Participation – Amplification – Gamification

This is the time when everyone creates a list of things that were or things that will be.  Normally, I do not participate in this ritual but this year I  can’t stop myself.  The reason being that the lists I am seeing are so out there in terms of predictions that I want to bring back to pragmatism to 2013.  I see 5 major trends for 2013 and here they are!

Participation - Now that Facebook has reached over 1 billion members, it is fair to assume that in Belgium we will round the cape of 5 million in 2013.  With LinkedIn having 187 million users, we will pass the 1.5 million users in Belgium in 2013.  However, I am predicting a boom of twitter usage in Belgium with thanks to the traditional media. Inspirational is the radio with programs such as #hautekiet or #touché, TV with the hashtag #7dag or #SODD, and traditional magazines such as Flair, Humo and many more.  Slowly they are driving consumers to Twitter and thus comes the explosion of number of users.  I think we could be looking at 2.5 million accounts with 1 million active users by the end of the year.

Amplification – Many companies are setting up company accounts on social media but they are struggling to get the following they would like to have.  However, they are forgetting the “untapped potential” they are sitting on.  A fair amount of their employees is active on social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) during and after working hours (survey Vanguard Leadership October 2012).  Unfortunately, they rarely follow, like or support their company on social media.  And these would be the best ambassadors for your company.  Remember the old days when they were motivated to recommend their company to their friends in the real world…

Companies are taking notice and we are seeing that large companies are running “awareness sessions” for their employees with a number of goals in mind: provide information about the general use of social media, explain the social media policy but mostly to ask employees to become social media ambassadors for their companies.  This leads to another trends for 2013, the introduction of social media “amplification software”.  These software packages will allow companies to post messages on the corporate accounts, inform their employees, ambassadors and influencers about these messages and have them re-distributed by their employees, ambassadors and influencers.  Tap into the “untapped potential“.

Gamification = Even though this word has been on the lips of many, I think 2013 is the year when it will become real.  The gaming techniques will find their way in which we use social media, learn, or do business.  Today the emphasis  lies on badges, mayorships, free goods, etc. but the evolution is going to be quick and innovative.  A true revolution in the making.

So the biggest challenge for companies in 2013 is how their are going to use awareness building  to inspire their employees’ participation to social media to become ambassadors and amplify the corporate messages using a number of gamification schemes.

How far on this journey are you today?

Finally, I want to wish you all a Merry Christmas!

The Social Media Alphabet

There was a time when the phonetic alphabet (Cfr. Wikipedia – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_phonetic_alphabet) was used to spell out letters.  Remember the “T for Tango” or “C for Charlie”.

But today we live and work in a world with a whole new generational language and fairly soon there will likely be classes on, “how to speak Social Media”. But any language starts with an alphabet.  So here is my take on how to teach the alphabet.

The benefits of using this alphabet is that many generations can relate to these platforms and the usage of these names increases your “coolness” factor.

Which other platforms would you use?

Why the political parties have no Social Media Policy?

2012 is an election year. This is not only the case in the US, but also in many other countries including my own, Belgium. There will be local elections and union elections this year. But I am looking forward, with a lot of anticipation, to how US politics will be using Social Media to rally to victory. Four years ago, Team Obama surprised everybody, but this year, many politicians and candidates will be fighting back and use the same weapons.

What I can not stop wondering about is whether the Democratic or Republican party has a Social Media Policy. I do not think so and in all honesty I am not sure they can make one that sticks. In reviewing the database of social media policies (http://socialmediagovernance.com/policies.php), there are a number of elements that always show up in such a policy. Maybe this is a good time to benchmark some paragraphs of these policies versus the political world. It will become apparent why it would be close to impossible to create a Social Media Policy (that would stick to) for any political party: Here are some clauses and further meaning:

