Good Medicine Tastes Bitter, Like Negative Online Reviews

"Come on, good medicine tastes bitter," whenever my mom made me take the Chinese medicine when I was a kid falling sick, she would say this Chinese saying to me. Until today, I still firmly believe that the good medicine, a.k.a the brown-ish liquid slowly cooked from all kinds of herbs with bizarre names, is, and is going to be the bitterest thing I've ever had!

Actually, there is another part of the saying: "Good medicine tastes bitter; sincere advice jar on ear." Well, I am not sure if all sincere advice has to sound jarring, but I guess it certainly applies to those negative online customer reviews that may sound really unpleasant to business owners and product/service providers.

Of course, nobody enjoys hearing criticism. It hurts feelings. In terms of online reviews, while good reviews are considered to be reputation boosters, bad ones are usually not- they are discouraging, disappointing and uninviting. But let's face it, although everyone wants to have, and only have customers that put the sweetest words about their most satisfactory five-star experience ever, many would use the online review service to let others know they are not happy or not sure about whatever they have received from organizations reviewed. Oops, jarring words. How would they ever help?

First of all, they do help. Instead of thinking about how to fire back, how to erase bad words, or how to bribe happy patrons to write good reviews, businesses need to have the right attitudes toward negative online customer reviews- they can hep, and they do help! Here's how-

1. Helping Customer Communication
According to a 2009 Nielson report, 90% consumers surveyed trust recommendations from people they know, and 70% trust consumer opinions posted online while 70% trust brand websites. Your customers want to listen to what fellow customers have to say about you, exactly as much as they want to hear what you say about yourself. Your customers would appreciate you facilitating authentic and transparent communication among them. That customer review system is just too important not to be provided. Besides, 87% of consumers tend to write reviews when they have positive things to say, which means opening the door to reviews helps you to have probably more good reviews.

2. Increasing Sales & Decreasing Cost
Many cases have taught us that things with customer reviews (positive or negative) sell better than those without. A good way to look at the benefit of bad reviews is through this formula I learned in my marketing class back in collge-

Satisfaction = Experience / Expectation

This means, bad reviews help decrease psychological expectations, and thus increase the chance of satisfaction. When weaknesses of products are exposed through bad reviews, customers are likely to have a more realistic expectation, which can reduce the number of complaints or returns.

3. Free Customer Insight Research
You get to know what customers don't like. Is it the product, or the pricing, or the promotion, or the competition... Those good or bad words about you are your first-hand customer insights, and the best part- this valuable information is completely free!!! With it, you can stop guestimating, and get to improving things. Please don't ignore the jarring words. Listen and learn! Good medicine is bitter, but it heals.

Organizations: Ready for Wiki?

My internship projects at a PR agency handle business development for three gaming technology clients, two of which have their own Wikipedia entries. The third client, a fairly new game artificial intelligence company from Germany does not. Our project team thought it was an issue while many competitors have presence on Wikipedia. "Why wasn't it there though?" I had this question. The computer-science-professor-turned CEO was very technology savvy; the company embraces social media- it's on Linkedin, Twitter, Youtube and Facebook; so, why isn't it on Wikipedia?

Then the project with this company got a major focus away from social media use, so my question hasn't got answered yet, but below are some possibilities when an organization is not Wikipedia ready:

1. Not 'Notable' Enough

Wikipedia has a special rule on notability- For a topic to be considered worthy of its own article, it must be considered “worthy of note”. In the case of organizations and companies:

"An organization is generally considered notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in reliable, independent secondary sources. Trivial or incidental coverage of a subject by secondary sources is not sufficient to establish notability. All content must be verifiable."

It is obvious that Wikipedia emphasizes the importance of verifiable, non-editorialized content for organization entries. Thus, press releases issued by the organization itself are not considered a credible resource. Organizations need to include several external references and cite as much as possible in the entry, which can be quite a challenge for small start-ups.

2. Not the Best Platform

Some wiki platforms can handle robust file types, while others can only support text or HTML files. If organizations need to use complex file formats, Wikipedia may not be the best choice. Also, since types of wiki are very diverse and specified, Wikipedia as the general one, may not be the best wiki that meets users' objectives. For example, the game artificial intelligence discipline actually has its own professional wiki.

3. No Time Taking Care of it

It takes efforts to manage the use of wiki. Constant monitoring, editing, and maintenance are required, which again can be quite a challenge for smaller-sized start-ups.

In sum, though having presence on Wiki, or specifically Wikipedia is tempting, organizations need to self-check readiness- what are the needs, possibilities, pros and cons, etc.

Listening & Making: Exploring Two-Way Podcasting

Podcasting has been considered more of a one-way communication means as the process of making a podcast usually does not involve opinions from the groundswell. Podcasts are usually created and made available for interested public to download with related technologies.

