Pinterest users create a number of pin boards for categories such as interior design, food, fashion and as they discover things they like they can “Pin It” to one or more of their boards. This is nothing special in the social bookmarking field, but Pinterest’s heavy emphasis on imagery has seen it become popular amongst women, who are interested in fashion and other aspects of retail.

Since September Pinterest has seen its user base increase fourfold, resulting in 7.51 million new visitors in December and in a single week (Dec 10-17th) it received 11 million return visits. This obviously resulted in the amount of traffic Pinterest was referring to other sites increased substantially

Brands that were early to use the service, such as Nordstrom, have used Pinterest as an online catalogue where other users can re-pin their favourite clothes items and outfits to share with their friends, while always linking back to their online store. More apparel brands are odopting this strategy help users share their favourite clothes.

This is  a trend that is likely to come across the pond as more and more people become aware of Pinterest in the UK, but unfortunately you will have to wait for an invite. You can add yourself to the waiting list here.

Below is an infographic about Pinterest potentially becoming a social commerce game changer, made by Monetate.

Here we look at what’s been done, what we suspect might happen and what it all means for brands.

Update to OpenGraph vocabulary

A update to the OpenGraph system means that the current “Like” system could be ready for a major change. The current system of liking a page or a product is a good one keeping up to date about what you’re interested in and then sharing with peer but it didn’t always fit with certain products. The latest update will bring new vocabulary that will allow people to interact with content more creatively by not being restricted to just “Like”. In the future brands will be able to define the verb and the noun before their product or brand, making it possible to create activity updates such as:

• KMP Digitata “read” a “Book”
• KMP Digitata “Watched” a “Movie”
• KMP Digitata “Designed” a “Website”

So for a company that is about to launch a product they can let people announce that they “want” it, for example “KMP Digitata wants an iPhone5″,  and then once the product is launched the Facebook user can update their activity to “has” or “owns”. With the information this feature would provide brands can create focused updates targeted towards those who want and those who have the product. To those who “want” the product, updates can be targeted towards them containing information to entice them to purchase or special offers, whereas people who “own” wouldn’t be shown those updates and instead could be shown updates about the latest developments or fun things being done with the product.

Updated News Feed Structure

The news feed on users home screen now consists of multiple feeds. For a brands their updates still appear in the main feed but those who rely on the appearance of friends “Liking” a page in order to achieve more fans will be disappointed to hear that “Likes” no longer appear in the feed and instead appears in the Friends Activity ticker in the top right mean that the updates are buried deeper and harder to find. Although it means “Like” update will be a lot less visible we are believers that if you rely on the Like feature to attract more fans then your strategy is flawed and instead you should be actively engaging your fans to get them talking and truly sharing your news.

Although activity updates now appear in the top right of the home screen Facebook now recognises when multiple people are doing the same thing and promotes that activity to the top of the news feed. An example of this would be if a number of friends were listening to the same album or mentioning a movie, then it will now feature at the top of the news feed.

Focus on Engagement

The change to how Facebook promotes popular activities is a shift from trying to get more people on Facebook to trying to get people engaging with each other and the brands they are interested in. No longer will the focus be on how many people “Like” your page but instead it will be about how engaged your fans are with you. If you have 100,000 fans but only 1% of them actively comment or share your news then you will be less likely to be promoted in the news feeds then another brand that might only have 20,000 fans but 80% of which engage with them regularly.

Potential of Timeline

Timeline is designed to create an individual’s life story through their Facebook profile, where they are able to identify key points in their life, for an example of what Timeline is then watch the video below;

There was no official word on how Timeline will fit into Brand pages just yet, but if the design is applied to pages then brands will have the opportunity to express themselves creatively and create a page that features updates as usual but also build an engaging story to how the brand got to where they are now. A good example of how it could be used is by Coca-Cola who could set their brand designs over the past 125 years as a key point and so their Timeline would feature large images of each new design.

Increased Advertising Space

Facebook has played around with its measurement metrics to provide marketers with a larger premium ad format that although it’s not too noticeable to the end user it does provide more space for adverts. With this extra space Facebook will apply a similar system as the Sponsored Stories feature, so that adverts will display friends who have engaged with the brand presented. This will add validity to your Facebook adverts because people will see that their friends have also chosen to click on the advert or engage with the brand another way.

