Do you know what TGIF means? It does not stand for Thanks God It's Friday anymore, but Twitter, Google, iPhone, and Facebook. It reflects how greatly social media are impacting the people and thus companies should find ways to use them for their business. Shortly, digital marketing is the inevitable for businesses. In short, digital marketing is inevitable for today's businesses.
This is not a story only applicable for the United States. After
iPhone was launched in South Korea early this year, the use of social
media became crucial to Korean marketers. Therefore, IDG Korea will be
holding the Digital Marketing 2010 conference on July 1st, at the
Sheraton Walkahill Hotel, and will be sharing the newest global trends
in the marketing industry to Korean marketers. Sean Garrett, the vice
president of communications of Twitter, will deliver how Twitter is used
by companies and how it helps to generate profits.
Garrett said that Twitter is a powerful tool to reach customers not
only of B2C market but also of B2B market in an email interview with IDG
Korea.
IDGKR: Even still, many people do not have ideas about what is
Twitter exactly. Please explain what Twitter is, and how Twitter makes
opportunities for enterprises.
Garrett: Twitter is a real-time information network powered by people
all around the world that lets you share and discover what's happening
now.
Twitter is a simple tool that helps connect businesses more
meaningfully with the right audience at the right time. Businesses and
organizations of all shapes and sizes are now able to stay connected to
their customers. It can be used to quickly share information with people
interested in your company, gather real-time market intelligence and
feedback, and build relationships with customers, partners and other
people who care about your business. Customers can use Twitter to tell a
company (or anyone else) that they've had a great--or
disappointing--experience with your business, offer product ideas, and
learn about great offers they've selected to be notified of.
IDGKR: How many users does Twitter have? How do you measure your
real-time contents in terms of quality and quantity? Do you have any
tools for your contents quality control? Garrett: Twitter has more than
125 million registered users and there are more than 65 tweets a day.
"Quality control" is created by individual users who decide what users
they want to receive tweets from based on their interests. IDGKR:
Marketers are getting interested in using Twitter for their marketing
activities. Please introduce successful cases.
Garrett: There are thousands of examples of business marketing using
Twitter worldwide.
They include the American airline called JetBlue. In the midst of
bad economic times and terrible customer relations between airlines and
customers, the magazine Fast Company says that JetBlue has managed to
create a "brand powerhouse" in just a few years because of social media
-- with Twitter playing a big role. JetBlue has more than one million
followers on Twitter and uses it to better listen to customers, augment
traditional branding campaigns and enable their customers to be
advocates for the company. The result of this is that JetBlue has the
highest ranking "social currency" of any American company as measured by
a Fast Company study.
The Dell Outlet is a another great example. A division of the giant
made-to-order computer business, Dell Outlet carries refurbished
equipment and other inventory that it needs to sell quickly. Because the
division has to get the word out fast, it doesn't have the luxury of
hiring an agency and developing an ad campaign. Instead, the outlet
relies primarily on email marketing, paid search results, search-engine
optimization and affiliate links to raise awareness and drive sales.
It's always looking for new, cost-effective ways to reach people.
The Dell Outlet began providing coupons for deals via Twitter. Where
they successful? Very much so. Not only do they get retweeted and
picked up by coupon sites--both of which spread the brand name--they
also drive sales. Dell Outlet has booked several million dollars in
revenue attributable to its Twitter posts. In addition, the division has
done research showing that awareness of the outlet has grown, too.
Dell now has more than 80 Dell-branded Twitter accounts (including
@dellhomeoffers for new system deals) offering everything from videos of
new technologies to promotions for Asia-Pacific customers. It also
encourages employees to twitter, and has well over 100 employee
accounts. Dell uses many of those accounts (with names like
@StefanieAtDell), primarily for customer service exchanges that require
direct messages (Twitter's private channel) and to reach out to people
who are twittering about Dell (which they find via Twitter search).
IDGKR: Most of enterprises users for marketing are B2C companies. How
can Twitter be used for B2B enterprises, and please introduce case
studies if any. Garrett: The New York Times recently wrote about the
success of the B2B telecom provider Avaya on Twitter. They wrote:"What
are people saying about your company? Unlike conversations by phone or
e-mail, Twitter conversations usually are not private, and listening is
fair game. "One company that has built a sophisticated listening post is
Avaya, a global communications provider in Basking Ridge, N.J. Avaya
uses third-party applications to track mentions of its brand name and
has automated alerts for dozens of keywords for products and
competitors, said Paul Dunay, Avaya's global managing director of
services and social marketing. "The company follows up to 2,500 Twitter
postings a week, often from clients with technical issues, he said. 'If
we see those, we're on them in 15 or 20 minutes,' Mr. Dunay said.
'That's providing killer support and customer delight.'"Avaya also looks
for sales leads and opportunities to replace competitors. One day, a
company posted about its quest for a new phone system. Mr. Dunay
replied, introduced himself and offered to put this person in touch with
an Avaya strategic consultant. 'Within 13 days, we were able to convert
that one tweet into a $250,000 sale,' he said."
IDGKR: How do companies and users evaluate 'promoted tweets' which is
currently released? Please introduce results for enterprises using
'promoted tweets' if any.
Garrett: We are still in the early stages of Promoted Tweets with six
brands testing the new service. However, as told to the publication
Advertising Age, there has been some early success, including:• The day
Virgin America's Promoted Tweets went live it recorded its fifth-highest
sales day in its history.• Virgin used Promoted Tweets as the sole
means of announcing its expansion into Toronto, offering 50 percent off
for the first 500 travelers who flew out of two California airports.
Thanks to retweeting, said Porter Gale, Virgin's vp, marketing, the
offer sold out in three hours.• When Virgin started using Promoted
Tweets, it had 64,000 followers on Twitter. Three weeks later, it had
76,000. Now it has 85,000• Bravo used the program in conjunction with
parent NBC Universal's Earth Week initiatives. Inviting consumers to
find out their green IQ in a game on its Web site, the offer hit the
maximum number of Promoted Tweets' retweets allowed, 300, within a
couple of hours, said Ellen Stone, svp, marketing at Bravo. In one day,
she added, it received 200,000 impressions.
IDGKR: As we understand so far, you are preparing other functions for
enterprises marketing other than 'promoted tweet'. What is your plan to
provide marketing tools for enterprises?
Garrett: Our plan is to provide analytics, simple account
verification and other powerful tools to businesses that we will
announce later this year.
IDGKR: Number of Korean users is increasing rapidly. Do you have
plans to launch Korean service or collaborate with Korean companies? How
do you find business potential in Asia Pacific market?
Garrett: The Asia Pacific region is very important to Twitter and we
are seeing very strong growth there, especially in Japan, Indonesia and
Korea. We do plan to launch a Korean language version of Twitter and
hope to do so in 2010.
IDGKR: Many people voice concerns over profit model of Twitter. What
is your profit plan?
Garrett: We just launched our Promoted Tweet effort in April and look
for it to grow substantially. Our main focus on everything we have
done is to grow the user base while providing lots of value for
consumers, businesses and everyone else who uses Twitter. This value
will translate into profits. IDGKR: How do you predict the future of
Twitter as a marketing platform? How do you draw a picture of your
future and what is your ultimate business goal?
Garrett: Our ultimate goal is to build a sustainable business that
can make a difference in the world while having fun doing it.
Source: idg.no
Author: Hyuna Kim
Date: 22/06/2010