How Influence Works in Brand New Ways - Conversation2Commerce

Contents
SECTION 1
03
Anywhere & everywhere
By claiming new omnichannel powers and
exhibiting tangible sales impact, influence
now reigns supreme in the new world of
digital communications
06
Influence: By the numbers
A compilation of data on topics ranging from
influence’s vital role during the customer journey
to the impact of social media influence on online
shopping trends in various countries
08
Game changers
A chronological review of recent campaigns
that underscore how certain brands have wielded
real influence that has directly impacted
consumer behavior
09
Opportunity for true integration
As various marketing disciplines seek to break
down silos, programmatic targeting is emerging
as a tool that enables them to support each other
and create maximum influence
SECTION 2
10
Rethinking how influence flows
A look at how earned content, which PR
pros have long known brings tremendous value,
can achieve its full potential
11
Earned content goes omnichannel
Introducing the Conversation2Commerce
platform, which enables brands to scale
influence and target it programmatically
12
Turning conversation into commerce
How Conversation2Commerce works
13
Reaping the rewards
Five ways marketers can substantially benefit
from the Conversation2Commerce platform
11
02
Today’s influence
has become crucial
to the bottom line
08

Anywhere
&
everywhereInfluence stands atop the new world
of digital communications. In its rise,
it has shattered the traditional world
order in the communications industry,
claiming new omnichannel powers and
remarkable sales potential
03
With origins in the world of public relations,
influence is bringing new respect to the indus-
try and driving new interest among marketers.
Influence comes from anywhere and every-
where. It’s what your neighbor thinks. What
the car reviewer says. What the mommy blog-
ger recommends. These spark trends, cause
actions, and can determine the fame and
fortunes of brands around the world.
This is not your father’s influence. It’s not
even your big brother’s or sister’s influence.
It’s totally modern. It’s digital. It’s tech-driven.
And yes, it’s based around earned media and
content. What’s new is that it means business,
literally millions in revenue.
Today’s influence has become so crucial to the
bottom line that advertisers, digital experts,
and media buyers are all looking at it critically.
The great news is that some of the top
thinkers from around the world are engaged.
For the PR pro who is not used to this new-
found attention, the question is how to best
collaborate on joint solutions.
For those who are industry insiders, this
isn’t surprising. Our content has always been
the most credible and authoritative.
HOW INFLUENCE WORKS IN BRAND NEW WAYS SECTION 1

Before social media – and, yes, hard as it is to believe,
there was life before social media – customer opinions
were certainly vital to every brand, but the avenues by
which companies would get that feedback were limited
to the store or the phone.
Today, consumers talk about you 24-7, 365. It’s a never-
ending conversation where opinions and ideas are
shared about your brand. Those conversations, which
shape fellow consumers’ opinions and can directly
impact their actions, take place with or without you –
so you better be a part of it and be ready to act upon it.
Why? Because every single person involved in those
conversations has influence. Today, customers are influ-
encers with the power to change your brand’s fortunes
more than ever before.
Relationships still hold the keys
Above all else, brands must understand that they no
longer can control the message because consumers are
increasingly skeptical of anything that feels contrived.
But even with letting go, brands can maintain enough
control to feel comfortable.
The key: relationships. A great way to create relation-
ships with consumers is to build relationships with the
right influencers. Obviously, research needs to be done
to identify those key individuals, but once you do, you
have an avenue to current and potential customers.
One really smart way to go about this is for a brand
to hook up with an influencer outside its niche. As
Stephanie McCratic, CEO of Acorn: An Influence
Company, told PRWeek in it’s “The New Influencers”
feature this past February: “Some-
times, when a message comes from
an unexpected source, if it is con-
nected to that source in a smart way,
it is really strong and lasting.”
She went on to note that such
influencers can truly impact a
broad swath of consumers because
any person who would deviate
from their usual content to discuss
a product outside it must really
love that product.
Tell a great story; create
a unique experience
One thing a brand can still control
directly is the narrative it builds
about itself. With brand content,
nothing trumps good stories.
They are so influential because
they tap emotions that stay with
a consumer right up until that
moment of purchase and beyond.
Stories are also a gateway to what
consumers really want out of brands
– and will want more of in the
future: experiences.
One thing a brand
can still control
directly is the
narrative it builds
about itself
04
Customers are influencers
with the power to change
your brand’s fortunes

