What are some tips for making social media a team effort in my company?

Great question Scott!

For most companies, marketing through their network of contacts is a smart strategy. People you know, friend of a friend, and word of mouth are tried and true. Because social media is digital networking it can be a terrific way to market your business.

It can also be a huge distraction, time waster or challenging to execute. And because anyone in your company (and outside of it) can contribute, it takes strategy and alignment to make it a great team effort.

Here are a few strategic tips about the why, who, what, and where of social media.

1. Why: set objectives for your investment of time and resources in SM

Getting new customers, keeping customers, becoming more famous, market research are all great objectives. Select one or two as the main reasons you want to do a SM program. Then measure your results and track progress against that objective. Tie the results to the success of your company but also the success of your team. Everyone wants to know why they are doing something and if they are succeeding.

2. Who: identify your audience

Who are you targeting? Are there specific segments? What are the differences between the segments? Once you have indentified an audience stay focused but watch closely to better understand how your audience really works. For an example look at Broadway Across America the producers of "Hair the Musical". They were originally targeting Baby Boomers but quickly saw that 25% of their audience is the much younger Generation Y. So the producers ask the director to try a few jokes about Lady Gaga and they do a trial offer of iTunes downloads along with the CD's on sale after the show. That is both focusing on an audience and understanding how your audience really works.

3. What: develop a content strategy

Unlike paid media, social media only works if your audience is willing to read and share your content. Therefore if your social media effort is all about you it will not be effective. Think of it like a party. The guy that sits in the corner with a monologue about the benefits of hiring him, why he is so terrific, how smart he is, and all the thing you can pay him to do is much less interesting than the guy who is interested in you and what you want to know. This cocktail party thinking applies to your content strategy.

Focus your content on “what your customer wants to know”. Use that insight to stay tight to limited range of content categories and topics. It is less about quantity and more about quality and relevance in the eyes of your audience. And stick to what you know. Share trade secrets, how to tips, stories from the field, trends & market information, ideas & inspiration.

4. Where: choosing the right SM

In choosing your SM channels you need to balance your objectives, where your audience is, how findable the channel is (Google loves Twitter but not FaceBook), the effort that each channel takes, where your team is already active and what is working.

One place to start is a blog. It can serve as a simple, search friendly destination allowing you to publish content that your audience is interested in while promoting your business at the same time (Scott see this blog for a landscaping example http://blog.doneganlandscaping.com/). And since you can cross-publish blog content to other channels like FaceBook, Twitter, email, and LinkedIn, it becomes easy for your team to share.

Again relevance is more important that quantity. Even if you only publish 1-2 posts a month but each one is on a subject that your customers want to know about they are much more likely to read it, share it, and learn more about what your company really does.

I hope this helps!

Scott Armstrong
“sharing what we know about how to connect with and convert more customers is what we do!”