Companies and other businesses who have shown interest in pursuing social media marketing must be made aware of certain developments at the federal level before going through on that front.

Jon Leibowitz, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, says the efforts of online marketers have “fallen short” to create a do-not-track mechanism, through a 120-plus page report. The efforts, the report describes, have been overly-complicated for consumers to opt-out of being tracked for marketing information, as well as other self-regulatory efforts.

On the night before he is scheduled to testify before a congressional hearing, Leibowitz and the FTC have called for markets to voluntarily create a user-friendly mechanism that would allow consumers to easily opt-out of data collection.

The reports detailed the marketers efforts to self-regulate and described them as being slow and failing to “provide adequate and meaningful protection.”

It has been over two years since FTC first called for online marketers to provide a clear and concise way for consumers to opt out of data collection, and as it would appear, those calls have fallen by the wayside. Now, the congressional hearings are being called in.

Before being called in from of a congressional committee. Leibowitz expressed his dissatisfaction with the marketers self-regulatory initiative and said, however, that he and the FTC are not calling for privacy regulations, but are not opposed to supporting legislation in the future should it come to that.

In a roundabout way, an ultimatum has been set by the FTC, that it’s been too long and things need to change.

If you are a business or company moving towards online marketing, the FTC is looking for two things – an opt-out mechanism, and that that mechanism is user-friendly.

Some companies have responded and have gotten out ahead of any prospective legislation, most notably Mircosoft, which has included an opt-out function for its latest version of Internet Explorer.

Buzzphoria passionately believes that companies must carefully monitor where and when their messages appear online. We adhere strictly to the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s (WOMMA) Code of Ethics along with those set fourth by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), as well as our own sense of keeping our clients’ best interests in mind.

Businesses that wish to take advantage of the social media space in their marketing strategies should be aware of recent developments in the courts with regards to the privacy and confidentiality in online sites. In these cases, unsuspecting site users have had their private conversations violated by site owners, who furthered their own interests by passing along valuable user information, navigation habits etc. to outside marketers.

In March of this year, judgment was handed down in the Facebook privacy lawsuit – the “Beacon Settlement,” in which user information was leaked to advertisers via banner ads – which resulted in Facebook being levied a $9.5 million fine. Furthermore, the court stipulated that Facebook set aside $6 million for the purpose of setting up a foundation, to be headed by a three-person board, tasked with ensuring the privacy of information for Facebook users.

It would appear that the online privacy issues have been resolved with social media users free to Twitter and post at will without fear of private conversations being violated.

However, the judgment which was levied down brings with it its own liabilities. The Facebook privacy foundation will be helmed by Tim Sparapani, the current Facebook director of public policy, which has led critics to call this a conflict of interests. In fact Ginger McCall, a lawyer for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, filed an appeal in the U.S. 9^th Circuit Court, calling the settlement “deficient and illusory.”

In addition, lawsuits have been filed against social media networking sites MySpace and Google Buzz for similar lapses in user privacy. MySpace applications – including TagMe, GreenSpot and RockYou Pets – have allegedly been passing user information to its advertisers.

Buzz – Google’s social networking service – has been charged with passing along personal information that might be held in a user’s Gmail account, making it public, and releasing what was confidential information if users did not specifically change the default settings. Google was recently forced to pay $8.5 million in damages.

Critics like McCall have lampooned the courts decisions, saying the penalty award amounts are misleading with only a small percentage of the damages go to the individual users who filed the lawsuits with the bulk going toward watchdog foundations.

Google admitted the February launch of Buzz was premature. But critics knew about these allegations beforehand and called Google out on its services deficiencies, but they continued with the launch anyway. This brings into question the security of social media more than ever. It is one thing when sites are passing consumer information to advertisers, but it is quite another when the safety of your confidential and personal information is jeopardized.

Even though a precedent has stemmed from these cases, McCall and others are left unsatisfied, even with millions of dollars made in settlements. They wish to go further and set additional legal precedents that will protect the privacy of social network users by having the site that violates those laws face serious penalties.

Buzzphoria believe that companies must carefully monitor where and when their messages appear online. We adhere strictly to the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s (WOMMA) Code of Ethics along with those set fourth by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), as well as our own sense of keeping our clients’ best interests in mind.

