The Social Practice

Welcome to The Social Practice, a full service social media agency formed by exciting influences between creativity, strategy, data insight, search engine optimisation and community management.

SuggestMe Traveller’s Guide

New platform SuggestMe allows people to create their own shareable custom travellers guide by what’s popular on real-time social media. Most tourist guides based on customer reviews are quickly outdated as opinions and reputations are constantly changing. Suggestme keeps on top of these opinions by analysing information from millions of social media mentions to determine the best places to highlight at the moment customers are browsing the site. Visitors can also search venues based on keywords such as ‘live music’ to find places to suit their mood. It’s great to see the real-time feature, and seems a step in the right direction for the growing dependency of customer reviews.

Stop the Spoilers

Unveiled at the TVnext Hack event in Boston, and winning Best in Show is the Google Chrome extension that allows users to block tweets based on chosen keywords and time period. Twivo has been created by a 17-year-old who was tired of getting the plot to her favourite TV shows ruined before she got the chance to watch them. With the popularity of second screen TV growing, and more and more people watching TV on catch-up or from recording, this is certainly software that will attract an eager audience. No more Game of Thrones spoilers!

SeeItShopIt on Facebook

To launch their new swimwear range, Littlewoods have claimed themselves as the first retailer to monetise Facebook by using SeeItShopIt – a new e-commerce Facebook tool. Retailers can monetise through Facebook by showcasing collections of products within a single post, where users can browse through collections, share items and click directly through to purchase. Littlewoods plan to expand this throughout May and June. This functionality delivers an interactive shopping experience straight into the newsfeed, creating a seemless shopping experience exactly where their customers are.

 

 

A Facebook Toast

Budweiser in Brazil has launched The Buddy Cup – a new way for alcohol to grow your Facebook friends. By containing a chip integrated with the social network, people can become Facebook friends simply by clinking their glasses. Being used at events that are sponsored by Budweiser, the cups are designed to increase the interaction between Budweiser consumers. Not to mention the ‘never been done before’ novelty effect drawing in more fans and raising brand awareness.

 

Go Back and Retwact

After receiving 1,500 requests for it to be built, a software developer has built the web’s first Twitter correction service. Retract Retweet (Retwact) gives you the functionality to correct one of your last 5 tweets. You can either send out a retraction tweet, or a tweet via Retwacts own Twitter account to those who retweeted your original message – highlighting the correction. This is potentially a useful service – but a terrible name.

 

Photo Donation

Johnson & Johnson has utilized the influential campaign mechanic of donating to charity in return for interactions. Their “Donate a Photo” campaign lets users upload a photo to a curated list of good causes to which the brand donates $1. In 5 days, 5,000 photos have been uploaded, raising $5,000. Integrating with Twitter, and Facebook where 350 million photos are uploaded each day, this campaign taps into a popular daily activity. However, perhaps the ability to upload to Instagram with its 100 million users would have also been a smart move.

 

Tate Twitter Guide

The Tate Modern is bringing a gallery tour to Twitter in a modern guided exploration. They are giving a tweet and image based tour of its Roy Lichtenstein exhibit for art enthusiasts who aren’t able to make the gallery. A museum curator will be managing the Twitter feed for 30 minutes, followed by a Q&A segment. Perhaps taking inspiration from the fashion world tweeting live catwalks, the art world is catching up.

 

The Social Comedy Festival

TV channel Comedy Central are to hold a five day comedy festival almost entirely on Twitter. Comedians will be tweeting Vines and jokes along with the #ComedyFest hashtag, including a “Vine Dining” party of six-second videos. With more and more people splitting their attention between TV and online, it’s only fitting that Comedy Central should follow their audience and also seek a wider one. Performers and distributors have to go where their audience is, and in this case, that’s online.

 

The Great Cycle Trade-In

Evans, the bicycle retailer is using Olympic gold medallist Sir Chris Hoy for a rewarding social media campaign as part of their “Great Evans Cycle Trade-In”. The cyclist has hidden three gold bikes in three UK cities and is tweeting out clues to their location. Whoever finds one can then trade it in for a bike worth £1,000. This is a good example of an effective celebrity partnership, and will be sure to raise brand awareness for Evans.

