A new video about the transformational power of Social Media and Word of Mouth is making the rounds on the social web. Check it for yourself now:

Mashable is interested in learning about user generated content and the positive impact it can have on businesses. It’s the “Comment Contest: How is User Generated Content Changing Business?“

The prize is two tickets to mediabistro.com’s UGCX conference on October 20-21 in New York City. Each ticket is valued at $345. You must enter by September 18th in order to be eligible.

Visit the mediabistro.com UGCX website for more details on the contest and how to enter.

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Aberdeen Recognizes Symantec Word of Mouth Program Powered by Zuberance

Symantec’s ground-breaking Word of Mouth marketing program powered by Zuberance has earned the prestigious Aberdeen “Excellence in Customer Advocacy” award. Aberdeen Group, a Harte-Hanks Company (NYSE: HHS), announced the award at the recent annual Aberdeen CMO Summit at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Francisco, CA, on September 9 & 10, 2009.

Aberdeen’s Customer Advocacy Award recognizes companies for excellence in engaging and energizing highly-satisfied customers. The Symantec program enables customers of the company’s Norton products to share their enthusiasm with friends, colleagues, and millions online.

“The Norton Advocates program stands out because it is delivering measurable business value and ROI for Symantec,” said Jeff Zabin, Aberdeen Customer Management Technology Practice Research Fellow. “Symantec is best-in-class in demonstrating how to create and leverage a thriving community of customer advocates,” Zabin stated.

Over 10,000 Norton customers have become Norton Advocates since the program started last year. These Advocates have shared their enthusiasm for Norton by creating over 1,000 reviews and testimonials plus sharing offers with friends and colleagues. The Norton Advocates program is powered by Zuberance, the leading Word of Mouth marketing company.

“We are very honored to have been selected for this prestigious award,” said Diane Beaudet, Senior Director, User Engagement, Consumer Business Unit, Symantec. “We look forward to enabling even more Symantec customers to share their genuine enthusiasm for Symantec’s Norton products,” she added.

“60 Seconds with…” features leading experts in Word of Mouth marketing, social media marketing, customer experience, and related areas. Today’s guest is David Rodnitzky, Founder of PPC Associates.

How is the Groundswell of Word of Mouth and social media changing search engine marketing?
First, I think WOM and social media is gradually replacing search results as the go-to source for answers to specific types of questions. Consumers and businesses have always relied on word of mouth to find service providers, for example. If you needed a good lawyer B.I. (before Internet), you asked your co-worker or your next door neighbor for a recommendation. But as our society became more transient, it became harder and harder to find that trusted resource for a referral. As a result, I think a lot of people saw the Internet and search engines in particular as the next best thing to a trusted referral. The rise of WOM and social media, however, is helping people create trusted networks in a transient society. So while I may not really know my next door neighbor well enough to know on his door and ask for advice about legal services, I can now go online and post a question on a site like Yahoo Answers, or ask my friends on Facebook, or even send out a tweet on Twitter. I’ll get a lot of responses, and I will likely value those responses more highly than the results I might find on Google.

The other interesting aspect of social media for me is the level of demographic honesty. Search marketers are always trying to infer intent from a search query. If someone types in “buy email marketing software” we assume that we should market email marketing software to them. But there are a lot of queries on search engines that aren’t nearly that specific and we are left guessing about what the user really wants. With social media like Facebook, users tend to be very honest about who they are and what they want. Users tell you their birth date, location, marital status, age, gender, and even their interests, occupation and title. In many cases, there’s no inference required to target the right people – the user has already told you who he is and what he wants!

Can you give us an example of a company that is doing a good job of integrating search with Word of Mouth and Social Media marketing?
I have a client called Robbins Brothers – they are a jewelry store in LA, San Diego and Dallas that focuses on engagement rings. They have a Facebook fan page, a Twitter account, and of course paid search campaigns. They also run TV ads and have some great, potentially viral TV ads. They are using paid search to attract people who have expressed specific intent (e.g. “purchase engagement ring”) and then using YouTube and TV to evoke an emotional response through their TV ads. And the Facebook page is sort of a hybrid of the two – it allows fan to interact directly with Robbins Brothers, but it also is a great entry point for people surfing Facebook who are specifically looking to learn more about their engagement ring purchase options.

So I think that a company like Robbins Brothers gets the fact that you have to market to people differently based on the consideration stage and the medium. Plastering their Facebook fan page with direct response ads invoking fans to buy an engagement ring this instant would only alienate users, but a subtle branding message on paid search wouldn’t get a high enough click through rate to drive much traffic.

What’s the most important piece of advice you would give to companies that want to improve their SEM/SEO results?
I can only really talk to the SEM aspect of the question. When I take over a new client’s SEM campaigns, the two things that almost always need immediate tweaking are their tracking and their landing page. Tracking needs to be very granular – from the keyword all the way to the final conversion, even if that conversion occurs offline (such as through a sales force in the case of an enterprise client). Landing pages need constant testing and need to tell the user exactly what you want him/her to do. You can get a great landing page developed by a freelance designer for around $1000-$1500 and you can literally double your conversion rate in the process. It’s amazing to me how many companies refuse to allocate any budget at all to improving the performance of their landing pages.

What brands and products do you advocate to your friends and colleagues?
Amazon.com – great customer service, great shipping. Freshbooks for small business invoicing. EchoSign for online signatures. There’s also a great book called “Four Steps to the Epiphany” that I recommend to anyone thinking of starting up or in the midst of starting a business. And, of course, Zuberance to create a volunteer salesforce!