This post is an excerpt from “6 Social Media Strategy Tips for Market Leadership“. We will focus on the first phase of a social media strategy: Socializing and Discovery.
Before you can write a plan, you need to gather the appropriate information from all the parties that will have a stake in your social media program. This is especially true if you are a multi-department business. If this step is skipped, you will set yourself up for failure, so take the time in the beginning to speak with people and gather historical information. In doing this, you will set proper benchmarks that you will measure against when you deploy your social media program
Speak with all internal stakeholders
C-Suite
These are the big picture thinkers and are most concerned with the bottom line. They are going to be concerned with lifting revenue or decreasing costs. Understand what their concerns are before making any type of recommendation. Note: This could include legal staff or compliance staff as well.
Managers
Managers have a different set of concerns. Most likely, they are more concerned about the performance of their individual team or function within the business, which doesn’t necessarily equate to bottom line reporting. For example, managers are concerned about the metrics that will make them look good like decreased time to resolution for the customer service department or increased leads from the marketing department.
Front Line Staff
Front Line Staff are going to be concerned about optimizing their performance. For example, call center staff will be concerned about relevant information to give to the customer at a quicker rate. Another example is human resources staff will need more efficient ways of weeding through job applicants.
Gather feedback and document it
Upon interviewing each stakeholder, make sure to record and report on the current needs of the organization. Outline the top priorities.
Look at analytics and data for all marketing activities
Web analytics
To create a business case, you will need to bench mark where the firm stands without social media. How much traffic is the site generating? Where is the traffic coming from? Is the site converting visitors into leads?
CRM data
Now you will have to dig into your customer relationship management reports. How many people that are website leads turn into prospects? What is the average sales cycle? What is the lifetime value of the customer. Most CRM software can provide an array of marketing reports that are specific to your business goals.
Read industry reports
There are countless white papers and reports delivered by companies within your industry. Use this data to create benchmarks and opportunities for capturing market share.
Surveying Customers and Preliminary Listening
- Email a survey
This may seem counterintuitive, since social media is a great channel for low cost-high value market research, but you will need to figure out what your customers desire when engaging with your brand in social media
- Conduct Preliminary Listening
Through the use of special software, you can figure out where your prospects and customers are hanging out online, what they are talking about, who is hanging out online, how they feel about you, and why are they talking about you.
After you concluded with the “socialize” phase, now it is time to identify your goals. For the complete guide, make sure to download “6 Social Media Strategy Tips for Market Leadership“.
Is there anything you would add to this list?
