The Top 10 Social Media Success Stories of 2012 & What We Can Learn From Them

The rush to capitalize on social networking in the past year has produced some amazing social media success stories that defy logic. Unfortunately, it’s also been responsible for far too many spectacular failures that never delivered on the promise of the medium. Creating a blockbuster social media campaign that confers superior ROI and makes an actual impact overall is equal parts art and science. The best approach is to look at what’s worked for others and emulate those examples. Here, in no particular order, are the most successful social media campaigns of 2012 and their inherent lessons to be learned.

1. Obama 2012

Granted, President Elect Barack Obama had the advantage of incumbency going into the 2012 U.S. Presidential Elections. Regardless, he made skillful use of social media to lock down an election that may have otherwise been a close race. Considering his popularity with young people and the use of social media by his main demographic, it was the wisest choice. In particular, the Twitter front and the use of the #Romnesia tag to frame the debate was clutch. The point is that social media success revolves around knowing your target audience and catering to them for the highest returns.
2. Share It Up from Hertz

Widely-recognized rental car company Hertz is a textbook example of an established company that uses social media in innovative ways to boost recognition and sales. Their Share It Up campaign on Facebook used social coupons to increase visibility. Users who shared coupons with their Friends on Facebook could accrue greater and greater discounts based on how much they proliferated the Hertz message. At least 45% of users who saw the coupon ended up sharing it. By offering a tantalizing discount on a common good, they amplified the power of social networking for greater long-term results that lasted.
3. Jetsetter’s Pin Your Way to Paradise

Pinterest has been a major boon to bloggers, large companies and small startups alike. It’s a natural fit for a site like Jetsetter, the travel portal that sparks the imaginations of vacationers worldwide. Their Pin Your Way to Paradise promotion garnered loads of interest and boosted referral traffic by a whopping 150%. This campaign is a perfect case study of how to match the appropriate networking site with the right business. As a social media success story, it’s a terrific blueprint for smaller brands who’re looking to raise awareness and make the most of what they’ve got.
4. Ikea

Swedish home furnishing giant IKEA pulled off a stunning social media success story with its interactive shopping catalog Celebrate Brilliantly. Located on IKEA’s U.S. website, it’s packed with video clips that incorporate sharing options for users who want to send gift ideas to family members and friends via Pinterest and Facebook. When shoppers see something of interest, they can click it to signify a Facebook Like or a Pinterest Pin. Their campaign demonstrates the value of making sharing seamless and easy, as well as the possibilities that come with user-generated content curation in a consumer setting.
5. Sharpie

For a company that’s been around since 1964, Sharpie knows how to refresh their image in imaginative ways. The Sharpie Equals… campaign made it easy for users to express how they felt about what the brand means to them. In addition, the company broadly embraced Facebook Likes, Twitter hashtags and more to keep themselves visible on the web’s most prominent forums. The key here is that even established brands can’t rest on their laurels. A bonus takeaway is that listening to customers and fishing for feedback to understand their concerns is one of the best uses of social media marketing in the 21st century.
6. Book Burning Party

Outright lies in a social media campaign are usually something to avoid, but they’re occasionally a great way to promote a cause. The humble city of Troy, Michigan, found that it couldn’t afford to pay its public library bills. So, they advertised a book-burning party on Facebook to publicize their plight. Rather than torch books, however, they focused attention on their dire situation. The lesson is that controversy can be a fickle fire to control. Still, it can be a potent weapon for philanthropic good. Using it for commercial reasons is even more of a crapshoot, so tread lightly.
7. Mercedes A Class

Luxury automobile companies typically have no shortage of advertising dollars. Mercedes-Benz isn’t an exception. What makes their unique promotion different is its take user interaction. Their option-based campaign in the vein of Choose Your Own Adventure put the power in the hands of the viewer by allowing them to control the outcome of their ads. It also added an element of excitement into the overall mix. The lesson to be learned from their promotion is that social media success stories ultimately depend on involving the recipients of the advertising. A high degree of participation from your target audience is ultimately crucial.
8. Live Off Groupon

