GLOBAL – With Social Media Week in full swing, there’re plenty of live events going on across the globe that enable you to connect with the people you chat with online and help you connect with them offline, too. The same can be said about companies – they’re also into making connections with the users of their products or services. As the lead sponsor of Social Media Week, Nokia is very much committed to engagement online, but how so? Here’s what Nokia is doing in the online social space and the different ways you can connect.

Dachis Group has ranked Nokia at number 20 in the Social Business Index. With more than 800 companies being monitored, we think that’s pretty good going. But how are we working with social media? It’s all about conversations and engagement, as the following shows.

On Twitter, @BarrettAll wrote a throw-away comment to another Twitter user that read: “@darkyetlovely Haha if you have a phone with a retractable antenna at this point you have given up on life. @nokia“. As you can see, he drew Nokia into the conversation by using their ID at the end. I don’t suppose for one moment he actually thought Nokia would reply. But Nokia did.

The reply read as this: “@BarrettAll @darkyetlovely retractable antenna, wow, I remember those!”

This was retweeted by @BarrettAll (Jeff Barrett) to his 3.5k followers and sent a reply back to Nokia which read: “I referenced @nokia in a joke. Speaks volumes that you responded. Nokia gets it! Social Media is all about engagement.”

People really love to engage with companies directly and Nokia is well aware of the necessity of being a good citizen in the social media world, giving back as well as receiving attention. In recognition for their online engagement, Nokia goes one step further to create big Follow Fridays (#FF) for those that interact with the company on Twitter. These aren’t just targeted at the people with huge followings: it’s anybody who is willing to communicate with them, whether they have 10 or 10,000 followers.

@ClintonJeff received a giant message spelt out entirely of Nokia phones that was retweeted 11 times. Newlywed @My_E72 had his – or her – name spelt out using a lot of post-it notes, which was retweeted 15 times, and several other people had their names cast adrift on the tides of the sea with a message in a bottle style #FF. These are just a few examples. It seems a little bit of effort and time focusing on people can be rewarding for both parties.

Here are some of the #FFs Nokia has undertaken to date. Click the images for the larger, full image.

Taking all of this into consideration, where are Nokia connecting with people and where does that leave the future of advertising? If you can connect directly with your consumers and vice-versa, why not do it?

Nokia currently has over 100,000 followers on Twitter and four million likes on Facebook and regularly uses video channels such as YouTube and Vimeo, all of which receive regular visitors and that’s just for starters.

While TV ads and regular advertising are still very much in the plans for Nokia, there will be more of an effort to engage with people in the online world, which is where people are more likely to engage with you. It’s the engagement that people really value. If you just broadcast a message, chances are that people won’t always be interested in listening to what you want to say. But if you ask people to take part, you can attract people who are interested and who are willing to join in, to help spread the word with you.

Take the Nokia Producers and the Nokia Short programs for example. Both initiatives were aimed at engaging with talented amateur film makers to create an amazing short film using nothing but a Nokia N8, with great prizes available. All the videos were placed online for everyone to see and share, and they have, collectively, been seen millions of times across the internet. And while those video projects help draw attention to the Nokia N8’s camera, they’re also about celebrating and publicising the creativity of Nokia users: we’re really proud that we’ve got such creative people using our kit.

What do you think is great about social online activity? Are you up for engaging more? Connect with @Nokia to start a conversation, or let us know using the comments below.