Integrating Online Conversations with the Art of Storytelling
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Integrating Online Conversations with the Art of Storytelling
- 1. Integrating Online Conversations with the Art of Storytelling Chris Tang Managing Director
- 4. Discuss Forum Uwants Forum Google Guru Group
- 5. Even government officials leverage the power of social media Source: The Straits Times (July 30, 2009)
- 6. Donald Tsang’s Blog Podcast Youth Station Discover Hong Kong’s Flickr Profile Hong Kong’s Reality Channel in YouTube
- 7. Social media impacts your brand’s reputation .
- 10. Google Marrying the Art of Storytelling with the Art of Conversation
- 12. D Attend meetings and events d Participate in online discussions d Read blogs d Join groups Engage in conversation d Google Blogger Strategy
- 13. Exclusive Preview Meetings Dedicated Blogger Events VIP Guests
- 14. d Google Maps Hong Kong Launch
- 15. Google’s Media and Blogger Coverage in 2008 48.98% 4.85% 19.64% 10.46% 7.40% 6.89% 1.27% 0.51% Total clippings: 392 (as of November 21, 2008) Dailies Tech Media Biz/Biz Tech Lifestyle Media Radio TV Blogs Trade Media
- 17. Local Bloggers’ Perception of Google “ Google Maps Hong Kong launch is my favorite blogger event by far! Google’s blogger engagement has given local bloggers like me an invaluable opportunity to interact and even brainstorm with their engineers. We appreciated that the engineers took some quality time with us, and we all felt that it was such a delightful and enjoyable moment. In the past, Google is very low-key and ‘mysterious’ to me as it preferred users to discover its latest products rather than aggressively promote its products like companies. But after Google has started to reach out to local bloggers actively, it seems that Google has opened up a lot, and become more active in sharing their news and product updates with us.” — Marie Yuen, Blogger, Marieyuen.blogspot.com “ Google Maps [Hong Kong Launch] is my favorite Google blogger engagement event for sure! When I joined Google’s Cantonese Suggest Launch, I put up a live stream of Google engineers’ product demo and shared it with 50 blogger friends of mine on my Facebook. Google’s blogger outreach campaign definitely established local bloggers’ growing support for the company and increased our usage of Google's products. It also helped Google get a more positive image, especially among end users. I appreciate the fact that Google values local bloggers, and the events it organize provide us a great opportunity to socialize and make friends. ” — Jansen Lu, Blogger, Jan’s Tech Blog
- 19. Google Maps Hong Kong Launch (July 22) Source: HitWise Google’s Web Search Market Share by Visits
- 20. Main Hong Kong blogger groups Google interacts with
- 21. Technology Campaign of the Year “Customizing Users’ Online Experience” (Google Taiwan) Asia-Pacific PR Awards November 20, 2008 Certificate of Excellence “Redefining Online Mapping in Hong Kong” (Google Hong Kong) Asia-Pacific PR Awards November 20, 2008 Google’s blogger outreach gets recognition from the industry
- 22. “ Software such as the mail server, Google Maps and Google Earth are useful in teaching. They make classes more vivid and close to daily life… More importantly, the applications are free of charge and the money saved can be used on purchasing other teaching tools. It is more cost-effective.” — Marie Yuen King-Yin, teacher and avid blogger A blogger interview about the uses of Google apps in the education sector Source: SCMP’s Young Post (December 3, 2008)
- 23. This full-page feature story unveils the successful formula of Mark Leung, who leverages YouTube to become enormously popular in the world. The power user demonstrates his passion and dedication to create and share his videos on YouTube by providing YouTube users with 11 invaluable tips on increasing the popularity of YouTube videos. Popular YouTuber shares tips on how to make interesting videos Source: Hong Kong Economic Times (March 17, 2008)
- 24. Community outreach: Day-to-day users describing the uses of Streetview Source: The Straits Times (October 13, 2008) “ It’s perfect for people who can’t read maps, as it offers a real ground perspective of how to get to a place.” — Kenneth Pinto, administrative officer “ Google Street View, which is 3D, will allow the students to see and plan better how they will actually get around.” — Wendy Tan, geography teacher “ Our café is located at street level, at a front shophouse at Holland Village, so it helps that users can walk their way to our café online before coming here.” — Evan Chung, café director
- 25. Fabrik Building a Presence on Wikipedia to Increase Web Traffic
- 26. d Fabrik Wikipedia Entry
- 27. Developed Fabrik’s own Wikipedia profile Added Fabrik references in competitors’ Wikipedia pages Composed competitive section in competitors’ Wikipedia pages to provide an area for Fabrik’s reference Contributed to community discussions on corporate controversies Posted information and links to Fabrik on other pages with relevant subject matter
- 28. Roxio Securing Mindshare from Target Consumer Audience with Multimedia Release
- 29. Roxio launches Easy VHS to DVD Helps Families Revive, Relive, and Preserve Cherished Personal Video Memories and Entertainment d Roxio Social Media Release
- 30. Captivate your audience “ If nothing else, you can't fault Roxio on their press relations. Huge, high-res photos, separate product-specific web site, wire-service press release and a promotional video embeddable through no less than 24 different video services. They sure know how to launch a product.”
