J-P De Clerck  is Managing partner at Conversionation Consulting, a cross-channel interactive marketing consultancy without geographical borders. J-P is basically everywhere interactive media is discussed and you can find his posts and thoughts on over a dozen of blogs, online and offline media and publications about interactive marketing, mainly in Europe and the US. The list is really too long to publish. He is also a founder of Social Marketing Forum and Social Email Marketing blog. You can follow J-P on Twitter or Facebook.

G: How and why did you get into social media business?

J-P: I didn’t really get into it. It was a very natural thing. Social media are a logical evolution in what has been happening in the online world since years. I don’t consider social media as being something new either. It is a term that covers a broad variety of platforms, technologies and changes in our behaviour but these changes have started before the arrival of what we understand as social media now. An example: blogs are often seen as the hubs in the social media hub and spoke model. It seems like ages since I wrote a book on blog marketing but blogging didn’t strike me as a big revolution, just as a natural evolution. The same goes for social networks.

It reminds me of the Internet itself. When channels, platforms and technologies like e-mail, forums and even the WWW became known it seemed like a logical evolution of what we had known before, being messaging systems, BBS, hypertext, wide area networks, all the stuff I was working with back then. Social media has several dimensions, including organizational, cultural and economical but let’s also not forget the technological possibilities brought upon us by Rich Internet Applications for instance.

G: What is it like to be a real Social Media Citizen?

J-P: I’m a consultant. Basically what I do on a daily basis with social media is function of my customers. I’m not a social media consultant, I work cross-channel. But since I’m also working customer-centric and content and community play a huge role in what I do, some people seem to think of me as a social media expert. I’m not. On a more personal level, my social media activities really depend on how I feel, the time I have, whether I have something to say, share or get upset about (I tend to be a bit cynical sometimes) and so on. I try to be consistent with myself, write blog posts on a very regular basis, tweet when the work is done and that’s about it. For the really personal stuff you’ll have to look for me on lesser known social network.

G: What are your favourite social media hang out sites?

J-P: I am most active on Twitter, really. Of course I also use Facebook, LinkedIn and all the others but Twitter seems to be my favourite hangout. I guess I like the speed (fits my personality), the short exchanges with people and so on. But my favourite social media hang-out is really my inbox because everything comes together there and, although it is not a social network, Skype. I like to talk with people. And finally, there is that lesser known social network.

G: How are you keeping up-to-date with social media environment ?

J-P: This might surprise you: I have no RSS reader, no page with bookmarks and even no list of blogs or sites I systematically follow. Again, my inbox keeps me up-to-date. I subscribe to what I find interesting and often this concerns newsletters of sites or blogs that group content I like. They are never about new products but always about analysis. I am less interested in the media and technology than in what’s beneath them and what they can do for you. In other words: I don’t visit Mashable, TechCrunch and all the others.

Twitter is a source but not systematically either. I also am quite active on various blogs so it’s logical I consult those but most of all: businesses know where to find me so press releases find their way to my inbox as well. Too much really. I have a folder in my inbox called “sources” where I put stuff I want to review later. Most of it gets trashed, some of it gets used. Further, I use Google News and Google Blog Search now and then and I’m an addicted white paper and report downloader and buyer. Finally, I try to respond to questions of people in communities but it happens less than I would like to. Often I see the same questions coming back and then that’s food for a post.

G: How would you define a  Social Media Citizen?

J-P: No idea really. I’m a world citizen, I’m social, sometimes I’m not and I use social media.

G: What are your favourite Social Media Citizens?

J-P: Tough one. Assuming a social media citizen is what I would call one of the people that are respected or successful in social media for whatever reason, I can’t really name one. Sometimes I like the things people such as @thebrandbuilder or @briansolis write, sometimes not but I guess those are a few of the people I tend to talk with and “read”now and then. For the rest it really depends. Sometimes people write, say or do things that make me feel like “wow” and the next minute they write, say or do things that make me think “crap”. I hope people that follow me do the same. Life is learning, I sometimes look back at texts I wrote years ago and say to myself “this is crap”. That’s good. One person I would like to mention is @jayderagon. Since some of my blogs are on the Social Media Informer website, I always find myself ending up visiting his Relationship Economy blog and often tweeting his posts.

