Random Acts of Awesomeness Day? Awesome!

What an awesome idea for associations: Random Acts of Awesomeness Day (RAAD). This is such a cool way to show appreciation for your members, especially those participating in your online communities.

What's the ROI of Everything Other Than Social Media?

The first Buzz2010 event is over, but there are still two more to go! On July 20 I'll be going to Managing Risk and on August 18 I'll be going to Social Media ROI. Woo hoo!

As if I weren't already psyched about both of those, this awesome slideshare by Olivier Blanchard is a must-watch and his session in August will, I'm sure, be equally don't-miss.

Here's what I want to know, though: with all this talk about the ROI of social media, why is it that nobody ever seems to stop to look at the ROI of anything else? Yes, social media is new and therefore under the microscope--but isn't there some business thing that says the ROI of every business activity should be regularly scrutinized? It seems to me that once something becomes established as "ROI positive" or whatever people are trying to prove that social media is, it becomes grandfathered in and nobody ever questions it.

So instead of questioning the ROI of social media, I personally wonder if others have to go through such hoops to justify their jobs. Like PR, for instance. What's the ROI on that? How about accounting? Payroll? IT? Do organizations regularly take a microscope to those positions to decide if they're still relevant, still worth the same salary, still worthy of X number of staff positions?

If not, why not?

Associations and Community Management Are Like PB&J

Whenever I read articles like this one about Community Managers for brands, I admit it--I say a little prayer of thanks that I work for an association. Why? Because being a community manager for a brand seems like much harder work than managing a pre-existing community. Talk about low-hanging fruit: associations already ARE communities.

Take a look at Facebook if you don't understand what I mean. Every day as I scroll through my feed I thank my lucky stars that I'm not a community manager for a brand. Basically they have to create an artificial community from people who are fans if they're getting something free or discounted but who mostly are there to gripe about how much they hate the brand. This quote from the Ad Age article above speaks volumes to me:

"One of the dangers of how it's being handled right now is the idea that every brand is going to have a community, and every community is going to have a community manager," she said. "The challenge is whether there's really a reason for that community to adhere."

Meanwhile, every association already IS a de facto community. True, not all of those community members are active online....yet--and "yet" is the operative word. Which would you rather--start as community manager at Brand X and have to start a community from scratch while upper management looks at their watches, waiting with baited breath to see the ROI on hiring you...in other words, WHERE ARE THE LEADS AND SALES?!...or start as community manager at an association of like-minded professionals who are already paying dues for one primary purpose: to connect with fellow members?

I Got My New iPhone 4 ...And All You Get is This Sorry Video Post

Wow I am bad at video blogging. That's all I have to say about that.

Is Social Media Marketing Teaching Consumers It's Good to Whine on Twitter?

Twilight Zone - It's A Good Life
Originally uploaded by HELLO CHICAGO

Interesting article on this in yesterday's Advertising Age. This is something I've blogged about this before and think the answer is absolutely yes. It's to the point that when friends complain about bad service with a company, I tell them "just tweet about it" because 9 times out of 10 that's what works.

I have no idea if this hypothesis is true or not, but I would venture to guess that marketing people make more than customer service people. Therefore, marketing people, armed with their social listening dashboards and gunning to keep their shiny-new social media jobs by proving ongoing ROI in the form of satisfied customers are under the gun to quickly identify gripers, turn those frowns upside-down by any means necessary, then report the success stories back to marketing. Marketing then turns around and gets great press out of their innovative social media responsiveness--Comcast, Best Buy, United....there's a big rockstar quotient in social media.

Customer service--not so much. Customer service people are in their regular old jobs with regular old metrics and regular old accountability--what's their motivation to jump through hoops to placate whiny tweeters? If social media "lives" primarily in marketing, what incentive to customer service people answering old-school phones and/or email inquiries have to quickly resolve issues? And even if they wanted to are they empowered to do so? I'd guess no.

As is the case with everything in life, leverage is what gets results. Customers used to be at the mercy of companies--they needed what companies provided. Now companies need what customers have the power to create: accolades on Twitter and Facebook and blogs and Foursquare and Yelp and YouTube and all the rest of it. The customer is now like that kid in that episode of Twilight Zone--the one where the kid could wish anything he wanted into existence and everyone was scared of him. Consumers now have the power to wish businesses into the cornfield and brands are scared.

