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Why Facebook Complaints Miss the Point

Why Facebook Complaints Miss the Point

By now you have heard of the Facebook changes coming, and seen the already implemented ones. If you have logged into Facebook today you have seen the complaints starting, and believe me they are just starting. Here is why complaining is pointless, and you either need to decide to ride the changes and find the benefit of the new service to you or simply disappear.

Facebook Complaints are Rampant Today

Facebook Complaints

Now these are my friends and they are each connected to hundreds if not thousands of people on Facebook, which is the reason they are speaking out. If it was not for those connections most of them would likely leave, cancel their accounts, or greatly curtail their Facebook activity. That is not the case however.

Most people see themselves as Facebook’s Customer.

The user is not Facebook’s Customer. Facebook provides access to their network without charging the users. Facebook is collecting Data, documenting your life, your connections, your marital status, your location, your dining preferences, the companies you like, where you travel, which brand of soap you use etc etc etc. They are doing this to sell that information to companies that wish to sell to you.

Remember this: The time that you invest in your facebook profile, the updates, and every other way you share, is the work that Facebook sells.

So what is the next move? You can make a choice as to how much of that information is OK to share, and adjust your usage. You and your significant other can decide that having Facebook aware of your relationship is not worth the marketing, or you can decide that it is.

You don’t have to use Facebook.

Shocking? Well it shouldn’t be.

Two examples of groups addicted to Facebook:

I understand the appeal of Facebook for adolescents. They are looking for their place in the pecking order and with the opposite sex, so it seems normal that they would be addicted to perfecting their profile picture and posting things that make them look ahead of the crowd and cool. Facebook provides that platform like no other.

Once you are an Adult is Facebook’s level of self centered-ness a healthy way to portray yourself? With the epidemic of divorce, those who are soul mate searching have a natural pre-disposition to use Facebook as a way to browse prospects and showcase themselves in the best light possible. It is a normal and powerful human urge that Facebook understands, and they profit off of the amount of information the 800 million users provide. Is that wrong? No the info is willingly provided.

To these groups it would be hard to stop using Facebook, which is exactly what they want. So they know they can continue to tweak their design, functionality, and data collection techniques to continue to make more and more money.

Mark Zuckerberg is worth 17.5 Billion Dollars, and they haven’t gone public yet.

Do you think it is ironic that most of the complaints about Facebook are conveyed with Facebook? Do you think that people making this much money doing what they are doing are going to change what they are doing as long as the people who complain about it are using Facebook to complain? There is only one way to go if you don’t like it…

The best complaint you can make is to leave.

If you do want to leave, and you have had enough of the childish games, and the amount of information about your personal life that they have collected and continue to find new ways to highlight, you can. There are several new services, the most promising of which is Google+, that take privacy very seriously. I love it there, and like everyone else, I just wish more of my friends were using it.

You can find me on facebook Here, on twitter Here, and on google+ Here.

Have a great day.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.
Filed Under: Facebook, Google+, Just Think, Twitter Tagged With:
Social Media Monitoring for Marketing

Social Media Monitoring for Marketing

Where are you when your potential customers are talking?

Social media provides a chance to hear things you would never hear before, find customers you would never find before, and make connections that lead to sales you would never make before. The key is to be there to capitalize on the thought, comment, mention that your customer makes, when they make it. You have to have the system in place to make it possible, your finger has to be on the shutter to capture the moment.

Are companies really doing that? Yes.

Here is an example from today that will illuminate the way companies are using social media monitoring to build brand awareness and make connections with proven customers. Earlier I stopped by Whole Foods to pick up some Burrata Mozzarella, a creamy fresh mozzarella that is one of a kind. While there I checked in with Foursquare and tweeted my checkin as shown here:

What Followed that Tweet was a Retweet by the brand that I bought. Notice I never mentioned a brand name, just the variety of the mozzarella. So how did the company know it was theirs? I uploaded a photo of the package with my checkin. That means the company was monitoring twitter for mentions of Burrata (they didn’t follow me prior to this) and were aware of my tweet and the fact that it was their product, they then re-tweeted my post. That all happened in 40 minutes. Not bad.

