First item at hand is that NPT did not make it easy for me to participate in the discussion on their topic – here they are espousing social engagement and then THEY do not allow a conversation on their post or article.  It may be that as it is a reposting of the content from print, they thought may never occurred to them to support a discussion on this very hot topic.   In my experience though, it is not unusual to see this kind of behavior – a lot of organizations see social as just another form of media and treat it like it was print, radio or TV which is all one-way.

Beyond them apparently not really wanting to engage, my sense of the article is that the writer seemed to be taking issue with stats that show MySpace is declining (it is), that ROI in nonprofits is somehow different from other businesses (it’s not) and that there is work involved in correlating the data that can show an ROI that is meaningful (and there is!)  They present a spreadsheet calculator for nonprofits (from Care2.com) that delivers a projected ROI of some kind of online effort. 

IMHO, projected ROI vs. actual ROI are often two very different numbers and using a tool like this is maybe helpful, but if you deliver results that are wildly off, what then? Imagine that for all the money finance puts into treasury services they’re somehow off on their figures?  What if they’re off 10% – heads would roll I think, but somehow we’re expected to allow marketing projects to be off to an even greater degree.  The travesty to me is that most organizations spend far more on items like banking to measure and track their money (already in the bank) than they spend on measuring their marketing (impacting future revenue / donations).

The article is just a bit too off for me to say that I think it’ll be helpful to NPO’s, but if it gets them thinking about how social can support their mission then it’s a good post.  What’s possibly more relevant is a discussion that every outreach effort needs to be tracked, just like a marketing campaign anywhere else.  An ROI model that considers all aspects of media and marketing is what really relevant here – the burden of suddenly asking social-based marketing to prove an ROI when previous marketing efforts have is somewhat disingenuous.  All marketing should be aligned with ROI; the really cool part about social marketing is that it is by far the most measureable form of media we have right now.

So whether your an NPO, commercial entity with regional, national or global reach you should be demanding and working towards a relevant ROI model for all your campaigns and marketing efforts.

Related posts:

• Social Media Here, Social Media there, Social Media Everywhere!
• Logo icon for the ROI of Social Media
• The Death of Social Media – Long Live Media That is Social!

What is most obvious to me is that social elements in marketing should not be considered apart from the traditional, non-social elements. Second is that the return on each part of the marketing mix can actually be measured pretty well – the social is actually the easiest part of it.  Today with the tools, tactics and technology at our disposal, we can definitely get the answer to these questions about what’s working.  The next question that seemed to come up then was “should the investment be made to measure ROI?”  Imagine it cost $20 to find out that a marketing campaign brought in another $5 in incremental revenue?  The investment in measuring the return on the campaign would just not make sense – it’s a question then of can we afford the ROI data itself?

What we’ve seen is that most marketers simply put no budget into measuring what the effectiveness is of the marketing effort at all.  Larger CPG or FMCG marketers appear to be spending 5% to 8% of their marketing budget on just getting the data and putting the tools to work to help determine what’s actually working, but other companies (small, medium & large alike) just are not getting data on what is actually working in their marketing.  Keep in mind that this is the investment set aside for just getting the data and putting in the tools and systems to know what is working – nothing on the actual creative or media buys.  Compare this for a moment to how much finance invests in measuring cash & cash flow in their relationship with banks – much more than they spend on finding out what marketing is actually working.  Seems a little backwards doesn’t it?

What we began with, as a class was a desire to connect social media marketing investments to data that helps with funding and increased investment in marketing and what we end up with is a well developed understanding that the ROI of all marketing is where a company really needs to start – not one media type vs. another – all marketing should be measured.

What I’ve also seen is that demanding a return on just the social part of a marketing effort has dropped off in 2011 vs. the last few years and investment in online & social media is growing.  What I am looking for is that we’ll see is a demand for ROI methodology in marketing overall – it might not manifest, but to their credit, marketers appear to be more interested in being able to state clearly the impact on revenue of all their efforts. 

