We are seeking a web savvy, detail oriented and self-motivated individual located in our Downtown Cleveland office.

The position of Online Production Coordinator will be responsible for organizing and maintaining all aspects of banner ad campaigns, Enews production, website postings and online reporting.

The responsibilities of the position include, but will not be limited to:

–Enewsletter campaign management
–Monitoring and managing online banner campaigns
–Producing monthly banner and content reports for both internal and customer uses
–Daily website postings to a network of sites
–Limited accounting functions related to online campaigns

Our ideal candidate will have excellent web skills, communication skills, Excel, HTML experience, and be comfortable in a fast-paced work environment. Photoshop & Flash skills a plus.

We offer a full benefit package including medical and dental coverage, profit sharing and 401K.

Please send all submissions to Patrick Curran at pcurran@wtwhmedia.com

A recent Harvard Study shows that Social Media gives the same pleasure as does food, money, and sex.

A recent study by Harvard University shows evidence as to why social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are so popular and highly addictive for many people. With the theoretical question of why people are compelled to share everything about themselves and their lives on mediums like Foursquare, Instagram, and Pinterest, this Harvard study aimed to dig into the psyche of why people are more than willing and even eager to post their thoughts and actions on social media.

Through a series of experiments, the researchers at Harvard University learned through the study that the act of disclosing information about oneself activates the same part of the brain that is associated with the sensation of pleasure, the same pleasure that we get from eating food, getting money or having even having sex.

While sharing a status update may not give us the same amount of sensational pleasure as that of sexual intercourse, the science shown in this study makes it clear that our brain considers self-disclosure to be a rewarding experience nonetheless.

In the experiments, the Harvard researchers asked test subjects a series of questions about their and others’ opinions while hooked up to an MRI machine. The researchers found that the regions of the brain associated with reward were strongly engaged when people were talking about themselves, and less engaged when they were talking about someone else.

Test subjects even indicated in the study that they would turn down money (a few cents) to talk about someone else, preferring to talk about themselves instead.

To further the information in their study, researchers performed a secondary experiment that was geared to help them learn how important having an audience to listen is to a person’s self-disclosure.

Through the secondary experiment, researchers found that when people got to share their thoughts with a friend or family member, there was a larger amount of activity in the reward region of their brain, and less of a reward sensation when they were told their thoughts would be kept private.

This may explain why some people reveal even detrimental information on social media platforms (think of the man who was arrested after posting photos of him stealing gas from a police car, or the girl who complained about her parents which lead to her father shooting her laptop).

So what is the takeaway?

Lead researcher Diana Tamir told the Los Angeles Times, “I think the study helps to explain why people utilize social media websites so often. I think it helps explain why Twitter exists and why Facebook is so popular, because people enjoy sharing information about each other.”

This just goes to confirm my belief that social media isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, at least not until food becomes unpleasurable. 

Read the full study here: Disclosing information about the self is intrinsically rewarding

-Lance Brown

Follow Lance on Twitter: @WTWH_SocialGuru

I think we’ve moved past the phase of social media being the “new” thing for businesses as most have begun or fully entrenched themselves within it. Unfortunately, many companies have dove into the social media pool with no idea how to properly swim, and now they just look like fools. Today, I want to get 5 pet-peeves of what these said companies do off of my chest.

1 – Don’t Listen

more often than not, my cheers and jeers fall onto deaf ears

Guess what? If you have a business, and you’re on social media, chances are that someone, at lease once, has tried to reach out to you via social media.  Are you there and are you listening to what they have to say?

I am not alone in the fact that I have had both good and bad experiences with brands on social media. I often tweet and/or post my feelings and opinions about a brand or product, and more often than not, my cheers and jeers fall onto deaf ears (hey, that rhymed!). Obviously, I don’t mind as much when a brand doesn’t respond to a praise I have for them, but what grinds my gears is when there are no responses to my complaints, not even an apology.

Not responding to negative commentary on social media is a huge no-no for companies; even if you can’t rectify the problem, acknowledging the customer and apologizing for their inconvenience goes a long, long way. If you are going to be on social media, fully commit to it and hire the right person to be there full-time, listening.