• Respect your Audience: One should show proper consideration for other’s privacy and topics considered inflammatory.
• It is a Conversation: it is supposed to be a two-way conversation and not just shouting out to the audience.
• Respect your competition, do not pick fights or launch personal attacks: Seems very obvious and does not really require any further explanation.
• Be honest and transparent: do not be sneaky or devious. Do not have others go out there and say good things about you and bad things about others. Stay away from ghostwriters.
• Be yourself and respectful: Voters will see through your marketing tricks and talk. Be passionate and let that show through your personality.
• Get your facts right: Separate your opinions from your facts. How often is this not forgotten?
• Admit mistakes, apologize and correct your mistakes: do not be afraid to say that you were wrong. Admit to those mistakes and correct them.
• Think twice about posting: Before you post think about how it will be perceived since that is what people will see as the reality. The internet does not forget easy. Make sure you are allowed to post this content.
• Do not lie: Obviously since you are personally responsible for “speaking” on a public platform.
• Add Value: People’s time is valuable so do not waste it with.
• Aim for Quality and not Quantity: Offer your contribution with content and in context.
• Do not spam your audience: Respect people’s time.

As most companies and organizations are urged to create good social media guidelines and policies, I think politicians should set the example. However, I know that politicians stand on the barricade when they see these types of policies, but just like marketers they feel that their hands are tied. So I wonder if any of the political parties are even giving this any thought and would love to hear from them. Any thoughts?

Are you being kept awake by circles, hangouts and sparks

Two weeks ago Google announced it latest effort to get involved with social media, called Google+.  Today, Microsoft leaked its efforts for yet another social media network.  Are these two efforts too late to battle Facebook and Twitter?

Google+ will offer a high degree of integration with its other social media platforms and this will be the USP to fight Facebook and Twitter.  The stream, which looks a lot like the one in Facebook, will be complemented with circles (groups in which you put people), hangouts (your favorite online places) and sparks (bits and pieces of information).  And Google claims this is only the beginning.

Microsoft leaked the story about its social network (Tulatip?) built around the Bing search engine to create a social search.  However, from the limited information available, Microsoft will not be inventing the network but use bits and pieces from Facebook and Twitter which might be a smart idea.

Back to Google+.  As it is fitting for social media platforms, memberships are handed out in small amounts which has lead to a frenzy to get access in the first week or so.  Many people were looking for such an “invite”.  Getting such an invite meant you are someone in social media land or had the right friends (what a good time to test the “give and receive” attitude).  I did not get one till 3 weeks into the process thanks to Roland Legrand from De Tijd.

Though I was disappointed that I did not get an invite, it made me think and ask a number of questions.  First of all, is this not just another gadget which we are not waiting for?  We are already part of so many social media platforms and networks.  Why add another?  After which we will complain that we have a lot of work to keep our social media profiles up to date… How much can we kid ourselves?  It seems we are looking for more work.

Second, all those people that are looking for such a special “invite” will not be the users of tomorrow.  These people are going to “test” Google+ to either break it down to the ground or praise it into the heavens but few will be (active) users in 6 months.  Many profiles will die very quickly even if Google claims they have 100 million profiles in less than a month.  Who wants to rebuild his/her Facebook/Twitter or even LinkedIn  network again on yet another platform.  Not me!

As far as I am concerned I am really waiting to see where Google+ will be making the difference with Facebook and the others before I switch.  The integration with tools such as  Tweetdeck and others will define if and when I switch to Google+.

So I will let Google convince that switching to Google+ will be worth my while and bring VALUE rather than just more work.

Trade Unions and Social Media Policies: an explosive mixture

I am looking with a lot of interest at the actions of trade unions when it comes to social media policies in companies.  Over the last months several court cases, which I do not care to mention (just Google “social media policy union”), have made the news and have spread via different media across the world.  It is true that currently most of the controversy is coming out of the US but I am sure in time we will have similar discussions in Europe.

There are 2 points that intrigue me:

• Trade Unions about Social Media policies
• Social Media policy in Trade Unions

I know that I am touching on very sensitive points.  So I think we need to face this topic before more discussions end up as social media cases.

Trade Unions about Social Media Policies

As more and more companies are seriously beginning to look at creating and implementing a Social Media Policy to control their employees, it raises more attention with the trade unions.  We all know that controlling social media is impossible!  So what am I seeing?

• Some companies have realized that rather than creating a strict policy it is better (for company ambassadorship) to provide guidelines to the employees.
• More and more companies are involving different functions and departments during the creation phase of a policy. We see HR, marketing and IT collaborate on such policies.