Brought to you by a “regular guy” by the name of Josh Stevens, the Live Off Groupon promotion highlighted the possibilities of a down-on-its-luck startup looking for a second, redemptive shot at glory. The gist of the promotion was this: one ordinary man would live off of Groupon discounts for a whole year. It was a risky proposition and its results are dubious. However, it managed to achieve an organic surge in interest for a beleaguered web company quickly losing clout. The first lesson is that the word “free” carries some serious currency. Secondly, an outside-of-the-box promotional idea is a legitimate path to social media success if implemented correctly.
9. Tweet Pie

Sometimes, the minimum amount of content can reap the maximum amount of rewards in the field of social media success. Tweet Pie began as a way to publicize a charity known as FoodCycle. In its short time on the Interwebz, it took on a life of its own. Using 140-character recipes, it successfully crowdsourced the collective knowledge of its users for the betterment of all and furthered a rather noble goal. Quite possibly the best example yet of a campaign that fully leverages the power of social media, it’s well worth emulating when devising a social media success story of your own.
10. Southwest Airlines’ LUV2LIKE

Facebook fans of Southwest were given the promotional code “LUV2LIKE” in order to promote the “Wanna Get Away” flights this fall. By booking flights in advance, customers could take advantage of a 50% discount on flights all over the world. Granted, Southwest probably lost a decent amount of money through this promotion. Regardless, it conferred a lot of popularity and attention to a company in an industry hurting for revenue. The lesson here is that coughing up dough in the short term can really help to boost profits in the long term through social media campaigns that spread like virtual wildfire.
The Larger Lesson
The most important component in any social media success story on every level is people. From business people to consumers to the marketers that attempt to bring them together, the actors involved in any social media campaign matter the most. Familiarity with social media tools is just one part of the equation. Knowing how to use those tools creatively is far more important. If you want your next campaign to be a social media success story, you’ll need to provide serious ingenuity in spades to pull it off and stand apart from the crowd.

Nearly Every Business Can Bring Their Audience Together With Basic Community Building Principles

Most community literature can be boiled down to this: 'get people in the same room and get them to talk to each other'. If you can do this, you’re usually doing a great job. If you're a business, getting your audience talking in the same room is easier than you think.
For example…

• A plumber can host a monthly gathering of customers where he demonstrates how to fix basic plumbing problems. Teach customers some basic trade skills and ensure they enjoy talking to each other. Perhaps team up with a mechanic and an electrician for a big winner.

• A pizza place can invite their best customers each month to an evening of free pizzas. Drinks, pizza and food. Nobody will turn down free pizzas. They might just enjoy meeting up with each other too.

• A communications consultancy can book a venue every month, provide free dinner and drinks to clients. It's simple to organize, clients might like the networking opportunity and you become the centre of your client's community. 

• A super-huge organization can invite their best customers to come by to the headquarters once a month. They can give honest feedback to the company whilst enjoying the open discussions, drinks, food and first look at new products.

Do you notice a pattern? By offering something ridiculously simple (free food and drink, usually) you can bring the people you want to talk to each other into a place where they will talk to each other. This is such a cost-effective step to building a sense of community, it's staggering more companies don't do it.

Different Types Of Communities

There are, broadly speaking, five different types of communities.

1. Interest. Communities of people who share the same interest or passion.
2. Action. Communities of people trying to bring about change.
3. Place. Communities of people brought together by geographic boundaries.
4. Practice. Communities of people in the same profession or undertake the same activities.
5. Circumstance. Communities of people brought together by external events/situations.

About 90% of community projects, especially branded communities, try to develop a community of interest. But a community of interest competes without our mental leisure time. Communities of interest are the hardest type of community to develop.
Why not consider exploring the other four types of community. It might set you apart from the competition and broaden your audience considerably.

