We all know that Social Media can be an incredibly powerful tool for businesses and community groups to promote themselves. At the same time, the “truth” can become a very murky proposition, especially when hundreds of millions of dollars are at stake.

A good case in point is the recent escalation of the disagreement between Fortescue Metals – a major mining company Yindjibarndi people who control some of the land where Fortescue wants to mine. There is seriously big money at stake here, and the company seems to be trying to engage the community, but also possibly divide & conquer.

So, what did the land-holders do? They posted a video on YouTube giving their version of events at a community meeting. The very title – FMG Great Native Title Swindle – probably gives a reasonable view of the opinion of the people who posted the video. Clearly whoever posted the video was trying to make the company look bad… presumably either to kill the deal all together or strengthen their negotiating position.

Activist groups posting videos on YouTube is not really new. What is interesting here is the way the company responded. They came out swinging, creating their own video in response, called The True Yindjibarndi Story. They also claimed in the ABC and other media that the original video was biased and criticised the created.

The upshot of all of this seems to be that the company has created further division and, so far at least, decreased their level of positive engagement with the community.

With so much resting for the company on positive outcomes with the community, my question is simply this… could FMG have been smarter about their response? Could they have engaged in a way that built stronger relationships with the key people they need to work with?

There are clearly times when you do have to take a stand to correct bias or inaccuracy.

In this case, the company will probably get its way and will have to pay handsomely for it. The story just makes me think that the response could have been more nuanced and progressed things with better community outcomes.

How would you respond if you were advising FMG?

There’s nothing quite like a global mega-corporation with a sense of humour and connection with its audience. One of the best of the lot is Google and the reminder is their tribute to Charlie Chaplin on his birthday…

It’s the first time I’ve seen a video header and the video is pretty funny. (It’s here if you didn’t get to Google’s home page on April 16).

The other interesting thing about Google at the moment is that they are very much focused on how to dominate Social Media, with lots of reports around that their bonuses will be linked to their success in SM. I guess their challenge is to do Social Media differently – SM2.0? – and evolve the platform. My thinking is that it will come out of YouTube… what does everyone else thing?

Here’s a good summary if you want to read more.

It’s been a good week, service-wise. I’ve had 2 fantastic customer service experiences that give me hope for what is possible.

The first one was an example of a retailer… I had some really fantastic, helpful, above & beyond service from OfficeWorks in South Yarra. Then, when I posted some praise on the OfficeWorks Facebook Fan Page, someone from OfficeWorks actually responded and thanked me for my feedback. So, not only did I have a great customer experience, I then felt valued for giving feedback. Guess where I’m going next time I need copier paper… or a stapler… or pretty much anything they sell

The second was an online experience. As many people know, my Mac hard drive died a horrible death last week. So, I wanted to bring the music from my iPhone’s iPod back. I found what looked like a really nice utility called Senuti… great web site, good benefits-based copy. But that’s not what I loved… what I loved was their purchase process.

If you have ever purchased anything on-line then you can hopefully relate… complicated process, error codes that would make Microsoft cringe and no support. Well, this was the exact opposite. The form was mostly pre-filled and easy to fill out.

What I really loved, though, was that the error I made (put the month in text not numbers) was pointed out… wait for it… next to the field that was a problem and in a way that made it really, really obvious what I was supposed to do. It took less than a nano-second to fix!

Then, as well as emailing the license code, it came up on the screen so I could just go ahead and register.

I almost want to buy it again, just so I can go through the check out process again… maybe I’ll buy another one of FadingRed’s products… check it out!

Ok everyone else. We can see it’s possible to do simple things that delight customers. Now get on and do them!

As someone who knows how hard it is to try to get a customer to part with their hard-earned, I really sometimes wonder at companies that do just plain stupid things once they have a customer in front of them.

A certain global fast food chain with yellow arches gave me cause to comment on this kind of customer-unservice again tonight. (Please don’t ask what a health-conscious young man like myself was doing even getting a drive through burger and fries, let’s just say it was 9.30 at night, I was on the way home from a meeting with several more hours of work to get done and was very hungry and leave it at that… sigh…  )

Here’s what happened… I drop up to the drive-through and ordered my burger. Then I realised that I usually choke on the things unless I have a drink so I changed it to a “meal deal”. The price on the board said $8.85. They then said, “That will be $9.15″ and I said, “Listen, it’s only a small difference, but it says $8.85.”

