I have a friend who won’t stop taking photos of food whenever she eats out. It seems that no matter what restaurant (except for McDonald’s or KFC and I don’t think they qualify as restaurants) the experience seems to turn into a full photo shoot.

Every angle is explored and the correct lighting is required.

At this stage there isn’t mood music to accompany the visuals, but I am half expecting a string quartet to become involved at some stage.

The next step is for the agent to show up and a movie director.

Why is this Happening?

The convergence of technology has produced a device (smartphone) that can take the photo in high definition and publish it to Facebook and Twitter before the food is even cold. Five minutes later you can check  to see if any of your friends have left a comment, shared or “liked” it!

This visual self expression and sharing culture combines the power of three.

1. People’s obsession with their iPhone (read smartphone)
2. Engagement power of Facebook
3. The love of photos that seems to have been reinforced with the easy availability of the camera in your pocket

The only challenge for marketers is how to harness that through a touch of creativity.

How to Take Advantage of this Obsession

Marketers have realised for a long time the power of images to motivate and engage people.  There are many business categories that can leverage social, mobile and photos to make their content contagious.

There is one very unassuming mobile app that emulates the simplicity of Twitter but is starting to make its presence felt that is playing with the power of “3″.

That “app” is Instagram.

Instagram is a free photo sharing application that you can download to your smartphone, that allows users to take photos, apply a filter, and share it on the service or a variety of other social networking services, including Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Tumblr, Flickr , and Posterous

3 Instagram Success Stories

Instagram’s success shows the power of simplicity coupled with the increasingly mobile and visual social networks.

Food can be made to look so inviting with a great photo (just ask my friend)

Food – Personal Brand

Lets start with a famous “chef” and personal brand called Jamie Oliver who has over 170,000 followers on Instagram and doesn’t miss the ongoing opportunities to market his personal brand, cooking shows and publications with visual online sharing.

Check out Jamie’s Instagram

Beverages – Coffee

StarBucks as one of the largest brands based on follower count on Instagram with over 200,000 followers realises the engagement opportunities.

Alexandra Wheeler, VP of global marketing for the coffee giant says this about Instagram “Photography plays such an important role in how we visually share Starbucks offerings and experiences,..this will continue to be a great network to connect with our customers as it grows.”

Fashion

Fashion brands are a perfect fit for Instagram.  Burberry gives followers behind-the-scene glimpses at fashion shows and photo shoots.

Instagram Ecosystem

There is a complete application and business ecosystem building around Instagram and John Jantsch at the Duct Tape marketing blog mentions the following 6 tools that enhance Instagram.

1. iDarkroom – This isn’t really an Instagram related tool, but it’s a great tool to use to enhance your images before you upload them to Instagram
2. Webstagram – This tool helps you search, sort, tag, follow and comment on photos shared by other users. One of the ways to make Instagram pay off is to build a following and part of that is done by finding and following relevant users and adding your comments to their images.
3. Postagram – Postagram allows you to turn any Instagram image into a postcard with the push of a button. Then Postgram sends your postcard for less than dollar. Think about how you could send product images to customers or showcase a project you’re working.
4. Printstagram – This tool takes your Instagram images and allows you to turn them into posters, mini prints, and mini books.
5. StickyGram – This app takes your custom Instrgram shots and turns them into magnets. It’s like having your own little promotional products creator right in your phone, but potentially much cooler.
6. Canvas Pop – If you want to take up a notch Canvas Pop will take your Instagram images and print them on canvas frames.

How could you use Instagram to spread your brands message and content?

More Reading

• Social Media Marketing – 10 Inspiring Infographics
• 6 Fantastic Facebook Marketing Infographics
• 20 Stunning Social Media Statistics Plus Infographic
• 11 New Twitter Facts, Figures and Growth Statistics plus [INFOGRAPHIC]
• Past, Present and Future of Blogging: 3 Infographics
• How Do You Use LinkedIn [INFOGRAPHIC]
• How Do You Use Twitter [INFOGRAPHIC]

As a business owner and entrepreneur you have learned the lessons and developed expertise that has made you successful. That expertise has value for your peers. Sharing your knowledge and passion can position you as a thought leader in your industry and create opportunities and win and secure  new clients. This expertise can also be turned into content that can create a new and additional revenue stream that can be extremely lucrative.

