Penny Power, co-founder of Ecademy, author and visionary and Andrew Ballenthin, founder of the Community Marketing Blog and President of Sol Solutions an Integrated Marketing Consultancy have teamed up for a series of articles under the theme of "Dialogue From The Head And The Heart on Social Networking".
Their goal is to assist professionals in removing the hype and misinformation around the application of social networks which prevents many organizations from starting and making effective use of today's communication revolution. This is a unique moment in history for connecting to each other as people and collaborating on personal and professional growth together. Both authors will share a complimentary perspective on the steps that make all of this possible and take you on a journey of discovery and application that just may change the way you see the world of social networking.
Article: From Broadcast To Conversation
Part 1: Dialogue From The Heart, By Penny Power
About The Role Of Trust - One of the most commonly used words I hear in business currently is trust. All around people are looking for ways of trusting decisions, people, companies and themselves. The difficulties that we have seen across the world have to a certain extent been created by the brake down of trust between the individuals in society and the companies and institutions. Barack Obama ran his campaign around 'change you can believe in' and some of that desire for change was the desire to trust again.
At company level it is becoming increasingly tough to believe in the ethics and intentions of the 'boards', a thought that is unjust in most cases, but when trust breaks down it impacts many innocents. Many leaders stay away from the coal face and are only recently being held accountable for mistakes and corruption that is being revealed by the media. However, change is a foot and we see inspiring case studies now of leaders of companies realizing that 'conversation with their customers' is the way to build trust. Having Blogs, being on Twitter and talking inside Social Networks is massive progress in the field of building trust.
On the internet we see people moving from being strangers to being friends, an 'open, random and supportive©' attitude to embracing others, not for personal gain but rather than for contribution and support. This is the real power of the internet, where people trust in a new world that will deliver new thoughts, ideas and friendships that will provide for them because of who they are not just what they do.
Moving Beyond Broadcasting With Your Social Network - Broadcast is one dimensional, it is impersonal and is a scatter gun approach to finding someone who may actually be interested in what you provide and can contribute to their life. Broadcasting your message gets you 'known' but dialogue and engagement get you 'liked'. There is a great deal more value on the internet of being liked than there is of just being known. Once you are liked you will be 'followed' advocated, talked about and the value of your brand inside the community that you are in will be your food and create your wealth.
So this leaves one question 'what conversations are you leading, and what emotional vibration do you leave behind that helps people remember who you are?'
Part 2: Dialogue From The Head, By Andrew Ballenthin
Mass Communication Was For Talking To Strangers - Marketing started several thousand years ago when caveman told their story with paints on rock, Egyptians and other civilizations used glyphs and statues to their message and today we're not so different as we tell our story in paper and digital media to mass audiences in hopes they will join us in a cause. But all of these are 'push' forms of communication for reaching potentially faceless masses. While this approach won't disappear what will change is the essential role of dialogue before, during and after your business proposition is shared.
Brand Building Becomes More Powerful One On One - The Nielsen Company reported in April of 2009, the combination of social networks and online video surpassed email traffic in February 2009 hands down. Considering the billions of emails that are exchanged every month this moment is not one to be disregarded. One of the lessons this statistic forewarns is that dialogue is one of the strongest growing factors a professional or organization need to be connected into. While advertising will remain a staple of the revenue generation engine the organizations that become leaders in interacting with their communities will have a far greater opportunity for branding, loyalty, referrals, innovation and a place within the community as authentic citizens.
Quality Of An Audience Trumps Quantity - Companies like Amazon.com and American Express are leading authorities in 'getting to know the audience' by building complex databases that studies their customer's behaviours, adapts, and offers unique services that are at times years ahead of their competition. Starting now, the definition of quality databases must change. Social networks enable organizations to develop a richness not based on studying behaviour but knowing who the audience and customer is based on dialogue. It is realistic to expect companies to need smaller databases of customers in the future because the quality of contact has outweighed the need to communicate to 90-98% of people who don't see value in your latest campaign.
Knowing Your Connection Leads To Dialogue - Hundreds of comments and testimonials abound on how much energy and resource social networks consume with potentially nil payback. When you zoom into how the specifics of the interaction take place you often see that social networks are being used primarily as advertising boards. Realistically few of us would expect to walk into a room of strangers, talk only about ourselves, leave and then expect people calling for our services. It's no different with social networks. By experimenting with smaller audiences and putting energy into creating dialogues with your audience you are less likely to waste time prospecting and more certain of generating opportunities because it's no longer push communication, it's about interaction which is the precursor to a transaction.
Dialogue Is What We Do Offline; It's Time To Bring It Online - My Starbucks Idea and Dove's Real Beauty Campaign are examples of businesses that get it on the mass level that their mission isn't about selling, it's about a social network dialogue with the wider interests of their audience at heart. The reality is we talk about companies, their products, their campaigns and lots more but we also gravitate to those businesses that really want to understand us in most cases. When building a social network follow the rules of great networking and offline communication. Take the time to know what individuals want for themselves and from you and apply the same skills that you would use offline to melt down the walls to enable a transition from strangers to acquaintances and potentially so much more.
You two should write a book about social networking. I'd buy it immediately. Both of you seem to really be looking forward instead of backward. I think I've learned more reading your articles than in the past few weeks of trying to network.
Posted by: Clark Palmer | July 15, 2009 at 03:08 PM