How to evaluate a social media partner

What’s the biggest bandwagon for marketing/communications firms in 2010, covering the span of Web developers, creative and advertising agencies and PR firms alike? No shocker here: it’s social media.

Having worked in social media for a few years now with a wide variety of clients, and hearing how different “gurus” sell themselves, there’s no doubt it pays to evaluate as well as ask the tough questions. Here are a few from our perspective that any skilled social media pro would not only be willing, but eager, to answer:

Do strategies and tactics always start with listening/monitoring?
Social media is the equivalent of joining a conversation at a cocktail party. You wouldn’t just burst in and start talking without first listening to know who is there, what topics of conversation are being discussed and what perspective you might be able to lend. Gauge your approach with these questions:
• What industry-leading share of conversation tools have they used, what do they recommend and why?
• How is monitoring information analyzed, shared, reported and utilized?
• Is it considered top priority before embarking on any effort?
• Are recommended strategies based on listening?

What’s the depth of experience?
Social media strategy is much more than deciding when to start a Twitter handle. Consider:
• The variety of brands, products, efforts, projects and the ability to spark word-of-mouth movements utilizing the right combination of solutions is a gauge.
• Determine how long social media has been an integrated core competency (beware if it’s just recently been tacked on).
• Find out what combination of experience the hiring manager prioritizes for the social media team.

How deep is the knowledge about your brand, tone, voice and priorities?
Social media gives voice to a brand. Does your partner understand what tone to take?
• What depth of experience is offered when it comes to knowing internal and external protocol, products and offerings?
• How integrated is your social media partner with the rest of your organization?
• Is there a willingness to team up, help educate and share best practices with internal partners who may be best suited to represent the company?

How are long-term plans/management realities considered?
It’s one thing to start a social media initiative, it’s quite another thing to keep it going.
• What is the game plan for not only building, but maintaining and partnering for the long run?
• What experience is there for not only starting, but fostering and building communities over time?
• Are ongoing costs in terms of time commitment/budget impact factored in up front?
• Does your partner think in terms of social media “campaign” spurts or long-term customer engagement?

Are PR best practices and principles integrated seamlessly?
At the heart, social media is simply a form of how your brand relates to and interacts with the public.
• What experience is offered for building communities, generating news and sparking word-of-mouth movements?
• Is top-level print and broadcast journalism expertise for content generation offered?
• What experience is there for handling online crises/issues?
• Are quality user-friendly ideas and content that compels and attracts audiences prioritized over developing tools, apps and channels?
• Is the philosophy to treat people like people, not marketing categories–tapping into audience passion points and interests vs. simply pushing marketing messages?

How are social media solutions weighted in terms of the overall marketing mix?
Social media should be part of an integrated marketing effort to best reinforce brands and to determine what the most effective communications solutions may be. Find out:
• Will social media be evaluated objectively and appropriately balanced as part of the larger, overall mix? How will this be accomplished?

What’s the biggest challenge/biggest success you’ve experienced?
Social media is a relatively new frontier, and it is evolving all the time. Anyone who tells you they have it all figured out isn’t being transparent (a must for social media, by the way).
• What is the biggest lesson you’ve learned when it comes to projects you’ve worked on?
• How do you set objectives and measure success?

Finally, does the approach follow overall marketing best principles?
Be wary of any social media plan that doesn’t start with research, strategy, objectives, audience identification, tactics, measurement.

Social media isn’t a bandwagon, it’s an increasingly important part of the mix and a great way to build relationships with audiences. We’re interested to hear your perspective on how you’ve vetted the right partners to help build your brand’s presence.

After the release of Microsoft’s latest search engine investment, Bing http://www.bing.com, there was an onslaught of credible and non-credible reviews of everything from its underlying technology to the choice of its name. The most ironic comments were from many a Scotsman; the word “bing” in Scotland can also refer to a wastepile.

In Google’s Technology Overview http://www.google.com/corporate/tech.html, the perfect search engine is defined by co-founder Larry Page as something that “understands exactly what you mean and gives you back exactly what you want.” Anyone who’s recently committed a search query to the annals of Google’s SERPs (search engine results pages) does realize this is more of a quest than current reality.

I’m not here to pore over discovery into the poor makings of a search engine, nor wax poetic on the glorious wonders of search visualization, however, part of what I get paid to do and definitely what drives me as a digital strategist is to understand current technology trends and to glance into the future to identify what brands should be paying attention to.

The reality is that semantic and visual search options are here. And, if you’re a big brand relying on the 90% (and growing) market share that Google and its partners in SERPs Yahoo and Bing hold, you’re playing the right odds. But, for every monolithic corporation there are a handful of visionaries and technologists that are willing to take a risk at making something better and more powerful for the user.

That said, there’s a movement around the creation of common information structures. The W3C has published guidelines at http://www.w3.org/RDF/FAQ on participating in the Semantic Web. It’s also worth looking at Common Tag http://commontag.org and others on the development of an open tagging format. On April 13, 2009, Arun Radhakrishnan wrote a post on Search Engine Journal regarding “9 Semantic Search Engines That Will Change the World of Search,” http://www.searchenginejournal.com/semantic-search-engines/9832/, and I believe he and others are definitely onto something. The crux of the situation is that users still want the fastest route from query to results; but the majority of those users doesn’t necessarily care or understand its relevance. So cycling aficionado that I am, I decided to dive into some searches.

In a quick comparison of Hakia (one of the aforementioned “9”) vs. champion Google for the term “Tour de France,” each yielded similar results. Even though Hakia was developed by looking closer at ontology and semantic rankings, it really doesn’t yet take advantage of many Web assets. And, it’s still text-based, so the results cannot be custom tailored visually.

When I started to play with the visual search engines, the real fun began for this cycling enthusiast (and admitted right-brainer). The power of the visual cloud, like seeing what you’re searching for in Searchme, was compelling.

And, Viewzi offered several different views into its results. The more visually delicious options are the Google Timeline and the Photo Tag Cloud (shown here).

Last on my Tour de Search is Spezify, a search tool utilizing relevant, free and open APIs to generate a more diverse set of results. Although more traditional SERPs have options to view blogs, microblogs, social resources, e-commerce, images, etc., it’s impressive to see the free associated relationships drawn up in a visual mind map based on keywords, tags, titles and content.

So, what’s the real takeaway for a brand navigating the Semantic Web and visual search aggregation?

The answer can be simple: The User Experience. It’s why we have strategists, information architects, user experience engineers, information and visual designers. It can also be complex, as the art of search engine optimization (SEO) is being redefined.

The aficionado of your brand may not use the path most traveled; from a desktop on the leading browser or from the leading search engine. What’s a critical failure? How about when a user, expecting to see visual results from your brand instead receives the “In order to view this page you need JavaScript, Flash Player, or Flash Player 8+” message?

For instance, many of the web assets from one of my favorite personal brands, Nike, are not accessible from my favorite device, the iPhone, using its native OS Safari browser. When I don’t have JavaScript or Flash Player installed on Firefox or Chrome or Internet Explorer, the same falls true. Until Windows Mobile 7, Google Android’s newest native browser, and future versions of the iPhone OS Safari browser are released, I still won’t be able to consume the visual layer or search in this new visual sense.

As to my original Tour de France reference, right now it’s less about seeing who takes the yellow jersey (maillot jaune) awarded to the best overall rider and more about appreciating who wins the white jersey (maillot blanc) given to the best up-and-coming youngster.