As you can see a subsequent conversation took place about their product and who knows how many people noticed and didn’t comment.

Social Monitoring used in marketing

 So how do you do this cost effectively?

You need to use tools that monitor the mentions for you. You can’t spend all day watching, and you can’t pay someone either, unless you are GM or Verizon etc. I use Spoke Social which I am involved in developing. Here is an example of the monitoring screen that Spoke has for setting up the keywords and other parameters:

Spoke Monitoring Set-Up Page

As you can see I set it up to monitor for mentions of Brunch or Sunday Brunch, within 25 miles of my restaurant Evenfall, as I am going to be starting brunch there in October. So now each time someone mentions that term within 25 miles of Evenfall I will be notified and able to message them an invitation. Will they all come? No. Will they have an interest in brunch? Likely. Will it cost me much time, money, or anguish to do it. Definitely not.

This is the type of Marketing Use that monitoring tools can have.  They are most often used as a customer service tool to make sure that any disgruntled customer taking to social media and venting about your brand can be contacted and the situation rectified.

If ideas and examples like this interest you, you can subscribe for free here: (It would make me happy too.)

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What do you think? Is monitoring interesting? It is not expensive, in fact it is one of 40 features that spoke has for $15 a month. I am here to answer questions for you, @spirocks on twitter or in comments below. 

I am Spirocks on Twitter.
Filed Under: Facebook, Google+, Local Market Strategy, Restaurant Marketing, Tools, Twitter Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
Business Communications with Google Plus

Business Communications with Google Plus

Google Plus for Company Communications

I thought I would share an example of the way that I am using Google Plus to strive for better communication with the employees of one of my restaurants. I created a circle in Google Plus and added all of the employee emails that I knew (I am hunting the rest as we speak), and set out to use that circle as a way to connect with everyone. When something new is added to the menu, when we run into and issue during service that needs to be addressed, when I decide to open or close for a holiday, and any other time that I want to contact the staff this will be the method. Of course I will still be managing verbally while I am present at the restaurant, but this is not a business where everyone is there from 9 to 5, Monday through Friday.

Some Employees work two shifts a week, and it has been up to me and a few managers to convey all the changes to each member of the staff when they came in. Until now.

Google Plus employee communications

This is the first message I sent to the staff to introduce them to the fact that I am going to be using this tool to communicate with them. It is my hope that I will be able to create learning moments from any snag we hit during service by bringing it to everyone’s attention as it happens with the hope that I can prevent the rest from stumbling over the same issue before it is resolved.

With access to this circle via my mobile and desktop I will be able to communicate with the entire staff when the need or solution arises, and that convenience is something that I believe will allow me to be better at what I do. With two restaurants and a growing marketing company my time is in demand and having the ability to communicate like this is a godsend.

Why Google Plus?

Well the greatest reason is that I can create the circle with just their email addresses and whether or not they are using Google Plus already I can contact them. It simply emails the contents of my messages to them if they are not G+ users already. You can’t do that with the friend request format of Facebook, and though I love Twitter it’s short messages and lack of a true group messaging function eliminates that as well. So Google Plus races to the forefront. The ease of setting up a circle is very key as well.

In the future I anticipate the ability to incorporate other Google properties such as: (Google Calendar – Scheduling and Google Documents – Training Materials) With Photos and Youtube there really is little limitation to where you can go with this.

Waiting for an Invite? Here You Go

If you would like to receive updates to this process and other thoughts on driving your business into the future all you have to do is:

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I am Spirocks on Twitter.
Filed Under: Google+, Tools Tagged With: , , , ,
Social Proof helps Launch a Restaurant

Social Proof helps Launch a Restaurant

Social Proof (noun) – The impact that an individual’s friends and acquaintances have on their likely hood to buy a product or service from a brand, derived from the commentary and activity the friends and acquaintances have with the brand on social networks and in social settings.

Ok so like I said in the video, Andolini’s has been open to the public for less than two full nights as I write this and I wanted to give examples of many kinds of social proof that have happened already. Its a motivator to be out there and get involved, and to ask for help if need be. This results in sales as you will see right now.

