eCommunications for global organisations

…still, it seems to be quite an organic growth with no pre-defined output…

At our recent event organized with IABC & ING around ‘How web Strategies can transforming your communications’, Globecorp.biz made an interview with one of our panel speakers & clients, Colin Hensley, General Manager of Corporate Affairs and Planning at Toyota Motor Europe (TME) on Toyota’s usage of social media including the Aim Zero Emissions blog, the Green Design Channel and Twitter we set up as part of a campaign we helped to develop.

Colin has developed new ways of engaging with his key audiences and is now actively twittering and blogging about what’s happening on CSR at the heart of Toyota Europe. Here the interview:

The event discussion around how web strategies can transform communications of global corporations is not over yet: You can join the online discussion of the eventin the IABC Ning Community.

Based on 2009 research, Forrester has developed a simple profiling tool that maps out consumers depending on their age, gender and country to determine their level of online engagement.





The scale to measure consumers’ level of engagement is based on Forrester’s Social Technographics® which classifies consumers into six overlapping levels of participation (see a 6 slide presentation below). Not all European countries are represented; nevertheless it’s interesting to see e.g. the difference between the US and Europe.

Just came across this post by JustinSMV about the impact social media is likely to have going forward (a bit like a fresh version of the machine is us).  A good way to get your mind to focus on the strategic importance of these new tools when preparing yourself for 2010.  As the FT and the Economist recently declared the recession in Europe (ok at least for France and Germany) is (almost) over, it is time to start thinking about the future and how to plan for 2010 - but without going back to the bad old ways…

This should give you some inspiration.

Here an interview from a Social Media presentation I gave at The Hub last week together with Oihana (eMarketeer at The Hub):

I do believe that the shift towards social media is not only important for Corporate Marketers.

The fact that you have to become more transparent also means you have to start reviewing your current business operations: How compliant are we really? And how do our stakeholders perceive our performance?

Some years ago it would have been a great opportunity for a Business to move towards social & environmental responsibility to gain a competitive advantage. Today it becomes more and more a must to not fall behind your competitors and to avoid a potential crisis.

Being truly transparent does not only mean that a corporation needs to implement a CSR report that is compliant with GRI standards we are talking about a process of change management that is not to underestimate. It’s not just about the numbers but also about the motivations & meaning given to these values by each and every employee.

Only in the moment a researcher from the R&D division, your supply chain partners and the external maintenance guy live up to this philosophy and come to work every day because they truly believe they help save the environment and add benefit to the community by working for your organization, you can talk about a successful implementation of this approach. It’s not just a one off exercise. It’s rather a cultural transformation of the whole organization.

There’s too much fragmentation going on in Brussels. First there’s internal fragmentation of communications within organisations. Marketing are doing this, product guys doing that, issue specialists saying X, PR saying Y. Surely companies need to be better integrated. In particular, marketing and PA especially need to be telling the same story far more. Why? Because selling to consumers and legislators is a lot more similar than it was a few years ago. Marketing back then would have said: we’re cheaper and/or we’re better. PA would have said: we’re providing jobs and innovation. Now? They’re still saying that, but they’re both also saying “our company is a model citizen because of X, Y, and Z” and in this respect, there needs to be a lot more collaboration.

Beyond that, there’s what I’d call external fragmentation on issues, which is totally different, but is still about fragmentation, so I’ll put it in the same post. Call me lazy. What do I mean? That when looking at an issue for a client or prospect, everyone is always struck by the mess: multiple players at national level and pan-European level, public and private entities, associations and pressure groups, old media and bloggers. Even within the Commission say, DGs can have totally different priorities on an issue. People are talking about pharma this week: it’s now largely under DG Enterprise, but DG Sanco want it because surely Pharma is about health, they say. Whatever the outcome, fact of the matter is that their approach would be quite different.

In communications terms, what this fragmentation of players results is in turn a fragmentation of content and story which frankly makes an issue appear far more complex than you as an organisation want it to be. It’s hard to thrive within complexity because your story is one of a thousand; legislators might not have the time, the nous nor the willingness to really understand it well.

So what should you do about it? You create your own story that is tangible and relatively easy to digest of course. In addition, and more importantly, you should be the one player that makes sense of the fragmented landscape, and you can do it online. How? You become your issue’s portal by aggregating and hyperlinking content from all stakeholders in one online HQ available on your site - whether they’re private, public, competitors, pressure groups, media or bloggers.

What’s the point?