- 35. d Hoffman Agency on the Web
- 36. Chris Tang Managing Director APAC Tel: +86 10 6507-0985 MP: +86 13801179352 Email: [email_address] Skype: chrisleitang_china
Editor's Notes
- Asia’s thriving community of bloggers is quickly becoming regarded as a trusted source of information, comparable to traditional media. Their growing influence spurred The Hoffman Agency (HA) to initiate a blogger outreach program on behalf of Google, a global online search company. Google needed a cost-effective strategy to maximize the exposure of its products and to encourage more people to use them. Since bloggers are technology’s early adopters and influencers, HA saw an opportunity to seek their help in promoting its customer’s technology and product offerings.
- To gain a better understanding of the blogging community, HA immersed itself in the blogosphere — participating in online discussions, reading blogs, engaging in conversations via popular Web 2.0 tools, joining blogger groups and attending events. Eventually, they became bloggers themselves.
- With the groundwork established, HA then initiated a two-way engagement between Google and key bloggers. By keeping bloggers in the loop about company news — offering product previews, organizing meetings and holding exclusive events — HA helped Google to grow its number of blogger contacts and also strengthen its relationship with them.
- Google Maps was first launched in the US in early February 2005 with the idea of making a user-friendly mapping technology accessible to consumers and business users for free. Since then, different versions of Google Maps have become available in over 30 countries, including the UK, Japan and China. In July 22, 2008, Google decided to launch Google Maps Hong Kong as part of its ongoing commitment to deliver tools and applications customized for local users. Blogger involvement: Google knows the growing importance and influence of a new breed of communicators: the bloggers. As more and more users turn to the Internet to get news and information, and as Web 2.0 continue to increase in popularity, Hong Kong’s blogger community has become a key factor to the success of Google’s local campaigns, including the Google Maps’ launch. Bloggers were invited to an informal dinner with Google’s marketing and engineering teams. They were divided into small groups and each group was joined by a Google spokesperson, who engaged the bloggers in a casual yet intimate conversation about the company and its products. A skit, done in Cantonese, showed two Google engineers demonstrating different scenarios where Google Maps can be incorporated in one’s daily activities. An interactive demo kiosk was set up at both the media conference and the blogger dinner, where local partners, such as PCCW, OpenRice.com and HKTDC showed how they integrated Google Maps into their web sites. At the demo kiosk, the journalists and bloggers were invited to experience Google Maps first hand.
- Thirty one bloggers attended the dinner, which surpassed our target attendance of 15 to 20 bloggers by 55% (based on maximum target figure). Key bloggers such as Jansen Lu and Poon Wing Hang (who are also media contributors) were in attendance. So impressed were they with the new Google product that Lu wrote a three-page Google Maps feature story for e-zone . Moreover, both Jansen and Hang featured Google Maps in e-world , a radio program aired on RTHK Channel 2. Other bloggers also appreciated the opportunity to meet with Googlers and to share their viewpoints on Google’s products. They were especially impressed by the skit performed by Google engineers Ben Luk and Chi-Yung Tse and wrote positive blog posts after the Maps launch. Blog readers became interested with Google Maps and as a result, the daily web traffic for Google Hong Kong and Google Maps Hong Kong significantly grew (see chart).
