A Social Media Marketing Experiment
So, I know, it's been a while since I've posted. Not that too many people read my blog, but I feel like I've been failing those few followers that I may have. Things have been busy, but that's never an excuse; take a look at my friend Casey's (aka Doomz) blog, and you'll see how a busy person can still manage a blog post almost every day of the week.
So, what's brought my back from the brink? Simple; incentives. Here's the brief story; my wife Tara is an incredibly talented designer. You can check out her work on her website, www.TaraPhillips.ca, or over on her Deviantart website. She's entered a design competition, and I'm trying to help her win. Where do the incentives come in? Let me explain;
The contest is to see who can get the most facebook 'likes' for their design. The design is for a laser etching, that would be done on the back of an iPad, kind of like a tattoo for your electronic device. In a modern age, why not get your devices tattooed, to make them completely unique and individual. There are a number of talented artists who've submitted their designs, but they are awarding prizes to the person who is judged to have the best design (decided by the company) AND to the person with the most likes! What is the prize? Well for Tara, the prize is recognition, possible monetary rewards (she might get a job from it), and expanding her art portfolio. For me, well the winner gets an iPad, and i've wanted one for us for a long time. As a self identifying gadget lover, the iPad is just one of those things i've wanted to have, but have been holding off from buying.
So, since there are incentives for both of us, I'm working as hard as I can to try and help her win. How exactly? By using my social network, and my online media skills, to get others to vote. I've taken enough e-marketing or consumer behaviour classes, that it's time to try and put this into practice. How? Well so far;
a) I've reached out to the people who are the most engaged online. You know, the people who are on twitter, facebook, tumblr, flickr, etc. all day long. Those people are the ones who post the most content that is seen more often by their friends. The connectors, as Malcom Gladwell would call them. Corey Tyhurst is probably the best example of this, in my network. Also, an old friend from my day at Brock, Sarah Regnier, was also incredibly helpful.
b) I've reached out to people with a wide social network. It's one thing to send a message to one person, to get them to vote. That gets me one 'like'. It's another thing to reach out to a friend, who sets up a facebook event page, and promptly invites 400 of her friends to come vote as well. People who have lots of contacts, those are the ones you want.
c) I've been honest in my disclosure. I tell people that it's for my wife, so she can win. I also tell them that we will get an iPad, if she gets the most 'likes'. In this way, people know my motivation, and can still decide whether to continue to vote or not. If I tried to trick them by not disclosing, some people would be put off when/if they found out, or might even vote for others because they thought I was being disingenuous.
d) Although I started asking people to vote, I quickly found it better to provide almost a checklist for people. This guides them to help, rather than just letting them figure out whether to help, or how they can. For instance, people can vote, but they can also reach out to friends and family members to have them vote, AND can re-post it on their facebook or linked in accounts, to get even more visibility. Mentioning this to people has significantly increased the rate at which the link gets forwarded.
So, having said all that, it's been fascinating so far, trying to get votes. As of right now, Tara is in a strong third place with 194 votes. The two other main candidates at this point have 211 and 224, so we're getting closer. Voting ends on March 31st, so another important element will be how we can maintain momentum. I've only been pushing hard the last 48 hours, so we have to be ready for the long-haul.
Having said that, how can you help?
1) Visit http://mactattz.com/contest/artist20.php and click like at the top of the page (you can see all the entries at http://mactattz.com/contest.php, if you want to compare first)
2) Get your friends, family members, work colleagues to log in and vote too.
3) Post it on your social media sites, and encourage others to vote too
4) Send me your ideas for how I can spread the word better! Leave a comment, get me on twitter (robertphillips7) or send an old fashioned email to robertphillips@gmail.com
Let's see just how far we can get with this experiment. I will be actively updating my blog over the next few weeks, tracking progress!
Excuses for not blogging….
For some reason I think it would be a great idea to start a blog again. Then I decide to start the CMA accelerated program, which is a pretty intense 8 or so months. And, then, the double whammy - this week is the Barrett Jackson classic car auction in Scottsdale, Arizona. So, tonight, i've parked myself in front of the TV, locked in to the Speed Channel, and am both live tweeting the show and trying to read through the primer for financial accounting. Week one of the CMA is done, all the videos, readings, problems, and quizes, but that just means I should be starting Week 2 tomorrow!
So, in summary, I may not update this as much as I originally expected. Sorry. Be sure to subscribe to the RSS feed (I recommend google reader as a great feed reader), that way you will see whenever I post an update.
Why do people blog anyways?
