Turku 2011 - European Capital of Culture and the Social Media

TWITTER

Tweet at least five times per day. Do not do this all at the same time. It must be intermittently for a couple of reasons. The first reason is that if a follower receives your tweets via text message, it will be quite annoying to receive five text messages from twitter from the same person at the same time. The second is that your posts will be scattered throughout your followers’ news feed rather than being in one block at the bottom.  Criticism: Just because business hours are done with, does not mean that tweeters are done checking their twitter accounts. I have found that you do not tweet on the weekends. You need to tweet 7 days per week. Just because you are done with your week does not mean that your followers are done checking their twitter. In fact, they are checking them more often. Tweeting is a must on the weekends and in off hours.

Tweet in English. People want quick and easy information. They will not waste their time on something that they don’t care about that much and have to translate. Reading a tweet needs to be as simple as possible and English is the language of business. So most speak it or know portions. It is suggested that you pick your target markets, then tweet in the language that is most understood by your target markets. Now you do not have to stop tweeting in Finnish. It is part of your culture and you should keep that. But translate it for the rest of the world to understand. Also make sure whoever is tweeting knows the language that they are tweeting in quite well. Otherwise, turku_2011 looks incompetent.

Search relevant topics. And follow those that are tweeting about you or something similar to you. Only way to get followers is to get your name out there. Also, follow profiles that are similar to yours as These profiles are more likely to promote your name

Follow those that Re-Tweet you. Followers are more likely to re-tweet you if they know that you are paying attention and noticing them getting your name out there. Re-tweets are a necessity to gathering followers as each re-tweet exponentially grows the group of people reading your tweets.

Interact with those that follow you. By this I mean actually read the tweets of those that are following you. Answer questions that they pose about tuku_2011. Once followers know that you are interactive, they are more likely to re-tweet, or tell friends to follow you.

Tweet pictures of latest events. Humans are quite visual. Information is wonderful. But a picture that accompanies information peaks the interest of followers.

Re-tweet followers that @ mention you. This may fall under interactivity with followers. But it is imperative that your followers know that you are listening and that you care. If they are re-tweeted by a large multi-national twitter account, any tweeter will be excited and talk to follow tweeters about being re-tweeted by you.

Benchmark yourself with other twitter accounts that have vast amounts of followers. Model yourself particularly after businesses and cities.

Overall

Not tweeting when audience will be checking twitter the most – at night and on the weekend and just, in general, not tweeting enough.

Not promoting yourself and the different events and activities  enough

Turku 2011 - European Capital of Culture and the Social Media

YOUTUBE

The channels website is made in colours and symbols that were used to promote Turku 2011 campaign. The channel consists of 155 videos of different themes.

Unfortunately the channel has been seen only 7768 times so far. This could be due to the fact that it doesn’t appeal much towards international audience. Most of videos are posted in Finnish.

One of videos which has been posted in English reached over 18 000 viewers. It is the most popular video of the channel. In contrast Finnish videos have on average 500 views each.

The channel could increase the number of viewers by using Finnish language as spoken and supporting every video with English subtitles.

Turku 2011 - European Capital of Culture and the Social Media

FACEBOOK

Looking through their Facebook page the majority of their wall posts and links are in Finnish so it means that for a foreigner, like myself, I feel alienated and uninvolved in their site. However, there is a link to their web page which can be translated into English. Their videos by "Live2011" are also all described in Finnish.

They have a photo album containing images of the city of Turku, Logomo which is being used for activities and events, a concert they held in Helsinki and another album for the artwork/logo they are using to represent the Capital of Culture. This is useful for potential customers as it allows them to view the highlights of the city and also become aware of events and activities that are being held.

They display their promotional video which is the advertisement for the Turku 2011 Capital of Culture. This contains images of Turku city and also things associated with Turku. It also uses the colour scheme that has been used throughout their marketing campaign.

The discussion board that they have is mostly in Finnish, with only one in the English language. There is also a link to another Facebook page which is no longer running.

Surprisingly only 16,822 people like their page so they maybe need to advertise the fact that they are using social media sites like Facebook because these pages may contain more up-to-date information and also give visitors a chance to discuss the events and activities that are taking place. However it appears that they do have a very active presence on their page as there are updates almost everyday.

Their likes and interests (networks) include:
-Turku Art Gallery
- Waino Aaltosen Museum
- Pécs2010 European Capital of Culture
- Tallin 2011 European Capital of Culture
- City of Turku
- World Design Capital 2012 Helsinki

By having connections with these pages it allows them to benchmark ideas that will hopefully help them develop and improve their website and how they are carrying out things.

BookBar - "MySpace For Dummies"

The book "MySpace for dummies” written by Ryan Hupfer describes how MySpace social media portal is used by number of organisations to promote and market their products.

The book is also a guide to getting started with MySpace. It explains how to open an account and set up your profile, customize your page, start a blog, showcase your skills, sell, buy and market, stay in touch by bulletins, e-mails, profile comments and lots more.

One of the chapters examines the concept of online social-network marketing. It indicates the pros and cons of marketing on MySpace and gives an advice how to manage the audience and measure MySpace marketing success.

There are examples of companies such as Dell and Honda which engaged in MySpace marketing. As a result, the companies are becoming more conscious about their offerings. On MySpace customers provide feedback and support to the company’s products as well as they express they worries and concerns.

The book offers practical advice on marketing the "MySpace way". This can be expressed using a quote from the text: You (the business) must be prepared not only to market to the community, but also to become a living, breathing member of it. It means that you have to be all-year long active member to make your profile two-way communication with its customers.