The demise of the Discussions Tab

Facebook alerted Page owners about the removal of the discussions tabs with a message saying “The best way to encourage conversation and feedback is through posts and comments on your wall” despite AppData showing that there are 22 million monthly discussion users.
The problem with removing the Discussions Tab to focus on the wall is that the wall doesn’t provide the functionality to group comments around a single topic or archive them. Facebook did comment about the issues though, saying “We’ve removed these tabs for now as we work on tools to help you moderate and filter content. Our goal is to help you can manage everything from one powerful place. Stay tuned”. Whether this means that discussions could return in another form or if the wall will receive new functionality we can’t be sure just yet but we are keeping a close eye on it.

What are your thoughts on these latest updates for brands? Leave us a comment below or tweets us at @KMPDigitata.

It is important to stay ahead of the curve to get the most out of your Facebook strategy. If you would like to discuss anything above or your digital strategy on a whole then please get in touch.

F-Commerce can be broken into three categories:

• On-Site F-Commerce – This consists of adding Facebook functionality to your existing E-Commerce website that allows your customers to rate your products then share with their peers.
• In-Store – You can provide Facebook enhanced retail by integrating systems such as Facebook deals with check-ins.
• Facebook Stores – More and more brands are now creating stores on their Facebook brand pages. We will focus on these for the rest of this article.

It is argued that Facebook has become the best place to go to find out what friends and peers recommend, so it makes sense for brands to provide people with the ability to view and purchase products from within Facebook itself. Here are the 5 key reasons why it is the correct time to get involved with F-Commerce;

1. With over 600 million users, Facebook is the biggest shopping centre in the world, all that it is lacking are the stores. The creation of a storefront on your brand’s Facebook page (or a new page entirely, eg Coca-Cola Store) is a low barrier of entry.
2. “Build it and they will come” doesn’t apply in the digital world. For this reason it is important to be where the majority of your customers are, and that is most likely Facebook. 77% of adults in the UK are now actively on Facebook, with 37.4 million live accounts. “Fish where the fish are” should be your new mantra.
3. As social media continues to expand an overwhelming number of people are now exposed more to brands through their news feeds as opposed to more traditional methods. It is best practise to provide potential customers with the most direct link to a product from advertising, this can be achieved easily with a Facebook store.
4. E-Commerce is dominated by the likes of Amazon but it is unfeasible to the likes of them to open their own Facebook store due to the size of their product range. For this reason F-Commerce is more suited for targeted products based on what your fans like, making the Facebook shopping experience unique for each individual where it’s like going to a shopping centre full of only shops they’re interested in.
5. Facebook credits are Facebook’s own digital currency that can be bought as gifts as well as purchased with debit/credit cards and along with Facebook you would be able to create a more socially engaging retail experience. Facebook credits are used to purchase virtual products and content, for example extra in-game content for games like FarmVille.

There are some great examples of how brands are using F-Commerce generate new revenue streams. Below are two examples of Facebook stores that are built differently but both provide Facebook users with easy access to merchandise:

Dexter Facebook Store

The TV show Dexter has a range of merchandise on their Facebook page. The store is built upon an application with its own shopping basket and checkout/payment system. Fans of the Dexter page receive updates and announcements of exclusive offers only available to their Facebook fans, all of which drive traffic to their store and increase sharing.

Old Spice Facebook Store

Another example of a Facebook store, but designed a different way is on the Old Spice Facebook page which displays their merchandise but instead links through to each product listing on their own website.

Media Streaming on Facebook pages

The 3rd type of Facebook store or F-Commerce system available is one that uses Facebook Credits and does not require 3rd party applications or links to an external site. An example of how this is being used is a streaming service done by Warner Bros where Facebook credits can be used to watch Batman: The Dark Knight directly from their Facebook page. As Facebook Credits become more popular this option will become more widely used due to its ease of implementation, but it will be at a cost with Facebook taking 30% of transactions.