A lot of companies “don’t get” corporate blogging and the value of content and those that do have found the benefits to far outweigh the investment. Corporate bloggers world wide every day are publishing great original content that in most cases they don’t earn a cent for and wonder if it is worth the effort.

One company that does get it is a software company 37signals who took its own experiences as a web startup and published them on their corporate blog and monetized that over 2 years into a $750,000  revenue stream by publishing and then repackaging it.

To provide some perspective they published a blog as part of their company called “Signal versus Noise” where a lot of their ideas originate driven by the creative process of writing an article which crystallizes their thinking.

How did they do it?

Step One:

They post articles which generate traffic. They make money off the traffic by running Deck ads in the sidebar.  (They make a few thousand a month off  ”The Deck” ads.)

Step Two:

They bundled up the best blog posts about their software development philosophy and turned it into a PDF book called “Getting Real”. They sell the PDF for $19. (They have made a few hundred thousand dollars from the PDF)

Step Three:

They take the “Getting Real” PDF and turned it into a paperback at a print on demand publisher Lulu.com. They sell the paperback for $25 and they make a few thousand a month on royalties. (The paperback is currently ranked the 4th best seller on Lulu)

Step Four:

They took the content from “Getting Real” and produced a “Getting Real” conference series. They hold a few conferences a year and made about $50,000 per conference. 37signals has produced about 5 of these conferences.

So if you add this all up:

• $100,000 on The Deck ads
• $350,000 on the “Getting Real” PDF
• $65,000 on the “Getting Real” paperback
• $250,000 on the “Getting Real” conferences (before that they were called Building of Basecamp).

Total $765,000 over a few years off the same content repackaged in a variety of ways.

This content was simply about insight and ideas about how they run their business.

So there it is, over $750,000 from Blog entries, PDF, paperback, and conferences.

How could you adapt this model to your industry?

Image by thinkpanama

So you want to run a successful social media competition for your brand. What are some of the results of  successful social media marketing by organisations, companies and agencies? What are the elements  of success to facilitate the campaign going viral? Here is a social media campaign that produced some results worth noting.

Case Study

Courtesy: Quinn & Co.

Competition: The Best Job In The World

Organisation: Tourism Queensland (Australia)

Tourism Queensland’s groundbreaking “The Best Job In The World” campaign is a PR and viral marketing phenomenon that has generated worldwide media attention, . Conceived by Tourism Queensland (TQ) and its ad agency, CumminsNitro Brisbane, it was executed in the US and Canada by Quinn & Co. The concept was simple: post a one-minute video application on Tourism Queensland’s Web site explaining why you should be chosen as caretaker of Hamilton Island on the Great Barrier Reef and you might get to blog and cam your way through a six-month gig that paid about $100K U.S. The story broke with a Reuters placement around sunrise in Australia on January 12, 2009. By breakfast time in London, AP was interviewing Tourism Queenslands’s UK director for a broadcast package that turned up on the morning shows in the U.S.

Results

• Within two days there were 1,100 TV placements in the U.S. alone
• In 30 hours they had 400, oo0 new visitors. The goal was to get 400,000 new visitors to it’s website (www.islandreefjob.com) over the course of the one-year campaign
• One million hits on the second day
• The million hits crashed the site
• When they brought it back up it was hosted on 10 Web servers, the maximum number of servers possible
• Approximately 34,684 people from more than 200 countries applied for the job of Island Caretaker
• A social networking frenzy ensued with 336,000 Facebook-referred Web site visits
• More than 3,170 @Queensland followers on Twitter
• 338 members on the campaign’s Wiki (islandreefjob.ning.com)
• By the 18th of March, 2009, 423,000 people (including 210,000 from the U.S.) had voted for their favorite top-50 finalist
• Also by the same date, the Web site had 6.7 million visitors, including 1.7 million from the U.S.
• Over $11 million worth of exposure
• 627 million media impressions in the U.S. and Canada alone

Note: Quinn & Co.’s work promoting “The Best Job In The World” continues to produce powerful exposure across all media platforms and channels So how can you make a Social Media campaign a success.

