comblu state of online communities 2010

The State of Online Branded Communities

A Study of Community Performance and Integrated

Social Media for America’s Top Brands December 2009

PREPARED BY:

ComBlu The State of Online Branded Communities 2 © Copyright 2007-2009. All Rights Reserved. Communications Blueprints, L.L.C. All copyrighted and trademarked material presented herein is the sole property of Communications Blueprints, L.L.C. (d/b/a ComBlu).

Table of Contents

Introduction……………………..3 Community With Purpose…………………………………... 3 Lessons Learned…………………………………………………..4

Strategic Conclusions……..5 No There There…………………………………………………... 5

Key Findings……………………...6 Experimentation Most Prevalent………………………... 6 Inconsistent Best Practice Adoption……………………. 6 Social Media Integration Lags……………………………... 6 The High Performers…………………………………………... 7 The Contenders………………………………………………….. 7 The Outliers………………………………………………………... 7 Missed Opportunities…………………………………………..7

Methodology…………………….8 The Approach…………..………………………………………..8 Calculating Brand Score……………………………………..9

Selected Findings……………10 Appendices Industry Detail…………………………………………………..20 Company Details……………………………………………….25 Community Sites Reviewed……………………………….26 Brand Score Methodology………………………………...27 List of Best Practices………………………………………….28 Glossary…………………………………………………………….29 Bibliography……………………………………………………...31

Contact Info……...……………32


The purpose most often cited for building an online

community is ‘customer engagement’ – a term that

marketers toss around like Frisbees at a dog beach. Yet

despite the fact that the art and science of community

building has advanced considerably in recent years,

most brands fall short when it comes to actualizing this

key goal. The marketer’s mindset has evolved from

“build it and they will come” to “scaling and measuring

business impact,” but reality does not reflect these in-

tentions. To succeed, community planners need a cohe-

sive strategy, a grounding in best practices and an un-

derstanding of how to truly engage with stakeholders.

This ComBlu research project was designed to closely

examine the community and social marketing programs

of 45 companies, all of which are major brands across

nine different industries.

Specifically, the research evaluates their effectiveness in:

1. Providing a meaningful experience for members,

2. Integrating their brand strategies across multiple

communities and social media, and

3. Taking advantage of best practices to strengthen

customer engagement.

The importance of these factors cannot be overesti-

mated. The Gartner Study predicts that more than 50

percent of companies that have established an online

community will fail to establish mutual purpose, ulti-

mately eroding customer and company value.

Brands have wholeheartedly embraced the concept of using online communities and social marketing to engage their

customers and stakeholders. Even in the midst of a recession, the 2009 Tribalization of Business Study found that 94

percent of respondents planned to maintain or increase their investment in online communities. A recent Gartner

Study projects that, by 2010, more than 60 percent of Fortune 1000 companies will connect to or host some form of

online community. However, according to Forrester Research’s latest report, Three Steps to Measuring Social Media

Marketing, when asked how effective their efforts were in properly measuring and planning their social marketing

efforts, the average was a failing grade (4.5 out of 10). Poor measurement and planning leads to poor results. Forres-

ter’s report, published October 29th, 2009 shares not only this conclusion, but also outlines a path for improvement.

Introduction

Community With PurposeCommunity With PurposeCommunity With Purpose


Our research found many examples indicating brands

do not understand what people want or expect from an

online community or the role the brand plays in fulfill-

ing those needs. They also fail to realize that engage-

ment is both personal and multidimensional, which

requires a serious commitment by the brand to be in-

volved. It’s not just hiring a team of mom bloggers or

having a Facebook page or even building a branded

community. These and other stand-alone tactics ulti-

mately are dead-ends unless they are linked to a

broader brand purpose. The brand needs to be an ac-

tive participant in the community and interact in ways

that resonate with members or visitors.

Another key finding was that the majority of communi-

ties in our study offered only a limited number of ways

for members to engage. This lack of channels overlooks

the fact that different types of people prefer to interact

with communities in ways that suit their personalities.

Without giving members multiple ways to participate, a

community can quickly become a ghost town.

The high performers in our study were on the other end

of the spectrum. In fact, the four who achieved a

“Cohesive Strategy” Brand Score on average used 17 of

the 23 best practices being evaluated. What makes this

especially important is that almost all of these best

practices are tools or pathways for engagement.

High performers also provided more opportunities for

purpose-driven conversations on topics of genuine

interest to both the company and its customers. It is

imperative that brands have a strategy for leveraging

the feedback, ideas, and insights they gain. According

to the 2009 Tribalization of Business Study, “to realize

the full benefit of social media and online communi-

ties, business leaders must move beyond viewing them

as ‘bolt-ons’ to their corporations. Companies need to

integrate the new information flow associated with

communities with those that already exist inside their

corporations.”

