newscred relevance media

8/20/2019 NewsCred Relevance media

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How To Be Ready for Real-Time Conversations


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Perpetual connectivity, driven largely by mobile

and tablet use, has transformed the way people

consume and interact with each other. Ascustomers spend more and more time online,

real-time engagement has become one of the

most powerful methods of storytelling for brands.

With new digital trends also comes a new set of

expectations. For brands, the two critical consumer

expectations for content are immediacy and relevance.

In order to start a conversation, a brand needs to

understand these two expectations. And to perform,

it’s essential to have the right process in place. Notevery brand will engage to the same level or extent in

real-time marketing or social media, nor should they.

But without building a process or infrastructure for real-

time marketing, no brand will be able to deliver on, and

stay ahead of, consumer expectations.

Increasingly, that process looks more like publishing

news than producing a TV spot or print ad. Senior brand

leadership commitment to this new methodology will

ultimately determine the relative success of its real-timemarketing efforts. The reality is: real-time marketing is

coming your brand’s way. The question is: will you be

ready?

Consumers Want Relevant

Content and They Want It Now

© 2014 NewsCred 2


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Relevance Has A Deadline:How To Be Ready for Real-Time Conversations

Chapter 1 The New Creative Team07 Structuring an Agile Team

08 Streamlining Your Process

11 Monitoring the Space

13 Creating Content That Resonates

Chapter 2

The New Client Relationship and Process19 Setting Expectations

20 Forming a Cadence

21 Overcoming Creative, Legal and Approval Barriers

Chapter 3 How to Translate - Measurement & Sustainable Success

23 Reducing Risk, Maximizing Opportunities

26 Fusing Creativity and Technology27 Expediting Client and Legal Approvals

Conclusion 28 So, What’s Next?

Contents

© 2014 NewsCred 4


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For this white paper, NewsCred has worked with global

marketing and technology firm DigitasLBi to compile

wisdom on what it takes to get real-time marketing

right. DigitasLBi was one of the first agencies to adopt

the real-time model with their signature approach,

BrandLIVE. DigitasLBi has done groundbreaking work by

implementing their innovative process for some of their

top clients.

Newscred interviewed six DigitasLBi executives, reviewedcase studies from across the industry, and researched

extensively to bring you a comprehensive, up-to-the-

minute guide on brand storytelling at the speed of social.

Methodology

© 2014 NewsCred 5© 2014 NewsCred 5


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A new creativeprocess:

Setting yourself

up for agilityand speed

Chapter One

Real-time marketing has the power to support and drive

the long-term narrative of any brand. It’s not just about

accumulating likes on Facebook, retweets on Twitter,

or views on YouTube. It’s about engaging with yourcustomers and adding value to their lives at every touch

point. Permanent connectivity means that there are a lot

of opportunities to do so. Each real-time interaction builds

loyalty among customers; consumers who engage with

brands become its most loyal advocates.

But, success in the real-time space requires a total

commitment to new skills and a new creative process: one

in which the rules are evolving at the speed of technology

and regulation, clients and agencies are working asextensions of each other side-by-side, and the turnaround

time from concept to launch is often compressed to days or

even hours. That’s a massive departure from the traditional

agency-client model, in which each step of the process—

from brief to brainstorm, from execution to approval—is

measured in weeks or months.

So, where does a brand begin? Whether you’re designating

a team to execute real-time marketing regularly or simply

preparing for sporadic social media engagement, the firststep is to put the right people in place.

© 2014 NewsCred 6


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Putting yourself in a position to do real-

time marketing effectively, and knowing

when you’re ready for it, takes a lot of

upfront planning. Success starts not with

a single well-timed moment, but a brand’s

day-to-day activity.

Purpose

Before anything else, it’s important to

make sure all stakeholders on both

the client and agency side know the

overarching purpose of the content.

Why are we doing what we are doing?

Without a clear answer agreed upon by

everyone, each piece of new content

will run through an old gauntlet and risk

destruction. The difficulty is in allowing

the purpose to manifest according to

consumer expectations and behaviors

on each channel, and not to force a

preconditioned content structure.

Process

Brands and agencies need to understand

that while there will continue to be

forward-looking calendars with planned

content, the high-reward activities are

those which are molded or created in

real-time. This can only happen, and

be approved, with a defined end-to-

end process, designed with a “how can

we make this happen” end goal. This

requires change-management, and

brands or agencies that treat it less

seriously than that will sit on the sidelines

during critical social moments.