- Launched an educational program targeting local educators Leveraged a popular blogger, who is also a local school teacher, as spokesperson Pitched power user stories to major dailies that have a high penetration rate in local schools, including Sing Tao Daily, Ming Pao Daily News and SCMP - Young Post Generated a front-page story in SCMP – Young Post ; a full-page feature story in Ming Pao Daily News; half-page story in Sing Tao Daily
- Thirty one bloggers attended the dinner, which surpassed our target attendance of 15 to 20 bloggers by 55% (based on maximum target figure). Key bloggers such as Jansen Lu and Poon Wing Hang (who are also media contributors) were in attendance. So impressed were they with the new Google product that Lu wrote a three-page Google Maps feature story for e-zone . Moreover, both Jansen and Hang featured Google Maps in e-world , a radio program aired on RTHK Channel 2. Other bloggers also appreciated the opportunity to meet with Googlers and to share their viewpoints on Google’s products. They were especially impressed by the skit performed by Google engineers Ben Luk and Chi-Yung Tse and wrote positive blog posts after the Maps launch. Blog readers became interested with Google Maps and as a result, the daily web traffic for Google Hong Kong and Google Maps Hong Kong significantly grew (see chart).
- It was this show of commitment from both HA and Google that inspired Hong Kong’s local bloggers to create Google Guru, a 222-strong online community of Google users and enthusiasts.
- Launched an educational program targeting local educators Leveraged a popular blogger, who is also a local school teacher, as spokesperson Pitched power user stories to major dailies that have a high penetration rate in local schools, including Sing Tao Daily, Ming Pao Daily News and SCMP - Young Post Generated a front-page story in SCMP – Young Post ; a full-page feature story in Ming Pao Daily News; half-page story in Sing Tao Daily
- With the success of HA’s blogger campaign, Google has decided to extend its community outreach further. In Singapore, HA has now started an engagement program to reach out to a broader audience. It is now working with schools, real estate agents and travel portals in a bid to introduce relevant applications and to gain a better understanding of the market’s level of interaction with Google tools.
- Wikipedia gets an estimated 10 billion page views per month, and Wikipedia articles are a top hit in the majority of online searches. It is among the top 10 Web sites in terms of traffic on a global basis and is considered one of the most influential reference sites on the Web. Entities that are looking to grow their online presence are taking notice of Wikipedia’s popularity. Former Hoffman client Fabrik was one such company hoping to make its mark on the site. Fabrik is a provider of hard drive and online storage solutions for a range of customers, including consumers, A/V professionals and enterprise users. The company had previously attempted to list itself on Wikipedia, leveraging its existing sales and marketing copy to create the entry. As often occurs, Fabrik’s entry was flagged as a “blatant advertisement” and removed from the site. When Fabrik began working with The Hoffman Agency, not a single mention of the company existed in the Wikipedia universe. The company engaged Hoffman’s Wikipedia expertise to help lead the charge anew. Fabrik’s director of corporate communications sent the team an e-mail containing its original Wikipedia article with one word in the subject line: “help.”
- The challenge in composing any successful Wikipedia entry is to walk the fine line that is getting the company’s messaging across while remaining unbiased in tone. New Wikipedia articles are closely scrutinized by a community of editors and admins to ensure that they follow a complex set of editorial guidelines for Wikipedia. Many Wikipedia entries written by marketing and PR professionals are often flagged for not maintaining a neutral point of view. Given the above, creating copy that will be approved by corporate marketing teams and the Wikipedia community is a paradoxical conundrum.