Engagement is a process, not a destination. Although

the brands in this study were in various stages of this

journey, all could have benefited by adopting a more

systematic and strategic approach to community build-

ing. The real purpose of online communities is to cre-

ate closer and deeper relationships with customers.

And the rewards are not just higher loyalty and in-

creased lifetime value, but customers who are active

participants in defining the brand and helping the busi-

ness grow.

Introduction

Lessons LearnedLessons LearnedLessons Learned


W ith a few exceptions, urban planning is

lacking in brands’ approach to integrated

social marketing.

Industries with multiple brands are missing the oppor-

tunity to use an integrated approach to social market-

ing to cross-sell and extend the umbrella effect of the

“mother brand,” or conversely, to extend the halo ef-

fect of individual brands to other brands and to the

mother brand. Most notably branded communities

often:

► Lack a consistent user interface across commu-

nities geared to the same audiences.

► Offer little integration of communities geared

to same audience by the same company but

different brand or product groups.

► It seems that many brands create a community

tab without first determining the real need for

and mission of its community program.

It’s unclear what brands are doing with the feedback and

input captured in their communities. There’s little visible

active community management so the interactivity

borne of true engagement is truncated.

► No obvious acknowledgment of feedback or

ideas. Part of the reason people offer ideas is

because they want to feel a part of the brand,

or want to help it thrive.

In some instances the brand has absolutely no presence

inside the community. There is no human face of the

brand. And, when there is, often there is no easy way to

communicate. It’s almost as if the brand thinks it needs

a community but doesn’t want to be bothered with actu-

ally engaging. This is a huge missed opportunity.

Strategic Conclusions

Common wisdom today is that the entire web is social

and brands are doing a good job of incorporating social

tools into websites, often putting many of them behind

a “community tab.” In reality, most of these are good

examples of social web but not true communities. They

lack the sense of destination and in most instances

display no compelling reason to return frequently.

► Many brands seem to be using a community

tab to jump on the bandwagon. But there’s no

”there there” when the visitor registers and

gets behind the community tab. Instead of

engaging the visitor, the brand drives them

away because they offer little of value. Con-

sumers today are sophisticated users of social

tools and seek out communities to learn,

share and interact. If these elements are miss-

ing or there is no obvious organizing structure

that fulfills specific needs, the “faux” commu-

nity will be quickly abandoned.

No There ThereNo There ThereNo There There


Most brands are still in the social marketing experi-

mentation stage. These brands exhibit lots of social

activity with little connection or integration with each

other. The next largest segment is community ghost

towns, which are basically void of members, engage-

ment or return visitors. Not surprising, ghost towns

displayed the fewest best practices in community de-

sign and/or engagement tactics. Only nine percent

showed evidence of community overload, which di-

rected multiple efforts at the same audience. These

brands may be confusing their customers or prospects

and may be dissipating efforts. Community overload

most often occurred with brands that have multiple

products that are targeted to the same or similar mar-

ket segments. Twenty percent of brands showed a

cohesive, integrated approach to their community and

social media programs. These brands typically had ro-

bust engagement tools and multiple activities that had

healthy participation levels.

Since most brands are either still experimenting or

have built ghost towns, it is not surprising that

slightly more than a third use more than 10 best

practices or have high levels of activity. On average

only 36 percent of the communities studied lever-

age a majority of the defined community best prac-

tices and 36 percent of the communities have high

levels of activity.

A number of brands that have more than one com-

munity program are inconsistent in their use and

application of best practices, bringing mixed results

across their social marketing programs.

► Many have one “shining star” that demon-

strates many best practices and active commu-

nity management. The remaining community

properties are underperforming or orphaned.

► Brand teams either are not deploying best

practices consistently across the brand’s eco-

system or have yet to form a Community Cen-

ter of Excellence to share best practices, learn-

ing and insights in a cross-team or cross-

functional manner.

Key Findings

Social experimentation: Lots of one-off effort but no evidence of a cohesive strategy

Community ghost town: No evidence of recent member growth or activity in the community or communities

Cohesive strategy: Existence of a solid community foundation with integrated brand presence across social assets

Community overload: Multiple communities and initiatives competing for the same audience

T he final result is a comprehensive audit of the prevalence of community best practices and

state of community and social marketing integration.

Experimentation Most PrevalentExperimentation Most PrevalentExperimentation Most Prevalent

Inconsistent Best Practice AdoptionInconsistent Best Practice AdoptionInconsistent Best Practice Adoption

Social Media Integration LagsSocial Media Integration LagsSocial Media Integration Lags

Most brands in the research sample use social media and community as separate initiatives.

► Overwhelmingly, 90 percent of brands re-

searched have an official presence on popular

social media platforms.

