Friday, March 13, 2009

How Social Media will Enhance Sustainability Strategy

I just answered a great question on LinkedIn: Can social media drive corporate sustainability strategy?

The inquirer, Katie Fry Hester, clarified that she's "been testing the idea that companies can derive real business AND sustainability value through online communication and collaboration. For example, testing new eco-products in Second Life, launching a sustainability report on JustMeans, crowd sourcing customers for product improvements, monitoring blogs for stakeholder feedback, using twitter for a more direct line to journalists…"

She added: "How is your company deriving business/sustainability value from these new technologies? If you have any examples and/or evidence, I’d love to hear them…" [so would I!]

So, my enthusiastic answer:

"Yes" is the short answer. I also believe it's potentially "game changing", as one commenter put it recently. Social media is perhaps the biggest cause for the increasing transparency in the corporate world. It will continue to play an important role in corporate social responsibility's (CSR) evolution.

Major themes of the way social media will benefit companies involved in CSR include: (1) greatly facilitating meaningful dialogue and collaboration with various stakeholders; (2) tracking and "officially" reporting their CSR efforts; and (3) using the information gleaned from the reporting process to communicate CSR efforts in an more accessible way to a broader audience than CSR report readers and watchdogs.

Some examples of organizations benefiting can be found in a report we did last year and a more recent article I wrote for the LOHAS journal (pdf format).

Social media is still in its infancy and the sustainable business crowd, like most others, has just begun to touch the surface. Your examples are good, and we're in the process of looking more closely at SM's use specifically in the development of CSR communications, with a new paper due out soon. Please do ping me if you'd like me to let you know when that's available.

Labels: corporate social responsibility, CSR, social media, sustainability reporting

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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Friday, February 13, 2009

Teas & Trees: Great Case of Cause Marketing & Social Media

I came across an excellent example of a socially-responsible brand using a combination of leading-edge marketing practices, including cause marketing and social media, that helps it to perform better, even in a recession. Celestial Seasonings isn't a client, but we've done a number of these types of campaigns for other clients with similar success (example case here), so I wanted to share this.

According to a MediaPost article, a currently-running campaign tying tree planting to Celestial Seasonings tea is generating strong sales plus customer data. In a classic example of cause marketing, Celestial partnered with Trees for the Future, a charity that has planted more than 70 million trees in Central America, Africa and Asia since 1988.

During the campaign, which started January 1 and runs through March 31, Celestial has committed to one tree planted in a developing country for every box of Celestial tea purchased, up to 1 million trees.

This campaign includes a microsite, where visitors can register, plant a virtual tree, and forward information to a friend. It's also supported by special displays at retailers throughout the country; two FSIs in newspapers reaching approximately 35 million people; and a Facebook page.

The campaign has secured over 482,000 tree plantings as of today, February 13, only six weeks into the campaign, according to the tree "ticker" on the main site.

While Celestial Seasonings has a long history of sustainability and social responsibility as a brand, it's still obvious that partnering with a cause can prove beneficial. By using an integrated strategy of best practices, including the cause partnership, a microsite, social media and offline support, Celestial is well on its way to reaching its impressive 1 million sales goal while having a positive impact -- all during tough times.

Labels: cause marketing, Facebook, integrated marketing, microsite, social media

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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Thursday, February 12, 2009

Twitter Here, There & Everywhere

Twitter suddenly seems all over the news. It's come a long way from the micro-blogging service whose attraction many of us wondered about not long ago -- who cared what your friend/colleague/sister was eating at her office cafeteria now?

There are at least a couple of good reasons for that.

First, Twitter allows communicating online to potentially large audiences easier than ever before (or forces it to be easier, depending upon your perspective). That's because no special technical skills are required to post to your Twitter page, just like none are required for more typical blog services. But, unlike other blogs, you have only 140 characters to communicate.

While I understand the premise for the quote "I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had time to make it shorter," attributable to Mark Twain or Blaise Pascal, depending on your source, I have not found it attributable to Twitter. Instead, Twitter has given me and millions of others permission to post snippets of information, rather than paragraphs, without looking less professional or knowledgeable (necessarily). This means I can share almost anything, including links to valuable information online, a lot more quickly than if I felt I had to elaborate with my own brilliant spin on that information, or risk being seen as dull or less informed.

Second, organizations are figuring out how to make Twitter a useful tool for such things as marketing, collaboration and customer service. Not bad for a free tool. For example, Airlines have found some of their customers like flight updates via Twitter (which can be received by mobile text). And Dell attributed over $1 million in sales due to specials announced on Twitter last December.

So, expect to see and hear more about Twitter as the year progresses. Try it out and think about ways you and your organization may be able to put it to use. Please visit my Twitter profile and join me there for lots of other great tips and information!

Labels: social media, Twitter

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Adults Quadruple on Social Networks

The share of adult internet users who have a profile on an online social network site has more than quadrupled in the past four years -- from 8% in 2005 to 35% now, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project's December 2008 tracking survey.

Labels: social media, social networks

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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Thursday, January 15, 2009

"Synchronizing Social Networks" Free eBook

As mentioned in Marketing Over Coffee, this free 19 page eBook walks you through the steps needed to synchronize, backup, and expand your social networks and social media contacts. You don't even need to provide an email address.

Labels: LinkedIn, social media, social networks

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Using Social Media in 2009, part I

Just finished a draft of an article on using social media. Here is a relevant blurb:

Think of the social media universe as one that allows you to create multiple, virtual “homes” where the most like-minded people (your customers, clients, etc.) spend time and do business; and therefore to reach them where it’s convenient for them.

I recommend what many people are doing now (and what we are planning to do in the near future) -- to place links to your social media properties on your website and vice versa. Among other things, including for SEO purposes, that allows your audience to engage you wherever they want.

I'm planning to include more tidbits from the article over the next couple of weeks.

Labels: social media

Posted by Perry Goldschein
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