My recommendation, however, is that you make the trade unions part of your project team to create the company social media policy.  Daring?  Impossible?  Not!  Speaking from experience, it can be done!

Social Media Policies in Trade Unions

Source: Alexwhite.org

Trade Union members are active on social media, let’s not deny this.  While most are there from a personal point of view, some are their as a trade union member.  This brings me to wonder if trade unions have their own social media policy or even social media guidelines since they are a brand too. What guidelines or policies are in place for trade union members to react via social media?  Just imaging how much damage the trade union brand and reputation could suffer from not having these guidelines. So far, I have not found one trade union that has published a policy but it would be interesting to see what their guidelines/policy looks like.

My recommendation is that Trade Unions should create, implement, communicate and publish their social media policy so their members do not hang out the trade union’s dirty laundry.

Conclusion

My business mantra is that you can complain about a problem but you need to come up with at least one solution.  So if trade unions are going to fight social media policies, they need to have one themselves and companies must include the trade unions in their social media project creation and delivery teams.

I would love to hear your comments and feedback.

Looking to implement social media in 2011?

Social media is all around us.  Over 600 million people of all ages are now engaged on social media sites.  Just take a look at the video “social media revolution 2” on YouTube.  In the course of 2010, companies have realized that these channels represent a great way to reach out and engage customers.

Joining social media as a company might seem easy and is started with a lot of enthusiasm.  However, success does not lie around the corner.  The initial drive to create necessary profiles and posts leads to worries about lack of success, large investments in time and hard to measure Return-On-Investment.

So, before you start, it is always a good idea to stop and think about the following items:

• Awareness of social media: How well do you understand what social media really is?  What different platforms are there out there and what are they used for?  Which ones do you pick to be active on?

TIP: A great start is to get a good overview by reading up on the subject or even better calling on a specialist who can show you the way.

• Strategy:  Social media is not a channel that stands by itself nor is it the exclusive territory of marketing.  HR, R&D and customer services can also benefit from it.  Social Media is an addition to what your company already does to reach it targets.

TIP: Find out if and where your customers are on social media and think about how to engage them – make it part of the questions in your annual customer satisfaction survey.

• Inventorize: Since so many people, including your own employees, are already using social media it might be a good idea to get a sense of where they are active and/or talk about your company.

TIP: The simplest way to do this is by going on the platforms and typing in your company name.

• Social media policy: Before you can really get going, it makes a lot of sense to create a social media policy or guidelines to help people protect their and your reputation online.

TIP: This policy should address items such as identity, time usages, company affiliation, handing negative comments, etc.

• Training:  This is one of the most forgotten but highly effective items in the whole process.  It can set you up for possible disasters – Not knowing the consequences of what you are doing or getting into can lead making simple mistakes with big reputation loss.

TIP: Create a customized training to will help your employees do their jobs using social media.

• Getting started:  Here the simple rule applies that you can not bite off more than you can chew.

TIP: Create a few profiles first (LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter) and add more as you go along.  Create both personal and company profiles and make the as complete as possible.

One final piece of advice is to start Monitoring.  Whether you are active or not, you should monitor what is being said about you.  TIP: Using free tools such Google alerts or http://www.socialmention.com are 2 great ways to start.  Paying platforms start at 100€ (www.Tracebuzz.com or  www.engagor.com) and provide better and more complete.

Companies can no longer wait to join social media on the basis that people are talking about them.  So it is better to join the conversation and engage the customers.

Mic Adam

Vanguard Leadership

Blog

Are we dumb? Lazy? Or naive?

We are joining social media platforms and making new friends every day.  Moreover, we even become friends with people we have never met before.  Some people pride themselves in having as many friends as possible and this is not without danger.

When horror stories began to appear in the US, we Europeans had some good giggles about all those stupid and silly things some people did.  Whether they were comments on Facebook, messages on Twitter or videos on YouTube, we could not believe our ears.  We got confirmation of the statement “only in the USA something like this can happen”.  It would not happen in Europe.  We, Europeans, know much better what privacy is plus we even think that our privacy is well protected.  Not to say, that we think we are smarter.  But nothing is further from the truth.  Looking at the newspapers over the last weeks, European horror stories are featured daily and they are not any different than we one’s we laughed at. Why?  Are we as dumb as the Americans or are we as naïf as they are?

