Avoiding Social Media Weak Sauce

A lot of small businesses are using social media. But it is interesting to see how few businesses are actually using social media well. Unfortunately, not many of them do.

Most still approach social media as if were just another place to put their billboard. How many times have you seen a Facebook page or Twitter post history that consist of nothing but product blurbs?

What they fail to see is that they are missing great opportunities to start conversations with potential customers. They aren’t harnessing the ability to build community around their brand.

Often times, there seems to be a correlation between companies with weak interaction skills and companies that don’t really seem to have a coherent brand. If a company doesn’t even understand brand, then of course they won’t get how everything can be an extension of their brand.

Could it be that the same mentality that doesn’t understand the concept of “brand” can also be linked to organizations that don’t even want to venture in to social media?

Like social media engagement, early brand management was stymied by an inability to show direct quantifiable results. Despite that, there were some who rode the hunch – who understood the power of a strong brand and used it to build business empires. Today the value of a strong brand is not only quantifiable, but often times what failing businesses lack most of all.

I am not contending that Social Media alone can bring in these kinds of numbers, but it can strengthen a brand. After all, isn’t a Brand ultimately a means to build a group of people who favor your product. Isn’t that what successful social media does as well?

A few companies really do understand how to leverage the power of social media when it comes to a more practical aspect – like customer service. You’ll see a lot of great examples on Twitter.

Companies like Zappos or Quicken Loans aren’t just using the web to make the customer feel a little more empowered or validated – they’re giving customers – and, in turn, the customer service rep – the power to instantly address concerns.

They realize what other companies miss: that the interaction doesn’t end once the service problem has been addressed. It continues beyond the transaction – as the satisfied customer spreads the story of the experience through e-mail, word of mouth, Twitter. In doing so, these customers are strengthening a company’s brand and helping secure future business.

For many companies, the step into social media is be a big one. For those that not only adopt it, but really use it to its potential, the rewards can build and sustain platforms to gain valuable insights and future revenue.

If you have seen any other good examples using other web venues, we’d love to hear from you.

Behind the Scenes: Filming with The RED ONE

You’ll have to excuse us if we get a little geeky for a minute.

A few months past, we were lucky enough to get our hands on a genuine marvel in digital video – The Red One, an HD camera that is poised to revolutionize digital video as we know it.

We put it to test – with help from Bill Gerring and the crew from Spectrum Films – on a recent Avera Heart Hospital shoot. And it was all we expected – and more.

Check us out, on location: playing with the fancy camera, executing beautiful videography, and rocking out with Avera Heart Hospital.

Whale Insurance

This might be older, but I’ve seen a lot over the past few weeks.

Uh… Er…

Okay. So I understand the value of building your brand. And I certainly get making your logo memorable. I applaud the use of simple image branding.

But… Uh…

Well, I guess I’m wondering - what am I missing here?

Because if you take the copy out of this spot (and let’s face it - the copy is no more than a logo and “Mutual Funds, Annuities, Life Insurance”) I challenge anyone to understand what the blankety-blank this company is trying to sell.

Whale-watching tours? Life jackets? Pacific Ocean cruises? Moby Dick? OH, WHAT… LIFE INSURANCE?

Is it life insurance FOR WHALES, AT LEAST?

Hooray Sioux Falls!

There’s something to be said for loving where you live.

It’s one of the things that drives us at HenkinSchultz – and I’m sure it’s what drives all of us, in all of the agencies across this dusty village.

A love for this city. A love for the people who live here. And a love for the opportunity to be creative – especially when it comes to working on local projects.

Warning. Things might get a little sappy from here on out. It’s a passion, this city, despite the snark that says you’re not supposed to like where you live.

There’s a reason we’re all here in one place – here in flyover-country, where the hills are barely hills and the houses are still cheap. Where the financial crisis has barely hit us – at least, not in the way it has elsewhere – and where we’re relatively safe and happy and content.

Most of us couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

HenkinSchultz has worked (and continues to work) on some great Sioux Falls-related campaigns over the past several years – from the Sioux Falls Convention and Visitors Bureau to Downtown Sioux Falls to the Sioux Falls Area Chamber of Commerce Annual Meeting.

We’re excited and proud to have our name associated with the most recent news from the Sioux Falls CVB – the release of a new video designed to promote Sioux Falls for conventions, events and sports tournaments. It was a fun project. Of course it was fun – after all, we love this place. And of course it was exciting. It gave us a chance to celebrate this city.

We’re not alone in this. Despite the size and perceived shortcomings, Sioux Falls is teeming with creativity, featuring a talent base you’d expect in a much larger community.

Go ahead. Ask the people who judge our yearly South Dakota Advertising Federation ADDY® awards. Ask the nationally-renowned ad peeps we bring in for SDAF meetings. We’re small town at heart, but we’re big time when it comes to talent.

Sure, there’s something to be said for loving where you live. But there’s even more to be said about the passion to create. It’s when the two come together that you truly realize how fortunately you can be to work with great people in a great industry in a great city.

Thanks, Sioux Falls. For being, you know, so flippin’ awesome.

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About HenkinSchultz

HenkinSchultz is an agency. An advertising and marketing and branding and design and production agency. All of those things, and then some.

But, underneath all that, we're really a bunch of thinkers. As in, we think about stuff, both pertinent and not, with and without boundaries, as if our lives depended on it. And this right here, Post Haste, is where we write about it.

Visit us at http://www.henkinschultz.com.

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