2 – Please, Be the Annoying Car Salesman

Yes, I know you have the best product ever known to man, and I know that you have the best service this side of the Mississippi, but no, I do not want to hear about it every time you open your mouth. News flash: social media is not a broadcasting tool, it is an engagement tool.

If you examine your social media content and the majority of it is only about you and your company, you’re doing it wrong. I’ll use the example of a car salesman: if a car salesman is pushy and in the customer’s face about their product, they will innately drive the customer away. Consumers are much more attracted to the salesman who can talk calmly, confidently, and most importantly, honestly about themselves as well as competition.

So please, join in the conversation; listen to what others are saying and engage, don’t just pick up the megaphone and tell everyone only about yourself.

3 – Post Things That are Definitely Not Up Your Alley

If you are a clothing store/manufacturer and I follow you on social media, chances are that I want to see what you have to say about clothing and fashion. I don’t think you have a reputable opinion on pizza or garden tools, so please stay out of it. If I want to hear about political issues and topics, I’m not going to follow ESPN.

Too often I see companies post things that aren’t relevant to their industry. Yes, the occasional human-interest or feel-good story that appeals to everyone, regardless of demographic is okay, but don’t be naive and think that people want to hear about industries outside of your expertise from you.

Looking at points #2 and #3 on this list, you can use these to help with your content strategy; you should post content that is not always about yourself, but about the industry in general. For example, if you’re a wind turbine generator manufacturer, feel free to post anything related to wind and renewable energy. Consumers assume that you already know more than them about that industry, so why not take advantage of that and position yourself as a thought-leader and post relevant content.

4 – Be Really, Really, Informal and Waste My Time

There is a fine line between being “real” and being “too corporate” with your speech on social media, and I agree that you should use social media to help your company become more personable, but I want to shine light on the extreme of when companies and brands become “too informal”.

Companies shouldn’t be afraid to be casual in their speech when posting to content, but companies are falling into the trap of hiring 21 year-old college graduates that are accustomed to using words and acronyms that are too informal for their posts. Phrases and slang words such as OMG, FML, ROFL, cray (short for “crazy”), and YOLO, as well as the over-usage of the terms “seriously” or “literally” do not belong in your social media speech. If they are, eliminate them immediately.

Along with being informal, make sure you deliver value in your posts. While the occasional “congratulations so-and-so” are okay, the majority of your posts should include links, photos, and/or videos. Share information of value with your customers, don’t be that 12-year-old girl wasting my time with posts about what you had for lunch.

5 – Be an Egg-Head

Don't be an egg-head, fill out your profile

Being an egg-head is a figurative term for not having a fully filled-out profile (i.e. Twitter users with no profile picture). Again, this is boils down to if you’re going to be in social media, be fully-invested in doing so and commit to it.

Your company’s social media pages are in fact secondary websites. You wouldn’t leave your primary website under construction or incomplete with missing text and/or broken images, and you shouldn’t accept any less from your social media platforms. More often than not, consumers will see your social media pages long before they ever visit your website, so you don’t want to give them a bad first-impression.

Long story short, fill out your profiles, write the short bio, and add the background images and thumbnails. Taking the time to make sure your page looks good and stands out will go a long way.

-Lance Brown

Follow Lance on Twitter: @WTWH_SocialGuru

ANSYS, Inc (@ANSYS_Inc)

ANSYS develops, markets and supports engineering simulation software used to foresee how product designs will behave and how manufacturing processes will operate in real-world environments.

Why ANSYS? ANSYS excels at retweeting relevant content as well as replying to messages directed towards them. ANSYS also does a good job on the number of tweets, putting out anywhere from 10-20 per day.

American Control Electronics (@AmericanControl)

American Control Electronics is a leader in power control technology. Their work in the DC Drives business has made them an industry standard through products and brand names like Minarik Drives.

Why American Control Electronics? ACE does a great job at retweeting relevant industries that their drives serve. A great example of aligning yourself with your customers and their industries.

Bishop-Wisecarver (@BWCnews)

Bishop-Wisecarver is a manufacturing company that specializes in guide wheels and guided motion technologies. Their product line includes quality components and accessories, manual linear guide systems, actuated linear guide systems and rotary guides and systems.

