Nick Cifuentes

Facebook made a bit of noise last week when they introduced the new Business Pages layout. Then, several days later, made changes to the Home page of all user profiles, and integrated a ‘Twitter’ like wall stream - Facebook’s strategy in building out a more real-time conversation tool.

As usual, when Facebook decides to make changes, your entire office, your close friends and other random people you might see throughout the day - they all have something to say, and I am sure you’ve heard the complaints already. However, I am here to bring calm to the storm…rest assured, Facebook is making a very intelligent change in status here. And most importantly, businesses will be able to flourish greatly from this move.

When it comes to the new business pages - it will now look and function much like personal profiles, offering stronger brand connections via the wall stream, which now takes center stage. When a fan comes to your page now, the very first page they look at is the ‘wall stream’. On this page, businesses that create content often, will thrive in this new environment. As a brand, the wall stream page will gather content and post information about the page and posts by the page itself. Also, content shared by you, links, photos, videos and short text updates via the status updates, and posts by your fans left for you - all now show up in the wall.

In this update, which is really the holy grail here, the wall updates you post will publish to your Fans’ news feeds, and posts by your Fans will go to their friends’ news feeds as well. So, think about this a second - the more content you are able to place and create in your channel, the more you engage with your fans, in turn, the more people you will be able to reach constantly. A single status update of your business profile seeds through Facebook into your fan’s news streams. Now, all their friend’s see this, and can ‘like’ or ‘comment’ on the update, and possibly go one step further and become a Fan of the page.

The wall stream will be a large key in driving attention to your page - use it wisely! You are familiar with how Twitter works, Facebook is integrating the same concept using this wall stream - homepage stream. The more frequency of status updates on your page, the more chance you have to stand out with your fans in the Facebook stream.

When it comes to the layout of the page, Facebook rid themselves of the long ‘leaderboard‘ layout, and moved to a tabbed layout - exactly how your user profile pages now function. And now, when a fan goes to your business page, they are defaulted to the Wall tab, so that fans can see the most recent added content to the page. And for non-Fans that visit your page, you can set a default landing page within your business profile page.

With the ability to send new potential fans to your business page, you can highlight a specific default tab to send them to that might have the most appealing or interactive elements within your page. This will allow users to better promote different portions of their page by driving ad traffic or new fans to certain sections of your profile. By driving potential fans to landing pages within Facebook, you can dramatically grow your fans and leads that ultimately improve conversion rates.

If you are running a specific campaign, or have a new application, event, or interactive element on your page you want new users to connect with - now you can easily create that conversion path for the user.

Some interesting analytics were also integrated into new business pages. Facebook now allows you to track video views, comments posted, news feed posts viewed, and this is all in addition to page views and unique views. And even better, all this data is exportable via CSV sheets.

New Design Makes Advertising on Facebook Irresistible

Facebook is clearly trying to drive more advertisers to use the platform, and it makes a lot of sense now with Facebook allowing you to drive non-fans to specific pages inside your business profile. This is going to add value and interest for users who will make their way to your Facebook page. Brands should embrace this tactic and give Facebook advertising a shot - you won’t be disappointed this time around.

People in the past have been reluctant to spend money on advertising within social networks. The real fact is, social network members are co-creators of content, and in turn, feel they have a sense of ownership within the site. Advertising needs to be more about participating in relevant conversation with consumers rather than simply pushing ads onto a social network user. Advertising should focus on being part of the conversation, not invading the social space.

Advertising needs to be about adding value to a user’s experience, as social networks are built around members adding value to each other’s lives through interaction. This is why fan sites and sponsored groups are truly one of the most successful strategies when marketing within the platforms. This act touches on the principles of interactivity, and adds value to a user’s experience via offers, previews, and the ability for user’s to help create content.

The true challenge though in creating a perfect marriage between social network advertising - marketing and that network’s user, is time. There is no quick-fix in social network marketing, sure there can be exceptions, but those are few and far between. Much like a friendship, social media marketing requires effort, time and a continual investment in the platform to build and foster relationships. Remember, your messaging needs to be authentic and humble, and built on two-way conversation, not a push (one-way) model - in the end, this will add value to the consumer’s decision.

