Denise Shiffman’s Engage Daily Blog

Heinz Topthistv.com received 10 million views, Doritos’ Crash the Superbowl contest got a whopping 350 million press impressions, Burger King’s Subservient Chicken viral site reached 14 million unique visitors, and Anheuser-Busch’s Bud Light Dude ad was viewed over 11 million times. With high profile campaigns setting the bar, how can you explain to your boss it’s not about the number of people we reach, it’s about reaching the right people?

We don’t all work for major brand consumer companies, but we still need to leverage the network effect of the Web. How? Determine up front if your goal is reach or touch. Reach is about getting the most views, interactions, or press impressions. It is to a much greater extent about brand recognition than about developing a relationship, context, or relevance.

Touch is about getting to the people who care most about your brand, or are most likely to care about your brand. It’s about getting them involved, interacting with your company or products, and learning enough to want to stay involved. Relevance is key.

So if you aren’t solely focused on reaching the largest possible number of people, what are you measuring? It really depends on the type of campaign, but here are some ideas: time spent on the landing page or subsequent product pages clicked on, number of forwards of the email, number of comments submitted, and corporate learning from the content of those comments, sales lift during or just after the campaign, or number of ideas generated.

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You can tell Jeb Blount loves what he does. Like most hyper-energized people, he just can’t sit still. Last year he started a social site dedicated to sales people, and has over 100,000 registered users today. Not bad for someone who’s just doing something he calls fun.

Jeb has taken a smart and strategic approach with SalesGravy.com. He didn’t set out to make it financially successful right away, so the site isn’t crammed with ads. It’s focused on people. When you join and set up a profile (which is generally a way to promote yourself and your skills), your picture is posted on the front page. People quickly find you, and friend you. And you immediately feel a part of this group.

There’s a bookstore, sales resources, podcasts, blogs, member chat, and a dozen additional services provided on the site. Jeb encourages users to write articles that offer helpful information to other readers, making user-generated content a core part of the site. All in all, it’s one of the better social sites with a clear audience, focus, and great services.

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Several people have asked me lately if they should implement social Web tools for their sales force. I can think of few organizations that would reap more reward from social media than the sales group.

There are several different ways to look at this. First, it’s difficult for sales reps to have any real-time knowledge about what’s happening in marketing and with the products they’re selling. Second, sales reps provide a treasure trove of information and feedback for marketing and product development but rarely have a good outlet to get their ideas heard.

Internal and secure blogs, wikis, and social networks can help. An internal blog can be used by product marketing to keep sales reps up to date on new features, product delays, and product issues in development or in the field. Commenting allows both organizations to understand each other better and as well as the impact of their decisions.

A product wiki enables sales reps to provide input early on a product or have an impact on the evolution of the product. Good ideas can come from anywhere, and sales reps who spend a great deal of time with their customers just might have some innovative thoughts.

Implementing a Web site with social profiles enables sales reps to determine where expertise exists in the organization so that they can tap into it. It also allows for an easy exchange of ideas of what works and doesn’t work in specific types of accounts. The social conversation can be monitored and mined (using text-analysis) so that themes, issues, and best-in-class ideas can be analyzed and acted on.

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