In recent marketing history every brand and their mother have been talking about using the most popular social media outlets at hand, in this case, Twitter, for promotion. Well, the companies may be tweeting, but is anyone listening? A study just came out today suggesting that companies still aren’t in on the conversation.
Now this study only considered a sample of 1,800 tweets, which you can only imagine is a fraction of the eternal chirping going on, but if we did assume that the results are a fairly accurate representation of the whole, the study concludes that brands are still having a one-way conversation.
So here’s the deal: 90% of tweets are posted by individual – or “real” – people. Of these tweets, only 12% mention a brand name. Which brand name do you think constitutes most of these shout-outs? Yup, Twitter itself. What other companies made the short list? Apple, Google, YouTube, Microsoft, Blackberry, Amazon, Facebook, Snuggie, ebay and Starbucks, in that order.
Another nifty fact – only 1% of the “real” tweets that mention brands actually volley back and forth in conversation. Which in effect means that most marketers aren’t really using this SOCIAL tool effectively. What would effective Twittering consist of? Holding conversations and creating relationships.
I know that even the most lovingly devoted of us who swore we’d never get enough of the Old Spice guy are getting a little tired of seeing the coverage EVERYWHERE, but I just have to point to the personalized campaign as the epitome of how a brand utilizes social networks, Twitter for certain, to make things, well, personal.
As for Snuggie making Twitter’s most-popular list, all I can say is that I can’t in good fashion conscience condone the promotion of Snuggies (I’m not personally a fan of the robe-backwards look). But I got an ad in the mail the other day from Bed Bath and Beyond with the following ad. Am I crazy, or is this just wrong??
