1. Does your target Digg your ads?

If zapping tv spots wasn’t bad enough, now Digg is allowing their readers to essentially vote ads “off the island” while promoting the ones they like to star status. For the undug, Digg is the highly popular tech-focused news site where the stories are chosen by the users—the more Diggs a story gets, the higher it ranks on the site. And now that ads can be Digged or Buried, marketers will get real time feedback on the relative appeal of their ads to this highly influential target. If you’re targeting techies, this could be the cheapest copy test you ever tried, as well as the most eye opening.

2. Is your marketing worth retweeting?

While the joys of tweeting may still escape you personally, the phenomenal reach of Twitter is undeniable. In addition to the 20 million or so global users, tweets now appear as status updates on Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo and other social networks, extending Twitter’s influence to just about everyone marketers might want to reach. This isn’t kid stuff either. Professionals between 35–49 are the biggest tweeters of them all. So, if you create marketing worth tweeting about, the world will find out about it faster than you can say, “Wow that’s tweet.”

3. Do interns handle your social media?

This is not a trick question. We’ve been asked this a lot in the last month and it is a reflection of a naive belief that it is okay to put a brand’s social media campaign in the hands of novices. One senior marketer even told us that his company uses interns for all of their social media and then shrugs off the lost intellectual capital when the interns move on. As social media advances from the experimental phase to the front lines of customer relationship management, building and maintaining expertise is essential to optimizing results and avoiding PR nightmares. After all, would you ever put an intern on the phone with the press or your top customers?

4. How many customer “love letters” do you get a week?

It is a simple fact—beloved brands do better. Becoming beloved requires achieving customer satisfaction on the basics (product quality) and somehow exceeding expectations via service. Zappos calls this delivering “wow” and does this wherever they can. The Apple Store does this with its amazingly knowledgeable squad of orange-shirted concierges. Others use Marketing as Service to foster brand love, as HSBC does with the BankCab, whose riders send at least one love letter every week. So ask yourself, what could your marketing be doing (versus saying) to generate this kind of passion?

5. Do you have an app yet?

2009 was the year of the app rush for marketers. Everyone from Blockbuster to ZipCar, Betty Crocker to Starbucks, and Fandango to The Food Network cooked up mobile apps for their prospects and customers. In fact, well over a hundred brands joined the fun, some with pragmatic extensions of their service offering (like FedEx mobile) and others with engaging entertainment to enhance their brand perceptions (like Scion’s AV Radio). Given the low development costs of mobile apps and the millions of smart phone users, there is still time to get app happy. And while you’re at it, check out the newly launched CALL THE SHOTS iPhone app that Renegade developed for HARLEM, the new ice cold shot drink imported from Holland. It’s fun, it’s free and it’ll answer the question—how lucky are you really?

6. Did you know Renegade moved?

Back in September we said goodbye to Chelsea Market, our home for 10 years and moved to our new digs in the heart of Greenwich Village, just south of Bowlmor Lanes and north of Patsy’s Pizza. It seems that a few of you might not have our new address so here it is: 41 E 11th Street, 3F, NY, NY 10003-4602. Our phone numbers haven’t changed and we look forward to seeing you soon.

Happy New Year!

While touting Marketing as Service relentlessly over the past few years, I’m also keenly aware that this approach may not be right for every brand or category. One category that I had my doubts about is Spirits. Relying heavily on visual brand statements in print and outdoor, it was unclear to me if a more service-oriented approach could drive people to drink. Well, I’m happy to report that a pitcher full of new campaigns have convinced me that Marketing as Service pours it on here too.

DonQ, a rum brand, recently launched a clever web campaign that answers some of the “tougher” questions men face today like how often to call their mothers and how quickly after the break-up can you ask a buddy’s ex out. The answers are provided by a large panel of ladies who’s responses can be segmented by age, relationship status, region, education, personal style and even “socialization.” According to a report by MediaPost, the campaign is designed to “engage men where they live these days — online and on their mobile phones.”

Word-of-mouth for the service — and further engagement with the brand — is being built via social media, including Facebook and Twitter and newer comers such as Foursquare, Tumblr, BuzzFeed, Nerve, Mixologist, HappyHoured and The Deck Network.

Given that the liquor category tends to be heavily reliant on on-site promotions and sampling and “one-way” advertising, there was “a clear space” for DonQ to enter with a service-oriented marketing perspective, adds Clay Parker Jones of New York-based digital strategy firm Undercurrent, who is the lead strategist on the project.

I’m also a fan of The Glenlivet Whisky Season Open and its smart sponsorship of the World Golf Tour program. Transporting me to the virtual dunes of St. Andrews, The Glenlivet introduced me to a highly engaging online golf game that is both challenging and addictive. Though I didn’t take the time to perfect my virtual swing, you can tell by the Leader Board that thousands have, no doubt many of them ending their round with a proper toast to their host, The Glenlivet.

Jack Daniel’s created an interesting “toast” application in celebration of the founders September birthday. Over 6,000 toasts were sent and this effort helped the brand attract over 370,000 fans on Facebook! Here’s a brief overview from MediaPost:

The “Give A Toast” application analyzes a user’s Facebook friend list, uses their profiles to automatically screen out any friends under 21, and identifies friends to toast based on their profile information or activities on the network. The user’s friends are ranked into seven categories based on their data: social friend, photogenic friend, musical friend, mysterious friend, all-around friend, active friend or interesting friend.

The app does all of the work for the user: No need to answer questions or manually select friends to send toasts to. The toast and the Jack Daniel’s cocktail selected by the user are posted on friends’ Facebook walls. The app also identifies those friends who have September birthdays, and encourages users to toast them.

I have lots more examples but will have to save them a later post.  In the meantime, cheers to the brands who DO something for their target versus those who just SAY something.  As the old sage advised, “actions speak louder than words.”