Many of us are just unaware of the dangers of social media.  By providing information about yourself on social media you are giving up your right to privacy.  All the information is stored on a server “somewhere” in the world so how can you protect that data?  Of course, social media platforms provide a number of security and privacy settings but your data is still in the cloud and you have no control over it.  Luckily, I see a number of social media policies that clearly state that you give up your right to privacy when you participate to social media but the issue is that most people do not know of the existence of such a policy in their company not to say they have not read them.

Sometime ago I read a great quote by Sam Lessin: “Privacy used to be cheap but now it is a precious good that is expensive to keep”.  Even though this is very correct, I do not entirely subscribe to it.  I want to argue that if you do not want people to know certain details about you, you should just not post or share it on any social media platform.  Privacy is at your own discretion and under your control – End of story and free of charge!

The problem might have deeper roots.  It starts with the fact that 95% of us who participate in social media never read the terms of service of those platforms.  We press “I accept” within seconds since we really have no choice when we want to participate.  It continues with the fact that 50% never changes the standard privacy and security settings and thus opens the can of worms even further.  Finally, no one ever reads a book or manual on how to use the different platforms and that is where the biggest problem is lingering.  Did you ever read a book about Facebook or Twitter?  We no longer read manuals in general (even if we buy a car, mobile phone or digital camera) and are unaware of the pitfalls.  Is that not just the recipe for disaster?

Is there a role for government, business or the general education system here?  Yes, I am convinced of it.  People need this information and built up these skills so they can reduce these types of horror stories.  True, it is up to the individual to take some action but still a gentle push can go a long way.  Or even better, put a “how to use social media” manual or book under the Christmas tree this year for all your friends and beloved family and make them read it.

Are you checking in into your hospital?

A few weeks ago, I got a call from a Belgian journalist (Peter Backx, editor of the Artsenkrant) asking if I had any data on whether the Belgian hospitals had any presence in social media. I was intrigued by the question and did some research which I will discuss later on in this blog.

The first question that comes to mind when such an inquiry pops up is whether and what hospitals are doing anywhere else in this world. Hospitals are mostly risk and discussion averse which completely opposite of social media. New projects are meticulously planned and kept under good cover. But still it seems that in the USA hospitals are embracing social media big time. From Facebook over Twitter to YouTube! Hospitals are finding their way to applications to increase their customer service, training (both patients and nurses), PR and crisis communication. There are several great examples around (Mayo Clinic, University of Maryland, etc.). A source of information is slideshare where there are some great presentations available on the subject.

Looking closer to home, Lucien Engelen recently noticed a significant increase in the social media presence in Holland. The number shot up from single digits to 30% presence in different types of social media. Similar to the USA, Dutch hospitals are uploading videos on YouTube, tweeting or posting messages on both Facebook and LinkedIn. One reason might be that hospitals are for profit and consider their patients potential clients (instead of just sick people). Another reason is that the effort of joining social media is headed up by HR which hopes to find new employees.

But what about Belgium? It is safe to say that the social movement has not hit our Belgian hospitals. There are some that are starting but a limited amount has social media profiles on LinkedIn (25), Facebook (even less), Twitter (single digits). Most of the social media is driven by individual contributors that are not acting on behalf of the hospital which could in term lead to some confusing and misleading representation and will have to be addressed by a social media policy.

So what is the next step? Since more and more patients are using social media to diagnose themselves before going to any care provider, hospitals should join the movement, know what is being said and actually contribute to the knowledge.

There are 5 steps that must be taken:

• Creation of an overall strategy which includes social media

• Create a social media policy and guidelines to help streamline the social media efforts

• Create the necessary profiles

• Take active part in social media (conversation and not just outward communication)

• Monitor social media

By being proactive they will be able to become a more trusted partner for the patient.