Why Bishop-Wisecarver? BWC is a prime example of giving a company a personality. Along with relevant information to their audience, they aren’t afraid to throw in any tweets that most anyone would find interesting, fascinating, and hilarious.

CGI, Inc (@CGI_Motion)

CGI, Inc.’s core business is manufacturing precision motion control solutions. CGI designs and builds high quality gearheads for AC induction motors, permanent magnet DC motors, stepmotors and servomotors.

Why CGI? CGI may not overwhelm you with a large number of tweets, but when they tweet, they mean it. CGI does a great job at scouring the “twitter-verse” and finding the most relevlant tweets for their audience. You won’t find any “fluff” from these guys.

Design world (@DesignWorld)

Design World is focused on serving the OEM machine builder, design engineer, and engineering manager. They deliver relevant editorial content and the most up-to-date supplier product and technology releases for engineers.

Why Design World? One word: consistency. It doesn’t matter if it is early in the morning or in the wee hours of the night, weekend or holiday, Design World is tweeting information to their followers. They are never lacking something to say, and as a result, they do a good job by putting out more than 20-30 tweets per day.

Exair Corporation (@EXAIR)

Exair was incorporated in 1983 as a manufacturer of compressed air-operated products to solve problems in industrial plants. Their product lines includes a variety of products from Vortex Tubes to liquid atomizing nozzles.

Why Exair? Exair is a really interesting case. Not only do they put out relevant tweets from their @exair account, but they empower their own engineers to have their own Twitter accounts to tweet and connect with engineers on a more personal level. By having common pictures and twitter handles, it also helps exair with their branding on Twitter, allowing them to appear bigger than they actually may be. (See: @EXAIR_JP,  @EXAIR_BF, @EXAIR_RB, @EXAIR_LE, @EXAIR_KE, and @EXAIR_NR)

Henkel North America (@Henkel_NA)

Henkel Adhesive Technologies is the market leader in adhesives, sealants and surface treatments. They serve many different industries including electronics, aerospace, metal, assembly, packaging, and maintenance and repair.

Why Henkel NA? Henkel does a fantastic job at connecting with their audience and followers on a personal level. If you watch their tweets, you may find things along the lines of Henkel congratulating them on weddings, responding to their questions in their native language, and wishing them good luck when they come in for interviews.

ITW Heartland (@ITWheartland)

ITW Heartland is a manufacturing company with more than 30 years of serving customers around the world. They specialize in precision engineered machines, parts, gears, and electro-mechanical products across a variety of industries.

Why ITW Heartland? If you want a good example of aligning yourself with your customers’ industry, look no further. This gear manufacturer understands that many of their gears are used in robotics applications, so they try and corner the market on those tweets. They clear, consistent, and focused in their strategy and it shows.

Minarik Automation & Control (@Minarik_Corp)

Minarik Automation & Control has been providing total solutions for the automation and control industry for over 55 years. They provide customers with a wide range of quality product lines and value-added services for automation and motion control applications.

Why Minarik? When you are a distributor, the best thing you can do is make your suppliers look good, and Minarik definitely does that on Twitter. They tweet and retweet about their suppliers, helping them get their message out.

Objet (@3D_Printers)

Objet Ltd., is a leading provider of high quality inkjet-based 3D printing systems and materials. Objet’s 3D printing systems are ideal for any company involved in the manufacture or design of physical products using 3D software or other 3D content.

Why Objet? Objet connects with its followers on a one-on-one level more so than most anyone else I’ve seen. If you examine their tweets, a high majority of them are directed at someone specific. They’re a great example of being their for the customer, answering questions on their terms.

Rapidform (@Rapidform)

Parent company, INUS Technology, Inc., has been a leader in providing technology and services that unlock the power of 3D scanning. Their flagship Rapidform software processes 3D scan data for a variety of uses, from manufacturing to medical treatment.

Why Rapidform? Here, we have an example of well-rounded Twitter user. Rapidform tweets on a consistent basis, has a well-rounded approach to its content that it delivers, retweets good information, and just does an overall good job.

Rogers Corporation (@Rogers_Corp)

Rogers Corporation is a technology leader in innovative solutions for power electronics, advanced foams for cushioning and protective sealing, and high-frequency printed circuit materials.