So, what do you think they did?

Did they:

a) Say, “Oh, sorry sir, we’ll correct that, $8.85, please drive to the first window?”

b) Say, “Oh, sorry sir. Our mistake. For your trouble, we will upsize your drink and fries. Terribly sorry. That will be $8.85, please drive to the first window?” OR

c) First have the server say “No, it’s $9.15. You are mistaken.” At which I reply, “Look, I know we are only arguing about $0.30 but it’s annoying and I’m looking at a sign that says what I ordered is $8.85 so I feel ripped off”. To which the manager comes on and says, in a fairly pissy voice, “Listen, we haven’t updated the sign yet, it’s $9.15, could you move through?”

If you guessed a, I would say you at least have a reasonable understanding of customer service. If you guessed b then pat yourself on the back because you really understand how to make a customer feel valued. If you guessed c then you have probably also spent your money with the famous Clown.

Now seriously, stop and think about this for a few seconds. How much did they spend to get me in the door? Hundreds of dollars over the years? Perhaps more… how much do they have to spend now convincing you that they are not morons? And not just the particular manager on duty on March 22 at around 9.30pm on the corner of Burke Rd and Waverley Rd in Melbourne Australia. It’s the whole freaken global business and it’s billion dollars a year in advertising.

All wasted because the local manager doesn’t have either the autonomy or the brains to turn a customer irritant into a customer win.

So don’t be a clown with your customers. If you make a mistake, or even if the customer thinks you have, fix it. Apologize. Make it right. Make them happy. It will cost you a couple of bucks and could create someone who will rave about you instead of writing blog posts about how stupid you are.

Human beings love stories… it’s how we have communicated, shared culture and passed on experience since the earliest times.

The idea of a “corporate story” has been around for a while and some companies have created stories that are powerful statements of not only their history, but their reason for being. It’s not an easy thing to create such a story but in many cases the effort is worth it for the results that having a coherent, compelling story can create.

In that line, I wanted to share a neat Prezi I found that shows how to create a good corporate story (plus I’m in love with Prezi at the moment – I think it’s a cool way to present information. If you haven’t seen it, check out www.prezi.com)

Hope it tells a good yarn…

The other day, I was waxing lyrical about social media in general and a presentation I’d heard by Peter Williams of Deloitte in particular when someone asked me a very simple and powerful questions: Why am I so passionate about social media anyway?

The answer is very simple… I am really juiced up aout helping people (and businesses) find and use their voice. It’s just what gets me going. You can cal it positioning, branding, marketing… doesn’t really matter. At the end of the day, everything I love to do is about helping people say what’s important to them and doing it effectively.

Where does social media come into that? As far as I’m concerned, social media is the single most effective way that any person or business can use its voice… and really engage in conversations with people who might care about what they have to offer the world.

Sure, there are a thousand tips, techniques, tools, web sites, help facilities, support, technical details. All of those things are important. But before any of that becomes relevant, helping people “get” social media is about helping them see that they do have something important to say (and everyone does as far as I’m concerned) and that this is the single most leveraged and cost-effective way ever invented for them to say it. (Not to mention get feedback, make adjustments, say it again slightly differently, find other people who want to talk about it, mobilise some of those people to take action, etc…)

Social media is so exciting because exactly the same tools are available to a one person operation, an individual with a passion or a global corporation. There’s no way a small business can do a global prime-time television advertising campaign, but they can certainly build a large fan base on Facebook and have conversations with those people and all of their friends.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about how businesses face the market – why there are some businesses that people just seem to love doing business with and others that people only just tolerate. What it seems to come down to is the customer experience that those businesses provide.

Why do people love Apple? They provide a great, consistent, fun user experience.

Why do people dislike most telcos and banks? Basically because the general customer experience is that you are a pain in the backside to them and they see dealing with you as a cost centre.

In fact, it’s interesting that the Bank of Queensland is currently trying to differentiate itself on providing personal service. Might be time to check them out.

So, with all the hype around social media, permission based marketing, relationship marketing… what is it that will really delight people and have the come back to you?