The 11 Fundamental Laws Of Building Online Communities

1. You must have a community manager. You absolutely must have someone who wakes up worrying about your community every morning.
2. Your community must have a purpose. Your community must have a purpose that matters to the people you’re trying to reach. You shouldn’t be creating the purpose, you should find a purpose a lot of people care about and build a community around it.
3. You must use whichever tool/platform your members are most familiar with. Don’t use MySpace if your audience isn’t on it. Don’t use the shiniest or most obscure tools available. Use whichever tool your audience is most familiar with.
4. You must create content about your community. Communities are about people, make sure you write about community members as much as you write about your organization.
5. You must build personal relationships with your top members. If you want to have real authority, you must be liked by the people who your community respects. You need to have good, two-way, relationships with your top members.
6. You must let heated debates happen. Good debates are vital for successful communities. You should let them happen, if not encourage debates on topics of controversy.
7. You must begin building the community before you launch the website. Don’t have a dead launch today. Work slower. Connect people before you launch the website. There should be a huge need for the website before you launch it.
8. You must recognise individual contributions from members. People should love to be recognised as much as you should love to recognise them. Recognition is free to give and the most important way to encourage further contributions.
9. You must encourage members to recruit friends. The best way to grow an online community is by referrals. You must create a referral strategy which includes tactics for members to invite their friends.
10. You must share control and power with members. You need to hand over control and power to members to help run parts of your website. This increases their involvement and ownership. In turn they will continue recruiting their friends and increasing their level of activity.
11. You must not use your admin powers unless absolutely necessary. …the best community managers are those that use their admin powers as little as possible. Every post you remove is an admission of failure. You let the wrong members in, didn’t create the right environment, can’t command authority without a big stick…

Day 3

Linkedin
- How to Create a Strong LinkedIn Profile
-10 Tips To A More Professional LinkedIn Profile

Creating an Online Community
http://www.feverbee.com/2013/02/how-to-build-an-online-community.html

-The 11 Fundamental Laws Of Building Online Communities

-Voting Systems

Different Types Of Communities

Basics Community Building Principles

- Settings Targets For Your Online Community

- Develop Community Management Strategy

- A Simple Formula For A Successful Online Community

- Don’t Target The Wrong People

Managing an Online Community

- High Value Community Management

- Attaining Power And Influence

- Social Media Engagement

- Community Guidelines

Businesses which have succeeded using social media

The future of Social Media 

What next? Bleeding edge social media

Course Summary

How to Create a Strong LinkedIn Profile

How strong is your LinkedIn profile? A powerful profile can increase your visibility online. You may or may not know that when your profile is 100% complete, you will get a higher search ranking. Your LinkedIn profile is key to your online success, because potential partners, clients, recruiters, and employers use LinkedIn as one of their first stops to assess you. It’s important to have as much of your profile completed as possible, because it helps with your personal branding. Recruiters are known for searching through LinkedIn to fill positions, because it’s an amazing resource, and it’s free. Passive job seekers and those not looking for employment should also have a profile that is 100% complete if possible, because you want to make a good first impression if anyone “googles” your name. One which is 85% complete is also acceptable, but anything less than that, and you have some work to do. Below are some tips on how to create a strong LinkedIn profile. The sections necessary to finish in order to have a 100% complete profile, are highlighted in red.

