Happy Holidays from Community 2.0!

We're going to be taking a much needed break from the world of online communities to celebrate the holidays with our family and friends. A huge "Thank You" to you, our loyal readers for your insight, news and communication about our shared community experiences. We look forward to 2009 and all of its glorious opportunity!

Thanks again and have a very joyous holiday season.

No more shooting in the dark- track your marketing campaigns.

So you just started a blog and have been promoting it like hell. Or maybe you just realized the power of the web for marketing and use it to promote your small business. Email signatures, emails, status messages and commenting and being a part of discussions across the blogosphere- and what is called as the social media. However, there is one problem- you just do not know if any of this is working better than the other. You spent time installing a web analytics solution, but many sources are listed as direct/others and you can’t figure out if they were from your email marketing campaigns or something else.

Whether you are a savvy blogger or a smart, hands-on small business owner who uses the web to connect, market and sell- there is one major part of the RoI jigsaw puzzle- tracking your off-site marketing campaigns. Sure you can use some existing ad tracking applications- but knowing that blogging and start ups are cash stranded, that might not be a very good idea.

I recently developed a marketing tool- a simple spreadsheet app that you can use to generate tracking tags for your marketing campaigns. And it is not just for online marketing, if you are creative, you can even use it for tracking your offline campaigns.

Interested? Read on. One caveat though. This works if you use Google Analytics (GA) as your web analytics tool. Not too much of a problem I presume- as GA is free and going by the success of it, it is likely that you’d be using this any which ways. In case you do not, I recommend that you do. (No- not getting paid to say this).

To access the tool, click on the link: ChasingTheStorm campaign tracking tool

It is a Google Docs spreadsheet- so you can log in using your Google ID, export the cells in your excel or spreadsheet, follow some simple instructions- and there you go.

There is a detailed explanation on ChasingTheStorm on how to use the sheet. Some details are also available on Google Analytics blog - and the inspiration to make the tool comes from there, though I have explained in a manner I thought would add value to the discussion. Of course, Google does not have a tool- they just have the theory.

Essentially- the sheet has 5 columns that need filled up- all according to your understanding and convenience. The 5 columns refer to the campaign variables that you as a marketer- populate. These variables will tell you about the source of the referrer and give you more detailed insights into the traffic emanating from your various campaigns.

The last cell has a formula that need not be changed- as it takes on the inputs from all those cells and then automatically develops a redirect/tracking code/tag.

What are the ways you can use this (there could be many ingenious uses that you can use this for):

• You could insert it as links in your email newsletter- and track not only one link- but use to track what call to action drives most traffic to your website
• If you track conversions, you could attribute this to conversions as well
• You could use this to update your status messages on your social network- and track people coming to the site from your social network
• You could even use it in your offline campaign- use URL shortening using a web service- and put the URL in your offline DM or newspaper classifieds ad. Track how many people visit your website after seeing this ad. Cool eh?
• You could use the auto tagging feature for your PPC campaigns across search engines and see which KWs are converting better

Are there any other ways that you think you can use the tracking for? Let us have the discussion continue for the benefit of all.

Best of Community 2.0 in 2008!

As the year draws to a close, lets look back at some of the most popular posts from Community 2.0 in 2008!

Here were the top 5:

B2B Advertising in Social Networks are Increasing

Podcast conversation with Dawn Lacallade

American Express adopts social media: OPEN Forum

Podcast conversation with Zappos CEO, Tony Hsieh

Pros and Cons of Social News Sites

Social media diary 19/12/2008 - Skype

Skype launches video cards in Facebook

Just in time, perhaps, for those of us who haven't yet sent all our Christmas cards, Skype this week launched Skype Video Cards, as both an application in Facebook and also as a standalone feature at SkypeVideoCards.com.

The concept is quite simple and it works well as a Facebook application. You choose a basic card, record your video message and send this to your friends. They receive a personalised flash video message from you (and with Skype branding!). It's a nice application, and out with good timing as we enter the festive season with a force. It's simple to use (in four clicks you can create a card), creates a personal message and sends a flash video card which means it can be viewed directly from a web browser.

So what can we learn from this?

One question that this application raises is why is Skype doing this? As some people have noted, the video card tool doesn't make use of any Skype technology, it doesn't even integrate with your Skype contacts list to send to your friends.

For me this doesn't matter, especially not for the Facebook application. If this were only a standalone feature, then it would be odd that it didn't actually showcase the product whose brand it carried. But in Facebook, and indeed in other social networks, it is not so easy to market and product-place in this way.

As we've written about before, it can be very difficult to advertise in social networks. Primarily because social networks are social environments with social rules. People are there for their own, personal reasons - to upload their photos, network with their friends, plan their events and talk about issues that are of interest to them. It's a 'me' space and when brands enter this they need to be fully aware of the social rules they must abide by. It's not that easy to just place your product in front of people or pump your marketing message to them.

This is why the Skype Video Card application works for me. Rather than trying to integrate their actual product and develop an application that people will use and forward to their friends. Instead they opted for the solution of creating an application that creates real value for the users (especially those who have forgotten to send holiday greetings already) and allows the Skype brand to be associated with this.

Facebook and other social networks can be scary places for brands, and difficult places for them to succeed in. My advice: think first how you can add value to the users experience and then put your brand on it. You have a great chance of being successful, and of getting that brand forwarded round the internet faster than you could hope for.

From the FreshNetworks Blog

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How can marketers use Web 2.0?

The Wall Street Journal recently took an in-depth look at how marketers can use online communities. Some areas that have benefited from Web 2.0 tools are product development, service enhancement and promotions.

They highlighted these areas as a way to engage your communities:
-Don't just talk at consumers -- work with them throughout the marketing process.
-Give consumers a reason to participate.
- Listen to -- and join -- the conversation outside your site. -Resist the temptation to sell, sell, sell.
-Don't control, let it go.
-Find a 'marketing technopologist.' -Embrace experimentation. For a more concentrated look at these items, read the article.

Everything you need to know about your customers

Jacob Morgan recently wrote a great post about why your business needs to be online. He pointed out that 1.5 billion people are online throughout the world, and they're using search engines to find out more about what they're interested in. Yahoo, Google, and YouTube are some of the most visited sites on the internet. They're already taking time to find you and engage about a topic pertaining to your product or service. When they arrive at your site, you are already given useful information to determine who they are and how to target them: who they are, how they find you, where they come from, what languages they speak, what they click on, how long they visit your site, and what pay they take through your site.

Need a holiday light tour?