For more information on social media marketing, please review our services, and contact us or myself if you have any questions.

According to a new report from Forrester Research, social media isn’t just for kids any longer. The new report notes that more than 60 percent of baby boomers are actually engaged in social media channels, such as blogs, videos, podcasts, and forums.

In 2007, the percentage of baby boomers consuming this media was at 46% for people ages 43 to 52, and 39% for people ages 53 to 63. By 2008, the number increased in a massive way, 67% and 62% respectively.

In addition, the number of baby boomers responding to content posted online increased as well. For the younger boomers, responding to content doubled from 15% in 2007 to 34% in 2008. According to Forrester, this is now at a percentage that’s high enough to target this group with social media applications and content.

When it comes to joining social networks, the activity has widely increased among baby boomers as well. Today, almost one in four of the younger boomers are actively engaged in social networks, up from 15% in 2007.

The one aspect of social media that is up, but not at a significant increase when compared to the other activities, is the aspect of actually creating content. Besides updating their online profiles and leaving blog comments, the baby boomers are still not heavily involved in writing blog articles or creating videos and posting them online. In 2008, 16% of younger boomers were involved in content creation (up from 12% in 2007) and 15% of older boomers (up from 8% in 2007). Both groups saw an increase, but it still remains the least popular activity online for baby boomers.

What Does this Mean?

According to Forrester’s suggestion - the best bet for getting baby boomers involved in your content is to create blogs or videos that relate to the life and/or work style of baby boomers. And creating these content channels without so many complex sign-up processes are most likely the smartest direction to take your ideas, as the numbers above show that baby boomer’s feedback is limited - so consider the sensitivity of your channel.

This research opens the door to start considering serious steps into creating social applications for this particular age group (ages 43 to 63). Although the group isn’t as active as the younger generations, their participation levels are now at a moderate level and increasing - very worth of a company to start to seriously consider marketing towards.

So when thinking about marketing to this age group, consider the social networks that many of the baby boomers now favor. Websites like Eons, BOOMj.com, TeeBeeDee, Classmates Online, and AARP’s new online community.

Fin.

“A picture is worth a 1000 words” is a well-known saying, and was coined to describe the idea that complex stories can be described with just a single still image. Images are crucial in today’s world, and more so in the presentation of ideas.

Images capture the essence of life, and without question, appeal to the emotions inside all of us. They make information more engaging and influential. An image can capture human emotions, uncensored reflections and a collection of beliefs that allows information to vocalize what message you are trying to convey.

Like videos, images can spread quickly and infect a population to the point where the message is no longer just an image with text, but more so an image with meaning. In turn, passing well beyond the ideals of human emotion and spreading the information virally into a person’s mind.

Visual representations, also known as infographics, are images that are created to attract attention and spread ideas. Similar to videos, images have the ability to be spread virally, and can capture an individual’s attention when they are presented cleanly and paired with text to present information.

The graphics are created to inform an audience, and construct a focused identity that supplements textual content. These infographics can stand alone on their own - acting as a presentation piece that explains a particular topic and acts as a citable reference.

Infographics have the ability to live on their own and can be spread virally to attract attention for almost any brand. When thinking about spreading information, consider an image weaved with information to create something ‘social’. Many B2B and B2C brands have trouble realizing how they can take advantage of the social space outside of the blogosphere and creating active social media profiles pages sometimes.

To take a look at some great examples of infographics here (courtesy of Princeton University)

Overdrive Interactive recently released an infographic in the form of a social media map that outlines the variances of the social web. The map is clean, concise, and acts as a clickable PDF - as it should because I helped make it…ha-ha. More importantly, it sits on a landing page designed with clickable chiclets that allows you to share the infographic directly on Twitter, Facebook, Digg and Delicious. This, in turn, gives the ability for a person to ‘share’ the graphic with their community of friends, making your simple graphic, more than just a pretty picture to review. It makes it ALIVE and more importantly - VIRAL!