How ready are marketers to pursue an ROI-based strategy?  An indication of the readiness of marketing in being able to connect their marketing with revenue was the answer to the question of “how many of you can produce within 1/2 an hour, a spreadsheet of current and past campaigns?”   It was an illuminating response for sure – most could not.  This is the kind of response we seem to get from marketers regardless of location; when we narrow it still further to just social campaigns the response is even more sparse.

Where to go from here?  I for one am happy to be carrying this question forward and to be an evangelist for marketing and social media ROI.  There’s not a quick, single post answer to the question, but rest assured, there is one – welcome to the journey.

Related posts:

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• The ROI of Social Media Series – Marcel LeBrun CEO of Radian6 Episode 4

In the first episode, she talked about how they endeavor to make their content inventive and influential enough so that their “tech savvy and forward-leaning” audience takes the conversation offline with their friends.  In our last episode Ellen describes some of the metrics they use and how they came to create the Bravo “Talkbubble”, which is a mashup of various social media components all working in concert to provide a virtual ‘TV Viewing Party’ around Bravo show premiers.

As we continue the series in the ROI of Social Media podcasts, we encourage you to subscribe to the RSS or notices via email.  You will want to hear every minute of these insightful conversations with business marketers successfully deploying innovative social media solutions.

In this episode, Guy recognized that, like other participants in our interview series, Bravo has found that the use of social media has supported interactions that allows brands to connect more often with their audience and to increase their exposure without overwhelming them.

In an example of this power to increase the touch points with viewers via social media, Ellen points out that of the 92 messages posted during a Talkbubble session, it is very possible that those messages will be reposted / re-tweeted over 400,000 times around the world and that the audience will not think that they are being spammed or feel overwhelmed in the flow of messages.

Nonetheless, the Bravo Team does try to space the messages and make them relevant.  One of the ways they do so is to enlist the help of the Bravo-lebritites to drive even more engagement, all of which satisfies the consumers desire to feel like they’re involved with the lives of the people they see on the screen.

Ellen expands on the increase in the messaging that is possible with a social presence and we ask “How much Bravo can one person get?”, and if it is even possible to satiate the desire of the consumer or fan to engage with a brand like Bravo?  It’s a serious question that she and her team work hard to make sure they understand the answer to so they do not overwhelm a fan.

Where is social media going for Bravo though?  Social is part of their DNA and social is a critical outlet for the brand to ‘make the conversations happen’ is what Ellen tells us.  They are always on the lookout for new ways to connect to the audience, regardless of platform.  Social is likely an urgent part of the Bravo tool set and will be a part of everything they do from now on.  It lets you touch base and talk to the audience which is so important to the Bravo brand; it’s a part of everything they do.

Right now everything is new and exciting in social media and with the level of engagement for the team, the real challenge is understanding what the audience is saying about the brand in the social media eco-sphere qualitatively and giving fan what they want in the social channel.  As new platforms come along, they want give their fans what they want – an exciting interaction.

They watch the conversation closely looking for cues to see what they need to act on to support their fans and increase ‘the brand width of engagement’ or range of interaction with the audience with their fans.  You can find Bravo online, mobile and offline – they want to wrap the consumer with as much Bravo as they want, anywhere they want.

Play / Download Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks – Episode 3 Podcast Here

To get our posts as they happen, follow us on Twitter (@ROISocialMedia) or subscribe to SocialMarketingConversations.com via email or your RSS Reader.

For an MP3 file of the entire episode and (eventually) the transcript of the podcast, we invite you to visit and join our community site relating to the book at www.TheROIofSocialMedia.com and to explore best-practices in the ROI in Social Media.

We’re very interested in your perspective on the topic and, if you have a great interview who can add to the conversation, please let us know – we’re looking to interview them and put it up here!

Thank you again to you our listeners – hope you enjoyed the effort and work we put into it!