Recently, at Fox News, they focused on the online community Tacky Light Tour. Matt Burgess of Richmond, Virginia, started this online community which plots houses with more than 10,000 holiday lights up on an online map. Families can then hop in the car and follow the map's directions to be treated to a festive treat. The maps started out in his hometown of Richmond, Virginia, but have since spread across the country.

How do people use their RSS feeds?

An interesting poll taken by the Social Media Club shows where people read their RSS feeds. Out of his 170 respondents, 146 people read their readers during work hours. Following that, 96 people read their feeds in the living room. Interesting numbers may be that 18 people read while in the car and 11 while walking.

What do you think? When do your posts go live? How can you take this information and promote your blog?

Social media diary 12/12/2008 - PlayStation

Sony launches online community for PlayStation gamers

After many years in development, this week Sony launched PlayStation Home, an online community for Playstation gamers.

The community is something of a virtual clubhouse for PlayStation owners. All registered PlayStation Network users will be able to create their own avatar and then interact with others in a 3D environment. Some are calling this a cross between Facebook and Second Life, but this is really an online community of gamers. Members will be able to chat with and text each other, build their own 'home' and explore those of other members, and take part in mini games and special events.

Building on the popular chat functions that sit alongside many online games, the concept of a central community that allows members to meet and join games has been in development for a number of years. The beta launch of PlayStation Home this week shows us what Sony has to rival Microsoft and to enhance the gaming experience. As Kazuo Hirai, president of Sony Computer Entertainment, says:

PlayStation Home is truly a promising network community service. We are committed to providing PS3 users with exciting gaming experiences with PlayStation Home and together with our partners and users, expand the new world of interactive entertainment as we move forward.

So what can we learn from this?

To some extent Sony is providing its gamers with something they have wanted for some time - a way to meet and exchange with other gamers, to easily identify and join multi-player games and to extend and enhance their experience of using the PlayStation.

There has been much discussion over the last couple of days about the actual functionality and use of PlayStation Home. Microsoft called the technology as "outdated" and some features are not yet live - streaming video and music will be in a later release. But overall response from gamers themselves has been quite positive.

Undoubtedly Sony hope that Home will be a success, and for me success would be if they retain gamers for longer periods of time because of this. They can monetise Home quite easily, either by selling functionality or features within the environment itself (such as selling houses or other property to users or taking a cut of peer-to-peer sales). Or they can monetise through charging for downloads, streaming music and video and entry to special events and games. And let's not forget the benefit they might be able to get from advertising if they so desired.

This kind of online community may seem like a clear candidate for success, and it is certainly true that the members share a common interest and goal (something that is critical to success of any community). But perhaps the real marker of success will be if the community fills a real need that the members have. Home needs to focus on gaming and on making gaming, easier, more fun and perhaps more challenging. They're not building a new Second Life (or Facebook, Bebo or anything) as some people have suggested. Rather they've identified a need that their gamers have and are using social media and online communities to help meet this need. Always a good strategy.

From the FreshNetworks Blog

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PS3 gets an online community

Yesterday, PS3 launched its online community, Home 3D launched December 11. This space is aimed at users of the consult, and allows them to interact with other users by creating online avatars, and interact with other users by chatting and playing games. Read more here.

Test your blog

Jeremiah Owyang recently posted a mini-test for corporate blogs. It asks you to consider your Writing style, topics, Humility, Linking Behavior, Customer Inclusion, Dialog, Comment Moderation, and Frequency. This is a great way to see how your blog is doing in the blog-o-sphere and also give you the opportunity to think about how you could improve your blog.

The Americanization of Thought leadership on the Internet

I blog on Business, Entrepreneurship and New Media- and try to publish stuff with an Asian perspective. Like most bloggers, I also turn to existing material on the web for inspiration and thought starters. However, I have been slightly perturbed by the fact that we have very little from an Asian perspective on the web. Specially thought leadership.

Have you been following the sudden surge of material on “social media”? And how almost every other theory/example that you get is from the US?

Ever gave a thought on: Why is that everyone talking about Obama being an ‘Internet President’- like he was their country's president?

Quick- name a known ‘internet’ personality: Seth Godin? Robert Scoble? Michael Arrington? Guy Kawasaki? Who else? Mitch Joel? Don’t say Avinash Kaushik or something like that- he did all that he did- guess where? Right! In the US of A.

Don’t get me wrong- I’m not saying it is a scam or something or that it is ‘wrong’- I like both the American enterprise and these gentlemen. But it is something to ponder upon for sure.

I listed some points on Chasing The Storm- where the discussion still continues.

Here are some thought starters from the post- but you can get the full version on the post along with the comments

The thought starters:

Why is the internet so Americanized (or ‘westernized’- at best):

• Internet was developed in the US and spread from there.

• Internet is largely an English media. And still continues to be largely dominated by English- English is the business language of the world. In this part of the world, English is widely used, but largely has been the domain of the educated and the literate. Asia has many languages and many countries are pretty much self contained. Netizens in China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and some South Eastern countries publish and document information in their own languages thus preventing the spread and proper dissemination of information. (Japan has the biggest blog traffic in the world- names of some famous internet personalities or marketing/thought starter/gurus or evangelists from Japan? Anyone?)

• The American obsession with documentation- It tangibalizes stuff- and increases what I call the Hype Life Cycle of the Idea/Project. In this part of the world (Asia)- documentation has not really been the best of virtues (or culture)

What Asian Netizens need to do:

• Learn best practices from the Americans- innovate, document and disseminate effectively

• Learn storytelling- the art of conceiving an idea and selling to the audience. The plot need not be ground breaking- we all know that in the end the bad guy licks dirt and the good dude gets the pretty girl. What is important is HOW the story is told. Ask Guy Kawasaki.

• Invest in research and breed thinkers.

So Phase next on the Internet should be called the Asian Internet. Not web 3.0- or some BS like that. With half of the world’s population, more than a third of world’s internet population (and number of searches conducted) and obscenely huge mobile phone numbers in Asia, this is what should happen next.

Do you feel that most content on the internet has an American origin? Do you feel that there needs to be a shift in power here as well? Like the world economic shift, financial system shift and migration shift?

Please be a part on Community 2.0 and contribute to the discussion on Chasing The Storm

The Twitter Song

Someone on the Community 2.0 Twitter recently mentioned this funny video Ben Widker for Twitter. Ben believes, "You're no one if you're not on Twitter, and if you aren't there already, you missed it." It makes a strong case for the use of Twitter in your business.

Increase your readership

At Social Media Today, Josh Peters recently commented on how to increase your blog readership. Get involved in the conversation going on around the web. People are out there talking about the topic of your blog, so throw in your opinions on their posts or Twitter comments. People will make it back to your blog if you give them a reason to read it.