more powerful when told by others.
Of course, a new mandate brands
have to meet is the consistent
development of new influencers.
Savvy consumers will quickly
recognize when a brand sticks with
the same influencer for a long period
of time. Eventually, people will tune
them out, too.
And going back to relationships,
a trend that will have to continue
in the near and distant future:
marketing disciplines will have to
increasingly work together to ensure
maximum brand influence.
Numerous questions remain.
What kind of content delivers the
most influence to drive a specific
consumer action? What role can
technology play in the delivery
and spread of influence? How
can influence be scaled and targeted
to the right consumers? How can
it be measured?
The real advancement in the science
of influence may come from the
sophisticated re-engineering of how
influence spreads.
The important new solution out-
lined on later pages (beginning on p.
11) is designed to help brands over-
come two key obstacles to influence:
the lack of scale for the best brand
stories and the difficulty in ensuring
it reaches the right targets at the
right place and time to drive action.
Live inside the mind
of the modern consumer
Millennials are an obviously crucial demographic as they now have
more than $200 billion in annual buying power. This is a group that will
maintain – and grow – its purchasing power for the foreseeable future.
So if you want your marketing communications efforts to succeed, this
is perhaps the most vital group upon which to focus.
So what impacts their buying decisions?
A recent Forbes study uncovered some interesting findings:
Brands no longer sell products. They
sell experiences. They offer a path
to feel a certain way. They empower
consumers to change their worlds.
Lists of specs and stats will never
accomplish that. Only stories can.
However, stories need to be relevant
to each individual recipient. Stories
need to be told in a manner that
empowers influencers to tell them
in their own words. And if brands
establish relationships in the
manner referenced earlier, they can
ensure their stories remain true to
the brand, regardless of who is
telling them and how they are told.
When influence sparks,
spark it again
PR pros are often focused on the
initial get – the story, the blog post,
the customer or influencer-created
content. But what happens when
the campaign succeeds and results
in some powerful – and influential
– earned media or earned content?
Most pros today resort to an ampli-
fication strategy, ensuring other
influencers see and share the post.
However, amplification has become
much more sophisticated than it was
even just a few short years ago. This
is where paid media colleagues can
come in with advanced solutions –
such as programmatic buying – that
allow the best content to be properly
scaled and targeted to drive com-
merce. (For more on this, see p. 9.)
An exciting new future
A number of rising trends are
destined to shape influence in new
ways. Authenticity will remain a
huge mandate as brands seek to
influence consumers – and a key
path to authenticity, at least how the
public perceives it, is working with
influencers to drive consumer trust.
Brands will increase efforts to help
position influencers in manners that
will help both their own brand and
the individual influencer stand out.
Taken a step further, brands will
increasingly focus on amplifying
influencer voices, again, understand-
ing that their messages become
05
62%
say that if a brand
engages with them
on social networks,
they are more likely
to become loyal
customers
60% are brand loyal, which means the rewards
for building connections and relationships with
millennials can reap benefits for decades to come
42%
are interested in helping
companies develop future
products and services.
This is an inviting
opening for brands to
enable their customers
A third
rely mostly on blogs
before they make a
purchase, compared
to fewer than 3% for
TV news, magazines,
and books
43%
value authenticity over
content when consuming
information. Trust must
be established before they
even read a brand’s content