Why Rogers Corporation? Rogers Corporation is a retweeting machine. They do a fantastic job at keeping up with all that is going on in Twitter and sharing everything that is relevant to their followers. They frequently comment on links, congratulating, thanking, and giving their thoughts. Great example of using the content that is out there to help fill your feed.

-Lance Brown

Follow Lance on Twitter: @wtwh_SocialGuru

While traffic back to your website can be a goal of a brand’s social media strategy, it should not be the top priority. I am a big believer that the main goal should be engagement; if you create and post engaging content, it will innately create top of mind awareness (TOMA) for the consumer.  When brands achieve a consumer’s TOMA, they will then reap the benefits as they are first on the list when a consumer is ready to buy.

Pandemic Labs, a social media agency, conducted a study on Facebook of 300 brand pages, 150,000 posts, and 700 million likes and learned that photos are bar none the best type of content to draw the highest-level of engagement.  Links, on the other hand, draw the least amount of engagement from fans.

If a company wants a particular message to be shared and spread, they should consider turning their message into a video as the study found that videos are 10x more likely to be shared than links. Ironically, despite a video’s capability to go viral, brands post less videos than they do any other type of content. (For a visual, see the infographic below)

So, an open message to all brand pages: Please stop with the plethora of links and give us consumers a variety of content in your post, especially things we can look at such as movies and pictures. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Everyone

-Lance Brown

       Follow Lance on Twitter: @wtwh_SocialGuru

(For a condensed version of the story, see the infographic below)

Companies often get caught up in the feeling that social media channels can and should be used to sell product and drive traffic to their website.  In doing so, they become a broadcaster and self-promoter, posting articles and links that theoretically say “look how great we are”. After some time, they check back to see their ROI and become frustrated because no one is commenting on, clicking, or sharing their content. Under such frustration, they throw up their hands and claim that social media doesn’t work for them.

What these people are forgetting is that the foundation of why pe0ple social media sharing and how pictures, videos, and stories become viral is that they invoke emotion. If you invoke someone’s emotion with your content, you have a far greater chance of getting the results you want to see.

The first keynote featured Lisa Utzchneider vp global ad sales for Amazon which she titled ‘It’s Day 1 for Advertisers’. Her talk was not about any new earth shattering tech that would re-set marketers efforts literally back to ‘day 1′, but the day-1 mentality they hold has yielded great success in the Amazon brands.

First off I guess it got by me that Amazon does a lot of work on custom campaigns for large brands selling on Amazon. They do not break the revenue out in this dept, and so she would not comment on how large this division of Amazon really is. But what was clear is the vast amount of segment data Amazon has compiled to assist advertisers. They were able to help Ubisoft who produced ‘Just Dance 3′ in that they could target both video game consumers by platform (XBox, Playstation, Wii, etc) and who also were specifically interesting in dancing by other buying habits (books, related products, videos, etc).

The formula for Amazon is simply Listen, Invent and Personalize – everyday. This is fundamental in growing their business and taking advantage of opportunities. They really listen to their customers- all the time. Its not about interpreting VOC (voice of the customer) to mold to some other corporate goal as many companies do. Its taking feedback both direct and indirect that will drive invention and customization. The Amazon recommendation engine is the best example of this. When you hit the site you see your name and recommendations for you personalized based on prior buying habits. They listened to what folks wanted, invented their own engine and rolled this out to customers in a very personal way.

Amazon owned brands

Who would have thought in 1997, or 2003 for that matter they would be in the tablet business? Amazon was relegated to the dot bomb category, but a constant formula is at work that has propelled Amazon as a top player.

Amazon then takes the innovation in personalizing to developing great products and great product service. And the core with anything they do is a ton of data analysis. The return has to be measurable and the ROI clear.  Its why you also don’t see much TV advertising on their behalf. In their mix, the investment just does not validate the return.

Amazon also asks not just whats around the corner with tech, but strategically whats going to be the same in 10 years? People are going to want to find the best prices and obtain products in a timely way (think of their Prime membership – free 2 day shipping). To summarize, there is a core in human behavior that will remain constant while the technology gives way to great products and services. And I did not even mention their cloud services and a whole lot of businesses they own.

