1. Definition
2. Discovery
3. Development
4. Delivery

Step 1 – Definition

A social media strategy should always be a part of your overall marketing plan and must always align with current marketing goals and objectives.

Therefore, it’s crucial to define the following:

• Mission Statement – define the Mission of the Organization, the reason for being
• Vision Statement - define the Vision, what you are aspiring to be
• Marketing Objectives – define the Goals (brand awareness, sales, customer loyalty, etc.)
• Situation Analysis
  • How do people view your company? Listen to your customers, take surveys, read customer reviews, and use online listening tools.
  • Conduct a company S.W.O.T.analysis
    • Strengths (What do you do well? What makes you unique?)
    • Weaknesses (What are you not doing well?)
    • Opportunities (What can you do to improve?)
    • Threats (What could go wrong?)
  • What can you invest? Resources, staff, time, etc.

Step 2 – Discovery

The next step is to document your current process.

• Identify current assets – website, blogs, social media channels, email lists, mobile apps, etc.
• Identify potential new assets – new social media channels (Pinterest, Instagram, Tumblr)
• Review and evaluate effectiveness of prior marketing initiatives – mailing lists, flyers, social media, print/digital ads, etc.
• List upcoming marketing opportunities – promotions, sales, sponsorships, events, etc.
• Determine resources – including budget, time, staff, technology, etc.

Step 3 – Development

The third step in the process is to develop a Social Media Roadmap:

• How will current and new assets be leveraged?
• What is your value proposition? Value = Benefits – Cost
• Who is your target audience? What opportunities exist to to cultivate “Brand Advocates”
• How long will it take to implement? What are your short terms vs. long term goals?
• Identify monitoring tools and measurement techniques
• Ensure consistency between all channels/platforms
  • Similar look and feel (logos, colors, etc.)
  • Set messaging standards

Which Channels?

“Those who insert themselves into as many channels as possible look set to capture the most value. They’ll be the richest, the most successful, the most connected, capable and influential among us. We’re all publishers now, and the more we publish, the more valuable connections we’ll make.” – Pete Cashmore, Founder of Mashable

While this is true, not every channel will work for every brand. So how do you determine which channels to use?

Choose channels that are relevant to your company/brand and comprised of your target audience. For example:

• Facebook – Facebook has over 900 million users. Most of your fan base is sure to be on Facebook and can easily find you. Take full advantage of Timeline for Pages.
• Twitter – Twitter is a great tool because you can easily search to find people and other businesses to network with. To use Twitter Search type in a keyword and start browsing.
• LinkedIn – LinkedIn is great for B2B networking. Join groups relevant to your industry and follow companies.
• Google+ – Google+ is extremely similar to Facebook. The majority of users are male in the 25-34 age range.
• YouTube – Upload your videos to and share across networks, create a YouTube channel for your brand.
• Pinterest – The Pinterest user base is mostly female mothers in the 25-34 age range. It’s very visual, food, fashion, and design brands would do well on this channel.
• Instagram – A mobile app for photo sharing, another very visual tool. Search Instagram by tags to find users and photos.
• Tumblr – Tumblr is a blogging platform where you can post text, photos, quotes, links, music, and videos. In addition users can follow, like or reblog content.

Step 4 – Delivery

The last step in this process is Delivery. Continue to monitor and revise your strategy as needed and you will be on your way to success.

• Implement your strategy
• Monitor and measure results
• Evaluate the effectiveness
• Revise strategy if necessary

Our team member Alison Kimszal recently had the opportunity to speak about Social Media Best Practices at the Jersey Shore Tech Meetup and decided this was a great topic to translate into a series of blogs over the next few weeks.

What is Social Media?

Social media can be described as a blend of online technology and social interaction. It allows users to connect with the people, websites, & brands that they value most. It’s a two-way conversation vs. one-way broadcast like traditional media and provides businesses the opportunity to promote, listen and respond to clients and customers in real-time.

Social Media Research Has Revealed

Why is social media so important for companies and brands? Research has revealed:

• One of every four minutes spent online is spent on a social site or blog (Nielsen, 2010).
• 81% of respondents said they received advice from friends and followers relating to a product purchase through a social site (Click Z, 2010).
• There are over 901 million monthly active Facebook users (Facebook.com 2012).
• 77% of consumers said they interact with brands on Facebook primarily through reading posts and updates from the brands (Mashable 2011).

Media Types

Traditionally there are three media types: Owned Media, Paid Media, and Earned Media. Social media is changing the way companies and brands are using these media types.

Consumers Trust Earned Media

It turns out that customers trust earned media. A recent report from Nielson indicates that:

• Earned media sources remain most credible.
• 92 % of consumers around the world say they trust earned media, such as recommendations from friends and family, above all other forms of advertising.

How Do You Create Earned Media?

