“Conventional
marketing wisdom long held that a dissatisfied customer tells ten people.
But…in the new age of social media, he or she has the tools to tell 10 million”
Paul Guillin, author of The New Influencers (HBR, 2014)
Many businesses and organisations are still baffled on how
to use Social Media platforms to effectively market their products and/or
services. Companies are spending precious working hours on the new trend of
Social Media. There is in a sense a ‘Herd Mentality’, whereby companies are
simply following suit and assuming they need the top 4 (Facebook, Twitter,
LinkedIn and Youtube). Whilst these can be used effectively, it much depends on
what type of business you are running as to what kind of social media platforms
you should be using. However, the lines are blurred and therefore most
companies simply opt for all and manage them in the same way. Social Media
Marketing is fundamentally different from traditional marketing techniques.
Businesses need to consider goals, objectives and metrics.
Social Media is now an
integral part of online consumer’s habits, but many efforts to engage with
these consumers via online platforms have been futile. The Harvard Business
Review found that only 12% of businesses feel they are using social media
effectively (HBR, 2014).
This ‘social stagnation’ may
be due to a number of things:
- - Social Media is
not necessarily an ideal marketing channel for every business
- - Lack of a clear
social media strategy: including listening and content strategies
- - Lack of attention
to social media channels: creating them, but not maintaining or using them
The Harvard Business Review
also revealed that 75% of companies did not know where their most valuable
customers were talking about them, 31% do not currently measure the
effectiveness of social media, only 23% are using analytic tools and only a
fraction (7%) are able to incorporate social media into marketing activities
(HBR, 2014).
Ric Dragon, an expert in online marketing identifies 7 Ways
to make you successful in social media marketing, coining the term ‘Social
Marketology’ (Forbes, 2014). I have shortened and adapted his 7 points in order
to convey a way to develop a digital marketing strategy. The objective of
strategy is to achieve a competitive advantage, which will result in superior
performance. As most companies have insufficient knowledge of how to use social
media marketing effectively, gaining this knowledge can greatly increase a
company’s competitive edge, and therefore their brand awareness and market
share.
Incorporate
brand personality and voice: Culture > humanized brand voice: listening carefully to the tone,
vision, and expertise of that voice.
Identify
the smallest segments possible of your constituents: Social media allows you to be hyper-granular
and drill down to micro-segments, to dramatically improve engagement levels and
conversion ratios.
Identify
the communities for these micro-segments: today a community is characterized by what they value, more than
proximity to one another > should create own online community > blog and
social media engagement > communities then = advocates.
Identify
the influencers of these communities: Social media brings all the aspects of important influencers these days,
including peer pressure, authority and credibility. Feedback from social media
operates in real time; you don’t have to wait months for results. You spend the
months influencing the influencers.
Create
an action plan with metrics: listening plan, channel plan, SEO
plan, and a content creation plan, with activities and metrics.
Iteratively
execute and measure results. Measuring is all about ROI = customer acquisition cost, revenue
growth or profit etc. Iterate and expect to pivot, based on results, because
you can’t get it all right the first time.
To really have success in your market you must apply
the above to your own business or organisation and try different techniques.
However, there is no trial and error. As a rule of thumb first ask yourself
whether you will be marketing B2B, B2C or both? This will give you a standpoint
to start using the appropriate channels, although arguable, Facebook is usually
considered as the ideal portal for B2C and LinkedIn the Ideal platform for B2B
as it links professionals and companies together. But this may not always be
the case.
Ultimately, it’s probably best to have a multiple
platforms of online channels to communicate and engage with your customers as
all their needs and their choices in types of social media will differ and you
will only be reducing your potential market size by not partaking in particular
social media channels. Having said that, this probably only applies to the top
four platforms (mentioned above), some social media sites such as Pinterest and
Instagram are probably way more relevant to B2C marketers in certain industries
i.e. Fashion and Retail.
References:
Forbes. (2014). 7 Steps to Productive Business Use
of Social Media. Available: http://www.forbes.com/sites/martinzwilling/2013/08/17/7-steps-to-productive-business-use-of-social-media/. Last accessed
01/06/2014.
HBR - Harvard Business Review.
(2014). the New Conversation:
taking Social Media from talk to action. Available:
http://hbr.org/hbrg-main/resources/pdfs/comm/sas/16203-hbr-sas-report-r3.pdf.
Last accessed 02/06/2014
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