Streamlining your

Process

Commitment

Brands looking to build an engaged

audience on social media must publish

quality content on a consistent basis. Just

like musicians or authors, brands can’t

develop an audience chiming in a handful

of times a year for big, publicized events

like the Academy Awards, the VMAs, or

the Super Bowl. That approach will prove

ineffective because you haven’t built any

kind of relationship with your audience.

Publishing regularly sets a strong social

foundation that will help you establish

a cadence with your internal team, your

client, and your readers. It prepares you

for success when the right opportunity

emerges.



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Social media audiences for brands – and even TV shows and movies – differ

from offline audiences watching TV commercials or viewing banner and print

ads. They also have different expectations and behaviors on social channels.

For an organically built social following, as opposed to a purchased or bribed

following, they’ve already opted into your content and need a steady diet of

things they love. This often means the interests of your owned community

may differ significantly from your target audience in other media.

“If your brand sponsors “The Bachelor” through a broadcast relationship and

negotiates access to the content, but you find that your Facebook audience is

tech-savvy/geeky, then you should figure out how to utilize and present “The

Bachelor” material in a way that will engage your social audience – but still tie

back to your overall branding. This content plan may be quite different from

the engagement plan you develop for the broadcast viewers of the show.”

— Eric Korsh, VP/Group Director, Brand Content, DigitasLBi

Understanding your community requires an exercise in dissecting your

followers, their behavior patterns and psychographic qualities. You should

align these points with your bigger brand story and social media strategy

to determine how to connect your brand to the community in the most

interesting way.

For example, take Buick’s #InTheMoment initiative. Buick, in partnership with

DigitasLBi, noticed an increasing trend amongst their social media audience:

technology fatigue, particularly with smartphones. In response, Buick

launched a movement aimed at getting people to put down their phones and

live in the moment.

The content was specifically tailored to their digital community:

a dedicated #InTheMoment Tumblr page, a content partnership with

Buzzfeed, a video produced with popular YouTube singer-songwriters Rhett

& Link (which received over 1 million views), culminating in a social media

blackout for Christmas—so that people would live #InTheMoment with their

families for the holiday.

Understanding Your

Digital Community

© 2014 NewsCred 9

*Video Distribution: YouTube is not a Dumpster, Eric Korsh, MediaPost


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Just as a news team meets in the morning to discuss

the latest news, a brand must designate a time to

meet and mine social conversations of the moment.

These meetings are integrated across disciplines:

expertise in planning, search, media, analytics,

creative and account management should be present

to discuss the latest content – but w ith the fewest

number of participants possible. It’s up to the team,

capability agnostic, to creatively connect the events of

the day to the brand. The team should have a ready

set of filters that help them translate their concepts to

the brand strategy on individual channels.

Establishing the rigor of cadence and of mining,

meeting, creating and revising is important. It

ensures the team is tightly integrated and sets up

expectations for the new creative process. Basically

– have the same meetings at the same time about the

same things. Moving it to accommodate other work

results in missed opportunities and signals a lack of

commitment to change.

Real-time monitoring tools allow you to approach

content analytically. Build your content strategy off of

social insights, trending topics, and viral content from

competitors and customers. You can easily see what’sworking or not, and evolve accordingly.

Establish a

Cadence

Internally

Learn From

Results and

Evolve the

Process

— Norman De Greve

Chief Solutions Officer, North

America, DigitasLBi

Any one ofthese pieces

of content canfail or be great.It’s a learning

process; we seewhat works andwe evolve.

“

”

© 2014 NewsCred 10


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The Creative Newsroom: Does the new creative

process call for a new physical environment?

Technology is a prominent member of any real-time

marketing team. Whether or not you designate a

physical command center to coordinate your efforts

matters less than your commitment to the process.

Today, advanced collaboration software allows teams

to manage project workflow in real-time from just about

anywhere. With platforms like the Content Marketing

Cloud, marketers can create content teams with varied

permission levels, queue content for editorial approval,

and even manage freelancers, contracts and payments.

Members of your team may be in different countries

let alone in separate rooms. However, designating

a physical environment within your agency can be a

mindset reminder to work in a new way. It also reaffirms

your team’s and client team’s commitment to the new

creative process.

Monitoring The

Digital Space

— John McCarus

SVP, Social Content,

DigitasLBi

While [at DigitasLBi]we have a suite of tools,partners and the creativenewsroom, the truth isyou don’t technically needthat stu. What you doneed is a commitment tothe new process. But it’shelpful to have the physicalenvironment that remindsyou and challenges you towork in a new way.

