Transparency Rules OK

It’s not going to be an astounding revelation to any of us but Nielsen’s latest Global Online Consumer Survey shows that word of mouth is the most powerful form of communication when it comes to getting people to trust your brand. No fanfares there.

What I think is interesting is the second highest result in this league table of “trusted sources” – ‘Consumer opinions posted online’. The opinions of strangers posted on online forums and review sites are now incredibly powerful portals for gaining consumer trust, and there’s not a thing the brands can do about it! Although I do wonder if this will provoke some corporations into trying to infiltrate the message boards… My advice? Focus on good CRM and values that you believe in and stick to and let the quality of your product shine through, and this fits perfectly well with cultural organisations too. The consumer (audience) is king!

Social Media = PR. Discuss

I was at a great conference yesterday:

Although the event was dominated by corporate PR types, there were some really interesting case studies raised. Craig Elder, Online Communities Editor for the Conservative Party demonstrated that he and his team absolutely understand how social media should be used to get your message out there. I think the essence of this understanding has come from the delicate position of representing a political party – you have to listen to people, not force your message down people’s throats, and that is precisely what was reiterated by several of the speakers:

LISTEN TO WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT YOU AND THEIR LIVES BEFORE YOU JOIN THE CONVERSATION!

I was delighted to hear everyone back this up! You wouldn’t barge into a pub and announce at full volume how great your next exhibition is would you? No. Sit down, talk to people, find out what they’re interested and find a way to introduce what you think is of value to them about your brand.

Also, I can Highly recommend Steven Davies’ (no, not that one) blog at www.prblogger.com, where he’s just posted a copy of the presentation that he gave about Twitter – WTF is Twitter and why should I care? Very useful for you newbies, I’ve just upgraded to TweetDeck, so I’m an expert myself. Read: proper geek now…

There’s so much to say about the conference, why not search for #dontpanic in Twitter - lots of comments were made throughout the day. And while you’re at it , feel free to check out my tweets – emmclean

On my reading list this week…

I’ve heard this book referred to a number of times – by Diane Ragsdale of the Mellon Foundation and also the International Futures Forum: Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzales (www.deepsurvival.com) – essentially I gather it focuses on looking at survival situations and concludes that those who realise they are lost the quickest are the ones that survive…

And on a different note – Citizen Brands – putting society at the heart of your business by Michael Willmott ie. being a better corporate citizen is the right business call – which seems sensible to me!

Reviews of these will follow! But both seem to have possible applications for surviving in a recesion…