Recently, the Gunn|Jerkens team tried something new – hosting a nationwide social media workshop via webinar! With 14 participants, representing three time zones, the webinar provided insightful information to building industry executives eager to turn their companies into social businesses and propel their brands to the next level.
The dialogue was great. Attendees asked numerous questions, engaging the Gunn|Jerkens team in the ongoing conversation about social media and its impact on new home sales and the consumer buying cycle.
We’re continuing to see measurable results with the use of social media. After tracking the behavioral patterns of potential homebuyers through the buying cycle, social media has proved to be a powerful link in nurturing brand-consumer relationships as buyers weigh all their options and conduct product research online. The focus of the recent national webinar concentrated on the current state of the social world, employing conversational engagement as opposed to traditional push marketing techniques, successful social media strategies, understanding how to measure ROI and the future of the digital and online marketing.
The conversation is only beginning! If you want to join the conversation, contact us to get connected and stay tuned for the next workshop coming to an area near you.
Do you remember your first day of school? It was that day when everything we did started to become less about ourselves and more about the community around us. We learned to line up in single-file fashion – a practice we use daily as adults. We also learned to speak when it was our turn – after we had raised our hand and the teacher called on us. Both these lessons were further developed over time and with much practice until they became integral parts of how we communicated with others. Likewise, there are many lessons we were taught in the schoolyard through our interactions with other children, maybe after school while waiting for our parents to pick us up or maybe during recess. But there are five lessons we definitely learned on the playground that impact how we do business today.
We play together: When you were a kid hanging out with your best friend on the swing set, monkey bars or slide, there wasn’t any sense of competition between you and your friend. Likewise, social media does not mean constant competition! Instead, it’s about constant conversation. Social media is more of a way to partner with your target community to come up with real-time solutions to problems.
No pushing or shoving: This point goes back to the single-file line concept. In the social universe, there is more than enough room for everyone and every brand to exist – there isn’t any need to use underhanded tactics like smear campaigns to steal business away from your competition. In fact, in many cases, that has resulted in negative consequences. If you’re able to present your business as reliable, valuable and transparent, then there isn’t any reason to shove or push another brand out of the way. Your ethical tactics will do that for you.
You have to wear the right shoes: As a kid, when you wore sandals to the playground filled with rocks that got uncomfortably stuck between your toes and the shoe sole, your experience playing wasn’t as fun as it would have been if you had worn some tennis shoes. With social media, it’s imperative that the experience your fans, followers and visitors have is as smooth and easy as possible. That means properly preparing the right social technologies to use. Having a well-designed website, engaging Facebook page and active Twitter profile is crucial to providing the valuable content your fans and followers are seeking. If you aren’t using the right platforms at an optimal level, you may not have followers for too long.
Don’t use playground equipment improperly – doing so may hurt you: One of the hardest things to deal with in social media is finding a good balance in your posting and engagement habits. You never want to post too frequently or you’ll risk loosing fans and followers because you’ll appear to be spamming! But you also don’t want to post too infrequently or you run the risk of falling off your fans radars. Find the perfect balance and you’ll develop your dedicated brand advocates.
We respect the “grown ups” who are patrolling the schoolyard: This is a big one! Even though we have to let users have a loud voice in the social business sphere, that doesn’t mean they are in control. In fact, users want to engage with your brand online because they respect you as the experts of the product or service. So act like the expert that you are and provide the most informed and experienced information that users can only get from the expert source. Your fans and followers will respect that.
Over the last few months, social media network Foursquare has really taken off. And no, I don’t mean it’s gone away–it’s actually quite the contrary.
So if you’re not using it already, you better hurry up and jump on the bandwagon now–because, honestly, who likes to be the last one to join the party?
If you’re not convinced, here are a few facts you should wrap your head around:
1. There are currently 10 million Foursquare users
2. 3 million check-ins occur each day
3. 400,000 businesses currently use Foursquare for marketing
4. 78,387 mayors get ousted each day (and you thought congress was bad)
5. There are more than 358 million check-ins outside the United States
Not convinced yet? Check out this awesome infographic:
Rules Don’t Apply: It’s Time to Join the Conversation
On Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Gunn|Jerkens hosted a successful social media workshop for a group of building industry leaders in the Southern California region.This exclusive event was held at the Lutron Experience Center in Irvine, CA.
For over a year Gunn|Jerkens has been tracking the behavioral patterns of potential homebuyers as they move through the buying cycle. The findings correlate the downturn of the economy with the extended buying cycle, resulting in greater amounts of time homebuyers are now taking to assess all their options before purchasing a new home. For homebuilders, this means that establishing and nurturing relationships with these potential purchasers over this extended period of time is more critical than ever. But how do you reach potential customers if they have never set foot in the sales office? You have to meet them where they are – online and on social networks.
The Gunn|Jerkens Social Media Workshop was an interactive forum designed to begin the conversation on how social media can be used in the building industry to build brand awareness and loyalty, cultivate meaningful relationships with homebuyers, and at the end of the day, help sell homes.