The Podcast and Credit For Where Credit is Due – This podcast / transcript was developed from a live recorded interview on April 7, 2010 between Ellen Stone Ellen Stone / Senior Vice President of Marketing with Bravo Media, Guy Powell and Steven Groves.

The podcast interview was downloaded and processes in Audacity, which is available from SourceForge.net, and with ‘4toFloor.wav’ music loop from member ‘Rooks’ and posted at SoundSnap.com.

The transcripts are sponsored by Social Marketing Conversations and the introduction Voice Talent is Ms. Cynthia Propst.

Related posts:

• How Innovators Takes Social Media to the Next Level – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• Making Content That is Inventive and Influential – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
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In this episode Ellen talks about how they use mobile to connect to their audience.  Their first iPhone app was developed around the Top-Chef shows and they shared with the consumer, the restaurants and shopping venues the contestants liked to eat at and shop in.  The app evolved into ‘Guides by Bravo’ where Bravo celebrities (‘Bravo-lebrities’) share their preferences for shopping, dining and entertainment in various cities like LA, NY and Atlanta.

Subscribe to the RSS or notices via email, if you want to make sure you do not miss a minute of this series with Ellen Stone and other social-marketing savvy business marketers.

The #1 goal for Ellen and her team is to have a high level of engagement with the audience – there are a lot of quantitative metrics, but not as many qualitative.  The qualitative metrics are very important and include –

• how many people become fans of the show
• how often Bravo becomes a top trending topic on Twitter
• # of Bravo-lebrity tweets get comments or are re-tweeted
• what are fan talking about
• how long the topic stays alive
• page views during the shows

The Bravo team took the idea of a TV Viewing Party and produced an idea they call the ‘TalkBubble’; which a multiplatform (online / offline / broadcast) media event that uses Facebook connect and Twitter to help fans enjoy Bravo shows when they are debuted.  The events include Bravo-lebrities, which encourages audience participate and features real-time interactions.  Bravo can see in real-time how the audience is responding to the show while it is being broadcast.

The metrics for TalkBubble vary a bit, but it includes page views, # of tweets, and other qualitative criteria that are somewhat proprietary.  As they see it, TalkBubble is taking social media to the next level connecting the audience and show celebrities in a unique and immediate way.

With capabilities like TalkBubble in place, the Bravo team can focus on the key elements in crafting a successful campaign – for Bravo that means they take more time with the message content and how it is crafted; it cannot be too corporate and it needs to mimic the tone of the show / brand and not push selling. 

Ellen and the team feel it is important to monitor and understand the # of messages being posted and what’s already trending.  If they try to compete with news, they want to make sure that to audience doesn’t perceive Bravo posts as spam; Bravo knows they need to break through the clutter and noise of the message stream. 

Play / Download Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks – Episode 2 Podcast Here

To get our posts as they happen, follow us on Twitter (@ROISocialMedia) or subscribe to SocialMarketingConversations.com via email or your RSS Reader.

ROI of Social Media Community Site

Guy Powell and I are avid about uncovering the ROI of marketing.  It’s work we are both passionate about and enjoy.

To support our work in exploring the question of ROI in marketing and social media, we’re launching a community site using the Ning platform at www.ROIofSocialMedia.com where we will be posting a wide variety of content for our readers and fulfilling our commitments we made in the ROI of Social Media book to provide fresh and updated content around the question of ROI in marketing and social media.

We have set the community as open for anyone, but a membership is required to access content like the complete episodes of all the podcasts and as comprehensive a list as we can possibly generate of social media monitoring and measurement technology and tool vendors. 

Come join us and let us know what the pressing issues are in your efforts to determine an ROI in your social media presence!

Related posts:

• How to Give Consumers All They Want From Your Social Presence – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• Making Content That is Inventive and Influential – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• The Vampire of Social Media Purity Deserves to Die

Bravo Networks has made social media a part of their DNA and with really powerful results.  In this podcast series with Ellen Stone / Senior Vice President for Marketing for Bravo, she shares some of the work that she and her team have undertaken to develop some award winning brand concepts and programs. 

