Here’s a breakdown of just what makes this campaign so compelling, using Facebook Page management strategies utilized by EDU Interactive and Castle Advertising as a guideline:

Strong Vanity URL

Facebook recently launched the ability to create a unique vanity URL for Facebook profiles and company pages. In the Gap: Born to Fit campaign, Gap capitalized on this opportunity and opted to use the campaign tagline as the URL. The result: A short, memorable URL that simultaneously creates brand reinforcement, authentically represents the company and enhances SEO. 

Specific Landing Page for Non-Fans

Currently, Facebook Pages are set up so that the “Wall” tab is the point of entry for all fans when visiting the page. However, Facebook allows company pages to choose which tab to use as a point of entry for all non-fans. In the case of Gap, the “Born to Fit” tab is set as the landing page for all non-fans, thus exposing all new visitors to the latest Gap promotion. 

Fan Interaction

You’ve heard the phrase– “Social marketing is about building relationships.” In the “Born to Fit” campaign, Gap puts this adage into practice by encouraging fan interaction through a variety of methods. Visitors can trade fashion tips in a discussion forum under the “Style Tips” tab. Visitors can create their own “Born to” Gap ads and share their own styles through Polyvore, an online image-mixing app. And visitors can also view videos featuring designer Patrick Robinson and Gap models about what they were “born to do.” By providing value back to the customer, the Gap “Born to Fit” campaign facilitates buzz and awareness, builds consumer loyalty and reinforces branding.

Cross-Promotion

On the main page, the Gap Facebook hub makes excellent use of cross-promotion by featuring the Facebook pages of sister companies Banana Republic, Me&Ro, Piperlime, Old Navy and Athleta in the “Favorite Pages” box. In addition, viewers are invited to further delve into the brand by following Gap on Twitter, checking out the YouTube channel and downloading Gap’s latest iPhone app.

With 332,360 fans and counting, the Gap “Born to Fit” campaign is clearly yielding excellent results for the company. And the website not only produces results, but does so in a fun, engaging manner that creates brand loyal customers. What are some of YOUR favorite company Facebook Pages?

1) Understand how people interact, network and talk in the social space

2) Strategically build optimized profiles on key, appropriate sites

3) Know where the brand’s customer hangs out, and how to speak with them depending on the channel

4) Listen more than s/he talks.  It’s about tracking and learning from the conversational flow.

5) Be alert to opportunities, ideas and suggestions that can lead to desirable new products or innovative changes to current ones.

* Social Media should not be considered a campaign, but a strategy to build relationships.

* The level of engagement should be the true measure of success, not simply the number of fans, members, or followers.  It’s the time spent, level of interaction, intimacy, and influence.

* Social media should not be used to outright promote a company or product.  Instead it should be used to share expertise, build relationships, create a conversation, and/or be more human.  What is your ultimate goal?

* 60% of people online use social media.  93% believe companies should have a presence in social media.  85% want to interact with select companies and/or brands and 56% feel closer to a brand when they have the opportunity to interact.

As noted in the article “Can Twitter and Facebook Help Fight Breast Cancer?” , one of the reasons that social networking posts are so effective in soliciting charitable contributions is that posts are short and sweet.  Readers from all walks of life are more apt to read messages on Twitter or Facebook than other websites because space is limited and messages are “to-the-point.”  Readers are gently “nudged” into making small donations within the framework of their day-to-day lives. 

Many of us are looking for ways to support causes that are especially meaningful to us or to others in our social circles.  Getting the word out on broad social media sites gives more and more people the opportunity to answer the call to give.

Here’s Wikipedia’s definition for the term: “Web 2.0 refers to a perceived second generation of web-based communities and hosted services–such as social-networking sites, blogs, and social bookmarking— which aim to facilitate collaboration and sharing between users. Although the term suggests a new version of the World Wide Web, it does not refer to an update to any technical specifications, but to changes in the ways software developers and end-users use the web.”
So what does this mean? And what started the “Web 2.0” revolution?

The concept of “Web 2.0” was born during a conference in 2004 with O’Reilly Media and Media Live International. Dale Dougherty, web pioneer and O’Reilly VP, noted that the dot-com collapse in 2001, had marked a turning point for the web. There were more and more new and exciting applications and sites popping up every day, such as weblogs, social bookmarking, wikis, podcasts, RSS feeds, social software, web application programming interfaces (API’s) and online web services (ie. eBay). Most of all, the way people were using the web had changed significantly. These websites take advantage of web application technologies and give web users the ability to collaborate and share their experiences, views, opinions and interests while they surf the web.

The diagram below was developed during a brainstorming session at FOO Camp, a conference at O’Reilly Media. I thought this diagram best described all of the concepts that Web 2.0 encompasses.

Given the lack of set standards to what “Web 2.0” actually means, there will continue to be controversy over the term. The most important thing to understand are the main web 2.0 characteristics that make a website successful:

• “Web as a Platform” meaning delivering (and allowing users to use) web-based applications entirely through a web browser
• Providing a service, not a product
• Unique Content – maintaining hard-to-recreate data sources that get richer as more people use them
• Rich Internet application techniques–programming done “behind the scenes” to increase the web page’s interactivity, speed, functionality and usability. Website is built using the latest web 2.0 technologies.
• Social-networking capabilities- allowing users to interact with one another (chat, messaging, email, blogging, discussion groups, etc.)
• Microformats – data formatting (coding) that enables data items to be indexed, searched for, saved or cross-referenced by web crawlers.
• Encourage user contributions – an open source format, like weblogs or message boards, that are open to the public and can be modified by users (user-created and user-owned data)
• Folksonomies (a.k.a, social bookmarking) – creating & managing tags to categorize content to make info easier to search, discover and navigate over time. (ie. del.icio.us and Flickr)

Below are just a few very successful websites that utilize the web 2.0 technologies:

1. MySpace.com – Perhaps the most popular social networking site on the web! The online community allows users to create their own, personal webpage to share photos, journals and interests with a growing network of mutual friends.
2. YouTube – a site that allows users to share their favorite videos with the entire world.
3. Wikipedia- The largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, and is written collaboratively by people from all around the world.
4. Digg.com – this is a user-driven social content website. Users submit content (favorite websites, opinions, stories, etc) and other digg users read submissions and “digg” what they like best.

All of these websites offer different services, but they all share the common characteristics of a web 2.0 website. They all offer the ability to take advantage of web-based applications and services. They all encourage user contributions, by allowing them to add content and customize the look and feel of the site. And they all allow for socialization and collaboration among users.

The World Wide Web is constantly changing and evolving, and new technologies will continue to change the way people use and interact with the web. Pretty soon, “Web 2.0” will become a term of the past, and we’ll be wondering… “So, what is “Web 3.0” really?”