Digigen & The TinMan

I have been avidly reading NYT’s coverage of the NetFlix $1m competition. If you don’t know anything about this, NetFlix hosted a competition to create an improvement in its service.. the prize $1m. The team winners were a 7 man team, who had exactly the same response as the second place losers….except they delivered it 20mins earlier. As the article points out, that is a very expensive 20mins. ($50k per minute)

The good news for all your losers out there, is that these losers have come up trumps. The team from Opera have managed to drum up an additional $10m worth of business directly from the learnings they discovered in the NetFlix process.

I’m sure this isn’t what they originally hoped when they entered but its quite an interesting way of thinking. e.g. Let’s enter this competition and see what learnings we can take from it. If we win great, if we don’t great.

I also wonder how many of these competitions we might see cropping up. Building improvements to eBay’s auction model, Facebook sourcing a new platform design from within its community, the list could go on and on. Perhaps we might even see Craigslist redesigned by someone who has got work through the classified board.

Either way its a nice story to bring a close to a Wednesday workday…

I have been studying social media pages for awhile in my role. We have some real success which we have been running for clients, no more so than Skittle Skuffle on Facebook. One of the most successful brand pages they have run. I think therefore that I have hit on a pretty smart model which I believe demonstrates what brands should be doing. Essentially it shows the real cost of running social media pages, through ad, human and content spends. Of course this needs refining somewhat and we are already on the fifth version. However, here is an original version.

I recently posted an article about Moving Brands and their quest for ideas for the rebrand of London….Although I personally thought that the pitch idea of crowdsourcing was fantastic, unfortunately the GLA didn’t think so and Moving Brands did not win. A real shame for London I think as the ideas, displayed on the www.abrandforlondon.wordpress.com site were absolutely brilliant.

Taking it on the chin like a true English Gent, Moving Brands has posted the full presentation on the site and therefore I am linking to it here.

I personally think the pitch reads really well and that they nailed the idea, but sounds like the GLA didn’t think the same.

The truth is, there is no simple way of doing this. The tools that I have dealt with to date have been consistent in one thing, not getting the completely right answer the first time around. I don’t actually think this is a fault of the tool or the person running the tool. Apart from in one case. Its not even a fault of the brief.

The problem comes from the data revealing more possible connotations each time you run it. Another influencer, another subject we hadn’t considered, more data than before. Because conversations are happening all the time and being started all the time in known and unknown places, the data set from buzz technology consistently shifts as well.

Therefore, getting buzz monitoring right is difficult and takes alot of manual intervention. It seems to me to pay to take a step back from the data and have a think about how it pans out, analyse it for yourself, then get the client involved. What do they think? What is important to them? Are we both trying to get the same things out of it?

I think the following diagram best represents the way buzz monitoring should work, a reduced emphasis on the buzz tool’s owners, and more emphasis on client and agency. Essentially, this is a top heavy approach but one which I think gives most benefit.

The rise of social media has meant it is easy for consumers to talk about their bad experiences with a brand. Although sometimes its hard to tell the truth from the chaff, these reviews can have a poingnant effect on a brand’s reputation and potential success. Some have embraced bad reviews and made better products, some have continued to make the same products thinking the reviews will go away. Kryptonite is an example of the former, Bose an example of the latter.

The consumer reviewer is indeed the one who holds the power. Even the stats are telling us so…. 78% of consumers have bought a product based on another consumer’s review, approx 43% of Europeans have bought a product based on a conversation in social media. (Jupiter 2009 and Fleischman Hillard 2008) So the clear output is make better products, provide a better service or feel the wrath of the consumer.

It isn’t just review sites which have enabled consumers to fight back. The cost of producing a site through the likes of blogger, the ease of using Google to push your message, and the time it takes (minimal) means consumers can fight back efficiently. The case in point is Audi Edinburgh.

As you can see from the above Google grab, a wiley consumer has played Audi at their own game. Having been serviced badly this consumer took matters into his own hands and launched the website www.EdinburghAudiPoorService.co.uk. As you will be able to see from the site, he is none too happy and is seeking revenge. He has actually been pretty clever in terms of using Google to back up his site. For the keyword “Audi Edinburgh” he can expect to generate around 5,000 searches in the month. If Audi are lucky he may just end up running out of money, unless of course a clever sponsor comes in e.g. BMW.

Two ways how this exposure to small arms fire can be alleviated for brands?

1) Ongoing Investment in Social Media Monitoring

I believe brands who effectively monitor social conversations and review sites, can alleviate these sorts of problems pretty quickly. Domino’s Pizza now know when anyone sneezes cheese onto their pizzas for this very reason. Its  clear from reading conversations around the web that Edinburgh Audi has been reliable for bad customer service and this seems like the tip of the iceberg. An earlier reaction to this could have stopped this taking place.

2) Rapid Reputation Management

Like a Kwik-Fit fitter, Audi should have been quick out the blocks to quell this problem. They could now outbid the user and engage in dialogue within Google. e.g. “We are sorry. From Audi Edinburgh” could be an effective way of going cap in hand. Maltesers certainly saw this when they reacted to news of their Rubber Maltesers, embarking on a rapid PPC campaign.