You’ll want to subscribe (to your email or RSS reader) so you don’t miss a minute of what is an excellent podcast series on how Bravo has adopted social media to extend their relationship with the audience in powerful, productive and profitable ways.

In this episode Ellen describes the Bravo brand and the five entertainment categories they focus their programming and content on ; they are food, fashion, design, beauty and pop culture.  She also shares that they see that the audience for Bravo really expects a connection in social media and she uses the terms ‘tech savvy and forward leaning’ to help describe the audience.

Their goal in content generation is to provide inventive and influential content that engage the audience and that the audience then talks about it with their friends.  As a pioneer in social content, Bravo was one of the earliest brands to get involved in social media with their connection with MySpace in 2005. which Ellen points out as proof that social is really a part of their DNA at Bravo.

The partnership with MySpace was for shared content around show premiers, building & maintain buzz around a series, and promoting branded products (such as cookbook, clothing.)  Their work today includes leveraging Facebook, Twitter and a wide variety of new properties to better connect to their audience.

In the way of a true market leader, she suggests that their biggest obstacles is also a benefit too – it is that with the social environment changing so quickly, they get to / have to decide where and how they use social media to connect to their audience in ways that are helpful to the brand, have the audience talking and impact the audience with the messaging they want to get out there.  With the growth in social it hard to determine just what tools and tactics will work best early & impact-fully.

Play / Download Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks – Episode 1 Podcast Here

To get our posts as they happen, follow us on Twitter (@ROISocialMedia) or subscribe to SocialMarketingConversations.com via email or your RSS Reader.

ROI of Social Media Community Site

Guy Powell and I are avid about uncovering the ROI of marketing.  It’s work we are both passionate about and enjoy. 

To support our work in exploring the question of ROI in marketing and social media, we’re launching a community site using the Ning platform at www.ROIofSocialMedia.com where we will be posting a wide variety of content for our readers and fulfilling our commitments we made in the ROI of Social Media book to provide fresh and updated content around the question of ROI in marketing and social media.

We have set the community as open for anyone, but a membership is required to access content like the complete episodes of all the podcasts and as comprehensive a list as we can possibly generate of social media monitoring and measurement technology and tool vendors.  

Come join us and let us know what the pressing issues are in your efforts to determine an ROI in your social media presence!

Related posts:

• How to Give Consumers All They Want From Your Social Presence – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• How Innovators Takes Social Media to the Next Level – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• Strategy: The Graying of Social Networks

We start out this episode with Steve telling us just how he feels about the use of the term “virality”.  At the time EVERYthing seemed to be intent on ‘going viral’ and it was a holy grail of digital marketers to get the content to ‘go viral’.  According to Steve it’s a potential outcome of a successful initiative, but he is more interested in substantive measures and measurements that show that the brand moves more deeply into the consideration set of the consumer; Steve suggests that virality is more a function of reach or awareness.

Steve explores the concept of driving trust and reputation to a brand and shares the concept that measurements and insights are situational.  Yes, standards and best practice studies are important, but the ROI is situational relative to the client and really should tie into the drivers that already exist for the clients business.  In the era where we can measure anything, ROI is situational and particular to the client.

The aspect that pushes for delivering more valuable metrics and ROI are being driven by clients and agency.  Clients want to understand what’s working and agencies are adopting tools and tactics that deliver the goods.

Steve explains the ‘Crisis of Attention’ plaguing marketers when asked what can hinder reach in social media.  The crisis of attention is saying that human attention is finite and people will make choices and what people will select to place in their sphere is often dependant on things like –

• life stage
• interests
• personal situation

These are all factors of reach or what Steve refers to as “Surface area”.  For 2010 and beyond, marketer will need  the areas to focus are based around time -

• when
• how long
• what time of day

…and qualitatively, what the mindset the consumer is in when they receive the message. 