To great extent MySpace influenced the way marketers create their marketing strategies. Real-world marketing is slowly translated into MySpace marketing which is much cheaper and more powerful tool at the same time. In order to achieve that companies employee staff specialized in communities around big social media portals.

MySpace audience may not be right for every business, but for those who find their target market on MySpace, you can create more loyal fans than anywhere else. All you have to do is to maintain this trust and support.

Example: "X-Men: The Last Stand" managed to gain 50 000 friends within few hours presence on MySpace. This took place before even the movie was released. By the time the film opened, it made more than 102 million dollars in domestic ticket sales.

The book and its examples are a useful resource for organisations which are willing to increase competitive advantage and be successful.

BookBar - "An Hour A Day"

Social Media Marketing: An Hour a Day by Dave Evans, 2008

"Building on personal empowerment and liberation the internet offers, consumers are actively connecting with each other and talking about everything...In process, they are reinforcing marketing efforts or beating marketers at their own game by directly sharing their own experiences on the social web"

Evans begins by discussing the earlier forms of online communication beginning with methods such as the e-mail and then goes onto say that everything began to change in 2006 when the website YouTube was created. This site allowed everyday people and organisations to upload and view videos created by other people and organisations. In 2006 YouTube were receiving 100 million viewers every single day.

These social media websites have allowed organisations, of any shape or size, to network. This has become a vital word in the world of social media as it allows organisations to expand and develop their knowledge as well as gathering important information about how their product, service or brand is perceived within the marketplace.

"The social web also connects more people than it would be possible otherwise"

Evans goes on to say that the knowledge obtained is not necessarily about your product or service but also about your customers or potential customers as it allows you to learn how to connect with them and understand what they are interested in. If you look at it from the customers perspective, viewing your organisation on a social media site, they are able to learn about your organisation and the values that you hold. This is important as you want to gain interest and a form of trust from your customers so it is vital that you make them aware of your product or service and also the values that you hold as these will be passed through the social media world faster than any traditional method of communication.

In order to succeed they must first make people aware and after this customers drive the marketing campaign by themselves by spreading the word through social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook and then they later on they will hopefully "purchase" the product or service that the organisation has marketed.

For an organisation that, for example, focuses on tourism it is vital that they attract as many visitors and customers as possible. In order to do this, having an active presence in the social media world is on of their best options if they want boost the numbers of visitors. However, if they are to use social media as a marketing tool they must be able to update regularly and make connections with, not only potential customers, but also other tourism/hospitality or local businesses that would be interested in participating in their marketing campaign. So potentially spending "an hour a day" on your site can keep potential customers interested and may increase popularity over a longer period of time.

In order to achieve their objective of gaining as many visitors as possible they must clarify their business objectives and understand their target audience so they can use the correct forms of social media. For example if they're target audience were from the ages of 15-30, Facebook would be perhaps the easiest way of "spreading the word" because through the influence of social networks a huge majority of this market are now online and using this site and through the process of "liking" pages and "joining groups", word travels much faster than traditional methods.



(EVANS, S., 2008. Social Media Marketing: An Hour A Day. Indiana: Wiley Publishing Inc.)

"You've got…Tweets"

http://www.faqs.org/periodicals/201002/1988430831.html

We have found from this article that social media is more than just a simple communication. It is the bridge to your digital island, which provides a business impact. The use of social media can greatly expand a business and its name through four major outlets: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and blogging.

Twitter is a straight forward "microblog" that provides access to upwards of 44.5 million users whether or not they follow your Twitter feed. Reaching this many users is done through "Re-Tweeting." Such a site can expand a company's name and following at exponential rates.

Facebook is similar to twitter but has a more community-like feel to it. Through the process of "friending" and accepting, a real connection between people is created. This type of social media provides a company's consumers with a more personal connection with a business and generates loyalty to said business.

LinkedIn is a more narrow media than both Facebook and Twitter. It is a more work oriented site where professionals go to connect to one another and share ideas on discussions boards. LinkedIn is unlikely to directly provide more  traffic/visitors/revenue. However, it will indirectly provide recognition amognst professionals.

Blogging is not like any of the other three medias. It is highly established and provides users with a flexibility of reading it whenever they choose. Also, it provides a great deall of interactivity between users and businesses.

With the knowledge of these four media types, we have found that this article proves that you must be consistent and persistant in the world of social media.

Social Media for Small Businesses

http://socialmediatrader.com/social-media-marketing-for-small-businesses/

This is an article by Social Media Trader, written in 2008 and it examines the benefits of social media for small business. We felt this would be of assistance in our project because we expect to be working with a smaller hospitatlity business within the Turku area.

"if you want to attract new visitors to your site then you have to actually participate and become involved in the community"

This is becoming increasingly important in this market at this time because of the vast awareness and and use of social media sites like facebook and twitter. It is also important for business to be aware of issues that arise from their product or service because it will be under constant review from the public and may result in either positive or negative feedback. Therefore the company must have a presence within these sites so they can respond quickly and effectively to this feedback.

We have discovered that you must put a large emphasis upon your target audience as these are the people who are going to invest their time and money into your product or service. They are also the ones who influence the content of the product or service that you are providing so it is vital that you, as a company, get this right when you first begin to advertise through the social media sites.

The article also says that a company does not just have to use social media to market their product or service but they can also use more traditional aspects alongside it in order to keep other customer segments aware.