Social Media For Brands
A roundup of a few big brands engaging in social media.
Microsoft will donate $100,000 to Stephen Colbert’s new charity fund to help clean up the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
Pepsi created the Refresh Everything and skipped advertising during superbowl (some saying it was a mistake) to give millions of dollars to fund ideas that will refresh the world to non-profits in six categories. Health, Arts & Culture, Food & Shelter, The Planet, Neighborhoods, and Education.
IKEA‘s Facebook campaign was a stroke of genius. Using the photo tagging feature, a bunch of showroom images were uploaded to the account of a store manager at their Malmo store. The first person to tag an object got to take it home.
Ford bet on social media to generate buzz to promote the new Fiesta ( story ) and head of social media Scott Monty has been hard at work and winning.
Dell stands out as one of social media’s best examples and have created success through a network of blogs, sale alerts on twitter, and listening to their customers via their community IdeaStorm.
Intuit created a community for it’s Quickbooks software users while being active on Twitter and Facebook.
Starbucks used crowdsourcing to create MyStarbucksIdea so customers share suggestions which others vote on, with the best being implemented.
Blendtec used video for its series Will It Blend and purees everything from the iphone and more for millions of views.
Zappos has an unparalleled commitment to customer service, and social media has allowed them to form more personal connections with customers.
Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, had the following to say…
“Brand building today is so different than what it was 50 years ago. 50 years ago you could get a few marketing people in a small room and decide, ‘this is what our brand will be’, and then spend a lot of money on TV advertising — and that was your brand. If you as a consumer only had your neighbors to talk to, you had to believe what the TV was telling you. Today anyone, whether it is an employee or a customer, if they have a good or bad experience with your company they can blog about it or Twitter about it and it can be seen by millions of people. It’s what they say now that is your brand.”
Or you could say that your relationships are your brand.
Other info of potential interest include this list of corporate blogs,
Tags: branding, online branding, Social Media

