Are Facebook’s Mobile Ads a Fad or will Successful Monetization Stick?

Whoever coined the phrase “it’s lonely at the top” forgot to mention that that loneliness is often short-lived.

That’s because, at best, aggressive competition means an eventual sharing of the summit (think iOS and Android). At worst, it means a complete dethroning. Remember when AOL was the most popular Web portal?

For now Facebook, still the world’s dominant social media network, can bask in all the mountaintop sunlight it wants.

Not only has active membership continued to grow – it stands 1.2 billion or one-seventh of the world’s population – but desktop and mobile ad revenue is starting to add up. Fully 60% of the publicly-traded company’s third-quarter revenue came from advertising and nearly half of that ad revenue came from mobile devices.

This is especially impressive considering how fast Facebook’s mobile advertising ramp up has been, starting as recently as early 2012. In other words, Facebook has successfully monetized advertising in less than half the time it has taken digital media to achieve even modest advertising revenue results.

But how much longer will Facebook’s mobile advertising miracle continue? The company has already been extremely transparent regarding its own expectations. For starters, Facebook will not continue increasing the percentage of ads in users’ news feeds. With this growth capped, there’s only so many clever ways to incentivize higher click-through rates.

Then there’s the nagging concern that teens are beginning to tune Facebook out, switching to sites like Twitter or embracing a host of direct messaging apps. Some of the pullback is due to Facebook’s own success. What teen really wants to be “friends” with their parents on social media or have them or other authority figures poking around on what was once the equivalent of their digital bedrooms – places considered off limits? According to financial firm Piper Jaffray, only 23% of 8,650 recently surveyed teens preferred Facebook.

While the siphoning of younger support isn’t a big deal for Facebook yet, it underscores just how fleeting social media platform popularity can be and how ad revenues, like a seasonal stream, can dry up as fast as it floods. A decade ago Myspace was the leading social media network. Today, despite a flurry of recent positive news, the site has a very long way to go in its climb back toward greatness – if it ever gets there. Its base of 36 million users is similar in size to the population of the Greater Tokyo Area. One city.

How long Facebook remains on top is anyone’s guess. While I applaud the company’s mobile advertising monetization efforts and hope they continue, could it be a little too late as the next social media fad goes on the attack, chasing that summit?

R.I.P. D.I.Y. P.R…Why Press Release Production is Harder Than You Think

I’ve been seeing a growing number of articles questioning whether companies, particularly startups, should be saving money by acting as their own PR firms. It’s interesting to note, too, that many of these articles have been written by PR consultants and small-business coaches-cum-authors. Just saying…

Dallas Mavericks owner, investment tycoon and Shark Tank star Mark Cuban got a rise out of the public relations industry in early 2012 when he was quoted as saying that startups shouldn’t hire PR firms to manage their messaging. And there is some logic behind that.

After all, the arguments against a startup or small company hiring a PR firm come down to the expense of a retainer fee and possible extra billings. With limited funds and irregular cash flow, this view is understandable. There’s also the nagging question of whether the communication services provided correlate into direct ROI.

Naturally, I don’t subscribe to this view. Of course, not every company needs PR assistance. But in an increasingly crowded startup and small business space – employing nearly half of the US private sector and responsible for 60% of all new jobs in the last two decades – getting noticed is a matter of corporate life and death.  

Sometimes professionals are what are needed to get the job done. Actually, it’s a lot like plumbing. Fixing a toilet with duct tape and paper clips will only get you so far. And press releases –central to what our industry produces – are liable to end up in the loo if they’re poorly written.

But love them or hate them, the press release, which appropriately starts with the same letters of our profession, is our calling card. And sadly, I’ve read thousands of press releases that fail to inspire. In fact, we have two former reporters on staff at ThinkInk who have attested to the daily barrage of bad press releases they were subjected to during their journalistic careers. One (who shall remain nameless) even admitted to turning them into paper airplanes and flying them around the newsroom.

Underscoring the point: about a week ago I received a press release – from a man I’ve never heard of at a company I’ve never heard of – announcing that his company won an award which I’ve also never heard of. Just out of PR curiosity, I checked the name of the company president, who is quoted in the release, against the name of the company’s media contact. It turns out it’s the same guy.

To be fair, it’s likely that the company president is so busy actually running the company to put much thought into how he’s telling its story. And that’s exactly the point. This is a communications job for communications professionals. Leave it to us.

