T.J. Maxx: Social Media Monitoring Report 2

T.J. Maxx Website

T.J. Maxx
I've now been monitoring T.J. Maxx and its use of social media for the past month and a half.  In addition to Social Mention, Ice Rocket and Addictomatic, I also used Google Insights, Starcount and Compete to expand my data analysis.

Compete.com

Social Media Metrics

Social Mention:  I tried to be more scientific in gathering social media metrics by checking at the same time each day.  I found the results to be much more consistent.  The strength is considerably higher on Saturdays, which makes sense, because more people are likely to be out shopping and talking about their purchases on social media.

Sat. 3.17          /          Tue. 3.20           /          Sat. 3.24           /           Tue. 3.27

Ice Rocket:  The number of blogs mentioning T.J. Maxx nearly doubled during the second half of my social media monitoring.  From 2/13/12 to 3/13/12 there were only 476 posts.  From 2/27/12 to 3/27/12 there were 861 posts with and average of 28.7 posts per day.  The number of posts spiked to 40 on March 2nd.

Ice Rocket - Graph of Blog Posts 2/27/12 - 3/27/12

Google Insights:  Google searches for T.J. Maxx have steadily increased over the past 8 years.  The number of searches spikes every December for the holiday season.

Google Searches from 2004 - 2012

Starcount:  Using Starcount I was able to measure the growth of T.J. Maxx Facebook followers.  The page has gained 32,049 followers in the past two weeks. 

  

Facebook fans as of 3.27.12.

Listening & Engaging

I had previously found that T.J. Maxx did a good job of listening and engaging fans through its social media pages.  Unfortunately, there's been some recent controversy with hate group known as One Million Moms. 

Read: OMM is not letting up on "GCB" 

T.J. Maxx not only made a bad business decision (in my opinion), but it is compounding this mistake by ignoring followers who are questioning this, while still responding to less controversial posts. 

Selective Hearing:  T.J. Maxx ignores a negative comment while responding to another post made at the same time.

Goals

1. Online Retailing - The company needs to move forward with its e-commerce plan and fast!
2. Listen Equally - The "GCB" controversy is a major step back in social media efforts.  
3. Respond Faster -   Someone should be monitoring the site all day or if that's not possible, a specific question and answer period could be made so followers aren't left hanging.
4. More Engaging - There should be more updates/questions on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  Also, the company could stage specific events, like a Twitter chat with buyers, fashion bloggers, etc.
5. Better Incentives - T.J. Maxx needs to draw more people to its social media sites.  It could hold more competitions or simply feature a shopper/outfit of the day.  Once the retail site is up, there could be 10% off on Tuesdays.







TJ Maxx: Social Media Monitoring Report 1

TJ Maxx Rant (YouTube)

When it comes to TJ Maxx there’s no lack of customer enthusiasm. But brand passion can easily go both ways. Take this rant from YouTube vlogger, MyStudioPhix, as an example. In the video, she shares her frustration as a loyal TJ Maxx shopper, who is told she can only receive a discount by signing up for the company credit card she already has. Less than a week later, she posts a follow up video explaining how her local store remedied the situation. The two videos only received about 100 combined views, but MyStudioPhix has posted a total of 60 videos in the past 15 months and she’s got a consistent following. Other TJ Maxx shoppers are definitely watching and they’re seeing social media documentation of the company’s good customer service.

About the Company

TJ Maxx is the United States’ largest off-price retailer with merchandise costing 20-60% less than other department stores.  Its target consumer, also known as a maxxinista, is a middle to upper-middle income woman, who is fashion savvy and value conscious.  I’m monitoring TJ Maxx social media with the help of Social Mention, Ice Rocket and Addictomatic.

Social Media

In terms of TJ Maxx’s own social media initiatives there’s definitely room for improvement.  But the company does well, considering it doesn’t even have a full retail website.   While many of its competitors allow customers to browse and purchase more items than are available in their stores, TJ Maxx only has a few photos of seasonal trends.  On February 22, CEO Carol Meyrowitz announced plans to change that.

Read more:  TJX Chief Revives Failed E-Commerce Effort  

Facebook

The TJ Maxx Facebook page has 827,080 likes and 27,243 people talking about it. That’s a lot less than its department store competitors Macy’s and Kohl’s, whose Facebook pages have over 4 and 6 million likes respectively. Still, TJ Maxx makes the most of its presence with engaging daily posts and regular responses to fans' comments and questions. I think the company will be able to make more connections with its future online retail effort by posting with links back to specific products.

Twitter

TJ Maxx's Twitter account has 39,188 followers.  That's about 12 thousand more than Kohl's, but TJ Maxx tweets only half as much. The company is encouraging more followers to tweet with its #maxxfinds competition - offering a $1,000 gift card for the best entry.

YouTube & Blogs

TJ Maxx could greatly improve its social media presence by adding more content to its YouTube channel.  Currently the company has 157 subscribers, but only four videos available.  I know there were past videos that have been deleted, which is fine, but I think it comes across as sporadic.

TJ Maxx doesn't have a company blog but it made a really smart move incorporating fashion blogger Lindsey Calla in recent TV commercials.  The company added this video to the YouTube channel last month.  It offers a glimpse of spring trends and viewers know they can go to Calla's blog to learn more, since she regularly talks about TJ Maxx.  By doing this the company is saving money that it would have spent on an internal blogger and making an important connection to social media.

Social Mention statistics from 2/13/12 - 3/13/12

Strength, Passion, Reach and Sentiment



Strongest sentiment on 3/10/12: 12:1

According to Social Mention, TJ Maxx is definitely being talked about.  In fact, the company's strength grew the most towards the end of February - around the time the online retailing announcement was made.  From what I saw, most of the discussion is on Facebook and Twitter, which makes sense, because that's where TJ Maxx has an official social media presence.  Passion about the company was strongest in early February, but it declined as reach started to increase.  That means the company has more unique authors but not as many repeat mentions.  Sentiment for TJ Mass is consistently positive, with my customers using social media to brag about their purchases.  The company averaged 8:1 positive to negative sentiment for the month.

Suggestions

As I mentioned before, TJ Maxx customers are very enthusiatic about the brand.  The company does a good job engaging this enthusiasm but I think it could make more connections by posting more frequently on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  I really like the #maxxfinds competition, but it would be great if they added other incentives.  A fan of the day or week could be prominently featured with a picture of the great outfit he or she bought at TJ Maxx or maybe a positive story from a recent shopping trip.  As for Twitter, it could be a buyer or a blogger like Lindsey Calla doing a live chat once in a while.  The same could work for YouTube, though it would be nice to see an incorporation of fan videos as well.

Ubiquitous Groundswell: The Evolution of Social Media

Undercover Boss (YouTube)

If you’ve ever seen the CBS show “Undercover Boss,” you know how hard it can be for larger corporations to communicate.  Typically, employees are spread out across the country – if not the world - and bosses are focused on the bottom line as opposed to the individual workers.  The CEO spends a week working various jobs and learns first hand how the company can better serve its employees, and thus itself.

“Internal groundswell applications […] can make them feel empowered, connected and more committed on a day-to-day basis.” (Li & Bernoff 216)

But even before the show first aired, there were companies like Best Buy using social media to overcome these internal communication struggles.  The company launched an online community called Blue Shirt Nation in 2006.  All employees were encouraged to use the site to reach out to other employees and to share ideas with bigger bosses.  It gave them a voice to request email addresses and to protest a proposed decrease in the employee discount.  According to Groundswell authors Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, “Blue Shirt Nation brought blue shirts together for listening and problem solving.” (220)  The community became so popular, that by 2008, organizers decided it needed an upgrade. 

Read Steve Bendt’s blog post:  Blue Shirt Nation Evolution - Staying True to the Learning

BSN Mix was later discontinued as the company shifted its social media priorities to include employees and customers.  Best Buy now operates through a variety of social platforms – everything from Facebook to community forums.  And it has seen a lot of success through Twelpforce – a technology twitter feed that allows customers to get their questions answered directly by employees.

As Li and Bernoff suggest at the end of their book, the groundswell is quickly transforming into the “ubiquitous groundswell.”  In other words, it’s a part of our life from the moment we wake up to the moment we fall asleep.  It’s as important for our social connections as it is for fulfilling our work obligations.  To succeed in this environment one must “live in the groundswell and grow as it grows.” (234)  This is important for companies like Best Buy, but even more so for educational institutions.  After all, the students they’re trying to recruit are the pioneers of many new groundswell technologies.

Read:  7 Ways Universities Are Using Facebook as a Marketing Tool

What do you think of UK's social media strategy?

The University of Kentucky is an example of the ubiquitous groundswell.  The school uses actual wooden signs shaped like Facebook place markers to indicate mobile check-in locations on campus.  So even if students aren’t on a computer or mobile phone, they’re faced with social media symbols in everyday life.  Three years ago, no one would know what the sign meant.  Now it’s taken to be a universally understood part of our culture.  That’s how fast the groundswell is changing.  It has virtually become a part of our reality.