages to blanket all the potential target segments.
• What makes a good brand advocate? They need to have established expertise. Whether it’s your peer, your uncle or a blogger, people will look at their prior content to see if their opinions are valuable and reliable.
• How do you find and engage a brand advocate? Well, we won’t lie. JitterJam does this very well. But in general, you need to search through the Social Web to find these voices. You then need to evaluate their engagement with your brand, their influence and reach, their prior content, their engagement with others, etc. You want to engage people with genuine enthusiasm for the brand. Use social searches to find those conversations and begin your outreach.
• How does sentiment analysis fit in? Overall sentiment analysis can help you determine how your social marketing is being received. You can track the trends and see the long-term impact of your outreach and advocacy. You can then try to correlate that sentiment analysis with the impact to your business.
4. Provide new channel for customer feedback.
• You may or may not find the true customer voice. Many companies ask direct questions to elicit feedback, but they often don’t get much response. Curb your expectations.
• Larger brands have a better chance to get feedback. Consumers are usually more willing to respond to a larger brand. You need a larger audience to capture that small vocal percentage. However, that vocal public may not be wholly representative of your market. Social media is like talk radio. Those on the extremes are the ones most likely to “call in.”
5. Provide new channel for customer service.
• Be ready. Customer service over public social media channels can have an extremely positive impact on how consumers view your brand. But a single poor experience can also become a very public, viral spiral of negativity and a PR nightmare. Make sure you are prepared to provide excellent service and have policies (including a very clear escalation process) in place to ensure customer satisfaction.
• One size does not fit all. You are not going to be able to please all the people all the time. However, how you handle the situation and work towards resolution will help you even if you can’t completely satisfy the customer. Make sure all your staff is responsive and execute well. They are not only providing customer service, they are acting in a PR role as well.

What are your business objectives for social marketing? How are you measuring your success! Let us know!

A few weeks ago, the FourSquare mayorship of our office was up for grabs.  Over time, a clear winner began to emerge, and the competition became one-sided.  While the battle is now basically over, it illustrated how good-natured competitions within the office can be fun for everyone.

These competitions increase dialogue between coworkers, offering more opportunities for them to connect with one another at work.  This provides another way for employees to get to know each other better, and will create a livelier office environment.  These are some other fun ideas for office competitions:

• Team Events – Separate the office into several teams, and create a fun competition that encourages everyone to participate.  Some events can be beneficial to an entire community as well, like a food charity drive or a recycling contest, while also improving valuable intangibles such as teamwork and overall morale within the office. Provide incentives for participation and rewards to everyone for their engagement.

• Office Olympics – Plan to annually take a full afternoon out of the office for this event.  Choose multiple activities, and develop a scoring method that aggregates accomplishments at the end of the day to determine the top three finishers.  Some of the easier events to run are paper and wastebasket free throw shooting, rubber band archery (shoot at a safe target not at coworkers), and the crucial best coffee contest (judged by all).

• Out-of-Office Challenges – This is more of an activity than a competition. Spend a day at a ropes course completing group challenges with all members of your office.  This teaches people to think together creatively to solve problems and accomplish tasks.  This is a great activity to help each individual build confidence and the team to develop skills outside of the office environment.

Prizes for all of these activities can be tickets to a concert or sporting event, an extra personal day, cash prizes, or anything else that coworkers would see as an incentive.  Be sure to ask for feedback from coworkers after events, so the next competition is even more fun than the last one.  What other ideas and suggestions do you have for office competitions?  How has your office used these in the past?

This Idea Spark blog post is the result of the discussion during our Friday morning Creativity Coffee. If you’d like to join us (in person or via web/phone conference), please sign up here. There’s no charge or obligation. We just love ideas and open discussion!

Our last Creativity Coffee generated a few very thought-provoking ideas. The topic of the week—identifying influencers—is a topic of interest to brand marketers around the globe. What are the hallmarks of an “influencer?” How do we identify and reach them? Are the same criteria applicable across brands, or is it very specific to a product, a market, or even a target market? Here’s some food for thought.

1. What is an influencer?
• Has credibility. A genuine voice is important. Is this person a subject-matter expert?
• Has a voice. People listen and comment on what this individual says.
• People relate. People relate to this individual on some level.
• People trust them. An influencer has established credibility through impartiality and expertise. People see their voice as genuine. Peers can be influencers—and often are; people tend to trust their peers more than companies or brands.
• Has a following. Friends/followers is an indicator. But…
2. It’s not just a numbers game.
• Numbers are only the start. Numbers signify the potential reach of an individual, but it’s not the whole story.
• If someone has 10,000 followers on Twitter, does that make them a key influencer? Or a number jockey?
3. Engagement is key.
• Seeing how much other people are sharing an individual’s content is key to identifying an influencer.
• How often is the individual engaging with others?
• How often are they tweeted/retweeted?
• How many people comment on their blog and engage in discussion?
4. Influence is very market-dependent, but there’s a method to every market.
• Who is in your target market?
• What communities attract that target? Where are they active?
• Who are the most active people in those communities? These are the potential influencers (positive and negative).
• Follow the breadcrumbs: Twitter lists, people being retweeted, people who put out great content, people who have tons of blog comments and hits…
• Recency and relevancy are important. Are they posting content and comments that are trending? Are they relevant to your target market? How often are they engaging in that community?
5. Does celebrity = influence? Sometimes.
• Celebrities are influential when there is relevance. Basketball players and sports apparel are a natural fit—”on brand.”
• In most cases, the celebrity is influential both offline and online.
• Celebrities may have lots of followers, but are they heard? Are people paying attention?

How have you identified the influencers in your market? More importantly, how have you engaged them?

Please let us know what you think. Comment below, or join us (live or via conference) for our weekly Creativity Coffee.