Microsoft announced recently a partnership with Facebook that would take the first step of a long-sought after goal to integrate social media and Internet search. Microsoft Bing will allow users to enter search terms and view responses as well as feedback from matches to those searched items from their Facebook “community.” For example, if someone should entering their Bing a search for a steakhouse, they might find several names of places in the area, but they will also find that a number of their friends have “liked” a specific steakhouse on their Facebook page. This has been a goal of search engines for some time and this marks the first step being taken in a new front of social media marketing.

You better believe that companies are taking that front very very seriously. Crown Imports EVP, which brings in Corona Beers, has launched a campaign centered around Corona Light to make it the most “Liked” beer on Facebook. Crown has purchased a large electronic display in New York’s Time Square urging people to “Make Us The Most Liked.” Not to buy Corona Light or drink Corona Light, but to make them the most liked on Facebook. To sink serious money into an advertising program such as that adds to the validity of the social market. Corona Light ranks eighth among light beer sales, but has risen in consumer sales since August while its competitors – Bud Light, Miller Light, Coors Light etc. – have declined in sales. And this is something that for certain will continue. If an average conusmer is sitting at home some night and is going to look for a movie to go see, he or she might go on Bing and check show times. If that person sees that 15 of their friends have seen and “liked” The Social Network, then they might be inclined to go see that.

Of course this brings into question the protection of personal information displayed on Facebook and other social media site – something which already has brought into question in the past. However, Mircosoft and Facebook, both, of course, have stated that personal information will not be taken or pulled or pirated or used. But with all that aside, this major push from a top company brings to the forefront the importance advertiser and companies alike are putting on social mediums, and how that is now paying off. Now, however, it will become on more important on more of a micro level with seeking after “likes.”

Buzzphoria will take that initiative and plan with the companies from the start to create a plan – a social media marketing strategy – whether it be gather “likes” on face to increase search engine optimization. Do you want your company to come up on the first page of a Google or Bing search? Who doesn’t? Of course an increase in exposure will get you company’s name on the mind of the consumer, but just where is that consumer located?

From early 2010 until the beginning of the summer, two Facebook users allege that the social networking site leaked users’ personal information to advertisers and marketers. David Gould and Mike Robertson claim that from February to May, Facebook leaked a generous amount of information about users who clicked on ads via refer headers. The clicks transmitted enough data to marketers that they could specifically identify the people (through their Facebook account) who arrive on the advertisers’ site after clicking on ads on Facebook. The pair claim that this violates federal and state privacy laws, as well as Facebook’s own privacy policy it ensures to all its users.

This is not the first time Facebook – or other social networking sites – have been accused of privacy violations. Just last year, two computer scientists published the report, “On the Leakage of Personally Identifiable Information via Online Social Networks,” which focused on how networking sites could be leaking personally identifiable information to marketers. One example given in an article published on MediaPost.com, if a gay Facebook users was struggling to come out of the closet, he or she might be view a Facebook gay support group page. If they should click on one of the ads on the page, the advertiser would then know that person was on a gay support group page, as well as their personal information given on their personal profile.

With just the click of the mouse, this person’s personal information – as well as the information from all the pervious pages they have visited – have been made available to advertisers and marketers, and what’s to stop the marketers from blindly soliciting these people? The truth – nothing. And what’s to stop these marketers from sharing information? Nothing. There exists no checks and balance system in online social media and marketing. Privacy laws exist, but it’s readily apparent how well those are followed if these allegations turn out to be true and Facebook glitches pass this information to its advertisers. Even so, nothing exists to check and see where these marketers obtained this information – it’s a roundabout way of “Everybody gets what they get,” and they will all use what they get.

Information needs to be protected, whether it be on a social media networking site or directly given to advertisers and marketers. For instance, when people sign up for Google Alerts and receive emails throughout the day because they want to monitor particular terms or information, they are trusting Google that they don’t need to worry about what else Google might do with that information or that they’ll have to deal with unsolicited, marketing emails. Much the same way they sign up for Google Alerts or other updates, people will sign up with marketers to receive emails about their products so they can be advertised to as opposed to a blind solicitation and are forced to wonder how a marketer got their information and what else they might be doing with it.

