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08
Dec
11

Facebook buys Gowalla, Can we Declare Foursquare the Winner?

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment
Categories: Advertising, Business Strategies, Facebook, Gowalla, Marketing, Social Media and Uncategorized
Tags: , ,

Facebook purchased the location-based social media service (LBS) Gowalla. This is the latest acquisition by Facebook pre 2012 IPO. Interestingly enough, when Facebook acquires a company, it acquires the leadership, developers and talent instead of keeping just the product.

From the Gowalla Co-Founder Josh Williams, “Gowalla, as a service, will be winding down at the end of January. We plan to provide an easy way to export your Passport data, your Stamp and Pin data (along with your legacy Item data), and your photos as well.”

As with many of the strategic moves from Facebook, there are privacy concerns. In this case, Facebook now owns all the pictures, check-ins and connections entered by users of Gowalla. Early rumors have the Gowalla team working on the new Facebook profile, Timeline. Gowalla’s team and data would add a robust component to the Timeline, but will Facebook risk the inevitable complaints of privacy exploitation?

So, in the world of location-based social media, Foursquare is left standing. In 2009, Gowalla and Foursquare launched in the same week as rival location service apps. Both apps provided a method for people to announce their whereabouts by using their smartphones to “check-in” at real-world locations, such as Starbucks. In 2010, Facebook launched Places as an alternative LBS. Places has received luke-warm acceptance, it is not a huge leap to assume the acquired leadership from Gowalla will be able to improve the user experience of Facebook Places.

In the meantime, Foursquare has a window of opportunity prior to Gowalla/Places integration to capitalize on reduced competition and own the LBS marketplace.  Foursquare should take our advice and use these ways to improve the service.

Let us know if you think Foursquare will seize the day or if Facebook Places with the infusion of Gowalla talent will overwhelm the LBS market. Share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

 

07
Dec
11

Facebook Revolutionizes Profiles with Timeline

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment
Categories: Advertising, Facebook, Flipboard, Marketing, Social Media and Uncategorized
Tags: , ,

One of the often-overlooked parts of Facebook has been the profile, with a combination of privacy concerns as well as Facebook automatic like and app postings apps to the profile.  However, prior to the 2012 IPO Facebook keeps rolling out improvements as well as value added applications to the service. The latest in beta testing is called Timeline. Timing of full release is unknown to due a legal dispute with timelines.com.

This redefining of the personal profile is a significant change. Facebook knows a lot about us. It knows about the crazy party, the time we went on vacation and when we met specific friends. This is the primary source of Facebook power; it is the online service with the most personal data about our lives. Timeline is the vehicle where a user can harness that power.

In another Facebook surprise, Timeline allows users to control what is displayed. (Three cheers for user control over Facebook content!)

  • Certain stories can be promoted, they will grab more real estate on the profile. You are not tied to chronological order.
  • Stories and posts can easily be deleted from the Timeline.
  • If anything is missing, it is easy to add ‘life events’ to the Timeline. The more info you put into the Timeline, the more robust it becomes.
  • It is easy to selectively edit the postings that will shape the view of people going forward.

In the past, I’ve written about my favorite iPad app, Flipboard. It appears that the Facebook team has taken the best of Flipboard to create Timeline. Instead of a random scrapbook, Timeline presents our online life as a high-end photo album.

Tell us what you think of Facebook grouping information to tell the story of our lives. Is Timeline a new, exciting way to detail history or is it a creepy way to reveal everything you’ve done in a potentially unnerving way? One thing for sure, anytime Facebook makes a change there will be a cry over privacy concerns.

Share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

23
Nov
11

Social Media Education – It’s Elementary

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment
Categories: Advertising, Communications, Facebook, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

I recently participated in a symposium and one of the topics was the basics of social media, hosted by my colleague Heather Horsey. I was surprised at some of the questions:

  • How do I get a hashtag? How much does it cost? How often can I use it?
  • When I set-up our company Facebook page profile, everything the company does is updating on my personal wall and to my personal email, how can I delete that?
  • Our company doesn’t want negative comments, is there anyway to choose the comments we want to post on Facebook?
  • When I was tweeting on the Twitter, I didn’t see any results. How can you make sales on the Twitter if nobody is interested?

The intent behind the questions were genuine, but I quickly came to the realization that there is a massive education effort needed regarding social media in business. If we can assume that social media is now an essential function of any business, executives will treat it as a discipline that they must understand.