Elements of Success For A Social Media Marketing Campaign

Courtesy: Toughtpick .com

The success of social media campaigns, and utilization in general, does not, in any way, rely on some magical formula or any secret ingredients we might need to acquire from the belated witches of Salem! Yet, it is a careful mixture of simple and valuable elements which need to be present before, through and after the implementation of any social media campaign. Some elements could be very obvious, while others need some research and attention to be achieved.

• Make sure that you apply smart integration with the “right” social media channels that suit your brand image, the product/service you are trying to promote and its value. Not every social media channel will bring about the positive feedback you are waiting for!
• Take time to choose the team who will be in charge of executing your social media plan. It is not about the quantity, it is about the quality, remember that! Experience and already established online PR agents or staff members will be of a higher value to your campaign in comparison with anyone with a lot of free time to waste!
• Again, content is king! It is a must to make sure that your social media campaign’s content is not offensive, biased or easily misinterpreted. This could be easily used against you!
• Just as it is important to know your target market online, learning more about your online target audience is very important! This will not only help you know where to find them, it will also guide you in designing the campaign that will intrigue them and lead them to take actions!
• You are under the microscope; play nice! Always be aware that once your social media campaign has hit the hot topics’ list, you are now being watched. Try to be continuously involved in any conversations, posts, chats and/or forums taking place regarding your product, service or campaign.
• Be innovative and try not to imitate whenever possible. You might use the same social media channels others are utilizing but try making your benefit and reward systems varied. Your audience is not always looking to get a free coffee!
• Constantly measure the depth of your social media campaign’s fulfillment of goals and returns. The ROI should always be bigger, or at least equal to, the invested money, time, effort and resources that you are putting in the project.
• Put effort into making the overall social media campaign’s experience fun, engaging and proactive. Adding games, puzzles and teasers can be very addictive!

What have been your successes with social media marketing?

In the last post I listed 5 Twitter case studies and how companies are using Twitter for business. Due to the popularity of the post and with over 737 views in 48 hours it seems there is slight unkempt appetite for this information.

So here are 5 more companies and how they have experimented, tested and implemented Twitter to push their brand out into the market place.

1. @CoffeeGroundz

CoffeeGroundz is a popular, albeit modest, Houston, TX based independent coffee shop that sells a variety of locally roasted coffee, tea, pastries, sandwiches, and alcoholic beverages. There are a couple of booths, 16 tables and another ten on the patio. If you come to CoffeeGroundz, J.R. Cohen, its general manager, strives to make sure “you feel at home.”

Initial Twitter Goal:

To keep his angel investor happy (The general manager, JR. Cohen started using Twitter in October 2008 at the prompting of a CoffeeGroundz angel investor).

He went out of his way to interact with Houston customers following him on Twitter. Growth in followers was slow and organic, but the connections with followers were strong. He would ask his followers from Houston to “come into the store and ask for J.R.” J.R. then seized the opportunity to meet with each and every patron who asked for him by name, strengthening his bond with his followers. To J.R. and his customers “this is what social media is meant to be.”

Most interesting Twitter experience?

Halloween morning 2008, one of CoffeeGroundz’s regular customers, Sean Stoner (@maslowbeer), requested to place a ‘to-go’ order for a breakfast wrap. It is argued that Sean’s request for an order ‘to-go’ was the first of its kind on Twitter. And because J.R. is an avid user of the Twitter service, was able to reply quickly to Sean’s requests. With this reply, J.R. spawned a whole new way to place and receive an order online. JR seized on the opportunity to grant Sean’s request and started taking to-go orders via direct message from all of his Twitter followers. J.R., to this day, continues to receive ‘to-go’ orders via DM. Customers can also reserve a table/booth, order from the patio, or reserve the place for events through direct message.

2. @NAKEDPizza

Founded in late 2006 as one small store in New Orleans in an area that flooded during hurricane Katrina, NAKEDPizza (originally named World’s Healthiest Pizza) was launched as an ambitious business model that seeks to change the nutritional profile of fast food in America. By way of example, NAKEDPizza is demonstrating that pizza does not have to be part of the problem in our national epidemic of obesity and chronic disease, but in fact can be part of the solution.

Why Did They Start Tweeting?

