Archives for category: Social Media

It has been an interesting few weeks with social media hitting the headlines on a number of occasions.

There was the case of Oprah Winfrey tweeting her love for the new Microsoft tablet Surface stating she liked it so much she was going to buy a dozen to hand out as Christmas presents to her closest friends and family but alas the tweet was found to have been sent from her iPad. Oprah and Microsoft own goal me thinks.

Then there was the expose from The Guardian that found out that Wonga employees had set up anonymous Twitter accounts to attack MP Stella Creasy calling her ‘mental’ and ‘nuts’ because of her campaign against the firm and the payday loans market. Wonga since has had to publicly apologise and promote a debt advice clinic in Creasy’s own constituency of Walthamstow. Another own goal.

There was also the case of Adrian Smith, a Christian who worked as a manager for Trafford Housing Trust (TNT). In February 2011, outside of work hours, Adrian posted a link on his Facebook page to a BBC website article entitled ‘Gay church marriages get go ahead’, with this comment ‘An equality too far’. In reply some colleagues asked him to explain himself which in reply he posted ‘I don’t understand why people who have no faith and don’t believe in Christ would want to get hitched in church.’

These comments that were not visible to the general public were enough in his employer’s mind to demote him from his managerial role, cut his salary by 40% and give him a final written warning.

Smith subsequently took TNT to court and won his case against breach of contract and was awarded a measly £100.

Whatever you think of Mr Smith’s comments they weren’t hostile or abusive and not open for all to view. They don’t fall into the same category as the Wonga tweets or the many trolls and abusive users that sometime frequent these platforms.

This case neatly illustrates the problems organisations have in understanding social media and how they should deal with it. For sure all companies should have a social media policy, which actually TNT did seem to have, but it clearly wasn’t descriptive or detailed enough for them to make the wrong judgement.

All employee’s need to know the boundaries that their employer places on their social media communications if not than the company has no excuse when someone strays over the line. In fact it should be part of every new employee’s induction programme.

But it’s not just your current employers that care about your social media footprint but also future employers. You are very naïve if you think that companies or the recruitment companies they employ won’t use social media to research your background before they decide to employ you.

So don’t post anything on your Facebook page or any platform that you wouldn’t want a potential employee to see, it’s just not worth it.

Tags social media

Categories Social Media, Uncategorized

Waitrose twitter campaign – Hit or miss

September 23, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

A lot has been written this week about the so called ridicule Waitrose suffered on Twitter after running a campaign to complete the tweet “I shop at Waitrose because….” , encouraging users to use the hashtag #WaitroseReasons.

While Waitrose did receive some serious responses it seems on the whole they got a host of hilarious tweets playing up to the ‘posh’ image of the shop.

For example @amoozbouche tweeted ‘I shop at Waitrose because it makes me feel important and I absolultely detest being surrounded by poor people’ and ‘I also shop at Waitrose because I was once in the Holloway Rd branch and heard a dad say ‘Put the papaya down, Orlando!’

I won’t publish all of the tweets but you can imagine what the others said.

This was seen in many quarters as a massive social media fail with Sebastian Joseph in Marketing Week suggesting that it ‘brings into sharp focus the worrying lack of understanding that some brands still have about how to use the micro-blogging site.’

I disagree I think Waitrose knew exactly what they were doing and the resulting impact from it has done them no harm whatsoever.

Let’s think what would have happened if the campaign had generated just straight laced replies. Sure they would have been seen by their already signed up twitter followers as caring and sharing but that would have been that and nothing much gained from it.

Instead they have managed to receive massive amounts of national news coverage not only online but in print and news coverage and they also managed to promote to other Waitrose customers that they have an active social media offering.

Yes Waitrose have been trying to project an image of providing an affordable option by price matching some of its products and that the resulting tweets only emphasized the upmarket nature of the store but all the news stories mentioned this, getting the message across to all that read it.

The only criticism I would level at them is that I think they should have leveraged the amusing responses more on their social media channels perhaps by awarding a prize to the funniest tweet.