► Fifty-six percent of the brands have some evi-

dence of social media integration with their

communities, but only 32 percent of the 135

branded communities reviewed are integrated

with social media.

A majority of the communities that integrated community and social media were among the top scorers.


Only five of the 45 brands scored 35 points or more

using ComBlu’s community scoring methodology to

be classified “high performers.” None scored above

43, which means no brand in the study achieved the

highest performing “black belt” level.

Four of the five high performers placed in the Cohe-

sive Strategy category; specifically, AT&T (43), Sony

(43), YouTube (39) and Sears (37). Only Best Buy (40)

was categorized as in Experimentation stage.

This finding implies that even if a brand does not ex-

hibit an overall cohesive strategy, it can still be a high

performer if it incorporates a significant number of

best practices into its community model and inte-

grates it with its social media initiatives, which was

the case with Best Buy.

A number of brands scored just short of the 35 points that would have put them in a high performing cate-gory.

► In most cases, there is some evidence of strat-

egy but one key element is lacking. Specifically,

Bank of America lacks social media integration

while eBay and Wells Fargo have limited best

practice adoption.

► P&G, which was classified in Experimentation,

also demonstrated limited best practice adop-

tion.

Key Findings

The High Performers The High Performers The High Performers

The ContendersThe ContendersThe Contenders

Walmart and Target, both also in the Experimentation

category, were found to be outliers, because they had

active communities with low best practice adherence.

Despite their low best practice adoption, they surgi-

cally applied the ones most closely aligned with their

community mission and integrated them with social

media.

The OutliersThe OutliersThe Outliers

There were a few brands with missed opportunities, which impacted their scores:

► Mini Cooper: Lacks key best practices such

as rewards and recognition, content search

and syndication, and rating and ranking. The

brand team also missed an opportunity to

interact with its organic fan base and leverage

their passion.

► Bravo: Active community, but lacks user-

generated content tools. Social media initia-

tives are separate and inactive.

► Sprint Nextel: Active social media presence,

but overall community experience is not

seamless or obvious.

► Novartis: Successful in social media cam-

paigns, but no integration with community

and very limited in best practice adoption.

This may be because of the highly regulated

nature of the industry.

Missed OpportunitiesMissed OpportunitiesMissed Opportunities


C omBlu analyzed the community and social

marketing programs of 45 companies dur-

ing the spring and summer of 2009. Selection criteria

included:

► Large enterprise

► Industry leader

► Diversity in its marketing approach

The sample included companies from nine sectors:

auto, entertainment, financial services, healthcare,

online services, packaged goods, retail, technology

and telecommunications. With one exception, all sec-

tors included at least four companies. None of the

companies were aware that we were analyzing their

community sites and social media initiatives. Further,

ComBlu did not contact these companies prior to the

analysis of the data it collected.

Each company was analyzed using a comprehensive

auditing tool that was designed to draw quantitative

rating and ranking data as well as qualitative reac-

tions to community experience. Once all scorecards

were complete, they were tabulated to determine the

aggregate score of each rating capture.

The auditing tool was used to:

► Identify and capture attributes of multiple

company or brand sponsored community

sites. In instances where one company had

dozens of community sites, a representative

sample was selected for scoring. Each site was

analyzed using a scorecard that indicated

which of 23 community best practices were

present. Observations about overall experi-

ence in interacting in each community were

also recorded.

► Capture data about overall community health

and wellness, when available, including com-

munity size, activity levels, frequency of en-

gagement by community members and recent

activity.

► Evaluate social media integration with com-

munity sites. Specifically, what is the brand’s

presence on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter,

YouTube, Flicker, Hulu and other social media

presence was also noted. While the primary

focus was community/social media integra-

tion, detailed observations about branded

social networking sites that were being used

in lieu of a traditional branded online commu-

nity were recorded.

√ To determine social media presence and

integration within the communities, re-

searchers specifically sought evidence of

an official brand presence in popular so-

cial media sites available for public ac-

cess. However, to be deemed integrated

with social media, a brand must:

» Drive traffic between social media

properties and online community.

Methodology

The ApproachThe ApproachThe Approach


» Indicate a shared vision and pur-

pose through common graphics,

verbiage, community managers or

theme.

» Share user-generated content be-

tween properties while using the

strength of each property for a de-

fined purpose to demonstrate the

highest level of integration.

► Assign each company’s community marketing

efforts a primary and, where pertinent, a sec-

ondary classification. These included:

√ Community overload: Multiple com-

munities and initiatives competing for

the same audience.

√ Community ghost town: No evidence

of recent member growth or activity in

the community or communities.

√ Social experimentation: Lots of one-

off effort but no evidence of a cohesive

strategy.

√ Cohesive strategy: Existence of a solid

community foundation with multiple

activities rolled into a single community.