This will lead to educational opportunities, as companies cannot make strategic decisions without understanding social media. Executives will see social media as function that cannot be ignored. Companies will begin building internal social media teams and it will cross multiple business functions from customer service to employee recruiting.  Any company not fluent in the language of social media will be at a significant disadvantage.

This is an opportunity for the marketing department to step up, take a leadership role in social media education and enhance its value to the entire organization.

Hopefully, we’ll never hear anybody ask about ‘tweeting on the twitter’ again.

Let us know if you think social media education will even extend to the C-suite, even if they never post, tweet or check-in. Share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

16
Nov
11

Four Ways to Improve Foursquare

By Mark Plumb 2 Comments
Categories: Advertising, Communications, Foursquare, Location Based Social Media, location data, Marketing, Social Media and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

Foursquare, the location-based social media service, has implemented two significant improvements to the service. They have integrated with Groupon to identify when a discounted offer is available for a specific location. Also, they have made home addresses private, which will hopefully mean fewer sites like ‘Please Rob Me’ mocking social media over sharing and identifying when you are not at home.

In the spirit of helping make the service better, here are four ways that Foursquare can become a better social media experience for users, businesses and opportunity for marketers:

  1. The establishment/location should be alerted that a user has checked in. Whether the store manager gets a text message or there is access to a group Twitter account, someone at the location should know when a Foursquare user has checked into their establishment. There is one location that I have been the mayor for more than six months and visited for 28 straight weeks with at least one check in per week. So far, ZERO acknowledgement from management.  The marketer in me wants them to know I am loyal and in return they should consider providing some recognition that will encourage me to spread news by word of mouth or social media. I know this will not be popular with all establishments, as I have heard from retailers that they do not want to ‘pay’ Foursquare to recognize someone that has already entered their store.
  2. The leaderboard and points are irrelevant – connect them to something of worth or simply eliminate them. This is the portion of Foursquare that feels like a frequent flyer program as I accumulate points with every check-in; but there is no cashing in my points for a romantic getaway to Napa Valley. In fact, the most often question I am asked by a non-foursquare adopter is, “A 5 point check-in? What did that get you?” I would be in favor of a donating my points to a charity and that charity can redeem the points for a monetary donation. But, for that to happen, the points need to mean something.
  3. Create another layer of recognition besides mayor. Foursquare has designated the person with the most check-ins over a rolling two-month period as the mayor. Since many locations are offering specials and discounts to the person holding the mayorship, it can be desirable to be the mayor. However, there are many valuable, loyal customers that cannot breakthrough to become mayor of a location. For today’s purpose, let’s call them a patron. Establishments should consider a loyalty bonus for a patron based on repeat visits over a short period. The offer can be less than the mayor’s offer to encourage a patron to strive to mayorship and still recognize the patron for being a valued customer.
  4. Enrich the experience at events. On Nov. 17, I am attending the Thursday night NFL game between the New York Jets and the Denver Broncos. Wouldn’t it be great to have a video highlight from the game broadcast for someone viewing my check in? You know, actually sharing information. This summer, I attended the Peter Gabriel concert at Red Rocks. When I checked into the event it would have been great to have a live video link for others to share the experience, a connection to his Facebook or My Space page or at least a link to iTunes to allow someone to purchase music. This is also an opportunity for ‘Swarming,’ Foursquare’s moniker for a location with a lot of concurrent check-ins. The idea is: everybody is here, you should be too! However, if I am engaged at a great networking event or an awesome happy hour, I am way too busy to check-in. How swarming can someplace be if you are stopping to tell everybody about it? There should be an automatic check in Foursquare pre-set option. For example, if my phone is at a place for 20 minutes with 200 other Foursquare users, it automatically checks me in – and you’ll know it’s really swarming.

We are convinced that location-based social media can be a powerful marketing tool. Many of our franchise clients would benefit greatly from a robust location-based program, but only if they can see a spike in repeat visitors.

Have you had good experiences with Foursquare? Want to add to this list, share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

14
Oct
11

Next Trend in Social Media – Editing Social History

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment
Categories: Communications, Facebook, Quora, SMM, Social Media, Social Networking, trends, Twitter and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

Someone tags you in an unflattering picture on Facebook, you are incensed about something and you tweet a response, you answer a question on Quora without a critical piece of information, wouldn’t be great if there was a social media EDIT button?

Whether it is potentially personally embarrassing or taking an action to protect yourself from an employer, we expect to see a service in the near future for people who want to selectively edit their social history. A Silicon Valley smartie is undoubtedly working on a tool to delete photos from other people accounts, an automatic clean up of your Facebook wall and other actions to sanitize your social history.