So how do you create earned media? It’s all about engagement; earned media is grown organically with Likes, Shares, and Comments. Create engaging content, and people will interact with your brand.

Research shows that people tend to share what they have a strong emotional or passionate connection with or something that provides them with a benefit (discounts, contests, etc.). When sharing occurs (Likes, Tweets/Re-Tweets, and Pins), your message is maximized, thus creating earned media.

Get your audience talking by posting images, videos, and questions. Ask for Likes, Comments, Re-Tweets, Pins, etc. Keep in mind that the quality of your audience is more important than the quantity. You could have 200,000 Likes on your Facebook page, but if your audience isn’t engaging with you, does it matter?

What has been your experience with earned media? Do you have any additional tips and tricks to share?

Yesterday Facebook announced 12 new media Open Graph applications will allow users to share and discover even more content.

“Today’s launches join existing apps ranging from the Guardian’s social news app to Washington Post Social Reader. These apps create new ways for readers to discover content, while giving publishers the opportunity to reach new audiences. They’re built around news and content people care about and identify with and provide easy ways to control the social experience.

As media organizations build new timeline apps, initial results show significant increases in traffic and engagement, while allowing media sites to reach new – often younger – demographics.”

The new apps are:

• Buzzfeed
• CBS Local: Los Angeles and New York
• CMT
• The Daily Show
• GetGlue
• Huffington Post
• Mashable
• MSNBC.com
• MTV News
• Pixable
• Sporting News (launching in March)
• TODAY Show

How do you feel about these media apps?  Do you like knowing what your friends are reading? Or is it too much sharing?

Facebook and Twitter have done it again. One more time, we’ve seen these tools used to cause real social change.

This week brought us a controversy about the pulling of financial support for Planned Parenthood by the Susan B. Komen for the Cure Foundation.  On Jan. 31, the fight was on when Planned Parenthood used Twitter to announce that they felt they had been wronged. Three days later, news sources reported that Facebook was recording 20 negative posts per minute about the Komen controversy. The next day, on Feb. 3, the Komen Foundation reversed its decision and reinstated their funding for Planned Parenthood.

Similar results occurred last month with the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) controversy. On January 18^th, thousands of web sites went dark in what was reported to be the largest online protest in history. Two days later, on January 20^th, Congress shelved the proposed acts.

It’s a whole new world when it comes to public protest. No longer do you need to spend hours painting signs and chanting slogans out in the cold. Not that that doesn’t work too. But we all now have access to a virtual Town Square that is immediate and worldwide.  And since it’s so easy to participate, more people than ever are out there fighting the good fight.

It’s exciting to think about where this is going to take us. Social media tools are still new to many users. Businesses, civic groups, and advocacy organizations are only starting to think of them as part of their marketing and communications strategy.

Maybe someday, bills in Congress will be voted on by all of us using Twitter. Who knows? Instead of taking back Washington, we can just take it over!

Which online protests have been most interesting to you?

Learn more about the Komen and SOPA online protests:

How the Internet Changed Komen’s Mind

The Best SOPA Protests Online – in Pictures

Web Sites Go Dark in SOPA Protest Against Plans to Ban Online Piracy

AYTM, the DIY online survey platform, has created an infograph entitled “Branding And How It Works In The Social Media Age” to understand how customers in the US are using social media to interact with brands.

Per the results of the survey 58% of users have liked a brand on Facebook, 42% have mentioned a brand in a status update, and 41% have shared a  link, video, or story about a brand.  In addition social media users  love to receive coupons, promotions, and discounts from their favorite brands via short updates on Facebook and Twitter.

What it all boils down to is sending your loyal fans relevant messaging via these social media channels and they will communicate and share about your brand.

See the full infograph below and let us know your thoughts.

Source: AYTM Market Research

Branding and identity are more important than ever!

Today we have so many key communication channels in which to market, including the internet, social media, mobile, video, and print. The better you brand your company and build your company image, the easier it will be to grow your business and increase profits.

What’s Included in a Marketing Plan?

A good marketing plan develops your company’s focus on your target audience, your messages, goals, identity, and branding. It establishes a structured benchmark by which you can measure all marketing activities and helps prevent wasteful spending on ineffective marketing.

A marketing plan can simply contain three basic areas:

1. Develop a company profile and a customer profile. Identify your key competition and their strengths and weaknesses.
2. Define your products or services in detail.
3. Define your objectives and key future strategies. Develop a list of marketing and communication initiatives that support and reinforce the company’s positioning, objectives, and strategies.

The Importance of Marketing Materials

How many times have you heard a business owner say “I don’t need marketing materials, I just need to talk to the customer.” Marketing helps plant a seed about your company for the future, and your customer’s needs will change in the future. They may not need you today but they may need you tomorrow. Marketing materials, branding, and identity allow your customer to know what services and products you offer and who you are. Even if they don’t need you now, marketing materials may remind the customer about you down the road. And getting marketing materials to a customer before a sales meeting ensures that when you meet with your customer, your time can be spent wisely talking about your customer’s pain and how you can help them.