As Managers and Directors are demanding to see ROI from Facebook activity could driving traffic to a Facebook commerce application be the answer? Although it is still in its infancy with companies experimenting with how best to use F-Commerce, the most successful social media marketing strategies and initiatives belong to those who get into developments early and get a head start on their competition.

When it comes to looking into F-Commerce there are plenty of options as to how to approach it and it is important to choose the method that is best suited for both you and your customers. To discuss your options for utilising F-Commerce or your digital strategy as a whole then please get in touch.

Control

The main argument for creating your own community is the increased control you will enjoy over the environment. Relying on third party tools that are constantly updating elements of their service can be a tricky business. Facebook is notorious for moving the goalposts without providing a great deal of notice. Just ask those brands who spent considerable time and money in developing Facebook apps when they were first launched only for Facebook to gradually phase out the prominence of these apps both in terms of profile page real estate and the ability to get into the newsfeed. Then there are all the various tweaks, adjustments and relaunches of the developer platforms, which usually happen as we are just about to launch a client Facebook project (paranoid, moi?). Most recently Facebook changed the width of the tabs used to deliver custom content and functionality. If you’re lucky, you can still see the odd brand page that has fallen foul of this change and has a chunk taken out of the right hand side of the tab content.

With your own branded social community you can work without the shackles and build whatever functionality you like. Here are a few key areas that this can be advantageous over, for example, a facebook page.

Moderation

Although it is possible to remove comments from a Facebook page wall, moderation certainly isn’t made easy. Our pals over at Tempero understand this only too well as they manage moderation for large brands on a daily basis.

Imagine that each time you publish a wall comment, within one hour, 600 people post a response and 10 to 15% of those are inappropriate, offensive, spam or downright rude.  Then imagine people are doing the same on your discussion area, your photos, videos — or any other area you’ve allowed them to interact. Clearing the latest content is your best plan of attack, but what happens when an older posts picks up attention for some reason?  You then have the issue of having to hunt around your now frenetic Facebook page for new posts, any one of which could be a reputation or legal nightmare waiting to happen.

There are many tools that aid community moderation by providing functionality such as moderation tools, swearing and spam filters, the option of pre/post/reactive moderation… none of which is possible in facebook.

*Update*

Facebook now provides a simple spam filter on company pages. The filter also picks up on certain swear words although this seems to be only American meaning English slang does not get flagged.

Content Promotion

Who decides which of the content added to your Facebook page gets priority? Certainly not the page owner. Facebook cares not a jot if you would rather push images or video, there is no concept of content tagging or “sticky” posts.

Messages

When on your facebook page, what other messages are your users seeing? You don’t know and never will. It’s quite possible that a competitor is advertising to your community via Facebook ads. On your own platform, you control the real estate giving you more opportunity to offer related services or promote the messages you want to promote.

User Journeys

Facebook and Twitter user journeys are designed around the news feed. Most page visits are prompted by the owner of the page publishing content then that content being shared or commented on by followers and their friends. With a limitation on design there is also a limitation on how well you can guide the user through a journey. There might be a link that leads the user offsite and into a different journey but then you’re taking them away from the community.

Useable Content

Content such as photos and videos uploaded to a Facebook page belongs to the users. As the owner of that page you are no more able to use that content than if you were to have found it on another site – unless you expressly ask the user who uploaded it of course. In your own environment it is possible to get users to agree that you can use uploaded content in a marketing capacity as part of your terms an conditions. You need to be transparent about this and be sensitive to the wishes of your community but if you are running a community with a heavy emphasis on photos, this can be a rich source of images for you.

Containment

One topic that constantly rears its head in regards to social media is metrics. How do you quantify success and track your return on investment and engagement? Most third party tools will have some form of analytics but if everything is in one place it’s much easier to keep track of what’s going on, define your performance indicators and set your targets. All this makes it easier to define and calculate your ROI.

Some considerations

The “build it and they will come” theory does not apply to social media. Building your own community is not easy and there are some things you should consider when doing so.

Freedom of Voice

Don’t stifle your users. If they can’t say it on your official environment, they will go elsewhere to do so. If you have moderation, be clear what the rules are. Don’t delete or ignore posts that you see as negative.