06
Initial gathering
of information
70%of consumers
become aware of
products from sources
unaffiliated with a
retailer (i.e. family,
friends, third-party
influencers, etc.)
Research/narrowing
down options
67%of shoppers
browse retail sites,
but 61% also use
search engines
Product selection
67%of consumers read
product reviews
from various sources
outside the brand
The actual purchase
(locating, buying, and
taking possession)
13%of shoppers buy
online and pick up
at the store, but 25%
indicate they will use
this method going
forward
70%of people prefer to learn about
products through content, as
opposed to traditional ads
(Source: Inc., 2015)
3.2Websites that contain validated
reviews convert 3.2 times more
than those that don’t
(Source: Reevoo, 2015)
How editorial
content, such as
articles, impacts
consumers in each
generation
(Source: Nielsen, 2015)
66%of global respondents
trust editorial content,
such as articles
(Source: Nielsen, 2015)
Influence
during
the customer
journey
Social media influence – across the globe
Consumers in various countries were asked whether online reviews,
comments, and feedback influenced their online shopping behavior.
The impact of earned media
Data gleaned by various sources underscores the power earned
content, such as articles, has on consumers of all generations.
Matters of trust
With online reviews being such a powerful influencer on consumers, it is more vital than
ever to ensure their authenticity. In addition, data indicates that negative reviews – to a
point – are not necessarily bad for brands as they enhance a general sense of authenticity:
Source: Deloitte (2015)
Source: PwC, Total Retail Survey, 2016
Influence:
By the numbers
India: 66%
China: 63%
Brazil: 56%
Mexico: 55%
South Africa: 52%
United States: 40%
United Kingdom: 33%
Global: 45%
68%
Gen Z
(ages 15-20)
71%
of shoppers read
consumer reviews
before making a
purchase, but 70%
of US consumers
have questioned
the trustworthiness
of reviews on
the web
(Source: Bazzarvoice)
66%
of global
consumers
trust consumer
opinions posted
online
(Source: Nielsen)
44% of US consumers would be more
trusting of reviews if they saw a
trust mark and accompanying description of
anti-fraud policies (Source: Bazzarvoice)
4.2 to 4.5
Average rating on items at
which point purchasing peaked
(Source: PowerReviews and North-
western University’s Medill IMC Spiegel
Digital & Database Research Center)
68%
Millennials
(ages 21-34)
66%
Gen X
(ages 35-49)
60%
Baby
Boomers
(ages 50-64)
55%
Silent
Generation
(ages 65+)

07
Influence:
By the numbers
The following data indicates the percentage of in-store retail sales influenced by shoppers’ use
of any digital device in both China and the US. Additional data reports on in-store retail sales
specifically influenced by shoppers’ use of web-enabled mobile devices, including smartphones
Digital/mobile influence by sector
Apparel
Automotive
Baby/toddler products
Electronics
Entertainment
Food/beverage
Home furnishings
Digital: 63.8%
Mobile: 37.5%
Digital: 57.4%
Mobile: 30.9%
Digital: 59.4%
Mobile: 33.1%
Digital: 63.8%
Mobile: 37.1%
Digital: 57.7%
Mobile: 33%
Digital: 59.1%
Mobile: 34.6%
Digital: 58.6%
Mobile: 33.9%
Digital: 49%
Mobile: 30%
Digital: 55%
Mobile: 29%
Digital: 52%
Mobile: 29%
Digital: 62%
Mobile: 37%
Digital: 55%
Mobile: 29%
Digital: 31%
Mobile: 17%
Digital: 59%
Mobile: 35%
Source: Deloitte Consulting, LLP – “Navigating the new digital divide: Addressing the evolving needs of Chinese customers”
and “Navigating the new digital divide: Capitalizing on digital influence in retail” (both 2015)

