by Todd Hyten

Most Top 20 public companies in Mass. invisible on social media

Are marketers like myself in a bubble when it comes to social media? I think so. We read and research so much about the topic that we naturally think every company is involved in some way.

I just tried a little experiment that says that’s not true — not by a long shot.

I took the Boston Business Journal’s 2013 Book of Lists and looked at the home pages of the top 20 largest public companies and the top 20 largest private companies in Massachusetts (measured by revenue). I looked for social media icons on the home pages, and only the home pages. I understand some of these companies are “parent” companies of well-known brands, but still, I wanted to see what their home pages presented to the world. After all, if you’re not promoting your social media accounts on your home page … where would you?

The results: 65% of the 20 largest public companies had no social media presence at all on their home page.

Do you find that astounding? I do. And these are companies with 2011 revenues between $1.85 billion (Waters Corp.) and $25 billion (Staples).

Private companies fared much better: 30% had no social presence on their home pages (which I still find fairly high).

Almost universal to both public and private company home pages, too, was the hidden nature of social media icons and links. In almost all cases, the social media account links or icons were located at the very bottom of home pages — and very nearly invisible (low contrast icons).

After looking at a few of these accounts, I understood why: a large number (I didn’t tally specific results) showed very poor sharing habits. They might have many followers, but in turn followed precious few other Twitter accounts in return. This screams to me they are using Twitter as a broadcast platform only — and don’t seem much interested in sharing content or listening to others.

I will look deeper into the top lists and report more later when I’ve tallied results, but I think this cursory look says a lot: Big companies, private, and especially public are prone to ineffective and superficial use of social media.

A good counter argument is that these successful companies are not engaging social media much because they effectively engage in customer feedback in more traditional ways. That’s fair enough.But these days, I’m surprised at the very cold, impersonal “front face” these companies show to the public.

Look at Nstar’s Twitter account in this image above. Do you think — especially to younger customers — that this says anything about their responsiveness to their customers? Yes, I understand they are a regulated utility. Does that really prevent them from “Following” others? Really?

Even if it’s a holding company, doesn’t it say something when a company uses social media only for its brand properties only? Doesn’t it seem to communicate a kind of “facelessness” that seems cold, impersonal — not really human?

At least that’s my impression. I’ll report more data when I’ve looked at more companies, so stay tuned.

03.01.13

by Todd Hyten

Getting Started on B2B Twitter: Build your Follower count with dashboard searches

For many B2B users who start out on Twitter, one of the first questions is “how do I start to get Followers?”

Here’s an easy way to get started: Use a social media management dashboard like HootSuite or TweetDeck to build custom search lists. Social media management dashboards are 100% necessary for managing your social presence across multiple platforms, be it Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and others. See this description of HootSuite on Wikipedia to get the picture or just visit the links above.

I’ll use the example of HootSuite, because it’s what I use, but feel free to use Tweetdeck or another tool if you wish. Naturally, you have to create your social media accounts first and then add them to your social media dashboard.

Now, let’s say you’ve done that. Here’s what the HootSuite search box looks like:

An easy way to build followers from a low count or even zero, is to use the search tool (in the upper right hand corner) to search for relevant potential followers by inputting these key word searches.

Input words that describe your general industry or type of business
Input words that describe your industry or business and use the “location” icon in the right-hand corner of the search box (it’s the circle thingy)
Input words that describe your type of product or service
Input words that describe your type of product or service using the “location” icon

Just start out with this task list, and when you find a stream of tweets that seem to be relevant, or match closely with the search and your interest, just click on the “Add Stream” button at the bottom of the search box. By searching with and without the location tool, you essentially get two searches that are “everyone on planet Earth” and “everyone in my area.”

Now … click on individual tweets and click the “Follow” button in the profile. Why? Remember the golden Twitter rule: To get Followed you must Follow someone else. What you are essentially doing is starting out by “Following” your peer set. This is a natural place to start or build from — and you get to see what your business peers (and yes, competitors) are talking about on social media.

Want to make it simpler? On the left hand side of the HootSuite search box you’ll see the Twitter icon and a down arrow. Click it and it will allow you to “Search Twitter” (which is the default) or “Find Twitter Users”. Click on “Find Twitter Users” and the result box will show Twitter users who have that key word search in their description or name — and a default button to “Follow” that user!

How easy can you get?

You will find yourself endlessly playing with key word searches, but don’t be shy — keep adding relevant streams that apply, you’ll eventually delete the ones you find not-so useful.

FYI, you can use the same search tool to search Facebook too! Unfortunately it’s kind of buried. Just click on the Twitter icon in the search box and you’ll see a bottom option for “Search Facebook.” Now … if they could only add LinkedIn to that functionality we’d really be all set.

09.28.10

by Todd Hyten

Why isn’t Twitter trying ads that work?

When the “new Twitter” was unveiled last week I noted that it certainly seemed like Twitter’s redesign had ads in mind in that conspicuously large right hand space.

I wasn’t alone in that observation – eMarketer noted in a good article last Friday summing up Twitter’s ad-relate moves that the right-hand column looks ripe for ad placement. They also noted that if Twitter algorithms are already recommending “who to follow” … it’s a short step to matching an ad with a topic of interest (theoretically, yeah, I agree). Also, the eMarketer piece notes that real-time advertising is likely — meaning Twitter is moving to pairing real-time activity with ads.

Frankly that’s the holy grail for Twitter, and why oh why they have not figured out how to monetize matching ads to trending topics (or any topic) is beyond me. Sure, until now their structure has limited ad space — but those structural issues (the size of ad space boxes) should be gone now.

But here’s what really puzzles me. Why doesn’t Twitter consider Facebook-like ads? Most people are not aware how much money Facebook rakes in from their tiny little ad space on their right-hand column. It’s around $1.5 billion annually. Why? Because they are so easy to create. Facebook’s ads are actually modeled on Google AdWords — you can self-create your own ads with headline, text and link (and image). Users can post and measure results by themselves. Simple, efficient, and for some, effective.

Why, oh, why, is there no buzz about Twitter trying THIS ad model which makes a huge amount of money for Facebook and Google?