Your business goals

Make sure you’re undertaking this activity for the right reasons. You should only go to the trouble of creating a community if you are going to benefit from it. Does the strategy line up with your overall business goals? It shouldn’t need to be said but you’d be surprised how many brands want to do “something cool and social” for the sake of the zeitgeist without thinking things though.

Ownership and privacy issues

Who owns the content, you or your users? It’s understandable you want to use the content uploaded to your site but be sensitive to your users’ wishes. Are users aware of your T&Cs? Are you aware of their wishes?

Make things easy

Integrate with the APIs of established networks as much as possible. Don’t make your users upload content twice. Allow two way publication of photos, video to existing social tools. If you force users to choose whether to place their efforts in creating and publishing content on your site or on their existing social networks, guess which they will choose (hint: not yours).

Use open authentication to allow users to sign up with existing profiles, no one likes remembering umpteen different usernames and passwords. Likewise, if they create a profile using their Facebook or twitter accounts, pull in profile information from their existing profiles.

A case in point – Trek America Live

KMP Digitata created Trek America Live for TrekAmerica, part of the TUI Travel group. The brief was to provide a platform for past, present and future trekkers to discuss their trips, allow them to make contact with travellers before embarking on their trips and let them share blogs, pictures and videos with friends and family as they travelled. The full case study is available and the community is off to a great start. TrekAmerica are delighted with the platform – especially with the flexibility of content display that allows them to group content around destinations.

Not wanting to build an isolated site, we allow users to publish photos they upload to Trek America live to Facebook and also pull in photos they already have in Facebook. More integration with sites such as Flickr is in the pipeline and TrekAmerica Live will continue to be developed to match the needs of both the community and the brand.

Read more about KMP Digitata and TrekAmerica Live

Download the case study

Let us for a moment imagine that your company, after identifying the importance of SEO and investing the time or budget into optimise your site, decided as the credit crunch hit a few years ago that you could not afford to allocate marketing budget to the continual optimisation of your website. You wanted an immediate return on your advertising budget and felt the mid to long term plan of establishing your site on the Search Engines did not offer this immediate gratification. Your site continued to develop, new pages added, pictures uploaded, those 10,000 links pointing at your Home page built a few years ago are more than your competitors have got, so what’s the point of SEO now? Anyway, Social Media is the thing now, and you’ve built a Facebook page and opened a Twitter account, so that will improve my rankings wont it?

So, while companies have been standing still, Google has surged forward, as it must do in order to keep searchers and advertisers coming back.

The most recent of these has been the Panda updates, brought in to try and counter the increasing rate at which URL’s are being registered each month, the majority of which are very poor sites whose sole purpose is either spam or link / advert farming. In this clear up, a lot of directories and article networks that display duplicate copy dropped down the rankings or disappeared completely. It is fair to say a great deal of link juices sites had built up a few years ago was wiped out, having a knock on effect on the sites linked to them. So link building undertaken in the past that wasn’t complemented and strengthened with the continued sourcing of good quality links, were effectively wiped out.

However, this update has also inadvertently affected legitimate companies who have simply fallen behind in their SEO practices, especially those with eCommerce solutions.

It is essential if you have an eCommerce site that you optimise your online stock correctly, ensuring that you have unique descriptions for your products to avoid and duplicate content issues that could lead to penalization. While doing this it is also advisable to ensure that the images on you site are tagged also. This goes for all sites, whether eCommerce or not. Google has increasingly started to include images within its blended search results and can provide vital collateral to a company’s search engine presence. If you have been neglecting the optimisation of your site, there is a fair chance you are missing out on this opportunity.

The same goes for Google Places (nee. Local). The past few years has seen a strong focus placed on Local Search by Google, with the search engine trying to return the most relevant local results in what was previously a flawed system of simply claiming your position on Google maps that saw many companies without a physical address hijacking local postcodes. We now see much more consistent results when we search locally, with more emphasis placed upon customer reviews and citations from other reputable local directories taken into account when ranking. We have also seen Google Places blended with Organic Search results which enable companies to claim prime position at the top of the 1st page for location based keywords a great deal quicker than pure organic optimisation.