Photo Courtesy of bpsusf on Flickr

Resume – You MUST upload your résumé to complete your profile. Doing so also automatically fills in the information in most of the sections, and brings you to about the level of 75% complete. You might have to tweak it and check for spelling before saving changes. If you choose not to upload your résumé, and manually complete all information, your LinkedIn profile will be at 85% complete (without recommendations). There will still be enough details on it to make a good impression.
Photo – Besides your name, the first thing people will notice is your photo. Not having one is a mistake. You should use a sharp, well-lit portrait with a solid or blurred background, and have it on most networking sites, i.e. Facebook. This consistency helps brand you online. Consider uploading your photo to Gravatar which is an image that uniformly identifies you on various sites.
Professional Headline – This is located just below your name, and is usually your current position, but it’s better to have a headline that describes what you do, rather than just stating a job title. Click edit near your name, and make your change where it states Professional Headline. The use of strong keywords is wise.
Employment – You need to add your current and previous two positions. If you’re just starting out or have been out of the job market for a while, the positions can be part-time jobs, internships or volunteer work. If you are unemployed and need help completing this section, read this post for further advice.
Education – List your highest levels of education. You don’t necessarily need to have a degree (yet) to list your college or university. You just can’t claim a degree for it. The same goes for high school. If you are working on your G.E.D. you can list your high school, but you can’t claim having your diploma. You can now add school activities and societies, so add whatever you have participated in.
Websites – Instead of keeping the default settings of Company Website, Personal Website, and Blog, the actual names of the sites should be listed. This gives a more polished look, which you can achieve in a minute. Choose to edit your profile, then in the section for websites, click edit for the first site listed. Where it lists the type of site, click to get a menu and choose “other”. Fill in the name of your site in the box to the right, and the URL in the box below “other”. You can do this for up to three sites, and then click “Save Changes” at the bottom. If you don’t have a company or personal website, or even a blog to share, you can add your Facebook, Flickr or YouTube accounts if you’d like. Be careful what you share on these sites, especially if you list them. Never say or upload photos or videos that you wouldn’t want a future employer to see. Consider fine tuning your Facebook URL or WordPress blog posts with these tips.
Twitter – Not everyone has a Twitter account, so this is not necessary to add, but if you have one or two accounts, please list them. Also remember to keep your tweets as professional as possible if you list your account(s). Check here for Twitter tips.

Public Profile – You can edit your LinkedIn Public Profile URL to customize it to contain your actual name, i.e. http://www.linkedin.com/in/johndoe.  Also, to improve your SEO (Search Engine Optimization), select “Full View” to increase your ranking.

Summary -  This should be a concise version of your employment history and specialties. It’s perfect for people to get an overview of your skills before having to scroll down to view your detailed experience.

Specialties – Use as many keywords as possible to describe your capabilities. Consider using Google Keyword Tool to find appropriate keywords that have the most search hits. This section can really boost your LinkedIn SEO by providing essential words recruiters are searching to locate you.

Experience – The more details you give, the better recruiters can find you via search engines. Tip: At the end of each position’s description, skip a space and write a string of all of your keywords for that position for improved LinkedIn SEO.

Applications - Add third-party applications, which can be found at the top bar. Click on “More” and the drop down menu will give you choices, i.e. SlideShare, WordPress or Box.net to share your work from other sources right on your profile page. Events and TripIt are both great apps for sharing upcoming events and travel. I sometimes find out about panel discussions or seminars by viewing the schedule of others. These applications help to customize your profile.

Groups – It’s a good idea to join as many groups in your industry as you can keep up with. It’s a great place to exchange ideas. or help one another with obstacles.

Recommendations – It is suggested to have three recommendations. You actually need them to achieve 100% completion of your profile.

Personal Information – This is optional, and many people feel uncomfortable listing this. If you have a Google Voice or a business number you don’t mind listing, it will give people another option of how to contact you.

Contact Settings – Here’s where you can add an e-mail address if you’d like. Where it asks: What advice would you give to users considering contacting you? You can add any contact information including your e-mail address, which can be your company e-mail, or web-based address, i.e. gmail or hotmail. FYI, some might be skeptical of a web-based account due to the fact that spammers use them.

Profile Layout - You can rearrange your sections in the edit mode by dragging the section to where you want it to be. This gives you a chance to customize the order of your profile.

10 Tips To A More Professional LinkedIn Profile

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/professional-linkedin-profile/