During one session on marketing mix, Glamour mag detailed their program with a group of advertisers on a custom type QR code to allow print readers  further engagement online. What has been working best is easy access (mobile optimized) to the product details (video, application, style) and then discounts to ‘buy now’. Social media ‘likes’, sharing and engagement was also a big part of the code program.  So a reader compelled by a eyeliner product, can see more online, interact with the product and then very easily click to buy at a discount.

For a lot of b2b marketers buying in the industrial space, you may wonder about the application, but a lot can be gleaned. If using QR codes, ensure the follow on online is completely relevant to the product, service or message on page. Be sure the content is mobile optimized and think about ease of use / access: watching a video, requesting more information or ordering product samples if relevant. A tie in here is using whats coined the Social Graph to allow a user to login or register with a Linkedin or Facebook account as example versus creating yet another account with a specific vendor. The benefit for the user is ease of access and a good amount of data can be accessed from their profile.

On the b2b front Cisco worked with Linkedin to gain access to providing emails to C-Level executives in very specific markets. I don’t think Linkedin has done much of this, But I expect to see more emails in my Linkedin inbox on behalf of advertisers in the near future. In the Cisco case study the emails yeilded a 14% open rate and a 4.5% CTR. Cisco was allowed to associate a companion ad featuring a video. Main take away is using social media opportunities to reach your target market - analogous to SEO – spend to develop organic search results or buy adwords, or both. If you have not developed much in the way of your own groups and communities, look for more opportunities to spend with the likes of Linkedin, Facebook and others.

There were good sessions on Email delivery with a big focus on mobile. The new mouse is your finger, and email should be monitored for mobile users and optimizing those emails for a mobile audience. With Design World enews and others, we’ve always optimized for mobile devices, but my takeaway on our development will be to take to a step further with separate custom enews, buttons blown out with the iPhone and Android smart phones in mind to make it even easier to click on features and offers.

By far for me the most interesting session was on display ad Attribution. If new to Attribution, its a way of analyzing data and giving credit to where credit is due when someone converts along a buy cycle. The most dominant ad display model is known simply as ‘last click’ and most marketers have figured out its too simplistic and flawed when analyzing buying behavior. As example, a person will go online, do some research, perhaps see something on TV or in a print ad, talk to some friends and then finally decide to buy. The buying process is not in most cases very linear. In many examples the last stop is Google, where the user forgot a web address so a quick search brings up a link and then the person buys something. Google gets all the credit as they were the last-click.

In this example its tough to track everything of course (off-line, print) but its very possible to track multiple on-line offers to model a more accurate picture of what really influenced a buyer. Many facets in consumer ad buying now include services that specialize in complex algorithm development and heavy statistical analysis to find the best place to put an offer online that has most impact. This modeling is having far reaching implications for ad buyers and publishers, for now mainly in the very large volume b2c space. Exchanges are popping up that allow real-time bidding and space buying down to a single impression on a specific website through an affiliate network. This is enabled via a plethora of cookie data stored on your computer, where the exchanges try to predict that you maybe open to a travel offer, say based on previous visits to travel booking sites and a jungle safari clothing outfitter. Companies can avoid bulk buying in the usual CPM model and bid specifically for the highest impact. Its retargeting and bidding on virtual real-estate with a lot of complex predictive modeling.

Now what I found interesting through all this data analysis, is it makes you look at CTR% in a different light on banner ads.

Several case studies found that a program of display advertising, Enews and other online offers (watch a video, social media tie-in) gave significant lift to conversion rates compared to campaigns that were straight keyword buying. In one case conversions from a publisher site was up 22% when display and enews programs were used in conjunction with buy offers versus the same campaign without. It was a real test where the agency and data modeling company turned all other programs off and went straight for an offer (think a singular Google PPC program). The point is that often marketers will look at what Google adwords delivered (last-click model) and then cut the rest of their budgets in favor of Google only. The risk is over-simplifying the buying process and path for a customer and by eliminating supporting campaigns it reduces the efficacy of the original program. Now these case studies were on 90 day + buy cycles and the longer the buy cycle, the more flawed the last-click model is for your business, especially for industrial critical components and systems where 2+ years can be common timeframe in the design cycle. The focus on display offers can then can ‘lift’ and benefit a complete program. The impression of the offer along with consistent content and branding will have significant effect when the design cycle does open and a buyer is ready to buy.

