Many executives are wondering how their companies can get started in the social media (SoMe) milieu. If you are one of them, you should be aware that this is still an evolving platform for marketing. As such, it demands a higher level of strategic planning than traditional marketing.
Perhaps a company might have formerly been able to develop new business and retain current clients simply by advertising, direct mail, maintaining a storefront or Web site and by telemarketing. Social networking – the use of various Web 2.0 tools, such as blogging, chat groups, forums, online communities and SoNet platforms like Twitter and Facebook – is radically changing all of this, however. SocialMediaToday calls it "the Social Media Revolution." BusinessWeek claims it "will change your business."
FACT: Our world is changing technologically and demographically.
FACT: Traditional marketing and advertising is making less of an impact on today’s decision-maker.
FACT: Small and midsized businesses could greatly benefit by creating the types of networks and communal resources that are typically only afforded by large corporations.
At Group 221, we were recently approached by a company seeking help in developing a prototype social media marketing strategy. Involved in the travel industry, the company was a leader in their niche, while managing to operate with only 40 or so employees. They had come to a crossroads in the corporation’s lifespan: Their customers’ needs, desires and habits were changing rapidly, while the company’s methodology continued to remain mired in the “old ways” of marketing and communicating. They were searching for new ideas.
Our client quickly grasped the concept that SoMe could help them build a loyal and committed community. They found that our phrase, “a social media marketing strategy allows you to entertain, educate and engage,” resonated and aligned with their corporate goal to become “the go-to place” for their customer base of small, entrepreneurial companies being recruited into a membership program.
Their biggest concern was the manpower resources that might be required. We promised to address this during the course of the project. We agreed to present our new client with a plan that would a) analyze their audience, competition and current status, b) provide them with a nuts-and-bolts, step-by-step social media plan and c) help them determine what resources – internally and/or externally – they would need to achieve their objectives. Our plan was as follows:
Action Plan for Creating Social Media Strategy
1. Group 221 provides the client with a series of proprietary worksheets to serve as a comprehensive questionnaire concerning their business, the competition, current situation and their goals and objectives. We review the worksheets with the client, item by item.
2. We then perform independent research to review the client’s product, what the competition is doing and how to reach the prospective customer.
a. People: Who are your prospects and customers, and how do they feel about your brand, service and products? Are they talking about you online? If so, what is your online reputation? (Positive, negative, neutral?)
b. Competition: What are your competitors doing online? Where can we leapfrog them? What is their online reputation?
c. Prospective Customers: How do your prospects wish to converse? How can you effectively use SoMe to communicate your company’s benefits and gain an audience among professional travel buyers most likely to purchase your product?
3. Group 221 then presents the client with a summary of our findings, recommended tactics to follow and a suggested timetable.
4. We study, analyze and identify resources to implement our client’s plan.
5. We typically provide them with a timetable that schedules activities on a graduated level of intensity. Ordinarily, our clients prefer to start out gradually so that results can be analyzed and quantified.
Conclusion
Companies wishing to excel in today’s environment must, in most cases, adapt themselves to the new methods of communicating. A company that accepts that SoMe needs to be part of their strategic roadmap for survival, must also be willing to allocate some upfront time and brainpower to better understand the “road conditions”; what avenues their customers and competition are taking and what direction they should be taking.
Sharon Drechsler, Group 221
Showing posts with label Business applications for social media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Business applications for social media. Show all posts
Friday, May 1, 2009
Monday, April 27, 2009
#1 reason businesses should participate in social media
My new friend, a terrific thought-leader and the proximate cause of www.askMANDO.com, Barry Brown, was kind enough to critique my recent apologetic for social media, or SoMe. (See my April 23, 2009 post, "5 Reasons to Participate in Social Media.")
His first impression was that I was talking to a reader that has little or no knowledge of SoMe. Indeed, that was my aim, but I also found the exercise of noodling about this global phenomenon to be refreshing and clarifying. PR and marketing professionals using SoMe often feel they have affixed their passions like votive candles in paper boats amidst a channel of eddying currents. Sometimes we just need a slack tide, for a time.
Barry observes, “There is a good parallel between word-of-mouth and the viral effects of the web, which is the same by a different name. It may be short in scope however, because it stops at “telling two friends”. Think of the chain as trust, then loyalty, and then advocacy (scale). The true power of web market reach is scalability. If you influence the right person, they may have an audience of influence in the hundreds, thousands or even millions. When these individuals become advocates, they extend your reach to many.”
Barry took some umbrage at my upbraiding the recalcitrant – those too intimidated (or is it lazy?) to even take the splash into this bold, new ocean. But he makes a great point that I had missed: The buzz has begun and it’s broiling into one heck of a whirlpool:
“To me the most compelling reason to get into social media is that your customers are already talking about you and your industry online now,” adds Barry. “Maybe something around “the conversation has already started without you” would be a better #1.”
Well said, Barry!
Barry kindly adds, “The blog feels like you, and this is important when you meet later with a reader. ‘Authentic’ counts and I think you hit it.”
Aw, thanks. --Sharon Drechsler, Group 221
His first impression was that I was talking to a reader that has little or no knowledge of SoMe. Indeed, that was my aim, but I also found the exercise of noodling about this global phenomenon to be refreshing and clarifying. PR and marketing professionals using SoMe often feel they have affixed their passions like votive candles in paper boats amidst a channel of eddying currents. Sometimes we just need a slack tide, for a time.
Barry observes, “There is a good parallel between word-of-mouth and the viral effects of the web, which is the same by a different name. It may be short in scope however, because it stops at “telling two friends”. Think of the chain as trust, then loyalty, and then advocacy (scale). The true power of web market reach is scalability. If you influence the right person, they may have an audience of influence in the hundreds, thousands or even millions. When these individuals become advocates, they extend your reach to many.”