I for one only shop in Waitrose occasionally, wishing I could do it more often. After all at the end of the day who would you rather be shopping with Wayne and Waynetta or Henry and Henrietta?

And as for the news coverage, as one of their rivals say ‘Every little helps.’

Tags social media, twitter

Categories Social Media

Rooney’s own goal. Thou shall not advertise.

June 24, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

What a week for ‘follicley” challenged Wayne Rooney, on Tuesday night he headed in from less than 6 yards to be installed as a national hero, then, only a few days later he and Nike were slapped down by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for incorrectly advertising on twitter.

To set the scene, earlier in the year the ASA received a complaint about the following tweet, stating that the tweet wasn’t “identifiable as marketing communications”.

“My resolution – to start the year as a champion, and finish it as a champion…#makeitcount gonike.me/makeitcount”.

The ASA quite rightly upheld the complaint and the watchdog, for the first time, banned a Twitter campaign.

Apart from the legal breach of the advertising code this also broke the unofficial rule of Twitter ‘Thou shall not advertise’. In a week that should have seen Rooney gain Twitter followers, it actually saw him lose followers. Before the controversy he had over 4.8 million followers – a quick look yesterday showed that he had lost at least 400,000 followers and all because he wasn’t open and honest and broke that unofficial rule.

The headlines around this and the subsequent ruling showed that promoting via social media is still in its infancy and that companies are still trying to guage how far they can go without stepping over the line. It shows that even a media savvy company like Nike still haven’t got this medium sussed, thus illustrating the dilemma facing every marketing or advertising team out there.

However, all this has actually damaged Rooney far more then it has Nike. People and companies need to be careful if they don’t want to damage their brand. Rooney should be using the medium to talk to his fan base, not turning them off by selling out to his sponsors. He may have been able to grow back his hair but he won’t be able to grow back his Twitter community quite so easily, especially if he continues to score own goals and ignore the commandment ‘Thou shall not advertise’.

Tags advertising, twitter

Categories Social Media

Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?

May 22, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

As a follow up to last week’s ‘Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble‘ blog on the Facebook IPO, I thought I would take a look in further detail on the crazy valuations currently floating around Silicon Valley on a few of the well known start ups.

As I write there has been a massive correction in the Facebook share price from its over-valued launch price of $38. It briefly hit the heady heights of $43 before settling back down to $38 at the end of the first day of trading, and this is only because the underwriters were propping it up.

Subsequently, it is sitting below $32 meaning that Zuckerberg would have lost a cool couple of billion in his personal wealth as a result.

In my view $32 is still too high a valuation. Don’t get me wrong, Facebook will be a profitable business for years to come, and has a sound business model, but it has a long way to go to justify its current share price.

Not so long ago Facebook bought mobile photo-sharing app Instagram for around $1 billion. I use Instagram and I think it’s an amazing app, but how could you possibly value it at $1 billion?

Yes it has 30 million users. Yes it managed to grow to that size in only 18 months. But it has no revenue. Facebook couldn’t have bought Instagram for its user base as it has 901 million users itself. So it must have bought it for the tech. But surely they could have created a similar app themselves? So why didn’t they? Crazy.

Then there’s Pinterest. Another social network I love. It has seen massive growth in under 12 months. In July of last year it had approximately 1 million users, today it has over 20 million. This week it managed to raise $100 million in capital, valuing it at $1.5 billion. This is for a company that has virtually no revenue.

So why are these companies being valued at such crazy prices? Probably because investors don’t want to miss out on the next Facebook, where a number of early investors have made a shed load of money.

One example, according to the Wall Street Journal, is Accel Partners, who invested $12.7 million in Facebook in 2005, its investment is now worth a staggering $7.7 billion.

But how many of the Silicon Valley start ups are going to provide a real return on their investment? The odds are not many. So you have to ask yourself one question ‘Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?’.

Tags facebook, social media

Categories Social Media

Facebook: Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble

May 14, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

Facebook’s proposed Initial Public Offering (IPO) is due to take place on May 18th, however according to latest reports this may be pushed back because of a delay in getting regulatory approval.