Social media diary 5/12/2008 - Orange

Orange launches 'Film Club' online community

I'm a big fan of mobile operator Orange's involvement with film and cinemas in the UK - from their amusing adverts in cinemas (including this with Rob Lowe) to their Orange Wednesdays offer where Orange customers can take a friend to the cinema for free.

To date they haven't formally used social media to engage people around their film associations, but this week they launched The Film Club. In Facebook and Bebo, this 'club' is actually an application that gives users access to free preview screenings, exclusive competitions, trailers, reviews and other film related content. The Club also lets you see which of your friends are taking advantage of the Orange Wednesdays offer, and if you're not an Orange customer you can poke your friends who are and ask them to take you.

For Orange this move is all about capitalising upon their association with film and being seen as providing a place for people to share this passion with them. As Spencer McHugh, head of brand communications at Orange, says:

The new Film Club communities give movie fans on Facebook and Bebo a place to come together and chat about the things they love most.

So what can we learn from this?

At FreshNetworks we talk a lot, and have indeed posted a lot in the past, about the difference between online communities and social networks and about how building a community online is as much about building an actual community of people as it is about doing it online. What Orange have done with their Orange Film Club is to cleverly and astutely leverage social networks (in this case Facebook and Bebo) to help connect their users and act as a portal for all their film-related content and activities. But building a true community in these social networks is notoriously difficult for a brand to do.

People invariably spend time in social networks for very self-centred issues - it's a 'me' place where I upload my photos, plan my events, talk to my friends and join groups that reflect me. From this angle it is clearly a great place for Orange to bring together all of its members who engage with it on film - taking advantage of their offers or watching their content. This one-to-one relationship between Orange and individual fans or customers will continue. Building a real community, where it is these fans who also grow the discussions and content and where they talk to each other and form bonds might prove more difficult.

A community tends to have a common purpose or something they are all contributing to, it tends to have no leaders but everybody (brand and fans alike) being equal members) and it needs careful design and guidance to make it grow and flourish (a bit like a garden can grow on its own but needs a gardener to look at its best). In Facebook (or any social networks) it's difficult to do the latter and as a very public space people are often unwilling to start discussions and build that real community feel.

So if Orange wanted to build and grow a large and flourishing film community, they may find doing it in Facebook or Bebo hard. If, on the other hand, they want to bring together all their activities and fans in this space into a convenient place then things will be much easier to do. I suspect this is what they want - making it easier for both parties to find content and engage on film. However, I hope this is the precursor to something. I hope they are planning an online community here. It could be great, and their brand could really help it to work - online and on the go.

From the FreshNetworks Blog

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Asian businesses and the use of microblogging

This blog is posted on behalf of Shalabh Pandey who is Editor at Chasingthestorm.com.

So you think you have seen and heard enough on the evolution, usage and effectiveness of this phenomenon called Twitter. Present almost everywhere on every social media or marketing centric site- this one topic is an omnipresent feature of today's ubiquitous opinion led conversation culture.

Many businesses and consultants have jumped into utilizing this tool- pushed by the harsh realities of today’s extremely fragmented consumer attention that pans across media.

Since this is causing such a storm, I wanted to do a check- like most marketing ‘hypes’- is this something that is largely US centric? A concern echoed by this post on- the Americanization of the Internet. Or is this a worldwide phenomenon?

Having worked in the Asian digital marketing space for about a decade, I know this is gaining traction very fast. A taste of this was seen recently during the ghastly terror attacks that shook Mumbai (and the world)- when Twitter was full of hash tags related to Mumbai. Ditto on the ongoing stand off in Thailand- though not of a similar scale as Mumbai.

But the issue is – are businesses in Asia using Twitter as a customer engagement tool? The answer from my post – probably not! I did an extensive research across all online social networks- tweeted on my Twitter network, asked questions on Facebook and LinkedIn, researched companies in general on twitter (using Twellow, Twitterlocal and other tools), sent DMs on Twitter- to brands and people with seemingly relevant accounts, researched whom they followed and tried to find if they had easily identifiable Asian accounts as well.

And what I found- as a result of this collective intelligence gathering was that – Businesses are not using microblogging very much in Asia. Full story on Twitter usage by businesses in Asia.

Though there are some interesting case studies in the post, and some interesting people and profiles, the number of businesses participating and using these tools is really quite limited.

Which leads us to the inevitable question- What could be the reasons behind this? Asia is home to most ‘thumb happy’ people in the world (You know what I mean). Billions of text messages flow every month- and every Asian country has its own mobile claim to fame- Phillippines becoming the SMS capital of the world, India exploding at the seams with mobile penetrations- and Vietnam and Indonesia touted as the next mobile tigers. I am not even talking about Korea and Japan, where they do unimaginable stuff (and I mean marketing and conversation wise) with their handphones. China of course has more twitter and iPhone clones than probably the rest of the world’s put together. And again, from Brand perspective- there are multinational companies that are using these tools elsewhere but not in Asia! So the big question is- why?


While the aim of the post was to gather information from the wisdom of the crowds, my top 5 reasons could be:
A) There is not enough traction in the market when it comes to online advertising. It is still treated as somewhat of a novelty and marketing budgets hover from less than 1% to close to 10% in some economies
B) Internet usage has exploded but still mobile-internet usage is relatively a niche and complex concept. Lifestreaming on the go is a novelty at best
C) Because of the above two, businesses are more interested in hygiene activities and hold on to the ‘new’ phenomenon till they start becoming mainstream
D) Marketers are more cautious in general and like to spend in tried and tested tools/vehicles
E) MNC marketing teams by regions do not converse effectively when it comes to marketing innovations (though they do so on marketing best practices I believe)

These are my takes on the results- what are yours? Have you come across any examples of businesses using twitter or any microblogging tool? Even if they are not Asian- do you have any interesting stories to share? Let’s collaborate.

Shalabh Pandey
Editor
Chasingthestorm.com

Twitter says no to Facebook for now

In San Fransisco yesterday, Twitter chief executive and co-founder Evan Williams said they've turned down a Facebook offer of $500 million, which was mostly in stock. They believe they still have many things left to do as a company, including turning a profit. This company, which is just two years old would like to stay away from turning a profit by making revenue from sales ads. For more on the story, read this article at the New York Times.

Twitter and Word-of-Mouth marketing

Jeremiah Owyang recently discussed the power that word of mouth marketing has, especially when combined with Twitter. The rapid speed at which information can be disbursed on Twitter makes it a powerful source for this type of marketing. If someone takes the time to retweet what you've said, not only did that take it as a source of information, but they went on to share that information with all of their friends.

