Being funny: A social media strategy?

People marvel at those marvelous folks on Twitter who have a knack for being funny in 140 characters. It creates a great vibe around the person or brand and people are drawn to them.

Clever businesses use humour to market their products, and Twitter has helped sharpen the digital funny bone. Otterbox, a maker of smartphone cases, show why you need their products. But they don’t show you the product…

Hubspot, A Cambridge, Massachusetts marketing software company, took parody to a new level a couple of years ago with their “Foursquare Cops” series.

But is it possible to have similar success in Australian small and medium-sized businesses?

It takes guts to be funny. Companies that half-arse it end up in the poo. It has to be well thought out yet spontaneous, executed professionally yet have a ragged edge. There needs to be an element of danger. Yet take it one millimetre too far and you have carnage.

Businesses need to be very careful when pushing the funny button. The Twitterverse et al is adept at ripping the guts out of anyone who is inauthentic, implausible or insensitive.

Donor Survey for NTA East Indonesia Aid

As part of our ongoing commitment to community organisations and in particular to NTA East Indonesia Aid, we recently prepared a donor survey using SurveyMonkey.

SurveyMonkey is a free survey web tool that is intuitive and easy to use for not-for-profits and SMEs.

We developed the donor survey for the NTA in response to the need to understand the pattern of previous donations and how the organisation can re-engage to help drive fundraising activities.

About the NTA

The NTA is an Australian not-for-profit NGO committed to supporting projects in the Indonesian province of Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) located immediately to the north of Australia. Nusa Tenggara Timur is the poorest region in Indonesia, and one of the poorest in the world. It encompasses the western part of Timor island as well as Flores, Sumba and other smaller nearby islands.

The NTA collaborates with local NGOs, and engages the community by co-ordinating a consensus (musyawarah) process where local people identify the most essential projects. This means that the people affected by the development have ownership of the processes, which are then overseen and regularly monitored by NTA staff. The NTA supports around 150 to 200 small activities at any given time, and these are aimed at meeting the basic needs of the communities in the following areas:

• small scale infrastructure (local roads, fencing, toilets, water tanks, wells, school buildings)
• educational resources (books, equipment, improvements to buildings, teacher training); and
• resources and technical assistance to foster income-earning activities mainly in agriculture, livestock management and marine activities including the introduction of new technologies.

About SurveyMonkey

SurveyMonkey is the world’s leading provider of web-based survey solutions. They describe themselves as a smart, passionate group of people who work really hard so you don’t have to. SurveyMonkey strive to make their tools powerful enough for professional researchers, yet easy enough for a survey novice.

Increasing your traffic with Inbound Marketing

The folks at The Whole Brain Group have released an interesting infographic on how to drive traffic to your sites and convert leads to customers. They talk about the concept of Inbound Marketing and how to:

1. Create compelling content for all stages of the buying cycle
2. Get found by people who need your products and services
3. Convert visitors to leads and nurture the relationship
4. Convert qualified leads to customers
5. Analyze and adjust your marketing tactics

It’s an approach which has many applications for Australian businesses. It looks at marketing from an entirely different angle – essentially driving demand by creating a set of reasons for potential customers to explore, build trust and engage. It’s pull marketing rather than the traditional push approach.