Open Announcement and Reactions Social Proof

Spirocks.com - Social Proof Example

Here you can see a post on my personal facebook page where I announced that Andolini’s was open. You can see that in the hours since it was posted 10 people have liked it and three more have commented. What this means is a few things:

  1. A high level of engagement will likely push this post into the ‘Top News’ feed, which will result in just about all of my friends and all of these people’s friends seeing the post and comments.
  2. By commenting on this, each of these people have brought it to the attention of all their friends via their Wall, where facebook places a notification that Dental Bright ‘likes’ the post.

Interaction and Testimonial Social Proof

As you can see here we have posted several photos of the food that we are serving at Andolini’s which a customer who had been waiting for us to open saw. The restaurant being responsive and answering him in a timely fashion is key here, and I think it is clear that he will be in soon. Down at the bottom Mr. Newman had been in the night before and posted a comment that serves as a quick review and endorsement. This post is a great example of social proof for a couple of reasons:
  1. Interaction via the posts comments led to Mat letting us know he was coming soon, any of his friends who see his post will take that as an endorsement and be more inclined to try the restaurant.
  2. A customer that has already come in raves and encourages people to try it. You don’t need me to explain why that is social proof I hope!

Third Party Generated Social Proof

This example differs from the previous two because in this case neither I nor the restaurant initiated any of the posting, it was purely the result of these people being inspired by something they saw or heard about Andolini’s. This is the best kind of social proof, because their friends will see that they were inspired to post and the friends will have a natural curiosity as to why.

The Social Proof of a Champion

Social Proof of a Champion

Champion (noun) – An individual who is devoted to your brand and is passionate about promoting it for you.
As I have been writing what you have been reading, the above dialogue has been going on on facebook. The social proof of a Champion is a nice thing to nurture and enjoy. In this case the role of Champion is played well by Meah, who starts by praising the restaurant after her first visit tonight. When a friend of her refers to another Italian restaurant in a neighboring town she quickly re-iterates her preference and strong endorsement for our new place. You can see from the rest of the comments that having a champion is a great source of social proof.

Social to Sales – Social Proof

This is actually a husband and wife, and as you can see a post leads to them coming in for dinner immediately. Which is nice as that is the end goal, that in itself is not the social proof. Though it is proof that social media leads to sales. :) Anyway the proof is in the fact that these messages were broadcast to all their followers on twitter, who may very well be influenced just by that, and or ask them how it was today. Anytime a customer shares the fact that she/he is spending money at your place with all their social contacts, repeat after me: THAT IS SOCIAL PROOF.
I have ton more screenshots to share, but I think you get the point by now. If you want to see more just check out the gallery at the bottom of this post.

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If you are interested in what me and my team at GuestFeed can do for you at your business or in your professional practice, you can contact me here, on twitter @spirocks, at spiro@guestfeed.com, or at 617-379-3015.
I am Spirocks on Twitter.
Filed Under: Facebook, Google+, Just Think, Realty Marketing, Twitter Tagged With: , , , ,
Google Plus Customer Management

Google Plus Customer Management

So I am embarking on a new project with my clients, to utilize the tools google has given us in Google plus to organize and market to their customers, prospective customers, and the world in general. First we are using gmail to maintain customer database, and then we are organizing these customers into circles by things they have in common. For instance a realtor is grouping buyers into price range circles, and town circles. In this way she will be able to share only that which is relevant to each group and never be intrusive.

Here is a video explaining a bit more about circles:

Even if the customer is not using Google Plus she will receive an email notifying her of what the realtor is sharing, the versatility of Google Plus will allow my client to share the stunning photos, videos, and written work we do with her in a variety of ways. Gmail will allow her to record all pertinent contact details both at her computer and via her smartphone. Here is the variety of information that Gmail will manage for each customer:

Gmail Contact Information Capabilities

Gmail Contact Information Capabilities

As you can see for a small business or professional the contact data is clearly sufficient with multiple notes sections that can be added for further customization. Couple that with the amazing google plus sharing technology, including video chat, and you have a dynamic FREE CMR and Marketing solution for the mobile entrepreneur and professional.

I will explain further in this video:

Let me know what you think in the comments, or hit me up on twitter: @spirocks

I am Spirocks on Twitter.
Filed Under: Google+, Mobile, Tools Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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