Facebook's next quest

The New York Times recently looked at Facebook's newest quest to make the web a more social place. After Beacon's explosion last year, they're hoping that FacebookConnect with help Facebook users connect with their friends across the web. Users will log into certain sites, and they can see the activity of their friends across the web, with websites including the Discovery Channel, the San Fransisco Chronicle, Digg, Geni, and Hulu. These sites are also working together so that Facebook users can log in on one site and have it carry across teh web so they don't have to sign in at every single access point. Facebook is hoping this will turn into a way to generate more revenue, but also have taken precautions to offer extended privacy to its users.

What do you think about Facebook's newest tool? Will it result in another Beacon or will Facebook users begin to warm to the social web?

Could your community already be out there?

The answer is yes. In a recent article by John Bishop, he looks at how you can find the customers that are already on the web talking about your product. Find out where they are. Use Facebook them down to specific locations and interests, the follow their chatter and monitor the buzz in the industry and react to it. Join the conversation when they start talking about your brand, and even create a few threads that promote a conversation around it.

What can you cook up?

Beth Dunn recently wrote about the importance of social media in the hard financial times that are upon us. However, she looks at it implementing a social media plan as something that's easy to do, and you may already have some know-how on your team at the workplace. Someone may already know how to engage the right audience through Twitter, and another may have great writing skills for a blog. With just a little time and effort, you could jump into the world of social media and start connecting with your target market. Read more here.

Where are blogs going?

What is the future of blogs? Jamshed Wadia recently explained in depth why blogs are hear to stay, because not only do they provide a face for a brand and an outlet for expressions, but they're a key part to any social media strategy.

He listed several reasons why he believes they're here to stay:

1. Personal expression
2. Stories not covered or ignored by mainstream media
3. Show case personal talent
4. Building Personal brands
5. Social Causes and non profit Fund Raising
6. Evangelistic blogs
7. Keeping in touch with customers

For a more in depth look at why he sees these as important factors, read here.

Social media diary 21/11/2008 - Sydney

Sydney uses MySpace to attract visitors

This week saw the launch of MySpace MySydney, a community for people who want to move to Sydney on a working visa. The page pitches itself as an online community and 'Ben' is your host (he's the one on the video on the homepage). The site contains information on how to get a visa, travel information, advice on Sydney as a place to live and work and also aims to be a hub for networking with others in the same situation as you.

The site is from the Tourism New South Wales who are hoping to capitalise upon recent changes in the work and holiday visa regulations for US students. It's now easier than it was for those from North America to get these visas and this MySpace site supports a wider marketing and social media push accompanying the change.

So what can we learn from this?

We've covered a lot of travel initiatives recently in the Social Media Diary - from BA's Metrotwin, to Amex's community for travel managers and Air France-KLM's Bluenity. Travel is certainly an area where social networking and online communities are being used more and more to engage people. We see this at FreshNetworks, where the latest community we helped to launch this week is for a big UK travel brand. Travel has a number of great hooks for activities in social media - some people need information and have questions that other users can answer based on their experiences, it's a subject that lends itself well to media and there is the opportunity for connecting people doing similar things in similar places. We're seeing different travel brands trying different things - from setting up their own online communities, to interacting with people on Facebook or MySpace, providing social networking tools or just blogging.

Some of these initiatives are successful and some aren't. What it seems that Sydney hope to achieve with this site is to present a lot of genuinely useful information in a way that is relevant to their target audience. They also hope to leverage some social networking - getting people in similar situations to get together, meet each other, share ideas and thoughts and between them build the usefulness of the site. This is an interesting proposition and I'll be following how it pans out. Whilst I can see the clear benefit of the marketing and informational element of the site, I'll be watching to see how (and in fact if) the social networking side of the proposition develops.

Whilst we often say that it is difficult for a brand to get a real presence in a social network, there is a real power of social networks to help people find others going through the same situation or with similar interests to them. It may be that getting people considering a move to Sydney to meet each other in MySpace might just work. We'll wait and see.

From the FreshNetworks Blog

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Measuring social media ROI

Social media ROI is a common topic in this community. How do we prove that our online efforts are making a difference? Kyle Flaherty wrote a great article at how we can look at this.

The next generation is particularly tech savvy, and a recent social media campaign for Twilight has proven that networking with your audience can prove that good social networking can turn into revenue. The social media campaign that involved widgets and networking resulted in a soundtrack that was #1 on the Billboard charts before the movie was released, high pre-sales in movie tickets and a continual presence in the best selling category for the books. Read more about it in The Standard.

The soundtrack marketing effort has been highly successful, ranging from videos released on author Stephenie Meyer's site to exclusives available for fans depending on format and place of purchase: iTunes has a digital booklet and three additional songs, while the physical CD contains a poster from the movie, with several different posters randomly placed in the CD cases.

There was also significant buzz created by exclusively debuting the trailers online for the fans.

Online ticket sales are booming as well, spurred by everything from movie trailers debuted exclusively at different sites to widgets available for social networking sites. Those who purchase presale tickets from MovieTickets.com or Fandango receive a code for a free music remix from iTunes.

Why do you think this is such a big social media phenomenon? We already wrote in August about this community with the book series, and now it's translated into revenue for the movie industry. Now this social media and networking has translated into revenue for the record industry and Hollywood. What can you take from this example and use for your campaigns?

How to Maintain a Successful Community

This is the third and final post in my corporate community series this week. The previous posts covered planning and getting started with your corporate community, and this installment continues the discussion with tips about what to do and what to avoid doing if you want to have a successful corporate community. While some of these tips are specific to corporate communities, most of them also apply to other types of communities as well.

The are many ways for a company to encourage or discourage participation in their community just by the way employees behave in the community, the way the community is facilitated, and how the infrastructure is maintained. There are a few things you can do to help ensure that the community successful, while other activities are likely to drive the community away. This post will cover both the do's and don'ts along with some tips for maintaining a successful community.

What makes a community work

Being open and transparent. Being as open and transparent as possible will improve trust within the community. It often helps to explain the “why” behind some of your decisions to avoid being seen as closed or defensive. In general people are more understanding, especially about difficult topics if you can explain why the company responds in a certain way.

A company who listens (to good and bad). It is easy to listen and respond when people say nice things about you or your company, but you should also be responding when people complain or provide negative feedback. The key is to respond constructively with something helpful: a suggestion, information about upcoming changes, or just a simple thank you.

Actively engaged in the community. The company should not dominate the community, but they should be actively participating by creating new content, responding to feedback, and in general being visible in the community.

Encouraging new members. Whenever possible, welcome new members of the community, especially if they are particularly actively in the community.

