Know-How Exchange : Just for Fun

Dear Gary

I think that you have a point – I have also noticed a drop in the number and frequency of interesting questions but that is a subjective observation. I think that to get to the reality, the data will have to be analysed by the MP technical staff to produce some meaningful statistics based on 5 years worth of data. They could also probably quantify your suggestion that more use is being made of searching the KHE rather than simply posting a question.

If a marketing site and in particular its forum is showing signs of decay, then there is probably no better time to change the trend (If it exists) than now. If a Marketing forum can’t attract new members and retain the interest of existing ones, then it’s rather embarrassing – along the lines of “Physician, heal thyself”

I think that one problem is that in its essence, the forum has not moved on over the last 5 years. The format is the same, the limitations on what you can post are nearly the same and longer standing members are bound to reach a plateau caused by them having seen that, answered this and got the T shirt for it.

Updating the forum is obviously a major task, but it should be well within the capabilities of the staff. Adding a tweet button was a useful innovation, but what about the ability to add graphics, interactive maths, video and audio to the forum site?

Most B2B forums and all social network forums have suffered from a decline new membership of late and have also suffered from attrition from existing members. In the UK, Friends reunited flattened out about 18 months ago and has consistently failed to attract further members from colleges and schools which are already listed. My own university membership for example has hardly added anyone new for the last 12 months despite offering more web 2.0 content.

FaceBook, BeBo and MySpace have all lost members and I think that YouTube is the only site to buck the trend. Ecademy have lowered their membership costs for power networkers and Black Star members and there is an ongoing debate there about membership, so we are not alone. I don’t know what the situation is with LinkedIn membership but I suspect that it too has plateaued. To top it all there are these me-to networking sites like Xing where there is yet more competition for people’s time and the added glamour of being one of the first users.

In summary, to survive in the face of increasing competition for your time (Not increased competition for marketing advice) MarketingProfs probably needs to update the forum offering. The blog and twitter aspects have grown as have the paid for services such as webinars and white papers, but if the owners forget that it was the forum which initially attracted such a large membership, their revenue generating enterprises will eventually fizzle out.

Best wishes

Steve Alker
Xspirt

I have written Marketing profs about this in the past. I believe that the questions being asked are way too basic or are asking more than people can supply in an answers forum. In my opinion, marketing Profs doesn't target marketing professionals enough and this has resulted in less intelligent questions and answers. In other words the forum is becoming boring.

Also, the lack of people adding their profile information makes me (I assume others also) to not want to give these people answers. Personally I would like to know who I am advising.

I stared with MP about 4 years ago and really enjoyed it. I was a paying member, but this year I dropped my subscription, because of what is happening on the forum.

For my work, I believe that Linkedin groups have detracted from MarketingProfs. This is especially true of those who are marketing products and services aimed at the wholesale distributor.

The linkedin version of the forums provide an opportunity to get feedback from a small but much more closely focused group.

You might find this a little cynical but I think that in summary, the various social and business network sites can translate roughly as follows:

Ecademy “Please give me work”

LinkedIn “Would your wealthy friends please give me a contract”

MarketingProfs 1 “Please do my homework for me”

MarketingProfs 2 “Tell me how to run / name / manage my business and no, I won’t give you any details”

YouTube “Please give me fame”

FaceBook “Please note how popular I am”

Xing “What the hell am I doing here?”

Twitter “Look at how cool and up-to-date I am, even though I’ve got nothing to say”

The House of Lords “Please note that my family is no longer allowed to sit there thanks to that bastard Tony Blair”

GoodReads “Look at all the really intellectual books I’ve claimed to have read, but please buy and read my latest millionaire business manual”

From a research perspective: Has the traffic gone down from the forum (and/or website in general) or has simply the number of people posting decreased? Is there a trend to fewer postings over time or simply a blip (time of year, recession, etc.)?

Also, since there are more choices online, dilution is natural. People simply don't have time to look/post everywhere. People tend to stick with what works for them and/or what's "hot".

Gary
I "subscribe" to certain categories. So..I get 10 or so per day.

There are other fora that I answer but I often send people here.

Michael

Good question. I am still happy with MarketingProfs. It seems the kinds of questions I answer here are a little different than the LinkedIn questions.