However, in organizational use of podcasting, it is important to address the needs and wants of the target audience. Making podcast more audience-oriented and interactive would be a great move to engage with viewers/listeners, which would help organizations develope preferred relationships with the target publics by making and using of podcasts. Here, I'd like to introduce a few cases to discuss some possibilities in bringing podcasting, specifically audio podcasting into a two-way communication pattern.

1. Involve audience in the creative process.
Just like magazines have special pages for readers' letters, and blogs have places to leave comments, podcasting programs needs to listen to what the listeners have to say/suggest about the works, and try hard to respond to the criques/suggestions with action. The Royal Airforce Museum in London are giving out lovely Teddy Bears as they are soliciting listeners' suggestions about which celebrity would be most ideal to record the next podcast series. I think this move is very beneficial to the organization-audience relationship established through podcasts. For organizations, it is a great way to understand the preferences of the target audience. It is also a positive message that says organizations care about the feelings and insights of the audience. For audience, this approach transforms the presumption about their duties involving podcasts- they are now not only expected to download and listen to the latest episodes, they are invited to add wit and wisdom to the creation of the episodes they are going to listen to. And, participation is awarded!

2. Get audience to generate their own podcasts.
Another great use of podcasts for organizations is to hold podcast competitions that encourage audience to initiate podcast creation efforts. Basically, organizations set themes and requirements based on which listeners/participants create and submit podcasts. NASA's 21st Century Explorer Program holds an annual podcasting competition. Participants of 2009 were required to record audio podcasts on what they think is NASA's greatest exploration achievement in the past 50 years. Similarly, Little White Earbuds, a website designed for DJs hosts an annual podcasting competion that encourages listeners to submit their mixing works for award consideration. I think organizations that has a mission of informing/educating target publics can do something similar in order to make podcasting experience interactive, though there is a premise- organizations need to have established a fairly good listener base.

Please let me know your thoughts about two-way podcasting. What else do you think would work?

Viral Video Marketing: The 'Midget' Case

So what do we mean exactly by “viral video”? The easiest way to begin is by thinking of its original meaning used in medicine. Viral is something that “spreads and grows.” Viral video is when other people take your created video and willingly share it with others; it spreads out to a larger audience, and when done right, grows in its reach and influence. Viral videos can be a great way for organizations to promote products and services as they are not full of hard sale like traditional commercials. Instead, the biggest priority of viral videos is being fun and entertaining, making the viewing public laugh hard and become willing to share them with others.

The first time I became aware of viral video marketing is by watching an episode of the Celebrity Apprentice 2009. The episode featured a task for both competing teams to create a viral video for the detergent company, ALL, on their new “small and mighty®” detergent brand. The objective was which team could better impress the executives of ALL with their submitted video. Team Athena's video was entitled 'Jesse James Dirty with Midgets'. Here is the video for you to watch-



Actually, both teams thought they should go with midgets in their videos, simply because it was one of the most popular keyword searches for videos on YouTube. “We searched the internet for one of the most-used keywords when searching for viral videos, and ‘midget’ is one of the top 5 words.” Said Melissa Rivers, who was on Team Athena.

It turned out that the executives from ALL hated the video. They complained about the demeaning of the little people, and considered their image to be very “clean” and conservative; not racy or “dirty”. Viral video marketing experts made similar criticism that the video creators made general assumptions about the searched keywords, rather than addressing the specific and unique interest of the target audience/consumers of the product, meaning that they thought moms/housewives wouldn't appreciate watching a video with little people in it.

I think the case touches a very important aspect of viral video production for marketing purposes-

1) Learn the target audience before making a video that you think EVERYONE would find funny. Who is your target audience? What is their demographic? What videos are they watching? What keywords are they searching for? What websites do they frequent? What online communities are they participating in?

2) Learn the expectations of your client before making a video. Are they looking for something edgy with strong appeal to humor, or are they intending to deliver a solemn yet inspiring message?

I'd like to know your thoughts and comments about making/using viral video for marketing.

Social Media: Gaining Executive Support

Social media transforms organizations. However, in the real world, not every organizational leader are Steve Jobs or Twitterpreneurs. To make some executives realize the strategic advantages social media brings to organizations takes efforts. To help them understand it, we PR and social media practitioners need to show to executives how big, dynamic and relevant the groundswell is, and maybe even get the executives into the groundswell. The persuasion would be no easy task, and several things need to be paid attention to.

1. Uncertainty stops executives from acting.
Executives may have already been informed how important and helpful social media is, but lacking first-hand experience of using social media makes them have second thought about implementing a customer centric communication program. Also, they may think what awaits organizations in the groundswell may be an organizational opportunity or threat, creating the impression of uncertainty and out of control with social media. Two things need to be clarified to reduce the anxiety- 1) how is social media transforming the organization in a positive way; 2) a fully developed plan to reassure that social media helps relationship building (maybe by using ROPES model, and including case studies).