“

”

© 2014 NewsCred 11


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*Two years ago, Procter & Gamble posed a challenge

to DigitasLBi to figure out a way to react in real-time to

conversations around the world. The speed of social

channels didn’t mesh with the slow-paced agency-client

process. The brand and cross-agency team created

something new: the Always On Newsdesk. Then

DigitasLBi built a physical workspace at its Boston

office headquarters designed to drive quick

collaboration. The project grew into BrandLIVE, a social

nerve center embedded in DigitasLBi offices across six

cities, including London. There, execs from certain client

teams are surrounded by six plasma screens displaying

all sorts of social content and data from which DigitasLBi

can mine and then create content in the moment. The

ever-present screens, pulsing with social activity data,

are affectionately called “the wire.”

DigitasLBi

Case Study:

The Wire

— Anne-Marie Kline,

SVP, Social Content / Managing Director,

BrandLIVE, DigitasLBi

The Wire is our sourcefor discovery. We look atwhat’s happening, what

people are consuming andwhat people are sharing –and those are oftendierent things. Paying

attention to what audienceswant is critical, ratherthan what you want totell them.

“

”


*Digiday, "Inside the Digitas 'Social Bullpen'"


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Always Relevant and Current

Consumers have become accustomed to brands in their

conversations and even welcome the interaction, if it comes

in an authentic, non-disruptive, and useful manner. The key

to successful real-time content is finding the intersection of

what’s relevant to your brand and relevant to your audience.

1. Getting Political. Within minutes of the bill legalizing gay

marriage passing in the UK, Virgin Holidays tweeted this

image and posted it to their Facebook and Google+ Pages:

Not every brand can celebrate legalized gay marriage in

social channels and have it come across as an authentic,

relevant message. However, Virgin knows their audience,

they offer honeymoon vacations, and founder Richard

Branson is an outspoken gay marriage supporter.

Therefore, the message itself is relevant and credible.

They used the #equalmarriage hashtag to expand their

reach and were rewarded with 265 retweets from their

community.

2. Smart Comebacks. Comical responses to consumers

can work, if handled expertly. @SmartCarUSA impressively

replied to one man’s snarky tweet: “Saw a bird had crapped

on a Smart Car. Totaled it” by amusingly debunking the

science of the claim with a snarky infographic of its own,

diagramming the “weight of bird crap required to damage

Smart’s Tridion Safety Cell.” Not only was it funny but

it managed to reaffirm the brand’s safety message in a

surprisingly delightful way.

Creating Content

that Resonates

3 Examples

of Authentic

& Relevant Real-time

Marketing *

“Today people’s trustis not with companies,it’s with people. So

companies need toact more like people –and sometimes thatmeans acting in themoment.”

— Norman De Greve, Chief Solutions Ocer,

North America, DigitasLBi

© 2014 NewsCred 13


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3. Weighing In On Pop-Culture Events. Oreo’s Super

Bowl blackout tweet prompted many other brands to

put on a real-time show at the Oscars three weeks later.

While most of their efforts lacked relevance or pizzazz,

this Nintendo tweet stood out for its wry, sardonic take

that contrasted nicely with the high gloss of the award

show:

Join an Existing Conversation.

It’s always a good idea for a brand to share a unique

perspective on a conversation that’s already happening,

rather than initiate their own conversation. A few

reasons:

1. Existing conversations have built-in audiences.

Organic, naturally-occurring conversations are more

sustainable than brand initiated conversations, which

ultimately are PR events. In general, it’s more useful

for a brand to consistently engage with the existing

audiences around natural topics than to spend

precious resources on creating a topic spike. On

Twitter and Instagram, those conversations are often

marked by a hashtag. Some hashtags are recurring,

like #TBT for Throwback Thursdays, in which

people and brands post reminiscent photos from

their past. Other hashtags are event-specific and

time sensitive, like #NYFW for New York Fashion

Week. Hashtags are an effective way to jump into

pre-existing conversations.

2. Live-blogging events ensures your message is

relevant to your audience. For example, if you

determine your target is young, male adults who

watch football, you can bet they’ll be tweeting about

a big NFL game on a certain date.

3 Examples

of Authentic &

Relevant Real-time

Marketing *

3. Real-time marketing etiquette is like being at a

cocktail party. “At a party, when you first enter

a conversation your head is nodding and you’re

agreeing. You’re adding value to an existing

conversation. But once you’ve been there awhile,

you can change the topic. I think this is a helpful

analogy for brands doing real-time marketing

because you don’t get invited into a discussion

if you just show up and want to serve your own

agenda. Over time, as you build trust, people are

more willing to listen to a new viewpoint from you.”