At Buzzphoria, we strictly adhere to WOMMA’s (Word of Mouth Marketing Association) Code of Ethics http://womma.org/ethics/code/intro/ and those of PRSA (Public Relations Society of America) http://www.prsa.org/AboutPRSA/Ethics/?utm_source=prsa_website&utm_medium=top_nav_intelligence&utm_campaign=ethics_nav. It is our feeling that as marketers, we need to provide consumers with a level of confidence when dealing with brands and companies not only to be transparent and authentic but to also protect the trust a consumer places in our hands when they provide us with personal information.

In a time when it seems to be a no-brainer for most companies to make the switch from analog to digital marketing initiatives, marketing strategists are making important decisions not only about which digital markets to reach out to, but also how much time and money could and should be allotted to digital expansion.

Enter a new study from the CMO Council and Accenture shows that not all Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) are gung-ho about investing company funds into digital outlets.

According to the study, most CMOs agree that digitization is important — 78 percent agreed with the survey statement, “digital channels are important to their organization.” Also, half of those that were surveyed agreed that “Technology now underpins and shapes the entire customer experience.”

However, when asked if they’re “heavily committed and invested” in interactive digital marketing strategies, only one-third of the respondents agreed that they are prepared. Which begs the question: If so many marketing professionals feel that bridging the gap from analog to digital is essential to the future of their company, why haven’t they invested the necessary time and funds to do so?

(Un)Preparedness — Of the CMOs that were polled in the study, only 38 percent said they “believed their organization was prepared to exploit the opportunities presented by digital marketing channels.” So what about the other 62 percent who say they don’t feel that they’re ready to take advantage of the growing digital climate?

· 59 percent say they feel that they don’t have the funding for digital upgrades.

· 46 percent say that there is a disconnect between how digital marketing operates, and general understanding among senior management that curbs digital marketing investments.

(Lack of) Confidence — Perhaps even more daunting is the number of CMOs that agreed that they know how their customers utilize digital outlets. Only 27 percent concurred, “We know what we need to know about customers’ usage of our digital channels.”

Here at Buzzphoria, we understand that it takes a multi-layered approach when it comes to understanding the ins and outs of digital marketing. We help our clients find ways to bridge the gap that stands between companies who understand how important digital marketing has become, and what it takes to effectively understand and tap those essential resources. In an ever-increasing digitized business climate we believe that it is absolutely essential for companies to understand which trends their target audience is most likely to follow, and finally how to effectively meld digital with traditional marketing.

Has your company decided to go head-first into what it takes to meet the needs of your digital consumer? Tell us about it!

A big question for those interested in social media marketing today is effectiveness. What drives customers and businesses to my site? How do I engage my customer base to create a two-way dialogue that promotes positive interaction?

A recent survey conducted by MarketingProfs in September 2009 of business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) marketers found that the marketing tactics most often used on social media sites aren’t necessarily the best.

Simply friending customers and attempting to drive traffic to corporate websites with status updates on Facebook, ranked among the most common tactics. But brands cannot expect to gain traction with these simplistic one-way communications.

Looking at MarketingProf’s survey of B2B and B2C marketers, the most effective tactic for consumer-oriented companies was creating a Facebook application. However, less than 25 percent of the total number of those surveyed used this approach. A close second for both B2C and B2B marketers were fan surveys, although ranked as the third most-common tactic attempted.

Coming in dead-last as effective were Facebook ads. Even targeted ads, using Facebook’s improved ad targeting package came up short.

Not a surprise really when you recognize that social media users, especially those savvy to traditional communication techniques, expect companies to provide value, interactivity and ultimately open up a human dialogue.

Twitter is another application where the goals don’t match the approach most marketers’ take.

Because of Twitter’s features, brevity and fairly recent entrance into the web its user base is different from Facebook’s and so is its utility to marketers. Those who used Twitter as a tool for monitoring and person-to-person communication, instead of as a sales channel, reported 40 percent or higher success rates.

Buzzphoria knows that success in social media means going that extra mile down the road less traveled to interact with customers and clients in a dynamic way. One-way traditional communications aren’t how real people talk to one another and it shouldn’t be how companies going forward address their consumers.

Has your company embraced social media’s human communication?

As more and more people hop onto social media platforms, we are seeing more companies tapping into technology in new ways. The word is spreading that there are ways to create dialogues and conversation with your own customers while being introduced to millions of potential new clients.

For those not tuning in to the stats, Facebook is currently leading in terms of users. On September 15, Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, posted a message stating that Facebook “now serves 300 million people across the world.” To put some perspective on that number, there are just three countries with a 300 million+ population: China @ 1.3 billion, India @ 1.2 billion and America @ 307 million. Simply said, your consumers and potential customers are out there… and they are talking.

