May 2011

Initially, this post was a mistake! It wasn’t intented to be published here, but on another blog, where I post more “on the go”. What is specific to Posterous, is that you can automatically link it to other platforms (Facebook, Twitter, blogs). But this is at the same time a tricky functionnality, since having multiple blogs usually means different “targets”. And you don’t necessarilly want to overflood your “public” (friends, followers) with the same content. Usually, I manually choose to what platform what content to share.
What happened is that I tried Instagram, a mobile application that lets you transform your pictures and give them a 70’s feeling. I linked it to Posterous, thinking it was a nice place to start with. But, O surprise! I found the same picture on all my social networks, automatically published! The system didnt’ allow to select to which site to publish the photo.
I decided then to delete some of them (on Twitter, Facebook) and leave it on some blogs, and to build meaning around it.

What kind of meaning?, one could ask.

A meaning arising from different perspectives brought together: a service like Instagram is more than just another application. Photos have a strong emotional power. Moreover, by its “retro-like” effects it convokes nostalgia; by having you transforming your own pictures, it makes you more engaged; by connecting you with other people and giving to all of you the possibility to interact, to share, to like, to comment, it touches you.

And creates an emotional connection.

You are free to live the experience on a personal level.
But you can also see it as an opportunity as communications’ link for a brand, a company. All while keeping live the genuine aspect. Just interacting on a more emotional level, to share passion, to connect in the instant. And go.

It can be seen as anecdotic, but it represents an opportunity to create a connection, a link. The famous one to one relationship. Without being intrusive or “evil”!
I see it as an opportunity, for example, for hotels: being located in beautiful places, like many of them are, in Valais, for instance, gives them an advantage. Pictures are an ideal way to convey the beauty of a place. And social networks like Facebook (Page) a perfect medium to share it. That’s what I explain (with the same picture, posted there automatically !), on a blog dedicated to hoteliers and tourism pros (in French).

So, now, you know: I am on Instagram, too. Let’s connect!
If you’d like to discover other mobile applications for photography, here are 2 links really interesting: on NYT and on Mashable.
Enjoy! And come back here and share your experiences with those applications. Or others. Do you use mobile applications for photography? How? With what purpose? In a private way? Professional? Both?

Your company is on many different markets, with people speaking several languages?
This is a highly challenging situation faced by social media/communication/marketing – name them as you want – strategists.
If you add to this that you are a small company , aka with limited ressources, I bet that you have to be very creative to overcome some obstacles!
Let’s assume that the objectives have already been set (and shared), some of the challenges will be:

What kind of information for what market on what social platform?
Content production:
think languages/translations before creating content
Share and (try to) avoid redundance (between languages, personal and company’s profiles, for instance)
Centralized/decentralized content creation? Both? How? by whom? How to allocate resulting costs?
Who’ll be responsible? With what margin of freedom? (to be outlined in the guidelines)
Guidelines: anticipate a maximum of mistakes, unpleasant, akward things that might happen. Clearly set the objectives. Translate them. Yes, it might seem anecdotic, but to translate 10-15 pages PPT into at least 2 languages, is a bit of a pain (and a hidden cost)! Plenty of things don’t need to be translated, but the guidelines are strategical and must be understood. (in my opinion). How to give directions, instructions, balancing autonomy and restrictive input? Where to set the limits? What kind of control to apply?
Training: even if the guidelines are the most thorough possible, training people before they get into social media is necessary. To give them confidence, to help them dive into “it” and to guarantee as much as possible consistency throughout the different media.
Keep a track record of results, aggregation, re-distribute for sharing insights-> organize, plan
Monitoring: train – with no pain (?)! Control.

I stop here, my purpose wasn’t to do a how to or “do’s and don’t’s”, but it was just to share a challenging situation I’m facing right now.
If you already went through that kind of problems, I would love to know how you handled them, if you found some tricks to make it smoother, maybe?
If you faced unforeseen difficulties, or, on the contrary, good suprises or unexpected positive results, it would be great if you could share them :-)
For the fun, I share with you an extract of our guidelines (still in process), for our Italian partners: it’s in Italian, and you’ll understand why ;-)