–John McCarus, SVP, Social Content, DigitasLBi

4. Developing an Editorial Calendar. One thing

digital agencies across the board agree on is the

importance of creating an editorial calendar or

content matrix: a loose roadmap for the brand’s

social media initiatives each week or month. For

any brand, this calendar will contain a mix of

planned (proactive) content, and spontaneous

(reactive) content. It may seem strange to plan to

be spontaneous, but that’s often what real-time

marketing requires. Always expect, and prepare

for, the unexpected.

© 2014 NewsCred 14


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FlowStock

Sweet

Spot

FlowStock

The Virtues of

Stock vs. Flow

“Stock” is the type of content that brands have always

been great at creating: glossy campaign-based assets

that attract new customers. This content is planned ahead

of time and often carefully executed – on TV, in print,

online, and sometimes on social media. “Flow” is the

lightweight content that brands are creating reactively,

in real-time, to engage their growing social audiences:

tweets, pins, Instagrams and Facebook status updates.

Right now, brands are awkwardly transitioning from their

comfortable place as stock content creators to the new,

haphazard world of flow. And in their adolescence, many

brands are struggling to make sense of their roles on

social media. Finding that sweet spot between stock

and flow is tough, but will soon prove to be a worthwhile

challenge for any brand to take.

The balance is important because each piece of content

you post should ladder up to a greater brand story arc

and help drive your narrative, which takes advance

planning. But over-planning can cause your brand to

appear stiff and inhuman. The whole purpose of real-time

marketing is to connect with customers on a personal

level—real-time marketing is entirely in the moment.

Ultimately, the best real-time marketing will have a

healthy mix of stock content (proactive) and flow content

(reactive). It’s important for your brand to understand

when each approach is appropriate and why.



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Some brands are developing campaigns and

platforms that utilize both stock and flow content,

as computer brand Lenovo demonstrated with

their web mockumentary series, “Tough Season,”and the social media program that flowed out of it.

Lenovo launched a new product called the

“Yoga 2 Pro” laptop, and leveraged their existing

partnership with the National Football League to

target the Fantasy Football crowd. Kevin Berman,

Lenovo’s marketing director, focused on fantasy

diehards because they are the technology “doer’s”

of the NFL, and Lenovo is “For Those Who

Do.” These fans have scale (over 30M fantasyparticipants), a 24/7 obsession with their rosters

and league standings, and participate in the

dominant social conversation that surrounds the

NFL.

To position the Yoga 2 Pro laptop as a must-

have accessory for the Fantasy Football season,

Lenovo partnered with DigitasLBi and The Onion,

a popular mock news publisher, to create a digital

mockumentary series called “Tough Season.”Tough Season is the story of Brad, the perennial

last place finisher in his office Fantasy league. The

comedy web series ran eight episodes, released

periodically, during the NFL and Fantasy Football

season. Consider that the “stock” content. It was

scripted and organized andproduced in advance.

Throughout the course of the season, Lenovo’s

contracted NFL Player Talent produced videos,

Tweets, Facebook posts, and Instagrams that

Case Study:

Lenovo, The Onion,

& Fantasy Football

engaged Brad the Fantasy Football character with real

NFL fans and Fantasy Football participants.

These engagements – ad hoc content based on

week to week events and fan conversations, withplayers such as Larry Fitzgerald and Andrew Luck,

were the “Flow” content. Coach Brad, using the

voice of The Onion on his character Facebook

and Twitter pages, engaged live during NFL game

days.

This marketing initiative, with both planned

and real-time content, proved effective because

it latched onto an area that people were already

passionate about, fantasy football, and used it asa launchpad to engage in real-time conversations

on social media. As of mid-January, the web

series and accompanying social video content had

received over 13 million video views.

© 2014 NewsCred 17


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The New

Client Relationship:

Working

Side-By-Side

Chapter Two

– Linda Piggot

EVP, Global Relationship Lead, DigitasLBi

The agency/brand divide

needs to be narrowed.

Agencies no longer havethe luxury of going o on

their own to come up with

a solution to a problem.

Instead, both sides need

to work together in real

time, or very close to it...

We are one team committed

to the end goal.

“

”

© 2014 NewsCred 18


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Real-time marketing is a true collaborative effort.

While brands may recognize the need and value of

having a strong social media presence, many don’t

understand the resources and dedication required to do

real-time marketing right – and that it’s the consumer

expectations in social that require the real-time effort.

Brands also may not anticipate how active a role they

will play in creating, approving, and mining content

along with their agency partners. Real-time marketing

requires that agency and brand teams are extensions of

one another; they are constantly in contact, reviewing

creative, and evolving the brand together. It’s important

for individuals to bring more than a narrow skillset or

point of view.

Creatives must be as interested in a relationship with

legal colleagues as account leaders must be in sourcing

creative ideas from the news and current events.