2. Approaches should reflect each executive's current level of support.
A scale should be introduced to measure different levels of support. Some executives may be blind about the value of social media. You need to educate them from lesson one. Some executives may be positive toward social media, but may need your help with a specified plan of action. Other executives may be social media enthusiasts, and they'd be your important assets for selling the social media plan to other executives.

3. Be ready to walk a long way for support.
PR practitioners should be prepared to take a long road gaining executive support on embracing social media. Timing (when to approach executives), information (what to present to executives) and manner (how to talk about it with them) all substantially matter, and all takes time. You need to be faithful and persistent in face of all kinds of challenges.

Happy Crowdsourcing!

When talking about embracing the groundswell, Li and Bernoff point out the importance of making customers an integral part of the way an organization innovates. They argue that organizations should be proactive in engaging customers in the product/process improvement to increase the chances of developing and presenting something customers want.

What organizations can do with the new trend are threefold- 1) listen to what customers are saying; 2) keep customers' talks going; 3) proactively ask customers to tell what they think needs to be done.

The third one touches the idea of crowdsourcing which combines "crowd" and "outsourcing". A crowdsourcing is done through an open call to a large group of people (a crowd) asking for contributions. An example using social media is a request made by Luce Foundation Center for American Art on Flickr to have people help with the task of finding a perfect substitute art piece from their online archive to fill display gaps when certain artworks are out on loan (as image below shows).



The "Fill the Gap!" crowdsourcing is very successful. Many people go to posted their selected artworks to fill gaps. They also interact with each other by commenting each others' choices. Eventually, Luce Foundation Center would fill each gap by following people's recommendations (as image below shows- the previous gap filled!).



Two important factors I've learned from this social media based crowdsourcing project are-

1) 'Crowdsourcability': make sure it's something your target publics know, care about, and are willing to participate in;

2) Execution: when great ideas come out from the crowd, adopt them. It's the best way to keep crowdsourcing efforts going.

Please let me know your thoughts about organizational crowdsourcing using social media. Thanks!

Photosharing= Photos + Sharing

How you are going to show whom what pictures?

For organizations, to effectively make a presence and exert impacts on photo sharing sites, they need to do more than uploading pictures, and hard-selling information/product/service with the pictures. An essential part of successful organizational photo sharing is... sharing.

With sharing, the logic is actually quite simple- those photos should not only be yours; they should also be your viewers', which means something within/about your photos can be felt, recognized, liked, and remembered by the target publics. Such emotional connections will lead them to give their inputs on the community (by commenting photos, or even sharing their photos), and become more involved with the organization (by joining your photo sharing groups and actively participating in communication).

Throughout many success cases, two aspects are consistently crucial with organizational use of photo sharing.

1. Helpfulness is valued in photo sharing, too.
Nikon Digital learning Center on Flickr is popular because of helpful photo taking tutorials and advices on member-uploaded photos given among group members (mostly photography enthusiasts) and by photography professionals hired by Nikon. Also, Nikon's Flickr has well served a large number of frequent Flickr users who care about quality of photos they take.

2. Participatibility is key.
Every month, Mass MoCA's Flickr Finds gives themes to its Flickr group members to take photos on. The January 2010 Flickr Finds featured photos capturing a touch of blue. Best photos were picked out and then put on the Mass MoCA blog (below are some of them).





Mass MoCA's Flickr has become very popular, as again, with its very interesting participatory Flickr activities, it manages to engage photography enthusiasts- a demographic factor too important to miss out on for using Flickr.

I'd like to hear your thoughts about what elements are important for organizations to secure the sharing in photo sharing!

Weibo, Scarf, and Microblogging

Since Day One of microblogging, many questions have been raised about current and potential organizational usage, a major one being how can organizations achieve two-way symmetrical communication when using microblogging? I want to share a success story of VANCL, an online fashion retailer in China, as its microblogging strategies have gained many thumbs-up from PR and marketing professionals.

In 2009, Sina.com, one of the biggest online portals in China launched a microblogging service called Sina Weibo (Sina Microblogging). Sina cleverly punned on the likeness of “wēi bó” (microblogging) and “wéi bó” (scarf) in Chinese pronunciation. Thus, instead of asking people “have you microblogged today?” Sina asks “got your scarf today?” The naming created a buzz, and attracted thousands of netizens to come and get their scarves.

VANCL were among the first companies on Weibo. Their first updates were about giving free VANCL scarves to new followers. Relevant and fun, the campaign helped VANCL gain initial attention and followership. Many of VANCL’s updates later were also about freebies and bargains- giving gifts, time-limited ￥1 purchase for some ￥888 apparel for followers who leave comments the earliest, etc.