• You’re doing people a favour by making things easier. They’ll appreciate it.
• Making things easier will also enable people to understand your take on an issue more clearly, as well as understand it within the context of other stakeholders.
• The base assumption is that your argument is valid and that most of the content you bring in backs up your story. Assuming that’s the case, the outside content you bring in will give you the 3rd party credibility you crave.
• Becoming the focal point for web content will enable you to own the discussion online, naturally making you a key stakeholder rather than just one of many. Search comes into it too. By becoming an online hub, others will link to you and you’ll get better a search ranking on your key issues.
• You’ll showcase both sides of the argument (again, assuming your side is strong) and thus prove that you’re a fair and open player.
• You’ll have taken step one of the the four-step approach to online engagement. I’ll be building on this in the coming weeks, so watch this space.

This is a cross-post from Steffen’s blog.

On May 28th, I will be speaking at an event organised by IABC (the international association of business communicators). Helen Dunnett, client and leading Brussels blogger will be joining us alongside a panel of experts.

Check out the info below (from the IABC site) and register here

A broad panel of social networking practitioners discuss how to weave your issues into the fabric of web 2.0 and gain influence through wider engagement.

* From Facebook via Linked In to Twitter, more and more people
are interacting professionally and politically online.
* Major news vehicles are adding their voices to the blogosphere.
* Companies and institutions are increasingly YouTubing.
* Even Queen Elizabeth II is now using email.

And for the moment all you’ve got is a web site.
Your presence on the net is a billboard in a side street.
This seminar is designed to explore how your messages can leap off that wall and mingle with the crowds where they congregate.

Panelists include:

* Charles Crouch, eBusiness Lecturer at Boston University,
* Helen Dunnett, a pioneer of Web 2 for the ECPA trade association,
* Philip Weiss, internet entrepreneur and HyperThinker from ZN,
* Mathew Lowry, the driving force behind the launch of Blogactiv,
* And over the web, the UK’s influential blogger and podcaster Neville Hobson.

Date: 2009-05-28

Event time: 14:30 - 17:30

Venue:
Boston University in Brussels
Boulevard du Triomphe 174

1160 Brussels
Join us for an intense afternoon of presentations and discussions on how to navigate today’s information stream.
Places are limited by the venue so get your registration in now!
Only €60 (€90 for non-members).

Register for this event

I just picked up this recent post from Helen Dunnett (disclaimer: she is a client of ZN and we think she is great) on some feedback she received from various audiences in political communication when approaching the internet as a core communication tool.  Over the past year she has been sharing her experience and enthusiam about the web and it’s power to transform communication with her rapidly growing network. 

Her comments will be very useful for those trying to find the best way to explore the web as a core strategic tool in getting the right message out to the right audience.  We have, in the course of our many meetings with a number of players in the Brussels political scene been confronted by many similar questions so it is great to see them put from a client perspective, from someone who has been able to make the case for this and seen the benefits for her own organisation follow.

After reading the objections she has faced my suggestions to the bold communicators interested in taking this further are the following:

1) Everyone now accepts that the internet is an important and powerful tool in shaping perception on critical issues.  The key problem is they don’t know how to act on this knowledge.

2) A personal and direct exposures to the tools and the social networks that are driving this change is key to enable communicators to form the correct strategy.  So like or not, you need to sign up to a number of online networks (linkedin.com - which most people do passively, facebook.com, and others that you find interesting) and actively use the tools (by posting on forums in linkedin for instance). 

3) The right tools for you and your organisaton keep on evolving so it is best to do some background reading of ebooks and follow some blogs (Helen’s own called learning curve or the one written by my colleague Steffen could be a good starting point). 

4) Meet regularly with people (agencies, consultants, colleagues) so you can learn about what works and gain insights from other people who have faced similar situations than you.

5) Get started.  Take some small, below the radar, steps with some online initiatives to get comfortable with the territory.  Start a blog, take it personally and see for yourself how it can help to get your message accross.

6) Get help.  Once you have decided to move forward in this space, surround yourself with a strong team with the right advice and experience as well as technology, create a plan and sell this to your management.  Then go forward and start learning.

Twitter spreading the “gfails” message faster than ever and seriously impacting the brand in just a minute…

Twitter search on Gfail

This is a serious challenge for communication as time to react is getting close to real time. Not only the speed to market but also the source of information is switching from key stakeholders to the online community, creating a buzz or destroying your corporate image while you just had time to organize… a meeting.

The rules are changing and so the communication consultant have to adapt.

More on the Gfail issue on TechCrunch

Since some of our colleagues and clients (no names to be mentioned) have become quite addicted to twitter over the last months whilst I hear some of my friends question the benefit of ‘another networking tool’: here a video explaining the benefits of this simple invention.

Twitter in Plain English from leelefever on Vimeo.