G: What are your favourite Marketing/PR tools on social media?

J-P: No real favourites but I use HubSpot, Spredfast, Raven (which is known in SEO circles but there’s a lot of social media going on there as well), GoToMeeting, Flowtown, Compete, PostRank, SurveyGizmo, Seesmic on Android, HootSuite, Ning, Trackur, Pitchengine, BackType, Topsy, TwitPic, BrainShark, MailChimp (for my blogs) and so much more. I also constantly test new stuff, looking for what suits me and my customers best in specific circumstances. And I have always been a big fan of Wibiya.

G: What are your favourite social media campaigns?

J-P: I like the way how UK retailer eSpares used customer reviews in its newsletter instead of product promotions and thus provided value for its subscribers and at the same time boosted conversion of its email. I know readers probably prefer a “real” social media campaign but the customer is cross-channel and so should a good campaign be. Using customer reviews, a.k.a. peer reviews, as a landing page, is bold, smart and integrated. That’s marketing. Building a Facebook page is not.

G: What are your Top 3 secrets of social media marketing?

J-P: There are no secrets:

• Social media marketing is marketing and communication.
• Marketing and communication are relational and two-ways at least..
• If it isn’t relevant, perceived as valuable and doesn’t improve customer (in the very broad sense, including ‘fans’, ‘employees’ etc.) satisfaction or experience, marketing doesn’t work.

G: What do you see in the future for the social media?

J-P: I hope we will not use the term social media since it is much too vague and broad and since media are not social. I hope people will be more social in 5 years. We probably will still talk about things like social bookmarking and social media as an umbrella might hang around for a while as well but the next evolutions are happening now: mobile, the Internet of things whereby devices get increasingly connected as well, you name it. I know many people think privacy is not of our time anymore but I also know that I for one will continue to warn for what’s really going on in the social media sphere and in all these “next big things”, among others from the privacy viewpoint and the stuff it’s really about: business, the battle for data and users etc.

G: Describe yourself in five tags?

J-P: Watch. Feel. Think. Act. Weird.

G: What’s your favourite hobby?

J-P: Writing blog posts and poetry. Swimming. Travelling. Disconnecting and finding open spaces to breathe. Family.

G: What don’t you like about social media?

J-P: That people that are “experts” in it, often don’t look further than the social media themselves and often seem to have some tunnel vision problems. This is one of the main reasons I blog and constantly talk about “cross-channel”, “holistic”, “relevance” etc. I see the same thing happening as when the Internet became more or less known: everyone talked about the “medium”. It created confusion and hype. I prefer cases, data and simplicity. One bubble was enough.

G: What is the funniest/most unexpected thing that happened due to social media?

J-P: I struggled with that question. I even tweeted about it. Someone advised me to answer “I found back my neighbour girl I knew from 0-6 y, fell in love with her and we’ve been together 17 months now” but I’ll have to disappoint you. I guess the most fun thing is to find back people you haven’t heard from in ages and vice versa. Then you connect and send a DM and they go like “Who are you? Don’t remember you, give context.” The opposite goes as well. I think it means that the people I used to know in the industry became forgetful old farts such as myself.

G: How did social media change your life?

J-P: What has changed my life most was the decision to try to start blogging, writing and working in English after a lifetime of doing it in Dutch. Social media has allowed me to connect with people from literally everywhere instead of sitting in a small and relatively narrow-minded local market. That’s the most important thing for me, being the world citizen I feel like.

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A big Thank You to my dear friend J-P for his great insights!! You can find the rest of the interviews with the Social Media Citizens at Social Media interviews category

I’m happy to share some great news for Social Media Citizens readers. We are teaming up with Social Marketing Forum and Social Email Marketing blog in order to bring more value for our communities. As a result, I am very happy to announce  that we going to have the guest bloggers from  Social Email Marketing and Social Marketing Forum – one of the fastest growing social media community in Europe. I definitely recommend to join it and I hope you will enjoy some fresh content on our beloved blog!