With the controversy over Mark Zuckerberg and questionable privacy policies, we believe there will be a fundamental shift from hiding information to cleansing information. The interest in electronic brainwashing will increase and will have impact and influence for the foreseeable future.

For example, what politician would like that picture from the long, lost college days deleted from view and access well before they make the run for political office.  Wouldn’t President Obama like to have the famous picture of him smoking (right) when he was in college stricken from the public record.

In a world where perception is reality, former Iowa State head basketball coach Larry Eustachy lost his job over pictures (left) that surfaced about him drinking beer (well, Natural Light) with underage college coeds.  Some might argue that the choice of “Natty Lite” is the greater offense. Wouldn’t he like a social media cleanser?

According to the survey by Marist College in New York, half of all users on Facebook and Twitter polled say that verbal or photographic miscues lead them to believe social media does more harm than good.  We’re fairly confident that former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner agrees.

Let us know what you think will happen when someone from the ‘Millennial Generation’ runs for President. Without selectively editing social media history what do you think will happen to every tweet, Facebook status or blog post they ever wrote? Share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

29
Sep
11

Franchise Healthy: Mascot Out, Guacamole In

By Tracy Weise Leave a Comment
Categories: Advertising, Franchise, Franchising, Health and Wellness, Marketing, Marketing Trends and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , ,

Burger King Retires their King Mascot in Favor of a Fresher Menu

In the past several years, Quick Serve Restaurants (QSR) have starting implementing healthier menus to reach a larger demographic of customers.  This new craze has helped many restaurants increase sales and use new marketing and advertising campaigns to draw in a previously untapped audience of healthier consumers.

The Burger King franchise recently (finally) decided to jump on the healthy trend.  Burger King, the home of the Whooper, is attempting to re-brand the system by adding a fresher approach in their fast-food menu which began with the success of the new Whopper Bars.  The Whopper Bar is a concept designed to create a more “gourmet” atmosphere for “Whopper Connoisseurs.”  With an open kitchen concept and the “create your own Whopper” menu, Burger King was aiming to reach new markets and satisfy new types of customers.  Due to the success of the Whopper bars, Burger Kings is dethroning the King mascot in favor of a fresher approach to advertising that reflects the new menu.

Freshness and healthy meals are some of the most important categories that are increasingly emphasized in the fast food world.  Competitors of Burger King began this new approach a while ago. McDonalds’s started the trend with healthy alternatives such as oatmeal, sliced apples, and salads. Subway also launched its new avocado topping and even the Cheesecake Factory has their new skinnyliciouse menu (can you use the words skinny and cheesecake in the same sentence???). Guacamole, oatmeal, and other healthy foods have proven to be very appealing to mothers and health-enthusiasts, which could be an untapped for Burger King.

Below is Burger King’s new TV spot. Its refreshing in so many ways, most notably because its not a Peeping Tom wearing a crown.

Burger King might be a little late catching up with the new changing food trends, however this new strategy will most likely prove to bring a wider consumer market into the historically  successful Burger King franchise system. According to an AdAge article, a survey by YouGov’s BrandIndex among people who had visited fast-food restaurants in the hamburger category in the last month — the same time that Burger King launched the campaign for the California Whopper — their perception of Burger King had gone from a 24.2 before the ad aired to a 34.3 just two days after the launch of the spot. (YouGov BrandIndex’s scores range from -100 to 100 and are compiled by subtracting negative feedback from positive.)

Have you seen other industry trends that companies should jump in to increase market share & revenue? Tell us about it here or visit our Facebook page.

20
Sep
11

Top Ten Things We Learned at SHSMD2011

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment
Categories: Business Strategies, Communications, Facebook, Health and Wellness, Health care marketing, healthcare, healthcare marketing, Healthcare reform, Marketing, Marketing Trends, Public Relations, SHSMD, Social Media and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Attendees of SHSMD2011 are all dealing with re-entry work, attempting to sync their Poken and evaluating to-do lists based on the SHSMD conference. While everyone will have their personal take-aways, Jay Weise and I developed a top ten list of things we heard and learned in Phoenix.

1. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act includes provisions about IRS oversight of requirements that nonprofit healthcare providers must meet in order to maintain their tax-exempt status. Nonprofit organizations are seeking assistance to track community benefit programs and keep it in a format approved by the IRS. This is an opportunity for the right company.