(The screenshot above shows the local search results from 2009, with the Google Places listings clearly differentiated from the organic listings, while the screenshot to the right taken in 2011 demonstrates how these Google places entries have been blended into the organic listings, providing the companies with a stronger presence and ultimately increased click through rates)

The results page landscape has also recently seen Real Time search results garnered via Twitter, Google News and Facebook fan pages come and go, although these are temporarily absent, the importance of optimising your company’s social media and news releases has been demonstrated and I predict it won’t be long before we see these return with G+ offering the Social dynamic to this.

Baring this in mind, importance placed on reviews, recommendations and Social Media interaction looks set to have a greater impact on Search Results in the future with the emergence of G+. With Google Places reviews and the Search Engine admitting that as part of the Panda project that they have been manually manipulating the search results based on user recommendation, G+ offers a further opportunity for the searcher to tell Google what content they find appealing, whether this be a site, blog or product in an eCommerce product.

The Search Engines are evolving and elevating the importance of ranking factors that benefit the user rather than the Search Engine, making it far more difficult to manipulate the listings with spammy links.

Therefore, this brings us all the way back to the fundamentals of SEO. If Google are going to start ranking sites on vote not via links but by user interaction and recommendation, it is vital you can be found by your audience and that the content you deliver to them is good enough for them to endorse you. Companies are constantly trying to get customers to engage with their Social, so now it’s time to get them to engage as much with their website, and with the Search Engines starting to take sites authority and trust into account when linking, a great deal more care and consideration needs to be taken in your link building process.

Businesses need to aware of this changing environment and potentially game changing developments within the way Google ranks websites in the future. The fundamentals will still remain a good site structure, well optimised copy and relevant links are always going to get you found one way or another. However as a company you can’t afford to stand still while Google is surging forward as the cost of catching up, both to sales and budget, could become very damaging indeed.

Further down the line we could also see Google infinite scroll being thrown into the mix too.

If you have any further thoughts on this changing landscape I would love to here your comments below.

Renold is an international engineering group, that produces a wide range of precision engineering products, operating in nineteen countries worldwide. The principal activities of the Group are the manufacture and sale of industrial chains and related power transmission products.

The digital revolution is growing at such a pace that many companies are struggling to keep up with the astronomical rise of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, however, Renold were able to identify an opportunity for them to utilise mobile at the correct time. As with many websites these days Renold was experiencing more and more traffic to their website from mobile devices so it was an obvious decision to create a site designed specifically for mobile devices.

The new mobile site will not only be used as a mobile optimised website for incoming web traffic but will also become an important tool for reps out in the field when large brochures and spec sheets are not ideal as well as on the factory floor during client/customer tours.

The new Renold mobile site

The challenge of creating the new mobile site came from trying to host the whole Renold product range in a clear, easily navigated site that would work on a wide range of mobile devices.

To make the user’s experience of the site as easy as possible, the search feature is emphasized to help the user avoid navigating through the menus. Although the search box is a key feature the menu is kept simple with the Breadcrumb Navigation at the top of the page so that the user knows the path they took to arrive at their current page and reduce the need for the back button.

Product pages on the website were of vital importance, so they contain an image, brief description and most importantly a link to download the stat sheets, which then open in the mobile device’s document viewer, making it easier to read and keep it with them rather than repeatedly visiting the Renold site to see the information.

The mobile device allowed us to create a more engaging “Find Us” page with links that open up map and navigation options within the device and in doing so help users not only find out where the offices are but also be navigated to them (dependant on software on the device). Users can now find their closest office, view it on a map and then get directions to the location all on the move.

David Turner, Marketing Communications Manager for Renold Plc. said of the new site:

Renold is determined to pursue innovation both as a manufacturer and service provider and we’re the first industrial chain manufacturer to launch a mobile site. KMP’s team kept the structure and design simple to make it quicker and easier for our customers and sales teams to access product information while on the move. We’re very pleased with the result.

This new mobile site is an exciting step forward for Renold who understand that mobile is quickly growing into one of the most important digital sectors and they are now perfectly positioned for the further increase of mobile devices used to view the web.

Visit the new Renold Mobile site here and if you’re interested in mobile strategy then feel free to contact us to discuss it

Twitter

Twitter can be many things to many brands. A news source, brand monitoring tool, a customer feedback and support tool, a promotional channel. However you decide twitter best fits in with your business make sure you stick to your goals.