Making it easy for people to participate. Reduce the barriers to entry for people to participate and make it as easy as possible to join the community. Allowing people to view content before joining and a simple sign-up form with very few required fields can go a long way toward reducing the barriers to participation.

Integration into other relevant areas of the site. In most cases, it is simple to pull information from your community into static areas of your website. This makes your static website seem less static, and it drives more people to your community when they see a piece of content that they are interested in reading. For example, if you have a static page describing your efforts in sustainability, you could pull the 5 most recent blog posts or discussions from the sustainability section of your community into a sidebar on the static page.

What to avoid

Community is lip service. People can tell when a company creates a community to give the appearance of listening, while not really considering it a serious endeavor. If you aren't serious about engaging with your community, then you might be better off not spending the effort to create one.

Pushing marketing messages. When pushing marketing messages out to the community members takes precedence over 2-way conversations and collaboration, you will start to see your community disappear. A community is about conversations between people, and you can talk about your products, but it should be done in a relevant and conversational tone, instead of sounding like a pitch or advertisement.

Deleting the negative. You should be responding to criticism, not deleting it. Again, communities are about conversation. If people feel like you are putting duct tape over their mouths when they express anything negative about the company, these people will simply leave their negative comments somewhere else on the internet where it is likely more people will see the criticism and not hear your side of the story.

Barriers to collaboration. Community software, configuration, or policies can often create barriers to collaboration. Configure the software to make it easy for people to find content and sign up for the community. Your policies should create guidelines for use that help keep the community healthy without being so heavy handed that people aren't interested in participating. Flickr's community guidelines are a good example of how to write guidelines that are simple and even fun to read.

Neglected communities. Nobody wants to participate in a corporate community where no one in the company monitors or responds to questions or feedback. There are too many of these floating around the internet, so make sure that you have the resources to give your community care and feeding over the life of the community.

No community is perfect

You need to keep in mind that no community will ever be perfect: things will go wrong; your community software will have bugs; and people will get defensive or irate. In addition to the internal factors in the community, there are external influences that can creep into the community. Companies have PR nightmares that drive people into the community in droves to complain, but in great communities, the company responds effectively, addresses the issue, and works to resolve it quickly. When you have one of these crisis situations, keep the focus on summarizing and fixing, instead of blaming and justifying. Maintain open communication channels and deal with these imperfections and issues as quickly and openly as possible.

What are your favorite tips to help companies have great communities?

If you are interested in reading more of my content, you can find it on the Fast Wonder Blog.

Zuckerberg: Facebook will one day broadcast our emotions.

From Valleywag:

In a conversation with GQ, Mark Zuckerberg reveals that he hopes Facebook will one day broadcast its users very emotions. Alex French probes him on this issue in the following exchange:

(12:25 p.m.) Alex: How’s things?
(12:25 p.m.) Mark: There’s this definite evolution happening. Where the first part of the social web was mapping out the social graph. And the second phase is now mapping out the stream of everything that everyone does. All of human consciousness and communication.
(12:29 p.m.) Alex: Imagine if you could broadcast people’s emotions into a feed?
(12:30 p.m.) Mark: I think we’ll get there.
(12:30 p.m.) Alex: So how are you going to map all of human consciousness and communication?(12:30 p.m.) Mark: We don’t map it directly. We give people tools so they can share as much as they want, but increasingly people share more and more things, and there’s this trend toward sharing a greater number of smaller things like status updates, wall posts, mobile photos, etc. A status update can approach being a projection of an emotion.
(12:31 p.m.) Alex: That’s what I use it for.
(12:31 p.m.) Mark: So it’s not so crazy to say that in a few years people will be doing a lot more of that. It takes time for people to be comfortable sharing more and for the social norms to change.

For more information, click here.

Corporate Communities Part 2: Getting Started

The first part of this three part series of posts about corporate communities covered Planning for your corporate community, and now we move on to a few things to think about when you are getting started with your community. While there is a fair amount of overlap between planning and getting started, the planning section covered setting goals / objectives and fitting the community into the company's overall strategy. This post continues this train of thought to talk about how you achieve those goals, measure success, decide to join or build, and put resources in place to make the community successful.

What are your plans for achieving your goals and how will you measure success?

Now that you have some goals for what you want to accomplish with your community, you need to figure out some specific steps required to achieve your goals along with the metrics you will use to measure whether or not you have been successful. The metrics that you select will depend on your specific goals, but common community metrics include page views or visits, new member sign ups, and participation (new posts or replies). It is easy to go overboard and measure everything; however, I recommend that you pick a couple (no more than 4 or 5) of the most important measurements to use to report to management on your success. You should have an analytics package or reporting tools that allow you to drill down for more details that you can use to help troubleshoot issues and understand the data, but use these as background materials for your team.

Do you need to build new or can you join an existing community?

This is the reality check portion of the process. If you can join an existing community and get the same or similar benefits for your organization without investing all of the resources to create something new, you should seriously consider joining rather than building. You should also look around your organization to see if you have any existing communities or other infrastructure that you can reuse instead of installing yet another piece of community software.

Do you have the resources (people and financing) to maintain it long-term?

Building a new community is a big effort. It is not one of those projects that you complete and move onto the next one. Building the community and installing the software is the first step, and the real work comes in after the launch of the community. You will need to have people on board and ready to manage the day to day responsibilities from a community perspective and to administer and maintain the software. For a small community this could be a single person, but for a large corporate community, it usually takes a team of people.

You should also plan for frequent upgrades and adjustments to the community, especially right after the launch. You will find bugs in the software, areas of the community that the users find difficult to use for whatever reason, and other things that you will need to adjust once you have people actually using the community. Your organization should be ready to handle these ongoing costs and resource commitments over the life of the community. Nothing is worse than wasting time and money on something that won't be maintained long enough to achieve your goals.

While this certainly isn't everything that you need to consider when starting a new community, hopefully, it will get you started on the right path. For more information, you might also want to read some of Jeremiah Owyang's posts about community platforms or some of the online community research that Bill Johnston is doing at ForumOne.

The next and final installment of this 3 part series will cover how to maintain a successful community with some hints about what to do (and what not to do).

If you are interested in reading more of my content, you can find it on the Fast Wonder Blog.

Corporate Communities Part 1: Planning

I'm Dawn Foster, and I will be your guest blogger for this week. I have a three part series planned that that will cover corporate communities: planning your community, getting started, and maintaining your community over time.

This first post is focused on planning for your corporate community. When I talk about corporate communities, I'm referring to any custom community created by an organization for the purpose of engaging with customers or other people who may be interested in the organization's products and services. For the purpose of this series, custom corporate communities include communities created by corporations, non-profit organizations, educational institutions and similar organizations. These corporate communities can take many different forms: support communities, developer communities to help developers work with your products, customer and enthusiast communities, and many others.

