Examples of Corporate Social Media Strategies
I recently spoke at a regional event organized to decipher social media marketing. The address dealth with variety of topics and touched various aspects of going social, ranging from how to get started, tracking tools, history, pros and cons and how to measure the impact.
I discussed some tactics to get your company better engaged with social media. To start with I have assembled this list of more than 35 companies who are experimenting with social media in a host of different ways.
If you have other examples of corporate social media engagement, please share them in the comments.
Blendtec is famous for its bevy of inexpensive “Will It Blend” videos posted on YouTube and shared by millions.
Adobe maintains a list of interesting company related websites and conversations on the social bookmarking site Delicious.
Best Western sponsors a blog,”On the Go with Amy,” where the author travels the country writing about her experiences.
Cadence recently relaunched its website that now prominently promotes the company’s community.
Cisco hosts 12 blogs addressing a variety of audiences for their global business.
Coca-Cola Conversations is a blog written by company historian Phil Mooney that focuses on Coke collectibles.
Dell leverages a variety of social media platforms for customer engagement, including an island in the virtual world of Second Life.
Ford publishes news releases with lots of multimedia content and employs a social media news release format to display them in their newsroom.
Fujifilm recently launched a social network to build a community of photo enthusiasts around its newest camera.
GM uses blogs to communicate directly with its customers around topics ranging from design to green tech.
H&R Block created a Facebook fan site to aggregate its social media activities, engage customers and offer tax advice/resources.
HP used Twitter to power a scavenger hunt at a recent conference.
HSBC built the HSBC Business Network to connect entrepreneurs using blogs, videos and forums.
IBM was the first large enterprise to embrace employee blogging and now boasts thousands of blogs related to every facet of its business.
Intel has also developed many social media touch points with its software communities, which includes blogs, Twitter and virtual worlds.
Intuit sponsors the Tax Almanac wiki, where anyone can find and contribute to this resource for tax information.
Jeep connects with customers via a community page with links to photos on Flickr, the company’s MySpace and Facebook pages and a list enthusiast groups.
JetBlue employs social media as part of its training for JetBlue University, as this video explains.
Johnson & Johnson uses this blog to show another side of the company, with frequent video posts and interviews.
Lenovo launched “Voices of the Olympics Games” to aggregate posts from the athletes competing in Beijing.
Marriott CEO Bill Marriott posts regular updates and stories from his travels to Marriott properties around the world to fuel the content for this entertaining blog.
McDonalds maintains a blog to highlight the company’s corporate social responsibility efforts.
National Geographic uses Google’s new virtual world, Lively, to bring people together around its new show, LA Hard Hats.
New York Times is beta testing a Firefox add-on that allows users to share and comment on stories through a decentralized social network.
Nike started a social community on Loopd to connect athletes interested in surfing, BMX bike racing and similar activities with the brand.
SAP sponsored a global survey of social media professionals to learn more about social media worldwide.
Sears partnered with MTV to create a social network around Back to School shopping.
Southwest Airlines employees share their stories and communicate directly with customers through the “Nuts About Southwest” blog.
Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz’s blog is the example most often cited for what the CEO blog can be.
Starbucks started MyStarbucksIdea so that customers can submit ideas for the company which are then voted on by other users, the best of which will be implemented by the company.
Toyota started its own virtual world to promote its products in Japan (site is in Japanese).
Visa launched The Visa Business Network application on Facebook to connect small business users and to help them promote their businesses to a larger community.
Wells-Fargo blogs target two audiences; one examines the company’s history and the other is for students interested in getting their finances in order.
WWE has a Facebook application, among other social networking tools and widgets, to bring fans closer to the action.
Xerox blogs address several of the company’s core B2B constituencies.
Zappos uses Twitter for employees to communicate with Zappos customers about their shared love of footwear.