Community Building via Social Media and Google+

BUILDING
A

COMMUNITY

With Social Media And Google+!

Presented by Max Thomas | January 18, 2013

www.ThunderSEO.com Follow @ThunderMax

FIRST
OFF

–

Who
am
I?

Max Thomas
President / Founder
@thundermax

Gplus.to/maxthomas

Bit.ly/thundermax

thunderseo.com/blog


Mom
&
Dad
–
Newspaper
Publishers


SMALL
TOWN
NEWSPAPER


How
small
–
is
small?

18,270

Popula:on


Gay
Wedding
Announcement

Dec.
29,
‘12


ReacGon?


Modern
Day
Wisdom

“When a politician slept with
someone it used to take a
week or more to blow over.
Now with social media it
takes less than a day…”
Lovan Thomas, Publisher, The Natchitoches Times


BeJer
Make
That
2
Days…


HOW
DO
BRANDS
COMPETE?


What
is
–
Social
Media
Success?

ENGAGEMENT


Are
brands
succeeding
–
With
Facebook?

Director of Marketing for a multi-billion revenue national brand


Facebook
Engagement
–
Where’s
the
beef?

Ehrenberg-Bass Institute Study referenced in AdAge Digital, November 15, 2012


Top
200
Brand
Pages
–
1.4%
Engagement

AdAge Digital, November 15, 2012


What
is
going
on?

a)  Email: 1.73% conversion rate

b)  Direct Mail: 1.83% - 3.42%

c)  Telemarketing: 6.16%

d)  Paid Search: 3.81%

DMA’s Response Rate Report Trend Report, 2010

1.4%
IS
EMBARRASSING


What’s
missing?


What’s
missing?

“I simply don’t interact with brands through
social media. I interact with people. Not one
of those top 10 passion brands does
anything for me. […] They aren’t my idols or
friends. Their ‘news feeds’ aren’t about
issues that I care about.”

Vincent Ammirato quoted in “Fixing The Engagement Gap.”, Olivier Blanchard


Methodology
–
PTAT
/
Fans

AdAge Digital, November 15, 2012


Higher
Engagement
Rates
–
It’s
possible

Thunder SEO social media campaigns for local
residential apartment communities
Average
Sweepstakes

MetroPointe
12.68%
12.68%

RhodeIslandRow
4.1%
5.7%

Gaslight
11%
44.89%

Halstead
7.97%
12.9%

PaleTe
9.7%
23.66%


Ad
Hoc
Facebook
Survey
–
Inspira:on

Request
for

help
yields
boom

in
comments

and
shares


Ad
Hoc
Facebook
Survey
–
Real
fan
feedback


Post
daily


Fun
content

that
gets

unrequested

comments

www.ThunderSEO.com
2
Follow @ThunderMax

Mul:ple
user

comments
with

no
moderator

involvement


3
Encourage
user
posts,

lateral
comments
&

conversaGons


Post
from
user
on
Taco
Bell

wall
encourages
conversa:on

among
fans.


4
Highly
responsive
to

posts
from
customers


Chobani
responds
right

away
to
post
from

concerned
customer


5
Post
content

from
other

sources

(non
promoGonal)

www.ThunderSEO.com

Follow @ThunderMax

Brussels
Airlines
posted

link
to
Wanderwall
travel

blog.
There’s
no
reference

to
Brussels
Airlines.


Fan
/
Follower

Speciﬁc

PromoGons


Sephora
features

FanFridays
specials

available
only
through

social
media.

This
rewards
fans

and
followers.


Celebrate
fans,

followers
&

customers

www.ThunderSEO.com
7
Follow @ThunderMax

Southwest
never
misses
the

chance
to
make
their

customers
feel
the
LUV.


8 Go
above
&

beyond
customer

expectaGons

–
Be
super
human


Be
Careful!

Avoid
common

failures


Be
Careful
–
Avoiding
posts

Taco
Bell
responds
to

posi:ve
post
but
not

challenging
post.
Looks

like
Taco
Bell
is
ignoring

fans
&
customers.
This

can
backﬁre.


Be
Careful
–
Ac:vity
stops

Oliver
Sweeney
shoe

company
has
ac:ve
updates

then
stops
on
September

3rd.
In
some
ways
it
looks

worse
than
having
even
a

limited
presence.


Be
Careful
–
Promo:onal
&
boring
content

Content
is
primarily
about
company

travels
or
events.
Doesn’t
provide

value
to
the
community
at
large.

Not
very
shareable
content.
Also,

no
face
for
the
company.


Building

Community
On

Google+


Google+

a)  What’s happening now
b)  Search impact
c)  Long term play


Google “is trying to build their own little
version of Facebook.”