Now that you’ve seen some examples - think how your brand might be able to incorporate an infographic. Think of it two parts. First, consider the content you want to incorporate. And then, secondly, in what display method will this content work? Could your information sit within a rich display like the first examples above, or live within a less involved design, such as the second example?

Either way, think about your branding possibilities with something like this…are you in need of an inforgraphic?

Fin.

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… C: wait… SD: wait…

I came across a viral branding website yesterday for a popular television show on HBO, Flight of the Conchords. The TV show is about two men that live in NYC doing sketch comedy and singing their comedic folk songs inside a once a week half-hour show that looks at the everyday happenings of the two main characters, Bret and Jemaine

The idea.

Take a concept of the brand and distinguish it as a ’sensation’. I know that might sound complicated - but it’s really so easy, and I don’t understand why other companies aren’t utilizing their ‘usable’ assets for something similar.

This is exactly what the Flight of the Conchords are doing with their new micro-site - “Lip Dub Video Fansterpiece.” The concept is to learn the lyrics of one of the songs the two main characters sing, and then you are supposed to videotape yourself lip-synching the song, and then upload it to the website - where you might be added to a final “Fansterpiece” that will air on HBO. This content is being advertised only on social channels, and is completely viral - meaning this is not having any media or TV dollars spent on the campaign.

The contest was launched in mid-November, and will last until the new season of the show starts in mid-January.

Simple. Simple. Simple.

I can’t get over how simple this is, but how effective it has become. They don’t give away any lavish prizes, you don’t win a trip to any special destination or big lump sum of money - just about 10 seconds of a small amount of fame.

At the same time, they do a great job of implementing bookmarks or sometimes referred to as chicklets. These are the type of calls-to-action that include the ability to post the “contest” to Facebook, Digg, Twitter, Delicious, and you can also email to a friend. These are all tactics in “spreading” the word-of-mouth further into the social networks.

The video service they are using is YouTube, making it ‘free’, as well as very viral! This allows HBO to spread their contest through the social channels with little to zero promotion on their part, which was their full intention.

Statistics.

Since the website launched in mid-November - the main website where they utilize the videos, the YouTube channel that was created for the contest - has seen nearly 8,000 views since the project launched on Nov. 13. I know those numbers are not monumental, but you have to think about the ‘trickle’ down effect from this contest alone.

On the microsite, you also are able to access the Flight of the Conchord’s Facebook and MySpace pages. Their current Facebook page has a more than 245,000 fans, and they have a little over 25,000 friends on MySpace. These channels were setup well before the contest started…but both channels have seen an increase in activity in fans/friends since the middle of last month.

So What?

Well, I tell you this information because it’s important to consider the outreach of a ‘viral’ campaign, such as this one, and what it can do for a brand. Chances are, many people are going to submit videos to try and appear on the channel, and many more people may just watch the videos other people create. Either way, their creating a ‘buzz’ about the show and the new season, interest of not only current fans, but new fans of the show are found through the ability of allowing others to easily spread the contest into the social content networks, such as Digg, Delicious, Twitter, and so on. They attach links to the show’s page on the HBO website, as well as create easy access to the show’s MySpace and Facebook pages.

Through a viral campaign like this, you should explore your brand further to see what kind of similar outreach you may be able to do. This is social media branding 101 friends - don’t take something as small and ‘funky’ as this to be something silly - when in all honesty, they spent next to nothing to engage new fans and current fans of the show - to stay tuned to the new season, maybe buy the DVD, purchase some apparel, or some other Flight of the Conchords related materials. It’s genius.

The point is - you need to think about social media branding if you have not already. Agreed, for some brands social media might not be the way to go - but as they say so often - “don’t knock it before you try it.”

Chances are, I think it will.

For more information, and if you have any questions on viral or social media branding - feel free to contact me @ nicholas.cifuentes@gmail.com

Although this might be slightly old news, it still something worth writing about. A new report from Peter Schilling, the Director of IT @ Amherst College, said that 438 students who enrolled at Amherst this fall, 432 had joined the Amherst College Class of 2012 Facebook Group by the end of August (classes started the first week of September). Schilling also said that 3,225 posts were made in the group by that time.

