Social media grows up

In 1996, Al Krueger was studying business at UW-Whitewater when he decided to start a cycling club. It was an opportunity to build an organization and run it, to be a leader. Soon the team was competing regionally, with Al both riding and managing operations and marketing.

Over champagne in Comet Branding’s Third Ward offices, Krueger recalls the experience. “It gave me the first taste of the idea that if you want something and the opportunity is there, why not just go for it yourself?”

Krueger and his business partner, Sara Meaney, have definitely gone for it since joining forces in April of 2009. Krueger had founded Comet Branding, then a general strategic marketing firm, in 2007, and the two met while volunteering for Friends of the Milwaukee Public Library. Al admired Sara’s business savvy and the way she could distill ideas into action, but never expected she would leave her secure position for a start-up.

Fortunately, he was mistaken. Last week came the announcement that Comet was merging with the nation’s leading active lifestyle agency, Milwaukee-based Hanson Dodge Creative. The dowry? Comet’s successful social media practice.

Mergers between marketing agencies have always been commonplace. But for an established agency like Hanson Dodge to not purchase, but merge with, an almost-new firm like Comet signals a sea change, not just here, but everywhere, as old-school marketers wake up to what web users already know: People heavily accessing the web through social networks like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter is not a trend, it’s a transformation. Al and Sara bet the farm on the idea early on, and now it’s paying dividends. Hence, the champagne.

“Sara and I saw the opportunity for Comet as a viable business, but we saw it from completely different angles,” Krueger explains. “We both felt, though, that social media was going to be powerful for business.

Meaney finishes the thought, something they do for each other a lot. “And we knew that there needed to be a balance between what was possible and what was responsible and practical for clients. It’s not just about buzz or being there, it’s about accomplishing real business goals.”

The merger will extend the capabilities of both agencies in obvious ways. HD has the reach, with clients like Kmart, Trek and Wolverine already using them for social media projects; Comet’s skills in audience engagement, analysis and content creation will extend those client relationships and create new ones. “Hanson Dodge was by no means the first agency to approach us,” says Meaney. “But they were definitely the most serious.”

Now, with the city’s most established social media-focused agency off the table, more traditional outlets will likely look further outward to acquire expertise, or work quickly to build their own internal practices.

Unlike with destination websites (like TCD), or print or broadcast outlets, where people are more amenable to taking in the whole experience – including ads – social network members are there to interact directly: with each other, with activities they like, with content that catches their eye.

And as more people embrace social platforms like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn in ever-greater numbers, they’re harder for traditional marketers to reach with advertisements. It’s been killing them – all those people, so close, but so far away!

But for those who do it well, social media has paid big dividends already. It turned the tide for Starbucks; Victoria’s Secret and Whole Foods have also captured Facebook and Twitter users’ hearts without crossing the line.

As consumers, it will be interesting to see if the now-predictable inrush of businesses to social media will drive us off or bring us closer to the companies that want a piece of us. It might be a little of both. One thing’s for certain, however: in the future, fewer companies will leave social media to their interns and the IT guy’s nephew. Then again, Sara and Al knew that all the way back in 2009.