Can brands have a social life?
by Tania Chew on May 23rd, 2008
One of the topics that was just presented at Ogilvy’s Verge digital summit, which is taking place right now.
Despite an estimated 417M users in Asia Pacific consuming social media, very few brands are actively leveraging the channel in a way that creates true value. In an attempt to provide direction to marketers and brands, we are initiating some research and we want you to be part of it.
Join the conversation by telling us:
1. What you think of social media?
2. How you think it will change brand marketing
3. Which brands are doing some really exciting stuff in your market
Please share with us your thoughts, start a new conversation or if you prefer, email us at socialmedia.apac@ogilvy.com.
Here is what some experts whom we interviewed (including Jeremy Wagstaff and Mr Brown) said about it.
Brian Koh 
May 25th, 2008 at 3:18 am
i think social media is about the power of connecting people together. It surely is a great way of getting loads of people together and sharing things with each other.
However, I feel that if brands want to enter this inclusive but at the same time exclusive (in terms of personal usage) space, they better jolly well give us good stuff to even want to give a glance at them.
Great video btw. Hoping to see more of such stuff.
May 25th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Good Stuff.
May 25th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Social media is probably here to stay for quite a while but i don’t think brands should even enter it…
makes the experience really crappy. why should i give a brand who isn’t someone i know personally information about myself?
no matter how great they do it, they are still not my real friend.. they are just being nice to me for the money. social media is about sharing without monetary benefits…
the moment money enters the scene, it becomes all so commercial and dictated.
instead of showing just experts who are obviously pro branding on social media, please show some consumers with a mixed variety of opinions.
May 26th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
thanks for the comments so far.
sherman - agree. consumers will be involved to get a balanced view of the potential roles that brands can play. i’m interested what you think of the marmite page in facebook. it’s got 85k fans. surely that’s a very innocent way of opening up your brand without getting commercial or trying to pull out money.
agree though that the video is one dimensional. more to come… watch this space…. including an interview we did last ewek with the ‘Father of the Internet’ - Vint Cerf - Google’s VP & Chief Internet Evangelist….
May 26th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
I think if brands play “ostrich-with-head-in-the-sand” and ignore social media, they’re missing out on a very integral channel for communicating directly with their customers. Engaging with customers on a digital platform isn’t necessarily about collecting information so that you can spam them…with social media it’s a completely different engagement experience…one that’s open, honest and conversational.
Dell is one good example with their Direct2Dell and Ideastorm blogs, which openly solicit feedback (criticisms included!) from their customers in order to create better products…products their customers actually want/have asked for.
And if you look on Twitter these days, you’ll notice that a lot of communications and marketing folks from companies are putting themselves out there as a direct point of contact (and giving direct, personal responses to gripes)…customer service at the forefront.
May 29th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
IMO, the problem with brands not adopting social media is due to the perceived perception of the channel is a personal social vehicle, vis-a-vis a platform to communicate and exchange ideas. It doesn’t help brands that social media cannot function the role of a website to promote and advertise their propositions to their target audience.
It is important for agencies and forward-thinking professionals to get as many use cases as possible from progressive companies such as Dell to convince other brands on the necessity of having a social media channel to their customers. More importantly, the advocates of social media need to demonstrate that feedback and ideas from social media contributes to the brands’ business ecosystem - product development, brand association, etc.
I won’t be surprised that as the number of use cases increase, the decision to embrace social media will be more of a business decision, rather than a leap of faith.
June 8th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Social Media is the new bridge between consumers and big corporates. I mean this is exactly what is happening here isnt it? Connecting people tops the most happening list on Social media but I think companies providing products/services to their customers will need to hop on the wagon soon.
Sherman, we get something from these brands daily in exchange for hard earned cash - cant run away from that. Why not help them, and help ourselves get more buck out of each dollar. The thing is, if they turn ONLY promotional and commerical in these social spaces we are smart enough to smell a rat and just ignore them.
I have not clicked on a FB ad a long time….
June 9th, 2008 at 10:06 am
[…] in Ogilvy Singapore, is a blog for brands and bloggers. They started a conversation on the topic Can Brands Have a Social Life. Interesting comments, from that […]
June 10th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Transparency is the future. What you don’t know will “kill” you.
So its better to for brands to know whats coming up, anticipate, innovate, and address the issues.
However, in a multi-channel environment, each with their own community, the different messages need to be tailored for the corresponding medium.