To think that only six students out of an entire class are not on Facebook is quite an astonishing fact. Over the past four years Facebook has become a second language on college campuses nationwide. Ask almost any student what ‘friending’, ‘poking’ or ‘leaving a message on someone’s wall’ means and they will be able to tell you almost instantly.

Facebook is your identity.

For many teenagers, college students, young adults, and even adults; Facebook is simply irresistible. It honestly is. Just look @ the numbers:

• Just this past June, Facebook became the largest social network by reach at 132 million uniques, a 35% jump from the end of 2007, according to comScore.
• Facebook’s user base grew by nearly 25% to 102 million active users. Facebook nearly added 20 million more members during the third quarter, 80% of which came from outside the U.S.
• 17 countries now have more than 1 million Facebook users: United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Turkey, Chile, France, Australia, Colombia, Venezuela, Italy, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Spain, Mexico, Hong Kong, and Argentina. South Africa and Belgium will be next to cross the mark.
• Facebook’s torrid growth in Europe and South America has continued. 10 of the 15 fastest growing countries in 3Q08 were European; 3 were South American.

Despite the international growth, Zuckerberg (Sir Mark), recently said in a German Newspaper interview that the company is focused on growth first, revenue second.

Sir Mark said:

“What every great internet company has done is to figure out a way to make money that has to match to what they are doing on the site. I don’t think social networks can be monetized in the same way that search did. But on both sites people find information valuable. I’m pretty sure that we will find an analogous business model. But we are experimenting already. One group is very focused on targeting; another part is focused on social recommendation from your friends. In three years from now we have to figure out what the optimum model is. But that is not our primary focus today… Growth is primary, revenue is secondary.”

And when asked about a potential IPO:

“No, we are really not planning to go public. For the next few years we are really focused on user growth.”

Finally, when asked about why the company is allowing employees to sell up to 20% of their vested shares (up to $900K), Zuckerberg answered:

“We are not going public for a while. So we want the people to have enough money to life [sic] for the period of time until we go public. In the early days of Facebook I was able to get $900,000 dollar of liquidity. That made a pretty big deal to me. We want engineers or other people in the company don’t have to worry about simple things.”

Facebook Futures.

Recently, Zuckerberg spoke @ the Future of Web Apps Expo in London - although mostly a controlled PR show for web app companies; Sir Mark hinted at a few things, most interestingly the theme of ‘enabling people to share’.

Some interesting tidbits from the event: (thanks to insidefacebook.com)

• The vision of Facebook Connect is to enable people to do on the rest of the web what they currently do on Facebook.
• There’s no firm launch date for Connect, but it’s expected to be within the next few months.
• As everyone already knows, Facebook does not want to encourage third party applications that are only interested in occupying profile space. The recent redesign has been specifically developed to encourage applications that enable sharing between users. Part of this is the prioritisation of feeds over profile boxes.
• Talk of the payment system was downplayed, and was even referred to as “the rumoured payment system.” (It’s more than a rumour, given the solicitation for developers to sign up for a beta programme last year, but obviously there’s nothing to be announced imminently.)
• Mark talked about his loose theory of a “Moore’s Law” for content sharing: the amount of sharing that goes on is growing exponentially over time.
• Asked about Open Auth, Open ID and other standards initiatives, the view expressed was very much along the lines of not having done it yet as opposed to not wanting to follow open standards at all. Mark’s view of Facebook as it stands was that “It’s more closed than we want it to be.” However, he believes Facebook’s implementation of things such as the Platform APIs and FBML are more developed than their open standard equivalents.
• Asked if he would build Facebook (or any web application) the same today as he did four years ago he said no, especially given advances in cloud computing and the availability of other sites-as-platforms.
• Despite running a multi-billion dollar company, he still goes into the code base and fixes bugs from time-to-time as a way to keep in touch with how the site is being developed and abstracted. (Still doing the dirty work…what a guy!)

To see more about what M. E. Zuckerberg had to say about Facebook, see his BBC interview here & his FOWA interview coming soon here.

Final.