Jeff Leach and Randy Crochet, co-founders of Naked Pizza, started using Twitter in March 2009. Mark Cuban, an early investor in the company (have to keep the investors happy), advised Jeff to sign up for a Twitter account to

• Help create a community around healthy eating
• Save on marketing costs
• Drive sales

Note: Interesting to note that 2 of the elements of the Twitter strategy were to reduce costs and increase sales

Marketing Challenge

There is a heavy focus on direct mail within the pizza industry, which proves to be particularly costly for owners. Opt-in newsletters cost $2000 to $3000 per year for even small database of names. Open rates are dropping to single digits and for small business owners, this can be prohibitively expensive. “Direct mail is sent to a single address but there are multiple people in those houses. We want to maximize and extend our marketing reach and Twitter helps us do this in leaps and bounds.” Jeff now takes that newsletter content and feeds it to Twitter.

Today, Jeff claims that Twitter is mission critical to his business, so much so that he has created a kiosk within his store, where customers can sign up for a Twitter account if they hadn’t already been users. In addition, right next to Naked’s online ordering page, there will be the Naked Pizza Twitter stream in case customers have questions about the company’s product offering.

How has  NAKEDPizza  used Twitter in interesting ways?

A custom Twitter button in the point of sale system. Naked Pizza relies heavily on tracking promotions that are fed into the company’s Twitter stream. In a test run April 23, an exclusive-to-Twitter promotion brought in 15% of the day’s business.

Takeaway: Keep experimenting (Jeff continued to experiment) and you will hit a home run… or two.

Note: On May 29th Naked Pizza set an in-store sales record, the bulk of which came directly from Twitter. A whopping 68.60% of total dollar sales came from customers who said “I’m calling from Twitter”.

3. @AmericanApparel

The Los Angeles company and leading basics brand provides hip clothing for people of all ages. Vertically-integrated American Apparel is the largest clothing manufacturer in the United States.

How and when did they get started?

American Apparel employees began exploring with personal accounts in 2007 and established @americanapparel shortly thereafter. The account was started by Lisa Kim from the web marketing department and now multiple people are involved with responding to comments Twitter users make about the company, taking advantage of the opportunity to interact directly with customers.

Most interesting Twitter experience?

American Apparel fans with blogs occasionally write posts with favorable mentions of the company or its products. In some cases, these AA fans use Twitter as a conduit to share their posts with the company directly. In one memorable encounter, Lisa @americanapparel received a DM from a freelance photographer (Ryan Marshal @ThePanicRoom) chronicling his wife’s pregnancy with week-by-week photos of the mother-to-be in American Apparel threads. After seeing the blog, Lisa and American Apparel liked the photo series so much that they not only provided the new mom with free clothes, but used the images as the basis for an ad campaign showing cute and comfy looks for expectant moms.

Lisa also connected her colleague in online advertising with the photographer to set up American Apparel advertising on the blog. They ran a unique banner ad for baby clothes, and the blog (pacingthepanicroom.com) became one of American Apparel’s top performing sites for online ads.

Takeaway: A serendipitous Twitter interaction can lead to fresh and creative ideas for engaging customers with campaigns outside of Twitter

4. @Pepsi or  @PepsiCo

Pepsi may be a classic brand, but it’s using 21st century tools to collaborate and build relationships with customers. See this post “Pepsi Forgets Super Bowl Advertising And Goes Super Social Media Marketing” For years, PepsiCo, based in Purchase, NY, has had a toll-free number that consumers can call to share product feedback. People call in all the time, and the company considers the line successful. But when Pepsi brand managers wanted faster and more personal ways to connect with soda drinkers, they looked online—and in January 2009, the team started using Twitter to listen to and talk with consumers. (The brand twitters as @Pepsi; the corporation twitters as @PepsiCo.)

“We’re trying to humanize the brand, to make it more accessible to consumers,” says Anamaria Irazabal, brand director for Pepsi. “On Twitter, they can complain or praise, and we can use it as a way to gauge how people are feeling.”

Reaching a new audience

Interestingly, the company finds the conversations on Twitter are different from those on the toll-free line. The callers, says Irazabal, tend to focus on products. Twitterers, on the other hand, tend to have opinions not just on the products, but on promotions, too. “They feel they’re invited to give their opinions on the how the brand should move forward, and they’re very detailed.”