After all, there is such a thing as a professional press release. And it starts with an effective headline and email subject line. Both should rely on the tenets of solid journalism: concise noun-verb sentences attracting eyeballs. The body of the release must be story driven; something that evokes a human emotional response. It doesn’t have to be profound. But something like a humdrum building expansion and lease renewal all of a sudden gains added relevance when that client-serving news is anchored to, say, an entire urban core’s renaissance. Placed in that context, a press release transforms from self-servicing copy into another form of narrative writing.

Can a small business hire a team to write these releases in-house?

Yes.

But writing an effective press release is only part of the story. Knowing who to pitch it to makes all the difference. There’s also channel relevance to consider and social media. This mix of writing skills, tech-savvy know-how and networking acumen is critical to what we do, and frankly, why we get paid.

It’s true; public relations services can be costly. And there is often a slow ramp-up period for the selected agency to learn the client’s voice. Unlike newly repaired toilets, ROI benefits aren’t always immediate. But history is filled with examples of PR campaigns that helped turn obscure companies into household names or conversely, re-brand fallen stars.

PR isn’t an instant gratification business. But it is professional in how it operates. To the naysayers who counsel DIY small business and startup PR, I’d urge reconsideration. Your brand only gets one chance to make a first impression. And in the mobile and digital age sometimes your fate is sealed even before that public unveiling.

So if at all possible, leave the PR job to the experts. And if your loo backs up – call a plumber.    

Facebook Flatlining? My Prognostications for the Social Networking Behemoth

It might still be the world’s second-most-popular website with 700,000,000 unique monthly visitors – behind Google’s 900,000,000. But, as history has taught us, it’s usually when you’re flirting with the top that the bottom drops out.

And when it comes to Facebook’s dominance, the digital Visigoths are amassing on the web’s virtual borders.

Who are these digital invaders? An expanding list of mobile messaging apps like Kik, GeeVee and WhatsApp, among others, that are growing increasingly popular with tweens and Millennials. Kik, for instance, launched in 2010, now boasts 40 million users, GeeVee has quietly amassed several million users since 2011 while WhatsApp recently became Canada’s top paid downloaded iPhone app. Once Facebook’s most coveted demographic, the 15-25 age group is starting to bypass the originally built-for-desktop/laptop site, calling the website decidedly un-cool. Does Facebook think that its “F-phone” might stop the bleeding?

Even in our age of instant communication, it’s amazing how fast the conversation has shifted. Just last spring media outlets were writing about the time when Facebook would reach the billion-member mark. The early call was for last August. Instead the feat was achieved in October. Not bad for a nine-year-old company.

Fast-forward six months and now a Google news search returns dozens of articles hinting at what I think will be inevitable, the flat-lining of Facebook. Even with an encouraging Q4 earnings – revenue was up 40% from a year ago – the stock is down 1.4% and profit margins have narrowed sharply as spending increases. To me, this sounds like an engine being pushed to its limits – running hard and fast until breakdown. In other words, Facebook’s present business model is not sustainable.

As with many other great empires, Rome’s final downfall might have come from without – the real Visigoths, a Germanic tribe, conquered it in 410 AD – but the beginning of its end came from within. Facebook has become too big and its autocratic intrusion on our privacy, culminating in a $15 billion class action lawsuit, bears ironic resemblance to any super state’s trampling of peoples’ rights.

Another shortcoming: the digital soapbox that Facebook became, with people collecting fake friends like poker chips, may finally be coming to an end. Maybe we’ve all just moved on and the cultural pendulum is swinging back to a desire for smaller groups of actual friends. You know, people you might actually meet in person and actually know, not just “like.” Apps like Kik, GeeVee and WhatsApp are also great for young users as they avoid cell phone data network charges and it’s a little harder for hovering “helicopter parents” to join social messaging apps. And forget about prospective employers snooping around too.

That said, it’s not as if Facebook is going to unfriend itself anytime soon. A recent Reuters article is right to point out that the many Millennials turning to this new breed of mobile messaging apps haven’t abandoned Facebook – yet. But the true canary in the coal mine will be tracking how their usage patterns change in the coming months and years. And you can be sure Facebook is well equipped with its prodigious metrics-gathering ability to learn its fate long before it’s sealed.

Even then, though, the great Facebook empire may still fall, as all empires do.

Do you think Facebook is flatlining? I would love to hear your thoughts on this.