It’s up to agencies, with their experience across

multiple brands, to educate their clients and align the

expectations of both teams. Clients needs to get on

board with the new creative process, and everything

that comes with it, before real-time content creation can

begin.

Setting Expectations

– Anne-Marie Kline

SVP, Social Content / Managing Director,

BrandLIVE, DigitasLBi

The people who aresuccessful in this spaceare all in. They have

media attached to it, aproduction budget, anda dedicated teamfocused on it. You needto have that in placeto be successful.

“

”

© 2014 NewsCred 19


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The age of big client presentations and the “great

reveal” no longer applies. Instead, agency and client

teams are communicating regularly— in many cases

daily—and their meetings resemble working sessions

more than formal creative presentations.

Develop a relationship of comfort and trust with one or

more point people. This includes the ability to challenge

orthodox points of view, and to focus on the needs of

the consumer within each channel.

Try to streamline the approvals process on the client

side. Levels of feedback will slow down the efficiency of

the creative process. Allow final decisions to be made

by individuals who are available and responsible.

Figure out a way to act more quickly and together,

whether it means meeting in person often, providing

feedback in real-time over the phone, or using

collaborative technology to work in tandem without

occupying the same physical space. Scheduling

no-miss daily meetings and catch-ups can work, or

identifying a client who will respond immediately with

yes/no answers within fixed amounts of time.

“We’re talking to our clients

every day. A shorthanddevelops between client

and agency, so the approval

process is streamlined.”

— Anne-Marie Kline ,SVP,Social Content /Managing

Director, BrandLIVE DigitasLBi

“Real-time requires a tighter

integration between agency

and client, so that truly, the

agency becomes an extensionof the client team”

— Nicole Estebanell, VP/Group Director,

Media, DigitasLBi

Forming A Cadence

Between Agency and

Client Teams



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The approval process often has a way of slowing down the

publishing process, making it hard to react in real-time. This can be

a challenging hurdle for both the brand team and the agency. The

back-and-forth between clients, agency partners, and legal counsel

that usually takes place with traditional marketing pieces simply

can’t apply to real-time content.

So, what gives?

As with the new creative process, the approval process also needs

to change. It helps when expectations are set ahead of time among

agency, client, and legal teams. The earlier all parties get involved in

the creative process, the smoother approvals will be. There are even

things all teams can do proactively to speed up approvals, avoid

compliance barriers, and ensure a continuous flow of work.

Agency team You have to do the work upfront to be successful

quickly. Account managers, planners, and creatives all need to

understand the brand’s legal risks and compliance standards. It’s

important to know what you can and can’t say ahead of time to avoid

legal barriers while creating content.

Client team Create a streamlined process for feedback that

maximizes efficiency. That could mean sitting in the room with the

agency and reacting/revising the work on the spot.

Legal team It’s not just about approvals and rejections. It’s about

looking at the end objective in the brief and helping the creative

team arrive there – not through word-smithing but through thoughtful

direction. Legal approval should be woven into the creative process

rather than tacked on at the end. For real-time events, lawyers are

often sitting with the client and creative teams, working together.

Expediting Client

and Legal Approvals

“This is where a content guidelines document comes in.

When looking at producing real-time content, there needs

to be a thoughtful approach as to what is covered and what

is not covered. That document then is put in front of the legal

team. What remains is the start of your real-time program

(since essentially legal has signed off on you producing content

in a certain area). Because it’s legal’s job to overreact, I would

recommend starting with smaller issues and then working

toward more controversial items (if that ever becomes the case).”

– Joe Pulizzi, Content Marketing Institute

Those are proactive measures each team can take to create a more

fluid approval process, but when it comes time to monitor social

media and create real-time content, a new plan should already be in

place.

Plan an approach. Determine who is going to be responsible for

interacting with people, who is going to respond to certain types of

questions, and when you need to hit pause and run comments by

your legal team for approval.

Keep everyone informed. While having every comment, interaction,

and response approved up and down the ladder will kill your ability

to truly be social, you can keep your team and management in the

know with regular interaction reports.

Get senior leadership on board. If you have the consent and support

of senior leadership on both the brand side and agency side, your

ability to act in real-time will be much smoother. Real-time marketing

is not a ground-up sell inside a brand – it requires senior level buy in

from the beginning.