After the spring 2009 launch of Pepsi Throwback—an initiative that involved packaging with a retro look and real-sugar sweeteners—the company was able to collect quick reactions on Twitter. The company has also found asking questions works well on Twitter. Even something as simple as “How many Pepsis do you drink a day?” generates a lot of chatter.

“Consumers own the brands as much as we do, and they want to share their interests and likes,” says Bonin Bough, director of social and emerging media for PepsiCo. “Twitter is the only medium where we can have a two-way continuous dialog about the brand.”

Fast response

Pepsi brand managers find that Twitter is useful not only for quick responses from consumers but for quick responses from the company, too.

When Michael Jackson—who made high-profile commercials for Pepsi during the 1980s—died suddenly in July, the company used Twitter right away in its “Thank you, Michael” tribute, engaging with fans. “We can move at the speed of culture,” says Irazabal. “Twitter means we can react to something that happens and provide a platform for dialog, That’s the key word. It’s about engagement and building the relationship.”

Dealing with complaints

Although Pepsi finds that nearly all of the conversation on Twitter is very positive, people do sometimes complain via tweets. The brand managers try to address negative comments very quickly.

“We try to gauge the overall tone and type of problem,” says Josh Karpf, manager of social and emerging media for PepsiCo. If somebody doesn’t like a piece of advertising, the company accepts that. But if a person has had a problem with a product or is attacking the company in some way, Pepsi has a process in place to resolve the issue directly. The company responds once in public, and if the person stays negative, they switch to DM and then to email or phone if needed. Internally, a cross-functional team can help solve problems.

“When we respond quickly,” says Irazabal, “people give us kudos.”

The logistics

Pepsi’s assistant marketing manager, Rachel Mills, works closely with two agencies to coordinate the @Pepsi Twitter account. With Mills’s oversight, one agency does the day-to-day twittering. But Mills sees all the tweets, and she gets involved if there’s a problem of any kind. Another agency helps Pepsi develop its digital promotion calendar three months ahead of time. The calendar—along with guidance on tone of voice and how to respond to certain types of comments—help Pepsi maintain a consistent brand presence across the Web, including its Twitter account.

Finally, Pepsi requires that staffers maintain personal accounts on social media sites—not to interact on behalf of the brand, but to learn about the channels. “It’s very hard to talk to agencies if you have never used the tools,” says Irazabal. “So we ask our teams to use these tools to learn what we can get out of them.”

Measuring success

Like many brands, Pepsi looks at the number of followers it has. But the company also looks at the sentiment of tweets, rating them on a scale from positive to negative. The balance changes from week to week, and the company—which considers itself to be in experimental phase with Twitter—is still figuring out what affects consumer feeling and how to measure it.

Takeaway: “We’ve got a lot ahead of us, and we’re learning every day.” In other words “Have a go”

Note: Now Dell has receieved so much press about it’s use of Twitter that I was thinking about not including it in the Twitter case studies but as I like the Number 5 (not 4) I had to include it. Sorry to those individuals that have overdosed on “Dell Twitter Love”.

5. @DellOutlet

Dell Outlet faces a common but vexing challenge. 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.

Holding Conversations

When company employee Ricardo Guerrero discovered Twitter at the South by Southwest conference in 2007, he thought he’d hit on a good channel for pushing out information. The rest of the team agreed. “We thought, ‘Great—this has a really short lead time, and it will let us communicate our message effectively,’” says Stefanie Nelson, manager of demand generation at Dell Outlet. “We started using it for one-way communication.” The company was surprised when people responded. “They wanted to ask questions. They wanted to share their experiences, good and bad,” says Nelson, who’s based in Austin, TX. “We realized that people were really interested in talking with us.”

Raising Awareness

So instead of using Twitter just to let people know about deals, the company has come to think of it as a good place to interact with customers—and to raise awareness about the brand. “When we respond to people on Twitter, they get really excited, and we gain advocates.” That doesn’t mean Dell Outlet has abandoned the deals. In fact, the company often posts offers that are exclusive to Twitter. They twitter only a few times a week so as not to spam their followers, and they use tracking URLs to gauge what followers find most appealing.

