Consumers around the world are more aware of the multiple global crises we face than ever before, thanks to information found on the Internet. – Simon Mainwaring
Brands must empower their community to be change agents in their own right. To that end, they need to take on a mentoring role. This means the brand provides the tools, techniques and strategies for their customers to become more effective marketers in achieving their own goals. – Simon Mainwaring
Brands are faced with the daily challenge of massively scaling their outreach in order to build personal relationships. While this may seem like a contradiction in terms, it becomes much more possible when brands shift from push to pull dynamics in their marketing. – Simon Mainwaring
There is an overwhelming amount of information available to us all on the web each day, not to mention what is shared with us by our family, friends, fans, and followers. This necessitates the need to filter through all that information and to decide for ourselves where to put our attention. – Simon Mainwaring
Since most corporate competitors have the same problems with sustainability and social reputation, it’s worth trying to solve them together. – Simon Mainwaring
The simple act of saying ‘thank you’ is a demonstration of gratitude in response to an experience that was meaningful to a customer or citizen. – Simon Mainwaring
How much do you as a consumer value a positive experience with a brand or its customer service department? How willing are you to share that with your friends? How inclined are you to let that person know that you’re interaction with them was positive? – Simon Mainwaring
A world in which government is burdened by historic debt, philanthropy has limited resources, and the private sector is only interested in its own personal gain is simply unsustainable. – Simon Mainwaring
Corporate executives need to re-frame their responsibilities to include the interests of all the stakeholders in society at large; not just shareholders, but also employees, the citizens of our communities, and those who care about the environment. – Simon Mainwaring
Find the human in the technology. The currency marketers trade in has not changed even if the methods have. Emotion is what we exchange. – Simon Mainwaring
Many corporate leaders and employees have the right intentions, but it can be overwhelming when you consider how everything is affected from leadership styles, to organizational structure, to employee engagement, to customer service an marketplace. – Simon Mainwaring
If capitalism is to remain a healthy, vibrant economic system, corporations must participate in taking care of the society and the environment in which they live. – Simon Mainwaring
A social contract is the way out of this dilemma for corporations that want to lead in the 21st century by showing consumers how seriously they take customer loyalty and goodwill. – Simon Mainwaring
Companies, to date, have often used the excuse that they are only beholden to their shareholders, but we need shareholders to think of themselves as stakeholders in the well being of society as well. – Simon Mainwaring
Radical transparency has an enormous impact on our personal lives. We can no longer share thoughts, quips, photos or personal opinions anywhere on the web without being mindful that they may turn up where we least expect it (notably job interviews, divorce proceedings or public media). – Simon Mainwaring
The companies that make meaningful contributions while also listening to the voices of others are the ones that will genuinely engage their community, who will then go to work for them. – Simon Mainwaring
In the social business marketplace, brands that hope to build loyal and growing communities do so most effectively when they demonstrate their core values and allow a community to build and engage around it. – Simon Mainwaring
Accept that the moment you buy your latest iPad, iPhone, tablet, app or game it will be promptly followed by a vastly improved and sleeker looking version. – Simon Mainwaring
In the coming years, if not sooner, social media will become a powerful tool that consumers will aggressively use to influence business attitudes and force companies into greater social responsibility – and, I suggest, move us towards a more sustainable practice of capitalism. – Simon Mainwaring
No one doubts the enormity of the social challenges we face around the world but one critical element of our response must be the generation of new thinking and ideas. Yet creating the conditions that make this possible is not simple. – Simon Mainwaring
There are many individuals, companies and even countries operating in what I call a ‘me first’ mentality, which is effectively a purely competitive approach to life, treating the planet as if it has infinite resources and pitting one country against another for supremacy. – Simon Mainwaring
The leverage and influence social media gives citizens are rapidly spreading into the business world. – Simon Mainwaring
The framing of how we relate to each other within and across social media platforms will continue to become more sophisticated and nuanced in their expression of how we structure our relationships in our real world lives. – Simon Mainwaring
More brands are waking up to their social responsibility and doing good work through cause marketing campaigns. Yet too many still go about it the wrong way. I mean ‘wrong’ in two senses. Firstly, they are marketing ineffectively, and secondly, as a consequence their positive social impact is not maximized. – Simon Mainwaring
One of the greatest challenges companies face in adjusting to the impact of social media, is knowing where to start. – Simon Mainwaring
We now see numerous examples of brands working together to address issues such as environmental degradations, climate control, pollution, poverty and disease. – Simon Mainwaring
Brands are facing a new competitive landscape in which self-definition, core values and purpose will increasingly define their ability to reach customers that only allow what is meaningful in their lives to pass through their filter. – Simon Mainwaring
There’s an adage that is an apt description of the new dynamic at work between brands and consumers connected through social media: People support what they help to build. But now that many brands are launching community-driven cause marketing campaigns, the challenge becomes what to do next? – Simon Mainwaring
As a speaker, business leader or marketer of any type, the onus is now on each of us to become equally capable of communicating very personally with a seemingly endless number of people connected by social technologies. – Simon Mainwaring
