Web Business by Ken Burbary

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Social Media’s Mount Everest, Helping Toxic Brands

By Ken Burbary ⋅ January 13, 2009 ⋅ 13 comments

During the past 6 months, I’ve talked and written a lot about how engaging in Social Media can help your brand. There can be numerous benefits. In fact, Social Media Maven Chris Brogan has already written what Social Media does best. And expert Mack Collier wrote a thoughtful article some time ago, describing how Dell has successfully integrated social media into its marketing communications and culture. Both are worth your time to read.

We’re delirious with Social Media mania right now. For good reason, in most cases. However, there is one important question that a brand needs to ask before jumping into Social Media. Is it right for my brand? How and where can it be useful for us? Translation: Does it make sense to engage in Social Media.

Sure, for many brands the answers may come easily. A strategy will emerge, tactics will follow. The excitement and energy that comes with entering a new channel will also.

However, what if you’re a toxic brand? What is your current brand perception is in the dumps? What if your current customers are your most bitter and harshest critics? What if your product is far inferior to the competition? How can Social Media help you under these circumstances (and I believe it can)?

What brand could I possibly be describing? Sadly, I’m using my favorite, and home town, NFL Franchise as my test subject. The Detroit Lions brand is at an all time low. They set an NFL record for the 2008-2009 season by losing every regular season game, finishing 0-16. Ticket sales are down. Home games are blacked out on local television because of it. The Lions franchise is the laughing stock of the league. And I, like many other thousands of fans, DO NOT LIKE IT. I’m a life long fan (I know, I know, spare the glutton for punishment jokes) and want to see them succeed, so much so that I’m devoting this time & energy to blogging about it.

I have my own ideas but am looking for your perspectives. I’m hoping to tap into the collective wisdom of the Social Media crowd, and answer these 3 questions:

How can the Detroit Lions effectively engage in Social Media to help improve their brand image?
How can the Detroit Lions effectively engage in Social Media to increase sales of tickets and merchandise?
How can the Detroit Lions effectively engage in Social Media to improve the relationship with their customers and fans?

Couldn’t this become the perfect case study? If Social Media can help save a brand like the Lions, lifting them out of the brand perception toilet, then one could argue the right Social Media strategy, integrated into an overall marketing strategy, could be a difference maker for any brand? And collectively, we have an opportunity to help make that happen.

I am VERY interested in hearing your input. Please share your ideas and opinions in the comments. With any luck, maybe…..just maybe…the Lions will be listening. And if they aren’t, I’ll do what is necessary to take the answers to their doorstep. Viva La Lions!

2008 Twitter Reflections

By Ken Burbary ⋅ December 31, 2008 ⋅ 6 comments

As 2008 draws to a close, I took some time to reflect and analyze how I tweet, what I tweet about and who I tweet with. I used a neat little tool called Wordle to create a visual topic cloud.

2008 tweet cloud

This topic cloud, which can also be made with Tweetcloud, makes it pretty clear that I spend a lot of time talking about Twitter, the people on Twitter, and saying Thanks. That’s no surprise to me. Every day I’m thanking another member of the community for the advice, knowledge and help that they so generously give. This year wouldn’t have been the same without every single one of you.

Thank you.

I look forward to an even more properous 2009 for each and every one of you.

Happy New Year!

The Age of DIY

By Ken Burbary ⋅ November 25, 2008 ⋅ 11 comments

I’m a big believer in DIY – Doing it Yourself. Call me old fashioned but it’s something I learned at an early age from my late father. If you don’t know something, learn it. Need a piece of info? Find it. Need specialized expertise? Seek it out. No one else is going to do it for you (usually), so you better take the initiative and get it done yourself. Like life, business is littered with challenges and obstacles that you will encounter along the way. How you handle these obstacles, what you do next, usually determines whether or not the outcome is successful.

Sound like a lot? It certainly can be. No one I know has the time, nor aptitude to be proficient in every topic and/or skill, let alone acquire deep expertise. Fortunately, the rules of the game have evolved and changed to point there where they favor YOU.

For example, until recently, if you were a web developer and needed to build a new application on a emerging platform (let’s say RoR – Ruby on Rails), what options would you have to solve the problem?

You could:

Learn how to write RoR code yourself
Hope someone within your network already possesses the skill/knowledge
Pass on an opportunity because you didn’t have the answers, right partner, etc..

That’s hard if you aren’t a technologist who can quickly adapt to a new technology platform (I know some rock-star developers out there, like David Hinson, can do this without skipping a beat).

But I’m not a techie you say. This doesn’t apply to me. Ok, what if you’re the brand manager in the marketing dept. for a successful consumer products company. You’ve been asked to develop the social media component of an integrated go-to-market plan for your brand. Social Media? Doesn’t that mean Myspace or Facebook? You don’t have experience with social media and aren’t sure where to start, so what options would you have to solve the problem?

You could:

Learn as much as you can in a short time and write the strategy yourself, hoping for the best (not advisable!)
Hope you can find an expert in your network who has the knowledge/expertise in Social Media
Recommend a plan that has no social media component, and miss a golden opportunity to engage with your customers

Do any of these sound good to you? Hardly. There is a better way forward, and it’s available to you because the world has changed and unleashed a new power for individuals. The network allows you to crowd source a problem. The network allows you to community source a problem. The network exponentially increases your capabilities, through the reach of others.

In the networked DIY age, the problems above get solved quickly because you have the necessary relationships and resources available to you. Don’t believe me? Try this example here, here or here. Answers come in minutes. The network allows you to move fast enough to meet business challenges thrown at you every day. However, it’s not something you get without first putting in the work yourself. How? By becoming active in the network. Establishing relationships, initiating dialogue w/others, helping others grow, so you can be in a position to benefit when you really need it.

This is available to anyone willing to take advantage of it. How? I suppose I could elaborate in extensive detail, but many others, far more knowledgable than I, have already provided the roadmap. You should read these blog posts on how to get started:

And then reach out to them.

The most important takeaway in all of this is: PARTICIPATION. Remember, it’s the age of DIY, and success can’t happen unless YOU are the one doing. The revolutionary difference about this is that you’re now able to contact these subject matter experts, build relationships with them. In some cases form partnerships with them. Ultimately, you’ll be in a better position because of it, and make better decisions about you business. Help yourself by helping others grow. The more you give, the more you get.

Let’s reexamine the hypothetical problems I described earlier, but in the DIY age. New options are available through crowd sourcing, or directly engaging subject matter experts who are part of the community. You’re able to go directly to the source for expertise. Establish a dialgoue, here (RoR Expert) and here (Social Media Expert), and work together to solve the problem. Experts can be instantly referred to you by colleagues in the network, or by contacts they have. The irony is, despite what the DYI term implies, you’re anything but alone in the DIY age.

Individuals over the world are adapting to the network so they can solve business problems, build new (and otherwise out of reach) relationships, build new businesses, even change countries.

How are you adapting to the DIY age? Do you believe in its ability to transform the way you work? The way you live? You should. It’s changing your world whether you like it or not. As Charles Darwin famously said: