How to Making Money

Thanks to the success of projects like Diaspora, Designing Obama and The Glif, more and more creatives are looking toward Kickstarter as a way to fund their projects.

The site makes it possible for individuals or groups to fund an album, finance a documentary film or publish a quarterly magazine by soliciting backers online. The brilliance of Kickstarter is in its all-or-nothing approach. This creates a huge incentive for project creators to really put a lot of thought into their project and to offer appropriate rewards for pledges.

We wanted to find out why so many entrepreneurs are turning to Kickstarter to fund their projects. Kickstarter projects come in all sizes and we spoke with three project creators about the how’s and why’s of crowdfunding.

The Still Funding

Christopher Salmon fell in love with Neil Gaiman’s short story, The Price. As a filmmaker, Salmon immediately saw the potential of bringing the story to life, using computer animation. He contacted Gaiman — and thanks to an incredibly detailed animatic — received permission to create the film. Gaiman even agreed to provide the voice narration for the project.

Things were starting to come together, until Salmon ran into a familiar problem for indie filmmakers: Money.

Getting funding for a short film — even for something like The Price that has a built-in fan base — isn’t easy. For Salmon, it was important to not only find a way to raise money, but to do so in a way that would let him retain control of his project. That’s when he turned to Kickstarter.

Salmon decided to use the service to raise the $150,000 he needs to turn his animatic into a full-fledged 3D animated short. As of publishing, the filmmaker is less than 32 hours away from his deadline and he needs roughly $20,000 to meet his goal.

When we spoke to Salmon last week and asked him about the project, he told us that it was the all-or-nothing approach of Kickstarter that really interested him. Ambition and belief in the story is what led Salmon to create the intricate animatic that won over Gaiman; that same ambition is what led him to trust that he will reach his goal.

Salmon spoke to us about the overwhelming feedback he has received from supporters. Interestingly, the film has generated a lot of support and interest from the overreaching film community since the funding push kicked off at the beginning of the month. Pledges have come from all parts of the world and that support — and trust — will guide him into making an even better film, according to Salmon. “I want to make it as good as it can be to show my thanks,” Salmon said.

The plan is for the film to hit the festival circuit as soon as it is complete.

Pledges of $25 or more will receive a digital download of the finished film. Those who choose to donate $50 or more will get a special edition DVD that includes an exclusive interview with Neil Gaiman. Additional pledge levels include other incentives like posters, a class='blippr-nobr'>Bluclass="blippr-nobr">Blu-ray edition and signed copies of the film.

The Just Funded

Tom Durham is another filmmaker who saw Kickstarter as a way to fund his project. Less than two weeks ago, Durham successfully reached the funding goal for his project, 95ers: ECHOES. Durham’s goal was to raise $12,000; he ended up raising just more than $17,000 for his project.

Kickstarter turned out to be a crucial part of making 95ers: ECHOES a reality. An ultra-indie sci-fi film about an FBI agent with the power to rewind time, Durham describes the project as “The Time Machine meets X-Files meets Heroes meets… A Christmas Carol.”

Durham has literally put his life into the film. The project has taken more than four years — though the idea goes back more than a decade — and most of the funding came from mortgaging his house. He does not recommend that approach.

After almost reaching the finish line, Durham hit a wall. Completely out of money, he was faced with having to wait another year to save up the funds to finish the project properly. Fortunately, a relative told Durham about Kickstarter and he decided to give it a shot.

Durham tells us, “Kickstarter understands the artist and understands today’s patron, and connects them.” After the initial round of backers trickled to a stop, the 95ers was featured on the Kickstarter home page. At this point, the project really started to take off. “Something about our own story, and something about the movie’s story, was connecting with people,” says Durham.

With his funding goal complete, the next step is to finish the film. The plan is to have it completed by the end of January so that it can go off to festivals and then TV and DVD. Durham hopes to have the film on SyFy in 2011.

Incidentally, this is only the first of five planned 95ers films. We imagine that Durham will skip the mortgage next time and go straight to Kickstarter.

The Big Success Story

About a week and a half ago, we covered a Kickstarter project called the TikTok+LunaTik. TikTok and LunaTik are high quality kits for turning the iPad nano into a multitouch wrist watch. When we first wrote about the project, it had raised nearly $200,000 — far more than its initial funding goal of $15,000.

Since then, the project has gone on to raise more than $450,000, making it the most successful project in Kickstarter’s history. Oh, and there are still more than two weeks to go before the project ends.

For Scott Wilson, the founder of MINIMAL, the Chicago-based design studio where TikTok and LunaTik were engineered, the success has been pretty overwhelming.

Wilson came into Kickstarter with more experience under his belt than the average project creator: his past client list includes a stint at Nike and he has an extensive client list.

So why choose Kickstarter? Well, as we mentioned in our earlier piece, Kickstarter is one of the more pure ways that an entrepreneur can fund his or her idea. Wilson didn’t want to deal with VCs. He didn’t want to compromise his design. He wanted to make his project on his own terms. That echoes what Salmon told us about his project.

Scott Thomas, who used Kickstarter to fund the Designing Obama book last year, is a friend of Wilson’s and encouraged him to give the service a shot. The results, needless to say, have been pretty spectacular.

It wasn’t until about 6:00 p.m. on the first day that the project started to gain attention. After seeing little activity for most of the day, Wilson was shocked to look at his phone and see the funding notices fly in. When we spoke to Wilson last week, the project had just crossed the $300,000 mark.

Aside from the ability to control his own project, Wilson acknowledges that the potential publicity was also an attractive element. Wilson believes that the story behind the project could be as compelling as the product itself.

At this point, Wilson’s priority is to just make sure he can get his kits manufactured. Within the first week, he already contacted his manufacturer and doubled-down on his tooling so that the process can get started as soon as possible. Kickstarter backers will be the first priority — with orders for retailers and others coming after those are fulfilled.

Wilson, like other Kickstarter project creators, updates the project on a regular basis. He has been using his project’s exposure level to help educate other would-be creators and to even promote some other Kickstarter projects. In the waning hours of the funding push for The Price, profiled above, Wilson sent out a plea via Kickstarter’s messaging system to those who back or watch TikTok+LunaTik and recommended that they also pledge to Salmon’s project.

The Future of Funding

Kickstarter is impressive because it can work on multiple scales. From smaller projects like 95ers: ECHOES to mid-sized projects like The Price to half-million-dollar juggernauts like TikTok+LunaTik, the model for creator-centric funding has tons of potential.

Of course, not every idea will meet its funding goals. As with anything else, luck — as well as effort and overall idea quality — will ultimately play a part in what makes it big and what doesn’t. Still, we think Kickstarter represents a new era for funding.

What do you think of Kickstarter? Would you consider using it or a similar service to fund your next endeavor? Let us know!

More Social Media Resources from Mashable:

- 10 Unique iPhone Photography Accessories/> - How Social Media Is Changing the Way Movies are Promoted/> - 4 Social Web Apps for Making and Sharing Your Travel Plans/> - HOW TO: Use Social Media to Enhance Your Event

For more Social Media coverage:

class="f-el">class="cov-twit">Follow Mashable Social Mediaclass="s-el">class="cov-rss">Subscribe to the Social Media channelclass="f-el">class="cov-fb">Become a Fan on Facebookclass="s-el">class="cov-apple">Download our free apps for Android, iPhone and iPad

Jamie Turner is the chief content officer of the 60 Second Marketer, the online magazine for BKV Digital and Direct Response. He is also the co-author of How to Make Money with Social Media, now available at fine bookstores (and a few not-so-fine bookstores) everywhere.

Given the hundreds of social media tools available, and the thousands of different ways to use them in business, you’d think that getting Fortune 500 companies on board would be a complex and daunting task.

But it’s not. The truth is, there are only five different ways the Fortune 500 use social media. Seriously — just five. And once you know what they are, you can figure out which ones would be most useful for your business.

These five social approaches, though different in many respects, all have one thing in common: Each of the Fortune 500 use them to generate a profit. After all, they’re not using social media just to be social. They’re using it to make money.

In order to make money with social media, you have to set up your campaigns to be measured. And I’m not talking about simple metrics like number of followers or unique page views (although those are important). I’m talking about real metrics like leads generated, prospects converted and profits realized. Those are the kinds of metrics that enable you to track the success of your social media campaign on an ROI basis. And when you’re tracking your social media campaign on an ROI basis, you’re making your CFO happy (along with your CEO, your CMO and everyone else in your company).

1. Branding

Some companies use social media strictly as a branding tool. Typically, this means running a YouTubeclass="blippr-nobr">YouTube campaign that (hopefully) gets a lot of buzz around the water cooler. While using social media strictly as a branding tool might be considered “old-school” these days, it can still generate some positive sales growth.

Take Toyota as an example. Its YouTube mini-series featuring the Sienna Family has generated more than 8.3 million impressions. Those are not passive impressions fed to consumers during a TV commercial break, but engaged views attained through social sharing. When people share your commercial with their friends, they’re reinforcing your marketing for you, and it’s the best kind.

Of course, one of the most successful campaigns of this type is the Old Spice YouTube campaign that has more than 140 million impressions and, according to Nielsen, helped sales increase 55% in three months, and a whopping 107% during the month of July alone. Part of what made this campaign successful was that Old Spice set it up so it could quickly respond to viewers’ comments about the videos. By engaging the viewers in the videos, Old Spice improved the stickiness of the campaign and, best of all, enhanced the viral nature of it.

2. e-Commerce

If you can sell your product or service online, then you’ll want to drive people to a landing page on your website where they can buy your goods. How can you accomplish this? Just do what Dell does. It tweets about special promotions for its folloers on Twitterclass="blippr-nobr">Twitter. Right now, the DellOutlet account has 1.5 million followers. If you crunch some hypothetical but fair numbers on the back of an envelope, Dell’s ROI might look something like this:

DellOutlet followers: 1.5 million

DellOutlet followers who actually see the promotional Tweet: 50,000

Followers who click on the link in the Tweet: 500

Prospects who purchase a computer based on the Tweet: 50

50 purchases x $500 computer = $25,000

That’s $25,000 in revenue just for sending out a tweet. Not bad for a day’s work. Of course you’ll have to put in the effort to build your Twitter community in the first place, but those are certainly resources well spent, given the potential return.

3. Research

Many companies are using social media as a tool to do simple, anecdotal research. Sometimes, this involves building a website that engages customers in a dialogue. Starbucks has done this famously with MyStarbucksIdea.com. When visitors land on the site, they’re asked to provide new ideas to Starbucks on ways to improve the brand. Visitors can share ideas, vote on which ideas they like the best, discuss the ideas that have been submitted, and even see the results of their suggestions in action.

But you don’t have to build an entire website to keep tabs on your customers’ needs. Got a blog? Great. Ask your visitors to leave suggestions in your comments section. Have an e-newsletter? Terrific. Use the tools from ConstantContact, ExactTarget or MailChimp to include polls and surveys in your e-newsletter. Active on Twitter? Wonderful. Then use Twtpoll, SurveyMonkey or SurveyGizmo to drive people to a survey page on these sites.

The bottom line is there are plenty of ways to keep your finger on the pulse of your community’s needs, using social media tools that are readily available to both you and the Fortune 500.

4. Customer Retention

A good rule to remember is that it costs three to five times as much to acquire a new customer as it does to keep an existing one. Given that, wouldn’t it be smart to use social media as a tool to keep customers loyal and engaged? That’s what Comcast and Southwest Airlines do. They communicate via Twitter, class='blippr-nobr'>Facebookclass="blippr-nobr">Facebook and other social media platforms to help solve customer service issues.

When Frank Eliason at Comcast first noticed that people were making comments about his company on Twitter, he probably wasn’t very happy. After all, if you’re going to Tweet about your cable company, it’s likely a complaint. So Frank took things into his own hands and started Tweeting back to the disgruntled customers. His tweets offered suggestions and tips on how to fix the problems people were having with their services.

Research has indicated that if you take a customer in a heightened state of anger and help them out, they’ll actually become brand advocates. In other words, they start promoting your brand to others because you reached out to them and helped them at a time of need.

That’s what happened with Frank and Comcast. Customers went from being disgruntled to being brand advocates — all because they were pleasantly surprised when Frank reached out to them via Twitter and helped solve their problems.

If you find yourself reading negative comments in the blogosphere about your brand, don’t shy away from them. Engage with them. You’ll be surprised how effective it can be.

5. Lead Generation

If you’re having difficulty selling your product or service online, you may want to invest in a social B2B lead generation strategy. At my company, we use social media to drive prospects to our online magazine for marketers. When prospects get to the website, they can read a blog post, watch a 60-second video or download a white paper. Once we gather their contact information, we (gently) re-market to them by reminding them of all the great results our partner generates for its clients.

This hub-and-spoke system works like a charm. Why? Because B2B and professional service firms are often sold based on a relationship. Much of the decision process is based on a vendor’s reputation and trustworthiness. What better way to build trust than by providing helpful, useful information to the client prospect via social media?

Remember, when you’re using this hub and spoke system, you don’t want to limit yourself to just the big five (class='blippr-nobr'>LinkedInclass="blippr-nobr">LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and MySpaceclass="blippr-nobr">MySpace). You’ll also want to use e-mail marketing, speeches, e-books, webinars, blogs, videos and other social media tools to build trust and awareness.

More Business Resources from Mashable:

- 5 Ways to Sell Your Expertise Online/> - Why Your Business Should Consider Reverse Mentorship/> - 35 Essential Social Media & Tech Resources for Small Businesses/> - 6 Ways to Score a Job Through Twitter/> - 4 Misconceptions About Marketing in Social Games

For more Business coverage:

class="f-el">class="cov-twit">Follow Mashable Businessclass="s-el">class="cov-rss">Subscribe to the Business channelclass="f-el">class="cov-fb">Become a Fan on Facebookclass="s-el">class="cov-apple">Download our free apps for Android, iPhone and iPad

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Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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Thanks to the success of projects like Diaspora, Designing Obama and The Glif, more and more creatives are looking toward Kickstarter as a way to fund their projects.

The site makes it possible for individuals or groups to fund an album, finance a documentary film or publish a quarterly magazine by soliciting backers online. The brilliance of Kickstarter is in its all-or-nothing approach. This creates a huge incentive for project creators to really put a lot of thought into their project and to offer appropriate rewards for pledges.

We wanted to find out why so many entrepreneurs are turning to Kickstarter to fund their projects. Kickstarter projects come in all sizes and we spoke with three project creators about the how’s and why’s of crowdfunding.

The Still Funding

Christopher Salmon fell in love with Neil Gaiman’s short story, The Price. As a filmmaker, Salmon immediately saw the potential of bringing the story to life, using computer animation. He contacted Gaiman — and thanks to an incredibly detailed animatic — received permission to create the film. Gaiman even agreed to provide the voice narration for the project.

Things were starting to come together, until Salmon ran into a familiar problem for indie filmmakers: Money.

Getting funding for a short film — even for something like The Price that has a built-in fan base — isn’t easy. For Salmon, it was important to not only find a way to raise money, but to do so in a way that would let him retain control of his project. That’s when he turned to Kickstarter.

Salmon decided to use the service to raise the $150,000 he needs to turn his animatic into a full-fledged 3D animated short. As of publishing, the filmmaker is less than 32 hours away from his deadline and he needs roughly $20,000 to meet his goal.

When we spoke to Salmon last week and asked him about the project, he told us that it was the all-or-nothing approach of Kickstarter that really interested him. Ambition and belief in the story is what led Salmon to create the intricate animatic that won over Gaiman; that same ambition is what led him to trust that he will reach his goal.

Salmon spoke to us about the overwhelming feedback he has received from supporters. Interestingly, the film has generated a lot of support and interest from the overreaching film community since the funding push kicked off at the beginning of the month. Pledges have come from all parts of the world and that support — and trust — will guide him into making an even better film, according to Salmon. “I want to make it as good as it can be to show my thanks,” Salmon said.

The plan is for the film to hit the festival circuit as soon as it is complete.

Pledges of $25 or more will receive a digital download of the finished film. Those who choose to donate $50 or more will get a special edition DVD that includes an exclusive interview with Neil Gaiman. Additional pledge levels include other incentives like posters, a class='blippr-nobr'>Bluclass="blippr-nobr">Blu-ray edition and signed copies of the film.

The Just Funded

Tom Durham is another filmmaker who saw Kickstarter as a way to fund his project. Less than two weeks ago, Durham successfully reached the funding goal for his project, 95ers: ECHOES. Durham’s goal was to raise $12,000; he ended up raising just more than $17,000 for his project.

Kickstarter turned out to be a crucial part of making 95ers: ECHOES a reality. An ultra-indie sci-fi film about an FBI agent with the power to rewind time, Durham describes the project as “The Time Machine meets X-Files meets Heroes meets… A Christmas Carol.”

Durham has literally put his life into the film. The project has taken more than four years — though the idea goes back more than a decade — and most of the funding came from mortgaging his house. He does not recommend that approach.

After almost reaching the finish line, Durham hit a wall. Completely out of money, he was faced with having to wait another year to save up the funds to finish the project properly. Fortunately, a relative told Durham about Kickstarter and he decided to give it a shot.

Durham tells us, “Kickstarter understands the artist and understands today’s patron, and connects them.” After the initial round of backers trickled to a stop, the 95ers was featured on the Kickstarter home page. At this point, the project really started to take off. “Something about our own story, and something about the movie’s story, was connecting with people,” says Durham.

With his funding goal complete, the next step is to finish the film. The plan is to have it completed by the end of January so that it can go off to festivals and then TV and DVD. Durham hopes to have the film on SyFy in 2011.

Incidentally, this is only the first of five planned 95ers films. We imagine that Durham will skip the mortgage next time and go straight to Kickstarter.

The Big Success Story

About a week and a half ago, we covered a Kickstarter project called the TikTok+LunaTik. TikTok and LunaTik are high quality kits for turning the iPad nano into a multitouch wrist watch. When we first wrote about the project, it had raised nearly $200,000 — far more than its initial funding goal of $15,000.

Since then, the project has gone on to raise more than $450,000, making it the most successful project in Kickstarter’s history. Oh, and there are still more than two weeks to go before the project ends.

For Scott Wilson, the founder of MINIMAL, the Chicago-based design studio where TikTok and LunaTik were engineered, the success has been pretty overwhelming.

Wilson came into Kickstarter with more experience under his belt than the average project creator: his past client list includes a stint at Nike and he has an extensive client list.

So why choose Kickstarter? Well, as we mentioned in our earlier piece, Kickstarter is one of the more pure ways that an entrepreneur can fund his or her idea. Wilson didn’t want to deal with VCs. He didn’t want to compromise his design. He wanted to make his project on his own terms. That echoes what Salmon told us about his project.

Scott Thomas, who used Kickstarter to fund the Designing Obama book last year, is a friend of Wilson’s and encouraged him to give the service a shot. The results, needless to say, have been pretty spectacular.

It wasn’t until about 6:00 p.m. on the first day that the project started to gain attention. After seeing little activity for most of the day, Wilson was shocked to look at his phone and see the funding notices fly in. When we spoke to Wilson last week, the project had just crossed the $300,000 mark.

Aside from the ability to control his own project, Wilson acknowledges that the potential publicity was also an attractive element. Wilson believes that the story behind the project could be as compelling as the product itself.

At this point, Wilson’s priority is to just make sure he can get his kits manufactured. Within the first week, he already contacted his manufacturer and doubled-down on his tooling so that the process can get started as soon as possible. Kickstarter backers will be the first priority — with orders for retailers and others coming after those are fulfilled.

Wilson, like other Kickstarter project creators, updates the project on a regular basis. He has been using his project’s exposure level to help educate other would-be creators and to even promote some other Kickstarter projects. In the waning hours of the funding push for The Price, profiled above, Wilson sent out a plea via Kickstarter’s messaging system to those who back or watch TikTok+LunaTik and recommended that they also pledge to Salmon’s project.

The Future of Funding

Kickstarter is impressive because it can work on multiple scales. From smaller projects like 95ers: ECHOES to mid-sized projects like The Price to half-million-dollar juggernauts like TikTok+LunaTik, the model for creator-centric funding has tons of potential.

Of course, not every idea will meet its funding goals. As with anything else, luck — as well as effort and overall idea quality — will ultimately play a part in what makes it big and what doesn’t. Still, we think Kickstarter represents a new era for funding.

What do you think of Kickstarter? Would you consider using it or a similar service to fund your next endeavor? Let us know!

More Social Media Resources from Mashable:

- 10 Unique iPhone Photography Accessories/> - How Social Media Is Changing the Way Movies are Promoted/> - 4 Social Web Apps for Making and Sharing Your Travel Plans/> - HOW TO: Use Social Media to Enhance Your Event

For more Social Media coverage:

class="f-el">class="cov-twit">Follow Mashable Social Mediaclass="s-el">class="cov-rss">Subscribe to the Social Media channelclass="f-el">class="cov-fb">Become a Fan on Facebookclass="s-el">class="cov-apple">Download our free apps for Android, iPhone and iPad

Jamie Turner is the chief content officer of the 60 Second Marketer, the online magazine for BKV Digital and Direct Response. He is also the co-author of How to Make Money with Social Media, now available at fine bookstores (and a few not-so-fine bookstores) everywhere.

Given the hundreds of social media tools available, and the thousands of different ways to use them in business, you’d think that getting Fortune 500 companies on board would be a complex and daunting task.

But it’s not. The truth is, there are only five different ways the Fortune 500 use social media. Seriously — just five. And once you know what they are, you can figure out which ones would be most useful for your business.

These five social approaches, though different in many respects, all have one thing in common: Each of the Fortune 500 use them to generate a profit. After all, they’re not using social media just to be social. They’re using it to make money.

In order to make money with social media, you have to set up your campaigns to be measured. And I’m not talking about simple metrics like number of followers or unique page views (although those are important). I’m talking about real metrics like leads generated, prospects converted and profits realized. Those are the kinds of metrics that enable you to track the success of your social media campaign on an ROI basis. And when you’re tracking your social media campaign on an ROI basis, you’re making your CFO happy (along with your CEO, your CMO and everyone else in your company).

1. Branding

Some companies use social media strictly as a branding tool. Typically, this means running a YouTubeclass="blippr-nobr">YouTube campaign that (hopefully) gets a lot of buzz around the water cooler. While using social media strictly as a branding tool might be considered “old-school” these days, it can still generate some positive sales growth.

Take Toyota as an example. Its YouTube mini-series featuring the Sienna Family has generated more than 8.3 million impressions. Those are not passive impressions fed to consumers during a TV commercial break, but engaged views attained through social sharing. When people share your commercial with their friends, they’re reinforcing your marketing for you, and it’s the best kind.

Of course, one of the most successful campaigns of this type is the Old Spice YouTube campaign that has more than 140 million impressions and, according to Nielsen, helped sales increase 55% in three months, and a whopping 107% during the month of July alone. Part of what made this campaign successful was that Old Spice set it up so it could quickly respond to viewers’ comments about the videos. By engaging the viewers in the videos, Old Spice improved the stickiness of the campaign and, best of all, enhanced the viral nature of it.

2. e-Commerce

If you can sell your product or service online, then you’ll want to drive people to a landing page on your website where they can buy your goods. How can you accomplish this? Just do what Dell does. It tweets about special promotions for its folloers on Twitterclass="blippr-nobr">Twitter. Right now, the DellOutlet account has 1.5 million followers. If you crunch some hypothetical but fair numbers on the back of an envelope, Dell’s ROI might look something like this:

DellOutlet followers: 1.5 million

DellOutlet followers who actually see the promotional Tweet: 50,000

Followers who click on the link in the Tweet: 500

Prospects who purchase a computer based on the Tweet: 50

50 purchases x $500 computer = $25,000

That’s $25,000 in revenue just for sending out a tweet. Not bad for a day’s work. Of course you’ll have to put in the effort to build your Twitter community in the first place, but those are certainly resources well spent, given the potential return.

3. Research

Many companies are using social media as a tool to do simple, anecdotal research. Sometimes, this involves building a website that engages customers in a dialogue. Starbucks has done this famously with MyStarbucksIdea.com. When visitors land on the site, they’re asked to provide new ideas to Starbucks on ways to improve the brand. Visitors can share ideas, vote on which ideas they like the best, discuss the ideas that have been submitted, and even see the results of their suggestions in action.

But you don’t have to build an entire website to keep tabs on your customers’ needs. Got a blog? Great. Ask your visitors to leave suggestions in your comments section. Have an e-newsletter? Terrific. Use the tools from ConstantContact, ExactTarget or MailChimp to include polls and surveys in your e-newsletter. Active on Twitter? Wonderful. Then use Twtpoll, SurveyMonkey or SurveyGizmo to drive people to a survey page on these sites.

The bottom line is there are plenty of ways to keep your finger on the pulse of your community’s needs, using social media tools that are readily available to both you and the Fortune 500.

4. Customer Retention

A good rule to remember is that it costs three to five times as much to acquire a new customer as it does to keep an existing one. Given that, wouldn’t it be smart to use social media as a tool to keep customers loyal and engaged? That’s what Comcast and Southwest Airlines do. They communicate via Twitter, class='blippr-nobr'>Facebookclass="blippr-nobr">Facebook and other social media platforms to help solve customer service issues.

When Frank Eliason at Comcast first noticed that people were making comments about his company on Twitter, he probably wasn’t very happy. After all, if you’re going to Tweet about your cable company, it’s likely a complaint. So Frank took things into his own hands and started Tweeting back to the disgruntled customers. His tweets offered suggestions and tips on how to fix the problems people were having with their services.

Research has indicated that if you take a customer in a heightened state of anger and help them out, they’ll actually become brand advocates. In other words, they start promoting your brand to others because you reached out to them and helped them at a time of need.

That’s what happened with Frank and Comcast. Customers went from being disgruntled to being brand advocates — all because they were pleasantly surprised when Frank reached out to them via Twitter and helped solve their problems.

If you find yourself reading negative comments in the blogosphere about your brand, don’t shy away from them. Engage with them. You’ll be surprised how effective it can be.

5. Lead Generation

If you’re having difficulty selling your product or service online, you may want to invest in a social B2B lead generation strategy. At my company, we use social media to drive prospects to our online magazine for marketers. When prospects get to the website, they can read a blog post, watch a 60-second video or download a white paper. Once we gather their contact information, we (gently) re-market to them by reminding them of all the great results our partner generates for its clients.

This hub-and-spoke system works like a charm. Why? Because B2B and professional service firms are often sold based on a relationship. Much of the decision process is based on a vendor’s reputation and trustworthiness. What better way to build trust than by providing helpful, useful information to the client prospect via social media?

Remember, when you’re using this hub and spoke system, you don’t want to limit yourself to just the big five (class='blippr-nobr'>LinkedInclass="blippr-nobr">LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and MySpaceclass="blippr-nobr">MySpace). You’ll also want to use e-mail marketing, speeches, e-books, webinars, blogs, videos and other social media tools to build trust and awareness.

More Business Resources from Mashable:

- 5 Ways to Sell Your Expertise Online/> - Why Your Business Should Consider Reverse Mentorship/> - 35 Essential Social Media & Tech Resources for Small Businesses/> - 6 Ways to Score a Job Through Twitter/> - 4 Misconceptions About Marketing in Social Games

For more Business coverage:

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As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

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Thanks to the success of projects like Diaspora, Designing Obama and The Glif, more and more creatives are looking toward Kickstarter as a way to fund their projects.

The site makes it possible for individuals or groups to fund an album, finance a documentary film or publish a quarterly magazine by soliciting backers online. The brilliance of Kickstarter is in its all-or-nothing approach. This creates a huge incentive for project creators to really put a lot of thought into their project and to offer appropriate rewards for pledges.

We wanted to find out why so many entrepreneurs are turning to Kickstarter to fund their projects. Kickstarter projects come in all sizes and we spoke with three project creators about the how’s and why’s of crowdfunding.

The Still Funding

Christopher Salmon fell in love with Neil Gaiman’s short story, The Price. As a filmmaker, Salmon immediately saw the potential of bringing the story to life, using computer animation. He contacted Gaiman — and thanks to an incredibly detailed animatic — received permission to create the film. Gaiman even agreed to provide the voice narration for the project.

Things were starting to come together, until Salmon ran into a familiar problem for indie filmmakers: Money.

Getting funding for a short film — even for something like The Price that has a built-in fan base — isn’t easy. For Salmon, it was important to not only find a way to raise money, but to do so in a way that would let him retain control of his project. That’s when he turned to Kickstarter.

Salmon decided to use the service to raise the $150,000 he needs to turn his animatic into a full-fledged 3D animated short. As of publishing, the filmmaker is less than 32 hours away from his deadline and he needs roughly $20,000 to meet his goal.

When we spoke to Salmon last week and asked him about the project, he told us that it was the all-or-nothing approach of Kickstarter that really interested him. Ambition and belief in the story is what led Salmon to create the intricate animatic that won over Gaiman; that same ambition is what led him to trust that he will reach his goal.

Salmon spoke to us about the overwhelming feedback he has received from supporters. Interestingly, the film has generated a lot of support and interest from the overreaching film community since the funding push kicked off at the beginning of the month. Pledges have come from all parts of the world and that support — and trust — will guide him into making an even better film, according to Salmon. “I want to make it as good as it can be to show my thanks,” Salmon said.

The plan is for the film to hit the festival circuit as soon as it is complete.

Pledges of $25 or more will receive a digital download of the finished film. Those who choose to donate $50 or more will get a special edition DVD that includes an exclusive interview with Neil Gaiman. Additional pledge levels include other incentives like posters, a class='blippr-nobr'>Bluclass="blippr-nobr">Blu-ray edition and signed copies of the film.

The Just Funded

Tom Durham is another filmmaker who saw Kickstarter as a way to fund his project. Less than two weeks ago, Durham successfully reached the funding goal for his project, 95ers: ECHOES. Durham’s goal was to raise $12,000; he ended up raising just more than $17,000 for his project.

Kickstarter turned out to be a crucial part of making 95ers: ECHOES a reality. An ultra-indie sci-fi film about an FBI agent with the power to rewind time, Durham describes the project as “The Time Machine meets X-Files meets Heroes meets… A Christmas Carol.”

Durham has literally put his life into the film. The project has taken more than four years — though the idea goes back more than a decade — and most of the funding came from mortgaging his house. He does not recommend that approach.

After almost reaching the finish line, Durham hit a wall. Completely out of money, he was faced with having to wait another year to save up the funds to finish the project properly. Fortunately, a relative told Durham about Kickstarter and he decided to give it a shot.

Durham tells us, “Kickstarter understands the artist and understands today’s patron, and connects them.” After the initial round of backers trickled to a stop, the 95ers was featured on the Kickstarter home page. At this point, the project really started to take off. “Something about our own story, and something about the movie’s story, was connecting with people,” says Durham.

With his funding goal complete, the next step is to finish the film. The plan is to have it completed by the end of January so that it can go off to festivals and then TV and DVD. Durham hopes to have the film on SyFy in 2011.

Incidentally, this is only the first of five planned 95ers films. We imagine that Durham will skip the mortgage next time and go straight to Kickstarter.

The Big Success Story

About a week and a half ago, we covered a Kickstarter project called the TikTok+LunaTik. TikTok and LunaTik are high quality kits for turning the iPad nano into a multitouch wrist watch. When we first wrote about the project, it had raised nearly $200,000 — far more than its initial funding goal of $15,000.

Since then, the project has gone on to raise more than $450,000, making it the most successful project in Kickstarter’s history. Oh, and there are still more than two weeks to go before the project ends.

For Scott Wilson, the founder of MINIMAL, the Chicago-based design studio where TikTok and LunaTik were engineered, the success has been pretty overwhelming.

Wilson came into Kickstarter with more experience under his belt than the average project creator: his past client list includes a stint at Nike and he has an extensive client list.

So why choose Kickstarter? Well, as we mentioned in our earlier piece, Kickstarter is one of the more pure ways that an entrepreneur can fund his or her idea. Wilson didn’t want to deal with VCs. He didn’t want to compromise his design. He wanted to make his project on his own terms. That echoes what Salmon told us about his project.

Scott Thomas, who used Kickstarter to fund the Designing Obama book last year, is a friend of Wilson’s and encouraged him to give the service a shot. The results, needless to say, have been pretty spectacular.

It wasn’t until about 6:00 p.m. on the first day that the project started to gain attention. After seeing little activity for most of the day, Wilson was shocked to look at his phone and see the funding notices fly in. When we spoke to Wilson last week, the project had just crossed the $300,000 mark.

Aside from the ability to control his own project, Wilson acknowledges that the potential publicity was also an attractive element. Wilson believes that the story behind the project could be as compelling as the product itself.

At this point, Wilson’s priority is to just make sure he can get his kits manufactured. Within the first week, he already contacted his manufacturer and doubled-down on his tooling so that the process can get started as soon as possible. Kickstarter backers will be the first priority — with orders for retailers and others coming after those are fulfilled.

Wilson, like other Kickstarter project creators, updates the project on a regular basis. He has been using his project’s exposure level to help educate other would-be creators and to even promote some other Kickstarter projects. In the waning hours of the funding push for The Price, profiled above, Wilson sent out a plea via Kickstarter’s messaging system to those who back or watch TikTok+LunaTik and recommended that they also pledge to Salmon’s project.

The Future of Funding

Kickstarter is impressive because it can work on multiple scales. From smaller projects like 95ers: ECHOES to mid-sized projects like The Price to half-million-dollar juggernauts like TikTok+LunaTik, the model for creator-centric funding has tons of potential.

Of course, not every idea will meet its funding goals. As with anything else, luck — as well as effort and overall idea quality — will ultimately play a part in what makes it big and what doesn’t. Still, we think Kickstarter represents a new era for funding.

What do you think of Kickstarter? Would you consider using it or a similar service to fund your next endeavor? Let us know!

More Social Media Resources from Mashable:

- 10 Unique iPhone Photography Accessories/> - How Social Media Is Changing the Way Movies are Promoted/> - 4 Social Web Apps for Making and Sharing Your Travel Plans/> - HOW TO: Use Social Media to Enhance Your Event

For more Social Media coverage:

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Jamie Turner is the chief content officer of the 60 Second Marketer, the online magazine for BKV Digital and Direct Response. He is also the co-author of How to Make Money with Social Media, now available at fine bookstores (and a few not-so-fine bookstores) everywhere.

Given the hundreds of social media tools available, and the thousands of different ways to use them in business, you’d think that getting Fortune 500 companies on board would be a complex and daunting task.

But it’s not. The truth is, there are only five different ways the Fortune 500 use social media. Seriously — just five. And once you know what they are, you can figure out which ones would be most useful for your business.

These five social approaches, though different in many respects, all have one thing in common: Each of the Fortune 500 use them to generate a profit. After all, they’re not using social media just to be social. They’re using it to make money.

In order to make money with social media, you have to set up your campaigns to be measured. And I’m not talking about simple metrics like number of followers or unique page views (although those are important). I’m talking about real metrics like leads generated, prospects converted and profits realized. Those are the kinds of metrics that enable you to track the success of your social media campaign on an ROI basis. And when you’re tracking your social media campaign on an ROI basis, you’re making your CFO happy (along with your CEO, your CMO and everyone else in your company).

1. Branding

Some companies use social media strictly as a branding tool. Typically, this means running a YouTubeclass="blippr-nobr">YouTube campaign that (hopefully) gets a lot of buzz around the water cooler. While using social media strictly as a branding tool might be considered “old-school” these days, it can still generate some positive sales growth.

Take Toyota as an example. Its YouTube mini-series featuring the Sienna Family has generated more than 8.3 million impressions. Those are not passive impressions fed to consumers during a TV commercial break, but engaged views attained through social sharing. When people share your commercial with their friends, they’re reinforcing your marketing for you, and it’s the best kind.

Of course, one of the most successful campaigns of this type is the Old Spice YouTube campaign that has more than 140 million impressions and, according to Nielsen, helped sales increase 55% in three months, and a whopping 107% during the month of July alone. Part of what made this campaign successful was that Old Spice set it up so it could quickly respond to viewers’ comments about the videos. By engaging the viewers in the videos, Old Spice improved the stickiness of the campaign and, best of all, enhanced the viral nature of it.

2. e-Commerce

If you can sell your product or service online, then you’ll want to drive people to a landing page on your website where they can buy your goods. How can you accomplish this? Just do what Dell does. It tweets about special promotions for its folloers on Twitterclass="blippr-nobr">Twitter. Right now, the DellOutlet account has 1.5 million followers. If you crunch some hypothetical but fair numbers on the back of an envelope, Dell’s ROI might look something like this:

DellOutlet followers: 1.5 million

DellOutlet followers who actually see the promotional Tweet: 50,000

Followers who click on the link in the Tweet: 500

Prospects who purchase a computer based on the Tweet: 50

50 purchases x $500 computer = $25,000

That’s $25,000 in revenue just for sending out a tweet. Not bad for a day’s work. Of course you’ll have to put in the effort to build your Twitter community in the first place, but those are certainly resources well spent, given the potential return.

3. Research

Many companies are using social media as a tool to do simple, anecdotal research. Sometimes, this involves building a website that engages customers in a dialogue. Starbucks has done this famously with MyStarbucksIdea.com. When visitors land on the site, they’re asked to provide new ideas to Starbucks on ways to improve the brand. Visitors can share ideas, vote on which ideas they like the best, discuss the ideas that have been submitted, and even see the results of their suggestions in action.

But you don’t have to build an entire website to keep tabs on your customers’ needs. Got a blog? Great. Ask your visitors to leave suggestions in your comments section. Have an e-newsletter? Terrific. Use the tools from ConstantContact, ExactTarget or MailChimp to include polls and surveys in your e-newsletter. Active on Twitter? Wonderful. Then use Twtpoll, SurveyMonkey or SurveyGizmo to drive people to a survey page on these sites.

The bottom line is there are plenty of ways to keep your finger on the pulse of your community’s needs, using social media tools that are readily available to both you and the Fortune 500.

4. Customer Retention

A good rule to remember is that it costs three to five times as much to acquire a new customer as it does to keep an existing one. Given that, wouldn’t it be smart to use social media as a tool to keep customers loyal and engaged? That’s what Comcast and Southwest Airlines do. They communicate via Twitter, class='blippr-nobr'>Facebookclass="blippr-nobr">Facebook and other social media platforms to help solve customer service issues.

When Frank Eliason at Comcast first noticed that people were making comments about his company on Twitter, he probably wasn’t very happy. After all, if you’re going to Tweet about your cable company, it’s likely a complaint. So Frank took things into his own hands and started Tweeting back to the disgruntled customers. His tweets offered suggestions and tips on how to fix the problems people were having with their services.

Research has indicated that if you take a customer in a heightened state of anger and help them out, they’ll actually become brand advocates. In other words, they start promoting your brand to others because you reached out to them and helped them at a time of need.

That’s what happened with Frank and Comcast. Customers went from being disgruntled to being brand advocates — all because they were pleasantly surprised when Frank reached out to them via Twitter and helped solve their problems.

If you find yourself reading negative comments in the blogosphere about your brand, don’t shy away from them. Engage with them. You’ll be surprised how effective it can be.

5. Lead Generation

If you’re having difficulty selling your product or service online, you may want to invest in a social B2B lead generation strategy. At my company, we use social media to drive prospects to our online magazine for marketers. When prospects get to the website, they can read a blog post, watch a 60-second video or download a white paper. Once we gather their contact information, we (gently) re-market to them by reminding them of all the great results our partner generates for its clients.

This hub-and-spoke system works like a charm. Why? Because B2B and professional service firms are often sold based on a relationship. Much of the decision process is based on a vendor’s reputation and trustworthiness. What better way to build trust than by providing helpful, useful information to the client prospect via social media?

Remember, when you’re using this hub and spoke system, you don’t want to limit yourself to just the big five (class='blippr-nobr'>LinkedInclass="blippr-nobr">LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and MySpaceclass="blippr-nobr">MySpace). You’ll also want to use e-mail marketing, speeches, e-books, webinars, blogs, videos and other social media tools to build trust and awareness.

More Business Resources from Mashable:

- 5 Ways to Sell Your Expertise Online/> - Why Your Business Should Consider Reverse Mentorship/> - 35 Essential Social Media & Tech Resources for Small Businesses/> - 6 Ways to Score a Job Through Twitter/> - 4 Misconceptions About Marketing in Social Games

For more Business coverage:

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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AMERICAblog <b>News</b>: Krugman thinks tax deal is bad for Obama&#39;s <b>...</b>

News and opinion about US politics from a liberal perspective.

Hulu plans its own entertainment <b>news</b> show, but will anyone watch?

As Peter Kafka at MediaMemo reports, Hulu is currently casting for a presenter for the show which will be published daily, taking a 'Daily Show'-style satirical approach to the latest entertainment news. Hulu (backed by US TV giants NBC ...

Light Can Generate Lift - Science <b>News</b>

Researchers create a lightfoil that can push small objects sideways.

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