Social media marketing (introduction)

Social media marketing: bursting the hype

Jeremy Swinfen GreenManaging Partner, Mosoco

Everything is changing

We’re all doomed

And don’t say I didnae

warn ye!

Don’t panic…

So why bother with social media?

Market insights

• Insights into– You and your competitors– Changes over time

• The words they use– The benefits the highlight– The things they dislike

• Who, when and where

Many free tools…

Some free favourites: social mention, tweetreach, hashtagify.me, twitonomy

And plenty of paid ones too: HootSuite is worth trying

Take care with measurement

• Do you understand what the data really mean?– How many people will actually see your content?– Is a simple action such as a “Like” worth much?

• Twitter “reach” is potential reach of a tweet: followers and followers of re-tweeters

• One twitter users on average– Follows 100 people, who each tweet 5 times/day– Is shown 500 tweets/day– Spends 5 minutes/day on Twitter – Will only be able to read 100 maximum (NOT 500!)

Marketing communications

One to one communications

Many to many communications

Listen

Engage

Who should own social media

IT, PR or Marketing?

None of the above!

You need a triage system

Sales

Marketing

R&D

PR

HR

Strategy

Triage because social media = RISK

• Internal risk– Board members– Employees

• External risk– Hackers– The Public

And it’s a big risk

• April 2013: Syrian Electronic Army hack into AP’s Twitter feed– They plant rumours of bombs at the White House

• Result: the Dow Jones drops 143 points– $136 bn is erased from the market

Risks: the board - compliance

• Board member responsible for social media?• Corporate responsibilities: potential negligence

– Not ensuring social media management is in place– Not ensuring security protocols are adequate– Not ensuring social media records are kept– Disclosing financial information

• Tweets allowed by the SEC: UK guidelines?

– Advertising Standards and Promotions• Publishing misleading tweets from consumers• Regulated industries e.g. FCA (FSA) guidelines: “Twitter

may be insufficient to provide balanced information”

Careless talk costs Likes

• Unwise posts may:– Damage the brand e.g. personal opinions that appear

official– Be accidentally libellous posts (e.g. the Christmas

Party)– Anger or worry stakeholders (e.g. shareholders

hearing about slow sales)– Create inadvertent contracts

Managing employee social media use

• Customised company social media policy– Training to gain understanding and buy-in

• Monitoring – Employee posts on company accounts– Senior employee posts on private accounts

Employees who walk

• Social media assets e.g. Facebook pages not owned by the business– Set up by employee who then leaves

• Appropriate protocols for setting up and maintaining social media assets

vs

…or who are being “walked”

Hacking

• Business pages being taken over• Personal email or Twitter accounts being hacked• Is YOUR password “qwerty” or “12345”?

“BurgerKing just got sold to McDonalds…”

Dell’s Director of Social Media gets his Twitter account hacked

Social PR crisis: when not if…

• Things that happen– Product and operational problems causing unhappy

customers to complain in public – Unhappy ex-employees post defamatory comments– Unacceptable executive behaviour is uncovered– Rumours of takeovers, financial troubles are

circulated

How to manage a social PR crisis

• Listen• Prepare

– Identify the most likely problems– Create template position statements– Implement management protocols – who does what

• Practice– Dealing with the speed and the stress of a PR crisis

So how can you use social media for marketing?

Start with a strategy

• Set organisational goals• Audit existing assets• Define resources available/possible• Ensure management processes are in place (inc

Board level responsibility)

Plan your campaigns

• Listen and research audience “wants”• Develop personas• Set SMART objectives• Plan your channels based on their strengths and

weaknesses• Develop Tone of Voice guidelines for different

channels• Create an editorial calendar tool• INTEGRATE with other marketing activities

Editorial calendar

• Publication date• Theme and subject• Audience/persona• Keywords• Author• Sign off• Channel• Purpose/Call to action

Innovation and content creation

• Idea generation can be hard– Book of ideas– Brainstorming– News, company news, industry news– Seasonal changes– Other people’s ideas reinterpreted or disputed

• Recycle content and reuse ideas regularly • Rework content e.g. 1 whitepaper=

– 3 blogs– 10 tweets– I info-graphic

Great content

• Is relevant and interesting (obviously)• Has a personal tone of voice• Uses appropriate grammar and spelling• Has interest hooks (headline, first sentence, last

sentence)• Generates engagement (ask questions, run

competitions, be topical, respond to comments) • Contains images• Has a purpose: business-focussed calls to action

Jon Morrow, Henneke Duistermaat, Content Marketing InstituteSocial Media Examiner, BufferApp

Video works wonders

• But you need text as well:– SEO– User preference

Content delivery: Driving audience

• Post at different times of the day/week• Recycle posts several times• Reply to comments/thank followers etc• Engage with influencers• Engage with employees and customers• Ask people to “follow” you on your website, your

emails, your blog etc• Be wary of buying followers – if only because

this can lead to complacency!

Evaluation and measurement

• What is a “Like” really worth?– You can’t assume that “Liking” causes people to buy– Correlation is not the same as cause– £1000 sales from 10 people who Liked you doesn’t

mean each Like is worth £100

• But– Likes have value as social proof, and may influence

other people’s decisions– Someone who Likes MAY be more inclined to buy

(principle of “commitment and consistency”)

• Unfortunately these are not readily measurable…

Things to avoid: insensitivity

Things to avoid: pretending to respond

Things to avoid: giving people freedom!

Things to avoid: ignoring the news

Conclusions

What’s it all about?

• Social media effects are a lot less measurable than some people might have you believe

• Social media marketing is important, but it isn’t the only marketing game in town

• Social media goes a long way beyond marketing and addressing the risks is essential

Thank you

jeremy@mosoco.co.uk

07855 341 589