The Naked Brand

I expose myself to friends and family on Facebook daily.  I disclose my real emotions in the moment, share candid photos, and give honest opinions.  Facebook is a community which is built on trust and relationships.  Just as in your local community, if someone isn’t being themselves it’s usually obvious.  In the Facebook world your choices are to hide the disingenuous person from your feed or choose not to be their friend (the same as the physical world – to hang with or not to hang with).   In the Facebook fan page world, the choice is to be a  fan or not to be a fan.  So corporate brands and small biz, it’s time to strip down to your birthday suit (the essence of your brand).  Go ahead and reveal your true nature!  You may feel unprotected and vulnerable at first, but your jewels will soon be discovered.

If the essence of your brand are the experiences and feelings created by your products and services, then celebrate in the sharing of these experiences by your fans via posts, comments, videos, and  photo sharing.  If you need to jump start the sharing, then do a giveaway, contest or promotion.  The JEEP Facebook fan page has over 10,000 fan photos and 163 fan videos along with posts and comments from fans sharing their JEEP experiences.   You will notice the wall is filled with experiences from JEEP owners, not with a corporate spokesperson posting.

Southwest Airlines does a great job of humanizing their Facebook fan page.  They have two dedicated Southwest representatives, Lindsey and Christi,  in charge of the page.  They use the standard box (see image) under the logo to give out their first names so you know who you are conversing with.  It feels true to the openness of Facebook and Social Media.  Southwest Airlines also doesn’t separate their fan feed, which gives you the good community vibes. 

A new study reveals Facebook profiles reflect actual personality, not self-idealization.  If you are a daily Facebooker then this isn’t news to you.  But how does this study apply to the Facebook fan page world?  More than 700 million people worldwide now have profiles on Online Social Networking sites (Comscore, 2009).   The study notes that creating idealized identities should be hard to accomplish because a social networking profile includes reputational information that is difficult to control (e.g., wall posts), and  friends provide accountability and subtle feedback on one another’s profiles.  The study concludes that people use Facebook to communicate their real personality.  Consequently,  lay observers should be able to accurately infer the personality characteristics of Online Social Networking Sites profile owners. 

Facebook  is the perfect nude beach for brands to show off.  At times they may feel naked, but in this new world of social media marketing, getting real and down to the bare essence is what it is all about.  Click here to read the complete study:  Facebook Study

Southwest Airlines Show Personality