Social Media ROI: You Get Out What You Put In

Trying to figure out how much a Facebook "liker" is worth (can Facebook just give it up and change that back to fan please?) is apparently tricky business. First Adweek reported that Facebook fans were worth $3.60 each. Suddenly that number skyrocketed: a more recent study claimed that each fan is worth $136.38. Great news, right?

Apparently not, according to Social Media Examiner; today they reported that most marketers are actually not finding social media to be profitable. But what about those Facebook fans worth $136.38 apiece?

Which is it--social media is great or doesn't work at all? According to Social Media Examiner, what you get out of social media is only as good as what you put in. Companies that have social media strategies and managers dedicated to implementing them are twice as likely to be successful. Makes sense--right? I mean, what other endeavor would companies expect to be successful at without a strategy or any dedicated staff--except maybe an intern or some volunteers? Yet, with social media, that's exactly how many companies are approaching it--first let's experiment in a haphazard way with no real goals or strategy or devoted staff...then if it works maybe we'll think about hiring someone to do it for real. If not, it proves this stuff is just a fad and not worth investing time or money in anyway.

This video by John Haydon about how to use Facebook Insights to measure is not only great in its own right but also gives valuable insight into WHY social media requires staff dedicated to nurturing, building, and analyzing it in order to provide value. The video is about 6 minutes long but it's worth sitting through, if for no other reason than to understand exactly what kind of effort is required to be successful in social media.



Look how painstaking the process is for identifying influencers among your Facebook fans. As John puts it, "building community is high-touch by default...there's no automated way to do it." Best quote EVER about WHY online community and social media are not things that happen in a vacuum or without sustained, dedicated effort.

Women and Salary Negotiation

I saw someone talking about this post on Twitter and went to read it for myself because I wasn't sure what all the fuss was about. Turns out padding your salary when a potential employer asks what you're making is such bad advice--for women--that Dailyworth had to retract the post.

Seriously? I think that's utter BS. The last thing women need is another reason to be namby-pamby about salary negotiation. Notice that it's perfectly acceptable for a recruiter to offer what the woman is currently making--what's up with that? You're telling me men routinely accept job offers for no more than their current salary?

Here's the reality: it's 2010 and women still make only $.77 per $1 that men make for comparable jobs. If what it takes to close that gap is a little harmless exaggeration I say who does it hurt? An employer should be offering a salary commensurate with the worth of the job they're hiring for, not basing it on a past job anyway.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Buzz2010 and Charlene Li's Open Leadership

Today I had the awesome experience of meeting Charlene Li at Buzz2010--and I'm still buzzing! I can't even describe how great it was--between being 5 feet away from Charlene to how great her presentation was to how relevant it was to associations in particular to her signing my book....Ok, I'll digress now.

• Here's the Twitter transcript from the event, if you're interested in what kind of buzz the event generated.
• In case you haven't read Open Leadership yet, here's my post about it--a definite must-read (the book, not my post...although I was psyched to get an email today asking permission to run it in Association Trends.)
• Since I already had a copy of the book, I decided to have some Twitter fun and do a giveaway of the copy I got at Buzz2010. I told my Twitter followers the first person to respond telling me what Mizz Information means would win it. Jennifer Berk got it right away!
  
  

  @maggielmcg Learn something new every day. An Upsy Downsy doll. Those are clever and mildly disturbing.less than a minute ago via SeesmicJennifer Berk
  jcberk

  
  
  I even got Charlene to sign it for her. See, Twitter isn't totally useless!

Internet Safety Month--And Why Parents MUST Be On Facebook if Their Kids Are

If I wasn't already aware of the importance of Internet Safety Month, spending some time perusing my kids' Facebook accounts this weekend would have been a sobering wake-up call. (My kids are 14 and almost 12 and yes, both have Facebook accounts--monitored by me.)

The thing is, I was already very much aware of the need for parents to be tuned into exactly what their kids are doing online and with whom...and I am STILL shocked/worried/disgusted by what I saw. Because it drives home the reality that there are MANY kids online whose parents have no clue what Facebook is or why they need to be monitoring/mentoring their kids on safe/smart use of it.

So what did I see that was so horrible? In addition to the general over-sharing by these tweens ("Going to hang out at [insert specific mall or other place] with [other kids' first and last names]--do you really want your kids sharing this specific information with the world?], the rampant cursing by kids 11 and younger (yes, I'm aware that Facebook "requires" kids have to be 14 to have an account; in reality, kids put fake birthdays and set up accounts so if you're thinking "my kid isn't on Facebook" you might want to double-check that), I was shocked to see an 11 year-old girl's update "Roses are red, violets are blue ,sugar is sweet ,and so is your boyfriend in bed"....as well as one of the responses, this also from an 11 year-old girl "roses are red , daisies are white , you're boyfriends dick is outta sight."

