Janet Lee Johnson | The Art of Marketing

I talk a lot on this blog about linking SEM (search engine marketing) efforts to PR efforts - I call it SEMPR - to boost awareness and relevancy online. It’s my opinion that my clients should get the benefit of integrating both efforts, rather than keeping them separate, as most marketing communications teams do.

(I was a VP managing corporate marcom efforts for many years, and I neglected to link them in my organizations. Most of my peers still do….)

In a very passionate post over on Micro Persuasions, Steve Rubel (long time blogger and PR pro) has taken a very pointed view on the subject he calls “SEO Shenanigans” - that of gaming social media solely to improve search results. In his very articulate argument, he states:

“Some respected experts are advocating launching social media marketing programs solely for the purpose of influencing search engines, rather than with the intent of fostering collaboration and genuine communication.

This represents a clear and present danger to the fabric of the community. If you care about the social web, then you should be alarmed.”

Good content and collaboration should always be the foundation and intention of any marketing effort, otherwise, why bother?

Some truths I’ve learned about both SEM and PR:

• Shortcuts in content quality are outed quickly online - who cares about your blog/tweets/facebook profile or your press release if I can’t learn anything about or from you? If I can’t, you’re largely going to be ignored - regardless of your search relevancy or reach.
• Fostering true collaboration will result in meaningful conversations. When I was at Marqui and we [unintentionally] started an ethical debate among bloggers and traditional media, the conversations weren’t always pleasant, but they were meaningful. And, by the way, those conversations without content were dismissed quickly as being without merit.
• Linking search engine marketing and PR efforts are jarring for each profession, usually. I’ve found the people in each vertical to be wildly opposed in many ways - how they think, measure and relate, for starters. On one hand, you’ve got relationship/rolodex-driven folks who measure awareness and reach in months, if not years. On the other hand, you’ve got measurement-driven folks who relate to spreadsheets and percentage shifts in A/B tests in days or weeks…
• But just because it isn’t easy doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it… with the right intention (collaboration and conversations) and content (properly written, tagged and optimized) for the best possible results.

Finally, I agree with Steve’s parting salvo:

“….the SEO shenanigans for the sake of SEO has to stop. If you’re going to play in our sandbox, follow the community’s (unwritten) rules.”

…Even though following “unwritten rules” is nearly impossible. Which is why smart marketers will always turn to other smart marketers - even us unruly consultants and those with opposing positions whom we listen to - in order to learn more.

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I was fortunate to be quoted in an excellent article called The Tao of Crafting SEM Partnerships by Marty Weintraub at aimClear over on the Search Engine Watch blog. As you may recall, I am to be the maiden sacrificed to Marty at the SEMpdx conference in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, we’ve met via phone and it turns out he’s a very nice guy. AND, an excellent writer to boot.

Turns out Lisa Williams from MEDIA Forte Marketing is also a potential sacrificial maiden on our panel, which deals with online reputation management. Ben Lloyd from Amplify Interactive will moderate the panel, and I have a feeling it’ll be a very fun session.

Looking forward to meeting Marty and Lisa - and expanding my network of potential partners - at SEMpdx.

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I’m just plain happy this morning. Maybe it was the lunar eclipse, maybe some great meetings this morning, and maybe, just maybe it’s that I’ve felt terribly productive this morning. I’m pretty excited that my RSS reader - from Attensa (a client of mine) - gives me the capability to tag my persistent search results (and have them appear in my del.icio.us account) and comment on blog posts that reference my persistent searches right from within the RSS reader itself.

I don’t have to follow a link to the site, I just get a little window with the post right in it, and can comment right from there, saving tons of time.

Check it out - hoping the thumbnail shot here will work for y’all. (Just click on it, and you’ll see the whole shebang…)

You can also see that Attensa searches 18 different sites for the most up-to-date mentions of any keyword combinations you want to track. Attensa’s RSS reader is free (as is their virtual feed server for little [1-5 people] groups - enterprises pay, but the increased productivity I’ve seen will quickly pay for itself), and you can download it from Attensa’s site for Outlook, Mac, or web reading…

Eclipses are cool, wherever you find them.

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“Spin doesn’t work anymore…. the Internet has a built-in BS detector.” - Chris Pirillo

My friends Johnny Hartman and Rod Pitman sent me a great little four minute video that they produced featuring people like Chris and Joshua Green from MIT talking about “transmedia; (define)” and how companies (and each of us as individuals) need to take a completely holistic approach to what constitutes new “media” entry points for effective storytelling and reputation monitoring in this brave new world.

Even though I agree with Chris about the BS detector, it’s incumbent on each of us to carefully manage our reputations online. It’s no secret that anyone has the ability to write about anyone’s brand, person, or product.

Spin isn’t really dead, it’s just been plopped in the hands any consumer, partner, competitor or detractor who wants to take it… marketers have lost control before they even release their carefully crafted messages.

But that shouldn’t make us hopeless. Once educated, we can manage this fundamental shift….

How?

Learning What Kids Already Know

Business is just learning about new media entry points. Kids have been learning about them for years.

Joshua Green heads up MIT’s “Transmedia Convergence Culture Consortium (C3);” set up specifically to advise media and entertainment (among other) businesses how to navigate the waters of brand and reputation management as media becomes more accessible to the masses.