Steer the Audi Story

Audi USA has partnered with Marvel Entertainment LLC for its latest campaign. The car company is using Facebook, Twitter and Google+ to create a crowd-sourced digital Iron Man graphic novel. It allows fans to submit sketches for the final panel of the comic book, determining how the story ends, with the winning entry being published. In the book, the superhero undertakes his adventures in an Audi R8,  an example of a powerful partnership. This is a great chance for Audi to provide consumers and fans with the chance to showcase their creativity and designs, not only of Iron Man, but their vision of the latest Audi innovations.

Name for a Beer

Belgian beer brand Maes wanted to drive new custom organically through Facebook. They produced a campaign that rewarded people with beer when they liked the page and had the same name as them (Maes is one of the most common surnames in Belgium). To not elimate everyone else, they also gave people the opportunity to change their surname on Facebook to enter. In one day, Maes’s fans had tripled in size and made it into Facebook’s top 6% most active pages worldwide. This is a successful campaign that took an inexpensive approach to raising brand awareness, and we feel it was a cheeky tip of the hat to the legendary Whopper Sacrifice.

Twitter Wants You

In light of today’s ‘Twitter for Brands’ event, Twitter has announced a step forward for Promoted Tweets. Usually following the interest graph, Promoted Tweets targeted individual users on their following, but now it will target keywords in timelines. This enables advertisers to reach users based on recent tweets as well as tweets they’ve engaged with. This new feature enables you to reach users who are already talking about you. The question is, how will reducing reach but hitting a highly targeted audience affect Twitter KPIs for brands?

Girls Can, Can you?

Plan Finland, use “social peer pressure” to gain donations to help improve the lives of girls in developing countries. A website and app, allows virtual cans to be created and passed between Facebook friends. The process is trackable with the site showing a timeline of the contributions and a map of where each can has travelled. It’s just launched but has already raised €29,977 and adds a social angle to the standard “Donate Now” message. It’s Facebook tie-in encourages a younger audience to help the cause, knowing that it’s easier to ignore fundraisers on the street, rather than your friends.

Are you Social Media Self Aware?

If not, you should be. Recently we’ve seen two high profile cases of people parting ways with their company due to inappropriate tweets. Plonking ‘opinions are my own’ in your profile and expressing yourself freely to the world is no longer acceptable. The public launch of Paris Brown as Youth Crime Commissioner matched her equally public demise after inappropriate tweets. Soon after, showing how even the high and mighty can fall, Microsoft’s Creative Director Adam Orth suffered the consequences when he tweeted his thoughts on “always on” gaming – a very sensitive subject within the gaming community. So how have you prepared for the social media magnifying glass?

Google+: The New TV?

New UK programme, The Fox Problem, is streamed through Google+ Hangouts rather than TV and encourages deep social interaction. The show’s social footprint also includes Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Tumblr, and the audience is encouraged to use these platforms to influence the script. For example, each week viewers can tweet to save their favourite presenter from completing a humiliating dare. Overall the show seems more about raising the profile of Google+. Having promoted the show on their own Google+ account it seems evident that some form of Google production is in play, and may be their way to endorse the Hangouts feature.

Tweet on Wheels

To showcase their new GPS tracking system, the stolen vehicle recovery system LoJack launched TweetCar, the first car with the ability to tweet. Capitalising on their intelligent tracking software, they have created a system that monitors activity and uploads it to Twitter. This car will drive around for a month interacting with followers with unique content and challenges for prizes. This is a powerful product that, rather than confusing consumers with its technical software, has used it to interact with them on a platform which they are familiar with. A good example of how functional meets creativity.

Regent Street 24/7

Using social platforms, (eg Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram) London’s Regent Street has launched 24/7, a customised social hub where consumers can interact in real-time with over 100 brands. Brands have the opportunity to engage with consumers who have signed in with their social accounts, whilst using the #regentstreet hastag. The one omission is the lack of purchasing ability; the platform is merely creating awareness and promoting loyalty rather than generating revenue. There is huge potential here for a social focused online shopping community as the community is already there, so brands would do well to push for such development, and in turn invest more into their social media channels.

