TIME’s 50 Best Websites 2008

TIME Magazine recently released their list of the 50 Best Websites for 2008, and a majority feature some aspect of social media, which goes to show how far this change towards sharing and disseminating information as an online community has progressed. Here are some that caught my attention -

• iliketotallyloveit.com – Shoppers post photos of items they like and other users provide their opinions, with the most popular items appearing closest to the home page. This process has earned the title of ‘social shopping.’
• Zeer – Offers nutritional information and user comments on hundreds of food products, and allows users to join communities to continue the conversation.
• Rate My Professors – Students can log in and comment about professors so you know what you’re getting into before you register for a class, but now professors can provide a rebuttal.
• Urban Dictionary – Particularly useful to those of us adjusting to a new culture, this site provides user submitted slang words and definitions.

You call that news?

One of the interesting impacts that the web 2.0 revolution has had is the shift in who decides what’s newsworthy. A couple of things have led to this change in the flow of communication, and I’ll start with blogs. The idea here is that each individual blogger gets to decide what’s worth writing about based on their own opinions and interests. This means that stories that might not have had a place in traditional media might still be of interest to a blogger and gain coverage nonetheless.

For consumer brands, the conversation has already extended into blogs, so it would definitely be wise to monitor what’s being said from a PR perspective. One example mentioned in Deirdre Breakenridge’s PR 2.0, which I reviewed in my first post, is Starbucks. If someone posts on their blog how they had to wait 20 minutes to be served one day at a particular location, you might just conclude that it’s a one-off experience and thus not worth looking into. However, if when monitoring the blogosphere you discover that a large number of people have complained recently about a long waiting time at Starbucks, it could be a reflection of a larger operations issue that the company should be made aware of.

Speaking of service at Starbucks, this is a pretty funny, loosely related video. Just for fun!

For non-consumer PR, a blog can be a great place to establish or reinforce a brand’s position. As mentioned in a previously posted Q&A, blogs can serve as the company’s authoritative voice, so what’s written on a blog by a company can potentially be quite influential. For example, if an architecture firm wanted to position itself as an industry leader in sustainable design, they could have one of their executives who is particularly experienced or qualified in that area start a blog. The whole focus of the blog would of course be sustainable design and by having the executive express his or her own viewpoints and convey their knowledge on the subject, it would contribute to the firm’s credibility in the area as well.

Another site that challenges what we define as news is Digg. Content is submitted by users – including news, videos and images – and users who read it either Digg it or Bury it. Content is ranked based on overall popularity so the collective community decides what is newsworthy and not editors.

Finally, I’d like to look at iReport. This topic was again mentioned in the previous Q&A, and many networks have done something similar but this is CNN’s version. Citizen journalists are encouraged to send in their own stories or they can choose an assigned topic from a list that CNN provides. Not only are stories featured on the website, but they have the potential to be featured on CNN’s national broadcast, which motivates people to participate.

All of these new media sites challenge the traditional channels of communication between PRs, the media and the public. The interesting thing to see will be how both industries continue to adapt and incorporate new media and change the way they interact with each other – only time will tell!

Social Media Q&A

A lot of people are talking about this topic, and one person in particular that I’ve had quite a few conversations with about social media is Desiree Banugo. She works as a Marketing Communications consultant and specializes in social media and internet marketing. She has a really interesting point of view that I’d like to share with you all in the form of a formal Q&A.

Q: In your opinion, is all the hype around new media justified?

A: Absolutely! However in some markets it will seem more like hype ie business 2 business sector and in others, new media has totally revolutionised their industries such as adult entertainment, music, TV, advertising, newspapers and general retail.

Q: What do you think makes new media a successful (or unsuccessful) method of communication?

A:

• Constantly evolving – it keeps up and at times leads business into new frontiers of communication technologies and challenges the status quo
• Accessibility – widens the reach to a global platform for all messages to mass and even niche markets
• Immediacy – the time required to publish or acquire information is almost instant compared to the print media which is a minimum of next day.
• Communication real estate – low cost of new media supports the inclusion of text, rich media and other formats which would be incredibly expensive in traditional media
• Democratising – levels the playing field for solopreneurs and small businesses with no to low budgets to reach their prospective consumers
• Information wealth - audiences can search and view multiple viewpoints on any subject or issue and thereby also contribute to the conversation
• The customer is truly king – the brand management team also includes the customer – they build (and can also kill) a brand. This may also facilitate a company’s R & D efforts to beat it’s competitors
• Tone of voice – new media doesn’t exclude by geography, dialect, accent, language, class or political affinity unlike some other mediums like newspapers. It’s very conversational in its nature and publishers target their audiences primarily by interest.
  