Tainted Horsemeat Turns PR’s “Gallop” to a Slow Trot

You have to wonder if the corporate executives dealing with Europe’s horsemeat food crisis haven’t just thrown their hands up in sardonic frustration and shouted “it was horsemeat, people, not horse s***!”

Be a dear and pass the Pepto-Bismol please!

Seriously, though, it’s cold comfort for the millions of Europeans who’ve been left with an unsettled stomach over the unfolding food scandal. And while there’s been a concerted effort on the part of Burger King, Tesco, Nestlé and others to address the meat recall across the continent – including the suspension of IKEA’s famous Swedish Meatballs – it hasn’t prevented social media from turning the crisis into one of misappropriated humor. There’s also been plenty of finger pointing at the failure of Big Business to protect the quality of the products they distribute, no matter where their third-party processing and distribution operations may be located.

And while that story was souring hearts and stomachs, another communications problem was gathering momentum stateside: the Newspaper Association of America, the New York Times and other newspapers joined The Associated Press in support of its lawsuit against Meltwater, a company that tracks and monitors media stories as related to client needs, but allegedly copies whole article leads and headlines without paying proper licensing fees to the AP.

Tsk, tsk, tsk.

Whether Meltwater wins or loses the eventual lawsuit probably doesn’t much matter in the court of public opinion. As a media agency they’ve only furthered the age-old belief that the PR industry is filled with nothing but “hacks and flacks.” 

Both stories reminded me of a more encouraging PR Daily article by Dorothy Crenshaw, CEO and creative director of Crenshaw Communications, named one of PR’s 100 Most Powerful Women by PR Week. Her article, How to Think Like a PR Person, articulated some of PR professionals’ most valuable skills. And by doing so, underscored that proper PR executive-think is very similar to the standards journalists hold high. In reality, this is a recipe that also works for corporate execs independent of their communications partners – something the horsemeat industry and Meltwater could learn from and use right now.

Crenshaw’s most relevant points included:

·         Think in sound bites: Talk about food for thought. This isn’t just a good idea for pitching media. It also helps condense one’s thoughts into step-by-step processes, more like an equation. When a company is in crisis mode, as IKEA and others are, this is particularly important.

·         Media training is essential: For similar reasons , media training is also about clarity of thought and preparation for difficult questions – ideal for Twitter and 140-character space restrictions – whether the questions are coming from news outlets or everyday consumers.

·         Voraciously consume media and content: Note, this does not say, “voraciously copy and paste media content.” For PRs pros this boils down to what I call “news aggregation with a point” – embrace the hyperlink, attribute constantly, and draw conclusions from the data used, helping prevent Meltwater-like accusations. (Exactly what this post does) From a corporate standpoint, knowing the news helps put immediate successes or crises in perspective.

·         Look for trends: Trends help connect the proverbial dots and can help draw conclusions from the above news consumption and content. For instance, if I were representing IKEA or another food brand right now, part of my voracious consumption of news would include data on the last time a food recall of this magnitude had occurred in Europe. I’d also be clamoring for positive data showing that incidence of these events has fallen to their lowest level in decades and the number of people taken ill has been negligible. Such trends help blunt the emergency of the immediate.

As I wrote earlier, whether it was horse meat or horse s*** doesn’t much matter to those affected by the tainted products. Hopefully this new week will see PR’s trot return to a gallop as communications and corporate executives consider this advice. Take that from the horse’s mouth and not from its rump!

Tuesday’s PR Lesson: Flood Your Clients with Facts and Figures

I love it when a progression of news stories works out like this... Yesterday, I posted a blog about how PR companies can learn to speak the economic and business language of their clients, adding to their marketing skill sets. My advice boiled down to this: become your enemy. Or, in Star Wars geek-speak, PR execs must learn to use “the force” to understand the mindset of their number-crunching counterparts, essentially getting inside their heads.

I also suggested the recruitment of business-background employees, expanded roles for in-house accounting departments and the taking of free online economic courses which have gained not only popularity of late but also legitimacy as quality teaching vehicles.

But there are other ways to demonstrate PR’s worth. It’s time for a little bragging so get out your batons.

Today, while traditional newsrooms have atrophied, PR has helped blur the lines between paid media, earned media and owned media. According to the latest estimates, the ratio of public relations professionals to journalists has increased from 1.2:1 (in the 1980s) to upward of 4:1 in 2010. Meanwhile, The Holmes Report, which ranks PR firms, estimates global PR revenues at $10 billion per year and Veronis Suhler Stevenson, a media investment group, predicted US PR spending would rise 8.3% in 2012 to $4.2 billion. Between 1997 and 2007 average agency salaries went from $38,735 to $50,499. Clearly we’re doing something right.

