How are Companies Succeeding with Social Marketing? Be Cause

Today is the last day of Useful Social Media’s Corporate Social Media Summit. In short, it was way beyond “Useful” with lots of ideas on strategy, best practices and KPIs presented by Fortune 500 practitioners.

For me, one theme really emerged – companies that attached their social presence to a social cause are seeing huge success. The examples were everywhere. Besides the often sited Whole Foods, Pedigree launched a program promoting pet adoption and saw their Facebook Fans increase from 50,0000 to 950,000 in four months. Even B-B players, such as Interface (a carpeting company that promotes sustainability) has had great success in their social efforts. The conference even provided a dramatic example of marketing failure when an animal rights activist group seized the podium to protest one of the presenting company’s policies.

Lisa Foley of Pedigree laid out a clear approach – find a cause people believe in, want to identify themselves with, and want to share that affinity with their friends. Of course the cause needs to be consistent with the brand and a core value of the company.