From their site: “C3 explores the ways the business landscape is changing in response to the growing integration of content and brands across media platforms and the increasingly prominent roles that consumers are playing in shaping the flow of media…”

Two years ago this spring I spoke at a conference at the University of Washington on Media Literacy - where educators, social services professionals and media literacy advocates from around the world gathered to share information about teaching media literacy to kids. In short, (define:) media literacy helps kids know what’s real, what’s not real, what to expect online and in other forms of media they’re inundated with on a daily basis: television, movies, etc…

It seems business is just now catching up with the kids in knowing what’s real, what’s not real, and what to expect online with regard to their brands.

What’s real/not real?

The first thing we need to do is track exactly who’s saying what about us… in real time.

The Law of Large Numbers and the Personal Web

The thing is, you don’t have to be a big entertainment consortium to produce amazingly effective, entertaining stories - true or not - about pretty much anything.

Today, anyone can be a content producer and generate interest and awareness from millions of people. Look at dooce.com - a very entertaining blog (that I enjoy every day) by Heather B. Armstrong. The word dooce has become synonymous with being fired for blogging, as Heather was

“fired from my job for this website because I had written stories that included people in my workplace.”

In 2005 her website (a suite of blogs) started pulling in enough ad revenue to support her family, as it continues to do today.

It’s the law of large numbers, as my learned friend Paul Kedrosky would say.

With 1.3B people currently connected to the web, there are a plethora of us producing personal, public content. We’re spending time updating our Twitter posts, managing our LinkedIN profiles, chatting with friends on Facebook and trying out Plaxo’s Pulse; it’s only a matter of my content coming up in search results that will connect me with hundreds, thousands, and even millions of people around the globe.

Consider these (smaller, but still significant) numbers:

• LinkedIN counts more than 17M members - mostly business people
• Facebook has more than 43M members - businesses are pouring in
• Technorati is tracking more than 112M blogs - businesses are beginning to blog (the spigot isn’t turned on far yet)

Tracking conversations about my products, my company, my personal reputation is critical in this more complex, transmedia world.

Online Reputation Monitoring - Essential to Your Brand

I talk about monitoring online conversations a lot in this space (dare I say, My Space?) because it’s a critical component of marketing and brand management. And it’s simple to do - using managed RSS technology tools.

RSS readers are free. And there are excellent, free RSS readers with a reach far beyond Google, including those from (my favorite, my client) Attensa.

How do I monitor my brand?

1. Download Attensa (or other RSS reader of choice). It’s free, and your results can be sent to your inbox or a web site specifically set up to track your feeds. Go to www.attensa.com/get-it and just do it (to borrow heavily from a great brand tagline).
2. Go into the Attensa application and set up a persistent search. All you have to do is put in your company name, your product’s name, your own name, and tell Attensa to keep a watch out online for ANY mention of your name(s); and it’ll do so automatically, persistently scanning 18 different search engines (way beyond Google - although if that’s all you do, good for you!) for instances of [your name(s)].
3. Any time something is said about [your name(s)], you’ll get it in your inbox or on your web-based reader.
4. When it happens, follow the link, see what you think, engage in conversation, drive to closure.

I’ve told audiences for years - in answer to the ubiquitous question, “What if someone says something bad about me?” - if they do, wouldn’t you rather:

• Know who’s saying what?
• Be able to address what’s real, what’s not real, and
• Provide your point of view?

… than not know they’re saying such things?

After all, you can’t please a million/thousand/hundred/all of the people all of the time.

But you can listen, learn and interact - using your own finely-honed BS detector.

And that, my marketing friends, is what brand awareness and engagement are all about.

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I have just finished driving that crazy stretch of I-5 south of Portland that makes me wonder:

What people are thinking when they’re driving a long, straight road like that?? That they can just exit in front of 18-wheelers going 80 without wreaking havoc?

I swear I witnessed the potential of three very scary accidents barely missed, I sincerely wonder how truckers do it!

And I’m so glad to be home.

I am happy to have made the trip, though, traffic and idiot drivers notwithstanding. The audience of Oregon Wine makers at this morning’s panel presentation was very attentive, asked excellent questions, and it made me realize how truly far we’ve come in technology in just a few short years.

Most of these people run small, family businesses. They were thrilled to hear the could buy shopping cart software for $300. That’s a far cry less than $5000 - which was the number that several people kept throwing out - having researched it just a few years back. I can see shopping carts popping up on wine sites all over the state now, which will be great for them (better margins) and great for us (supporting the direct growers).

Most are concerned about immigration rights, and the changes afoot here in Oregon. One man stood in front of a group of probably 300 people at a morning session, and said, “People don’t realize where their food comes from.”

I pointed out in our session (to about 100 people) that the web is a great forum to discuss the issues, educate the public and generate understanding. I hope to see blogs (or at least comments) popping up from wine growers all over the web now, which will be great for consumers (they’ll know where their food comes from) and great for the debate to be held in a very public (and very big - potentially reaching hundreds of thousands of people) forum.

It’s a wonderful time to be alive - to watch lightbulbs go off en mass over people’s brains, and to participate in the understanding gained through education.

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