MarketingProfs seems to attract people with questions that they really need an answer to.

LinkedIn forums often have hypothetical questions from people who want to have a discussion.

I think there's plenty of room for both, but there is always going to be an evolution of the way people use these two forums.

Melissa

My father used to tell me that he could tell what trade a home owner did for a living.

Peeling paintwork – Painter and Decorator
Drive full of potholes – Tarmac Contractor
Roof caving in – Roofer or Builder
Security light on all day and night – Electrician or Environmental lobbyist.

His maxim was the Trades people and Professionals (Like him) rarely thought about using their skills for their own benefit.

That’s what’s happening on MarketingProfs – we all want a decent sized membership, lots of top experts and quality posts and answers, but we rarely use our dark arts to help to boost the membership and get more people involved. True, we can send a post to a friend, but I bet that it isn’t used much.

Here’s an idea. Most of the active members with profiles are serious marketers with a database / list / CRM system / back of fag packet of all their contact details including email addresses. MarketingProfs should be able to use this information, through the members.

If I were to send out an email to all 6000 of my contacts with a message telling them what a brilliant source of marketing advice and debate and that it is free to join, I’d be very surprised if less than 300 people took action to view the site and join. The trouble with this is that not everyone is a CRM nut like me where sending out personalised emails is a couple of clicks on my software.

Most members will have their contacts on Outlook or a propriety database or CRM system or on Yahoo or Hotmail or Google Mail but it is far from trivial to set up a mailing to them to show them the site.

We could use a trick or three from the Social Networks. Our technical team could produce a widget – possibly Java based, which will read all the email addresses in an address book and then send out an emailing inviting our contacts to take a look. With a further bit of effort, we could also ask our clients if they would consent to having MP send out an email to the customers and clients of our clients! It would go through the MP servers so the success can be monitored and you can ensure that you remain white listed.

In return for doing this, the members will enjoy a new and improved forum and you could also offer some incentive as a thank you. (Lunch with Anne or Shelly ---would do for me!)

So, why not go for it – trial the idea on the top 100 and if that works do the same to your entire subscriber base.

Anyone on MP’s management team prepared to give this a go?

Steve Alker
Xspirt

PS – my fee for this advice is a replacement for the Bentley I bent last week!

Gary,

As long as you are all here, I’ll ask a question. I’d post this in the “Strategy” section, but this is quicker and easier FOR ME. I’d like a boring, complicated (versus “catchy and clever”) name and tag line for my business. In fact, if it’s offensive, that’s even better. I want this because I’m sure that’s all that is needed to make my business successful and besides, that’s all that marketing is anyway. Well, OK, it’s not really for my business. It’s for my doctoral thesis. I plan to take all your work and put it in my thesis as my own work. Unless you can come up with another topic for my thesis. I want something that is edgy and current because I’m sure that’s all the peer reviewers will look at. I’d ask my PhD advisor, but that would mean I have to get up off my rear and go see him. Oh, can you provide me with some books and articles to reference? I’d go online to my library and find some myself, but I don’t know how to do this, where my library is, or even how to spell library. Could you write the thesis for me? Needs to be in APA format. It doesn’t really matter what the topic is – because I don’t care to actually learn something. I just want to get it over with so I can graduate. When I graduate, I’m going to get a Vice President of Marketing job. This will be my first ever job in marketing. By the way, could you tell me what a vice president of marketing does, how to organize my department, set up my KPI’s, and tell me how much salary to demand? I think it should have a big base and not be related to a percentage of sales because marketing really doesn’t contribute to sales – that’s the job of the sales people. Do you think marketing and sales should be in one organization together or two. Or maybe three?

