experience matters

Lauren Ysseldyke | Critical Mass Chicago

Being new to CM and the Experience Distribution team, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to attend Digg’s Social News & Social Marketing Summit and meet the mastermind behind Digg.com, Kevin Rose (@kevinrose). While listening to Kevin talk about Digg’s place in the social space, its upcoming new Digg platform (to be released in a month or so) and marketing concepts in a constantly changing social media world, I realized how extremely important it is today for marketers to know how to find a role in social media. With today’s audience immersed in a “snack culture” (as Kevin put it) of wanting online content in short, interactive form, marketers must learn to cater to these needs when it comes to advertising and building brands. Kevin has learned this concept well through his creation of Digg.com. Falling in a social space between Facebook and Twitter, Digg.com offers its “snack culture” audience a customizable news experience in which content is driven by the audience itself in a concise and interactive format.

“Snack culture” wasn’t the only concept I found interesting and relevant to the CM team and other marketers today. After listening to marketing panelists, Daina Middleton, Sloan Broderick, Rick Wion and Chas Edwards, I took away several necessities to making it as a marketer in an increasingly digital and social media driven world. Here are my top five picks:

1.    Role in Social Media: Before diving into the world of social media, it’s crucial for marketers and clients to talk about what each partner’s role should be for social media…Creative? Curator? Publisher? Sloan Broaderick (Managing Director, MediaCom) went into a great story about how Audi follows this concept and focuses on building brand relationships before people even enter the purchase stage. “If you’re just hearing about Audi when you’re ready to make a car purchase then we’re already too late,” Sloan says.

2.    3 Universal Categories of Digital Marketing: Daina Middleton (CEO, Performics) stressed the importance of dividing the digital marketing space into three categories of owned, earned and paid. Owned includes your own controlled assets (websites, commercials, videos); earned includes social and social monitoring and paid includes distribution. Then each of these channels/categories have a different purpose and a different set of goals/KPIs. This is very similar to how CM views the digital space and how the Experience Distribution team is structured. Whereas the rest of the CM company is dedicated to the owned category, the Experience Distribution team is divided into both an earned and a paid media group.

3.    Importance of Transparency: Consumers today value information and advertising that’s transparent and it’s crucial that marketers realize the value in this concept. By remaining transparent, marketers are able to gain consumers’ respect and offer them a more personable experience. Kevin Rose stressed this concept by comparing a “bot tweet” he received from an advertiser and a tweet he received from a real person talking about a brand. Kevin said his experience with the real person was more valuable to him than the “bot tweet” because he knew the real person’s tweet was sincere and not merely an advertising attempt.

4.    Conflicts of Interest in Digital Measurement: One of the main challenges that was brought up during the panel discussion was the conflict of interest that arises when a person on the client side is in charge of both the website and social media. Whereas the goal behind a website is driving people to the site, social is more about having people talk and interact with your brand. Sloan supported this point by saying “If you knew a cable station had 50,000 viewers who liked your brand and watch it every day…would you invest your money there? The answer is yes and that’s what social does.”

5.    Biggest Upcoming Platform for Advertisers: With the recent introduction of the iPad into the tech world, iAds now offers advertisers and marketers the opportunity to reach the “snack culture” in yet another medium. Kevin talked about the development of Digg’s iPad app and how it’s “going to be awesome.”

As the world of social media continues to expand, marketers must strive to satisfy the hunger of today’s “snack culture.”  I’m learning that we at CM know exactly how to do that.  When I look around at our digital consumption today, I can’t help but wonder what’s next for our “snack culture” way of life? What’s going to replace the iPad and iPhone in the next couple of years? Will we still be considered a “snack culture,” or will we be beyond that? These questions are just the beginning to understanding the future of the digital world.

Lauren is an intern in the Experience Distribution group at Critical Mass Chicago, focusing on paid media.