The Power of the Social Media Space

Methodology

While there are a large number of possibilities for the usernames and handles that Coca-Cola, IBM, Microsoft, General Electric and Nokia could and should register—including varieties with hyphens, brand name and product keyword combinations and acronyms—we limited our examination to the following core identities:

• The username “CocaCola” for Coca-Cola
• The username “IBM” for IBM
• The username “Microsoft” for Microsoft
• The username “GeneralElectric” for General Electric
• The username “Nokia” for Nokia

FairWinds used knowem.com to check the availability of these usernames in the social media space. This site searches the availability of usernames across 350 of the top social media networks. Rather than looking across all social sites offered by knowem.com, FairWinds focused its examination on community sites such as Facebook (knowem.com monitors 44 of these sites) and microblogging sites such as Twitter (knowem.com monitors 16 of these sites) in order to gain a better understanding of the social media space that surrounds these two areas. After searching knowem.com for each of the usernames listed above, FairWinds noted how many of the usernames were registered (either by the appropriate brand or by a third party) and which were still available for registration. In several cases, the username would prove to be too short or too long for registration in a particular community or microblogging site, so that was noted as well.

Finally, we analyzed the information that we gathered and drew upon our experience with clients to highlight some of the unique challenges that each brand faces in the social networking space.

Key Results

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