law firms & social media - a growsmartbusiness.com event - june 24, 2009

Shashi BellamkondaSocial Media Swami

Raj MalikThe Social Media Lawyer

Hashtag : #GrowSmartBiz

Hi ! I am Shashi Bellamkonda (@shashib)

• Social Media Swami / Chief Community & Social Media Evangelist at Network Solutions

• Network Solutions listening post in the Social Media

• Network Solutions won

•2008 SNCR Excellence in New Communications Award for Online Reputation Management

• 2009 a Gold Quill Award of Excellence in Social Media from the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).  

• Speaker - `How to Sell Social Media to Your Boss' and 'Social Media Tools for Small Business, at national and regional conferences like IABC, SXSW, Affiliate Summit, American Institute of Writers, and Podcamps.  

I am Raj Malik (@rkm2929)

• Sr. Director, Legal & Business Affairs at Network Solutions Champion for the Social Media efforts at Network

Solutions along with the Swami Active Twitter User One of main legal points of contact for all social media

matters at Network Solutions

• Speaker at 2009 SXSW• Ex-Wal Mart Greeter and Ex-Subway Sandwich

Engineer

Domains• Find-a-domain services

− Certified Offer− Backorder− Premium Domains

• Domain Web Forwarding• Private Registration

Domains• Find-a-domain services

− Certified Offer− Backorder− Premium Domains

• Domain Web Forwarding• Private Registration

Communication• Business E-mail• Secure E-mail

Sell Online • E-commerce website

packages• E-commerce Tools

Merchant Account• Do It For Me E-

Commerce Website Design Service

Marketing • Search Engine

Optimization• Pay Per Click

Advertising• Optimized Press

Releases• Directory Services:

Monster Marketplace & ThinkLocal

• Enhanced Business Listings

• Link Building• Content Creation

Marketing • Search Engine

Optimization• Pay Per Click

Advertising• Optimized Press

Releases• Directory Services:

Monster Marketplace & ThinkLocal

• Enhanced Business Listings

• Link Building• Content Creation

Security• SSL Certificate• PC Security

Small Business Lifecycle

Websites• Website Hosting• Statistics and Website

tools• Professional Website

Design Services• Professional Logo Design

Services• Mobile Websites

Network Solutions

PR Measurement SummitJune 20094

• We service over 3 million SMB customers and manage 7.5 million domain names.

Social Media – Hard Sell to Your Boss and Legal?

Don’t let the skeptics win

No way to measure? Is there any ROI?

All these will pass They are not mainstream,

nobody pays attention to them

We cannot not control the message, lack of consistency, danger of going haywire

You can only promote the company or products

Multiple stake holder approval of the message

Tools are expensive Legal will never approve

Photo Credit : http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnygoldstein/2546693421/

Challenges - Who is responsible

•http://flickr.com/photos/jjgardner3/3202924768/ Jimmy Gardner http://www.eastcoastblogging.com

• Everyone is responsible for social media – YOU!

• How do you share the ownership? - EVERYONE

•Who are your internal social media people? – MOBILIZE A TEAM AND COORDINATE EFFORTS

•Can they write? Express yourself well and know your writing also reflects the company

•Who should approve? – set up a process

•Can we trust them? – start slowly, build trust then unleash the fury

•Where should they engage? Wherever company is mentioned and customers are

Opportunity : Who owns the conversation?