► A literature search provided additional in-

sights about the overarching strategy of a

company’s social marketing efforts.

Once all data was captured, analysts applied an algo-rithm that yielded a Brand Score.

► The community scoring algorithm overlays

multiple data points from the data capture to

yield a score for brand community perform-

ance. A detailed description of the filtering

process is included in the Appendix.

► Resulting scores could range from 0 to 60.

√ Scores between 0 and 34 were consid-

ered “low performers” and were in the

“red zone.”

√ Scores between 35 and 49 were “high

performers” and were placed in the

“green zone.”

√ Scores of 50 or above were considered

“best practice leaders” and were given a

special “black belt” designation.

Methodology

Calculating Brand ScoreCalculating Brand ScoreCalculating Brand Score


Selected Findings

Community Classification by Industry

Technology and online services’ use of com-

munity is likely driven by the social approach

applied to the development of their product

and service mix.

Healthcare provides a number of community

venues but most lack any form of meaningful

interaction and community best practice tools;

this is likely due to a lack of understanding of

how to deploy community tools effectively

within a highly regulated environment.

Branded content still monopolizes most health-

care community properties.

Retail’s community approach follows a tradi-

tional channel bias towards marketing, transac-

tional demand generation and promotion.

Packaged goods use of community likely emu-

lates the approaches taken in offline demand

generation, many of which are similar to those

tactics used by retail.

Financial services takes a more focused and

conservative approach to community. This dis-

ciplined approach seems to have curtailed inno-

vation and activity within the various venues

they have established.

Auto’s approach seems to lack true utility and

relevance, with a higher degree of focus on

product rather than use or lifestyle.

Cohesive strategy: Existence of a solid community foundation with integrated brand presence across social assets

Community overload: Multiple communities and initiatives competing for the same audience

Social experimentation: Lots of one-off effort but no evidence of a cohesive strategy

Community ghost town: No evidence of recent member growth or activity in the community or communities

Classification by IndustryClassification by IndustryClassification by Industry


Selected Findings

Many of the least used best practices are the

ones that potentially can give a community the

greatest lift in terms of engagement, recruitment

and growth. A few examples follow.

Community manager’s lack of active commu-

nity management was a big red flag. The commu-

nity manager is the face of the community and

provides the coordination between the commu-

nity sponsor and its members.

Faceted search allows users to continuously

customize their community experience.

Social bookmarking gives community mem-

bers a tool to personalize and aggregate their

online experience at the brand’s destination site.

Content aggregation allows the brand to col-

lect a variety of pertinent content, conversations

and tools in a single place, making the experience

at the destination site richer and more engaging.

Social networking gives members the tools to

find others inside the community who share in-

terests or needs. While brands may not want to

get into the social networking business, having

social tools for creating and interacting in groups

is an important community technique.

Community Best Practice Use

0102030405060708090

100110120130

8877 73 72

6658

53 53 52 51 51 50 49 48 46 44 4435 32

1914

9

Best Practice UseBest Practice UseBest Practice Use


Application of Best PracticesApplication of Best PracticesApplication of Best Practices

Community Best Practice Adoption Rate

Industry Score

Selected Findings

The application of best practices is limited.

► Only 36% of all brands used 10 or

more best practices in their commu-

nity approaches. Finding the best mix

of tools and tactics that align with the

community mandate and member

needs will generate higher perform-

ance levels than are evident today.

► The industries with the highest adop-

tion of best practices also had the

highest average industry score.

The brand score was created by overlaying

several key data points that were captured

during the research. (See Appendix for full

description of the scoring methodology.)

► These same industry groups yielded

the highest scoring companies that

were reviewed as part of this re-

search. These included:

Technology: Sony

Online Services: YouTube

Telecommunications: AT&T

Auto

Entertainment

Finan

cial S

ervice

s

Healthca

re

Online Se

rvice

s

Packa

ged G

oods

Retail

Technology

Telecommunica

tions

Auto

Entertainment

Finan

cial S

ervice

s

Healthca

re

Online Se

rvice

s

Packa

ged G

oods

Retail

Technology

Telecommunica

tions


0

2

4

6

8

The mix of best practices present in each classification.

► Comments was the most used best practice in all but the community ghost town cate-gory, which still had it among its top five.

√ Since comments are a proxy for en-gagement, this is an important tool. If visitors or members cannot interact with experts and peers, they will have little reason to continue to use that community.

√ In many instances, the comments functionality is the only way that com-munity members can ask questions and add their insights and knowledge to a conversation.

► Those with a cohesive strategy used some of the best practices that lead to deep en-gagement such as faceted search and con-tent aggregation.

► The other three community classifications did not go much beyond basic out-of-the-box community functionality.