Versus

• Lack of control of messages once it reaches the public domain
• Time and physical effort to continually feed the social media marketing machine
• Fast evolution leaves users eating the dust trying to catch up and the investment (time and money) required to upgrade knowledge banks and resources to do so
• Slow adoption of new media techniques in the mainstream may cause disputes in the industry resulting in glitches in growth cycle of a business.

Q: Does PR 2.0 have a place in non-consumer sectors?

A: Yes it does. As trade journal circulations numbers dwindle, many editors and journalists will become bloggers and form/join blogger networks according to particular interests. Traditional press releases and press campaigns cannot be transposed for the digital media space and will have to be adapted. I think as this is quite a new-ish area for PR, (they are about 10 years behind traditional marketing), there will be many trials and errors before adopting an acceptable best practice across the industry.

Q: Are there any areas of web 2.0 that you think PRs are overlooking? Are there any that are already over saturated or over hyped?

A: PRs should be paying close attention to the social media which is tailored toward their interests. Social media also broaches that overlap that PR has with marketing, and that’s purely until more businesses get with using social media for b2b purposes.

In general, PRs should be using a blog as their central social media. It’s the one site that they can control and position as the authoritative voice, opinion and viewpoint of their client.

Secondly, PRs must use the top general social media to raise the profile of the clients:

• Facebook (any sector)
• Myspace (entertainment, media or arts sectors only)
• Bebo (youth, and youth-related consumer brands)
• Youtube (any sector)
• Twitter (any sector)

But before all of this, PRs need to clarify what they need to achieve using social media and craft their activities with that purpose in mind.

I don’t think that any are over saturated or over hyped because I do feel that those people with a distinct disdain for web 2.0 is due to disappointment because they didn’t know what to do and how to do it successfully. And the message is simple. Create a profile and get involved in existing conversations without plugging a product (consumer web 2.0 marketing). For business to business 2.0 marketing, there are many business social networks around now, and it’s a case of finding the site where all your potential contacts will be networking and introduce yourself, offering to help where you can. Just like in traditional business networking.

Q: How do you think new media will change the PR industry in the next 5 years?

A: Many TV stations are asking for the public to create the news by uploading news and picture stories directly into the studio, thereby leaving the PR industry in a precarious position. Now look at the democratized internet where a news story could be published as a video, blog post or picture story within 5 minutes of the event.

The PR industry may become restricted to big campaigns and therefore end up merging with digital media and advertising agencies as the overlap between the two grows bigger and bigger.

The role of a PR will change drastically as media relations activity will change to blogger/webmaster activity primarily via email or something like Twitter.

I see PR agencies becoming or forming their own newswires or portals, particularly the larger ones as they will have to disseminate information themselves to retain the ‘freshness’ of news.

Q: What potential effect could being a late adopter of new media have on a brand?

A: 5 years ago, many business advisers and marketers strongly recommended that all businesses must have an online presence. It is said that those that didn’t do so died, even at the peak of the recent boom economy.

Now an online presence is not enough, in order to build an awareness of any brand and get unsolicited advocates, the brand must be endorsed by customers, opinion formers and influencers. There must be lots of easily accessible information for prospective customers to view, interact with and contribute to if they wish. Ideally, the more interactive a brand is online as well as offline and the experience offered will surely get people talking.

In my opinion, it’s best to get started now and figure it out on the way, than be the last company in through the new media gate.

And yet another point of view worth considering! I think Desiree brings up a lot of valid points about social media and many of these points deserve a deeper look so I’ll be expanding on these ideas later in the blog. If you’d like to check out her blog, you can find it here. Thanks, Desiree!

Fans on Facebook

Facebook – the global social networking site – reached a considerable milestone on 26 Aug 2008 when their membership reached 100 million. Creator Mark Zuckerberg has announced another major milestone today on Facebook’s blog. Membership has climbed to a total of 150 million. Almost equally impressive is that nearly half of the users are visiting the site on a daily basis.