Then there’s recent acquisitions news with AdAge reporting that PR buys are “red hot” this year.  While AdAge was quick to point out that some of the recent buying frenzy was spurred by expected tax code changes, it reaffirmed that much of the interest lay in advertisers and marketers realizing the value of what PR companies bring to the table.

Phil Palazzo, founder and president of mergers-and-acquisitions consulting firm Palazzo Investment Bankers sized contemporary PR up like this: “PR agencies have become very adept at delivering strategic and targeted solutions over multiple channels – varying from experiential to crisis to social media to events – and for that reason they've been capturing a growing share of marketing dollars." 

Go us!

Of course, industry snapshots, in isolation, do little to convince a potential client of your agency’s worth. But whether it’s drafting that initial proposal, the weekly phone call, or the periodic visit to client headquarters, infusing your written and spoken narrative with these industry facts, can’t be a bad thing. There is a reason why pack mentality works. If everyone is choosing PR firms, why aren’t you, goes the implied subtext. The next step is placing what your individual firm does in the context of this macro-industry data.

It may astound some clients, but PR communications have been around since the days of classical antiquity. And if you go back further, information management and agenda-focused storytelling have been central to businesses for as long as business has existed.

So, the next time you find yourself on that unpleasant client call (admit it, they do happen) take some inspiration from this blog and flood ‘em with facts and figures, remind your clients that PR’s worth is often a lot more than what industry metrics state and prove to them why their business cannot live without yours.

The ThinkInk 2012 Review Has Arrived! Get Your Copy Now

It’s that time again… time for ThinkInk’s annual review of the year gone by as seen through the lens of PR professionals.

Every year has its ups and downs, its moments of jubilation and of terror. A year may pass quickly but a lot can happen in 52 weeks. 2012 certainly felt that way for us at ThinkInk!

Amidst all the news that hit our multiple screens, overflowing Twitter feeds and at times nonsensical  Facebook posts, making sense of what happened in our community and in our 24/7 news cycle proved challenging at the best of times.

This year’s review, called “Think Again,” aims to provide some fresh perspective on the scandals, trends and uproars that really got us thinking (and doing) in 2012. From loose lips to sinking ships, Think Again delves into:

·         Why it’s in poor taste for big brands – or any brands – like Gap and American Apparel to “bank” on a national disaster

·         The reasons why remembering the victims of 9/11 is (definitely) more important than educating TV viewers about Kris Jenner’s breast implants

·         How to avoid the plague of plagiarism that has a habit of impacting journalists and PR professionals

·         Why the US President’s slow-jamming ways on national television translated into a PR win for his camp and really made Obama the ‘POTUS with the mostest’

·         What happened when a cruise ship and the reputation of its parent company both sank in the Mediterranean Sea

Of course, not everyone will agree with the opinions expressed in our annual review, and that’s the whole point. If you feel strongly about any of our commentaries, we want to hear from you! And feel free to share Think Again with your friends and colleagues while taking care to attribute appropriate credit.

You can download the Think Again here.

 

Thought you knew 2012?  Think again…

Happy reading from the ThinkInk team!

Channeling Mobile’s Four ‘Es’ – Enhancement, Engagement, Experience and Enjoyment – into 2013 Success

Many end-of-year or dawn-of pieces open with the obligatory “My, hasn’t time has flown by?” or a “What a year it’s been!” statement. I will skip both, but go on record to say that 2012 was the year where mobile finally got top billing, a year where experts predicted that by 2017, more than 4% of all ads will appear on mobile phone screens and where the mobile mindset matured.

More than the technology itself, was how consumers used that technology and how brands capitalized on those uses.

No longer are consumers tethered to one place. And the type of engagement that users gain from their mobile experiences differs depending on location, whether it’s the beach, kitchen, office, train, or elsewhere.

For marketers, this means an unmatched opportunity to tailor their messages to these places of use while at the same time capitalizing on the four E’s – enhance, engage, experience and enjoy.

Now on to the technology itself and some of the trends we will see in the year ahead.

Setting off the proximity alarm: Geo-marketing is gaining traction
At times, I am shocked by how much farther this technology needs to advance. Of course, smart digital signage still lit up screens as it did minds in 2012, but I did not feel as though its “future had arrived.”

