Post Control Marketing

Adweek (Adfreak) has pronounced U2’s Songs of Innocence album release the number 1 brand fail of the year. It is very easy to nod your head yes after reading this, yet I challenge you to go a little deeper and determine what “brand fail” really means. I respect Tim Nudd’s point. Placing automatic download on 500 million people’s phones, whether they wanted it or not, did draw a backlash. I wrote about this U2 and Apple criticism when it first happened. Nudd says, “The criticism was swift and merciless, and Bono later admitted that his “beautiful idea” with Apple might not have been so beautiful after all. “[We] might have gotten carried away with ourselves,” he admitted in the understatement of the year.”

Was this really “the year’s silliest, scariest and stupidest brand fail?”

This was a bold move and bold moves hardly ever go perfectly, but before we pronounce this the brand fail of the year let’s dig a little deeper. Think about the challenge of getting through the clutter, trying to keep an older band (sorry Bono, but you’ve been around for four decades) relevant and trying to reach new audiences. What is the objective of most advertising campaigns? To make everyone happy? I would say most brands want to sell product. In this case U2 wants to get their music out into the world and make some money doing it.

Irish Central presents another point to consider in their recent article “U2 Have the Last Laugh with Massive Sales of New Album.” iTunes reported this week that 26 million people have downloaded “Songs of Innocence” in its entirety since they released it at the beginning of last month – nearly double the 14 million who previously had purchased the group’s music through iTunes since it launched in 2003. Mark Farragher says, “I’d say the publicity stunt paid off as U2 achieves their ultimate goal: a global reach of their new music in this world of fractured attention spans with so many entertainment choices.” This article includes a different Bono quote, We were already annoying people, it was already divisive, it was already, ‘I can’t stand them, I want to kill them.’ It’s the job of art to be divisive.”

Before pronouncing the U2 album release a brand fail I also point you to another article recently published about their concert ticket sales. Live Nation reported that U2’s iNNOCENCE + eXPERIENCE Tour 2015 was sold out in every city where it went on sale the same morning. They continue saying, “Following overwhelming fan demand, including a record-setting 118,000 fans queuing online to purchase tickets in New York, two new shows have been confirmed in New York, Chicago, Boston, Montreal, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Berlin & Paris.” If your objective is to keep a 40 year old band relevant and sell albums and concert tickets then it seems to be producing real business results.

It may not have been perfect, but to pronounce this the biggest brand failure of the year may be an overstatement. What are your thoughts? Perhaps I am just seeing it through rose color Bono glasses because I am a U2 fan.

I was listening to Mark Schaffer discuss the update of his book The Tao of Twitter on Michael Stelzner’s podcast the other day and realized that I have been using Twitter all wrong for the past 6 years. Maybe I shouldn’t say ALL wrong. Twitter is one of my favorite social channels. I use it to stay connected with the latest developments in the industry and share valuable articles and resources with followers and via hashtags. I have even added it as required participation (#SocialMedia453) to my Social Media Marketing course at JHU.

Learning and sharing and finding are all part of Twitter, but the big piece I have been missing is real time conversation. No channel gets closer to real time socializing like Twitter. This is perhaps its greatest value and I have been missing out on it for 6 years! The closest I have gotten to this step is at conferences where I have had wonderful Twitter conversations with audience members of talks. I have found that the most meaningful professional relationships and opportunities tend to come from conferences where real time, in person conversations happen.

In Twitter I have had too much of a publishers mindset. I have been viewing tweets as a set of blog posts that will be viewed somehow like a table of contents. I also worry about direct comments feeling out of context for others who see them. Now I am realizing that these thoughts are merely misconceptions. There are over 350,000 tweets sent per minute, 500 million tweets per day and around 200 billion tweets per year. A Twitter user on average has over 200 followers and follows over 100 people. With this sheer amount of activity, rarely do we see someone’s stream in its entirety.

Twitter is not about more information or perfect information. Twitter’s strength is making mini one-on-one connections that can build up to more meaningful relationships. To do this we must cut through the clutter with real conversation. This is what Gary Vaynerchuk was talking about in The Thank You Economy. I know all these things. I’ve read the books. How did I miss it for so long?

As I have attempted to build up social media knowledge I have tried to be everywhere and learn everything. I have jumped on every new and old social channel and have tried to do it all. Do you do this too? Yet most of the social media experts tend to be experts in one or two channels. Generalists are few and far between. Community managers are hired to be active in one social channel. To be more effective and get greater results from what Mark Shaeffer calls, “The most popular real-time conversations in the world” we may need more of a focused approach.

Personally, this may mean letting go of some of the other channels for a while. For marketers this may mean cutting channels to the ones that make the most sense or dedicating people to individual communities. Really get to know what makes a specific channel tick and put that effort into each interaction. On Twitter, Shaeffer says it’s about “People sharing, connecting, teaching, and entertaining each other in the moment.” For Twitter tactics I turn to Jay Baer at Convince & Convert. He reports that 92.4% of all retweets happen within the first hour a tweet is sent out and he makes the following suggestions for success:

1. Find Influencers. Not all Twitter followers can amplify messages equally. Find the most influential followers and concentrate efforts there. Interact with them when you have something relevant and valuable to add to the conversation.

2. Repeat Tweets. Tap into multiple Twitter audiences throughout the day. Jay tweets posts 3 times a day with different headlines. Research suggests that the best times to tweet in general are 10am – 3pm – when most people are active on Twitter.

3. Test Tweet Times. Give yourself the best chance of being retweeted by knowing when influencers are on Twitter. Try different times, track response, and look for patterns. Or simply think about possible patterns in your audience’s day. Breaks between meetings, lunch, morning, night – when are they most likely to be on Twitter?

4. Manage Expectations. Only 6% of all tweets are retweeted. Don’t expect everything you send to get shared to the world. Focus on quality versus quantity. Build more one-on-one relationships that will build to more influence over time.

Shaffer says Twitter is the most powerful business networking system that has ever existed (via 140 characters) yet 60% of people who try Twitter quit after the first week. To truly get these benefits we must use the network the right way – the real time way.

For one last insight, Vaynerchuck’s latest book Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook says, “link clicks do not create stories.” Real time conversation is about sharing stories. People are moved by stories. How do you use Twitter? Are you missing out on its greatest potential?