Increasing Sales

Do the coupons work? Big time. 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 more than $3 million in revenue attributable to its Twitter posts. In addition, the division has done research showing that awareness of the outlet has grown, too. “The uplift has been more than we dreamed,” says Nelson.

Connecting with customers

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).

Takeaway:It’s smart to reach out to your current customer base. They’re already interested in chatting with you, and they’ll tell other people about you. But no matter who’s following you on Twitter, “offering relevant information that people are interested in is key.”

How are you using Twitter for your business?

I would like to thank the Twitter Blog as the resource for the the above information

I am still hearing this deep and meaningful question at dinner parties, social moments and musings.

“I don’t understand this Twitter thing, isn’t it just people telling their friends what they had for breakfast or did last night , what’s the point of that!”

In fact, for a lot of people it is exactly that…a bit like a normal cross section of your average conversation to be frank, but Twitter is a whole lot more! (2,000 plus apps and counting), if you are willing to not just skim the surface but take a deep breath, dive deep and explore the Twittersphere.

So I thought it might be productive to look at some Twitter case studies and how different types of businesses are using Twitter to increase sales, drive traffic, use as a service tool and  add to their digital marketing toolbox.

1. @JetBlue

When JetBlue (an airline) joined Twitter in the spring of 2007, it was one of the first major brands to do so. Today, the company has over 1.6 million followers.

Why did they want to join Twitter?

• It wanted to help customers.

“Some people were asking for help, and others were saying things that weren’t correct,” recalls JetBlue’s manager of corporate communications, Morgan Johnston. He’d been spending time on Twitter search, and he’d realized that JetBlue customers, often on the move, were Twittering about travel problems. “You can only see that a few times before you want to jump in and do something.”

They started slowly, as it gave the company time to learn what worked and what didn’t. Johnston hit on what he calls the Twitter “kernel of truth”: be receptive to what your followers want. “Ask them on Twitter” and he got answers.

Skyblue also used it for

• Customer service—much of which other people don’t see because it happens via direct messages (Twitter’s private channel).

Current Twitter Resources: Half dozen staffers who can post directly to the Twitter account, plus he he has some backup staff resources

Next challenge: To staff the account 24/7, so that travelers at any time can get a quick reply.

Takeaway: Johnston says “Qualitative rather than quantitative improvements” is what Twitter is about, not ROI.

2. @TeusnerWine

Teusner Wine is a boutique winery in Australia’s Barossa Valley, has three employees. Dave Brookes is the sales and marketing department. A cycling fan, Brookes was watching the Tour Down Under in  January 2009 when he noticed that Lance Armstrong was on Twitter. “I followed him,” says Brookes.

What was their goal for using Twitter.

• To promote their business by” building relationships with customers and potential customers.”

He created a Twitter account for Teusner, and to get rolling, he used Twitter search for wine-related terms. When he found interesting and influential people talking about the business, he followed them. Then he started conversing about wine and interacting with them. When he finds them, he sends a friendly message. “We say, “Thanks for trying the wines, we’re really glad you’ve tasted them. G’day.’ They’re really surprised, and they’re happy to hear from us.”

Brookes, who keeps the exchanges relaxed, steers away from sales. “This is about building trust as well as relationships—and that comes from not selling.”

Since he started twittering, Brookes says more people are coming to the winery for tours. The company has seen an increase in traffic to its website, along with a jump in the number of people from the US and Canada ask where they can find Teusner wines at stores and restaurants near them.

What else does he use Twitter for

• Gathering feedback
• Sharing information

In addition to lots of chatting with Teusner customers and distributors (The Jug Shop in San Francisco (@JugShop) and Stokes Fine Wines in the UK (@JustinELLiddle) are both on Twitter), Brookes posts third-party reviews of the company’s wines; if they get a really stellar one, he might repost it a couple of times over a few days. He also shares information about tastings and dinners featuring Teusner wines, and he reports on what’s happening at the winery.

Takeaway: “It’s building, we’re establishing new relationships, and people enjoy what we’re doing.”

3. @Current

For the 2008 presidential elections, Current knew it had to do something different. The media company, headquartered in San Francisco, would receive the same live feed of the debates as every other broadcaster. Unless Current distinguished its coverage, viewers would have no particular reason to tune in.