Let’s Mix It Up

Launched at SXSW, Mixhibit is the new web app from Smirnoff that helps turn social feeds into personalised video compilations. The app scrapes content from Instagram, Facebook and Twitter to turn users’ shared content into a video with the soundtrack of their choosing. Smirnoff has positioned Mixhibit as a tool that transforms social media activity into a one-of-a-kind, shareable experience. They have tapped into their target demographic, who will use more than one social platform, and have tied it back into their strong ‘Nightlife’ association. Also, by using social media channels, it means the content produced will be of interest to each users’ friends,   making it even more shareable.

Facebook rolled out threaded commenting across all brand and subscription pages last week, and this is a working guide to best practices for both brands and agencies that manage Facebook pages. Rather than a Fan replying in a single list under a post, they can now also reply directly to another readers comment. We’ve summarised the change, the effect on pages and outlined some simple action points to help co-ordinate a successful approach.

Why and what:
Historically, the commenting functionality, particularly on popular brand pages, didn’t work well from a community perspective. It was confusing, hard to follow and resulted in “fly by night” fan postings, rather than genuine conversations. Facebook has tested threaded commenting since 2012, and it’s now available on all brand and subscriber pages. But before we lose you to go check your pages or chase up your social media agency for an update – this change is currently optional and you can still turn Replies on and off in your Permissions settings (phew!).

Observations:
During the past week we’ve see Facebook fan behaviour change. Interaction between users is simpler and helps fans to engage with each other rather than just the brand. Where a passing comment previously would have been lost, now with support (engagement) from fellow Friends or Fans, it will appear directly under your original post, regardless of its time stamp – this is affected by both Likes and Comments. If you’re familiar with Reddit, you’ll understand the power this gives your fans and why it can’t be ignored.
Brands that rely on the platform for customer service are now able to easily respond to individual comments left on the wall post – it’s taking a while for users to get use to this and we’re currently seeing some fans engaging on threads rather than the main comment stream. However, customer service teams aren’t the only page admins enjoying the update, community managers who have been trying to engage their fans on a deeper level for years no longer have to deal with a vertical conversation. This is beautifully described by @poetagrafico over on Mashable “now it’s like a chain with links where the links are individual group discussions”.

Top Tips when making the change:

1. Get a budget for a moderation tool. The current Facebook notification process is a logistical nightmare. A tool should be able to solve this. As Emoderation’s Tia Fisher highlighted this week, the current Facebook API does not support this change so if you are using an existing tool, don’t turn on your replies yet. The changeover isn’t obligatory until July so you’ve got lots of time to start your research, trial a few tools and retrain your staff to use them.
2. Revisit your House Rules to include a guideline for behaviour towards other Facebook users on the page, as well as towards the brand. We’ve always taken the stand that your page is yours, so OWN IT! Don’t be afraid to ban or hide comments that break your rules. Your page’s fans are a representation of your brand, if someone visits your page and has a bad experience due to your badly behaved fans, that is a reflection of you. For example, last month Justin Bieber was held responsible for his fan’s manic and often aggressive behaviour on Twitter towards each other.  This instance further fuels the theory that the way your fans and consumers behave on a public platform has implications for your brand. Read this and deal with it.
3. Clearly define the purpose and Call To Action on every post. Of course everything you post has a clear Call To Action and purpose, but if you are calling for conversational engagement from your fans manage the direction. Unfortunately, left to their own devices, the most engaged post (and therefore prolific) isn’t always the most popular or intelligent (see pt. 4).
4. Be extra vigilant with your moderation and watch out for Trolls. Bringing the content that’s most engaging to people seems like a great idea until someone decides to post inflammatory or irrelevant messages for no other reason other than to provoke an emotional response from your fans. They may even abuse Facebook’s new ranking system to get their comments to appear most prolifically on the page by Liking and Commenting on their own comments.

In summary, get ready!
Have a clear timeline, of when you want all your documentation to be completed, as well as a date in mind for when you’ll have the resource and budget to manage the change over efficiently. Finally, look over your content strategy and double check that your direction is one step ahead of your fans.

A huge thank you to the fabulous #CMGR community over at e Mint for their comments and thoughts.