Selected Findings

Social Experimentation

Comments New & Featured Content

User Profiles

Forums Avatars

50

40

30

20

10

0

Community Ghost Town

Use of Rich Media

User Profiles

Fun Engagement

Tools

Comments Social Networking

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

Cohesive Strategy

Comments Forums Faceted Search

Content Aggregation

Avatars

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

Comments Forums Blogs

Top 5 Best Practices by ClassificationTop 5 Best Practices by ClassificationTop 5 Best Practices by Classification

Community Overload 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 New &

Featured Content

User Profiles


Community Activity Levels High vs. Low

Industry Wide Social Media Integration

Selected Findings

yes no

Activity Level & Social Media IntegrationActivity Level & Social Media IntegrationActivity Level & Social Media Integration

Communities generally had low activity rates and lacked consistent social media integration. ► The vast majority of communities exhibited

low activity levels. Activity was measured by number of discussion threads, views of threads and comments.

► Most brands in the research sample use so-cial media and community as separate initia-tives.

√ Overwhelmingly 90% of brands re-searched have an official presence on popular social media platforms.

√ Fifty-six of the brands have some evi-dence of social media integration with their communities, but only 32% of the 135 communities themselves are inte-grated with social media.

√ Those communities that integrated community and social media placed among the top scorers.


Activity Level & Social Media IntegrationActivity Level & Social Media IntegrationActivity Level & Social Media Integration

Percentage of Communities That are Active by Industry

Social Media Integration by Industry

Retail had the most active communities as well

as the highest evidence of community/social

media integration.

► We defined the latter as those brands that

presented consistent graphics, look and

feel on both their community and social

sites such as Facebook, YouTube, Flickr,

etc. They also had easy and obvious link-

age between the community and other

social properties.

√ This integration was achieved through

content syndication and aggregation,

links and marketing themes.

► Retail, like telecommunications and online

services has had a long history with dy-

namic online tools. E-commerce was pio-

neered by retail in partnership with tech-

nology and online services, so as with the

use of best practices, it’s very likely these

groups have a greater understanding and

cultural acceptance of community and

social media integration within their busi-

ness models than other categories.

Selected Findings


Industry Scores

Analysts applied an algorithm once all data was

captured that yielded a Brand Score.

► The community scoring algorithm overlays

multiple data points from the data capture to

yield a score for brand community perform-

ance. A detailed description of the filtering

process is included in the Appendix.

► Resulting scores could range from 0 to 60.

√ Scores between 0 and 34 were consid-

ered “low performers” and were in the

“red zone.”

√ Scores between 35 and 49 were “high

performers” and were placed in the

“green zone.”

√ Scores of 50 or above were considered

“best practice leaders” and were given a

special “black belt” designation.

Selected Findings

Industry ScoresIndustry ScoresIndustry Scores———AverageAverageAverage



Industry scores showed a wide range between categories and between brands within categories. ► Online Services, technology and telecommu-

nications lead the field, primarily due to a

greater understanding and bias towards the

use of online tools to collaborate than other

business categories.

√ It is likely that there are a greater num-

ber of resources inside these organiza-

tions who both understand the impor-

tance and have the capacity to imple-

ment community best practices online

than other business categories.

√ Further, historically the speed of innova-

tion and change within these categories

helps them in quickly adopting and

evolving their community best practices.

► While telecommunications fell into the ex-

perimentation category, both online services

and technology had a high percent of brands

that demonstrate a cohesive strategy.

Selected Findings

Total Brand Score Technology

Total Brand Score Telecommunications

Total Brand Score Online Services


► Retail, packaged goods and financial services

are the second tier performers. Like the top

performers, quickly and effectively responding

to consumer demand is a requirement for suc-

cess. This reality likely translates into this cate-

gory's approach to community and their will-

ingness to experiment and interact with their

customers in a meaningful way.

► Financial services had a high percentage of

brands that fell into the cohesive strategy cate-

gory with both retail and packaged goods

showing high levels of experimentation.

Selected Findings

Total Brand Score Retail

Total Brand Score Packaged Goods

Total Brand Score Financial Services



Industry Score’sIndustry Score’sIndustry Score’s———AverageAverageAverage

► Auto, healthcare and entertainment had the

lowest scores in ComBlu’s community per-

formance measurement system. All three of

these industries had the highest level of com-

munity ghost towns.

√ Auto and entertainment only used 34%

of best practices, healthcare had the

lowest with 5%.

► Healthcare had virtually no integration with

social media Auto had the second lowest.

► Entertainment was the most difficult to un-

derstand. Consumers of entertainment have

a natural passion for their favorite programs,

characters and programming. Yet the indus-

try fails to leverage that passion and connect

via community.