Tuesday’s workshop was filled with valuable and engaging content, including two guest speakers from GE® and Newhall Land. One of GE’s online marketing team members presented an in depth case study on their L.O.S.S. (Laundered and Orphaned Socks Society) campaign which debuted earlier in 2011. L.O.S.S. was the company’s first campaign created specifically for social media. The speaker from GE® offered insight into its strategy for creating the GE® social footprint, lessons learned throughout the campaign and its measurable results. Newhall Land also presented a case study on their ongoing Awesometown campaign, which was created by Gunn|Jerkens to reinvigorate the master-planned community of Valencia, California after two years without any marketing. The study focused on integrating social media marketing with traditional marketing techniques to maximize brand exposure. Social media was presented as a tool to build community and a major force in driving traffic both online and onsite.
In addition, some of the major topics covered included the current state of the social world, the paradigm shift from traditional push marketing techniques to conversation, successful social media strategies, understanding what and how you can measure to determine ROI and the future of online marketing.
Gunn|Jerkens would like to thank the Lutron Experience Center for providing the ideal space to host the workshop and to the guests in attendance, including Brookfield Homes, D.R. Horton, Playa Vista, The New Home Company, Newhall Land, The Building Industry Association, Orange County and William Hezmalhalch Architects, Inc.
Founded in 1983, Gunn|Jerkens Marketing Communications is a premier Long Beach-based marketing communications firm specializing in real estate marketing and advertising. A leader in the industry, Gunn|Jerkens prides itself on providing fully integrated branding and marketing solutions that embrace the future and propel marketing to new heights, utilizing the latest trends in mobile, web and social media. With a passionate commitment to excellence and superior quality, Gunn|Jerkens partners with clients to ensure they receive measurable results and are kept up to date and in touch with their target markets.
Rest assured the conversation is just beginning! Do you want to join the conversation? Contact Gunn|Jerkens to get connected and stay tuned for the next workshop coming soon to an area near you.
Quite a few of us around the office are avid Foursquare users–in other words, the battle for Gunn/Jerkens mayor is always a heated topic. So, of course, when I saw this article, I knew it was something I had to bring up.
According to reports from RadioShack®, those who use Foursquare spend 3.5 times as much money on products as those who are not using the location networking app. The article further reports that because Foursquare users are generally young and tech saavy, Foursquare has become a very valuable marketing tool. For more, check out the article.
Once again, social media proves to be one step ahead of the game. So what about you? Do you follow brands on Foursquare or use it to find your next new gadget?
It’s been a long time coming, but Twitter has finally started utilizing promoted tweets. If you are unfamiliar with Twitter (and/or that last sentence made no sense to you) don’t feel bad, it just means that you have better things to do than reducing your life into 140 characters at a time – that said, I am a Twitter fanatic.
To truly understand the importance of promoted topics, you really need to understand the power of having a topic trend on Twitter. Luckily, Twitter’s own site does a pretty good job of explaining itself. This entry in particular does a good job of explaining the power of trending topics.
For marketers, promoted tweets mean a lot of things. Most importantly, they give businesses a way to direct the conversation surrounding their brand. In the past, marketing items on Twitter in such a way so that they trend has been nearly impossible. Even when a topic receives a lot of attention, it’s rarely able to trend with such topics as “Justin Bieber” or “Your mommas so ugly.” With promoted tweets, marketers have a much better chance of being seen and therefore trending. The specifics of promoted tweets are fairly complicated, but Twitter’s recent blog explains how influential they can be, as well as what the future holds in store.
The brilliant folks over at MediaPost have a great section called Engage:Moms, and if you don’t have it all nice and snug in your Reader then you are missing out. One of their recent articles I found particularly interesting as it covers how Facebook is fertile ground to engage mothers and drive sales – a no brainer, right?
Wrong. Apparently some marketers are still in the dark about the solid benefits of participating on Facebook by means other than display ads. That seems odd to me, and I don’t mean that in a snarky way. I suppose I’m just so deeply entrenched in these social channels that I have a hard time understanding how people aren’t. Does that make me a bad person? Shoot, I hope not.
I’m not a mom (yet), but I will give you an example of one way that I use Facebook.
When I want to find a new restaurant, I don’t look in the Yellow Pages. First, I go to Facebook and ask my friends for suggestions.
“Anybody have a favorite sushi place I should try tonight?”
Within 30 minutes I have five or six recommendations. From there I turn to Yelp to see how these venues compare in price, and what the reviews are like. Then I find the one that best suits my needs and proceed to enjoy yummy white tuna sashimi (hopefully). Following my meal I thank my friend for the suggestion via Facebook or Twitter, and write my own review on Yelp. And thus the social circle of life continues…
According to the study and report on marketing to moms on Facebook, they found:
That more than eight in 10 moms log on daily, and three in 10 log on five or more times a day.
They use the site primarily to interact with others in their social networks – which translates into a lot of potential referrals.
75% of moms are fans of at least one company on Facebook, and parenting-specific sites are moms’ top picks.
I think the point here is this: if you are treating moms as consumers first, rather than as people first, you’re missing out on greater long-term engagement. Of course, this applies to more than just moms, but the article definitely got me to thinking about it. Why would you limit yourselves to just Facebook Ads? Start talking, start sharing and build a relationship that lasts more than five seconds.
Gunn/Jerkens Marketing Communications is based out of Long Beach, Ca. Stop in frequently to see what’s happening, share your stories, questions and perspective.
Wrong. Apparently some marketers are still in the dark about the solid benefits of participating on Facebook by means other than display ads. That seems odd to me, and I don’t mean that in a snarky way. I suppose I’m just so deeply entrenched in these social channels that I have a hard time understanding how people aren’t. Does that make me a bad person? Shoot, I hope not.