MediaPost did a great little round up of free offers from various restaurant chains in the last few weeks. What they noticed was that several of these brands were able to achieve similar results to Denny’s without having to buy a SuperBowl ad:

Quiznos gave away a million subs in three days after using only banner ads, Facebook and Twitter presence and some free local radio exposure.

International House of Pancakes just completed its third annual National Pancake Day on Tuesday, in which it gives away a small stack of pancakes and in return asks customers to consider donating to the Children’s Miracle Network or a local charity.

Since neither of these programs received much traditional advertising support, they exemplify the power of well managed social media programs:

Social networking and restaurants are a logical match, says Reggie Bradford, CEO of social media marketing consultancy Vitrue. “Food is naturally social,” he points out. “Where do you want to eat? Do you want to grab something here? This is translating to online conversations around restaurant brands. We’ve seen tremendous adoption of social media strategies among QSRs and fast-casual restaurants.”

Combine social media with freebies, and you’ve got marketing dynamite. “Giving away food in these uncertain economic times obviously resonates strongly with consumers,” Bradford says. “Huge gains are being made by brands who are reaching out to consumers with something tangible.”

Given the economic “nuclear winter” that we find ourselves in, free is one of the few words that will truly turn heads. Sure, any moron can give stuff away free. The question becomes, can you give stuff away in such a way that you attract and then maintain new customers as well as reward existing customers for their continued loyalty? Denny’s certainly tried by doubling up their wait staff and making sure that the chefs were up to the task. I can’t speak for IHOP and Quiznos but certainly with all the store traffic their freebies generated, they had the huge opportunity, an opportunity made all the easier via social media.

To succeed in social media, brands would be wise to LIAISE, a six-step process to connect with consumers: Listen, Identify, Activate, Integrate, Socialize, Evaluate.

At The CMO Club Summit today, I moderated a discussion among 35+ CMOs about social media. It was really a lively conversation representing the range of experiences of these CMOs. The group divided into three segments, from novices to making their way to “kicking butt and taking names.” David Spark provides a quick overview of the discussion on TheCMOClub site (yes, the very same social network that Renegade helped create!) but I thought add some more detail given the broad interest in the topic.

Introduction to Social Media
Here’s the definition of social media marketing from Frog Design’s blog that I used to start the discussion:

Social media marketing is all marketing that utilizes the social graph of both marketer and audience (in fact, the interesting thing is that they can be one and the same) to facilitate and cultivate a conversation. Social marketing is whenever more than two individuals collaborate online or offline for content generation and distribution. Social marketers harness the viral power of social networks in order to grow both the frequency and the reach of conversations exponentially. They know how to feed the social orbit with content that catalyzes conversations. And they understand that an “architecture of participation,” that lets employees be marketers, has become paramount for turning brands into live brands.

Social Media Numbers (or why CMO’s should care)

• 62% of consumers actively seek out and read customer reviews prior to purchase
• 82% of consumers found reading reviews better than researching a product in-store
• 60% of Americans use social media
• 59% interact with companies via social media; 25% do so once a week or more
• 93% of those that use SM believe companies should too
• 56% feel stronger connection to companies that they interact with via SMcompanies should use social networks to solve my problems
• 43% believe companies should use social networks to solve my problems
• 41% believe companies should solicit feedback on their products/services
• 37% want more ways to interact with companies

Renegade also created a Social Media IQ test for these CMO’s at CMOquiz.com which may be of interest.

Its been a slow time for Marketing as Service. Frankly, I haven’t seen one example really worth writing about in several weeks. Desperate to find something of interest to you all, I decided to munch on a social media effort by Terra Chips. Here’s a taste of this effort as served up by MediaPost:

On Tuesday, the brand will launch a “Chip in for Change” campaign on Facebook. The concept: Tap into the patriotic zeitgeist and give Facebook users a channel to share their opinions not only with each other, but the new president–while also conveying that consumers by no means need to wait until next July 4th to enjoy Terra’s S&B chips.

The campaign centers on a Facebook product page where users will be able to register their ideas and priorities regarding changes that they would like the new president to address, via a virtual “Chip in for Change” suggestion box. The input will be gathered into a virtual gallery where users can read one another’s perspectives.

In addition, users will be invited to become “fans” of the Chips for Change “movement” by downloading the branded application and adding it to their personal Facebook profiles and/or sending it to Facebook friends.

It will be interesting to see if Facebookers find this to their liking or simply salt it away with the rest of the contrived attempts by marketers to invade their social network. When MoveOn.org or another politically savvy organization asks me to chip in, I’m prepared to engage. When a spruced up junk food says “lets talk,” the conversation on could go something like this:

Terra: “Hey Drew, chip in for a change and tell the next president what you think.”

Drew: “Hey Terra, are you serious? Why would I want you, a salty snack, to be my portal to the President?

Terra: “Now Drew, relax, we’re just trying to demonstrate that we understand your Facebookian lifestyle and want to engage in the conversation.”

Drew: “What conversation and who asked you become part of it? If you want to talk to me about the health benefits of blue potatoes, I’m all ears but when it comes to politics step aside. You’re cutting this thing the wrong way. I didn’t sign up for Facebook to face off with a tiny tater.”

Terra: “Now Drew, don’t be that guy. We just want to be your friend.”

Drew: “I’ve got plenty of friends already you specious spud. You want to be my friend, bag this Chip In program and do something useful that is somehow relevant to your brand.”

Terra: “Whatever dude. We’re getting great PR and our marketing folks are now being invited to every social media conference in town. So any way you slice it, we win.”

Drew: “You got me there. Serves me right for talkin’ to a bag of chips.”

For the record, Terra Blue is my chip of choice.