Before jumping in to create a new community, you should think carefully about the purpose of this new community, your goals and objectives, and a plan for fitting your community efforts into your organization's overall strategy.

Here are a few questions that can help you think through the process of planning for your new community:

What is your overall strategy and does the community fit with it?

If your custom corporate community does not support the overall strategies of the organization, I give it about a 5% chance of being successful. Creating a new community can be a very large project with quite a bit of upfront work to create the community along with a large effort over the life of the community to manage and maintain it. If this time and effort is spent in support of the overall corporate strategy, then it will be much easier to justify keeping the community during the next planning cycle for your organization. On the other hand, when a community is built to support goals that are not clearly aligned with the overall strategy, people will look at it as a big expense that can be cut, and your community will die a quick death if you are lucky or a horrible slow death by neglect if you aren't quite as fortunate.

Spend the time now to make sure that you can find a way to structure your community plans to support the overall strategy of your organization. If you can't find a good way to align your plans with the strategy, you should think twice about whether a corporate community is an appropriate solution for you right now.

What do you hope to accomplish and what are your goals?

Think very carefully about why you are creating a new community for your organization. Spend plenty of time upfront to clearly define the reasons for creating it and what you will accomplish by having the community. There are many benefits of having a community, and here are a few benefits that you might want to consider when you think about the goals for your community:

• People: gives people a place to engage with your company
• Product Innovation: get product feedback and ideas
• Evangelism: help you grow evangelists for your products from outside of your company
• Brand Loyalty: engagement can drive a tremendous amount of loyalty for your products

After you have a good grasp on what you hope to accomplish, you need to set some specific goals for the project. When you get into the platform selection process and design phase later in the project, having clear goals will help ensure that you build the right kind of community to achieve these goals.

In part 2 of this series, I'll focus on a few more things to think about as you get started with your community.

If you are interested in reading more of my content, you can find it on the Fast Wonder Blog.

Social media diary 14/11/2008 - Windows Live

Microsoft turns Windows Live into a social network

This week, Microsoft announced a slew of changes to its Windows Live site, adding a social layer to the existing communications services. As some commentators are claiming - they are turning the Windows Live site into a social network. Whilst stressing that this is not what they are doing, Microsoft are adding tools that for many define social networks, including central profiles and news and activity feeds.

The changes are part of an aim to give their existing services (Spaces, Windows Live Hotmail, and Windows Live Messenger) deeper ties with one another. As Brian Hall, the general manager for Windows Live, says:

The general thing people are trying to do in all of these services is keep in touch

As he goes on to explain, Microsoft are trying to increase the amount of time people spend on site (which already gets a reported 11% of internet minutes) and including news feeds from users other sites (such as Facebook or MySpace) will help to do this.

The other focus will be on photo sharing with Microsoft offering its own storage options as well as providing links to Flickr, Photobucket and the likes. Again, this will add a more social media element to the site, and bringing content from users' other communities will help to increase stickiness.

So what can we learn from this?

Windows Live wants to increase the amount of time spent on site and to increase the connections between their communications tool. I'm not sure that what they are doing is building a social network, rather they are doing what we at FreshNetworks see as a major trend - they are adding a social layer to their existing content and tools.

Some of the examples we have seen of brands using social media have been of them setting up online communities, co-creation sites or social networks. I think that what Microsoft are doing is different; they are taking their existing site and making it more social. For many brands this can be a much more successful strategy. You can take elements of online communities (photo sharing maybe, profiles or forums) and integrate them into your existing site. It works really well where the existing site is well used and so is perfect for Windows Live. It also works well when you already provide useful tools to users.

When you are adding a social layer you are just augmenting the user experience or adding new and useful tools for them to do what they are already doing more efficiently or better. You make their user experience better by bringing other content to your site, letting them collaborate with other or just by creating central profiles that connect users. You are not setting up a completely separate online community, nor are you adding a community onto your existing site. Rather you are weaving community elements into your existing site.

What Microsoft are doing is capitalising both on the strengths of their existing site and the ability to weave social and online community elements into this to enhance the user experience. You don't have to set up a separate online community to engage people online. You need to do it in the right way for you and for your users.

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Pampers brings the village online

It takes a village to raise a child. Pampers has just launched a new community that brings the village online for moms who are connected to the digital world. In this space, Pampers Village, moms can connect with other moms and can access a great number of articles and resources pertaining to parenthood. The content on the site is provided by the Pampers Parenting Network, which will provide information and resources related to the well being of Mom, baby and the family.

The site is divided into three main areas. Me focuses on the health and well being of the mother, My Baby provides information for the baby, and My Family and My World is mom's source for information about the village she's raising her family in, way to keep the family running successfully. Read more about it here.

Power to the People: Politics Tapping Online Networks

Many of us have read the headlines and regardless of our political inclinations, watched with growing fascination the remarkable ease the Obama political campaign amassed an online presence across Facebook, YouTube and its own social network, MyBarackObama.com to create a political base in scope and size unknown in prior elections. This is the real deal. As many media outlets talk about the implications of an Obama presidency and the work at hand, one impact already being felt is the use of online networks to build the power base that traditional political parties would establish on behalf of a politician's campaign using traditional methods of mailing lists, telephone banks and advertising to build get out the vote efforts and donations to the campaign.

Some recent articles I've come across take a close look at the impact of what the Obama campaign has done and the impact it will most likely have on future campaigns. Full disclosure: yes I did vote for Obama, but my interest in sharing these insights is really to look at how successful a social media campaign can be and how important it is to take a 360 degree approach that does not necessarily favor one online tool over another. I think there are lessons for all marketers to consider as they develop their own social media efforts and consider successful strategies.

With that said, again regardless of your political inclination or even interest in politics, here are some thoughts on the Obama campaign's success with social network. First of all I came across this analysis in the NY Times regarding the campaigns use of social media. It gives some excellent highlights and looks at some general implications. The most obvious, when you bring in tens of thousands of individuals to share their own perspectives, a place to voice their expectations, and to provide their own opinion, well the possibilities are endless. But not always manageable.

But the advantage is clear: a lower cost to expand their database and communicate instantaneously to this audience, and more important leverage it as an expanded distribution channel to pass along all types of content to the expanded networks of their community members.

