Wednesday Webinars: Learn How to Sponge

Are you curious about what Spongecell can do for you?

Whether you’re a new Spongecell user, or already sponging and want to learn how to use it more efficiently, the webinar is the perfect opportunity.

We will review everything you can do with Add to Life technology , and you can throw out any questions, suggestions, feedback. Even if you don’t have any specific questions, listen in, and pick up some tips from other users.

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How’s Your Company’s Email Karma?

 

“As we progressively move to less and less personal forms of communications — from handwritten letter, to targeted direct mail appeal, to email blast –we gain reach and increased ROI, but face the danger of disengaging from our customers.” -MediaPost

One of the inherent challenges facing company emails, is the risk of being categorized as just another annoying spam. Research and common sense tell us that consumers want to be treated as people, not as data to be passed around from company to company, overused and abused.

“They (consumers) reward marketers with a track record of providing valuable and useful emails in the past, and ignore emails that didn’t, even when they recognize the brand and email sender.”-MediaPost

So where does that leave a business’s need to increase the reach of their emails? It’s hard to believe companies selling each other email lists is a valid, long term business model. And once again, common sense and research are telling us this model is going to be less and less viable as time goes on.

In a perfect world, a company would build their email list only with consumers that have shown a proven interest. The emails that get delivered would be interesting, wanted and relevant to recipients. And in turn, the people receiving your company’s email are receptive and willing to spread the message. How’s that for good email Karma?

Marketing Trends 2008

“With the cost of production and distribution of digital content rapidly approaching zero, including distribution to the television platform, the opportunity to create branded micro-content that consumers will invite into their lives becomes a financial reality with a huge ROI upside; it’s advertising that people want to watch. This should be the single biggest trend to catch fire in 2008. “- Tom Martin, Top Power 150 blogs ‘Positive Disruption’

AdAge asked the Power 150 bloggers about the marketing technology to pay close attention to in 2008. Not to our surprise, digital content approaching zero (that’s us!) is one of the top trends pushing marketing technology into more than just the hands of the rich and powerful. Acclimating to this new ‘free’ digital climate, begins with understanding that everyone has a newfound platform to do their own personal marketing ; from blogs and websites, to Facebook or Myspace .

We recognize the power to spread your message in this new digital climate, and we provide a way to get your word out in a more effective and efficient way than ever in the past. Whether you’re a PTO organization, sports team, non-profit, restaurant promoting a half priced wine night, or just an individual with a lot to say, Spongecell can help you deliver the message. We’re here to put the right tools in your hands to communicate your passion. And no, there’s no catch. It’s totally free.

Competition Motivates Participation: Let’s Rumble

We love when our users integrate our technology in new & creative ways, and who doesn’t love a little competition?

Punkvsmetal.blogspot is challenging Punk and Metal fans to get the word out about their favorite Punk/Metal bands, via Spongecell list widgets. The most popular bands will not only get their concert dates/locations posted on the list widget, but they also get a customized event page all about their show. “Seems like the Metal side is kicking Punk ass all over the place these days!” Sounds like a challenge! Cast your vote here, and maybe throw together a battle of your own. The list widget spreads the word about your events, whether concerts, sports games, church groups, school functions, artshows.. and a little competition motivates participation.

Land of the Free

The Land of the Free

At Spongecell we have never been more excited about the concept of Free than ever before.  When we started the company we agreed that we always would have a component of our platform that would be free.  We’ve experimented with various incarnations of the Freemium model and are psyched to enter into the next phase of our existence by opening up our entire publishing and reporting toolset to all of our publishers, for free.  Whether they want to publish event data to their audience or let their consumers syndicate that content into their social network of choice, our job is to make that experience as seamless as possible.

As more and more people enter the digital world, web based platforms have an incredible opportunity to maximize their reach by removing as many obstacles to usage as possible.  That can be accomplished by various means: such as creating a great user experience, offering a product with tremendous utility or by offering a free product.  We want to continue to offer our products for free so all of our publishers, large and small, can experience our platform on their own.  This allows the community groups, small businesses, religious organizations , and political groups to continue to use Spongecell to publish their event content across the web through our widgets and custom event pages.  In addition, when global media companies, professional nightlife promoters and multi-national musicians want to continue to customize our technology to specifically fit their needs they can still do this with our platform and/or our web services, but hopefully will have gotten a much better taste of what it means to use Spongecell by the time they make their usage decision.

For all the hype Chris Anderson’s Wired article on Free received (and believe me, we are feeding that hype machine as well!) we really dug this comprehensive trend briefing from Trendwatching.  We grow as our publishers grow, and the more publishers who are using Spongecell to distribute their event content across the web, email and mobile, the more attention our network gets and the more relevant our pages and widgets become.  I thought the guys from Newsgator summed it up well in their own posting on their move to free, “…we want to collect “attention” data …and use it to make everyone’s experience better…and if there are a lot of people doing this, it’s probably a good indicator about the “relevancy” of that content for other users. Basically, by using your data, in combination with aggregate data from other users, we can deliver a better experience for everyone. And that’s a good thing – both for us and for you.”

Soaking up..Part 2

Don’t ask how I ended up on the Illinois News-Gazette, but sounds like educator Elizabeth Perrachione in the Champaign school district could use some Sponging.