Take foursquare, a location-based social networking service. It has “only” reached 25 million users in the last three years. Compare that to Facebook, whose membership now exceeds 1 billion, or one-seventh of the human population.

With more people using more mobile more often, it is only natural marketers tap this resource.

Of course, there have been some encouraging 2012 examples ranging from KLM Airlines and its Meat and Seat social media program that allowed travelers to choose who they’d like to sit next to based on the sharing of personal information via social media, to a California-based organic foods company that launched a successful Twitter campaign.

Considering these successes, (and others) perhaps 2013 will see the growth of “hyper fencing,” or proximity-based offers and deals within a single shopping outlet or mall or airport?

Mobile payments and wallets usage will grow, but not prosper – yet
Mobile payments became a hot topic among industry experts and consumers in 2012, with 66% of the latter believing that mobile payments will eventually overshadow card payments.

Perhaps no better example of this trend emerged than with Apple’s Passbook, the loyalty program and gift card aggregator. The app has seen more than 20 companies join its ranks and the latest upgrade rumors hint at the possibility of NFC.

But Passbook is not mobile payments, and technologies such as Near Field Communication – NFC, or radio frequency contactless payments – that herald a new age of mobile wallets, doing away with paper cash and plastic card, have yet to mature.

The limited number of NFC-enabled devices – only 12 attendees at an NFC conference had the NFC enabled phones (ironic, no?) – as well as nagging security risks, namely third-party digital eavesdropping and the theft of personal data, will tend to keep NFC and the mobile wallet game a spectator sport – even if Passbook performs some kind of NFL-style NFC punt.

Augmented reality will augment the face of mobile
What used to be considered a fad that would eventually disappear has undergone a significant turnaround.

Augmented Reality, or AR, superimposes digital data, gathered from the Web and social media networks and places that information over physical objects or pictures.

Recent Juniper research already predicts AR smartphone apps will generate $300 million in global revenue this year.

One company, Layar, began its AR focus on real estate in The Netherlands but has since moved on to print publications, banking the technology will prove most entertaining for consumers and revenue generating for marketers there.

Of course, to its detractors, AR might cause one to yell, “AAAARRRRR!!!!!” as it is not where prognosticators predicted it would be. But continued media interest reaffirms AR will augment the face of mobile – eventually.

Enhance, engage, experience and enjoy
Ultimately the four E’s are what matters most. Not just for consumers, but marketers as well.

When Motorola’s brick phone started us on our mobile path more than 30 years ago, few could have predicted how far and fast technological miniaturization would evolve.

The first mobile phones were not envisioned as enjoyable, engaging experiences but utilitarian devices performing tasks.

For marketers, though, that is the furthest thing from a successful product.

LIKE THOSE EARLY mobile models, many of the trends highlighted in this article – proximity, mobile payments and augmented reality – have yet to fully hit their stride.

But that is what prediction and prognostication is all about.

I, for one, am betting on mobile’s continued success – in the mindset and the handset.

This article originally appeared in Mobile Marketer on January 4, 2012. To read the entire article, please click here.

My Hopes for the PR Industry in 2013

With so many year-end forecasts and predications out this month, I thought I’d take a different approach and focus on my hopes for the PR industry in 2013.

Doctors, it is said, are often the worst patients. Why? Well, not to generalize too much -- but many feel compelled to interfere with their own health management, trampling the jobs of accomplished nurses and other qualified physicians because, after all, they are doctors too. And damn it, they know what’s best for their own bodies!

True enough. But doctors aren’t the only professionals blinded at times by their own confidence and arrogance. Many others are guilty of letting pride block rational thinking, stymieing best courses of corrective action.

Countering the signs and symptoms of a communications illness  

Right up there with MDs are our very own PR professionals. As we close out 2012 and face a New Year, I fear our industry has developed an infection -- caused in part by an outdated way of measuring our own “health” (or revenue and client success) and the failure to cede some of our communications control to others in our industry who might be able to heal our ailment. Maybe we should call it acute communicative technological undermining and paralysis, or ACTUP for short.

The signs of ACTUP include:

·       The reliance on dated metrics like advertising value equivalency, as well as the Web’s equally rickety ad value formula that is as much substantive as it is subjective. While both formulas no doubt strive for empirical accuracy and consistency, they fail to incorporate the vagaries of a news story’s importance to a reader, and whether the length of an article is truly a measure of its worth. In other words, bigger isn’t always better and color (versus black-and-white) may not always bring in more green (cash).