2010
Old Spice “The Man Your Man
Could Smell Like”
The original Wieden+Kennedy ad in
February 2010 set social and main-
stream media ablaze. But it was the
subsequent videos created for YouTube
where the actor directly responded to
personalized tweets in real time that
really hit home. Sales jumped 55% in
the first three months following the
campaign launch.
2013
Oreo “You can Still Dunk
In The Dark”
Oreo scored a touchdown during the
2013 Super Bowl with some brilliant
real-time marketing that was enabled
by preparedness. Having already aired
a TV ad during the game, Oreo set up
a mission control team with executives
who could approve things instantly if
an opportunity arose. When the power
went out in New Orleans, the brand
pounced. It was a very creative tweet –
deemed by many pundits the best “ad”
of the game – but it was made possible
because Oreo was ready to act.
2011
Diesel’s “I Like Diesel” Campaign
A 2010 eMarketer report noted that 68%
of consumers were more likely to buy
with a positive Facebook friend referral.
Enter this great – and at the time
standout – initiative, where the fashion
brand successfully pushed content from
the real world into customers’ social
streams. Diesel combined Facebook
and QR codes to link consumers in
their stores with their friends online.
2014
Always #LikeAGirl
P&G changed the conversation with
this campaign. Always uncovered the
insight that more than half of girls
experience a drop in confidence during
puberty, and many never fully recover.
Always took on a common playground
expression, documented its debilitating
power, and reinterpreted the phrase
#LikeAGirl with fresh and inspiring
meaning. A huge confidence movement
around young girls blossomed over-
night and organically, creating an
historic shift in the conversation around
the globe while also lifting the brand.
2012
Lay’s “Do Us a Flavor”
This combination of crowdsourcing and
Facebook is a testament to the impact
direct consumer involvement can have
on product marketing and development.
Celebrating its 75th anniversary in
2012, Frito-Lay welcomed consumers
to help create its next chip flavor,
which was Cheesy Garlic Bread in that
inaugural year. Year-on-year sales rose
12% and the brand has continued the
annual contest ever since.
2015
Burberry’s Snapchat Pre-Show
In an unprecedented move, the high-end
fashion company shared its entire 2016
spring and summer line digitally on
Snapchat a day before last fall’s London
Fashion Week launch. Along with
offering an early look at their designs
– something consumers always will
appreciate – the brand was able to tell a
story about its collections. In an age of
storytelling, this move generated major
millennial buzz. And in another ode to
influence: other brands now livestream
their fashion shows, thus underscoring
how Burberry changed the game.
Game changersWhile brand messaging is no longer solely in the hands of the companies
themselves, a recent look back reveals campaigns that underscore how brands
wield real influence, in many cases directly impacting consumer behavior
08

Performance marketing is the
most measurable, transparent, and
accountable form of marketing to
drive incremental impact and ROI
faster and at scale. One aspect
of this is programmatic media
buying, simply defined as a way to
specifically target the audience you
wish to see your advertising. It is
a drastic change from traditional
ad buying, as brands are no longer
locked into a set number of spots
on specific sites. It is basically an
algorithmic purchase in real time.
There is no doubt programmatic
buying is the future. According to
the Interactive Advertising Bureau,
by 2018 programmatic spend will
have grown from 28% in 2013 to
more than 80% of marketing spend.
Most discussions about pro-
grammatic tend to focus on the
ad side, but there are numerous
aspects of the process where the
strengths of marketing and PR can
be brought into play to make it more
effective – and influential.
Speak to your audience
The advertising world has never
lacked for creative brilliance, but
it has not always focused with the
same level of rigor on where the
beautiful ads were placed. What
was missing was data that could
help us understand the precise
target and where that individual
was in their purchase journey.
Performance marketing enables
us to leverage multiple data sets
so the precise right message can
be targeted programmatically to a
specific individual at the right time
in his or her purchase journey. All
of this literally happens in seconds.
As programmatic spending has
increased, ad-side professionals
have come to realize the importance
of delivering relevant content to
drive deeper audience engagement
– something innate in PR.
In-the-moment thinking
Perhaps the greatest area where
advertising can tap into the
strengths of its PR and marketing
brethren is the ability to turn on a
dime with creative.
Oreo’s highly acclaimed “You
can still dunk in the dark” tweet
epitomized the ability of marcomms
to instantly react to a real-world
event and engage consumers
with fresh, ultra-relevant content.
Traditional advertising could
never be so in the moment.
But that’s changing.
With programmatic, brands
have fundamentally shifted from
buying ad space to buying a
target customer wherever they
are online. This literally occurs at
scale in milliseconds on an almost
impression-by-impression basis.
This speed represents a big shift
in advertising, but it is something
their partners on the marcomms
side have been living for years.
We can show them how to prepare
for such instances and be ready
to offer up dynamic creative and
offers at a moment’s notice.
The big news
Programmatic is here to stay
because, regardless of the
discipline, the need to reach
consumers on an individual level
is crucial to the bottom line. And
technology enables that to happen
in ways never thought possible.
It’s the ultimate way to influence
consumers to action. And on the
succeeding pages you will be
introduced to an important new
offering that will enable your
brand to deliver influence in a more
targeted way than ever before. And
this platform is designed to help
brands overcome two key obstacles
to influence: the lack of scale for
even the best brand stories and
the difficulty in ensuring that
influence reaches the right targets
at the right place and time.
The rise of programmatic targeting exemplifies
how various disciplines can truly support each
other to create maximum influence
Opportunity for
true integration
09
Programmatic targeting enables brands to reach individual buyers at the optimal moments