© 2014 NewsCred 21


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How to

Measure & Sustain

Success:

Turning Real-timeContent into

Long-term Results

Chapter Three

© 2014 NewsCred 22


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Reducing Risks,

Maximizing

Opportunities

Joining real-time conversations online means opening

yourself up to feedback from fans. Brands should see

this as an opportunity, but understand the risks. It’s up

to a brand team and agency partners to set expectations

for both positive and negative scenarios, and together

decide how to capitalize on opportunities and minimize

risks. The way a brand reacts to feedback, positive or

negative, often matters more than the feedback itself.

Authenticity gives brands a wide berth for error in the

eyes of consumers.

Consider the Wednesday morning in August of 2013,

when The New York Times website and mobile app

suddenly collapsed. While the Times was inaccessible,

several employees took to Twitter to reassure readers that

they were aware of the problem and that it was being fixed.

Some employees shared updates on their stories over social

media; others offered tongue-in-cheek alternatives for

readers while the site was down. For important breaking

news, the Times took to Facebook to provide a more

robust lede with visuals. Clearly, the Times has a stronger

imperative than most brands to deliver timely content;

that’s their only job. Even so, commercial brands can

learn something from the Times’ graceful handling of

a negative situation.

Real-time marketing may be new, but it’s been around

long enough to see some tremendous success stories

as well as horror stories. Brands can learn from those

examples and use them to reduce risk while maximizing

opportunities in the social space.

© 2014 NewsCred 23


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“If you don’t have a

right to play, don’t say

anything. No one will

ever say, ‘I can’t believe

Brand X didn’t comment

on MLK day.’”

— Anne-Marie Kline,SVP,Social Content/

Managing Director, BrandLIVE,

DigitasLBi

“It’s tempting to jump

on a major breaking

news story, because

it’s what people will be

talking about. But it’s

when a brand is seen

to be jumping on the

misfortune of others

that things can go

wrong. It works if it

is playful so makes

people smile, or is truly

supportive in intent so

adds real value.”

— Grant Hunter, Regional Creative

Director Iris Worldwide

Know the right time to talk. Not every cultural moment

deserves a real-time response. In other words, brands

don’t need to jump on every conversation happening

on the web. Talking too much, too often, or at

inappropriate times can really hurt your brand. Real-

time works when there’s a legitimate reason for you to

participate. Otherwise, a timely social media post does

little for you if it doesn’t align with your brand story.

Finding success with real-time content often means

knowing when to let opportunities go. Consider

the anniversary of September 11th. In 2013, many

brands felt compelled to weigh in, and while most

social media posts were harmless tributes, few were

relevant to the brand or their story. In one case,

a well-intended tweet by AT&T caused a flurry of

negative feedback from fans.

The post was widely criticized and lampooned by

followers who felt that the company tried to capitalize

on the somber event by showcasing one of their

phones in the image. Eventually AT&T posted an

apology, took down the tweet, and moved on. But

there is a valuable lesson to be learned from their

misstep

On the flip side, some case studies reveal brands that

knew exactly the right time to talk. During the launch

of Apple’s iPhone 5S, for example, competitor brands

Samsung, Nokia, and Motorola bought social ad space

to tout the superior features of their own phones.

The timing and placement of those ads played off the

cultural moment just right, in a way that was relevant to

the competitors’ products and brand story.



25/31

© 2014 NewsCred 25

“When we started, it

was most important that

you were rst. Now it’s

shifted and it’s more

important to be the best.

So you might get there

second, but you better

be better. You better be

right. And you better becredible.’”

— Anne-Marie Kline,SVP, Social Content /

Managing Director, BrandLIVE,

DigitasLBi

Stand out from the rest. Every brand is now jumping

on the real-time marketing trend, so it can be difficult to

distinguish your brand through all the noise. As with all

marketing efforts, the quality of your content and ideas

ultimately defines your level of success.

The personality you establish for your brand on

social media will help determine what t ype of content

you’ll post and how you’ll talk about a topic. Is your

brand playful? Informative? Irreverent? Quirky? When

all stakeholders have a firm grasp of your brand’s

social persona, and stick to that persona regardless

of the scenario, it really helps your brand stand out.

Oreo’s “slam dunk” Super Bowl tweet was as much

about style and tone as it was hyper-relevance.

Know when to take a risk. Some kinds of risks are

rewarded on social media. Others backfire. How

does a brand determine the right kind of risks to take?

In general, the more playful and good-natured the topic

and tone, the safer it is the less of a risk your brand

faces. If people are talking about Miley Cyrus at the

VMAs and you have a pithy one-liner, you’re probably

on solid ground. If you want to weigh in on an incident

in which people have been hurt, like Superstorm Sandy,

you’re probably better off staying on the sidelines. If

you feel compelled to comment in those cases, keep it

simple and brief.