As they cast around for ideas, Current staffers noticed something interesting during the conventions. When the candidates gave live speeches, there were surges of commentary on Twitter. “A lot of us are Twitter users,” says Current’s vice president of strategy, Robin Sloan, “and we saw this real-time commentary track that suggested a parallel to the commentary you normally hear on the news.”

Current realized that if people were twittering about the conventions, they would definitely comment on the debates.

Initial Goal

• Harnessing the surge of comments on Twitter and incorporating tweets into its broadcast.

How did they incorporate tweets into their broadcast?

Created an application with two levels of filtering.

• The first was a triage phase. About ten people searched Twitter for debate-related terms, and then quickly tagged any post that looked like it didn’t contain “profanity“, “hate speech” or material that would raise “copyright issues“.
• The second phase was actively curatorial. Three or four people looked at the queued messages from the first filter and then decided which of those would be shown on air.

How did they display the Tweets? Settled on the idea of having a stream of tweets roll up the screen and then dissolve about halfway up.

Throughout the election season, Current received a lot of attention—far more than it would have had it stuck to a traditional broadcast.: The company also received a lot feedback on the project. “Some people thought it was too aggressive, some thought it was just right,” says Lentz. “But everyone acknowledged that it was a great experiment and that in the world of a two-screened experience, we moved things forward.

Takeaway: By daring to be different and by experimenting, they stood out from the crowd.

4. @TastiDlite

The popular dessert franchise Tasti D-lite offers customers over 100 flavors of guilt-free frozen treats. Tasti has been beloved by customers in the greater New York area for over 20 years, growing to 50+ locations and continuing to open new locations while expanding its geographic reach. They weren’t sure initially how to take advantage of Twitter and use it to benefit the business. BJ Emerson is the Director of Information and Social Technologiesand and this is how he and his team applied Twitter to their business.

Initial Twitter Use: Using search to listen to what Twitter users were saying about tasti, its products, and its competitors.

He advises a three “m” approach to getting started on Twitter.

1. Monitor- “Using search to listen to what Twitter users were saying about tasti, its products, and its competitors”
2. Mingle- “Jump into the conversation and mingle with customers who were already talking about tasti and their New York dessert needs, using DM or @replies”.
3. Measure – “Create specific codes for each coupon that are entered into the point of sale cash registers at tasti locations to enable the tracking of coupon conversions and the resulting sales”

From the numbers, BJ concluded that Twitter coupon campaigns can outperform similar targeted ads on other social network platforms or certain PPC ads if Twitter is used effectively. However, BJ sees these efforts as merely the beginning of what tasti can do on Twitter. Next stop? Experimenting with paperless mobile coupon options and Twitter accounts for individual stores.

Takeaway: If you approach Twitter like a conversation and think creatively about how you can add value to followers, then you can use it effectively”

5. @Etsy

Etsy is an online marketplace for buying & selling all things handmade. Since launching in 2005, the Brooklyn, NY company has grown to over 65 employees. More importantly, over 250,000 sellers have opened up shop on Etsy to sell their handmade goods.

Etsy, just decided to  “just have fun” and experiment with using Twitter in a broad variety of ways.

• Alert followers to particularly creative products from Etsy sellers
• Share valuable tips & tricks
• Provide information about upcoming events and promotions on the site.
• Share information from individual Etsy sellers (via “retweets”),
• Monitor and respond to Etsy-related questions and concerns that users express via Twitter
• Garner feedback and ideas instantaneously, effectively creating focus groups from the @Etsy followers.
• Discover users’ favorite Etsy items, design blogs, and projects
• Tool for impromptu surveys and feedback

In Etsy’s experience, a company that constantly seeks to build community and, “voraciously” learn from its users will find that Twitter is, “amazing in the way it harnesses the collective brains of so many people.” For example, Anda recently tapped into the community to come up with helpful tips for craft fair season.

@Etsy has also realized that great content on Twitter has the opportunity to reach new users who were previously unaware of Etsy’s website. Anda often tweets about particularly unique and creative handmade items that Etsy sellers have listed. The coolest items are subsequently “retweeted” by @Etsy followers, exposing a broader audience to the handiwork of Etsy sellers.