·       Failure to appreciate that in many circles, public relations gets some rather bad press -- even from within its own ranks. An October 2012 study by research firm Edelman Berland (part of the Edelman PR empire) found that when asked the question “Which profession provides the most value to society?” only 11% of consumers felt “PR Professional” met that standard. Think marketers themselves would reach a healthier conclusion? Think again. Less than a third of those working in communications (23%) felt their job held societal value. Coming from an industry that prides itself on message management, this is an abysmal finding.

·       An almost allergic reaction to many forms of social media. And in the select cases where it is adopted, its integration into the messaging plan is haphazard and ad-hoc. Sometimes that means big failures with little impact. Case in point: a little error, one keystroke long, caused quite the embarrassment for the United Nations in November 2012 when UN Information Officer Nancy Groves tweeted about the UN General Secretary’s desire for a 1-state Palestinian solution when in fact his official position supports a 2-state resolution. Oops.

PR patient prognosis: healthy if we ACT now

To be clear, I’m not saying I have ACTUP’s cure. Nor have I been holding out all this time as the PR industry was ridiculed both privately and publicly earlier after it tried to give itself a new definition of what exactly it does -- the first attempted definitional overhaul since 1982. I won’t bore you with rehashing it, but suffice it to say it’s loaded with enough jargon and wordsmith gobbledygook to make you hang your head in shame and consider a new profession. Doctor maybe? But as we begin 2013, the adage remains sound: recognizing there’s a problem is the first step toward recovery. It’s the conversation starter that inspires feedback, makes waves and, frankly, gets sh*t done. 

In fairness, the fact that the PR industry has tried to redefine itself speaks to the beginning of that conversation. However, that’s not good enough. Traditional metrics aren’t likely to change much any time soon. But as the Web, carried by smartphones and tablets, grows ever more complex and critical for communications, we must as an industry better embrace these technologies. Not as gimmicky add-ons and apps, but through integrated, ground-up measures.

Although we may struggle to define ourselves and ad values remain notoriously suspect, there’s no doubt that in the tech-savvy, 24/7 news world we live in, our services are vital to the clients and corporations we serve. So we better get healthy and ACT fast.

Here’s to a happy New Year knowing we’re actively addressing our communications shortcomings. And here’s to a healthier one as little by little, brainstorming session by brainstorming session and conversation starter to conversation finisher, we tackle and triumph over each of our collective symptoms! It won’t happen in a day, a week or a month. But as with medical professionals, nothing inspires us quite like a challenge and the discovery of a new illness.

Together, let’s prove we can be better patients after all.

I would love to hear what your hopes or wishes are for the PR industry in. Feel free to email me at vanessa@thinkinkpr.com. You can also find me on LinkedIn or visit my company’s website at www.thinkinkpr.com.

Here’s to a healthy and successful 2013!

PS – the above article originally appeared in Marketing Daily on December 27, 2012.

Loyalty To Go: How Mobile is Remaking Guest Allegiance

This article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of ThinkInk, originally appeared in the Hotel Business Review on 11/19/12. 

The ballots are in. The votes tallied. And President Barack Obama successfully avoided joining the more than 12 million unemployed. While pundits will argue his re-election was as much about an aggressive (and expensive) negative ad campaign as it was substance, there will be just as many supporters who will point to his recent speeches and swearing in address earlier and say they’re loyal to the man who offered a list of promises – prevented financial meltdown, began an economic recovery, fixed healthcare, hunted down Osama Bin Laden – and delivered, and so on.

Yet supporters will say even more. Obama loyalty remains multi-faceted: from his cool, calm, demeanor, to his matter-of-fact style, to his reliance on tech-savvy youth to help get out the vote via smartphones and tablets, to his all-too-human human blunders, (remember the Beer Summit?) people were also loyal to the person for good or for worse, and not the politics. As President Obama placed his hand on the bible and swore to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States,” his immediate concerns over citizen loyalty came to a close.

But when it comes to industry loyalty, and specifically the hospitality sector, hotel operations don’t run in four year cycles, and nor can they take presidential retreats to Camp David to collect their thoughts. Committing to loyalty is a constant process, where even the slightest misstep could impact occupancy rates and the equally important revenue per available room, (REVPAR). In these still-challenging economic times, for hotels as in other industries, retaining existing patrons – like voters – is vital. And to a large extent, mobile is the ideal medium to drive that engagement. While 2012 has proven to be a banner year for mobile and its incorporation into hotel hospitality and loyalty, 2013 is where hoteliers must get creative. They must move beyond mobile’s low-hanging fruit e.g. mobile booking, checkout, trip itinerary planning and really break new ground.