Whether you are a student, e-marketer, or just a normal someone (wink), you know where this is heading - Facebook is growing daily, and your just a small part of that. So go ahead and look @ those pictures from the rager last night…look @ those party invites you have yet to confirm, go write on Steph’s wall about her new dog pictures…go nudge that other someone, go see what the class is saying about the new Physics professor, go watch that video with that kid getting hit in the nuts with the soccer ball, go see how many comments you have that partially naked photo of you that you just ‘had’ to get up on the site as soon as you got back from the party, go add that fun application where you can send growing plants to your friends and let’s go buy fake gift icons for a $1 and send them to everyone too.

I am not making fun…I take part in this revolution daily.  I just always like to step out of the ‘branding’ work I do on a daily basis (sometimes it feels much more often) and realize the actuality of the framework in this platform.

It really is amazing…or scary.  You choose.

Fin.

As Democratic Sen. Joe Biden and Republican Gov. Sarah Palin prepare to square off tonight in the first Vice Presidential debate, I need to step back to a moment last week and talk about something Twitter launched for the election – that has the social media world stirring in its belly.

For the presidential debate last week, Twitter launched a niche application site called Twitter E08 that focused directly on the presidential election campaign in the United States. The website worked by simply filtering twitter messages (tweets) from all users by certain keywords and aggregating these messages into one page.

In addition, a user can go directly to the section on the website and send a message directly, and it is seen in the twitter timeline immediately. I love the idea of this, as does the community – if you head to the election page – you see it is constantly updating – the interaction is priceless, or useless…depending who you ask.

By promoting the election – Twitter has finally begun to think about ‘micro’ sites within Twitter that will not only aggregate conversations, but build out ‘channels’ per-say of different topics, sports, fashion, marketing, schools, and dare I say ‘business’?

Let’s walk into one of those channels, oh, look, a big transition ad for the NFL.  Oh look, now were in the football channel – with 543 other people talking about football. You see my point. I am not against this at all.  I am actually 100% for it.  I am sure Twitter is tired of hearing criticism surrounding their business model and how they generate money.  I think this election is the starting point for something ‘big’ twitter is considering doing.  Twitter is run by a group of 20 people, that’s it!  I am sure their partner channels and VC funds are well stocked, but naturally you think ‘bigger’ and growth.

I know we would hear endless people complain about a new layout, if the site were to take on niche groups and starts with ads galore; but I think only the current twitter use would complain. Look at the people who now wish to ban the new Facebook layout – because they are too lazy to see their precious applications are on the bottom toolbar – in static mode. Facebook was tired of seeing user pages that would just go down for miles with comments, applications, etc…this opened the door to keep everything within the “user’s level” – instead of having to scroll down 30 seconds to see what someone said about somebody else (you know you care about that!)

Either way, this election and what Twitter is ‘experimenting’ with is just the beginning of a new style Twitter will be undergoing. You know it. I know it.  We all know it.

Go Twitter!

Blogs. 

As an Internet strategist - my life daily is consumed with social media feeds, blog alerts, feedburner stats, google alert updates, monitoring, strategizing, execution - all of these overused terms and time consuming tactics certainly take a toll on you.  

But one thing I do often, as I do for all my clients, is research - taking notice of the growing digital space around me - thinking of ideas to implement innovative strategies among the community and with my clients.  

One of those key strategies that are a must in today’s Internet spectrum is a blog.  A blog is key in driving not only traffic, but interest to your brand, product, or company.  Blogs help you appear authoritative in your industry - allowing you to give views on the latest events in your trade, offer reviews, insights, and so on.  

This expands into relationship building tools, as you are able to speak more freely and in a more informal and personable style, as compared to how you direct the voice on your main website.  Through the blog channel, they are more likely to trust you, and then all the more likely to visit your main website and then click your links and possibly purchase your product.   

It also offers insight for your customers, and allows them to leave comments and ’speak’ to you on a key level. In addition, blogs are extremely search engine friendly - through thousands of possible keywords and fresh, updated content on a regular basis - blogs are simply great facets to have on your website today.  Your simply misguided if you think otherwise.

*Read More for a detailed blog breakdown of the popular clothing line Free People.

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In a recent survey done by Careerbuilder.com, an increasing number of employers are taking a look at staff’s social networking profiles before hiring a candidate.

