Social media originally started as a tool for friends and family to keep in touch, and has now moved also to the business community for Companies to engage discussions with their customers, partners and others organizations.
Large Enterprises, as well as SMB in a smaller scale, are adopting Social Media as a new wave of Marketing.
Based on recent reports and studies, the top benefits of Social Media Marketing are seen as (in this order):
– Branding: Generating exposure for the business
– Word-of-Mouth: Extending audience, raising awareness, increasing traffic
– Discussions: Engaging discussions & building relationship/partnership
– Revenue: Generating leads or sales
– Cost: reduce marketing expenses
Marketers have high expectation of Social Media, often and wrongly perceived as a free or low cost, easy to launch and deploy, not resource consuming tactic and they could be disappointed by the results and return in investment if they do not use best practices; It could even be a failure and damage your brand or business if not well executed and then abandoned after an unsuccessful try.
So, based on my own experience, here are few tips to successfully engage in Social Media Marketing:
1- Define a clear strategy
2- Secure executive sponsorship
3- Clarify Goals & Business Objectives: Talk or Listen, raise awareness, engage discussions, generate leads, drive sales & revenue, foster loyalty.
4- Integrate Social Media as one marketing tactic of your marketing mix
5- Document metrics
6- Target your audience: understand digital audience behaviour, develop social media map, identify and engage the influencers,
7- Define content, aligned with your objectives and aligned with corporate marketing messages
8- Select appropriate social networks, based on your goals and audience: Twitter, facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, YouTube or others videos sites, Social Bookmarking sites etc… (see chart)
1- Select appropriate tools: management tools, short url tools, analytics tools, maximize digital assets distribution
2- Allocate dedicated assets and resource, experts to provide content, be the Voice and participate in relevant discussions,
3- Define and document some Social Media Guidelines for people participating to your social media activities, bloggers, and all employees,
4- Design your Social Media image, theme, tag line and main message: name, gravatar, banner, theme, colors, page
5- Launch and deploy your Social Media tactic and tools
6- Start Talking and empower consumer advocacy, tell the story, but also let the others tell the story about you
7- Listen to your Audience, monitor the market conversation
8- Engage discussions, be very responsive, show appreciation, gather market intelligence
9- Promote and advertise your Social media presence (via your web site, email marketing, newsletters, blog, webinar, print…)
10- Leverage your network: employees, partners, customers
11- Grow and maintain you LIST of friends, followers, Fans …
12- Maintain the relationship, keep the momentum, keep communicating regularly and intensively, keep on building and growing,
13- Tie all your Social Media and web presence all together and keep the Buzz growing,
14- Track and measure qualitative, quantitative and competitive results using analytics tools, document lessons learned and communicate monthly reports, understand the impact and do what it takes to improve your ROI.
Social Media are platforms for interactions and relationships, not just a branding or advertising platform, it represent a fundamental shift on the way we communicate and make decision, so take advantage of it, build et develop new relationships and partnerships.
Jump on The Social Media Bandwagon, Start Talking & Listening, Start Engaging Discussions with Social Media.
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