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This marketing visual was inspired by Chris Brogan. Check out his original post: Cultivate an Active Network.

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New Marketing Snakes and Ladders

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Today I wanted to illustrate how to use the network update feature on LinkedIn to connect people to your online content.

In this example, I’ll be demonstrating how I introduced my network to a marketing e-newsletter that I publish every month. My goal in this case was to engage new readers and turn them into subscribers.

This tool is also great for connecting your network to other content you publish, like:

• a blog post
• a whitepaper or e-book on your website
• any content you feel is helpful and relevant to your target audience

After going through the few easy steps outlined in the video above, your network will receive an update with a live link directing them to your content. If you’ve got some cool stuff you want to share with your target audience, using LinkedIn network updates is a great way to spread the word.

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Social media is intangible - how do you quantify the ROI of online social tools that are based on human networks and one-to-one (micro) interactions?

Vancouver based consultant, blogger and author, Shane Gibson, recently posted a great podcast that discusses 26 ways to measure social media ROI.

Being Social

What resonates with me is the connection between online social networking and being social in your physical community.

Some people ignore or abandon social media because of its digital nature - they might not view the benefits of online social networking in the same way they see the ROI of being a member at their local Chamber of Commerce.

In my opinion, online social media and face-to-face networking need to be viewed through the same lens. Both involve social interaction, contributing to a community and getting out what you put in -  The only difference being the medium.

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Is marketing EQ becoming more important than IQ? If building a successful brand or simply selling your “stuff” depends on creating an emotional connection with your target audience, is your level of emotional intelligence as a marketer becoming as important as your ability to implement marketing tactics?

As social media and online marketing continue to provide infinite access to the marketplace, will your success be based more on learning how to use the tools or understanding the emotional needs of the people you are communicating with?

Changing Skill Set

Social media and search technology has changed the way businesses communicate with their tribes. New marketing skills will likely need to emerge and evolve in order to keep pace and increase the odds of success.

Louise Robertson, owner of Bright Business Concepts, a marketing communication agency in Guildford, UK, feels that the required skill set for marketers is changing rapidly.

“Building a successful brand depends on the ability to create an emotional connection with a target audience and the ability to message these groups in an engaging manner,” says Robertson. “Success is not only based on learning to use the tools but understanding the emotional needs defined by target audiences.”

Okke Amerongen, Owner of Okke Internet, a web consultancy in Utrecht, Netherlands believes the importance of emotional intelligence is highly underrated by marketers. He theorizes that the dynamics of traditional marketing create a Jeckell and Hyde complex amongst some marketers.

“Most marketeers actually have a high EQ when you meet them outside of work,” says Amerongen. “Once they take on their professional role as company marketers, most of them will think of ways to talk TO people and not WITH people.”

On the other end of the spectrum, Erica Friedman, President of Yuricon LLC, a publisher based in New York City, validates emotional connectivity but leans towards marketing IQ as being more important.

“Unless the emotional connection to a brand can be converted into action for a brand, emotion is pretty meaningless,” says Friedman. “I can say I ‘like’ or ‘love’ a brand, but unless there is some action attached to it, my support is empty - If marketers want to understand emotional equity, they need to understand how to harness that emotional energy…Just becoming a fan of a brand isn’t enough.”

Balance

Deborah Bifulco, Certified Guerrilla Marketing Coach and Owner of Bifulco Business Solutions LLC, an entrepreneur focused coaching and mentoring practice in New York City, thinks that your marketing EQ and IQ can’t really be separated. She suggests that, in order to be an effective marketer, businesses need to understand what drives people to buying decisions - and that implies some level of EQ.

“Granted, there are plenty of ‘functional’ marketers who are stuck on the facts, figures, mechanics, and metrics of marketing,” says Bifulco. “But, when you look at truly successful campaigns, more often than not, you will find that they have engaged us emotionally on some level.”

The New Frontier

Creating an emotional bond with the consumer is a fundamental in advertising - but has social media, and the possibility of engaging in real time micro-interactions, changed the relationship between marketing IQ and EQ? If so, how?

Martin Smith, Chief Technology Officer at TruEffect, a relationship advertising firm based in Denver, Colorado, feels that advertisers already understand the importance of an emotional connection at the mass market level - but that the need to balance EQ and IQ is becoming more visible when delving into the micro-marketing.