I’m going with Marcus – the drop is economic related. Realty is way off because of the over-inflated situation crashed. The lure of “get rich quick and easy in real estate” is gone. Now it’s just hard work. Outside that industry, many (dare I say most?) businesses are going against common sense and STOPPING investing in marketing. As a result, less people are going into the field (unprepared) and many in marketing are going into other opportunities as suggested by their employers involuntarily. Also, I’m going to go with Steve here and say that the falloff really doesn’t have anything to do with social media. This is not a social media site. And I don’t find what Steve wrote as humorous because it’s truth! I think that social media is down at the same time because the luster is off. People have figured out they can’t get rich off Facebook. It’s gone the way of blog riches. Everyone thought if they shared their most inner thoughts, people would read it and put ads on there and they would get rich. Well, now there are a million billion blogs with people sharing absolutely nothing important and nothing worth reading. That bubble burst. Along comes Myspace, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc, etc, etc. All you have to do is post pictures and your random thoughts and people will flock to you – and you will get rich! Again, nope. Turns out everyone is on those sites to get things for FREE! Here’s an experiment: Offer to give a product away and you will have no end of people coming to your Facebook page and then ask them if they like it enough to buy one. 99.9% will tell you yes. Then, ask them for their credit card number and see how fast they run, never to return! And Twitter! O-M-G! Don’t take this the wrong way…I love each and every one of you, but I really don’t care to read what you’re doing, thinking, and where you are every ten minutes, 24/7/365. Nor do I have time to write…I’m on the couch…I got up…I poured a cup of coffee…I’m responding to an MP question…Still responding… Still responding… Still responding… Still responding… Still responding… Still responding… Still responding…You get the idea.

However, much of America is of the voyeuristic set. Those that avoid reality by watching reality TV. The double digit IQ group (where 60’s. 70’s, and 80’s aren’t JUST the decade in which they were born, but how they scored) who thrive on WWE and NASCAR, Cops, Real Housewives of (insert current city), and anything on the food network. But, I digress.

Randall,

I thought we weren't going to declare our relationship out in the open just yet? That whole "stigma" thing we discussed? Of course I support you! I just have to support others so it doesn't look so suspicious!

Marcus, I HATE your last answer! There's no way I can go along with that! (I had to put that in here for Randall hahahaha)

Actually, there's a model of what you proposed for tag lines and names. It pops up on Facebook at the side and it's for logos. If you put up $200, people will contribute logos and you give feedback to refine them, reject them, rate them. At the end - within a few days, you award one person the "job" and they are payed some percentage of the $200 - like half or 3/4? I'm not sure of that. But, that would work for tag lines and names.

I like the profile bit too. And with respect to essays for students, perhaps we should offer a fee for entire degrees! $50,000 and we'll do ALL homework. $100,000 for a bachelor's and master's degree. $250,000 for undergrad, master, and PhD.

Wayde

I have signed up for twitter, and for face book, and for ecademy, and linkedin, and probably for several other sites which I have forgotten. I haven't looked at twitter in weeks, but I am on this site everyday. Certainly there are things we can do to improve this forum, and I will be glad to donate some time to help any way I can. Certainly this site is to some degree a barometer of the market: when the economy heats up people start asking questions about real projects. Certainly there is increased competition from other sites, but I have not found another online community to match this one.

some time ago, I heard through the grapevine that this forum is not generating much income for the site as a whole. Is this still true? Before we start asking for big programming changes, let's be sure we are thanking our hosts, helping drive traffic to the site, and doing what we can to bear our share of the costs. Lots of people love this site, but maybe it is unreasonable to assume that other portions of the marketingprofs.com site will continue to subsidize us forever.

Saw this post earlier with just a single response and started to think maybe it is beginning to fade a little (but certainly not fade away completely) for all the reasons that many have posted.

Then returned this evening to see all the fun again, like the old days. I think Marcus said it in describing the “ebb and flow” nature of this site. I think the forum will rise again and be more popular and more active than ever before.

Long live the KHE’rs

Steve

Hey everyone,

I hope you don't mind me jumping in here.

My name is Beth Harte and I am a long-time MarketingProfs member that has recently joined the team as Community Manager.

I've been reading your comments with great interest, because to be honest with you as a paying member and marketer I never saw value in the KHE because it seemed everyone was asking for a free tagline. And it appears from your comments, I missed out on a lot of great conversations with that as an impression.

MarketingProfs added me to the team because they do care about the forum and our community of members. Part of my job as community manager is to participate in the KHE forum as well as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter...wherever our members are comfortable having conversations with each other.