Mobile is an area that Edelman is driving clients to, supported by the studies released by Morgan Stanly and Gartner statement that most web content in the very near future is going to be consumed primarily on mobile devices.  For several months he’s been able to leave his laptop at home and work almost exclusively on a smart phone and he has some really powerful insight on what’s important when it comes to mobile – in a few words, less serendipity and more focus on the brevity of the message, an aspect that will help social grow even more.

For measurement tools, Steve makes a shout out to Radian6, Sysomos and Trendrr but predicts that before long it is likely that Google will move to make similar information more available for possibly even a lower price. 

As we wrap up, Steve suggests a consumers backlash in 2011 that will drive an enhanced need for managing their personal data that marketers have access to.

Play / Download Steve Rubel / Edelman Digital Episode 2 Podcast Here

He is available at steve.rubel@edelman.com, on Twitter as @SteveRubel and as a life streamer at SteveRubel.com.

This is the final episode of the two part podcast with Steve Rubel.  Guy Powell, Jerry Dimos and I want to thank him; we appreciate her perspective and taking the time to share it with us in our podcast interview!

Usually, we’ve been posting links here to the entire episode and the transcript of the podcast.  Starting next week we are opening a community site relating to the book (today it is at www.TheROIofSocialMedia.com) and the exploration of ROI in Social Media – you’ll find the content being posted there in the near future.  We’re very interested in your perspective on the topic and, if you have a great interview who can add to the conversation, please let us know – we’re looking to interview them and put it up here!

Thank you again to you our listeners – hope you enjoyed the effort and work we put into it!

The Podcast and Credit For Where Credit is Due – This podcast / transcript was developed from a live recorded interview on January 18, 2010 between Steve Rubel, SVP for Edelman Digital and Director of Insights for Edelman, Guy Powell and Steven Groves. 

The podcast interview was downloaded and processes in Audacity, which is available from SourceForge.net, and with ‘4toFloor.wav’ music loop from member ‘Rooks’ and posted at SoundSnap.com.

The transcripts are sponsored by Social Marketing Conversations and the introduction Voice Talent is Ms. Cynthia Propst.

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Amazon now has the “ROI of Social Media: How to Improve the Return on Your Social Marketing Investment” (affiliate link) in it’s listing with these particulars –

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (March 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470827416
• ISBN-13: 978-0470827413
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches

Very stoked and very excited!

The journey to this point has been a roller coaster, some events that are very pleasing and others that were somewhat stressful – but this is a great milestone and one i am more than happy to share with you all.

Thanks to all the people who made this possible, but especially my co-authors Guy Powell in Atlanta and Jerry Dimos in Singapore – it’s great working with you guys!

Back to work on implementing the models and ideas we’ve covered in the book!

Related posts:

• The Death of Social Media – Long Live Media That is Social!
• The Evolution of Social Media; Are We Doing It Right?!
• The Social Media Bible is Open for Pre-order Now!

He was kind enough to spend some time with us as we kicked off the podcasting series back in January, but the content got misplaced and recently was found as I had to rebuild my system from a crash – so I’m tardy in posting, but nonetheless Steve’s comments and his insights are timeless so we’re very happy to bring you this episode in our podcasts with industry executives and innovators – this is episode #53 actually!

We open the discussion asking Steve about how Edelman handles the  question of ROI for their clients.  He tells us that while he is not directly assigned to accounts, he helps connect digital programs to public relations and shares and example in the work they did for Ben & Jerry’s when they introduced a flavor called ‘Flip’.  The ROI for the client in that case was an increase in awareness of the product and how it drove engagement with the audience, demonstrated by a buzz in the social ecosphere and in blogs.

Steve suggests that there is a natural synergy between PR and social media and with digital media being much more measureable.  He shares some of the measures they use, which include -

• reach
• engagement
• reputation
• sentiment

…and for some clients -

• trust

The basis of the measures are really rooted in the traditional metrics they’ve used for PR and then adopting it to the resources they can bring to bear.  Steve suggests that social and digital are much easier to measure than traditional.