The survey found that 20 percent of companies admitted to checking out the profile pages of potential employees on social-networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace before deciding to hire them. Another 9 percent said that they would begin to review potential employees social-networking websites in the future.

The research also revealed that while 24 percent of employers had hired a member of the staff based on their social-networking profile, 33 percent had decided NOT to make a job offer after reviewing certain content on a profile.  Use of drugs, alcohol and posting of photographs that seemed ‘inappropriate’ or ‘provocative’ were identified as the most popular reasons why employers eliminated a candidate after reviewing their social-networking profile.

Should you be scared of this?

Yes.  You absolutely should.  If you dragged yourself out for a Saturday night pub crawl, blacked out at some point and the next day arrives with you not remembering what happened - be worried. In today’s world - transitioning from school to a professional career can be a lot of work, but just be careful with what you do on your social-networking profiles.  You don’t want to have last week’s party to be the reason you don’t get hired for that job you’ve always you wanted.  These pictures work great in college, and globally acceptable among that crowd - but the professional world is a much different story. Pictures and comments your friends might leave about you could become a liability in the workplace.  

First, privacy settings are your friend - use them.  You can set websites like Facebook and MySpace to allow only your friends to view pictures or profile specifics.  Blogs can be a huge risk too - so unless you are blogging about things like what I am talking about - keep it clean and remember, people can find what you are reading easily - so use those privacy settings. And even if you do have a job - remember that people get fired for unauthorized blogging all the time now - so BE CAREFUL!

Are you that person that Google’s themselves all the time?  You should be.  You have to keep up with what people might be saying about you on Yahoo! and Google. Or, if you are really curious, give Pipl.com, a “people search engine” a try.  What you see here is the same thing a possible hiring manager is seeing - be careful!

And another thing to be careful of - don’t befriend people who you don’t know.  You just don’t know if it will come back to bite you later.  Keep your friend list to ‘friends’ and associates in both personal and professional social networks.  

Case Study.

A bank intern, in 2007, was caught through Facebook lying to his boss about a family emergency, when he actually just wanted to ‘party it up’ on Halloween instead.

Kevin Colvin (pictured below) was an intern at Anglo Irish Bank’s North American arm, was busted by his manager Paul Davis after Kevin told Paul that he had to miss work because of a family emergency.  His boss then turned up this photo of Colvin on his Facebook profile from a Halloween party he apparently missed work to attend, and attached it to his reply, copying the rest of the office as he did it.

Below is the short email exchange and incriminating photo.

NetSuite.

OK, I am not one that is normally critical of certain software or CMS programs – as all have their positives & negatives – but I have to stress the limitations of NetSuite and its astounding ability to ‘frustrate’ the creative design and marketing process of brand marketing.

If you are not familiar with NetSuite, it is an all-in-one set of online business software programs that include accounting, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, e-commerce and website development.

NetSuite can be broken down into four main types of accounts:

1. NetSuite (Standard: Comprehensive Web-based solution for midsize businesses that integrates Accounting/ERP, CRM, Ecommerce and partner collaboration capabilities.
   
2. NetSuite (Small Business): One complete Web-based application for smaller businesses that integrates the front and back office, managing sales, service, accounting and Web presence.
   
3. NetSuite CRM: NetSuite CRM offers a Web-based CRM solution that gives your company all the traditional CRM capabilities you need to manage marketing through customer acquisition.
   
4. NetSuite CRM+: Total Customer Relationship Management CRM solution for businesses large and small with customer-centric view to manage initial and on-going relationships over the phone, in person, or on the Web.
   

What is NetSuite Good For?

NetSuite is ideal for businesses of various sizes – mainly small to mid-businesses, providing integrated accounting, CRM, online marketing, web management, inventory, and sales management, as well as vendor and manufacturer relationship management.  NetSuite keeps track of all product information, web pages, customer login information, vendor/manufacturer details, stock/shipping details, auto-responder and customer emails, SEO and ad tracking/web metrics information, online marketplace, as well as accounting/ERP details.