“Brand building in traditional media was/is all about EQ creating the emotional connection of the product to the consumers that, on a mass basis, moved the most share in aggregate,” says Smith. “In focus groups consumers relayed the emotion of how their soap powder was like a ‘white knight’ or other powerful sentiment of their association to the personality of the product.”

However, when it comes to social media, the playing field has totally changed. The single mass market has turned into multiple micro-groups, each with different needs. This highlights the importance of both tactical knowledge and emotional intelligence.

“In a market where we measure share, intent, action and need at a single user level, we are now able to see the balance more clearly,” says Smith. “But more importantly, we can take action on smaller groups - This creates new tension in the yin and yang of EQ/IQ. Instead of single position we can now move to micro-groups of multiple millions.”

In closing, Smith goes on to say that marketing in the social media era is not so much about increasing EQ over IQ or vise verse, but rather, understanding the difference and importance of both with the aim creating an effective combination.

“Now it is about aligning the optimal message (to micro-segmented audiences) to key drivers of engagement that combine EQ & IQ,” says Smith. “The traditional drivers of response, audience, timing, offer, creative, etc. are now within the web context - So when you work both sides of it, that is when you truly see results that deliver on the promise. We now have a different challenge of making ourselves relevant and emotionally connected with audiences of one in real time . . .but then that is why we built what we’ve built.”

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Notes:

• What are your most important interaction channels?
• Where can you have the highest impact with your target audience?
• How well do you communicate at each touch point?
• Is your brand message consistent?
• Does your target audience have a positive experience at each point of interaction?
• Take an objective look at each interaction channel - What can you do to improve the experience for your clients and prospects?
• Develop some strategies for each audience touch point - What is the goal of each interaction?

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Has the proliferation of social media tempered our desire to get out of the office and build face-to-face (F2F) relationships? Is social media actually making business people less social or simply modeling the new wave of digital communication?

Global Village

As global communication becomes second nature, are business people defaulting to social media to interact locally as well (at the expense of F2F communication)?

Jessica Routier, a Virtual Assistant with IAC Professionals, feels that the convenience of being able to build online relationships with prospects and clients outside your trading area hasn’t eroded the importance of personal networking.

“Social Media has provided a communication portal for online businesses that do a majority of their business with people so far away from them geographically that they will never see them face-to-face anyway,” says Routier. “But I don’t think that social media is taking away from face-to-face interactions - companies that have a majority of their clients in close proximity still realize the value of in-person contact.”

Lance Cordill, an experimental marketing and promotions specialist based in Fort Wayne, Indiana, believes that Social Media has its purpose but that the more time we spend communicating digitally, the less time we have in front of decision makers.

“For people in smaller markets who are ambitious and confident enough to compete with those in larger markets, using electronic social media may be the only practical way to go,” says Cordill. “But, when all is said and done, when it comes showtime…time to actually perform with your product or service, a digital image of such or text can’t replace the real deal.”

Catalyst or Crutch?

Social Media offers a great opportunity for professionals to develop business relationships online and can be a great tool to help initiate face-to-face interaction. On the other hand, it might be a crutch for some business people…making it easy to communicate without having to get out of their comfort zone and meet people face to face. Are businesses using Social Media to pave the way for F2F interaction or as a tool to help them avoid it?

Oscar Trelles, a Technology Director at Domani Studios, an New York based advertsing agency that is dedicated to digital media, feels that Social Media tools are effective and can be used to help build personal relationships online & act as a bridge for face-to-face interaction.

“Social media has enabled contact that wouldn’t be possible otherwise. Face-to-face interaction is important, both within a company and in reaching out to existing and potential clients and partners,” says Trelles. “In my own experience, social networks have allowed me to reach out to more people that I could have ever done in person, while making efficient use of my time. Deals are always closed in person, but social networking tools can help getting there faster and more efficiently.”

Liz Ingle, an Account Executive at MeadsDurket, a San Diego branding firm, believes Social Media has a purpose - to help connect people that would otherwise have a hard time meeting face-to-face - But also thinks that Social Media is reducing the number of F2F interactions between business people. She is concerned about some of the negative effects Social Media might be having on our ability to communicate F2F.