Incorporating Social Media into Your Marketing Strategy

Social media has become a great way to attract and communicate with potential customers. Social media has overtaken email as the number one activity on the web. You can use social media to build your client base, develop relationships with potential customers, and develop customer loyalty with existing customers.

Once you’ve used the marketing basics to develop a strong message, social media is a great way to spread it.

When introducing a new technology across a large organization, a change management best practice is to find a use case that has clear business value and solves a real need that senior leaders care about.  If you can show them how enterprise social networking tools work on a manageable scale and their benefits, senior leaders are more likely to support broader use of social media within the enterprise.

A good case for introducing social media technologies in large companies is crisis management.  Senior stakeholders need and want an organized, trusted, and transparent way to engage and respond to customers and key constituencies when confronted with a corporate crisis or a disruptive business condition. 

Let’s look at how social media was used (or not!) by companies that were confronted with a significant business-impacting event:

BP – Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill (2010) – During the crisis, hundreds of BP personnel were involved in the response and thousands more were involved in the containment and clean-up efforts.  Initially, BP did not use any social media messaging to inform, answer questions, gain sympathy, or show that they cared deeply for the lives lost, the damage to the environment, and the resulting economic challenges across the gulf region.  Instead, they chose to distribute limited information through official spokespersons, and when they did speak up it was to assign blame elsewhere.  By the time BP realized the common public perception was that of inactivity and ineptness, it was too late and the brand damage had already been done.   So much for the millions of dollars and years BP spent crafting an image as an environmentally and socially aware firm. Eventually BP began incorporating social media into their PR efforts, but their efforts were lost in the sea of anti-BP messages that beat them onto Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

Blackberry® Network Outage (2011) –  Research In Motion (RIM), the company that makes the Blackberry phones, issued several service updates on its website but failed to fully disclose what had happened or get in front of the situation using social media channels.  Their lack of a formalized implementation of a social response, especially given their stature as a global smartphone and messaging leader, served to increase customer concern about the leadership team and impact their brand.  Just three hours after the start of the outage, their tech team tech team @BlackberryHelp, oblivious to the social media disaster they were facing, were cheerfully chirping from their account: “Hey #teamBlackberry Happy Monday everyone! Hope you all had a great weekend!

Sony PlayStation® Network Attack (2011) – Initially, Sony was hesitant to say much more than the network was down and they were investigating.  Six days into the outage, Sony finally released a detailed update via email and on their PlayStation blog that they had experienced a very serious network intrusion and that customers’ personal information may have been compromised.  A class action suit has been filed on behalf of customers for failing to inform them in a timely fashion that their personal information may have been compromised.

Netflix Service Outage (2011) – When an unexpected network outage occurred, using both traditional and social media channels, Netflix responded within about a half hour of the outage, informing customers that they were aware of the issue and that were taking steps to correct it.  What Netflix failed to do was address the sheer volume of buzz around the issue.  A number of Twitter hashtags were instantly floating around and the vast majority of the tweets mentioned Netflix.   They missed the opportunity to respond with personalized tweets letting people know that cared about their concerns.

Amazon Web Services Outage (2011) – Although Amazon had a historically bad outage shortly after the Sony outage, Amazon kept up a running commentary with its customers by leveraging information from its social intranet and having its employees provide customers with constant updates and information.  They also acknowledged that they could have done better to provide even more details about what was  going on, how long it would take to fix, and what they were doing so that it doesn’t happen again.

When a crisis occurs or a significant issue develops, customers are increasingly turning first to their social networks, whether they’re seeking the latest information or just want to complain.  Companies that are ready to respond in this medium quickly, repeatedly, personally, and with a coherent message, can mitigate some of the immediate damage and prevent long-lasting negative sentiment from developing around their brand.

Don’t be caught wondering what to say when the unexpected happens.  Check out this blog, which  provides a 7-step playbook for using social media for crisis communication and management. 

Please share if you know of other examples of companies effectively using social media to respond to a crisis. Are there social media tools that are helpful in these situations?

“How to best market business using social networking” was a good topic but in a territory emerging so quickly, with little to no hard data on return on investment (ROI) or “Facebook Likes to sales conversions” statistics, the proven strategy still seems up for grabs.

Needing a little break, I tabled the matter in the back of my mind and decided to do a little shopping.  As a mother of two, in the process of a move, I got online and began to surf “children’s twin beds.”  I found two beds I thought would be good in my new place, but wasn’t sure which one to choose.  Knowing my sister to be an expert at all kids-related purchases, I decided to ask her which of the two would best suit my needs.  Without the thought of directly emailing her even crossing my mind, I posted links to the two beds on her Facebook wall.  I figured why not have her friends and my friends chime in if they had valuable input?  As I suspected, she gave me her choice, and so did several mutual friends.  I added a comment to the end of the thread explaining that I would definitely be buying the JC Penny twin storage bed, as that was not only her first choice, but the first choice of most others.