Twitter Tips

• Don’t just broadcast. Think of twitter as a conversation
• Find the conversation – engage with like minded users using @mentions and #hashtags
• Think about how you can add value – hold competitions for your followers in exchange for content or loyalty
• Use Twitter Search to monitor mentions of your brand and competitors. You can gain valuable and actionable insight before actively engaging

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is of particular use in B2B marketing. Think about what your profile says about your business, not just you personally. Use LinkedIn to build and maintain relationships that could lead to sales.

LinkedIn Tips

• Keep your profile up-to-date and make sure your public summary contains all the information necessary for people to understand what it is your business does
• Claim your Business profile and update with the messages that you want to communicate to your audience
• Use the search to find relevant individuals in industry related groups. Contribute to these group discussions to become an authority in your field
• Find questions relevant to your industry on LinkedIn answers. Share your knowledge and connect with individuals who have expressed a need
• Research individuals for recruitment purposes

Facebook

Facebook is primarily a tool for interacting with friends and family. However, 38% of users “like” a brand page. A facebook page can be a useful B2C tool. If you give people a reason to “like” your page, you with have an active, living, realtime audience just waiting to interact with your content.

Facebook Tips

• Give people a reason to follow. Discounts, exclusive content, brand affinity and peer endorsement are all incentives for liking a brand page
• The aim is to get your content into the News stream of your audience and your audience’s friends
• Encourage interaction by sharing engaging and exciting content. Photos, videos and links are more engaging than text updates
• Use facebook ads to grow your userbase. Target your ads to your intended audience based on demographics or consumer behaviour

Foursquare

Foursquare, a geolocation app that allows users to check-in to various venues and locations from their mobile devices. A newcomer in the social media landscape but is gaining traction with users. It’s especially useful if you are a business with that relies on foot-fall, e.g. bars and shops.

Foursquare Tips

• Claim your venue. This will allow you to set up special promotions with foursquare which will be presented to users checking in nearby
• Leave tips and encourage users to leave tips on your venue

Blogs and Forums

Social media isn’t just about the broadcast tools; it’s about being involved with the conversation.

Social Media Tips

• Find the conversation and monitor influential blogs and forums. See what is being said about your business or your industry
• Don’t engage in a conversation unless you can add something of use. Comment spamming is not the way forward!
• When you do engage, consider your business messages and if possible, provide a link to your site/blog/linkedin profile for further information
• Abide by the Ackura Rules of Social media Engagement

The key to social media marketing – Influence

Listen – People want to know that their opinions are valued.
Be a voice of authority – By providing people with useful information and being knowledgeable you establish trust and credibility.
Create a Dialogue – Engaging with users and enabling them to question and discuss your content will generate conversation and prologue the relationship.
Generate awareness – People who are engaged with your content will want to share it within their networks; encourage them to become “Connections”, “Retweet” and “Like” you.
Generate Loyalty – Keep your audience informed with regular news, products or service updates.

Rules of engagement

Be active – Post content regularly but also comment on and share
other people’s content.
Be interesting – Remember the aim is to be viewed as an authority
and get links/shares to your content. Make sure to add your
own opinion or extra insight when commenting on or sharing other
people’s content.
Be humble – Social media etiquette lets every user have a voice:
Give credit for people’s content and opinion.
Be human – Avoid slogans and brochure-speak. Try to inject
content with your personality. Include profile pictures for author blog posts and LinkedIn profiles.
Be honest – Always be transparent about who you are and who you are representing. Don’t plagiarise content or bad-mouth competitors.

Milligan believed that it’s old website lacked certain features, such as a “What’s New” area, a “Firsts” section that focused on innovative elements created by Milligan and an “About Us” page that contains a video which showcases Milligan’s unique approach and vision to create places where people are inspired to shop.

Milligan challenged KMP to produce an innovative design that would create an immediate positive impact on the user while still catering for a wide range of audiences. The site was to be exciting and bold with clear signposting and branding to allow users to quickly and easily navigate through their journey.

KMP Digitata has created a visually striking website that is easy for all users to navigate and fully editable thanks to its underlying CMS platform – Ackura SiteManager; a system developed by KMP Digitata as part of their Ackura product range.

