{"id":42657,"date":"2009-05-28T19:00:42","date_gmt":"2009-05-28T17:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/visionarymarketing.wordpress.com\/?p=570"},"modified":"2020-11-07T11:48:13","modified_gmt":"2020-11-07T10:48:13","slug":"social-media-nokia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/visionarymarketing.com\/en\/2009\/05\/28\/social-media-nokia\/","title":{"rendered":"Blogwell #3 social media presentation by Nokia\u2019s Molly Schonthal"},"content":{"rendered":"

The second blogwell social media presentation at Blogwell #3 which took place on April 29 in NYC, was that of Molly Schonthal<\/a> from Nokia<\/a>, who is in charge of social media for the Finnish cell phone manufacturer in the US, and also one of our representatives of the blog Council<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Blogwell #3 social media presentation by Nokia\u2019s Molly Schonthal<\/h2>\n
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Blogwell in NYC (photo by Yann Gourvennec) – Blogwell #3 presentation by Nokia\u2019s Molly Schonthal<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Molly\u2019s presentation was truly outstanding, there were so many questions and answers at the end of the presentation that I\u2019ve had a hard time trying to keep track of them all, but a good many of them will be transcribed in this post anyway.<\/p>\n

The presentation was entitled \u201cfrom broadcast to social media\u201d. And it started with references to Tara Hunt\u2019s latest book, \u201cthe Whuffie factor\u201d, on which we have already had an opportunity to comment on this very blog (click here for an interview of Tara Hunt about her new book<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Molly insisted on the fact that \u201cwhat is difficult for a big company is \u2018listening\u2019, participating openly and respectfully.\u201d It might, in fact, sound to be an obvious thing to do. Still, it\u2019s not always for a large organisation, for it is so easy to be concentrated on one\u2019s internal organisational issues and forget about one\u2019s clients. So what are the changes as a big organisation is facing when trying to engage in different kinds of relationships with its customers and ecosystem?<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 One has to think, Molly says, not in terms of technological adoption, but of \u201cpsychological adoption\u201d. Web 2.0, she says, is not difficult from a technical point of view, and it can be set up in a matter of seconds. But working with communities can take a lot longer than that.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Her second point is just about that when she says that \u201cbuilding networks take time\u201d. And, \u201cit does not follow the principles of normal press relations\u201d. She even coined the phrase \u201csocial release\u201d which she opposed to “press release”. What it takes is actually creating messages that are relevant to influencers. And to stop and listen and engage. And she also insisted upon the fact that collaboration is about \u201ccross-functional interactions which are at the heart of success\u201d.<\/p>\n

What Molly and Nokia\u2019s teams have been able to achieve in the field of social media is just awesome. Here are just a few examples which I have been able to catch up on the catch on the fly:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Nokia encouraged the widespread adoption of 2.0 tools internally,<\/li>\n
  2. Nokia developed what they called an \u201cinfopedia\u201d internally. This is some Wikipedia, but it is internal. It was actually instrumental in getting Nokia employees to understand what a wiki is what a blog is etc.,<\/li>\n
  3. Nokia also created a blog hub: all internal blog content was focussed in one place that is to say that access is granted to what employees are talking about, sharing thoughts and ideas,<\/li>\n
  4. An internal WebTV was also created, which is some youtube which enables employees to upload, invent and discuss,<\/li>\n
  5. externally, blogs have also been rolled out, therefore enabling conversations about Nokia products. They also created a platform called \u201cblog bites\u201d, which enables them to generate three-minute podcasts from existing text.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Engaging with influencers is also an essential item on the Nokia agenda, and they are engaging with them on events, such as SXSW09<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    Molly also insisted on what she called the blogger test centre to<\/em>ur<\/em> which actually consisted of sending bloggers to two different countries. The stories were published in leading blogs such as Gizmodo, Techcrunch, the BBC etc. A 500,000 audience reach was achieved for that event in 2 geographical areas (the UK and Australia).<\/p>\n

    In conclusion, Molly insisted upon the fact that one had to allow company culture to evolve, beyond \u201cPowerPoint slides with bullets<\/em> in them\u201d<\/em>. (Reminiscent of an article I published a long time ago with the help of Giancarlo, and which was entitled PowerPointitis<\/em>)<\/p>\n

    Questions and answers<\/h4>\n

    1. how are you selecting bloggers for your events?<\/p>\n

    Few people can be admitted to the test centre. Loads of explanations about temperatures were given (Nokia phones had to resist all kinds of temperatures, perform the lowest to the highest). The Nokia lab folks were also very excited about the idea and about the ability to interact with real people. The way that Nokia organised this was very straightforward. All Nokia had to do was to \u201cinvite them and be nice with them\u201d.<\/p>\n

    2. measurements?<\/p>\n

    It is tough to track results back to sales, Molly says. They do some monitoring at Nokia and then look at the number of people and followers (Nokia has more than 500 followers on Twitter<\/a>). Another question was, \u201chow did you convince managers?\u201d Molly responded to that: \u201cour company understands the value of social media\u201d, which is great support what she and her teams are doing at Nokia across the world for social media. She also insisted that social media produces soft numbers, which do not have to be linked to sales automatically.<\/p>\n

    3. what is the hardest thing?<\/p>\n

    The most difficult thing, according to Molly Schonthal, is to \u201clisten well all the time\u201d. It is hard to get an e-mail from a blogger\/influencer, she says, because it always has to be taken as an emergency. \u201cOne has to stop,\u201d she adds, it\u2019s a \u201cpersonal challenge\u201d. Raising expectations is an issue (a phrase which I often heard times pronounced during this blogwell session). Planning is also a major issue: \u201cone has to avoid formatting\u201d she adds (mainly on Twitter)<\/p>\n

    4. what are your worries about accountability?<\/p>\n

    Molly says that Nokia never \u201cdiscloses private information, earnings, confidential information etc.\u201d But that in the long run, some \u201cof that could happen with maturity\u201d and that \u201cNokia\u2019s people and managers are not hindered by fear\u201d. (I take this opportunity to link back to the minutes of a previous blogwell session in San Jose which was facilitated by Ken Kaplan from Intel about fear and social media<\/a>)<\/p>\n

    5. how do you handle comments?<\/p>\n

    \u201cYou cannot say you\u2019re open and honest and stop people from saying things\u201d Molly rightfully points out. So, you will have to assume that some of the comments won\u2019t always be coming your way and you\u2019ll have to take it like a grown-up.<\/p>\n

    6. what is the difference between press and social media release?<\/p>\n

    Molly says that social media release comes with some video plus a bunch of pictures and multimedia files to download and text, which is more appropriate for blogs. More and more packages such as these are indeed made available on the market by agencies on behalf of big businesses.<\/p>\n

    8. what about smaller bloggers?<\/p>\n

    There is more than one approach, Molly says, and we hope to do it again with more folks.<\/p>\n

    9. responding to external comments?<\/p>\n

    Molly says that you have to ask yourself two questions:<\/p>\n