I took a fantastic course at the Rotterdam School of Management this past fall, on Management Control Systems. To put it in a nutshell, we discussed different to incentivize people to do things. We talked about setting goals, measuring performance, and rewarding/punishing people for achieving or not achieving the goals. It sounds fairly simple, but at the end of the day, there are lots of outcomes that companies are looking for, many different ways to measure whether or not someone is working towards accomplishing the goals, and lots of possible reward/punishment structures that can be used to make people work harder to accomplish said goals.
One simple distinction is action controls vs. results controls - action controls measure and reward people for taking a specific action, whereas results controls measure people for achieving a specific result, regardless of the action required to get there. Most companies have some mix of both - a performance bonus for reaching a sales target, but also action controls in the form of punishment if you steal clients from a co-worker to try and meet the target.
How does this tie into blogging? Well, I'm interested in thinking about what motivates people to blog, how they measure success in the blogging world, and what incentives are required for someone to start, and to continue, blogging. Let's look at motivating factors to start; there are simple things like financial rewards - some bloggers get paid, others get free products, others get nothing. Some get nothing now, but are able to turn their blogging into money later on (see Tucker Max, Maddox, or Shit My Dad Says, since they all got book/movie/tv show deals). So there is some kind of economic valuation for current vs. future returns from blogging.
Even for those who never expect a financial reward from their blogging, there must be other interests at play. Some blog to gain fame, notoriety, or just recognition. They want to be heard and they want to be famous. Some are able to turn this into money, others are just happy being recognized as being a B or C list celebrity. Or, perhaps some have a cause they really believe in, and are striving to get their message out to the masses. Either way, everyone has some kind of motivation when they start a blog.
Which leaves me in a dangerous position - why did you start blogging again Rob? What's your incentive? To be honest, I'm not yet sure. As part of my years of undergrad and graduate studies, I've found that I enjoy discussing and debating ideas. In theory, a blog is a great way to share ideas online. Of course, that means people have to read it, so I'm sure there is some motivation from the notoriety aspect. I do like the idea of being a blogger with a large group of subscribers, commenters, participants, etc. And hey, if some day I was offered to be paid to blog, then I wouldn't really have a problem with it.
Which brings be to my final point. There are serious implications from any control system that you have in place. Measures and rewards can have unintended consequences, which may actually lead you further from achieving your goals. Financial rewards for bloggers, specifically, concerns me. As soon as you start to get paid for having an opinion, and sharing it with others, it changes how you approach blogging. You need to appease the masses, to keep them reading, otherwise you lose that money. What's the easiest way to do that? To write more of the same stuff that you've always written. Perez Hilton is a great example of this; imagine if he decided to take a more serious look at the world, with legit news stories. His readership would be gone to any other celebrity stalking site in a day.
I think my point is this; all bloggers have some kind of motivation that draws them to the blogosphere, and it's important to know what motivates you. I haven't really touched on measuring success in the blogging world (yet), and want to explore more the changes in incentives from when you're just starting (like me) to when you're a world famous blogger. It's one thing to post when a couple people (mainly your family) is reading, and it's another when you have a world wide audience expecting some form of blogging greatness on a weekly basis. I'll just have to save that for another day.
If you've read this, and you're a blogger, what motivates you?
Back to the world of blogging…
So, here it is, the first post of my newly reborn blog. I'm not entirely sure why I've been drawn back to blogging, but I'm interested in exploring once again. This site has now gone through three iterations; the first, from back in my days at Brock University, which started as a site hosting lecture notes to share with people who missed class and quickly grew into a basic blog. The second, and most recent version, was my attempt at getting involved in political blogging. I was a full blown conservative blogger, and member of the blogging tories. After a couple years of that, and some traveling around the world, I grew tired of trying to blog every day, and just decided to give it up.
While I was taking a break from blogging, I've been giving twitter a try (http://twitter.com/robertphillips7) with some success - 150 followers and over 400 tweets, but I still don't really get the concept. I think the real value for twitter comes from use - if you're a heavy user, it's incredibly valuable. Tweeting a couple times per week, however, isn't really beneficial for you, or for anyone else. I think there's a lot of people on twitter just looking to be more popular, but then again, what's the main reason for someone having a blog (see my next post for thoughts on that).
So, you may ask, why create a third version of a blog? Well, I've just completed my second round of school (an MBA from the Rotman School of Management), and I guess I've got some things that I'd like to say. Since I'm not a journalist, getting my ideas out online is easiest through my own site. I'm going to try to focus on blogging about big ideas. These ideas won't necessarily have easy answers, or any answers, but hopefully getting them out there will start a conversation, and will help them develop further.
Current ideas on my plate? Democracy 2.0 (ie. how we can harness the web to revolutionize government), Making Canada Great (what big ideas can bring our country together to become great again), and Rethinking the MBA System. I'm excited to see where we can go with these ideas, and with others!