But that was not all. Besides good at giving away scarves, VANCL also made efforts to connect with followers/consumers emotionally. What they did included:
- Sharing designers’ new creative ideas for new seasons
- Sharing photos of office, studios, team activities and energetic friendly looking new VANCL employees
- Answering followers’ questions in a timely manner
- Asking for and rewarding design suggestions
- Recruiting catalog models
- Reminding people to dress warm and travel safe for Chinese New Year.

Several good lessons could be learned from VANCL on organizational usage of microblogging to interact with key audience in dialogues and interactions:

1. Find a good bonding point between your organization and the microblog. For VANCL, it was on Weibo because its target consumers (young people in the early years of career who like to shop online) are comfortable with microblogging. What makes the reason for your organization to be on Twitter?

2. Introduce yourself. Tell organizational stories. Help people know what you do and what you believe. Build emotional ties.

3. Listen and be responsive. Microblogging is not another place to put news and news releases. It enables organizations to directly communicate/interact with the audience. Value their feedback by ingratiating and responding it on time.

4. Prepare incentive packages to encourage participation. Everyone can use a giveaway or a few coupons, so give a wéi bó (scarf) for their “wēi bó” (microblogging)!

A Brainstorming Exercise for Organization Vlogging

As an owner of a very popular vlog, Philip DeFranco has actually made a vlog on how to make a popular vlog.



In summary, DeFranco mentioned (in an entertaining manner of speaking) three important elements of a vlog-

1. Has a theme/themes a vlogger is passionate about;
2. Gives interesting/innovative input;
3. Solicits audience feedback.

All these elements are actually applicable and critical to organizations’ vlogs, too. First, a theme sets the tone for the vlog and the perception of the organization in the vlog audience’s eye. Second, interesting input is the key to identifying with the audience. Jason Calacanis, enabler of the vlogging sensation Mahalo Vlog Idol believes that a great corporate vlog needs to be: a. entertaining, and b. informative, and that the order is important. Lastly, vlog, as a form of social media, needs to be interactive and participatory. Philip DeFranco solicited feedback from other vloggers by promising to publicize the best vlogs; Blendtec invited the audience to tell them what to blend next time. In essence, vloggers need to have ways to ensure viewers that feedback is expected and worthwhile.

So, how about some brainstorming exercise for organization vlogging? It only takes two steps-

1. Name an organization you want to work for (ideally or realistically);
2. Help the organization come up with a theme for a vlog.

Toyota’s Hibernating Blog

Once bitten, twice shy.

To owners of 8.1 million Toyota vehicles worldwide, this idiom has become increasingly relevant. A massive recall due to a sticking accelerator problem has made a substantial number of loyal Toyota customers reevaluate the reliability of their Toyota cars as well as the maker of them.

Toyota has, gradually, implemented crisis communication programs (here’s a timeline regarding Toyota’s responses to the incident). Social media wise, Toyota has, again gradually, addressed issues on Youtube, Facebook fan page and Twitter. But with this post, I’d like to direct your attention to an official Toyota blog that is fast asleep during a whole winter of crises.

Our Point of View is a blog written by Toyota associates that aims to “explore current issues in the automotive industry”. A frequent author is Irv Miller, Toyota’s VP of Environmental and Public Affairs. The first post was written in January 2008, and the last in December 2009. As the tag cloud indicates, the blog makes the most effort to inform/educate/promote “hybrid”, “Prius”, and “Venza”. It’s interesting that though tags of “recall” and “recalls” are listed in the tag cloud, they don’t link to any related posts.

Also as said, the blog stopped being updated since December 2009 when the floor mat problem started to hugely affect the carmaker’s reputation and revenues. Information related to the most recent recalls is not available on the blog; nor is a hyperlink to Toyota’s official recall website. The last post has generated 205 comments, but none of them were responded. Speculations, anger, and disappointment were everywhere yet unheeded-

“You asked for it..You got it Toyota”

“The problem is not the pedal but the electronics. Toyota needs to come clean and tell us the real problem. And then fix it.”

“Be a company of integrity, if there is a problem admit there is a problem, and fix the problem. be a company of integrity, honesty, open communication and be responsible and do your part, so step up to the plate.”

……

I feel that since Toyota has decided to open a blog in the first place to directly communicate with its stakeholders, it needs to carry on the communication, and make efforts to turn the hatred into discussions- before the place becomes a recycle bin of hatred and negativity.

I’d like to hear your opinions on Toyota’s hibernating blog. Do you think they have stopped updating the blog for a reason? Or do you think the carmaker needs to wake up the blog, and manage the crisis through frequent and genuine communication with the blog readers?