Before I give MHO about the answer, I’ll tell you what got me thinking about this again. I was sitting in a trendy Melbourne Cafe and had just paid too much for a coffee. When the waitress brought it over, along with the nice chocolate covered coffee bean, I asked for a glass of water. She very politely told me that it was over on the counter and I was welcome to help myself and refused to bring it for me when I asked her.

Now this water thing has become pretty common practice in Melbourne. To me, it’s cheap, annoying and creates a really poor customer experience.

Obviously other people don’t care that much – or don’t drink water – since most of the cafes that do it seem to be pretty full.

But to me it’s a real turn off. And I’ve made a firm decision that, no matter how good the coffee is, I’m not going to spend my money in places that don’t have the common decency to bring me a glass of water when I’m a paying customer.

So now I can get back to answering the question… the single most important thing that I think any business can do it to find out what kind of experiences will delight their “A” customers and then consistently provide it. At the same time, they can find out what really annoys those people and avoid it.

So if you are a fast food joint, maybe the experience that delights people is getting a consistent, reasonably priced meal in really quick time and a clean environment. Seems to have worked pretty well for a well known chain for many years – while their nearest competitor still goes on about how their burgers are better.

The second lot seem to have missed the point of the experience their customers are after. Or, they are after different customers and should work that out.

So, if you are running a business, what kind of experience will delight your best customers?

Much has been said and written about the future of journalism over the last few years. The Australian national broadcaster, the ABC, is a leader in using social media and blending s/m with traditional journalistic channels like tv and radio.

The MD of the ABC, Mark Scott, gave a keynote last year that should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in the future of journalism, communications and social media. It’s a little long, but well worth the time.

Check out http://www.abc.net.au/corp/pubs/documents/3075240.pdf

I’ll be interested what people think.

I suddenly realised that it’s the end of January… and I haven’t blogged since early November! How the hell did that happen?? I’m supposed to be immersed in Social Media and on the pulse of the Digital Revolution… so how could I let so much time pass between blog posts?

Did I lose my Social Media Mojo?

Well, there are a bunch of (not very good) answers to that, but I think that there is something a lot more pertinent here. It actually comes out of a conversation this morning with a client. This particular client looks after a group of highly skilled professionals and their only “inventory” is the time they have to sell. Sounds a little like my good self and, I’m certain, many other professionals out there. Time really is money and it certainly is finite.

How does this all relate to Social Media? Very directly… because anyone who has ever spent a whole night surfing around Facebook or getting lost in YouTube or WordPress.com know, Social Media can be a HUGE time sink. If you are undirected, you can let yourself get lost in The Cloud and come out the other end having wasted hours.

On the other hand, if you persist and keep focused, you can build a strong community around yourself and create a strong stream of referrals and clients. So keep at it. Come back to your blog. Jump back in to your LinkedIn Profile and FaceBook Fan Page. Keep putting your voice out there and connecting to people who might want to engage with you. Over time, the rewards will be there.

One of the holy grails of the marketing world is relevant, location based advertising… in other words, giving people relevant offers close to where they are. After all, if you are walking around feeling like Indian food, wouldn’t it be great to be able to get a special offer from the closest Indian joint?

One of the leaders in this space is Foursquare – an app available on iPhone, Android and Blackberry that lets you “check in” at your favourite locations. The apps has a great social element… you can have friends and there is a bit of competition involved. The person who checks in the most times at a location becomes the Mayor of that place and you can see where friends have checked in. You can also earn achievement badges for being active (like the Scouts).

For a bricks & mortar business, Foursquare can be a great marketing tool since it lets you create special offers for people who check in, or just for the Mayor. Now, Foursquare is looking beyond specials to how they can provide custom offers and even check you in automatically. Mashable has good coverage of the presentation by Foursquare’s CEO at ad:tech.

The challenge for Foursquare is that Facebook has recently released it’s Places feature that is very similar. It allows users to check in and this is shared with their friends via their news feed. Now Facebook is opening up Places for specials as well – and they are the huge player in the space. According to Facebook, over 200 million people access their platform via mobile… pretty amazing.

The challenge for marketers, of course, is to not stuff up the mobile medium. If you’ve ever seen the Tom Cruise film Minority Report you will have an example of push advertising at it’s worst. On the other hand, if it’s opt-in and/or user pull based, this could be the most targeting, relevant advertising ever devised. Certainly Facebook seem to think so.