Selected Findings

Total Brand Score Healthcare

Total Brand Score Auto

Total Brand Score Entertainment


Appendix: Industry Detail

Industry by Classification

Community Activity Levels

Social Media Integration

AUTOAUTOAUTO

ENTERTAINMENTENTERTAINMENTENTERTAINMENT

Community overload

Social experimentation

Community ghost town

Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No



FINANCIAL SERVICESFINANCIAL SERVICESFINANCIAL SERVICES

HEALTHCAREHEALTHCAREHEALTHCARE




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No



ONLINE SERVICESONLINE SERVICESONLINE SERVICES

PACKAGED GOODSPACKAGED GOODSPACKAGED GOODS




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No



RETAILRETAILRETAIL

TECHNOLOGYTECHNOLOGYTECHNOLOGY




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No



TELECOMMUNICATIONSTELECOMMUNICATIONSTELECOMMUNICATIONS




Community overload



Cohesive strategy

Low High

Yes No


Appendix: Company Details

Auto

BMW - Mini Cooper 13

Ford 17

Honda 3

Hyundai 11

Entertainment

Bravo 25

DreamWorks 11

Food Network 20

Sony Entertainment 16

Warner Brothers 22

Financial Services American Express 20

Bank of America 30

JP Morgan Chase 4

USAA 28

Wells Fargo 22

Healthcare Johnson & Johnson 4

Merck 4

Novartis 10

Pfizer 3

Packaged Goods

General Mills 27 Kimberly-Clark 20 Kraft 12 Proctor & Gamble 31 SC Johnson 16 Unilever 19

Online Services Bing 14 eBay 30 YouTube 39

Retail Best Buy 40 Home Depot 11 Lowe's 15 Nordstrom 14 Sears 37 Target 11 Walmart 21

Technology Apple 21 Dell 28 HP 16 Microsoft 13 Sony 43

Telecommunications AT&T 43 Comcast 23 Sprint Nextel 23 Verizon 11

Company ScoresCompany ScoresCompany Scores


Appendix: Community Sites Reviewed

COMPANY COMMUNITY

BMW - Mini-Cooper Mini Owner's Lounge

Ford Fiesta Movement

Mustang

Synch My Ride

Honda Owner Link

Hyundai Elantra

USA Hyundai

Kia Forums

Kia USA

Toyota-Lexus Lexus Owners' Club

Toyota Nation

Toyota Owners Club

Lexus Drivers

Bravo Bravo TV

DreamWorks DreamWorks Animation

Food Network Food2.com

Food.com Beta

FoodNetwork.com

Sony Entertainment Sony MyPlay

Sony Television

Sony Pictures -- Movies

Crackle

Warner Brothers Warner Brothers

The WB

The CW

Kids WB

TCM

Zuda Comics

American Express Food and Wine

Open Forum

Executive Travel Magazine

Bank of America Small Business Online Community

JP Morgan Chase Chase.comJP Morgan Community Facebook Application

USAA What's On Your Mind

Wells Fargo Stagecoach Island

Johnson & Johnson J&J Connect

Merck Zostavax

Gardasil

Cozaar

Emend

Isentress

Januvia

Zetia

Novartis CML earth

Pfizer Pfizer Home

Bing Bing Community

Bing Community Forums

Bing Developer Community

Bing Travel Community

Ebay eBay Neighborhood

YouTube YouTube.com

YouTube YouTube.com

General Mills Betty Crocker

PSSST

eatbetteramerica

The Racing Mom

Pillsbury

Kimberly-Clark Scott Common Sense Community

Huggies Baby Network

Kotex GirlSpace

Kotex Ladies Room

Kleenex Stop & Feel

Depends.com

Viva Diva Café

Kraft KraftFoods

Boca sponsored "Balanced Living"