The model is that that every campaign has an agenda and the campaign kicks off with some kind of outcome in mind.  Edelman tailor the outcome to the business objectives of the client and then employs various tools that help measure the outcome and how well it meets the clients stated business goal.

The change in measurement reflect the change in the audience.  More and more people are getting involved in social media and the ability to breakout social from traditional media elements is getting harder, Steve suggests that all media is social, all social is media and that the trend line suggests that more people are consuming media through digital channels than traditional, with the notable exception of television. 

In 10 years, Steve predicts that all tangible forms of media will be gone and people will engage in digital almost exclusively.  his observation is that social is more addressable than anything previously and that the measurement will become more powerful and sophisticated.  The real questions we’re trying to address are what is needed, how do we use them and what are the standards that can be applied that are common from brand to brand, media type to media type and venue to venue – the best practices are emerging.

Play / Download Steve Rubel / Edelman – Episode 1 Podcast Here

To get our posts as they happen, follow us on Twitter (@ROISocialMedia) or subscribe to SocialMarketingConversations.com via email or your RSS Reader.

To support the work in uncovering the ROI question in social media, we’ve set up a Fan Page at Facebook, and a LinkedIn Group.  Come join us and let us know what the pressing issues are in your efforts to determine an ROI in your social media presence!

Related posts:

• Social Media Here, Social Media there, Social Media Everywhere!
• Logo icon for the ROI of Social Media
• The Death of Social Media – Long Live Media That is Social!

• My laptop died, had to get a new one and rebuild it
• I was uprooted / moved from one home / office to one in Central Phoenix (BIG transition there, still settling in)
• My 18 year old son moved in
• Took a business trip to Malaysia with Guy Powell & Jerry Dimos, my co-authors on the ROI of Social Media – able to talk to several new and prospective clients
• Opened files for several new / prospective clients here in Arizona – thanks to some word-of-mouth referrals made by some dear friends
• Lastly, and possibly most impactful was I went through a hugely disruptive spat of news regarding my dearly loved twin sister Stephanie and the potential diagnosis of her developing a brain tumor; a second opinion says she doesn’t have one and we’re all praying that that becomes a non-incident.

…and you get the idea.  No apologies, life has continued to happen and my media creation has lagged.

I am also way down on my media consumption; I usually read / review several hundred blog posts a day; not for several weeks have I been able to open a Google Reader that did not belong to a client project.  I always share what I like that I find and you can subscribe to my shared items here – I call it the ‘Best of The Best Feed’.

On the good side – there is a HUGE backlog of content on my computer that should start moving to the web here soon.  Podcasts from companies using social media with good effect, videos of the authors of the ROI of Social Media and a new community site for the book which should be coming up any day now. 

The ROI of Social Media community site is nearing a soft launch (click here to subscribe to this blog feed from Feedburner – you’ll get notice when it opens) – The community site will be a place where we’ll concentrate content from the book and invite people into a dialog focused on the models we present in the book for measuring and managing media.  It will be a place where we all can exchange ideas, improve the case studies and we can fulfill the promises for online content we made in the book – one of the elements we present is a model for evaluating measurement and monitoring tool and we promised to provide an online crowd-sourced director of tools.  We’ve seen some really good directories on this topic so far, referencing what we all know will be a part of the community function.

In any case, I’m feeling a bit more balance coming back into my efforts so the content should start back up.  Thank you to everyone who has supported me in these efforts over the last few months, especially Cynthia, who is my girlfriend, best friend and who has been the ‘wind beneath my wings’, supporting me in just amazing ways.

Look for more content soon!  Good to be back!

Related posts:

• Launching theSocialMediaBible.com
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• Remembering Steven Groves II

Michael is the Director and General Manager for the Global Small and Medium Online Business at Dell, and is responsible for the overall online business and strategy for Dell SMB worldwide.  When he spoke with us from his offices in Stuttgart Germany, Guy Powell and I were able to find out a great deal about how Dell manages and measures their social marketing and their online presence.