Barry took some umbrage at my upbraiding the recalcitrant – those too intimidated (or is it lazy?) to even take the splash into this bold, new ocean. But he makes a great point that I had missed: The buzz has begun and it’s broiling into one heck of a whirlpool:
“To me the most compelling reason to get into social media is that your customers are already talking about you and your industry online now,” adds Barry. “Maybe something around “the conversation has already started without you” would be a better #1.”
Well said, Barry!
Barry kindly adds, “The blog feels like you, and this is important when you meet later with a reader. ‘Authentic’ counts and I think you hit it.”
Aw, thanks. --Sharon Drechsler, Group 221
Thursday, April 23, 2009
5 Reasons Why Your Company Needs Social Media
Reason #1: Social media is viral.
We ‘old-timers’ remember a shampoo commercial in which a girl tells two friends, they tell two friends and so on, until the television screen is lathered with suds-ridden females virally marketing their favorite shampoo. If you use the Internet (via blogging, social forums, micromedia platforms such as Twitter and Facebook and eNewsletters) to do good things for your customers and prospective customers, you will inspire their loyalty, plus they will tell two friends.
Reason #2: Social media is to marketing, what fire was to the caveman.
How do you think business people felt about the telegraph and telephone when they were first invented? Do you think they automatically embraced its many possibilities? It took even the most intelligent entrepreneurial types a while before they began automatically reaching for the phone instead of the pen if they wanted to reach someone instantly. Companies that ignore social media as the new mode of communication may wish to consider installing tin cans and strings for inner-office conversations. (Nobody in the real world is going to be listening to them, anyway.)
Reason #3: Social media is cheap…well, affordable.
True, it does require time. How much time you invest is for you to decide. One cleverly-planned campaign can make you an overnight sensation. However, it’s more likely you’ll want to strategize to build an audience by reaching out to participate in chat groups and forums, posting informative and entertaining information on your blog and/or eNewsletter and engaging in conversations with individuals and groups of individuals to form ongoing relationships.
Reason #4: Establish your brand as a thought leader.
Social media best practices call for a one-on-one conversation. Compare it to sending a representative of your company to an important social event, perhaps a cocktail party. You want to send someone who will be a credit to your company; someone whose comments will be respected. That person should also be someone who is personable, approachable and able to engage other people in a conversation. Your representative won’t march past the bar and the canapé tray and pronounce your company’s benefits over a loudspeaker system. Rather, they’ll nibble their brioche, sip their merlot and smile politely as they listen and respond to those whom they meet. When they do speak, they are sharing information that has value for the listener. They gain respect for you and your company.
Reason #5: Track your community.
If you use social media for nothing else, you can passively watch what your competition is doing and track what your customers and prospects are discussing, like never before! A well-planned social media plan will identify the micromedia sites, blogs, forums and Web sites to watch. You’ll know when your supporters ‘share the love.’ You’ll see where your detractors are giving you a poke in the rear.
Any more questions? As we here at Group 221 look into our crystal ball, we see that a social media program will certainly be as common an office fixture as a PC on everyone’s desk. (Yes, Virginia, we also remember the days when NASA was the only organization that owned its very own computer!) Those businesses taking a step forward to implement a well-orchestrated plan, now, stand to get in on the ground floor.
We ‘old-timers’ remember a shampoo commercial in which a girl tells two friends, they tell two friends and so on, until the television screen is lathered with suds-ridden females virally marketing their favorite shampoo. If you use the Internet (via blogging, social forums, micromedia platforms such as Twitter and Facebook and eNewsletters) to do good things for your customers and prospective customers, you will inspire their loyalty, plus they will tell two friends.
Reason #2: Social media is to marketing, what fire was to the caveman.
How do you think business people felt about the telegraph and telephone when they were first invented? Do you think they automatically embraced its many possibilities? It took even the most intelligent entrepreneurial types a while before they began automatically reaching for the phone instead of the pen if they wanted to reach someone instantly. Companies that ignore social media as the new mode of communication may wish to consider installing tin cans and strings for inner-office conversations. (Nobody in the real world is going to be listening to them, anyway.)
Reason #3: Social media is cheap…well, affordable.
True, it does require time. How much time you invest is for you to decide. One cleverly-planned campaign can make you an overnight sensation. However, it’s more likely you’ll want to strategize to build an audience by reaching out to participate in chat groups and forums, posting informative and entertaining information on your blog and/or eNewsletter and engaging in conversations with individuals and groups of individuals to form ongoing relationships.
Reason #4: Establish your brand as a thought leader.
Social media best practices call for a one-on-one conversation. Compare it to sending a representative of your company to an important social event, perhaps a cocktail party. You want to send someone who will be a credit to your company; someone whose comments will be respected. That person should also be someone who is personable, approachable and able to engage other people in a conversation. Your representative won’t march past the bar and the canapé tray and pronounce your company’s benefits over a loudspeaker system. Rather, they’ll nibble their brioche, sip their merlot and smile politely as they listen and respond to those whom they meet. When they do speak, they are sharing information that has value for the listener. They gain respect for you and your company.
Reason #5: Track your community.
If you use social media for nothing else, you can passively watch what your competition is doing and track what your customers and prospects are discussing, like never before! A well-planned social media plan will identify the micromedia sites, blogs, forums and Web sites to watch. You’ll know when your supporters ‘share the love.’ You’ll see where your detractors are giving you a poke in the rear.
Any more questions? As we here at Group 221 look into our crystal ball, we see that a social media program will certainly be as common an office fixture as a PC on everyone’s desk. (Yes, Virginia, we also remember the days when NASA was the only organization that owned its very own computer!) Those businesses taking a step forward to implement a well-orchestrated plan, now, stand to get in on the ground floor.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