With such a powerful network established, the question then is how will it be used now that the election is over? In a recent article on ComputerWorld regarding MyBarackObama.com it's been confirmed that it will stay online even now as the campaign is focusing on launching his presidency. There was a recent post on their blog confirming this. (On a side note, for those of you unfamiliar with Chris Hughes, suggest you read up on him, we may see this wunderkind pop up again and again.) Now one interesting point the article cites is the fact that legally Obama cannot use this political tool as part of his administration, so more than likely it will be brought under the Democratic Party National Committee and their own social network. It will certainly be interesting to see how well this distinct group, who has so closely identified with Barack Obama's campaign and the political brand he has created using social media, will be incorporated and morphed into some element of the DNC base.

Before I go on, here are some figures I've been able to track down regarding the campaigns use of social media. I've gone to each site to see what figures are reported for lack of an official breakdown of the numbers, so if anyone has other sources of data please feel free to share in the comments:

1) YouTube:Subscribers: 134,998 , Channel Views: 19,576,473

2) Facebook: 914,496 members - and if you perform a search on Facebook you will find any number of groups in support of or against Obama, but this figure is the official campaign group.

Unfortunately, I could not find any clear membership numbers for MyBarackObama.com, so I welcome anyone with such information to please share and I'll update the post with that detail. Though Jeremy Owyang has a great side by side comparison of both campaigns and their comparative figures across these platforms. Now while McCain clearly did not build up as much of a base on some platforms as Obama, some things come to mind. First, his campaign began using these later than Obama, also they did not use it as frequently as Obama's campaign until much later in the general election - though many would say this failure in their social networking strategy may have been a result of the fact that McCain won the Republican candidacy earlier and did not feel the need to develop such tools.

Now for many of you, far savvier and knowledgeable in using social media, the clear lesson here is persistence in my view; the constant outreach across not one but multiple platforms to reach the widest audience possible. From my perspective the campaign's effectiveness in ongoing and constant outreach was unlike anything I've ever seen. Naturally there was a tremendous interest in this election year. But at any time that I would go online there was never a moment when I did not see some site that would link to one of their blog posts, link to a new video update, as well as their constant email after email informing their community members of the latest and greatest available online. It was deafening in my opinion.

As marketers we all have developed a sense of consumer fatigue, how much is too much; but what social media has clearly demonstrated is that rather than worrying if its too much, we must worry about if its enough. The tools available at hand give individuals every ability to control the flow of information, but even if they restrict it, what can be worse than when there is a moment they do come to your site, your online community, or any other effort, and nothing is fresh or new for them to interact with? It's a worry I have and face daily in order to build up and create the type of interactions that are necessary for an overall positive experience. This election year, watching how the campaigns played out online, clearly demonstrates the power of social networks to bridge demographics and create the the relevant associations to a political brand. Through the interconnections across these platforms, they then expanded their reach even to individuals who may not directly associate themselves to a campaign, but nevertheless were reached.

It's an ideal scenario for sure, one we all can learn from, and I'm sure will be dissected for months to come. This is just my own two cents, but one I felt worth sharing. I'm curious to see commenters thoughts and perspectives on the use of social media in the campaigns - though I ask that let's keep any heated political discussions to a minimum.

Don't miss out on the conversation

Chris Brogan recently wrote a post the continuing conversations of the online world. He first noticed it by chatting with someone else a conference, and discovering that there was the actual conference itself and then the conversation that took place online using Twitter. He's also started using BrightKite again, which is a twitter-like application, but geographical location is one of the main focuses.

At the end of the post, Brogan had a list of way to create and continue the conversation online. Here are just a few:

• When you’re somewhere new, snap photos and post them to Flickr.
• Take photos of people at events and post the good ones. Add their names and companies to them.
• When you post photos in Flickr, when you can, add contextual information about where.
• Write reviews for places and services in Yelp.
• Add hash tags to specific presentations if you think Twitter will enhance it.
• Provide information about places. I tweet traffic jams.

Social media for a cause

Today, I came across this article at Social Media Today. Chris Mischler is raising money for diabetes research for the Diabetes Research Institute. He started off locally in his community, then turned to communities online to raise money for the cause. His spin, however, is with money goals that will slowly turn him into Mr. T. Find out more about his goal here.

He's gaining traction, as he recently written about in the Milwaukee paper, and is currently at Phase 6 of his plan.

Phase 1: $100 Grew a beard
Phase 2: $200 Dyed my (blond) hair black
Phase 3: $300 Shaved the Mr. T mohawk
Phase 4: $500 Got an ear piercing, and an additional piercing for every $50 (up to 6)
Phase 5: $2,500 First-level of the tattoo challenge: 'small' "I Pity The Fool!" arm tattoo
Phase 6: $7,500 by Nov 23, 2008 A portrait of Mr. T above the text "I Pity The Fool!"
Phase 7: $20,000 The size of the tattoo doubles, to take up most of my upper arm
Phase 8: $50,000 An A-Team collage 'quarter-sleeve' tattoo
Phase 9: $100,000 A full A-Team collage tattoo on my back

Social media diary 07/11/2008 - Air France-KLM

Air France-KLM launch Bluenity, the 'first' social network for the airline industry

Today Air France-KLM launch what they claim is the 'first' social network for the airline industry: Buenity. Once signed-up, members will be able to share tips on hotels, restaurants and shopping at destinations across the globe. But the real USP of the site is that is allows members to make their travel plans public - showing their flight bookings made through KLM or Air France. They can then find other members on the same flight or in the same locations when they are.

There are some obvious benefits to this - people to meet in the lounge and to travel, people to share taxis with, people to meet for dinner or business or just a way for people to share ideas with others who are similar to them. As Patrick Roux, Senior Vice President Marketing at Air France-KLM, says:

This is a response to those customers who would like to be proactive on their trip, whether they are travelling for professional or leisure purposes. From 7 November onwards, travellers and especially the 75 million customers who choose our two airlines every year, will be able, by using Bluenity, to meet before, during and after their flight

So what can we learn from this?

Whilst I'm not sure that this is the 'first' airline social network (see the launch of BA's MetroTwin), but the proposition certainly is an interesting one. When we are working with clients at FreshNetworks, building online communities for them, we spend quite some time identifying why an online community could work in this situation and what the connection between and motivation of members would be. In this case it is clear that the commonality between members is first that they are both customers (maybe regular travellers on) Air France and/or KLM, and second that they might both share a closer experience - the same destination or flight.

I would expect the team who built this site to have looked into this shared experience in quite some detail. Do people who fly want to interact in this way? How do they currently meet people and spend their time in the lounge and on the place? How much do they actually want to engage and how much of this do they want to do online.

With the launch last week of LinkedIn Applications it is now possible for your TripIt travel plans to be visible there so that people can see where you are going and so that you can find others going to the same place. It will be interesting to see if users are more likely to use this kind of service than they are to use a site like Bluenity. Airfrance-KLM do have the significant benefit of a direct link to their reservations engine which makes the whole process much simpler, but I expect this will be a good case study of whether people prefer a separate social network or a widget to help them in this goal.