One area that seems like a safe (and fun) place to take

risks it interacting with the social channels of other big

brands. Perhaps because those brands are not tied to

any single person, getting sassy is unlikely to offend

followers.

Here are two successful examples of brands

poking fun at each other on social media:

“You can’t enter this space

without a contingency

plan - both for when

things go well and for

when things don’t go asplanned.’”

— Nicole Estebanell, VP/Group Director, Media,

DigitasLBi

“Negative remarks will

always be around. But the

power of positive brand

and community sentiment

can be your support

system. Great content,delivered consistently,

will cultivate an audience

that will become more

than just fans - they will

become advocates and

defenders.”

— Eric Korsh,VP/Group Director, Brand Content, DigitasLBi

© 2014 NewsCred 25


26/31


What to do when something goes wrong.

Every brand will have missteps— it’s part of the process

of seeing what sticks. However, brands can of ten turn

mistakes into opportunities to show their human side

and make improvements by staying authentic and

sincere.

Consider JCPenney’s “Hitler Tea Kettle” incident. In

May of 2013, a billboard was erected in Culver City,

Los Angeles advertising a designer tea kettle that bore

a striking resemblance to Adolph Hitler. This caused a

flurry of negative commentary and caught the attention

of some high-profile celebrities on Twitter. JCPenney

immediately tried to diffuse the negative publicity

by responding to the tweets in a calm, human, and

sometimes humorous manner.

Don’t delete it, deal with it.

Unless someone is violating community guidelines

it’s important not to delete a person’s post. Doing so

would violate the understanding that Facebook, Twitter,

and other social media are open forums for dialogue,

and can make fans skeptical of the authenticity of

your brand’s other content. If it feels appropriate, you

might even engage fans who are expressing negativity

and use it as an opportunity to open the floor for

constructive feedback. But remember, most of your

followers aren’t visiting your page to view negative

commentary; they’re viewing the content you push out

into their feeds. The exposure to negativity may not be

as great as you’d expect.


27/31

Creativity at the Core. The digital tools available today

encourage dynamic thinking and open up possibilities for

engagement. But at the core, real-time marketing is contingent

on creativity and good ideas. The key is to use technology to

your advantage to help you create a diversity of content at scale.

Brands have a tendency to think linearly about their content in

relation to their products and/or ad strategy. But more dynamic

thinking is usually rewarded. Forget your products for a moment;

who is your target audience and what do they really want from

content? Brands that answer this question first, and back into

their advertising strategy second, tend to maximize creativity and

optimize results.

Stay True to Your North Star. With all the new digital platforms,

social spaces and devices, it can be tempting to veer away from

your traditional voice and adopt a persona that doesn’t normally

fit your brand. In some cases that’s okay, but it requires everyone

on board committing to the new, established social media

personality. The better bet is to stay true to the brand you’ve built

offline and bring it to life on social media.

Use Innovative Technologies to Create Better Content. Every

brand has advanced tools at their disposal to plan, discover,

source, publish, share and measure content at scale. It ’s

worthwhile to find the right technology for your target and goals.

Planning & Workflow. Plan ahead with an editorial calendar and

track content approvals. Easily organize and archive all owned,

licensed and social assets, in one place with asset management.

Content Discovery & Social Listening. The ability to surface and

curate the most relevant content in real-time based on socially

trending topics, your brand’s target audience and marketing goals.

Fusing Creativity

and Technology

Publishing & Social Sharing. Publish content to hosted landing

pages and share across social channels. Amplify distribution

through paid campaigns.

Measure ROI. Measure content clicks, shares, social engagement

and conversions, page views, unique visitors, time-on-site and

bounce-rate.

© 2014 NewsCred 27

“We have this mantra:

No one should

develop content that’s

not shareable, and

there are no great

social ideas without

content at the center.”

— John McCarus, SVP, Social

Content, DigitasLBi


28/31

Real-time moments, even when successful, are fleeting

interactions between a brand and its followers. How can

brands turn these instances into opportunities to build

deeper, more meaningful connections?

Finding Hidden Insights in Consumer Responses. If you’re

only talking to people on social media channels, and never

with them, then you’re missing out on the social part of

social. Fans and followers can provide valuable content and

insights if you let them. The next step to publishing real-time

content is soliciting real-time participation and feedback.

For example, what if Oreo had asked fans at the Super Bowl

to show them how they dunk in the dark? They would have

likely received hundreds of responses that provide valuable

insight into Oreo’s audience. Are the images clever?

Sentimental? Silly? The feedback can help the brand shape

the tone and nature of future content. It can also serve as a

springboard for more real-time interaction in the moment.

Turning a ‘Like’ Into Loyalty.