Advice for other companies joining Twitter?

For a site specializing in handmade goods, there is no experience more flattering than being one of the first Twitter accounts to be followed by Martha Stewart (@MarthaStewart). That’s exactly the “spine-tingling excitement” Anda and @Etsy recently enjoyed. Anda’s advice to new companies? What she recently told the legend herself about how Etsy uses Twitter.

Takeaway: @MarthaStewart “To connect, listen, interact, get feedback from our users that use Twitter too. And to have a little fun while we’re at it”. 9:52 AM May 13th from Tweetdeck

So how are you using Twitter for your business?

I would like to thank the Twitter Blog as the resource for the the above information

Etsy is an online marketplace for buying & selling all things handmade. Since launching in 2005, the Brooklyn, NY company has grown to over 65 employees. More importantly, over 250,000 sellers have opened up shop on Etsy to sell their handmade goods.

How and when did you get started?

Etsy originally joined Twitter in December 2007 at the insistence of an early adopter within the company, but the account initially was underutilized. That is, until Anda Corrie (who manages the @Etsy account) saw the powerful ways many Etsy sellers were using Twitter to promote their handmade items and Etsy shops. Anda followed their feeds and learned how to make the best use of Twitter by observing the tweets of followers of @Etsy that she found to be insightful. As Anda points out, “Our community always comes up with great ideas.”

How does Twitter add value?

Etsy originally began using Twitter only to share new posts from Etsy’s blog, The Storque, which Anda now calls a classic Twitter “newbie mistake.”

After realizing Twitter could be more than just a RSS feed of the blog, Anda decided to, “just have fun” and experiment with using Twitter in a broad variety of ways. @Etsy now uses Twitter to alert followers to particularly creative products from Etsy sellers, share valuable tips & tricks, and provide information about upcoming events and promotions on the site.

Twitter is also used to share information from individual Etsy sellers (via “retweets”), monitor and respond to Etsy-related questions and concerns that users express via Twitter, and garner feedback and ideas instantaneously, effectively creating focus groups from the @Etsy followers.

In Etsy’s experience, a company that constantly seeks to build community and, “voraciously” learn from its users will find that Twitter is, “amazing in the way it harnesses the collective brains of so many people.” For example, Anda recently tapped into the community to come up with helpful tips for craft fair season.

According to Anda, “The best Twitter experiences are when you ask a winning question and get hundreds of captivating replies. It’s a super fast way to get info you’d spend hours searching for… and it’s valuable info as well.” Besides sourcing tips and tricks, Anda uses Twitter to discover users’ favorite Etsy items, design blogs, and projects. She also uses it as a tool for impromptu surveys and feedback (including feedback on how she can make the Etsy Twitter feed more valuable to followers).

@Etsy has also realized that great content on Twitter has the opportunity to reach new users who were previously unaware of Etsy’s website. Anda often tweets about particularly unique and creative handmade items that Etsy sellers have listed. The coolest items are subsequently “retweeted” by @Etsy followers, exposing a broader audience to the handiwork of Etsy sellers.

Etsy Day unites the community on Twitter

Individual Etsy sellers and groups of sellers known as teams have also found new and powerful ways to use Twitter to promote their shops. An exciting culmination of these grassroots efforts was on April 24, 2009 – otherwise known as “Etsy Day.”

Photographer and Etsy seller SchuGirl was surprised how few of her friends and family were aware of Etsy and decided to do something about it. She used the website’s Forums to a call to action, for Etsians to band together on April 24, 2009 and, “get the Etsy name out there in the brightest, sparkly-est, boldest way you can think of!” Etsy Day was born.

Advice for other companies joining Twitter?

For a site specializing in handmade goods, there is no experience more flattering than being one of the first Twitter accounts to be followed by Martha Stewart (@MarthaStewart). That’s exactly the “spine-tingling excitement” Anda and @Etsy recently enjoyed. Anda’s advice to new companies? What she recently told the legend herself about how Etsy uses Twitter.

@MarthaStewart To connect, listen, interact, get feedback from our users that use Twitter too. And to have a little fun while we’re at it.
9:52 AM May 13th from Tweetdeck