For those of you who have been on a different planet for the past month, Facebook plan to sell 180 million shares valued between $28 to $35, valuing the company at a whopping $96 billion.

Should the shares sell for $35 then shareholders will be paying 99 times Facebook’s earnings. Let me say that again 99 times Facebook’s earnings. Crazy. When it comes to technology and social media the stock market tends to lose all sense.

Don’t get me wrong, Facebook has a lot of potential. As of the end of March, it had 901 million people using it on a monthly basis and 526 million daily users.

But only last week it announced what effectively was a profit warning, when first quarter 2012 profits dropped 12% to $205m from $233m a year earlier, this despite revenue rising 45% in the same period and advertising revenue up by 37%.

But costs grew from $343 million to $677 million because of investment in expanding data centres and recruitment in sales and marketing.

In the same announcement they also highlighted that mobile usage had increased, a cause for concern, because as of yet, they haven’t got mobile right, the experience is clunky and unfriendly but more importantly to revenue, they haven’t worked out a way of introducing advertising. The $1 billion acquisition of Instagram (another crazy valuation) was supposed to help with the user mobile experience but this could be delayed by up to a year because of a competition probe from the FTC.

You could argue that when they do get it mobile right revenue will increase dramatically, but I’m doubtful of advertising revenue. Who out there uses Facebook and clicks on a paid ad? I’ve never done it.

Another cause for concern is that when Facebook does float on the stock exchange, Mark Zuckerberg retains 57% of the shares, meaning he still has complete control over the company, and can do whatever he pleases. Is this good? Sounds a bit like News Corporation to me. And does a man who is quite clearly a talented technician have the know how to run a multi billion company. I’m not sure.

The social media space is also highly competitive and there are new entrants all the time. Look at Pinterest. But one thing Facebook has in its favour is the barrier to entry its competitors face to persuade Facebook’s users to switch. I personally love Google+ but without an easy way to port your Facebook friends across it will never persuade users to switch.

At the end of the day does the share price reflect fair value for its current size and its near to medium term growth prospects? No it doesn’t, it’s way over valued and that’s what most people should be asking before investing in what could be one huge bubble.

Tags facebook, ipo, social media

Categories Social Media

Facebook design fatigue

April 16, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

The recent redesign of Google+ has led me to think how dated and old Facebook feels and their apparent lack of concern or thought in regard to their interface design. I mean G+ has been around for a relatively short amount of time and it has already had a face lift.

You could argue that Facebook is perfectly functional and doesn’t need to be refreshed, a valid point, but I would argue that your user experience would be far greater and enjoyable if it was well designed.

I would group Facebook with a number of other big companies where design doesn’t seem to matter. Microsoft have been guilty of this for years.

There are a few companies that consider design essential but they are usually niche players in the market. For most big companies, up until Apple started to dominate the market, design was seen as superfluous, an added cost to the bottom line not needed to shift products, but Apple changed this completely, they have proven that great design can sell and in big numbers.

From the very first Mac, thoughtful design has been evident. Apple, before the iMac, used to be a niche company, really only ever used by designers or creatives, but they have always had a hardcore following and evoked feelings that no other company has managed to replicate.

Recently a rare Apple Mac has gone up for auction on eBay with a starting price of $99,995. In 2010, one of the first ever Apple computers made in Steve Jobs’ parents’ garage sold in auction for more than £133,000. Would this happen with any other company? No, it wouldn’t. All because they care about the user experience, down to the smallest detail.

For me they really stepped up a gear when they launched the iMac in all its different colours. As everybody already knows, this is all down to an English man. The now knighted, and deservedly so, Sir Jonathan Ive. You know that whatever Apple bring out in the future, if he is involved, it will look and feel great.

Objectified – Jonathan Ives from DamienLT on Vimeo.

His influence and Apple’s has been so great that even Microsoft are starting to think about design. The upcoming Windows 8 on first impressions looks great. Let’s hope other companies start thinking this way.