In our first episode, we learned about the Four Pillars of the online marketing strategy they employ and in episode 2 we heard about the five Customer Value Drivers and the five key metrics they apply to measure the success of their online efforts.  In our last episode, Michael shared how Dell works hard to present a broad offering of online communities and communications options to support the B2B and B2C initiatives and to give customers a chance to have their voices heard and to drive the innovations in products and services they want to invest in from Dell.

In this episode, we wrap up the conversation with Michael with him sharing how Dell is absolutely committed to social media as a fundamental tactic because they see success in it and they see how well the customer base responds to it.  He also points out that the massive increase in social engagements in other geographies, away from North America, to other regions that including Brazil, Russia, India and elsewhere.

A second area of focus for Dell is an increased effort on Search; Michael suggests that search is where customers are looking for information and they expect to increase and improve their presence in search engine marketing (SEM) and as for a business like Dell, you should ‘fish where the fish are’ with paid advertising in the search engines.

The next key element he suggests will be businesses targeting market influencers.  Influencers can expand your exposure and credibility in social media and influencers provide a multiplier effect to your efforts – he sees Dell and other companies beginning to target those influencers with a more consistent and focused effort.

The fourth element he shares is an encouragement for businesses to development an engagement ecosystem of online and offline media assets that present a cohesive and consistent message for customers so that the marketing message carries between them seamlessly.

Next is the topic of mobile computing and this is getting to be a red hot space for businesses wanting to adopt social media.  Mobile is a big area for deployment of social media, particularly in light of the migration of social activity to other geographic areas that will have different connectivity models, one where mobile devices will be the dominate access tactic.

He restates that ‘Marketing is the New Finance’ and businesses wanting to improve revenues and reduce costs need to look to more efficient marketing to do so, but not without some metrics and measurement.  As social becomes a bigger part of the marketing mix, businesses need to understand how to engage and further to grasp the idea that a social campaign is not as streamlined as traditional marketing campaign.  Social media is still a bit of a jungle and businesses need to be prepared to handle a few mistakes along the way.

Lastly, and possibly most important is that Michael makes it clear that social media is not a gimmick for him and the team at Dell – it is a way of working and a way for we, as humans to interact with one another more and to deliver a higher degree of service to customers.  He suggests that if a company understands that, they can excel in their respective marketing effort, but social needs to becomes a part of the culture and not just a shtick or PR stunt – those efforts are a sure way to get your brand called out or worse, ignored.

Play / Download Michael Buck / Dell Episode 4 Podcast Here

You can find and connect with Michael at Michael_Buck@Dell.com, or via Linkedin, or on Twitter as @WorkingForDell

Here are links to material related to the interview that you may find useful; the entire conversation in one extended recording and a transcript of the conversation

Play / Download Michael Buck / Dell SMB Entire Interview Podcast Here

Read / view the Michael Buck / Dell SMB Podcast Transcript at Scribd.com

We’re very interested in your perspective on the topic and, if you have a great interview who can add to the conversation, please let us know – we’re looking to interview them and put it up here!

Thank you again to you our listeners – hope you enjoyed the effort and work we put into it!

The Podcast and Credit For Where Credit is Due – This podcast / transcript was developed from a live recorded interview on April 13th, 2010 between Michael Buck, Director and General Manager for the Global Small and Medium Online Business at Dell, Guy Powell and Steven Groves.   The interview was arranged via Jerry Dimos.

The podcast interview was downloaded and processes in Audacity, which is available from SourceForge.net, and with ‘4toFloor.wav’ music loop from member ‘Rooks’ and posted at SoundSnap.com.

The transcripts are sponsored by Social Marketing Conversations and the introduction Voice Talent is Ms. Cynthia Propst.

Related posts:

• How Dell SMB Supports Customers in Diving Deep in Social Media
• How Dell Does Online Media – The Four Pillars
• What the 5 Customer Value Drivers and Top 5 Metrics are for the Dell SMB Social Presence