Where the hell are the parents?! I'll tell you where: out there, with the majority of parents who think Facebook is a waste of time and a fad and see no reason to even know the first thing about it. You tell me: isn't the fact that 11 year-old girls are saying stuff like this reason enough that EVERY parent, no matter how truly stupid Facebook may or may not be, needs to be on it so they a) can serve as role models for their kids in the online social networking space and b) so they can SEE for themselves the kinds of stuff their own kids are posting and put a stop to it?

Still unconvinced? Then how about the messages in my 14 year-old's inbox--messages I was beyond relieved to see her answers to but also messages which made my blood run cold because if my daughter was a different kind of kid...well, I don't even want to think about it. What messages, you ask? Messages from guys asking to be her friend, to which she responded (an internally proud moment for me) "Do I know you?" and their responses, which made my stomach drop: "no, but your eyes are so beautiful I would love to get to know you" or some variation of that. Her responses to each of these again made me proud--flattery gets you nowhere with my daughter--"Um, I don't know you so no."

How about your teenaged--or pre-teenaged--daughter? Is she insecure about her looks and/or popularity? How would she respond to compliments from boys or friend requests from strangers who tell her she's beautiful? Do the words "pedophile" or "predator" mean anything to you?

Still think you don't need to be on Facebook?

Here's the reality: kids are using Facebook. It's not all fun and games. They need someone to guide them, tell them what's ok and what's not, what's safe and what's not...and if you have a kid, that someone is you. Period.

Open Leadership--and Why Associations Shouldn't Outsource Social Media

I was privileged to receive a review copy of Charlene Li's new book Open Leadership. With almost every page turn I couldn't help but think "every association leader needs to read this book." One line in particular jumped out at me:

"The first step is to understand the specific benefits of being open, which is especially important to put forward to an organization and leaders who may be beset with the inertia of precedence."

How great/applicable is that phrase "inertia of precedence" to associations, the hotbeds of "we've always done it this way"?

I love that the opening example in the book is of Wendy Harman at the American Red Cross, because--well, because she's awesome for one--but also because the anecdote about how she worked to indoctrinate first the executive team then over 700 local chapters illustrates the importance of the social media manager role. Plenty of people--including, ironically, Charlene Li herself--say that organizations shouldn't have a designated person "in charge of" social media; that it should be part of everyone's job. While that's a nice sentiment and something to strive for, the reality that Open Leadership addresses is that before that can happen, leaders need to learn to let go and embrace the concepts of openness and social technologies. I firmly believe that in order for that to happen, there needs to be a Wendy Harman-esque person on staff to help that happen.

What this means is that hiring an intern or outsourcing social media are, in my opinion, not viable alternatives if an organization wants to successfully implement a culture of openness and/or a social strategy. In the book Charlene says "No matter how compelling a technology or potential relationship might be, in the face of an immovable mass called company culture, and without the right organization and leadership in place, any digital strategy will fail." In my opinion, in order for the necessary cultural change to take place, there needs to be a person on staff whose job is helping bring about that change--and there are too many facets of that process to make outsourcing a viable option. There's nothing wrong with using consultants to educate or train staff, but the change to a more open culture needs to happen within the organization.

At any rate, the book is about much more than this one issue--I honestly think it is a must-read for any leader or wanna-be leader, especially those in the association world. Why specifically in the association world? Because while more and more associations are implementing social initiatives like white-label platforms, Facebook pages and Twitter accounts, for the most part, corresponding cultural changes necessary for the success of those initiatives are not happening. Silos are still rampant. Poor or no communication between executives and staff is commonly the rule. The myth of control is still going strong.

Here's the thing: for some reason I received not only a review copy but another complimentary copy of the book. So guess what? One of you lucky readers can win it! All you have to do is leave a comment and on Friday (6/11) I'll pick a winner at random and send you the book. Don't stress about the comment part--you can either add a thought or two about how open (or not) the organization you work for is, how you're staffing for social media, etc. Or if that requires too much thought, just leave your name and email address or Twitter handle so I'll be able to contact you if you win.

**Update**
Congrats Janet McNichol--you won the book! (convenient for me since she works at ASHA; and in case anyone's wondering how I picked the winner I used Random.org).