So how is social media changing business strategy?

1. Social Media Gives Candid Feedback:

Last time I took a restaurant phone survey, there was no option along the lines of ‘push 7 if your waiter should have been fired on the spot for the horrific service you received.’ However, many consumers will express this frustration in the medium most commonly at their fingertips. Before a company is even aware that someone has dropped their name in cyberspace, their brand is smeared all over Twitter within hours. Or the total opposite may be occurring and users are mentioning how much they love your product. Either way, it’s up to the company to react and create dialogue or to be totally absent from the conversation.

2. Social Media Creates B2C Dialogues:

One of most influential factors in a company’s choice to plug in to these networks is the opportunity for consumer dialogue. Instead of buying ad space to talk AT your target market, we now have the option to talk WITH them. Time to phase out the little feedback cards and mini pencils; the answers are right in front of us! Using social media gives companies a perfect opportunity to show personality and character 24/7 rather than trying to cram feeling into a :30 or :60 second ad slot. As for ROI, your success is solely dependent on the effort you put into your accounts. Dell has around 40 Twitter accounts, each personalized to a different target group of consumers. Definitely a lot of work to maintain correctly, but the end result is an estimated $3 million in sales attributed to Twitter.

3. Social Media Allows Personalized Service:

Of course, so does a customer help phone line. Here’s the difference: a recent Mashable poll showed that people spend an average of 68 hours per week on the internet. Social media-savvy companies are reaching out to their customers in a place they know they can find them. This is proactive approach can save a lot of problems down the road. For example, when a user tweets about their negative experience with Comcast, Frank Eliason (@comcastcares) responds with tips or offers to help. Eliason’s efforts were highlighted last year in a NYTimes article that shows how effectively social media works to allow companies to help consumers… and hopefully quiet the consumer’s negative postings!

Buzzphoria stays connected to the web, constantly seeking out conversations involving or affecting our clients. From there, when a company really sees how consumers are reacting to their brand, they can respond in an honest and helpful way.

Has your company gotten in to social media? Why or why not?

In our last posting, we talked about how we’ve made ourselves our own best case study by putting our own brand on the line to illustrate how we can help you protect yours.

As we discussed last time, there are unscrupulous individuals and groups who are hijacking brands for both sport and profit.  In our case, a hijacker registered and began impersonating the Buzzphoria brand on Twitter.

The first step in defending your company and brand when a hijacker hits it to verse yourself on your rights within terms of service for the social media platform or site in which your brand has been compromised.

Below is a screen shot from Twitter’s Terms of Service:

Twitter Terms of Service

Notice that the Terms of Service clearly state that:

1. You must not abuse, harass, threaten, impersonate or intimidate other Twitter users.
2. You may not use the Twitter.com service for any illegal or unauthorized purpose. International users agree to comply with all local laws regarding online conduct and acceptable content.
3. You must not, in the use of Twitter, violate any laws in your jurisdiction (including but not limited to copyright laws).

Twitter General Conditions - Terms of Service

Please note the following:

1. We may, but have no obligation to, remove Content and accounts containing Content that we determine in our sole discretion are unlawful, offensive, threatening, libelous, defamatory, obscene or otherwise objectionable or violates any party’s intellectual property or these Terms of Use.
2. We reserve the right to reclaim usernames on behalf of businesses or individuals that hold legal claim or trademark on those usernames.

Below, we’ve share the final section of Twitter’s Terms of Service - Copyright (What’s Yours is Yours):

Twitter Terms of Service - Copyright

Please note the following:

Twitter undertakes to obey all relevant copyright laws. We will review all claims of copyright infringement received and remove content deemed to have been posted or distributed in violation of any such laws. To make a claim, please provide us with the following:

1. A physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner or the person authorized to act on its behalf;
2. A description of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed;
3. A description of the infringing material and information reasonably sufficient to permit Twitter to locate the material;
4. Your contact information, including your address, telephone number, and email;
5. A statement by you that you have a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and
6. A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and, under the pains and penalties of perjury, that you are authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner.