I know I am newer to this particular community, but I am all for making this a stronger forum with meatier conversations and it looks like you are too, but I need to know from you how we can do that together...

I can tell you're all long time KHE members and contributors and I am looking to you all for guidance (in addition to what you've provided in the above comments).

If you feel more comfortable touching base offline, you can reach me at bethh [at] marketingprofs [dot] com.

So, you'll see me here on the forum and at conferences... I hope we can get to know one another better on and offline.

Thanks for your time!

All the best,
Beth Harte
Community Manager, MarketingProfs
[Twitter address deleted by staff]

We can chat here or email. If you prefer email, like Randall said... let me know who wants to be included so I can copy you all.

If you are celebrating the 4th, enjoy!

Thanks,
Beth

I arrive late as usual, but here is one thing i've been wondering recently about MProfs in general...

Who comes to the site? By reading the blog (MP fix), it seems like a very close circle of 20 people (none of whom interestingly seem to be Forum contributors). By reading the main/weekly articles that get posted and comments to same, it seems like it is a different group - let's say small to midsize businesses. By reading the Forum, it seems like yet another group: 1-to-5-person businesses.

Ann H and team know the "segmentation" answer i suppose, but i don't think you'll ever see someone from Procter & Gamble post a question here....which is a shame.

It would be interesting to know, Beth, what a "Community Manager" does. What do you manage? What does success look like for you? Do you have specific objectives, or are you just going to somehow "manage" community interaction? Do you have a budget and/or a revenue target? KPIs?

Please don't interpret this as a negative or rhetorical question. I suspect I'm not the only one who is wondering about this, and a public answer would probably help us help you more effectively.

kevin.horne ...

You might be surprised at how many folks from large companies are MarketingProfs members. When I led a series of "Small Business Marketing" seminars a couple years ago I was amazed at how many of the folks were from larger companies ... or at least smaller business units that are part of larger companies.

As for Procter & Gamble specifically, I'm a P&G alum (a/k/a a "Proctoid"), and I periodically post information and questions that crop up in the P&G Alumni Association newsletters. The most recent one is particularly interesting for the folks here in the KHE:

Want To Partner With Procter & Gamble?

Michael:

I might not have been all that clear. I didn't mean to imply there are no large-company readers (and you used the term "members" which just added a fourth segment to my mix :)....just that I doubt they make up a large share. I'll never see the data anyway...

My real point tho by extension was related to the original post, about the KHE Forum. The share of "P&G-size" submissions to the questions wouldnt even be a rounding error.

Where does a mid-manager at P&G go for marketing advice? Now there's a good Forum question, eh? :)

PS also a P&G alum, but I'll not mention the dates to protect my age ....

Hi, Beth,

I would like to contribute to the discussion and be included on copy or however we have this discussion.

Wayde

Having the discussion via private email kind of defeats the purpose of community, doesn't it? I'd urge that we keep the discussion public/open ... probably under the "Our Forum" heading.

I find it amusing that the *Community* Manager has suggested *private* email as an option! :) (I know, I know ... some people are more comfortable when their opinions are not out there for all to see ... and jump all over. I just found the juxtaposition amusing.) This crowd is not generally shy.

Here's something curious ...

Beth wrote that she is "a long-time MarketingProfs member." No need to doubt that, for sure.

Yet her profile says she's been a member since June 23, 2009.

What's the deal? Is the profile just for KHE?

Kevin

We do actually get people from Procter and Gambol and other top marketing companies, both asking and responding to questions - they just don't declare their employer.

I only know this because I know quite a few of them from other places. They remain anonymous for many reasons, one being that the ideas and answers they get can contribute to their esteem in a large company where managers assume that they are their own and they also don't want to own up to not knowing how to do something in case it makes them look weak or thick.

I won't be outing them in a hurry!


Steve

I would personally prefer that we at least begin discussions about improvements to the forum in the open, using this forum rather than another communications media such as e-mail or linked in. To that end, I have posted a 10,000 .question in the “About Our Forum” category.

I realize that, at some time in the future, discussions will need to be taken off line, and decisions made, and I would love to be a part of that process.

Michael Goodman, it’s nice to meet you. Thanks for all the great questions!