“Perrachione would like to see several hundred people at each forum, and people from all areas of the community. The district is advertising the forum through fliers in English and Spanish, posted at the schools and sent home with students, through radio spots and on school e-mail lists…”

An interactive calendar and list widget would spread word about the forum by giving Perrachione the ability to send email blasts; targeting those people with a proven interest in attending the forum. Following up with future forums becomes much easier with all the information about who bothered to tell a friend via text or email, set a reminder, or added it to their Facebook page..

It’s a great way for educators to keep parents informed about school functions, from forums to school events, plays, potlucks, and even parent-teacher conferences. If educators have the right tools for communicating with the school and larger community, the sky is the limit in being able to mobilize parents and students to participate more in their community; and ultimately, help kids succeed.

Soaking up the marketing opportunities..

For the past couple weeks, I’ve been inundated with ideas about how to help people get their word out using interactive tools. So this week, I’m going to calm my frantic brainstorming and showcase for all our readers some interactive marketing opportunities in current events..

On Sunday, the Times described the growing field of ‘Citizen journalism’, where community members report news firsthand and in real time. It’s pretty exciting to think about the potential number of “citizen journalists”, as it really could be anyone and has the clout to revolutionize an urban niche in reporting.

The Knight Foundation in Miami is donating $25 million over five years “for innovative ideas using digital experiments to transform community news.” I wonder if anyone has thought about a calendar/list widget that can be published to every community members desktop, about who/what/where/why/when is happening around their community. Interactive tools would help coordinate efforts to communicate, and effectively advance their ability to organize reporting efforts.

How Marketers Can Start Speaking With-Not to-Customers

Word of Mouth campaigns can be difficult to execute and often backfire. Spongecell CSO Marc Guldimann recently gave some insight on producing successful online WOM campaigns, in a byline article on the leading online marketing site Adotas. The article outlined key points online campaigns should follow to spread a consistent message and gather useful data about how the message is being carried.

1. Going viral, but not becoming a virus.

Using tools that guarantee message consistency, help brands avoid a mutating message, and their online campaign turning into a game of telephone. The tools that provide consistent branding and intact message across multiple interactive media:

desktop widgets, add to calendar & meeting invites, social network apps, mobile applications, like SMS, RSS readers

All of these tools catalyze word-of-mouth campaigns, without mutating; viral, not a virus. The same tools also provide the ability to quantify “buzz” trends, and measure individual interest levels in a brand. This keeps control of the message in the hands of marketers, and hands off the necessary tools to power a word-of-mouth campaign to the consumers.

2. Scalable one to one marketing.

Using this approach, marketers offer pricing options based on what they know each individual consumer is willing to pay. Interactive marketers have the power to gather this data, and utilize real-time info to price goods/services based on consumers interest level. Frequency of visits to a Web site, a demonstrated interest level in particular brands, average cost per purchase, which calls to action they are most receptive to (email, SMS, sales or product launches), open and click through rates, etc. – all help create detailed profiles so brands can understand their consumers.

Help consumers help themselves

Staying on top of new online technology is daunting and overwhelming. Last night, I was talking to a friend about Spongecell’s ‘Add to Life’ tools, to which she confessed it took her months to integrate GCal (Google Calendar) into her life. As a marketing professional, she was able to recognize the value in a marketing agnostic platform like Spongecell’s, which allows consumers, customers, and website visitors to select the information that is most relevant to them, and seamlessly bring it into their lives. Unlike Google calendar, aiming to convert every customer into a GCal user, this platform allows users to add to their outlook, google, ical, whichever is comfortable and already a part of their life. If they’re texting savvy, they can send themselves an SMS reminder, and if they belong to social networks like Facebook or MySpace, they can share it with friends.

The platform provides facility to the end user, which makes marketing more successful in the end because you’re not forcing a user to sign into Google to add something to their calendar, but inviting them to bring that data into their lives, in a way that is relevant to them. As my friend summed up quite simply:rather than force feed one technology on your consumers, you encourage them to sample the buffet, and choose what’s most appealing.

Moving merchandise

Recently, I’ve been noticing a lot of sales signs on retail stores around the neighborhood. It’s as if everyone decided to hold a sale over the last week. Perhaps it’s just the season for sales or maybe it’s a reaction to Fed Chair Ben Bernake’s statement about the future of the economy. Either way, it made me think about what retail stores have to do to move merchandise and what the best way to reach shoppers with all the competition. After all, being in downtown Manhattan is somewhat like being in a high-end shopping plaza.

Small stores – with a footprint or one or two stores – often struggle with getting the word out. Though they have loyal customers (as many businesses do), the question of how to alert them of new merchandise of interest or an upcoming sale without sending out postcards (the norm in the retail industry) or brochures….both are quite expensive once the post office gets through with the weighing and mailing. And that annoying weekly email just isn’t cutting it.

Here are methods that might work for you:

- Get an online calendar for all your events on your web page (and, if you don’t have a web page, get one!)
- Targets alerts segmented by customer preferences (a pain, but if you can get this automated and electronic, you save a bundle).
- Get involved in the community. This is unbelievably useful for you (as a business owner) and for your business. It also helps the word
spread. The company that’s been most successful with community involvement is McDonald’s. Thought a Global 1000 company, it
operates at a local level.
- Hold events that drive business. Whether you’re selling clothing, books, comics or housewares, the key is to build awareness of your store.
- Step up that customer service. People go back for products, but if you’re competing purely on what you sell in your store, you’re already at a
disadvantage. Anyone can find the same product on the Internet or at another store. What will stick in a customer’s mind is customer
service.

But, the first step is to get that online presence. Define your brand, get your events out on an online calendar and take care of your customers (they will certainly take care of you!).