Otherwise, it makes the job easier for sales, accounting, and other internal groups within a business – providing a ‘streamline’ system that (doesn’t) always work.

The Various Troubles of NetSuite.

NetSuite has fixed a number of issues since its release in 2002, but many still remain. There is a plethora of issues that still remain when it comes to transferring a website to the NetSuite platform; such as setting up proper page redirects, setting up dynamic links, changing content, images and other aspects of the website – it often takes much time and calls to customer support to fix.  And when it comes to making changes to the website once things are setup  - it could take a few hours or sometimes even an entire day to show up on the website.

And sometimes smaller issues such as creating new items, losing customer order history, and more – although these problems seem minuscule, with NetSuite they take HOURS of extra work to fix, and can cost companies thousands of dollars in extra work and time wasted that could have gone into adding new products to the website or improving marketing and management systems.

The NetSuite Now.

Although NetSuite has grown to the point of debuting its own IPO, and grow exponentially, NetSuite is still only geared toward the small to mid-size business.  And at a price and support-process that seems very high and overrated respectively - you have to be careful when deciding to use NetSuite.

I am not here to ‘bash’ NetSuite – I think their software is wonderful for its all-in-one features and growing application development.  But, I also think that it really depends what type of ‘brand’ you are – whether you want to invest the time, effort, and often-headaches into the software system.

If you are an ecommerce brand that wants to just ‘sell’ your products and see a return – NetSuite is great.  But I will say this, if you are a ‘creative’ brand that really wants to stretch the wall with what you might have going on within the brand, from an internal and external marketing point – referring to design, development, UI functionality, internal marketing (NetSuite is good at), and external marketing such as social media and other ‘new media’ marketing tactics – you are limited.  Very limited.

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When it comes to growing communities in an online environment, collaboration is the key.

How often do you see people, young and old, carry on multiple conversations on Facebook? Younger people seem to have the instinct to know how to pool their resources – sharing information as easy as pressing ‘enter’. Approaching this concept on a business level, can be a bit different – collaboration is the common goal, and it take all parts involved to create this partnership.

However, if you think you know where I am going with this, I am not going to talk about in-house collaboration; that is for another discussion. I want to talk about external collaboration – aka ‘Wikis’.

Sharing information is what today’s ‘Web 2.0’ world is about. Allowing others to take part in your community, be it a blog, forum, website – a Wiki goes one step further. It allows ‘personalized’ information to take the forefront and become the spoken word for your brand. Creating a Wiki that might allow others to supply information, fill-in-the-blanks, and create viable documentation at the same time – is the best of both worlds.

Now, you may not have a brand that is suited for this, that is fine – but you may be surprised how many brands can build out external wikis and make them successful.

Evaluation

What do you do? Let’s think about what your brand does for you. Who is your demographic? What type of information do they read? – questions like this will open up discussions for the possibilities of creating an external wiki.

What don’t you do? This is even a better question to pose to your team. What about your brand is missing? What do you want to see improve, in terms of ‘collaboration’, amongst your brand?

How will a wiki improve my brand? This could be the end all question, and might make sense for you not to implement such a branding tool into your website(s). Even though the conversation might end here – just re-think for a moment ‘why’ this might be effective for you, and more importantly ‘why not’?

Benefits of a Wiki

Highly Targeted Traffic. A wiki produces this, plain and simple. If you create a wiki that is area-concentrated, and maybe, let’s use this for example only, in the surfing industry; after you produce enough content on the pages – you will begin to see your keyword searches improve for particular events that relate to your industry. Simply put, the web loves content, and because a wiki is 99 percent content, wiki pages end up ranking very high in search engines. NOTE: Pay attention to all SEO devices, don’t expect just by putting information on a wiki page for your websites to go right to the top of search engine results…we all wish that could happen – but it doesn’t. Play it Straight!

Branding. As far as branding and marketing strategy – a wiki can act as an authority for your industry if you develop the concept properly. If you want to be seen as an authority in the ‘surfing’ industry, for example – why not develop a wiki and build out a branding page of surfing, the best spots, wave lengths, daily tides, how to do it, etc, etc…I only use this as an off the cuff example – but you see my point.

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