Will Facebook’s lack of design awareness cause them to lose custom in the near future, probably not, but new comers like G+ and especially Pinterest could start chipping away. Pinterest in particular has an excellent interface; it’s fantastic in its simplicity.

At the end of the day Facebook will not care until they start losing market share, but hopefully like Microsoft, they will realise that great design is essential. I just hope it won’t take as long as Microsoft for them to realise it.

Tags apple, design, facebook, social media

Categories Design, Social Media

Social media’s Troll trouble

April 4, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

Much has been written and spoken on the subject of abuse that some people have received from Trolls in the social media space.

High profile personalities such as Noel Edmonds, Richard Bacon, Derren Brown, Rob Brydon, and footballers such as Stan Collymore, Darren Gibson, Micah Richards and Fabrice Muamba have all received abuse in some shape or form. Several other high profile premiership footballers have even closed their accounts due to the level of abuse they have received.

It seems that a small section of the social media community feel that they have the right to abuse people. Some, when caught claim, it is only a form of harmless banter. There has also been a suggestion that the people issuing this form of abuse do not realise what anxiety and harm they are inflicting.

I am sure the majority of these people would not dream of doing it directly to the victims face, and only do so because they feel protected by the remoteness of social media.

So what can you do if you are on the receiving end?

Firstly, you can report them to the relevant social media platform. Both Facebook and Twitter have extensive guidelines on what is and is not acceptable behaviour and how to report a violation.

Although, in regards to Facebook, it looks like you will need to complain to the police in order for them to act. This was recently highlighted when Noel Edmonds complained to Facebook of a page that stated that ‘he needs to die.’

If, like Noel, you get a ‘No Deal’ from the social networks, then as Facebook suggests, you should complain to the police.

Every individual in the UK is protected from abuse of this kind through Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003. Section 127 states a person is guilty of an offence if they send by means of a public electronic communications network, a message or other matter that is grossly offensive, or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character, or causes any such message or matter to be so sent.

If found guilty, a person can be imprisoned for up to 6 months. A heavy price to pay for Twitter abuse.

But there is criticism from legal quarters on this act. I will not go into detail here, an interesting blog in the New Stateman puts it far better than I ever could.

Recently, there have been a couple of high profile convictions under this act.

Joshua Cryer ,a law student, racially abused Stan Collymore on a number of occasions on Twitter and received two year’s community service.

More recently, Liam Stacey, a biology student at Swansea University received a 56 day prison sentence for racially abusing footballer Fabrice Muamba via Twitter.

At the end of the day, nobody should put up with abuse in whatever shape or form it comes in. If, unfortunately, you are on the receiving end of this kind of behaviour, report it to the relevant authorities and do not let the Trolls win by stopping you from using social media.

Tags facebook, social media, trolls, twitter

Categories Social Media

To tweet or not to tweet, that is the question

March 20, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

I’ve worked in financial companies pretty much all my working life, and although I currently work for a forward thinking company in terms of social media, this isn’t the case for the majority of the financial services industry.

In a recent Mortgage Strategy article on social media it rightly says that Twitter is becoming the medium of choice for those financial firms willing to enter the social media space, but that a lot of firms are shying away from using it altogether.

In this blog I’m going to share why I think all financial services companies should have a presence on social networks including Twitter.

Why?
Let’s look at the stats. Twitter is approaching 500 million registered accounts and as at the end of 2011 there are 845 million monthly active Facebook users.

For a lot of people around the world, social media is their communication method of choice. It’s not a fad. The popularity of each one may change and new entrants could displace the current goliaths, but social networking is here to stay.

So if a large proportion of consumers are talking and sharing on social networks there is a good chance they could be talking about you on them. Companies can bury their heads in the sand all they want, but these conversations are going to take place whether you take part or not. So you might as well listen to what they are saying; at least that way, you can try and do something about it.

But one of the concerns of many in the financial services industry is compliance with the FSA financial promotions guidelines.

According to the FSA, “some of the key issues firms must avoid include misleading claims, key risks not made prominent enough, insufficient product information, unrealistic impressions of the product, or anything which might create an unrealistic expectation on the part of the consumer,” he says. “Essentially, we ask that promotions must be balanced, clear and not misleading.”

