“Social media is not a unicorn, it’s a horse!” That’s how I opened up my bit of the panel session at the SAScon conference in Manchester today, when asked about the role social media plays within my business at Brother, highlighting that is should form part of an overall marketing plan. The panel was exploring the challenges of actually getting social media going in business. Rather than write a massive long blog about it, I’m going to bullet point the key points I made (in no particular order): -
- T.A.T is what matters nowadays. Time. Attention & Trust. See earlier blogpost about it here.
- Choose your channels carefully and only do whats relevant to the outcome you want.
- B2ME is the new B2B. Blogpost here.
- Keeping relevant in peoples lives is what matters.
- Engagement should lead to marriage. If you are going to get going with engagement, ultimately you want that person to be a customer or stay a customer, that’s the end game or don’t get engaged.
- Social media promotes authenticity and transparency and can create emotional connections with customers.
- Getting it all going can be hard work. I personally drove it in my own organisation. If you don’t have the buy in from the leaders, it can all end in tears if the going gets tough.
- Create a framework. Develop a policy that is relevant to your business, don’t borrow someone elses.
- I.T. have to be on board. I’m fortunate in having a supportive European IT Director. In many business they can get in the way or be a barrier.
- 61% of businesses say sales and profit are their key drivers yet 64% of people practicing social media say it is hard to measure (source – econsultancy survey). Social media should form part of your overall campaign integration, not be mutually exclusive of it.
Social media is a trend not a fad. It’s here to stay. Customers are no longer king, they are KING KONG (didn’t manage to get that soundbite in). We all have intolerance of bad service and we have the tools to tell others. If you want to win more customers, win their hearts and their minds and then let the six degrees of separation do the rest!
