A social media plan! Time to answer the questions businesses are asking!
As I write this post the UK General Election 2010 has just happened. 45 million people will have either cast their vote, be thinking of who they’d have voted for or be glad they didn’t get involved in all that nonsense and then moan and whinge for the next few years.
Sound Familiar? You’ve think you know what I’m talking about… but can’t quite put your finger on it.
Let be put you out of your misery. The UK electorate behave in exactly the same way that many businesses and organisations do towards social media. Bingo! My guess is that you’re now either smiling at the screen you’re reading this on or groaning in the realisation of what I’ve just said.
When it dawned on me I felt like a leader of one of the main parties; someone who needs to facilitate change in how we, as the prospective MP’s of the social media world, behave and act towards our constituency of potential clients and communities.
MS v MP: members of social v members of parliament
Look deeper at some of the similarities. Both sets of representatives have many who:
- Talk the talk but don’t really want to get their hands dirty with work
- Fill the media with puff, spin and rhetoric
- Communicate with the same people all the time – but rarely talk to the communities that matter or who want to hear
- Alienate the very people who want our help and create a backlash because of our behaviour
- Never get round to actually changing things
So as leader of the Cow Bell Party (I’m messing) I’ve decided to look at how we change. How we change from allowing ourselves to believe that we’re the Messiah’s of a so called social media revolution and how we change into an industry that shows results and change instead of just talking about it.
Scott Gould has recently provoked a number of intelligent and thought-provoking blog posts. I was particularly taken by his, and his communities, views on comments and how he sees a blog as a home where you welcome people in and to put it simply – engage and collaborate with.
He is, of course, right! and this approach should play a key role in the Cow Bell manifesto.So let’s begin. Let’s make a social change and really do something special.
This is now not rhetoric or puff. What I’m saying is let’s just do it. I know a lot of people who are making things happen and who work on successful strategic campaigns to integrate social media into a marketing plan for both B2B and B2C.
Business Needs
This is what businesses demand. From their point of view simple answers to simple questions.They want
- solutions and answers to their problems
- to know how to get involved and which networks to join
- How long to spend in social media
- To understand the tools of the trade
- see how it integrates into other forms of communication and marketing
- watch their communities (tribes if you prefer) interact, engage, collaborate and …. BUY something
Some may feel these are too general and can’t be answered without more depth. This may be true, but if we can’t deal with the simple things then there’s no hope when it comes in wanting to write wonderful strategy documents and communication plans; or thinking about how amazing it would be for customer service, product development or actual sales if we just implement that 12 month campaign across twitter et all.
This is the bit where you come in. I need like-minded people to join in with this.
My feeling is that we need to simply the offering and make it clear that this isn’t magic. We need to ensure that we don’t bamboozle potential buyers with jargon and show how integrating social media into their organisation will bring about huge change – for the good.
This is a marketing and communications tool. Every single person in a company is responsible for how a buyer perceives that organisation. They market that brand, product or service with everything they do. Convincing the cynic or those who fear walking in our doors is all about distilling this down to its simplest form.
So, in true Social style I need you to engage and collaborate with me.
Questions
What’s the best thing about the social landscape? Is it feeling wanted & talking to friends?
Are your followers, friends and those in your network helping you do business through either knowledge sharing or in-depth collaboration?
What Now?
The point of all of this is for some of us to now engage in a discussion about helping business understand. Please add your comments below and mention you interest in discussing this further if you want to share knowledge and ideas or just want to be a part of us all helping business develop and understand their social potential. The next stage is to share good & bad experiences – maybe via a [Google} Wave where we can all collaborate or possibly through Linked-In or Facebook.
Please pass this on to others you feel can add to the discussion.
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[...] change for me has been seeing others take a stand. A splendid gentleman named Chris Hall wrote a post last week about bringing people together to work through the issues that will genuinely help [...]
You've got my vote Chris!
As ever, very thought provoking.
I have spoken to 6 business owners in the past month who are all considering Social Media for the very first time. What was most interesting to me was this – not one of them had ever heard of “Social Media”!
They sort of knew what Twitter and Facebook were but they all dismissed Facebook as something their children use and 5 out of 6 just perceived Twitter to be a complete waste of time from a business perspective!
This I found absolutely incredible and astounding. How could business owners not get this stuff?! This was incredible to me. These were smart people who you would think would know about Social Media and marketing and Internet Marketing.
It was a profound discovery and it made me realise that some of us are forgetting our past, myself included.
It reminded me of a mate of mine called Jon, who became a scuba diving instructor. I had got him into scuba diving and we progressed up the ranks together. I was a Rescue Diver on this guys very first open water dive – and he was rubbish! He couldn't get his bouyancy and always forgot to equalise his ears and was quite a nervous diver. Now he is awesome – one of the best and most experienced divers and instructors I know.
But I remember this occasion when he was teaching some students in the pool he lost his patience becasue they were slow learners; they weren't good at mastering bouyancy! It was incredible. He had completely forgotten that not so long ago he had been in their fins (shoes!) making the very same mistakes and was just as nervous. But he was now a scuba diving guru and so had no time for the beginners.
I listen to many of the people I've met in the SM space during the last year and a half and I get the feeling that a proportion of them are making the same mistake Jon made.
Let us not forget that the newbies who know nothing and are asking the same old, boring questions which we all think are so obvious; they are in the exact same position we were when we first jumped on the Social Media train. They need our help like we all needed the help we got when we began our journeys.
I'm in Chris! We've all been in the buffet car for too long! No more Gin and Tonics for me. It's time to get off the train at the next stop and help the new passengers who are nervously waiting on the platform. Lets get them onboard and give them the answers to their questions and show them case studies that give great examples of the results Social Media can help businesses achieve.
Love the analogy. Seems you me and a fair few others (who've commented here) are off that train are going to get back to the streets and help the new people in town – not alienate them anymore.