Positive earned content has great value because it is pure. In that purity, there is power
For more than a century,
PR professionals have worked
to earn credibility and trust by
convincing reporters, third
parties, and influencers to share
a point of view or validate a truth.
As every communicator knows,
there is tremendous value in
positive earned – read: not paid
for – content. It is pure. And in
that purity there is power.
Research shows that media
coverage, influencer content,
ratings, and reviews are among
the most credible, believable,
and influential type of content.
They remain the top drivers of
purchase consideration, affinity,
and familiarity.
Maximum impact
Still, despite its clear value to
marketers, earned content has
traditionally fallen short of
achieving its true potential.
For a PR professional, a great
story is an important achievement,
but in the new world order of
communications, the story can’t
be seen as an end unto itself.
Moreover, most earned content
doesn’t scale in a predictable
way, meaning there’s no built-in
mechanism to ensure it is seen
by a larger audience, gets viewed
multiple times, or is put in front of
people at the precise moment of
decision-making. This deficiency
prevents it from achieving the
commerce returns that are most
valuable to marketers.
What’s more, some marketers
still struggle to provide measurable
omnichannel communications
plans that integrate earned,
owned, and paid content. They
can measure the results of
owned and paid content, but it
remains difficult to link earned
content to a clear and obvious
increase in commerce.
Because of this, many marketers
and communicators consign earned
content to “air cover” – a “nice to
have.” Sure, it may stimulate some
buzz, but it’s not playing a critical
role in the communications mix.
That simply is not acceptable in
today’s marketing mix. These
limitations have put the PR industry
on a decades-long defensive. It’s
the age-old “PR paradox.”
But when you turn to the
next page, you will see there
is a solution……
Earned content delivers 7 to 10 times
the ROI paid media does in most media
mix models. And earned content has
staying power. It can be relevant days,
weeks, and sometimes even years
after it first appears
Rethinking how
influenceflows
10