We’ve been big proponents of packages and surrounding users with content on their terms – gaining trust, being a thought leader and offering great content. The work being done now on Attribution is backing that up statistically although it will be sometime before realtime ad bidding is part of most marketers toolboxes. In the meantime a full program to reinforce buy offers will result in better conversion rates and recognition.

My favorite comment of the event was during a keynote tech chat between Guy Kawasaki and Robert Scoble. Scoble is Rackspace ‘start-up liasion’ tech geek and Kawasaki is founder of Alltop.com and previous was chief evangelist at Apple. Kawasaki is a busy guy and was asked how he juggled family, business and technology. He replied that he doesn’t consider himself the smartest guy by any means, just passionate and willing to work hard – very hard.

“I’m just willing to go out there and grind it out. Simple as that.”

I couldn’t have said it better.

Overall the exhibit halls were dominated by affiliate ad networks, mobile developers, ad exchange services, some SEO, analytic companies and app developers. Google was a sponsor but was surprised somewhat they did not exhibit. Overall a good event showing direction in advertising technology and some good ideas to apply to the world of b2b marketing.

Google showed off its first venture into wearable computing, called Project Glass.

Google seems to be changing our lives in many ways and one thing that is on its testing board right now could make us feel like we’ve finally arrived in “the future”. In a New York Times article, it reported that Google is beginning to test its Augmented reality glasses called “Project Glass” openly in public.

Augmented reality is a live, direct or indirect, view of a physical, real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, graphics or GPS data. Until now, augmented reality has mostly been used by smart phone apps such as Borglar and Layar which show you reviews, ratings, friends’ comments about places you pass walking on the street.

So what does this mean for your social media strategy? Positive feedback and ratings are going to become vital because with the technology of augmented reality, people will be able to see in real-time what others have to say about your company. Questions like “what places are good to eat around here” and “are there any interesting shops nearby” can be answered instantly by using augmented reality technology.

And as the old adage goes, do you like what they are saying about your company on social media? If not, you better…

Google made a video (below) on how their augmented reality glasses could be used in your daily life, and I have to admit, it made “the future” seem very real.

To help you transition your business page to Facebook Timeline, I’ve compiled this cheat sheet that has things you need to you know.

See something that I missed that would be helpful for this Facebook Timeline Cheat Sheet? Put it in the comments section and I’ll add it.

Image Sizes (in pixels):

• Cover photo: 851 x 315
• Profile picture: 180 x 180
• Thumbnail image for apps: 111 x 74
• Highlighted & milestone images: 843 x 403
• Images within wall posts display as 404 x 404

Change/Add Cover Photo:

1. Click “Add a Cover” button that should be near the top of your profile
2. Choose either to use existing photo or upload a new photo
3. Choose a photo (851 x 315)

How to Change your Profile Picture:

1. Hover over your current profile picture
2. Click “Edit Profile Picture” button that should appear
3. Choose the type of photo you want to upload from the drop-down menu that appears
4. Upload your photo and crop if necessary (180 x180)

How to Create a Custom Image for Your Apps:

1. Choose an image (111 x 74)
2. Click the drop-down arrow to the right of your apps
3. Hover over the app you wish to edit
4. Click the edit icon (a pencil) that will appear in the upper right-hand side of the app
5. Click edit settings
6. Click “change” link that is to the right of the text “Custom Tab Image:”
7. Upload your new image

How to Set a Milestone:

1. Click Milesone in the sharing bar at the top of your page (same place as you post a status update)
2. Add details such as a headline, date, location, etc
3. Add a photo if you wish (843 x 403)
4. Click Save

How to Pin a Post:

1. Select a post that you want to feature (note: it only stays for a maximum of seven days)
2. Hover over your desired post until the edit box appears in its upper right-hand corner
3. Click the edit icon (the pencil) to bring down the drop-down menu
4. Click “Pin to Top”