At the beginning of the .com boom, it was squatters grabbing brand names they felt were valuable and holding them for ransom to corporations.  In the past weeks and months, it was employees at a Dominoes who disparaged the brand by posting YouTube videos, causing the company to go into crisis communications mode.  It hasn’t just happened to Dominos:  with the rise of user generated content, comes the crush of corporations being impersonated and spoofed across user-generated mediums, creating more publicity nightmares, crisis communications situations and expensive legal battles.

Equally as deadly and dangerous to brands, are imposters who grab brand names within popular social media platforms such as Twitter, MySpace and Facebook, to name a few…

Thus, the Buzzphoria case study continues… We too were a victim of brand high-jacking and the retrieval process to gain our brand back.

Within Scott Allen’s original blog post about Buzzphoria, he essentially posed a call to action for someone to high-jack the Buzzphoria name and identity within multiple social media sites.  Someone took him up on it and immediately grabbed the Twitter identity @buzzphoria.  The individual(s) then took elements of artwork from the Buzzphoria website and set up a branded page, representing themselves as our brand.  From our tracking, we witnessed the individual(s) populating the page with tweets representing themselves as us, sent to the followers the culprit(s) had begun amassing.

When we spoke to Scott Allen, he told us that the culprit(s) had reached out to him and had let him know that they would give us our brand back…if we asked.

Unfortunately, most corporations don’t see that level of generosity and kindness (I’m being facetious here…).  No…brand high-jackers do not usually reach out to a blogger or journalist to say - “hey, if you do talk to that company let them know I’d be happy to hand them back their brand…”

So, what’s the journey for a corporation or brand to retrieve its identity?  (without an expensive and protracted legal battle?)

Our next few posts will show you step by step how we were able to retrieve our identity from Twitter.

In our last post we covered To Blog or Not to Blog. In that post we mentioned that too many brands and corporations take a Field of Dreams approach to creating a blog believing that just because they build it the audience will come.

A report in the Wall Street Journal, noted the effect of adding a blog to a web site: unique site visitors increased from 100 per month to 150,000 per month; total sales increased 18 percent; web-site generated sales increased to 25 percent of referrals, up from a mere one percent.

The Wall Street Journal article also suggested that a blog can be more important than having a web site.

While we agree that blogs can be an important component of a brand’s marketing mix, we feel that it would be reckless for a brand or company to depend solely on the blog as their online marketing initiative. A blog is a great tool if properly planned and executed, however, if there is no voice, no plan and no audience it can also fall into the proverbial tree falling in the forest argument…

Creating a blog can be inexpensive when free blog sites such as Google’s Blogger.com (www.blogger.com). And while no one can promise that using Google’s blog site will get your blog a better listing in a Google search, it just seems like common sense that it would be a plus.

Other free blog sites include Wordpress.org (www.wordpress.org), LiveJournal.com (www.livejournal.com), and . . . we’ll stop here, because any list will be sure to omit the one blog site that someone thinks is the best blog site on the web. But that’s one of the great things about a blog: readers add value by posting comments. So, let the debate begin over the best place to be blogging. Or whether Blogger.com earns better positioning in a Google search.

But back to business . . . your business.
 
Why Blog?

A blog is alive.

A web site is static.

A blog is fresh, it’s now: content with a “born on” date.

A web site is like . . . that jar of peanut butter of an unknown vintage, lost in the back of the pantry.  Contaminated with salmonella? Who knows how long it has been sitting.
 
A blog engages the reader by empowering each reader to post comments.

A web site is mere dictation . . . dictatorially delivered.

A blog collects consumer feedback . . . in a place where your business can respond, especially to show the world you care about satisfying any unhappy customer.
 
A web site may invite an email or phone call, but can fail miserably at enabling you to show the world you care and do deliver excellence in customer service.

Updating a blog is as easy as posting your latest text, pics, or video to the blog.

Updating a web site? Unless you’re technically savvy, you’ll be writing text and a check with every little update.

A blog allows you to show your expertise. With this blog, Buzzphoria aims to illustrate details about our being our own best case study while at the same time showing how your business can use digital marketing strategies to enhance your bottom line.

To help stimulate the discussion, Buzzphoria will continue, intentionally, to do some things wrong, while unfolding all the elements of endgame and “we are our own best case study” illustration . . . and, we invite readers to demonstrate their informed opinions on the better way to achieve marketing success in this space. Uncensored.

Coming soon: What is a social media reality check? and What happens when your brand gets hijacked.