Anna Ritchie : Community Maven
Anna Ritchie
Marketing & communications practitioner, and product manager for TMCnet. Focus on content marketing and social media with a specialty in Online Community-building for businesses. Follow @Connectincloud and @apritchie
| Expertise and Advice on Successful Online Communities

September 2011

You are browsing the archive for September 2011.

How to Maintain Brand Consistency Across Multiple Sites: Lessons from Dell

September 29, 2011

Online marketing has its challenges, regardless of your company size. Even large companies like Dell struggle with brand consistency, online reputation, and social media interactions. In a recent article by Christopher Hosford,   Dell shares some of the lesson they learned while trying to build a brand through online communities, and has some insights I think any community sponsor could learn from and apply to their own programs.

For one, the first and most important part of your online marketing strategy must be brand control.

Why You Need a Twitter Button on Your Online Community

September 28, 2011

As any marketing practitioner knows, keeping track of all your online community, company website and social media activity, discussions and content can be daunting. I feel like I’m constantly slogging through comments and links and likes and tweets (before I’ve even had my coffee) trying to figure out which pieces I’ll re-tweet, comment and link to, and so on and so on…

That’s why marketers are focusing on integration as a main priority for 2012- and are looking to marry the 3 pillars of their online marketing (website, online community and social) activities by making sure messages are consistent and the sites are all “speaking” with each other.  Now, how the heck do you even do this?

Coca-Cola's Sweet Lessons in Online Community-Building

September 6, 2011

Recently, I stumbled upon this article, which outlines how companies are changing their retail strategies to meet the changing needs of consumers who, though spending less due to the current economic conditions, are also still highly engaged in mobile, video, social and traditional e-commerce activities. The article highlights Coca-Cola, who launched an exciting social and interactive campaign in 2009 with their “Freestyle”  vending machines which people can use to select flavors and combinations of their choice for a unique, personalized drink. Now, the company is taking this feature online with an interactive Facebook page and Smartphone Apps that allow people to choose a mix, name the drink, get a code then go to a machine to get their blend dispensed.

That’s more than a yummy refreshment.