This has caused a lot of financial companies, both big and small, to decide not to use Twitter. I mean how can you promote and include an adequate disclaimer in 140 characters, right?

Easy, you don’t promote. Simple as that. One thing social media users hate is the medium being used for promotion/sales.

Social media isn’t about selling, there are other great uses for it. It’s perfect for customer services, relationship building and brand management. These are 3 great reasons for using social media without going anywhere near promotions.

Social media is also great for marketing, but marketing needs to handled with more care, as this can sometimes wander into promotions territory, I will blog about this another time.

To get started in the areas mentioned above, the first step is to listen. It’s crucial. Set up searches for your company name and keywords. Get to know your audience, find out what they talk about, their interests. Then gradually take part in those conversations. Social media is a long affair, not a one-night stand. You can’t build relationships overnight, patience is needed. Relationships are hugely important, and your audience is more likely to listen to you if you have built an understanding with them.

None of the above, if used sensibly will breach FSA regulations.

As mentioned in my previous blog, social media is a multiplier and a small problem can turn into a full blown crisis very quickly. So don’t bury your head in the sand, get out there and start taking part. If you don’t, you and your company could one day regret it.

Tags financial services, social media, twitter

Categories Social Media

Go forth and multiply

February 20, 2012 //

By Stephen Fairweather

A recent blog posted on the Castle Trust website by Sean Oldfield on ‘Animal Spirits’ made me wonder how human psychological forces have an effect in social media.

For those who haven’t read the blog. Animal Spirits is the expression British economist John Maynard Keynes proposed for the confidence factor in rising markets. More recently Robert Shiller and George Akerlof wrote on this subject in their 2009 book ‘Animal Spirits’, suggesting that human behaviour exacerbates swings not only in a rising market, but in a falling market too. They state that in a rising market people tend to ignore any suspicions they may have, creating a multiplier effect.

How does this relate to social networks?

Before social networking, engagement between companies and consumers used to be one way with the company creating a message and pushing it out through traditional media hoping consumers would like it. Olivier Blanchard in his ‘Social Media ROI’ book refers to this as ‘vertical’ engagement.

Feedback would be virtually non-existent unless expensive market research was undertaken and this meant it had very little impact on companies brand or products. Sure, a customer could complain to customer services but the effect would be localised to that one person and maybe a small group of peers.

Since the introduction of social networks, however, consumers are more than happy to voice their opinions on any aspect of a company’s behaviour or product and this can be shared with thousands of people in an instant. As stated in my previous blog, companies are no longer in control of their brands. The impact on a brand from a negative story is significant and real.

The basic principle of social networks is of course sharing and communication but they in themselves aren’t the multiplier, they just make it easy to spread the word. As mentioned above confidence is one of the multipliers in a rising market, but greed and envy also play a role. In social media other psychological multiplier forces come into play. Usually they are purer forces like outrage and justice.

There have been a number of high profile examples of this in action, most notably the News of the World scandal.

If there ever was an example of a social media multiplier effect in action this was it. Moral outrage ignited by stories in the press of the hacking of Milly Dowler’s phone snowballed on Twitter over a period of a week leading to the demise of the Sunday newspaper. This could not have happened ten years ago, not in such a short space of time. The story in the press may have been the catalyst, (and Twitter the medium) but it was the sense of outrage that multiplied the effect.

The speed at which news can spread causes great concern for companies and instinctively they want to shy away from participating in social media altogether. But these conversations are going to be out there whether you take part or not, so you might as well get involved. At least that way you can communicate your side of the story.

In fact if a company is transparent (or as transparent as it can be), honest and swift in its communication it can dampen the multiplier effect and take the sting out a story. After all, people are more inclined to believe bad news about a company that is not open and honest.

Shiller and Akerlof propose that if we are to achieve sustainable economies we must dampen our animal spirits. I believe that in social networks we should do the opposite, after all social networking would be nothing without human feelings and behaviour.

Tags psychology, social media

Categories Social Media

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