Social influence – Do you have any? Does your company? Does your Boss?

While many of our  clients are starting to leverage the power of social media for their companies, some are further down the path then others.  The ultimate test for effective use of social media is whether it influences opinion, propels action and engages the intended  audience.  The question then becomes: can you measure social influence? The answer is yes and it’s called the Klout Score (www.klout.com), defined as the “measurement of your online influence.  The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. Klout uses over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.  The final Klout Score is a representation of how successful a person is at engaging their audience and how big of an impact their messages have on people.”  When you go to klout.com, enter you organization’s name, your name,or your CEO’s name in the box provided and get your score.

Check out these “5 lessons from business leaders on social media marketing” –  http://on.mash.to/social-influence

I feel the need…the need for speed

Just when I thought the summer sun and mellow pace of afternoons by the lake has dulled my sense of how fast the Web is really moving, I came across a resource that snapped me back to reality.

To really appreciate what is happening, take a look at Gary Hayes Social Web Counter at http://bit.ly/socialmediacounter. Although I don’t think that as human beings we are wired to process so much information so quickly,  the Social Web Counter provides some perspective.It shows a variety of stats in real time, as well as daily and longer.

Hurry up and check it out at http://bit.ly/socialmediacounter.  You’ll be blown away.  Guaranteed.

Your Company Sucks

Just kidding. You know we love our clients. But someone, somewhere on the vast network we call the Internet, may be saying this about your company.  The better known your brand and your products, the greater the chance that someone is taking a pot shot at you.  The issue is not whether the criticism is justified but how quickly you find out about, and respond to, it.  The difference in finding out within hours as opposed to days or weeks can be measured in millions of dollars and, once in a while, can even become a matter of survival.

If your company was “slammed” for no good reason, you can set the record straight.  If the criticism is justified, you can fix it quickly and win points for your lightening-speed response and exemplary customer service — a perfect opportunity to make lemonade from the lemons you’ve been handed.

So how do we find out as soon as possible? By using a set of tools readily available online. We’ve covered some of these before, but they are worth mentioning again:

1. Google Alerts — http://www.google.com/alerts.  A content monitoring service, offered by the search engine company Google, that automatically notifies users when new content from news, web, blogs, video and/or discussion groups matches a set of search terms selected by the user.  The service is free with a Google account and is easy to set up.  The key is to set up alerts for numerous terms, including product names, as well as those of key executives.  I would even go as far as to suggest that one of your alert terms should be “your company name sucks”.  Most of our clients have been using Google Alerts for a while and we are working with them to gain even better leverage with this tool.

With Twitter growing by leaps and bounds on a daily basis, you absolutely have to monitor conversation in the Twitterverse.  Recent stats tell us that users currently generate 2 billion (that’s a “B”) per month.

I previously recommended in this space Tweet Beep (www.tweetbeep.com) which enables anyone to receive alerts by email whenever a specific word or phrase is tweeted on Twitter.  Here are a couple of other options for Twitter:

2.  Tweet Alarm – http://www.tweetalarm.com/

3.  Tweet Alerts – http://www.twitteralerts.net/.  With this service, you have a number of options when it comes to notifications, including SMS.

To see the effectiveness of Twitter as a customer response and service tool, Comcast is the classic example. Read the these stories and you’ll become a believer:

Savvy online service can win back customers – http://bit.ly/apZlyP

My @ComcastCares Customer Service Story – http://bit.ly/dqx3L7

HootSuite.com becomes Mother’s little helper – Keeping tabs on your brand

A number of clients have been asking us about social media tracking and monitoring tools.  Over the last little while we’ve been recommending HootSuite.

It allows you to create a dashboard of your most important social networking apps including LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook and monitor them all on the same Web page.

This is a huge time saver for any company that want to keep tabs on its brand in the fast expanding social media universe.

Hootsuite received a good write up in today’s Financial Post.  You can read it here – http://bit.ly/ceicL2

If there are other tools you use, let us know buy leaving a comment below. If you need help setting up HootSuite for you company send me an email at michael@ar-com.com