Mark Zuckerberg, PCWorld


Google+
Surpasses
Linkedin,
Instagram
&
Tumblr


Google+
Keeps
Growing
–
135
M
ac:ve
users

Danny Sullivan: Marketingland.com/google-hits-135-million-users-27904


Google+
At
a
glance


Timberwolves
–
They
get
Google+


Bob
Stanke
Explains
–
Dir.
Interac:ve
Services

“Circles Are A Perfect Match For a Membership Model”
•  Growing trend in sports business
industry is membership model.
•  Annual packages determine the
experience.
•  As individuals add us to their
circles, we segment them into the
proper circles, updating their CRM
record.
•  We tailor Google+ content based on
membership level.


Bob
Stanke
Explains
–
Dir.
Interac:ve
Services

“Bring the Experience Closer to the Fan”


Google+
Hangout
–
Fireside
Chat
/
The
White
House

Whitehouse.gov/blog

Whitehouse
Google+


Ford
has
built
an
ac:ve
community

around
photo
sharing

(a
hobby
interest).


Moderators
are
Ford
Motor
Company

(Page),
Robert
Wallis
(Social
Media
for

Ford
/
Europe)
and
ScoT
Monty
(Global

Social
Media
Lead
for
Ford).

It’s
a
Public/Public
community
with
lots

of
posts,
comments
and
+1’s
without

moderator
encouragement.


Foodies
Online
is
a
very
ac:ve

Community
built
around
the

interest
of
food.
It
is
Public/Public.


Foodies
Online
was
created
by
Bridget

Davis
(The
Internet
Chef)
which
is
a
Page.

There
are
two
moderators.

Bridget
does
not
ac:vely
moderate
the

Community
but
there
are
lots
of
shares,

posts
and
+1’s
by
members.


Bridget
Davis
-‐
The
Internet
Chef

Page
has
over
622,000
+1’s!

Bridget
ac:vely
moderates
posts

and
comments
frequently.


Turns
out
she
has
3
Communi:es
–

all
pertain
to
diﬀerent
aspects
of
food

and
support
sharing
and
engagement

around
food.


Example
of
industry-‐speciﬁc

Community
that
is
not
:ed

directly
to
a
brand
but
an

individual
who’s
passionate

about
Google+.


Used
Google+
Proﬁle
to
setup

Community
THEN
selected

strong
moderators.


Mark’s
Proﬁle
is
in
over

28,000
Circles


Google+
Engagement

1.  Post daily
2.  Create content that gets unrequested comments
3.  Encourage user posts, lateral comments &
conversations
4.  Be responsive to posts from customers
5.  Post content from other sources (non promotional)
6.  Feature fan / follower specific promotions
7.  Celebrate fans, followers & customers
8.  Go above & beyond customer expectations

Google+
Speciﬁc

9.  Build your own Communities owned by your
brand Page (ex., Ford Photo)
10. Post regularly both your own & curated content
to your Communities
11. Build a strong moderator team
12. Participate as your brand in other Communities
13. Invite the outside world to your Community
(e.g., Facebook, Blog, Twitter, etc.)
14. Use Communities for customer service
Thanks to Mark Traphagen Source: socialfresh.com

Google+
Engagement
Grows
–
News
study

Adam Sherk: Adamsherk.com/social-media/google-plus-engagement-for-news-sites/


Search

Beneﬁt


Social
Media
–
Google
cares

?

Source: SMX West 2012, SEOmoz


Google+
Impacts
click
thru’s

Page’s
proﬁle

Friend’s
proﬁle


Google+
Impacts
search
results

+1's
from
friends
and
contacts
can
be
a
useful

signal
to
Google
when
determining
the
relevance

of
your
page
to
a
user’s
query.
This
is
just
one
of

many
signals
Google
may
use
to
determine
a

page’s
relevance
and
ranking…


Google+
Gets
the
traﬃc

Websites that use Google's +1 button
generated 3.5 times more traffic from Google
+ than websites that don't have the button
installed.

3x
Source: Hubspot study of 5,000 business websites


Long

Term


Google+
A
long
term
play

•  Google is about organizing data and making
it easy for us to access that data.

•  Google+ applies same “data organization” to
how we discover and digest content from the
people and sites we care about.

•  Google+ is to social media what Gmail was
to email.


Google+
A
long
term
play

Now, Google offers the long term prospect
of combining all of these together:

Inspired by Brad Feld. See Feld.com or follow @Bfeld

Q
&
A

DOWNLOAD
this presentation
Bit.ly/smcgoogleplus

max@thunderseo.com

@thundermax

thunderseo.com/blog

@ThunderSEO

MAX THOMAS
Founder & President Thunder SEO

Community Building via Social Media and Google+

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