Think Customers: The 1to1 Blog

For days leading up to the speech, CNN featured an area on its site asking visitors to join CNN.com Live to have the ability to update their own Facebook status directly from the CNN.com Live player during the presidential address. As a result, users could also see status updates from their friends and other Facebook users on CNN.com Live. On Facebook, the status updates for those using CNN.com Live were published in their news feed with hyperlinked tags that read "via CNN.com Live" so users' friends on Facebook could click the tag and join the CNN.com Live/Facebook experience.

Following the historic address, Anderson Cooper, along with Wolf Blitzer and a panel of political analysts, hosted a special two-hour edition of his show. During the show, Campbell Brown interjected with Facebook pulses that included graphical charts and stats from CNN's Facebook feed. She was able to show in real time what Facebook/CNN users were saying about the speech and break down participants' reaction to the speech by percentages.

Last night wasn't the first time CNN benefited from partnering with Facebook. During President Obama's inaugural address, the Facebook/CNN feed saw 200,000 status updates with 3,000 people per minute commenting on the feed.

The Facebook/CNN partnership has demonstrated the power an organization can garner from tapping Facebook's millions of dedicated users and gaining immediate feedback as a result. The network gathered an interactive perspective on the thoughts and feelings of those watching CNN's coverage of the speech. CNN not only gets real-time insight from this process, but the network now has a dedicated and ever-growing user group for ongoing marketing purposes.

Coincidentally, the network reported today more growth than any competitor in the marketing-rich age 25-54 demographic. Whether that increase can be tied to Facebook or not, CNN's social media strategy exemplifies customer interaction done right.