Why?

Because the above mobile amenities list is becoming as standard (and unimpressive) as the placard boasts of “in-room color TV.” As the New Year removes its training wheels, sobering itself from the parties and hoopla that closed out 2012, the new “loyalty party” is fast moving toward the realm of social media. Only through the combination loyalty programs and social media, and the ways in which guests are being empowered to become the next generation of brand ambassadors is where the as yet uncharted hotel loyalty territory lies.

The Rise of “Socialized Loyalty”

Just like the President’s mislabeled healthcare reform, “socialized loyalty” is not about a government or hospitality takeover of social media – far from it. But it is recognition that social media, specifically mobile social media is rapidly becoming standard and a must-have component for hotel loyalty programs.

In the last 12 months, US smartphone adoption has continued to surge and by all accounts, has exceeded critical mass. Business and leisure travelers alike now enjoy adoption rates above the 56% U.S. average (around 84% for business travelers) and others report that smartphones and tablets might be the world’s fastest spreading technology ever, beating out telephones, electricity, radio, television, computers, and others. Or put another way, according to a recent Flurry report, iOS and Android adoption rates are moving 10 times faster than the 1980s PC revolution, twice the speed of the 1990s Internet explosion, and triple the speed of social network adoption.

And with 3G broadband mobile Internet access nearly ubiquitous and 4G access being provided by Verizon, AT&T and Sprint in 2012 and T-Mobile joining the ranks in 2013, it’s clear consumers crave constant connectivity – even if many consumers are still uncertain what differentiates one broadband carrier from another.

Increasingly that connectivity includes their social media connections to brands as well as people. Consider these five staggering stats:

·         91% of adults use social media regularly

·         70% of adult “social networkers” shop online – which bodes well for loyalty programs

·         Every minute of the day 684,478 pieces of content are shared on Facebook

·         Facebook enjoyed a 67% year over year mobile growth rate

·         28% of consumers share deals, (coupons and discounts) through social media

So if social media is where consumers are already heading in other facets of their lives, why can’t hotels move their mobile initiatives one step further and join the social media conversation?

Socializing Guest Allegiance

The good news is that hotels are beginning to get the mobile message and are readily taking to social media in new and novel ways. But before we address those, one of the most effective approaches is for hotels to incentivize guest social media usage through loyalty programs. In July 2012, MGM Resorts International expanded the provisions of its M life loyalty rewards program to include points accumulation and tier status upgrades for members of various social media sites including, Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and Instagram. All members have to do is rely on their smartphone’s embedded location-based technology so that their physical presence and social media shout out (worth 500 credits per tweet, Facebook post or Instagram picture) at MGM-owned properties in Las Vegas, Mississippi, and Detroit generates excitement and buzz from other would-be guests. Doing so earns members rewards that can be used beyond the casino floor, like restaurant dining. Dedicated loyalty members can rack up 6,000 credits each day and up to 30,000 a year.

Essentially, guests are rewarded for what they’re already doing naturally even before the rise of social media: telling people, both friend and stranger alike, that they’re at “such and such” a location, have had a positive experience, and directly and indirectly nudging others to “go check it out.”

Looking ahead, future use of social media and loyalty may involve aspects beyond the digital shout out and include items like gaming – another online and mobile activity that’s become increasingly social. Staying within the casino-hotel sphere, imagine if a casino offered a virtual gaming experience where future guests could play poker against other future guests and all of the winnings linked to one’s loyalty program membership? Rather than waiting for guests to arrive, they’ve already been incentivized possibly weeks before their journey. And, the more casino-hotels that offer such mobile amenities, the more their allegiance will be secure. Casino-hotels (and any others looking to drive guest allegiance via mobile loyalty) that fail to keep up will essentially be rolling snake eyes.

Caution in the Coming Quarter

While linking mobile, social media, and loyalty together are an essential 2013 next step, equally important is to be mindful of the basics and the realities of the current global economy. Even though stock markets have settled some following the presidential election, the world’s economic outlook remains uncertain at best: Europe’s debt crisis looms like an unpaid (and unwelcomed) hotel guest bill and the US “fiscal cliff” (the mandatory government spending cuts that went into effect some three weeks ago) is just beginning to be managed and dealt with.