2. HCAHPS (Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems) is a national survey that asks patients about their experiences during a recent hospital stay.  When will the general public adopt HCAHPS as criteria they use to select a hospital? Unfortunately, there is a lot of focus by hospital administration on these scores, but no evidence that a patient is using it in the hospital selection process.

3. The new buzzword, ‘Patient Experience’ Not patient-centered, not patient-centric, not patient-focused…Patient Experience.  This is intended to represent the totality of the interactions and perceptions of interactions between the patient and the health care facility. Patients with a more favorable experience are more likely to adhere to treatment protocol, have a positive outcome and provide favorable recommendations to others.

4. A big question from the conference: is government mandated health care constitutional? When will a ruling that provides certainty occur? How much legislative change will occur to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act prior to the large provisions taking effect in 2014?

5. From Michael Sachs’ keynote presentation on Friday, Constitutionality ruling on healthcare reform will not affect the macro trends in the healthcare industry.

6. Hospitals are waiting for someone to figure out a strategy for Accredited Care Organizations (ACO’s) before they adopt it. Right now there is too much uncertainty and confusion. ACO’s are too far away from current Key Performance Indicators.

7. From Jeff Bauer’s keynote presentation on Saturday, “By 2020, there will be more people living in the United States under 18 that were born outside the U.S. than were born inside the U.S.” The impact on medical treatments will be far-reaching. For example, men of Korean descent do not have the genetic enzyme to process the anti-depression drug, serotonin. How will this effect care, drug protocols, pharmaceutical company focus and online information?

8. Marketing strategist in healthcare organizations are the only people in the organization that can bring the customers point of view to strategy. Hospital Administrators are counting on the marketing strategist voice. Marketers need to speak up.

9. Healthcare marketers must consider the system of care is not inside the hospital walls, it is outside of it. Healthcare marketing strategists must take the leadership position and consider all entry points including: the website, community events, referral lines, physician offices, etc.

10. Integration across multiple platforms of data and across functional areas within a medical facility must occur to provide value to patients. The cost-efficiencies will be mandated in health care reform and are essential in a competitive environment.

Maybe we should have called this a top fourteen list because we have to include some of our favorite quotes:

“Patients fear rude doctors and nurses more than death.” – Colleen Sweeney, Director of Innovation, Ambassador, and Customer Services,
Memorial Health System, South Bend, IN

“HIPAA is the mullet of patient safety, your data is not as protected as you think.” – David McDonald, CEO, True North Custom Media, Chattanooga, TN

“Be realistic when setting Facebook goals for any hospital. Who really wants to LIKE a hospital?” – Dean Browell, Executive Vice President, Feedback, Richmond, VA

“The FDA has rejected many new cancer drugs because they were tested on the wrong kinds of cancer.” – Jeffrey C. (Jeff) Bauer, Ph.D. Health Futurist and Medical Economist, Chicago, IL

Want to find out more about what we learned at SHSMD 2011? Give us a call. Want to add to this list, share your thoughts here or on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

12
Aug
11

Three ways to drive traffic to your publication, using Facebook

By Heather Horsey Leave a Comment
Categories: Uncategorized

Please welcome back guest blogger, healthcare communications professional Rachel Brand in her second of three guest blog posts on health care public relations.

Facebook wall, meet traditional media. Print and electronic publications, meet Facebook. How can you two create something wonderful?  Read on…

1) Tease a question on Facebook, reveal the answer in editorial.

Credit this tip is to the Association of periOperative Registered Nurses (AORN). One day before publishing its e-news, AORNs quizzes fans, revealing answers in the e-newsletter.

This AORN post generated 20 responses:

“Question of the Week: ‘Why do we remove cosmetics before the preoperative skin prep?’ Be sure to comment with your answer below, even if someone else posted what you were going to say. Check out the answer in tomorrow’s Periop Insider e-mail :) ”

2) Continue the story.

New York Times reporters often provide Facebook epilogues to their print stories, especially those that generated a big response. When you do, you’ll want to link to the previous story. See Nicholas Kristof’s page:

“Six weeks ago I wrote about a 10-year-old Indian girl, M., who was in great danger of being sold to a brothel: http://nyti.ms/qg5nyk. Today I just got great news: the family has returned M. to the New Light Shelter in Kolkata and she’ll be returning to school! Thanks to readers for all your concern about M.”

3) Let readers shape the story. 

Interviewing an expert? Attending a conference and planning to cover it? Before, ask readers on Facebook what questions they would like answered. Their questions may surprise you. You’ll publish the answers on Facebook too.