The new website uses a strong visual element that focuses on using striking full screen images to convey information about Milligan and its style. The images and photos used have been specifically chosen to complement the content on the pages they are used on.

The decision was made to split the navigation into two sections, one in the in the top left containing Milligan’s services and company information, and one across the bottom containing secondary navigation information, such as T&Cs and approach. This was used in order to provide the more important information in a clear and concise manor and avoid having large navigation menus.

Milligan Retail now has an outstanding new website that embodies the company’s drive to create inspiring retail venues.

KMP Digitata helped Manchester Airport set up their hugely successful Twitter account and aided them with their strategy for the first few months. Here at KMP Digitata we had already had success with TrekAmerica‘s 8 Mates Across the States and VIE at Home Facebook applications and we knew that there was an opportunity for Manchester Airport to take advantage of the popularity of Facebook.

The Task

Manchester Airport came to use with 2 objectives that they wanted to achieve through any means that we saw appropriate. Following on from KMP Digitata’s and Manchester Aiport’s success with Twitter and the Tweeting Departure board we felt that something with Facebook was the next step.
The first objective was to inform people of all the destinations that the public can fly to from Manchester Airport outside of the destination map on the Manchester Airport website.
Secondly Manchester Airport wanted to increase the number of contacts in their CRM database in manor where the contact would be happy to provide their details.

The Solution

Drawing inspiration from a campaign run by Manchester Airport back in spring 2010, featuring a piggy bank, KMP felt there was a game in the concept of an airport making a pig fly. The idea of pig-a-pult was born and to fulfil the objectives given by the airport. The aim of the game is to launch the pig (named Piggles) via a catapult from Manchester

Airport and get him to land at one of their many destinations and in doing so subtly inform the user of where Manchester Airport can catapult them to. By applying a scoring system that rewards those who get nearer to the furthest destinations we can create a leader board and give a top prize to whoever scores the highest then smaller prizes to randomly selected players. To be entered into the competition the player enters their email and so fulfils the 2nd objective.

The Prizes

With Social Games the main pull is getting the bragging over your friends as to who have the highest score. To add extra incentive to play the game, Manchester Airport is giving away an iPad to the person who gets the highest score. In addition to the iPad there is also a lucky draw to win £500 worth of holiday vouchers.

So if you want to win an iPad or £500 give pig-a-pult a go and make some pigs fly.

VIE at home specialise in selling beauty products through consultants in a Party environment and online. At Parties customers can try their products first hand, whilst enjoying a fun night with their friends. With this social interaction between the consultant and their clients, KMP Digitata saw the perfect opportunity for VIE at home to utilise Facebook’s API and create an application that could help Consultants organise parties and sell products.

The objective

The objective of the application was not necessarily to increase the number of VIE at home consultants. Instead it was to provide their existing Consultants with a tool that would expand their customer reach by allowing them to easily share VIE at home products with all of their Facebook friends. The application had to announce that the user was a VIE at home Consultant to other Facebook users and also provide a means of navigating to the consultant’s VIE at home profile where they could then purchase products or sign up to host a Party.

The Application

Firstly, the application was decided that it would not be customer facing meaning only VIE at home Consultants can take advantage of the applications capability.

The application has two features. The first is that a Twibbon is added to the bottom of the user’s profile picture saying “I’m a VIE at home Consultant” and publishes the picture on their News Feed.

The second function is that the application creates a profile tab for the Consultant that sits alongside the “Wall” and “Info” tabs so that Facebook friends of the user can easily access their VIE at home profile.

Louise James – E-Commerce Marketing Manager for Vie at Home said;

Over the past 12 months the VIE at home Facebook community has grown dramatically. In particular we noticed a number of our Consultants using it as a place to talk about their VIE at home Party Plan businesses and successfully grow them. We therefore approached KMP to help us develop a Facebook app that would be exclusive to our Consultants, would help them interact with their Customers and identify themselves within their community as a VIE at home Consultant.

Although the application was designed for Facebook the VIE at home consultants are already using their profile picture created by the application as their Twitter Avatar and on the internal messageboard system on the VIE at home website.