“If business people rely to heavily on social media and other forms of electronic communication, they’ll lose skills needed to build interpersonal relationships,” says Ingle. “Business people need to be cognitive of our actions and not allow our relationships to be primarily type based - We need to balance how we communicate and continue our efforts to build relationships through personal experience with our contacts.”

Resistance

Are some industries more apt to engage in Social Media than others? Do certain organizational cultures resist Social Media because they embrace F2F as being more effective or because they are intimidated by the technology or fear of change?

Casey Rhodes, a Senior Communication Specialist, is part of a team that is facing some interesting challenges implementing Social Media at their insurance/financial sector firm.

“Based on my experience and research within this particular culture, I’ve found that employees are actually less receptive to engagement with peers and managers by means of new social media tools,” says Rhodes. “The surveys we’ve conducted (after implementation) show that employees are resistant, or don’t see the value in it, and would much rather communicate and interact face to face.”

Communication Skill Set

Generation Y (b.1980-1995) are the Social Media pioneers. What are the effects of growing up in the midst of a technological renaissance? Is Social Media improving or eroding the communication skill set of the next generation of business people?

Kaitlyn Smeland, an Account Manager at Search Mojo, a SEO/PPC management firm in Charlottesville, VA, wrote a great blog post questioning whether social media is making us anti-social and effecting our communication skills. Here are few excepts:

Oxford neuroscientist Susan Greenfield believes that social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter may negatively affect children’s attention spans and social skills: “I often wonder whether real conversation in real time may eventually give way to these sanitized and easier screen dialogues”. Greenfield believes young people are no longer as well acquainted with the more direct work involved in face-to-face relationship building; instead they are more comfortable in the faceless, removed world of tweets.

A recent UCLA study at the Memory and Aging Research Center also concludes that “digital natives” (younger people who spend 8.5+ hours per day online) generally display poorer people skills and empathy.

Engagement

Engaging with your target audience is critical whether you use Social Media as a primary form of business communication or as a tool to facilitate F2F interaction.

Deanna Vincent, owner of Boston based Web Content, feels that Social Media, if manged properly, can act as a bridge to more meaningful F2F interactions - but professionals need to get engaged online and invest the time to learn how to use Social Media tools effectively.

“I’m surprised how many successful businesspeople I’ve met recently can’t translate simple social graces into social media, says Vincent. “In order for social media to be engaging, one must BE engaging.”

Vincent suggests Social Media uses try to incorporate some of the following practices into their online interactions in order to try to become “engaging business posters”:

• link out to resources on the web that help solve problems or help people discover new ideas
• add some personal tidbits that tie-in to a business mission - this will allow you to get to know the person even better than F2F would typically allow
• recommend real world events that you will be attending to help convert social-media followers to F2F

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Word of Mouth (WOM) is enigmatic - fairly straightforward and simple to understand yet elusive and difficult to engage, spread and sustain.

Here is are a few ideas/elements that make up word of mouth marketing (I’m sure I’m just scratching the surface with this post so please feel free to add thoughts and ideas to the list by posting a comment):

Viral Capacity

• WOM + Social Media + Global Connectivity + Inexpensive Publishing Tools =Viral Capacity

Consumer Empowerment

• Technology has enabled today’s consumers to voice their opinions and experiences about issues, products/services or brands.
• As a business owner, it’s important to understand the power of WOM
• Embracing an empathetic approach during individual interactions and across all marketing touchpoints can ignite WOM
• Think about your brand experiences as a consumer - who would you talk to about your product/service and what would you say?

Positive Interactions

• WOM is fueled by positive interactions across all your touchpoints (the places where stakeholders come in contact with your brand i.e. website, tradeshow, retail store, customer service desk, etc.)
• Macro: Experiences that stem from organizational elements i.e. company policies, quality standards, etc.
• Micro: Experiences that are impacted by individual interactions i.e. the accommodating customer service rep, the friendly deliver driver.
• The type of macro/micro interactions stakeholders have with your product, service or company will have a big impact on whether WOM occurs…and whether it will be positive or negative.

Lead Generation

• Delivering on your brand promises builds loyalty and trust
• Loyalty and trust leads to WOM
• WOM translates into referrals and sales leads
• Referrals from WOM are cool because they include some inherent trust in your brand passed on from influencers

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“Performing search engine optimization on a crap-filled site just makes it slightly less crappy.” (David Meerman Scott)

Source: SEO and Your Crap Filled Site (Web Ink Now)

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