Facebook clearly realized the potential for businesses when they launched Facebook Pages back in November 2007. A business or brand can set up a Page to connect with Fans, start a conversation, and share content. Also, only official representatives of a brand, organization or person are allowed to set up a Facebook Page. Facebook also provides information to the creator about the number of visitors to a page. While the pages are open to anyone on the internet, only registered Facebook members can post comments or content.

What I like most is that these Pages facilitate a two-way conversation between companies and consumers in a completely straightforward way. Content is posted both by the representative of the brand and Fans alike. Currently, the top 3 Pages are:

1. Barack Obama – 3,694,210 supporters
2. Homer J. Simpson – 2,127,780 fans (in French)
3. Coca Cola - 1,952,391 fans

Take a look at what’s posted, and at the differences between the Pages. Rather than focusing on the obvious consumer PR relevance of the Coca Cola page, I’d just like to mention a few things about Obama’s page. His unprecedented use of this and other social media platforms during his presidential campaign created a lot of buzz for the future of political PR. Along with photos, videos and news announcements, his Page provides a variety of personal information (such as general interests, favorite books, and educational history).

Major non-profits like Greenpeace International and Unicef also have a Facebook Page. So as you can see, Facebook is yet another web 2.0 tool that can be relevant for both consumer and non-consumer PR. The key is the way that PRs go about it. Users probably wouldn’t appreciate companies or brands flooding their inbox with promotional information, but it’s a completely different ballgame when they actively seek out your brand and openly register and participate as a fan. And thanks to the news feed, a user’s friends will see their activity on a Page as well, which further spreads promotes the Page and the company behind it.

What the world is watching

YouTube is the world’s largest online video community. Hundreds of millions of videos are watched every day, and every minute, ten hours of video content is uploaded. If you had any question of the value of this product of web 2.0, the $1.65 billion that Google paid to acquire it should provide a pretty telling answer.

Operators of social media sites like YouTube are still struggling to perfect their advertising-based revenue stream, judging by this article from CNNMoney.com, but companies are still finding ways to use social media to their advantage.

My first example is Banana Republic. I personally am a fan of this brand, which is how I came across the video, but I think there are quite a few notable aspects from a PR point of view that are worth looking at. First of all, it provides a behind-the-scenes look into their event, which 1) adds to a person’s appreciation when they see how much work is put in, and 2) makes people feel closer to the brand. The video also includes interviews with the President and the Creative Director/EVP of Design. This helps consumers put a name and face along side the brand and makes it more personable.

There’s also the third party endorsement of a number of senior fashion journalists that adds to brand image. This, along with the user openly identifying itself as ‘BananaRepublicPR,’ enhances the overall credibility as well. However, the video is extremely long at nearly ten minutes. The danger here is that you risk loosing the viewers’ attention. Besides that, it’s a great way to showcase a product and a brand all at once. The interactive aspect of YouTube – the comments section, viewer rating and view count – allows people to share their thoughts while also providing feedback to the company. With a five star rating and over 8,400 views, people are clearly interested in what Banana Republic has to say.

Now is YouTube a useful communications tool for non-consumer sectors as well? My argument is yes, and here’s why:

From a PR evaluation perspective, I would say this video about architect David Fisher’s new design is a success. In the six months since it was posted – and at the time of this blog post – it’s been viewed 569,615 times, received 1,042 ratings (for an average rating of 4.5 stars out of 5), and generated 2,764 comments (with the most recent comment posted only 6 hours ago).

For these non-consumer industries, it may seem more challenging to produce videos that would be both relevant to a particular communications strategy and also of interest to the target audience, but that doesn’t mean it should be discounted. Andrew Foote of Pepper Digital had the following to say about web video for B2B clients to Deirdre Breakenridge in her PR 2.0 book: “The fact is, there is a tremendous opportunity for B2B markets to utilize video and audio streaming to reach key stakeholders. Our goal is to help them determine how to strategically utilize online video as a component to a larger communications initiative.”

And then there are those videos like this one that you watch just because. I don’t think Michael Jackson had anything to do with it, but with well over 20 million views, I don’t think he minds the publicity.