- The Hoffman Agency set out to write a Wiki that was neutral yet engaging and conversational in its overall written tone. It would eliminate common marketing jargon like “industry-leading” and focus on building energy around the company brand, culture and products by offering online references to substantiate Fabrik’s differentiators. On Wikipedia, references are the criteria for establishing facts, so the more citations included in an article, the less likely it is to be contested. To maximize the impact of Fabrik’s Wikipedia entry, the team planned to take a “spider web” approach, in which it would add information about Fabrik and its products to other Wikipedia entries that covered material relevant to the company so that visitors to those entries would be given a link back to Fabrik’s page. Also part of the spider web approach, the Hoffman team planned to add a section on competitors to the Wikipedia entries of each of Fabrik’s main competitors. Again, this move would direct visitors of those pages to Fabrik’s entry should they want to learn more. Throughout the process, Hoffman would remain in close contact with the team at Fabrik, providing regular updates over the phone that detailed necessary revisions to ensure that all new copy would align with Wikipedia’s complex editorial guidelines. Hoffman leveraged information from more than 40 online sources to compose the core Wikipedia pages on Fabrik and its subsidiary brands. The entries were citation-heavy and included logo and product images. Hoffman also set up necessary redirects that would send online searchers looking for similar terms to the correct page. Once the main pages were up, the team put its spider web plan into action, adding a reference to Fabrik in the sections of competitor companies’ pages that listed their competitors, including those of Seagate, Samsung and Toshiba. For competitors whose Wikipedia page did not include a competitive section, like Iomega and Western Digital, Hoffman composed one that included Fabrik’s reference. In Wikipedia community discussions regarding some of Fabrik’s competitors, users had mentioned the need for a section on corporate controversies. When appropriate, Hoffman took the lead on drafting and posting these sections on competitors’ pages. Completing its spider web strategy, Hoffman posted information and links to Fabrik on other pages with relevant subject matter, including those detailing computer data storage and hard disk drives. When its additions were met with a flag by some Wikipedia community members, Hoffman worked through the issues by engaging with the community and backing its actions, resulting in a successful post. In addition to text content, Hoffman also added images of Fabrik products to these subject-matter pages. Since the images on Wikipedia are generally free for use by bloggers and other media outlets, the team felt this enhanced the chance of a Fabrik product being included in a story or post about those topics. In the month following Hoffman’s Wikipedia efforts for Fabrik, Wikipedia became the top referring site to fabrik.com (outside of the sites of Fabrik’s subsidiary brands), bringing in roughly five percent of the site’s traffic. Overall, Hoffman was successful in its goals of raising the visibility of Fabrik across Wikipedia and increasing traffic to the company’s site in a short timeframe. Note: Fabrik is no longer a Hoffman client. The company was significantly restructured, resulting in a layoff of more than 85 percent of its workforce. Due to these circumstances, Fabrik’s presence on Wikipedia is no longer monitored by Hoffman or Fabrik’s marketing team.
- In late 2008, Roxio was poised to launch the latest edition of its Easy VHS to DVD, a product that allows consumers to convert VHS tapes to DVDs. Easy VHS to DVD is a small subset of Easy Media Creator, which is the 10th version of the product to be released in 10 years. Given this, there was little interest from the media in traditional product reviews. Since reviews coverage was largely how the company got the word out about new products in the past, it needed to devise a fresh strategy to garner the media’s attention, thus securing mindshare from its target consumer audience. Roxio challenged The Hoffman Agency to develop a plan to ensure that news about Easy VHS to DVD and its benefits reached potential customers. The team faced the major hurdle of securing interest in what was essentially a “follow-along” product. Sure that it could not take a traditional route to securing coverage for this new product, the Agency decided on an approach that would directly engage the target audience using a multimedia methodology. Since magazines and other customary outlets were not interested in Easy VHS to DVD, the team made the tactical decision to directly contact bloggers who fit the demographics of Roxio’s target consumer. This included those who covered parenting, weddings, gift ideas and topics of interest to retirees. Beyond the typical tactic of providing the bloggers with copies of the product to use and hopefully review on their sites, the Agency suggested composing a social media release that it would distribute to these bloggers as well as to other relevant sites and traditional Roxio targets. The goal of the release would be to provide information to online writers in a format that made it simple for them to grab content and multimedia elements to compose their own unique story about ways to use Easy VHS to DVD that both they and their readers would find compelling and interesting. Most importantly, Hoffman would frame all of its outreach within the bigger-picture trend of VHS tapes deteriorating over time and quickly becoming an obsolete technology. By focusing the news hook on an issue that most consumers can relate to (rather than on a new version of an old product), the team hoped to gain greater buy-in and interest from the press.