Crystal Light

Tassimo

Planters

Proctor & Gamble Pampers Village

P&G Everyday Solutions

Bounce Everywhere

Being Girl

Asacol

SC Johnson Nature’s Source Community

Right at Home Community

Unilever Wishbone

Heartbrand

Lipton

Axe

Bertolli

Slim Fast

Dove

Vaseline

Best Buy Best Buy Connect

Best Buy Forums

Remix

MyRewardZone

AskABlueShirt

GeekSquad

At15

Home Depot Home Depot Garden Club

Home Depot Home Improver Club

Lowe's Lowe's Creative Ideas

Lowe's for Pros

Nordstrom's BP Fashion Board

Sears MySears

Target Target.com

Walmart Check Out Blog

Elevenmoms

Product Rate & Review

Your Life Your Stories

Connect & Share

Apple Apple Discussions

Apple User Groups

Dell IdeaStorm

Direct2Dell

Ratings and Reviews

HP IT Resource Center Forum

Creative Printing Community

HP Small Business Community Wiki

Business Support Forums

Microsoft Windows XP

Xbox

Technical Forums

Office Live Workspace

Windows Live

Sony Sony Electronics Blog

Sony Style

Sony Vaio

Backstage 101

Digital Darkroom Community

Frontline Community

AT&T Wireless Forums

DevCentral

Small Business Online Community

Comcast Comcast Community Forums

Comcast Help Forums

Fandango

Sprint Nextel Sprint.com

Sprint Now Network

SprintUser

Buzz About Wireless

Inside Sprint Now

Verizon Verizon Community Forums

COMPANY COMMUNITY COMPANY COMMUNITY

Sites ReviewedSites ReviewedSites Reviewed


The community research algorithm is a performance

filter built in two parts intended to assign a score for

brand community performance. This score is set

against a color coded graduated performance ranking

scale (red, green and black). Red being for low per-

formers, green being for high performance and black

being for best-practice leaders.

► The filter calculates overall brand performance

taking into account aggregated community activ-

ity and provides an overall average of that brand’s

community effectiveness.

√ Assigns a value to only those brands which ex-

hibit an identifiable community strategy.

√ Assigns a sliding scale value to the different

type or classifications of a brands communities

(Experimentation, Community Overload, Ghost

Town and Cohesive Strategy). ► Part one of the filter contains a single multiplier

which is applied if the brand exhibits a cohesive

strategy. ► Next a performance score is calculated for brand

activity associated with community. ► This score is then integrated into Part Two, where

it is incorporated with the sub scores associated

with the various individual communities the

brand has in play.

► This filter addresses individual community per-

formance against a set of best practices and per-

formance thresholds. Scoring of the second part

of the filter is broken into Tool Use, Community

Activity and Social Media Integration.

√ Tool Use: Thresholds which measure the per-

centage of tools are applied to a branded com-

munity. √ Community Activity: A value is then assigned

to communities which show consistently high

levels of activity. This metric does not take into

account membership count, only activity (so

that a small but vibrant community is not penal-

ized). √ Social Media Integration: A value is provided

to communities that exhibit social media tools

and activity integration within their community.

Communities that lack this integration and ac-

tivity do not receive a value.

► In this filter there are two potential multipliers

available to high performers.

√ The first multiplier is applied to the tools sec-

tion of the filter. Communities using 70% of the

tools (i.e., Forums, Wikis, Content Tagging,

Community Management, etc.) or more receive

this first multiplier.

√ The second multiplier rewards communities

that integrate their community and social me-

dia strategies.

Each of the three multipliers in Part One and Part Two

of the filter carry an equal weight. Brands and their

respective communities that integrate best practices

and showcase strong results will reap the benefit of all

three multipliers and will move them closer to the top

performance category of black. Brands and communi-

ties achieving one or two of the multipliers, as well as

showcasing strong general and individual community

results will fall closer to or within the green category.

Those brands with sporadic or poor performance are

assigned to the red category, indicating ineffective

community use.

Appendix: Brand Score Methodology

Algorithm Structure & RationaleAlgorithm Structure & RationaleAlgorithm Structure & Rationale

Part OnePart OnePart One

Part TwoPart TwoPart Two


Appendix: List of Best Practices

► Collaboration

√ Forums

√ Comments

► User-Generated Content

√ Rich media

√ Blogs

√ Wikis

► Social Networking

► Polling/Feedback Mechanism

► Community Manager

► Content Tagging

► Content Aggregation (RSS)

► Quality Content Rating and Ranking

► Faceted Search

► User Reviews

► Social Bookmarking

► Rich Media

► Fun Engagement Tools

User ParticipationUser ParticipationUser Participation

► Avatars

► User Profiles

► Blog Roll/Recommended Reading

► Emoticons

Personal Identity/ProfilesPersonal Identity/ProfilesPersonal Identity/Profiles

Return MotivatorsReturn MotivatorsReturn Motivators

► Rewards/Recognition

► Available Site Statistics

► New and Featured Content


Appendix: Glossary

► Community Overload – Community overload is

possible due to the existence of multiple commu-nities for the same audience, or “too many build-ings.”

► Community Ghost Town – Communities are

unpopulated and therefore have little to no activ-ity from community members, or “no bricks, no buildings, no people.”

► Experimentation – A brand is experimenting

with one or more communities as well as social media, but lacks evidence of a cohesive strategy to tie it all together, or “lots of bricks, no buildings.”

► Cohesive Strategy – The existence of a solid

community foundation with multiple activities rolling into a single online community, or “building with a solid foundation.”

► Social Networking – The ability for community members to find and interact with others within the community that share similar interests, opin-ions or activities.

► Polling/Feedback – Inquiring into community

opinion through surveys, open forum discussion, commenting or polls to allow community mem-bers to voice their recommendations for commu-nity improvement.