Of course, at FreshNetworks we know that travel is a vibrant market for online communities and social networks. It's a sector that a lot of our clients come from and a sector where engagement with your customers and guests is critical. It should be no surprise that Air France-KLM have entered the fray. I'd expect most of the big players in this sector to be doing the same in 2009.

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YouTube will begin hosting feature-length movies

We all knew it was coming, but now YouTube has announced it will soon be showing ad-supported feature length films. This now puts it in direct competition with Hulu, who already specializes in showing feature length films. Now the competition will begin, as YouTube receives more visitors a month and Hulu receives more money from ad revenue because sponsors are more likely to pay for video that's full length. Find out more at CNet.

Single Point Reality gets social media

Ben Rosales and Lani Anglin-Rosales of Austin, Texas, who own the Single Pointe Realty company, have completely embraced the tools of social media to connect to their potential customers. The company began using the tools in 2007, which has lead to all of their buyer referrals coming from online efforts. The Austin Statesman recently shared their story.

In an industry that is catching on to social media:
A small but growing contingent of real estate agents is getting on board. The number who write a real estate blog doubled this year from 4 percent to 8 percent, and 13 percent said they planned to start a blog, according to a survey by the National Association of Realtors. It's a new yet familiar direction for an industry that has long depended on referrals and networking.

The Rosales believe that since social media gives customers a way to really connect with both the and the potential real estate their buying, they have been able to form a personal relationship with their customers. They are the creators of Agent Genius, an online magazine for real estate that gets contributions from 37 bloggers from across the nation.

Are you taking advantage of the iTunes Apps Store?

I recently found a post by Ben Lorica which looked into the best selling apps at the iTunes store. According to his post, the top sellers are apps dealing with sports, education and entertainment. Read his analysis.

After having a chance to browse the iTunes Apps store, I found a few companies who have already started to use it to their advantage. Slate has a Poll Tracker '08. ESPN has a few apps as well. What could something like this do for your company? Have you seen a great example of companies taking advantage of the iTunes Apps Store?

A few tips for Twitter

Recently, Corey Wynsma posted a few tips on how to maximize the use of Twitter. Although the tips focused on newsroom use, I think the points are valid for any company starting to use Twitter as a new source of reaching their target crowd.

1) Forget about Twitter ROI
It's not about making money, but adapting to the new culture shift that lies ahead.
2) Twitter isn't a broadcast channel
It's about conversation. Don't just post the latest news, create a way for your followers to have a conversation.
3) Climb down off the pedestal
Approach Twitter carefully. You don't know what exactly you'll receive in return for your efforts, so hang back and jump in with two feet and an open mind.
4) Don't rely upon a single branded Twitter experience
Connect with people in your community. Find a way to make people interact with your users and experience available for everyone to comment.
5) Find Twitters and their niches
Use your strength and expertise to reach out to other Twitter groups. Use what you have to build your community.
6) Help your twitters take ownership of their efforts
Provide your followers badges and logos to share your group.
7) Make twittering easy
Make sure your followers know they can Twitter from anywhere, promoting the different apps that allow them to comment through their mobile phones.
8) Gain followers that count
Thing quality not quantity. Allow your group to grow with members who are genuinely interested and can contribute to your conversation.

There are more points to the list. Read them here. Is Twitter a valuable source for your company? How have you gained your followers?

Social media diary 31/10/2008 - Amex

Amex to launch online community for travel managers

One of the best examples I know of a brand using information they have to add a social layer to their site is the Members Know site from American Express. On this site Amex use the data from spending using their cards to highlight restaurants and hotels in certain cities that are popular with their members. Once you've signed up you can share your thoughts on these establishments and exchange travel tips with other business traveller. Today, they are launching a new online community, and this time it isn't aimed at the business travellers, but at the people who organise their travel for them.

Business Travel Connexion is aimed at corporate travel managers and will combine editorial from Amex and other suppliers with user-generated content. Amex hope to create a real-time resource for the members and also build a fairly homogeneous community of a group of people who would valuable to marketers. They will be able to share information and ideas with each other and also with Amex and other suppliers. The site includes a "Product Lab" area for feedback and co-creation.

So what can we learn from this?

Amex are a great example of how brands are adding social layers to their existing sites and products, delivering real value to people and making the most of the product and information they already have. With Members Know they took data that previously wasn't used externally (data on spending in hotels and restaurants) and repackaged this in a way that was both useful for members and encouraged them to interact and upload their own content. In the same way, Business Travel Connection, links a set of individual customers who are isolated (often working with no peers in their organisation) but who share a strong common bond (they all deal with the same problems). That they can be linked through the Amex brand is even more powerful.

When thinking about 'going social' - building online communities or using social media - too many firms build approaches that don't always address their unique position in the market or capitalise upon what they may have to offer. Amex have done things the right way. They've thought about their strategy and about why people would engage in an online community that they manage; and about what they have to offer that's different. These are important stages and ones that we at FreshNetworks spend a lot of time on with clients. Working out why people will engage and why they will engage on your site is a critical first step to any online community

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Community 2.0 vs. Focus Group 2.0

This post from ZDNet raises the interesting question regarding the boundaries of community 2.0. Recently Intel and Asus requested user feedback for a dream PC. The concept was that users come together, talk about what they want, vote about it, then Asus will build it. No one would argue that this is a community effort, and that it is an online forum, but would it really be considered community 2.0? So the author of the ZDNet post, Joe Brockmeier asked the question

"What do you think? Community, or focus group 2.0?"

Do you have an answer to his question? What are your thoughts?

Education and Community 2.0

Community 2.0 has entered the Education space with ePals, which encourages collaboration between classrooms. Growth of this new community has been significant with over 16 million members, in conjunction with 5,000 new classroom joining in as mentioned here. Recently the company was awarded with the 2008 Education Software Review Award granted from the ComputEd Gazette. Edmund Fish, CEO of ePals had this to say regarding their growth:

"Increased awareness of safe and effective web-based learning tools, and ePals' decision to provide these services without cost to schools, are important factors in this unprecedented growth. Our members have told us they have chosen ePals because of a combination of a safe, purposeful learning environment; powerful communication tools enhanced for collaboration; meaningful learning opportunities designed to build reading, writing and problem-solving skills that are easily implemented in classrooms; and a large, diverse community of like-minded users so that classroom 'matches' can be global or local, but always productive. This combination makes ePals unique, satisfies user needs and delivers meaningful learning outcomes."