Continued engagement with consumers is what will

ultimately create loyalty and purchasing power. In the end,

“Likes” and “Follows” do not drive sales, but brand loyalty

certainly does.

Creating a Sustainable Relationship with Fans. As in

any good relationship, it’s important to take notice of a

consumer response and assure customers that they’ve

been heard. The simplest example of this is when someone

tweets a question at your brand on Twitter, tweet back at

them. Write as though a person is on the other end, and not

an automated machine or corporate headquarters.

»

»

»

Turning Real-time

Moments into

Something More

Lasting

— Jay Curley

Global Marketing Manager,

Ben & Jerry’s

In order to givevalue back to yourcommunity, you haveto understand whatyour communityvalues.

“

”

— Jon Burkhart

Co-Author, Newsjacking

You need to cultivate theprinciple of little bets... inother words the willingnessto foster lots of small,experimental creativityto put things out there and

see what sticks. It’s theapproach that’s builtGoogle and HP.

“

”



29/31

This white paper can serve as a guide to any brand on

how to go about structuring their organization for

optimal success. The following are key points to take

away:

Embrace a new creative process.

• Structure a nimble, multifaceted team that’s not

afraid to experiment with their ideas.

• Identify the communities relevant to your brand and

listen to what that community values before you start

to speak.

• Establish a cadence of content creation internally

and with your client.

• Monitor the social space for topics relevant to both

your community and your brand.

• Generate high volumes of content that live at the

intersection of stock and flow.

Set expectations for a new kind of client relationship

• Narrow the agency/client divide by working as

extensions of each other.

• Present new ideas regularly and often, establishing

a workflow cadence.

• Put new processes in place to speed up the

approval process. That could mean integrating

client, legal, and agency teams from the start.

Learn from past examples to reduce risk andmaximize opportunities.

• Know the right time to talk and when to take a risk.

• Have a contingency plan for if something goes

wrong.

• Stay true to your brand’s narrative in order to stand

out from the rest.

• Build a sustainable relationship with consumers by

finding hidden insights in their responses.

So, What’s Next? Real-time marketing isn’t a fad; it’s a natural evolution of

the social age. These moments, when fueled by social

media, give brands an opportunity to achieve cultural

relevance and an engaging, ongoing dialogue with their

audience. Those that do it successfully will continue

to surprise and delight their fans and the industry. But

brands that jump into the game before they’re ready--

before they’ve embraced the new process and set up a

strong foundation--risk their reputation.

The real challenge for brands is successfully structuring

their organization to capture these moments on a

sustained basis without losing sight of their overall

strategy and goals. To keep up with consumer

expectations, all brands will eventually need to use

social media – whether for daily engagement or

sporadic responses to consumer requests. The only

way to be ready is to put the right processes and

infrastructure in place. Doing so isn’t easy and takes

time, but the outcome will prove worthwhile and

become more important as social media plays an

increasingly prominent role in brand vitality and health.

© 2014 NewsCred 29


30/31

NewsCred is the leading content marketing platform.

Pairing cutting-edge software with world-class content,

we transform brands into storytellers.

NewsCred’s Content Marketing Cloud© provides the

easiest end-to-end solution for content planning, creation,

publishing and analytics. In one place, brands gain

unprecedented access to the world’s largest contentmarketplace, including licensed content from over

4,000 publishers and original content from our award-

winning journalist network.

Through NewsCred, global brands like Pepsi, P&G, Dell,

General Electric and AIG have seen explosive growth in

social sharing, engagement and lead generation.

Founded in 2008 by Shafqat Islam, Iraj Islam and Asif

Rahman, NewsCred has offices in New York, London andDhaka and is backed by FirstMark Capital, Mayfield Fund,

IA Ventures, Greycroft Partners and others.

Learn more at newscred.com and follow us on Twitter @newscred

DigitasLBi is a global marketing and technology agency

that transforms businesses for the digital age. We help

companies of all shapes and sizes decide What’s Next…

and then we take them there. Also a top ten global agency,

DigitasLBi comprises of 6,000 digital and technology

experts across 40 offices in 25 countries worldwide.

In 2008 the agency created the now-annual Digitas

NewFront, a breakthrough, industry-leading event to

showcase what’s next in original digital content.

In 2012, the agency successfully founded the Digital

Content NewFronts (DCNF) to shape a new market space

for original, premium content at scale—an acknowledged

competitor in the Upfront marketplace.

DigitasLBi is a member of Publicis Groupe [listed on the

Euronext Paris Exchange – FR0000130577 – and part

of the CAC 40 index], one of the world’s largest leading

communications groups.

© 2014 NewsCred 30

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