More than your reputation is at stake, take it a step at a time
Social media is a revolutionary means for connecting with customers, prospects, vendors, partners, even co-workers and recruits. This is important because it means you are now connected in ways never before seen. Your company is becoming more and more transparent, whether you want it or not. With blogs, chat rooms, email, text, and tools like Twitter, an unhappy employee or an unsatisfied customer can merely comment about a bad experience and it can spread and mutate like a wildfire. Through this exposure, your company unknowing puts out messages that can linger in the cosmos of the Internet for an eternity. On the flip side however, there is equally good news. Happy customers and engaged employees can also share good experiences with millions of people just as fast, and just as easily. There’s more.
Consider some of the ways social media (SM) is such a great tool. We usually think in terms of the aforementioned human connecting it does so well. But it also powers SEO (search engine optimization)—by enhancing Google’s ability to find your website fast. It augments other marketing activities—by engaging a target audience and measuring response. As well, SM will allow you to establish a thought leadership position, manage brand reputation and influence peer and public perception. Just to name a few.
Social media (SM) is literally changing the world’s culture, and it is simultaneously changing how business is done. Therefore, it has the gravity to affect the culture at your company. You have the choice to make it work for you or accept what could amount to unprecedented risks with public relations. Are you ready for SM? If not, read on, this is for you.
Late adopters always find certain advantages to waiting and watching. They are happy just to avoid some of the pitfalls early adopters consider part of the territory. Here is my advice, if you’re waiting, use the time to create a strategy (for SM adoption) that will work for your very unique culture. There are enough complexities to a social media program that it will require full adoption by everyone in your company. It is definitely the place to start.
Every business should do some planning before embarking upon any level of social media activity. Here, at a glance, are the first few considerations. We’ll try to cover the subject completely and in bite size increments, over the next few posts of the Industrious Bastard.
Step One. Understand what your company is up against.
Start a serious conversation among personnel at all levels. Gather input and ideas and try to understand the key concerns of the entire organization. First capture all ideas separately for more discussion later—these initial, unbiased thoughts could be valuable to your strategy. Second, organize all likely topics of concern. Here’s an outline that should cover most of the issues:
- Budgeting—weighing the benefits against estimated costs
- Security risks—consider everything from viruses to loss of proprietary secrets
- Employee adoption and productivity—who should be directly involved and how you will estimate the amount of time employees will likely spend online
- Damage to reputation(s)—ignoring social media is not a solution. Involvement in SM can also improve reputation.
Step Two. Address everything you learned with virtually everyone in the company
- State the facts—using terms your audience will understand, highlight opportunities and offer ideas on how to manage all the key concerns
- Draw on success—demonstrate how competition in your category are benefiting through the use of SM
- Emphasize the potential—illustrate the impact on the company’s bottom line and longer term sustainability.
Like lots new technologies with great promises, social media will create even more work for you.
The trick is to make it work for you and everyone in your company. More later.
Credit: Segments of this post adapted and condensed from “A Step-by-Step Guide to a Successful Social Media Program” by MarketingProfs—Kimberly Smith author
We are using Social Media as a platform to build credibility with our customers. Our company differentiates itself from the competition through our level of expertise – whether in higher quality technology or more experienced personnel. The use of SM to promote company happenings, educate customers, etc is going a long way to show off our expertise. And in turn, we are building credibility and furthering the overall company brand.