I’ve just read this brilliant quite personal story by Peter Bregman on Harvard Business Review “Why Friends Matter at Work and in Life“ . The author analyzes a few interesting researches how friendships affect your business and everyday life. I love the authors points taken out of the research:

• If you’re looking for a job you’d better have friends. The number-one way people find new jobs is referrals by friends.
• Once you’re on the job, having a best friend at work is a strong predictor of success.
• Friendships in high school were a strong predictor of increased wages in adulthood — to the tune of 2% per person who considered you a close friend.
• Want to stay in that job you have? Then you’d better have friends.

In my opinion the real friendships are of vital importance factor in Social Media and community building. I know that this topic of friendship has been discussed over and over again but there is a big difference in having “fans” and having at least a few very good “friends” in the community you are building, mainly because of there reasons indentified by Peter :

• Friends can refer your business to their friends
• Friends can  stand up for your business and brand values and send the right message to their friends
• Friends can help to grow your business by heavily engaging in your social media activities (commenting, sharing and etc.)

So are you here to make friends?

Gemma Went is the Director of Red Cube Marketing, a communications agency integrating Marketing, PR and Social Media. With 10 years experience in Marketing and PR, Gemma is working collaboratively with businesses, large and small, to ensure their communications activities help them to achieve their business objectives, engage with their communities and build brand awareness. You can follow Gemma on Twitter or Linkedin.

G: How and why did you get into social media business?

G: I’ve been in the comms game for over 10 years. I started my career in-house, heading up the Marketing and PR at a number of businesses within the creative sector (an industry I simply love) and later as a consultant. My grand plans to set up Red Cube started in the summer of 2008, originally as traditional comms agency. That plan soon changed as I became immersed in social media. By the time I launched in January 2009, I had started to integrate social media into my offering. Being a bit of a social animal at heart, it seemed a natural extension to me, plus the opportunities it offered my clients excited me, particularly SME’s who get the chance to level the playing field. The transparency and ‘realness’ of social media appealed to me greatly, it works perfectly with my own values and Red Cube’s ‘no fluff, no jargon, just common sense’ focus

G: What is it like to be a real Social Media Citizen?

G: Well, being social is as easy as being ‘me’. However keeping up with social media as part of a daily routine can be tricky to manoeuvre when client work takes over. I start the day by browsing Google Reader, digesting posts that keep me abreast of news and developments. When I find great content, I schedule it to be published on Twitter throughout the day through Hootsuite. My primary goal for social media is to help people, so this content tends to be around Brand, Marketing, PR and of course, Social Media.

I tend to check in on Twitter throughout the day, responding to people, answering questions and retweeting anything I find interesting. I also pop in to LinkedIn and Facebook once or twice a day and engage there. As I run a blog, The Cube, I regularly work on my editorial calendar (which usually runs two months in advance) and know what posts I’ll be writing and publishing that week. I tend to publish 2 per week and book in 3 to 4 hours once a week to write and edit those and any other guest blogs I may be doing. Doing it this way is the only way to keep me consistent (otherwise I’ll just forget).

G: What are your favourite social media hang out sites?

G: Twitter is my main hang-out, I find it easier to share and connect with people there, plus the 140 character limitation means you can easily dip in and out without having to commit too much if time is short. Behind that would be Google Reader, LinkedIn, Facebook and Foursquare. I choose Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook purely because the people I want to connect with are there.

G: How are you keeping up-to-date with social media environment ?

G: As I mentioned earlier, I rely heavily on the blogs I subscribe to in Google Reader and I get the rest from Twitter. I prefer not to jump on new developments straight away, instead I sit back and observe how people react to them and read their reviews. Otherwise I’d spend a large proportion of my time trying out new tools that may not be relevant to me or my clients.

G: What are your favourite Social Media Citizens?