What do you think about these three techniques to increase traffic using Facebook? Do you have other tactics that have increased traffic to your site? Share with us here on TheSideNoteBlog.com or @ message Weise Communications on Twitter @Weise_Ideas.

Rachel Brand is a healthcare communications professional who can teach writing over brown bag lunches at your company. Contact her at rachel (at) brandcommunicationsllc.com.

11
Aug
11

Top 5 Tips: Franchising in Health Care Conference

By Tracy Weise Leave a Comment
Categories: Uncategorized

The inaugural Franchising in Health Care Conference was held at the law offices of Faegre & Benson in Minneapolis. The purpose of the conference was to bring together franchisors and perspective franchisors in the health care industry to discuss challenges, opportunities and best practices associated with the legal, marketing, technology and service sides of both franchising and health care.

What follows is a list of our top take-aways from the conference.

  1. Franchising succeeds because of the ability to replicate a brand experience in a measurable way, but health care is a service-oriented industry. This juxtaposition is what makes franchising in health care a challenge, but also means great success for those who can consistency in the delivery of health care services.
  2. Second only to food, health and wellness is the fastest growing franchise sector. While this means competition is coming, the market is far from saturated and there is great opportunity to create brand awareness and become an industry leader with a replicable service model.
  3. The growth of franchise models will, without a doubt, have a significant impact on the delivery of health care services in the U.S.
  4. Primary health care practices that may be losing money can become profitable through the shared services in a franchise system. As the acceptance grows, physicians are likely to turn to these business opportunities to provide their services.
  5. The perception of franchised medical services is evolving as communities embrace the cost effectiveness and delivery efficiency of franchise systems.
  6. Layering the legal issues of franchising on top of the legal issues of health care can create management nightmares if the programs and services of both the franchisor and franchisee are not established properly before the sale of the first franchise.

Do you have great take-ways from the conference we missed? Share them here.

Minneapolis, MN.

If you missed the inaugural conference, do not worry. The second Franchising in Health Care Conference is preliminarily scheduled for Fall 2012 in Denver, Colo. If you are interested in receiving additional information, please let us know or visit the office blog at http://www.franchisinghealthcare.com

11
Aug
11

Is Google+ Creating a New Type of SEO?

By Mark Plumb 2 Comments
Categories: Advertising, Google, Google Plus, Marketing, Search engine, SEO, Social Media and Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

As Google+ keeps growing, many people are wondering, what will the new ‘+1’ feature do for SEO?” Will Google searches give a search advantage to sites that have been “+1?”

We believe Google+ is essentially going to put a different spin on searching.  The +1 button is similar to Facebook’s “like” button.  However, Google is taking it one step further.  If your friends and family recommend content with the +1 button, this content is going to become more relevant in your searches. SEO Scheduler discussed what Google insiders said about this new +1 feature:

“Content recommended by friends and acquaintances is often more relevant than content from strangers. For example, a movie review from an expert is useful, but a movie review from a friend who shares your tastes can be even better. Because of this, +1’s from friends and contacts can be a useful signal to Google when determining the relevance of your page to a user’s query. This is just one of many signals Google may use to determine a page’s relevance and ranking, and we’re constantly tweaking and improving our algorithm to improve overall search quality. For +1′s, as with any new ranking signal, we’ll be starting carefully and learning how those signals affect search quality.”

Essentially Google+ is turning SEO into SER, Search Engine Relevance.  And the relevance part is if people you know “like” certain content. The ability for this to change the way you get content from searches is going to be a slow process, so no need to worry just yet.  First of all, you must be signed into Google+ for this to have any affect on the content Google gives you.  Also, until you build your Google+ circles and recommending content reach critical mass, the social search feature isn’t going to have much impact.

Another thing to be aware of is that Google has not yet set up profiles for businesses.  You may notice that in order to get information from a business on Google+ page, it must be from a specific person, not the business.  For marketers, once business profiles are implemented, jump on the bandwagon ASAP.  This will definitely improve SEO and allow a business to utilize “relevance searching” to your advantage.

Our best advice today is to be keenly aware of Google+. Start by implementing +1 buttons on websites to get better page rankings. However, there is no need to immediately change the way you create SEO. Our prediction is that social searching could be HUGE in the near future!

Props to Natalie Kleopfer for her research and contributions to this story.

Let us know if you have started implementing +1 buttons and if you are using Google+. Share your thoughts on the impact of Google+ with us on Facebook at Weise Communications and follow us on Twitter at @Weise_Ideas.

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