salterbaxter social media roundtable 28th june 2011

Social Media Roundtable

Ian Howlett – Head of Digital Anja Maerz – User Experience Consultant

28 June 2011

Introduction

•  Housekeeping

•  Session structure

•  Our approach to the topic today

•  Presentations

•  Discussion

•  Timetable

Context

•  What does it mean to be social?

•  Or when did we become ‘anti-social’!

•  Don’t be fearful - it’s hopefully already how you do business

•  Now with connected tools/software to help us

About communicating, listening and responding

Why might you use social media?

•  Could be for many reasons:

– Traffic

– Exposure

– Brand build

– Listen

– Share

– Collaborate

Or put another way

•  It depends on what you are trying to achieve

What are the issues you are facing?

I don’t know where to start!

I don’t have the time or people to support social media.

Not the right channel for us

Social media is only for B2C or my kids

We can’t control it!

I don’t even know where to start!

What do you need to do first?

•  What is your ultimate objective?

•  Culture?

•  Is there a commitment at a senior level? From a legal perspective?

•  Might views be different for internal and external comms?

•  Technical restrictions?

•  Test the water

•  Pilot or internal test

•  Monitor & make measurable

I don’t have the time or people to

support social media.

•  Start small

•  1-2 people can coordinate

•  But advocates and champions are crucial

•  Cross departmental involvement

•  Certain competencies are necessary (content creation, monitoring and moderation, technical support)

Nothing’s happening

•  Whatever you do will take time to grow, so you must persevere

•  Develop your champions

•  Remind people

•  Work hard to make it a priority

Show your social media footprint •  Email footer

•  Letter head

•  Poster

•  Business card

•  Website

Some ideas take only hours

But we can’t control it!

•  You decide what you say and where

•  Don’t fake it

•  Don’t smother negative content – respond to it

•  You do need guidelines and policies for everyone

Make it clear

Otherwise you can lose control

Or make mistakes

Social media? Yes, but it’s just

for fun and networking.

Excellent customer service •  Goal: Engage with customers and

improve the customer experience.

•  Success: At a point of crisis (Heathrow Airport closed due to weather) social media was successfully used to provide customers with information about travel options

Idea generation

CR Reporting

Single channel campaigns are effective

•  Procter and Gamble CSR initiative ‘Future Friendly’ invites visitors to pledge participation by saving water, energy etc

•  Share pledges with friends

•  146k followers, active community

•  Consumer brands secondary

Recruiting via social media

Not the right channels for us

Collaboration through social media

•  Goal: Connect to your peers within the business to share their business experience and expertise

•  Success: Creation of a social business network where all employees can collaborate; high employee satisfaction

Improving internal communications

•  Goal: Faster collaboration and communication across company

•  Success: More than 14,000 employees use Socialcast. The CEO, Stephen Elop lso uses it, and holds important dialogues with employees via socialcast.

Changing the recruitment process

•  LinkedIn is fast becoming the only place to recruit

•  Widely used by recruitment agencies, companies are now using it directly to advertise jobs

•  Offers far more insight into candidates with recommendations, social integration etc.

•  Shifts recruitment emphasis back to company

So much more than recruiting

•  Show your expertise

•  Encourage debates

•  Promote your events

•  Increase the company’s visibility

•  Encourage connections

Involving customers in customer support

•  Goal: Find a ways to scale up customer service and support

•  Success: 75% reduction in support requests to the company, more than 90,000 registered users and over 15,00 topics created; vibrant

Share what matters to you

Be creative – channels can offer more than you might think

In summary

I’d like a social media strategy please

One size does not fit all

It’s not for everyone or every situation

Who should I listen to?

Whoever is asking you the right questions

Enough of us talking

•  Firstly, did we answer the questions you have?

•  Are there key questions we’ve missed?

•  Have you faced similar issues in your own organisations?

•  What other issues are you facing?

•  Where are you on your social media ‘journey’?