- The Hoffman team created an in-depth list of specifically targeted blogs, online sites and traditional media outlets. After developing targeted pitches for Easy VHS to DVD within the context of VHS’s demise, the team provided targets with a link to the social media release, which lived on the Web site CopyVHSToDVDWithRoxio.com. This URL was chosen and the site was optimized so that individuals searching online for information on copying VHS tapes to DVD would be led to the site. The social media release was written in a bulleted format to make it easy for authors to grab useful tidbits about Easy VHS to DVD and the related trends to customize a story. The site also included a digital video of a Roxio spokesperson commenting on the need for individuals to transfer VHS tapes to DVD for longevity, providing a demo of the software that highlighted its ease-of-use. Rather than tout the specific features of the Roxio product, the video took an approach of setting up the problem (an overwhelming number of VHS tapes stored away and aging) and offering one of many potential solutions (Easy VHS to DVD). The site also included an array of high-resolution images that authors could easily download to add to their stories. The Agency uploaded the video and photos to a number of popular media-sharing sites such as YouTube, Google Video, Flickr and Photobucket with the goal of making it as simple as possible for online reporters and bloggers to make use of those elements by providing them on the platforms that they prefer. On the video-sharing sites in particular, the team created search-optimized titles and tags so that people looking for tutorials on how to transfer their VHS tapes to DVD would have a higher likelihood of coming across the video. In addition, the team embedded buttons for many popular social bookmarking and networking sites (including Twitter, Facebook, Digg! and del.icio.us) so that visitors could easily share the release with friends and other contacts. The team did not want to ignore print journalists with this announcement, so it arranged for traditional text newswire distribution via the appropriate channels and custom outreach to top-tier and vertical targets. Hoffman also took advantage of Business Wire’s EON service, which cycles pull-quotes in the release each time the page loads, fooling search engines that the site has just been updated. This helped further search-optimize the news of Easy VHS to DVD. Once initial outreach was complete, the team fielded requests for review units and provided any necessary guidance throughout the review process.
- The social media release approach helped the team exceed the expectations of Roxio. Just days after the launch, Easy VHS to DVD had netted: • 25 news items (more than double the goal) • 41 press release reprints (more than quadruple the goal) • More than 40 requests for product review units • Nearly 100K qualified views of the site and video (10 times the goal) During launch week, the BusinessWire EON release registered 2,321 views and 73,794 headline impressions (i.e., RSS and other syndications combined). A month after the launch, the Web 2.0 resource microsite had registered 3,298 unique visitors and the video clip was viewed by over 23,807 people across the various placements. This alternative approach helped Roxio get in direct contact with the consumers it targeted with Easy VHS to DVD. The targets were so impressed with the simplicity and straightforward nature of this tactic that one blog headline stated “Roxio Launches ‘Easy VHS to DVD,’ Sets Bar for Press Kits.” The great majority of coverage embedded a multimedia element from the site within the article. And on BusinessWeek’s Business Exchange social network, the story was ranked the No. 2 most compelling story on the site two days after the launch.
- Tell the truth. First of all, don’t prentend to read their blog, if you don’t. Starting off with a lie gets any potential relationship off on the wrong foot. Be upfront. Okay, this is pretty much the same as ‘tell the truth’ but we wanted to spell it out. Acknowledge that you are in the midst of a promotional campaign and that you want to connect with bloggers. Provide value. Look beyond your needs as a marketer and consider the bloggers’ needs. Provide some ‘quick tips’ and a graphic (sized for the Web, please!), If you can, offer a giveaway promotion or send a discount code for the bloggers’ readers. Don’t be a pest. Reach out to a blogger no more than twice. When bloggers don’t respond, it means they’re not interested. Move on. Open a conversation. Let bloggers know you’re open to feedback or interviews. In essence, offer to work with them in whatever way would provide most value to readers. Be sure to follow up promptly on requests for more information. Join the conversation. This is a best practice along the lines of keeping with blogs long before you ever need to pitch them. That said, we recognize that forging blogger relationships isn’t feasible on a mass scale (many bloggers recognize this too). Contribute to the convesation if you can. Become a part of the bloggers’ community. Just don’t be self-serving and make the mistake of posting comments that are simply ads or trackbacks to your own site.