•http://www.webinknow.com/2008/12/the-us-air-force-armed-with-social-media.html

•What if they say bad things about the company ? – Look at it as a challenge to turn opinions around

• Which networks should we participate? – Most popular, but keep eye out for where customers are

• Are our customers on social networks? – Ask customers where they are

What do we call this position

Taking the Lawyers to Lunch

• The legal department is your friend• Electronics Frontier Foundation list

of some of the legal liabilities issues that can arise from a blog: Personal and Business Defamation Intellectual Property

(Copyright/Trademark) Trade Secret Publication of Private Facts Publication of Sensitive Financial Data

• Don’t have a legal department see our post on standard social media guidelines

Legal can help you from making mistakes

Social Media Guidelines

• Get everyone in the company on the same page as to social media best practices

• Compliance is mandatory• Failure to meet the guidelines can result in job loss and

expose the company to liability• Guidelines

Do’s and Don’ts− Do not disclose confidential information; Do no post negative or

defamatory content; Do not plagiarize material etc. Topic Taboo List Continually review and update guidelines

Network Solutions Strategy

4 Point Social Media Strategy

Brand / Reputation Management Connecting with Customers Community Outreach Get new business

Network Solutions Strategy : Changing Perceptions

• First Half 2008: • Approximately 60 percent of Network Solutions

social media conversations negative• Perception of Network Solutions as domain

registrar only• Changing perception become critical for long term

health

Planned Approach

• Listen and engage customers directly Online At conferences General participation

• Respond to feedback, calls for help and knowledge

• Build positive equity through valuable content

• Community member

Network Solutions Swami’s - 3 Word Mantra

Photo: courtesy: http://flickr.com/photos/metrojp/92038203/

LISTEN

PARTICIPATE

Photo Courtesy: http://flickr.com/photos/redcarpet/50339009/

CONTRIBUTE

Photo Courtesy: http://flickr.com/photos/presta/129832836/

We started by listening

Commenting where we were mentioned

Blogs

Media

Podcasts

Answers

Forums and Niche Social NetworksVideo

Communities and conversations

•Earn Credibility as an expert by helping others

• Commenting is a way of conversation

• Traffic from your comment to your blog

•The Huffington Post Allows Top Commenters To Become Bloggers

Content and Conversations

Twitter Conversations

• Reply to all the people who @ you

• Retweet or tweet interesting links

• People like conversation

•3 tweets a day keeps the doctor away

Built online relationships offline

Results : Online Positive Reputation Grows

• Network Solutions won the Society of New Media Communications and Research Award for Corporate Online Reputation Management

•2009 a Gold Quill Award of Excellence in Social Media from the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).  

Results : Google Juice

Our Blog is Google Result No. 6

Our Blog is Bing Result No. 5

Karmic Marketing also gets results

• Referrals • Coupon requests• Traffic to NetworkSolutions.com

Sometimes the Competition helps too

What Does the future hold

• More community engagement Events Online monitoring

• Content: Seeking to help small businesses, web companies during recession Smart Business Success Index : GrowSmartBusiness.com

• Continued blogging with new voices• Expanded offerings

Women Grow Business Webinar Small Business Conference

• Small Business Conference Oct 1st in Washington DC (tbd)

Training other advocates

• Social Media• Twitter• Blogging• Bookmarking

Your Social Media Plan

• Setup Alerts • Join and setup profiles in 3 social networks• 15-20 minutes a day tracing the alerts and responding • Choose 3 blogs on your field to read and comment• Converse, don’t sell• Answer questions and become an expert in your niche on LinkedIn• 2 hours a week - Learn and write about the products you promote• Measure your efforts

How many times were you mentioned How many people read your posts Inbounds links Are your customers evangelizing

• Attend one local event a month

• Ask for help from the community if you need it

GrowSmartBusiness.com

Questions ?

• Shashi Bellamkonda shashib@networksolutions.com• Twitter: @shashib• Raj Malik rmalik@networksolutions.com• Twitter: @rkm2929• Small Business Success Index : http://www.GrowSmartBusiness.com• Network Solutions Blog : http://blog.networksolutions.com• Web Community Network : http://www.LinkTogether.com• Small Business Network : http://www.MySolutionSpot.com• Women Entrepreneurs : http://www.WomenGrowBusiness.com

• Personal Blogs: Technology & Social Media: http://www.shashi.name Digital Thoughts: http://readythoughts.blogspot.com Restaurant Reviews: http://www.carryoncurry.com