As I whipped out my credit card and completed the transaction, it dawned on me: My transaction was an example of social media being used to convert a sale (that elusive ROI for social media marketing budgets that CEOs are eagerly trying to nail down).

As a social media marketing client manager at DefinedLogic, this made me laugh.  To my tech-savvy, tweeting, mashable friends, this was obviously some sort of synergistic marketing campaign, aimed at their demographic, to sell JC Penney twin storage beds for kids.  In reality, I simply needed a pair of twin beds and wanted to ask my sister about the two I liked.  Just as if we were shopping together (along with approximately 600 of our “closest” friends).

Have you used Facebook to gather input before you make a purchase?  Please share your story.

Customers have a lot to say. Sometimes it will be positive and other times, not so much.
When you are creating your social strategy you must focus not only on getting your message out, but how will you respond when the conversation starts. In the real world we call that listening. That is being social. Creating a Tweet and not expecting a response is meaningless, or better yet a waste of time. If you are being social, you would expect a response so you can keep the conversation going.

“There is no such thing as a worthless conversation, provided you know what to listen for.”

-James Nathan Miller

You must listen to what is being said, interpret tone, consider not only those that have responded, but those that are listening. Social conversations are not private – they are not meant to be. It is your goal to keep the conversation going, solicit comments and use this information to make informed decisions about your audience – and respond accordingly.

Facebook provides the Open Graph, which provides additional information about the audience in the conversation. It provides access (through ‘Likes’) to people who have ‘Liked’ information on your website. They can then provide a comment about a product that they like (they start the conversation). Are you listening? Do you know that they commented on YOUR product? You should, because they are talking to you and every one of their friends on Facebook. And if one of their friends comments on it then all their friends see it and now they can comment…and so goes the conversation.

The more comments on your product the more eyeballs see it on Facebook. The more eyeballs that see your product on Facebook the more you sell.

So keep listening, to keep the conversation going.

So am I part of the Facebook generation?

I am a part of Gen X, but can you be part of another generation if it is classified by the use of something. Even if I smoked pot every day, I would never be classified as a baby boomer. But technology changes that. It extends the sense of inclusion and allows any one, of any age to participate.

Facebook’s success is based on connecting people with similar ‘likes’. Facebook must leverage a users profile to identify ‘likes’. This is where the concern amongst generations begins to arise. Each generation has tolerance for how much information is used. It seems that the older you are the less likely you are to be open to sharing your information within an online social environment.

The Lost Generation, Greatest Generation and Silent Generation are not even age groups that appear in Facebook user metrics. Based on the age of these generations the youngest of which would be 70 years old, this does not come as a surprise. That is not to say that there are no 70+ participants in this social medium, but these groups will not be effecting change.

Baby Boomers
The majority of this generation (not all) is skeptical of Facebook. My mom worries about every pop-up and is convinced people are trying to invade her computer to get personal information. These concerns are not completely unfounded, but the reaction from the members of this generation is more apprehensive than it is of the generations that succeed them. The social aspect of connecting to long lost friends is appealing, but being “out on the internet” limits these users acceptance of this form of social media.

Generation X
My generation has been an adopter. Gen Xers grew up being the early adopters to technology, but have suffered with the growing pains of slow internet speeds, computer viruses, eCommerce security, etc. We tend to hold our personal information closer to the vest and have learned to adapt to ever changing tides of what a new technology has to offer. Some have been passersby, some use it casually and others have adopted it as a way of life (and means to improve business). We are a loud voice in the world of Facebook, but it is not ingrained in our soul. I did not need it to get into college, get my first job, facilitate a meeting, negotiate a deal, build a business…

Generation Y, Generation Next, Millennials, The Facebook Generation
To thrive in this generation social computing is a must. This generation continues to be the largest audience within Facebook and it is being taught at an early age (usually by peers) that this is simply part of being. There is less apprehension about privacy. They know there are creeps and cheats that want their information, but they are also well aware of the power of sharing the right information. It is this knowledge that will facilitate the Millennial’s Facebook use to change the world.

Social platforms will be used to connect and educate students around the world. Imagine a collaborative science project with students from Spain, the Ukraine and the United States. The learning opportunities will explode. Barriers will be eliminated and social communication will be at the heart of this global communication uprising. The Millenials will lead this charge.

So, as many before me have wondered or hoped, “am I part of the next great generation?” it is with regret to say that I am not. The Millennials will change the way we learn, work, love and live by expanding the power of their social lives through the use of Facebook.