In response to the underutilization
of influence in the marketing mix,
MSLGROUP, in conjunction with
Publicis Communications and
Public Media, has launched an
influence-to-impact performance
platform that combines aspects of
public relations, advertising, digital,
and shopper marketing. Called
Conversation2Commerce, this
communications platform extracts
far greater influence from earned
content than could ever happen
naturally or through manual hit-
or-miss amplification.
Conversation2Commerce places
earned content at the core of the
communications mix to help realize
enormous gains of mindshare and
market share. Through its powerful
platform, it uses performance
marketing to scale influence and
target it programmatically. For the
first time, earned influence can
be combined with specific offers
for omnichannel distribution. The
result is a platform that can have
a predictable and measurable
impact on a client’s business.
The Conversation2Commerce
platform works not only for
b-to-c consumer marketing and
new product launches reaching
millions of people, but it’s also
just as effective for highly targeted
b-to-b and b-to-g initiatives. These
services will be marketed under the
Conversation2Credibility name.
By expanding and targeting
the reach of the most important
messages to the right people
at the right time, the platform
strongly supports reputation
management, executive visibility,
employee engagement, corporate
social responsibility, education
campaigns, issues and crisis
management, and nonprofit
communications, as well as
consumer marketing.
“ “
By using the latest
technologies and
integrated thinking,
Conversation2Commerce
addresses the key drawback
to earned content and
influence by completely
re-engineering how it
flows. This will allow PR
professionals to make a
stronger contribution to our
clients’ business goals
As the barriers between the
disciplines in communications
continue to erode, this platform
is one of the best examples of
how true integrated thinking can
bring new value to clients. C2C is
integrated by birth: as one of the
most-integrated agencies, we have
worked together with our paid,
shopper, advertising, and digital
sister agencies inside Publicis
Groupe to develop the platform”
Guillaume Herbette, CEO,
MSLGROUP
New technologies and more
integrated thinking are allowing
a modern and dynamic version
of traditional PR influence to take
root. This modern-day approach
to influence marketing effectively
unlocks, scales, and targets
the flow of influence in order to
improve brand positions and grow
commerce across channels”
Erin Lanuti, chief influence
strategist, MSLGROUP
Earned content
goes omnichannel:
Introducing the Conversation2Commerce Platform
11

Turning
conversation
into commerce
12
In operation, the Conversation2Commerce platform
is quite simple. It quickly converts a strong piece
of earned content into an “earned content unit” – a
clickable online ad built around the story’s headline.
It is accompanied by a powerful brand-owned visual. A
click on the ad takes the reader back to the actual piece
of earned content in its original environment, where it is
perfectly positioned to exert its credible influence.
The earned content unit can be distributed
programmatically to the precise person at the right
time via other paid media solutions. We can then
apply the same universal measurements to earned
media that would be applied to paid media.
Below we provide an overview of the
typical engagement process using the
Conversation2Commerce platform.
IDENTIFY
Credible
Influence
An Influence To Impact Performance Platform
AMPLIFY
Performance
Media, SEO and
Shopper Marketing
CREATE
Content and
Advocacy
MEASURE
Brand Relevance
and Commerce

Reaping
the rewards
Conversation2Commerce from MSLGROUP places earned content at the
center of integrated communications campaigns, harnessing the power of
this influence to drive growth in brand and commerce. Marketers benefit
from the Conversation2Commerce platform in these ways:
1 Influential earned content is turned into
commerce and brand lift
Earned content is not yesterday’s news – it’s the fuel for tomorrow’s
marketing engine. This form of influence helps guide peer
recommendations that lead to a 2X sales increase compared to
traditional advertising.
2 The platform is turnkey
Conversation2Commerce is an influence platform that enables you to
turn earned content into a commerce amplifier quickly and easily.
3 Integrated thinking is built inside
The built-in intelligence of the Conversation2Commerce platform
integrates the expertise of all the people on your marketing team
– your experts from PR, advertising, digital, research, analytics,
shopper marketing, as well as from your agency and your own team.
4 Marketers can react opportunistically
Real-time influence has finally hit the rocket age. Only a powerful,
process like Conversation2Commerce can bring scale and impact to
the influence of earned content so quickly – in hours, not days.
5 Business RESULTS and ROI from earned
content can be achieved in ways that were
simply not possible before
Conversation2Commerce produces a much higher ROI from your
communications budget by programmatically combining specific
offers and actions with influence in a manner that is predictable
and measurable.
13
We intend to
keep our efforts
in a perpetual
state of beta,
continually
looking for
new and better
breakthrough
solutions
to connect
influence to
commerce”
Erin Lanuti,
chief influence
strategist,
MSLGROUP
“

Introducing Conversation2Commerce
To learn more about how
Conversation2Commerce can boost your
brand and commerce, contact:
Erin B. Lanuti
Chief Influence Strategist
erin.lanuti@mslgroup.com
MSLGROUP
375 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
+1 646 500 7600
Produced by Haymarket Media
© Haymarket Media Group Ltd.

How Influence Works in Brand New Ways - Conversation2Commerce

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How Influence Works in Brand New Ways - Conversation2Commerce