Social Media in Belgian Recruitment Companies

Recruitment and social media seem to go hand in hand.  Candidates who are looking for a new job are often told to update, complete and professionalize their profiles on all of these social media platforms in order to be found easily.  However, how professional and visible are recruitment companies and professionals?  It is clear that these companies and its professionals are making progress using social media but there is certainly a lack of strategy and direction.

Limited visibility.

Though recruitment companies are present in social media, few promote their presence (14%) on their website of jobsite.  8% of all companies analyzed did not have a website nor a social media presence.  LinkedIn is the social media platform that recruitment companies seem to embrace (57%).

Room for improvement on the professional image.

Job searchers are often told to professionalize their social media profile on LinkedIn by completing them as much as possible.  However, this can not be said about the recruitment professional!  They seem to leave all the good advice behind them with as most notable examples the fact 51% does not have a profile picture and 52% do not mention their own company website.

Lack of engagement.

The limited visibility of recruitment companies and the poor level of professionalism by the recruitment professionals lead to a lack of conversation and/or engagement with candidates.  The mostly mentioned reasons for this behavior is the “lack of time” and “lack of results” (aka ROI).  The conclusion is that today social media is being used reactively as to mainly verify that the paper resume corresponds the online resume.

Recruitment companies let a lot of opportunities slip because of this lack of engagement with possible candidates including those not actively looking.  Engagement will lead the way to finding good candidates with the right profiles more easily as a few companies in the research have demonstrated.  Creating the right image will build the brand even in the recruitment business.

This research is the result of a market study done by Vanguard Leadership in July 2010.  In this market study we have used social media and the internet to build the dataset.  We have analyzed 180 websites of recruitment companies and 850 profiles (in LinkedIn) of recruitment professionals in the Belgian market). The complete report and the presentation can be found on slideshare (report: http://slidesha.re/9rJlt8 or http://scr.bi/atOa17 – presentation: http://slidesha.re/9q47JN or http://scr.bi/aM94PS).

Contact:

Mic Adam

Social Media Policy Creator/General Manager

Adammic@vanguard-leadership.be

Phone: +32 478 50 41 35

Vanguard Leadership (www.vanguard-leadership.be) is a company that helps protect companies and individuals protect their reputation in social media by providing awareness presentations, social media inventories, creating social media policies, training and social media monitoring.

Learning goes social

As a follow on to my blog post of July 2^nd (http://wp.me/pnzGc-6f), I want to expand the subject with newly acquired information from the conference where I presented my research and survey on social media in Learning and Training.

There are a few conclusions I heared and want to put forward:

• There are certainly a number of good examples around of how (e-) learning can happen using social media.
• There seem to be no negative stories around especially in the training sector (Domino Pizza’s example overlooked?), but that is more because the professionals in this domain are thinking along the next point in the list.
• Learning should be kept within the firewall and not use publicly available tools.
• Platform vendors seem to think they have included social media in their products.
• Platform vendors seem to be re-inventing functionality of social media tools rather using existing platforms.

Focusing on the positive, as I mentioned, there are some good examples out there of how you can use social media in a training and development environment.  Here are a few examples.

One area where social media could play a big role is in induction training materials.  Learning to understand the new organization you will be working before you actually show up should have enormous payback.  Here are 3 elements that come to mind:

• You can start the process before the person actually starts working for you.
• Video, org charts, contacts, mentors and products can be provided to smooth out the initial period.
• It will increase the retention

Video is certainly the best media to use in social learning.  Companies like Black& Decker, Waterford Wind Turbines or BT (Dare2Share – http://www.btplc.com/today/art88664.html) have demonstrated that social media is a viable channel to learn.  Each of these examples have demonstrated a great ROI whether that is in $ or in less downtime.  The type of training needed is different.  Here is a concept: Teach people how to make and upload a good video…

I think Winston Churchill was right when he said “I hate to be trained, but I love to learn”.  Social learning is something that needs to come from the grass roots up where people help each other rather than being told to use social media to actually sit down and learn.

Your feedback and comments are welcome.  You can reach me via a number of ways:

Email: adammic@vanguard-leadership.be

Mob. +32 478 50 41 35

Website: www.vanguard-leadership.be

Blog: http://micvadam.wordpress.com/

Find me also on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo, Netlog, etc.