G: This is hard, I could list so many people that inspire me, daily. But I’ll narrow it down to those that really stand out for me. These are the people who make me think. The people with balls (particularly the ladies). The people not caught up on their own ego. People like Amber Naslund, Valeria Maltoni, Chris Brogan, David Armano and closer to home Neville Hobson and the guys at 1000 Heads and Fresh Networks.

G: What are your favourite Marketing/PR tools on social media?

G: Well I use so many, let’s try to narrow this down too:

• Hootsuite – To schedule the links I want to share each day, it also gives some great stats on what links people love, which helps guide me when deciding what to share. It also provides a handy monthly round up blog post of top links.
• Tweetdeck – I still prefer this dashboard to manage my Twitter streams, accounts and searches. I think it’s an UI thing.
• Echofone – I was using Tweetdeck on the iPhone but since that stopped working I’ve moved to Echofone which has a few nifty tricks up its sleeve.
• Google Reader – for my daily read.
• Social Mention, SM2 Alterian for some handy, free monitoring and Scout Labs for paid monitoring.
• Google Alerts – do I need to explain that one?
• Addictomatic, BoardReader, Technorati, Alltop, Blog Rolls and good old Google for blog searching
• Google Analytics to help me understand how people get to my website (for me understanding the digital journey and how people wind up at the end destination is fascinating).

G: What are your Top 3 secrets of social media marketing?

G: There are no secrets. If you’re asking what three key things help businesses succeed in this thing we call social, they are thus:

• Social media isn’t a tool, it’s a new way of doing business. The sooner businesses embrace this, the better results they’ll get.
• Be true to yourself or your brand. Words like honestly, transparency and integrity are bandied around a lot and I’m not a fan of buzz words. But those businesses or brands that demonstrate these values do well. Those that don’t are more likely to fail.
• Be open to the unexpected. I’m a big believer in developing the right strategy before adopting social, however I’m also a big believer in being open to the new, unplanned opportunities that regularly show themselves through social media. They can be astounding.

G: What do you see in the future for the social media?

G: Well in 5 years let’s hope people will have stopped seeing it as a fad. By then we will have seen proven results and have better tools to allow us to measure, monitor and make the most of social media to ensure better business results. I don’t think it will actually be a term, social will simply be a part of our business strategy. How we connect with each other and how brands connect with us as consumers will simply be through the tools that allow us to do it socially. People are already connecting wherever they are to whatever they want and this will become more targeted as they browse, read, learn, listen, engage, chat and purchase this way, seamlessly. Those businesses that don’t get on-board with that may be left behind. Advancements in mobile technology will play a huge role in this, allowing more targeted and personal interaction with our favourite brands or businesses on the go.

G: Describe yourself in five tags?

G: Far more than 140 characters.

G: What’s your favourite hobby?

G: Horse riding, it’s the best stress buster around and sets me up for the day.

G: What don’t you like about social media?

G: I’ve come across a few people creating a ‘persona’ on social media that doesn’t match who they are offline. I find that a little dishonest and, to me, isn’t what being social is about. I’ve also observed the same types of social behaviour you find amongst groups offline, such as cliques that make it hard for people to ‘break in’ and engage. But I also find this hugely interesting, social behaviour is a favourite subject of mine.

G: What is the funniest/most unexpected thing that happened due to social media?

G: Well, as I mentioned earlier, some amazing opportunities can come your way through social media. My most unexpected ones have included writing a chapter of a book for the design industry on using social media, being asked by the Design Business Association to run a series of social media workshops across the UK and winning a “Local Entrepreneur of the Year” award for both establishing a successful agency through social media (I only use social media and SEO to market my business) and integrating the social media service as part of the offer.

G: How did social media change your life?

G: It’s connected me to people that would never have crossed my path previously. People who have enriched my business and personal life. It’s also become a huge part of my business, both as a communications and sales tool (much of my fee income comes directly from social media) and as a core service (much of the work I do at the moment is either integrated with or focussed on social media).

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A big Thank You to Gemma for her great insights!! You can find the rest of the interviews with the Social Media Citizens at Social Media interviews category