Effective social care (being customer service through social media channels) fosters strong customer loyalty, finds NM Incite [download page] in a new report released October 2012. Among customers who have sought a social care response, 71% of those who experienced a quick and effective response say they are likely to recommend a brand or company, versus just 17% who had an effective but slow response. 33% would recommend a brand or company that offered a quick but ineffective response, and 19% would still recommend a brand or company, even without a social response.

via 7 in 10 Would Recommend A Brand Or Company After A Good Social Care Response.

One of the most important conclusions is that sending newsletters during readers’ top engagement times of 8 a.m. – 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. – 4 p.m. can increase their average open rates and CTR by 6%.

However, optimizing email timing takes more than awareness of top engagement times. As our research points out, it’s a combination of many factors, including knowledge of time zone differences, your subscribers’ daily routines and the practices of other marketers. Find out more for yourself:

via Best Time To Send Email [INFOGRAPHIC] | Email Marketing Tips – Blog GetResponse.

YouTube anchors most social video

The power of social video represents an evolution in digital advertising, according to a new eMarketer report, “Social Video: The Next Wave in Digital Advertising.” Marketers are starting to move past the interruptive model of the 15- or 30-second pre-roll ad and toward a broader strategy that includes longer opt-in videos with built-in sharing capabilities. This branded content is designed to be consumed and shared on the social web, driving earned media and raising the potential for viral success.

via Brands Get Users Sharing with Social Video – eMarketer.

One-third of B2Bs have a politically charged messaging processAny brand has numerous stakeholders in its marketing messaging and positioning. But whether those stakeholders cooperate to develop brand messaging and campaigns is another question.Research from message management firm Corporate Visions indicates that collaboration is happening—at least some of the time. One-third of business-to-business sales and marketing professionals surveyed worldwide in Q3 said they had a collaborative process, while another third described it as “semicollaborative” and the rest admitted their message creation was politically charged or otherwise lacked cooperation between parties at the company.

via How Collaborative Is Your Branding? – eMarketer.

In late August 2012, President Barack Obama hosted an “Ask Me Anything” AMA live session on Reddit, a social news website that reports up to 3.5 billion page views a month. While the President was only able to respond to 10 questions in the time allotted, nearly 25,000 comments and posts were generated by users from the online outing. Erik Martin, general manager at Reddit, spoke to eMarketer’s Danielle Drolet about the presidential discussion and what brand marketers can learn about the role of social media in politics.

via What Brands Can Learn from Obama’s Live Q&A on Reddit – eMarketer.

Until now, a Facebook Page showed up only in the language it was created in, alienating foreign fans. Now Pages can appear translated into a visitor’s local language, which could inspire global brands to buy more Facebook ads promoting them. Global Pages could help a billion language-fragmented users commune around what they like, and connect Facebook to the pesos, pounds, and yen Wall Street wants.

With the new Global Pages structure, brands can set up localized versions of their cover photos, profile photos, Page apps, milestones, “about” info, and news feed stories. An English version’s cover might say “Hello” while users visiting from Spanish-speaking countries would see a version welcoming them “Hola”.

via Facebook’s New Translated And Localized Global Pages Could Lure International Marketing Dollars | TechCrunch.

B2B marketers believe that the most effective content tells compelling and engaging stories. Apparently producing that kind of content isn’t such a problem anymore – but producing enough of it is. According to a new report from the Content Marketing Institute (CMI) and MarketingProfs, 29% of North American marketers surveyed said their biggest content marketing challenge is producing enough content. That challenge – up from 20% of respondents last year – has supplanted concern over content quality, which took a big drop from a leading 41% of respondents last year to 18% this year.

via Forget Quality. Quantity Is Now the Key Challenge For B2B Content Marketers.

7 in 10 American mothers with children up to 12 years old make recommendations about brands, products and services to other mothers at least monthly, according to [download page] a study released October 2012 by The 360PR MomSquad and Mom It Forward. Fully half make brand recommendations daily. But what motivates them to recommend? Some 61% say they are motivated to share special offers, with other drivers including a sense of fun 54% and pride 51%.At least one-quarter of moms make recommendations on the basis of high ratings and positive reviews read online or in a magazine 32%, a cause 31%, or seeing something on a friend’s Facebook or Twitter feed 25%.

via Why Moms Recommend Brands – And Why It Matters.

As both digital media and multicultural outreach become more popular marketing techniques, US marketers are beginning to combine the two efforts.In its “2012 Multicultural Marketing and Newer Media Survey Results,” the Association of National Advertisers ANA found that this year, more than half of US marketers 60% will spend more on new media efforts, such as social media or mobile outreach, specifically to reach multicultural segments. An additional 24% will spend the same as they did in 2011.

via Marketers Increase Digital Media Spend for Multicultural Outreach – eMarketer.

This is a series of videos that visualizes a single piece of content being shared between hundreds of thousands of individuals on Facebook. We’ve tried to capture the frenetic energy surrounding three of the most shared images, all of which were photos published on George Takei’s Page.Each visualization is made up of a series of branches starting from a single person. As the branch grows, re-shares split off on their own arcs, sometimes spawning a new generation of re-shares, sometimes exploding in a short-lived burst of activity. The two different colors show gender, and each successive generation becomes more and more white as time goes by.

via Facebook Stories – Data Visualization: Photo-Sharing Explosions.