Social media

Problem: social media in business

Learning objectives (LO):

1. Which social media platform is suitable for which purpose? 

• B2B vs. B2C platforms
• Different tools for different industries

2. Strategy: social media plan

3. Measuring tools

• Techniques and tools to measure effectiveness

1. Which social media platform is suitable for which purpose? 

• B2B vs. B2C platforms

• Different tools for different industries

http://crossroadsprm.com/2013/01/b2b-vs-b2c-social-media-part-ii/

Socialbakers' Social Media Reports show the top Pages and Posts per Industry
http://www.socialbakers.com/resources/reports/industry/

In fact, according to GrowEpic’s data here is a breakdown of percent of companies in an industry that use each social media channel:

• 45% – Facebook
• 22% – Google+
• 18% – Instagram
• 7% – LinkedIn
• 18% – Pinterest
• 53% – Twitter

Here is the full chart with all the industries tracked:
(source)

2. Strategy: social media plan

A social media marketing plan is the summary of everything you plan to do and hope to achieve for your business using social networks. This plan should comprise an audit of where your accounts are today, goals for where you want them to be in the near future, and all the tools you want to use to get there.
In general, the more specific you can get with your plan, the more effective you’ll be in its implementation. Try and keep it concise and don’t make your social media marketing strategy so lofty and broad that it’s unattainable. This plan will guide your actions, but it will also be a measure by which you determine whether you’re succeeding or failing at social media. You don’t want to set yourself up for failure from the outset. (source)

How to make social media plan
(source)
Step 1: Create social media objectives and goals
The first step to any social media marketing strategy is to establish objectives and goals that you hope to achieve. Having these objectives also allows you to quickly react when social media campaigns are not meeting your expectations. Without these goals, you have no means of gauging your success and no means of proving your return on investment.

These goals should be aligned with your broader marketing strategy, so that your social media efforts all drive towards business objectives. If your social media marketing strategy is shown to drive business goals forward, you’re more likely to get executive buy-in and investment. They should also go beyond vanity metrics like retweets or Likes, in favour of more advanced metrics like leads generated, sentiment or website traffic referred. Strive to approach these goals using the SMART approach, meaning they should all be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound.

For example:
For Instagram we will share photos that communicate our company culture. We will do this by posting 3 photos a week that will achieve 30 likes plus 10 comments each.

Step 2: Conduct a social media audit
Prior to creating your social media marketing plan, you need to assess your current social media use and how it is working for you. This requires figuring out who is currently connecting to you via social media, which social media sites your target market uses and how your social media presence compares to your competitors’.

Find a social media audit template at  http://blog.hootsuite.com/how-to-create-a-social-media-marketing-plan/

Creating an organized plan will act as a checklist to keep you on track with your social media efforts- covering everything from daily upkeep and weekly tasks to big projects, contests and promotions. (source)

• Commitment: According to Social Media Examiner, “invest time, energy and resources into [your social media] no matter what. [It] will keep you committed and prepare you to be active and engaged even when you feel like your presence is stagnating.”
• Determine Goals: Think about realistic goals you’d like to achieve, as well as the steps you’ll need to take in order to get there.  For example, would you like to increase traffic? See more engagement on your site? Determine how you will you go about accomplishing these goals.
• Do you have an existing fan base?: Are people currently posting videos of your product on YouTube? Are they uploading pins of your product on Pinterest?  Find out if you’re already getting attention somewhere and take advantage of that.
• Develop a Schedule: Decide how many times you’ll be posting and how often you will be replying to keep up a steady engagement. Everyone wants to create conversations—the important thing is that you find a timely way to always respond.
• Create an Editorial Calendar:  This will sum up everything you’ll be doing for an entire month. Decide on what kind of content you’ll be posting, how often you’ll be posting it and if there will be a theme for this month.
• Customization: So you have a nice following on a certain platform now? Mix things up a bit and get creative. Consider creating custom apps on your Facebook page or upload videos to YouTube. Play around with different ideas and see if your spontaneity works for your benefit.
• Review: According to Social Media Today, after 90-days have passed, it’s important to take the time to evaluate your current results and statistics. “Were your goals met? Did you reach your intended audience?  What worked and what didn’t work?” Adjust what you’re doing to work with these results.

3. Measuring tools

Great article on socialmediaexaminer.com:

5 Ways to Use Metrics to Improve Your Social Media Marketing 

Forbes article "Measuring The Impact Of Social Media On Your Business" (source)

Use goal-driven metrics. Set specific goals for each social media campaign and then develop metrics based on those goals. If a social media campaign is designed to generate brand awareness, then engagement is an appropriate metric. However, if a social media campaign is intended to drive purchase, then the conversion rate from visitor to buyer might be a more suitable metric. This insight may seem obvious but there is often a disconnect between goals and metrics.

Demonstrate metric validity. Metrics must be vetted to ensure they are valid—meaning they measure what they are designed to measure. For example, at what point should marketers classify a consumer’s interaction with a company on social media as “engagement”? Is it when a consumer likes or shares a post? Proving metrics requires linkages to key outcomes, customer interviews, and managerial judgment.

Uncover and verify leading indicators. Social media engagement, measured by the number of page views, click-throughs, comments, shares, and likes, is often used as a leading indicator of downstream sales outcomes. Identifying and tracking such leading indicators is valuable as companies can gain an early sense of how well their strategies will pay off.

Create dashboards. Most companies with a social media presence track metrics from multiple sources. As a result, it is helpful to create a social media dashboard that aggregates these different sources and shows a comprehensive view of the company’s or brand’s performance. A dashboard saves monitoring time and ensures that marketers have real-time access to how important metrics are trending.

Develop meaningful benchmarks. Comparing results to meaningful benchmarks provides important context when assessing the impact of social media campaigns. Building a database of social media campaigns and their corresponding outcomes enables your company to develop these benchmarks. Your agency may also be able to provide a broader view of these benchmarks if they have access to a range of campaigns from various companies.

Conduct experiments. To truly understand the impact of social media, companies must be willing to conduct experiments. Small experiments such as pre- and post-tests that measure consumer activity before and after a social media campaign are a useful way of assessing performance. Even better, include a control group that is matched on observable characteristics for comparison to the treatment group. For example, use geo-targeted social media in one city and compare results to a control-group city in which the campaign did not run.

Allocate funds to measurement. According to The CMO Survey, companies spend only 2.3% of their marketing budgets on measuring ROI. Measuring the impact of social media requires investing in metrics. This investment might include dedicated staff, agency partnerships, tools and technology, models, or customer databases.

Consider the cost of ignoring social media. One social media expert we interviewed offered the insight that the inability to perfectly measure social media’s return on investment (ROI) should not limit investments in it. Instead, he encourages his organization to also consider the Cost of Ignoring (COI) social media – “What is the cost to our business of ignoring this new platform?”

Build predictive models. Metrics are often used to analyze what has happened, but they also can be used to predict what is likely to happen depending on the tactics employed, such as spending levels and media placement. To gain the most out of your metrics, leverage them to build predictive models and then plug in different inputs to simulate possible outcomes.

Guide future actions. Measures should ideally be designed to offer developmental feedback. Ask yourself, if your social media campaign is not working, what information do you need to know in order to improve? Build your metrics or add additional metrics to capture this information so you know how to course correct and do better in the future.

Stick with your metrics. Vendors are constantly developing new tools to measure the impact of social media. Nevertheless, marketers should focus on utilizing a handful of tracking tools that fit their goals and have passed important validity hurdles. Be careful not to flit between different metrics as doing so will hinder learning and waste valuable resources.