Twitter Campaigns

I'm a reluctant "twitterer". I have an account and once in a great while, I check in. It's one of those tools that I just don't seem to have time for. I did recently set up a Hootsuite account that combines my Twitter/Facebook/LinkedIn accounts and I'm going to TRY make it my go-to social media source.

I found "The ROI of Social Media" in the micro-blogging chapter particularly interesting. This was a business that makes effective use of Twitter and actually sees results.
I started trolling the web for other successful examples.

One case I found on Mashable is the Edge Shave Zone Anti-Irritation Campaign. (Mashable.com, http://mashable.com/2011/01/18/edge-soirritating/, Twitter + Random Acts of Kindness = A Successful Social Campaign.) Edge relieves the suffering of irritated twitterers out there who tweet their annoyances to #soirritating or other accounts. Mashable reports two Edge employees work full-time seeking out irritations and, in some cases, trying to ease those annoyances with clever and creative solutions from the #EdgeofGreatness account.

For example, when someone tweeted it was irritating to run out of cereal, Edge sent him a supply of cereal. Another annoyed tweeter received a new iPad. One woman who reported hearing voices in her head speaking Spanish received a Spanish-English dictionary.

The campaign has garnered thousands of followers and is building the always sought-after and elusive "buzz".

Two key points jumped out at me after reading this article.

First of all, a social media campaign like this one requires an investment of time, energy and creativity to be effective. The campaign kept two employees busy full-time. If you want a social media campaign to be successful, you have to be willing to devote the resources to it.

Secondly, the campaign was also a success because the employees were able to move quickly and autonomously. The Mashable article says the Edge team had the freedom to make decisions without consulting with the client. Reports Mashable: "Had the team, let’s say, had a weekly meeting with the client to approve that week’s tweets, the campaign would have lacked its conversational tone and much of its ability to engage."

This gets at one of the benefits and dangers of a social media campaign. In order to run a successful campaign, a client has to let go. That's a scary prospect. But with communications campaigns that evolve and develop as quickly as social media, you can't keep tight control without losing effectiveness.