That being said, there’s no denying that for hoteliers, 2012 was a positive year. As of this article’s writing, the week of October 2012 saw gains in three important year-to-date metrics: REVPAR grew 11%, to $71.42, occupancy rose 6% to 65.1% and the average daily room rate was up nearly 5% to $109.65.

But the proper implementation of social media and mobile means that it must be done in a way that doesn’t upset other budgets, or undermine the basics of what hotel brands do well: provide an unsurpassed, unique brick and mortar (read: traditional) customer experience. If the basics can’t be covered, mobile’s next-level incorporation may have to wait. Besides, assuming your hotel brand has been successful in the years leading up to 2013, it’s likely you’ve earned at least some leeway with your most loyal guests – before they reconsider.

The ballots may be in for the President and the Electoral votes cast. But in the early weeks of 2013, when it comes to the latest in lodging loyalty, hotel guests have yet to cast theirs. The hotel “election season” is just beginning and it’s looking like the merging of social media with loyalty programs might break the race wide open.

A new race is on and all hotels are up for a vote!

This article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of ThinkInk, originally appeared in the Hotel Business Review on 11/19/12. 

Communication Gap and an Un-American Decision: Sandy Sinks More Than Property

By: Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer

Sometimes 140-characters isn’t enough.

In my continuing efforts to practice what we preach at ThinkInk when it comes to the importance of social media, yesterday I tweeted about two retailers, The Gap, and American Apparel and their careless  (some would add heartless and foolish to the list of descriptors) marketing ploy. Both tried to weasel their way into “competitive advantage” following the devastation and destruction wrought across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic by hurricane/super storm/nor’easter/post-tropical storm/Frankenstorm Sandy.

Both companies reached the absurd conclusion that marketing to customers during a tempest that rivaled the ferociousness of weather not seen since 1888 was a smart idea - and a novel way to win loyalty.

Wrong. And this Tweeter needed to go on her own tear.

American Apparel’s 36-hour, 20% off “in case you’re bored” sale was geared toward residents in nine of the 11 states in the grip of the crisis: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. Why Rhode Island, a New England state where summer cottages fell into the sea and West Virginia, pounded with some 3 ft. of snow in higher elevations, were left off the “generous” list remains unknown. For its part in the PR fail, Gap sent out a tweet that while telling people to be safe, also nudged them to consider a dose of retail therapy.

Needless to say, the public reaction has been swift and the Twitterverse is alive with derision, with “the lowest of low,” being a very common tweeted and re-tweeted sentiment.

Misery loves company as the saying goes, so of course there are plenty of examples of Gap and American Apparel-like PR blunders. Just last year Kenneth Cole’s Twitter account tweeted:

“Millions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online.”

Really?

But returning to the recent crisis at hand, as a PR professional I wanted to go on record and add my voice to the chorus of disapproval. It’s truly disturbing that someone, somewhere, likely paid a decent to very decent salary, had the light bulb go off in their head and thought, “Wow, I’ve got the brainiest of ideas! Let’s use a natural disaster for our own gain and corporate greed.”

Well, I’m sure that in many Gaps and American Apparels across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic their light bulbs (and their heat, and phone lines, and computer systems) really are off now. Perhaps time spent in the cold and dark, thrown back for a moment to simpler times, will remind executives and higher ups at these retailers and beyond that the almighty dollar is not always king.

Many of our clients speak about the importance of driving quality experiences. Having a dose of humility and knowing when not to hard sell, soft sell, or anything-else sell is also a respectful way to move beyond the pettiness and triviality of our daily lives.

When New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a staunch Republican, praises President Obama for a job well done handling this historic calamity, you know you’re approaching the humility, honesty and transparency of which I write.

Eventually, every state impacted by Sandy’s arrival will rebuild. Beaches will open for summer. Amusement parks will charge overpriced tickets. Communities will come together and the lights will come back on. Just know that for every American Apparel and Gap blunder, there are other companies, nonprofits, communication companies, and everyday citizens all-too-eager to lend a hand and help.

None of them come 20% off. They’ll be there 100%.

Shame on American Apparel and the Gap – two companies whose despicable actions won’t fast be lost to the waves, nor this PR executive.

And if you would like to help your fellow citizens who were impacted by the storms, here are a couple of links where you can donate money or blood to the relief efforts.  If they were half-clever, that’s what American Apparel and Gap should have been encouraging people to do, not banking on others’ misfortune.