► Community Manager – A personality present in

the community charged with building, growing, and managing it and making him or herself visible and active in dialogue.

► Content Tagging – The ability to tag user-

generated content with keywords to allow for enhanced search and organization.

► Content Aggregation – Grouping like-minded

content from various resources into one or more easily searchable sites.

► Content Rating/Ranking – Allowing community

members to judge the quality of user-generated content on their own criteria.

► Faceted Search – The capability to explore the

community’s content by filtering available infor-mation through keywords, topics, dates, etc.

► User Reviews/Content – The presence of user-

generated content in the shape of user reviews of a brand’s products and services, experiences, sto-ries, opinions, etc.

► Social Bookmarking – Offering community

members a way to store, organize, search and manage content either within or outside of the community.

► Fun Engagement Tools – Games, quizzes, en-

tertaining rich media and other bells and whistles created by the brand for the sole purpose of member entertainment.

► Use of Rich Media – Integrating video, audio

and/or photography into brand content as well as allowing for user-generated rich media to be cre-ated and shared.

► Forums – Also referred to as message boards and bulletin boards, these are applications used to hold both consumer-to-consumer and con-sumer-to-brand discussions containing user-generated content.

► Blogs – Online journals housed within the com-munity may be written by community managers or community advocates and offer commenting by all community members to create two-way dialogue rather than simply a one-way push of information.

► Wikis – Allow all community members to easily

create and edit any number of interlinked (often database) community content.

► Comments – Opportunities for community

members to add their own point of view and ex-pressions to either written content or rich media created by the brand and other members.

CommunityCommunityCommunity

User ParticipationUser ParticipationUser Participation


Appendix: Glossary

► Avatars – Customizable online identities selected

by community members that help members cre-ate their own online persona and share their per-sonality with the community via an uploaded photo, brand-generated illustrations, icons or 3D models. Avatars enhance community member’s user/screen name.

► User Profiles – Collection of personal data com-

piled by community members allowing others to find people like them and vet the credibility of members’ content by gauging their background on the subject at hand.

► Blog Roll/Recommended Reading – List of

blogs, websites and other sources typically re-viewed by each community member, commonly included as part of a user’s profile.

► Emoticons – Portrayal of community member’s

mood or facial expression via illustrations or text. ► Social Media Integration – Integrating key so-

cial media platforms for the intended audience (Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Hulu) into the community platform and marketing/communication initiatives.

► Rewards/Recognition – Publicly awarding com-munity members for community activities and involvement.

► Available Site Statistics – Sharing community

activity and size data with members and/or site visitors.

► New & Featured Content – Highlighting new,

highly-rated or interesting user-generated content outside of its original home, whether on the com-munity home page, user profile or topical pages.

Personal Identity/ProfilesPersonal Identity/ProfilesPersonal Identity/Profiles Return MotivatorsReturn MotivatorsReturn Motivators

Social Media PresenceSocial Media PresenceSocial Media Presence


Appendix: Bibliography

Bodine, Kerry, and Ross Popoff-Walker. User Ratings Top Consumers’ Online. Report Forrester, February 6, 2008. Web. Cook, Scott. “The Contribution Revolution: Letting Volunteers Build Your Business.” Harvard Business Review October 2008: pp. 60-69. Print. Deloitte. 2009 Tribalization of Business Study. Rep. Deloitte, October 5, 2009. Web. Deloitte. 2008 Tribalization of Business Study. Rep. Deloitte, August 20, 2008. Web. Elliott, Nate Mr. Three Steps to Measuring Social Media Marketing. Report. Forrester, October 29, 2009. Web. Fournier, Susan, and Lara Lee. “Getting Brand Communities Right.” Harvard Business Review, April (2009). Print. Gartner. Gartner Says More Than 60 Percent of Fortune 1000 Companies With a Web Site Will Connect to or Host a Forum of Online Community by 2010. Gartner.com. Gartner, October 6, 2008. Web. Johnston, Bill. “Online Communities: Establishing a Community's Culture.” Web log post. Online Community Report. ForumOne, 26 Nov. 2008. Web. Owyang, Jeremiah. “Forrester Report: Online Community Best Practices.” Web log post. Web Strategy. Jeremiah Owyang, February 14, 2008. Web. WOMMA. WOM 101 Positive Word of Mouth Marketing Strategies. Rep. WOMMA, 2007. Web. Worthen, Ben. “Why Most Online Communities Fail.” Wall Street Journal, [New York City] July 16, 2008. Print.


Contact Info

► Learning more about community best practices?

► Getting a customized best practice review?

► Finding out how ComBlu can turn your communities into high-performers?

We’d love to talk! Kevin Lynch ComBlu 312.649.1687 [email protected]

Steve Hershberger ComBlu 312.649.1687 [email protected]

You can also check out our website at: www.comblu.com

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