 

Written by Lizzie Gold, Senior Community Manager @ The Social Practice

The Online Egg Hunt

Tesco has put Google Street View to topical use with an online Easter Egg Hunt that’s the perfect fit for their wider mobile marketing campaign. Participants can find the eggs, and ultimately prizes, by visiting the microsite and entering their postcode or linking to GPS to begin. After their great success at Christmas with “Pull-a-Cracker”, this is another strong interactive campaign for Tesco, who are showing initiative around topical events. With 29% of people having purchased through mobile in January 2013, is this Tesco’s efforts at pushing into mobile commerce?

Kit Kat vs Oreo

Kit Kat saw a great opportunity to fight for a follower’s loyalty after a Twitter user declared her love for both Kit Kat and Oreo. They responded to the tweet challenging Oreo to a game of noughts and crosses – see what they did there? Oreo responded also visually with a polite declination and an extended compliment. This is a great example of how a sense of humour and timely creative work can stand a brand out from all the noise of Twitter, and give them a personality rather than pushing out the usual messaging.

 

You Talking To Me?

Facebook has introduced a ‘Reply’ functionality within comment threads. This means that rather than tagging the person you want to respond to in one long singular thread, you can reply directly under that post. What does this mean for you? It means you should concentrate your efforts not just on customer service on your Facebook pages but also community management. The comments with the most replies and likes now appearing directly under your original post, if you only interact with complaints, they’ll become prolific on the page. This is another push from Facebook to encourage conversation and deeper engagement on their platform. How is your brand going to deal with it?

 

Dangerously Beautiful

Oriental Princess wanted to use their new make-up range to reposition themselves as modern and colour intense. They created six murder mystery mini-films – with 6 beautiful women acting as prime suspects. By registering via Facebook, viewers secured a ‘special agent’ card and collected clues to earn points that were later redeemed for discounts. Viewers could also click on ‘get the look’ icons within the videos to unlock makeup tutorials. This campaign saw nearly 300,000 people click through to the brand site – indicating interactivity and giving the audience rewards can lead to increased site traffic and ultimately sales.

‘The You Generation’

Using YouTube, Simon Cowell has launched his latest talent competition that begins and ends on the internet. Entrants are able to upload their auditions to the video sharing site showcasing their talent. Entries are reviewed, with winners receiving a cash prize. The success rate is clearly measured by the popularity of videos such as that of Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent, and this competition system is a great way for the entertainment industry to utilise YouTube, which is already a huge part of their platform. But is this just another way for Cowell to exploit young talent at minimal cost?

Tweet for TV

From the growing trend of social TV, a recent study has confirmed that there is a strong correlation between a TV show’s ratings and the volume of Twitter conversation around it. It is no surprise that the percentage is higher in the younger demographic, with 60% of 16-24-year-olds saying they use a second device to monitor their social networks while watching. Twitter is one of “three statistically significant variables” connected to TV ratings, social media is an instinctive outlet for us to voice our opinions, and TV is a prime subject that we all have in common.

 

Doritos #BOLDSTAGE

Doritos have brought to life the first fully interactive concert. The tweet powered stage is designed as a giant vending machine, and turns your tweets (with the #boldstage hashtag) into a real-time concert-control mechanism. Use your tweets to choose the playlist, control the special effects, send your photos to appear on the giant LED screen and pick the opening act. They will also stream the live show on Facebook and use the opportunity to showcase their new worldwide ad campaign “For the Bold”. Being the first of its kind, will concerts be the next Social Media dominated events?

Twitter for Music

Sources have claimed that Twitter is to release a new app focused on music, called “Twitter Music”. Soundcloud is set to provide the music streaming, whilst music recommendations will be tailored dependent on Twitter accounts. Moving into music is a strong step forward for Twitter, after launching their video-sharing app, Vine. Music discovery would be a nice fit since people are already tweeting about the music they like. Spinning out separate services that take advantage of users’ feeds and reach has strong potential.

 

For the Good of Pinning

Without a doubt – Pinterest is about everything we want and where brands can capitalize on our desires. So it is refreshing to see this helpin.it campaign that has used the platform to give to others instead. Each board is dedicated to a family that has suffered devastation through Hurricane Sandy. Pins on each board are of essential items that the family needs, from beds to shoes, all linking through to Amazon. With charities sometimes perceived as corrupt, this is a safe way to see where your donation goes, and it a good starting point for charities on Pinterest.