I am a long-time member, but every time a member renews with a different email address (say you change employers or home e-mail addresses), your MP account reflects that new email address and date. Meaning, I haven’t used the same personal or business e-mail for the past 8 years. The reason it looks like I am a new member is because my account was renewed with my MarketingProfs email address and month/date of hire.

The reason I suggested e-mail as a way to communicate is to give every option possible to those that might want to take their personal comments to me offline (you can even have my phone number if you’d like or chat with me on LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter). I have found through the years that even though we’re part of a community, some folks do like to take certain comments offline for privacy purposes.

As for what I do as a community manager… A lot of people misunderstand the role or haven’t heard of it before, so here’s a long answer to a short question:

First, “managing interaction” implies control and that often offends people… that’s not my role.

I see my role as:

Community Liaison
Public Relations (all constituents, not just the media or bloggers)
Marketing Communications
Product/Service Management
Business Development

Public relations: As in building mutual relationships with all “publics.” I look at the role from the perspective that I need to be available to engage any public that might have an interest — whether it a fan, a member, a contributor, a speaker, a journalist, a blogger, a passerby etc. As such, it’s important to be a constant and consistent part of the community (wherever that community develops) and understand how that community relates to me, MarketingProfs and one another. It’s also my job to provide timely, credible and accurate information (from multiple sources, not just MarketingProfs) where/when/how it’s needed to help a marketer do their job better…that’s what adds value.

Marketing communications: Sorry, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t share what we’re up to at MarketingProfs and the great information that we have to share. Again, it comes back to the community and knowing how much you can share and when/where.

Product/Service management/development: It’s the community manager’s role to have an ear to the ground and to monitor what’s being said. It’s also the CM’s job to be a liaison between the community and the organization to make sure their needs are met. If it’s a new feature, documentation, new information, new service, etc., the community will let the CM know what they need. It’s our job to listen, comprehend and make sure the message accurately gets inside.

Business Development: To be able to build authentic, honest and valuable relationships that lead to long-term relationships, and yes, new members.

All of these areas are peppered with the need to listen, monitor, engage and communicate externally and internally proficiently and professionally.

There are MarketingProfs members that are bloggers, on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. I engage with members wherever they are active in a community and that sometimes means even offline at MarketingProfs conferences, local PRSA, AMA, IABC association meetings or tweetups (Twitter meetups).

I also have my own blog, The Harte of Marketing [URL deleted by staff] where some MarketingProfs members and other marketers comment. If you want to know more about me my blog will give you all the insights you’d ever need (that or my LinkedIn profile). If you want to know me professionally and personally, Twitter [address deleted by staff] is place… I am a pretty open book online.

Michael, I hope this answers your questions. If not, just let me know… I’d be happy to provide more information.

Telemoxie, it’s nice to meet you! I am all for chatting here on the forum…I just wanted to provide other options as well. I will hope over and see what responses you are getting to you question.

NuCoPro/Gary,

Thanks for the KHE history, it’s much appreciated. I have some questions, if you don’t mind helping me out. Would you like to have discussions only around features, processes and operational procedures of KHE only? Not marketing as a whole? Meaning, discussions on trends, the shift in the marketing profession, etc.

For example, on LinkedIn, there are discussions of marketing folks helping each other understand blog setup best practices or long-tail keyword analysis (the two most recent discussions) but not really providing specific help with a particular marketing issue (such as how to roll out a new product or a tagline for a new business).

I understand that there are lots of marketing pros that contribute here; I am just trying to get a sense of whether or not you want the forum to continue as is or if you’d be interesting in expanding it to other areas.

If you could help me to understand better, that would be great…because every MarketingProfs community is different.

Thanks, Beth. Nice to meet you too.

Sounds like you have your hands full. It will be interesting to see how things unfold here at KHE, what you can do to improve the forum, and how you can help update/transform the forum into a more vibrant community.

I think most of the long-term members can sense a decline in the number of questions, and more importantly, in the number of meaty questions. And I think we have more abandoned questions now than before, and perhaps that's also what we're noticing.

Anyway, welcome. Let us know how we can help. Just post questions in the "Our Forum" section of the KHE and you'll get plenty of input. (Your challenge is to separate the wheat from the chaff!)