Create a Social Media Strategywith JENNIFER NEELEY

Start By Listening Know why: You’re listening

to gather business intelligence about your customers and prospects.

Listen to everything – the good the bad and the ugly.

Document what you hear over time… are you seeing trends?

Think about how you can tie customer feedback – as well as customer expectations – into your business plan.

Know Your Audience

Think about customer and prospect personas – just like you would for traditional marketing.

Use data to ensure the information you have is true – not based on assumptions.

Develop stories and messages that map to your audience.

Yield To The Power Of Search

“Small rectangular pieces of cardstock with your name, phone number and company logo are going the way of the land line, compact disc, and yellow pages. It's pretty simple: Google is the new business card.”

- Gina Trapani, Harvard BusinessAugust 10, 2009

How To Be ‘Found’SEO Benefits

Site traffic.

Brand recognition.

Sell product & lead generation.

Launch a new product.

Push a message or idea.

Combat bad publicity.

SEO Best Practices

Make sure your Web site has a title, meta description and meta keywords.

Description that is similar, but not the same as your site content.

Dynamic title-tagging.

Link to sub domains within your site.

Content Keeps The Customers Coming

You need to have quality, on topic content fed through all your channels to get and keep users engaged.

You must have ways for those users to share content with others.

Play to your strengths: What types of content do you already have and what would users be expecting to see for your type of business?

Use the right channels for the right content and find new community interest.

Types Of Content And Elements To Consider Blogging

Commenting

Community

Social Media Newsroom

Content Sharing

Lead Generation

Measurement

Policy

Training

Make It Viral

One-click access to information about your company, linking directly from the home page.

Provide links to popular bookmarking sites so visitors can share news items and tags to improve the online visibility of each news item.

Rich media like video and audio are more likely.

Where-possible, make content printer-friendly. It's a small touch, but one that many Web sites neglect.

Use The ‘Right’ Social Networks

Not every social network is right for every business or brand.

You want to find the right place to increase brand awareness and goodwill among purchasing decision-makers, potential partners and recruits.

The social networks you chose should allow you to leverage their platform to emphasize your credibility as an expert industry resource.

This is where your audience should drive your decisions.

Email Marketing and Your Web Site Companies that are successful

at leveraging social media include email marketing and their Web site.

Emails should contain persistent messaging to join or follow your social media efforts.

Web sites should have buttons with calls to action to make users aware and grow your following.

Don’t forget that your companies’ email signature can be powerful if standardized to include links to your social media channels.

Web Site

Email

Email Signature

Have a Policy in Place

Most employees and volunteers contributing to online spaces such as: Blogs Social networks Wikis Forums Photo & video sharing sites

Guidelines help employees talk about work that’s: Open Transparent Responsible

Example policies and guidelines can be found at: The Altimeter Group Wiki Beth Kanter’s Blog

User Comments Should I respond to comments or mentions I see on other blogs?

Your should respond to mentions you see. When needed, seek the counsel of subject matter experts to help us get the right information to people talking about us.

What if people leave mean comments on our blog, Facebook page, Twitter account, Flickr photos, etc.?

If you receive a negative comment, evaluate whether it’s constructive. If it is constructive, don’t be afraid to engage the person who left it. Even if you don’t have all the right answers, try to find them together. If the comment is not constructive and does not align with your organizations principles, you can remove it. If you have a blog, you can usually moderate your comments before they’re published to your site.

Negative Comments If the comment is constructive you should use it as an opportunity to

discuss, clear up the misunderstanding, or otherwise work through whatever issue the person is having.

If you do need to remove comments, use language similar to this, as used by the American Red Cross. Be sure to review with your own counsel before publishing and, especially, enforcing:

Example: “Remember, we encourage you to comment on this blog. All viewpoints are welcome, but please be constructive. We reserve the right to make editorial decisions regarding submitted comments, including but not limited to removal of comments. The comments are moderated, so you may have to be a tiny bit patient in waiting to see them. We will review and post them as promptly as possible during regular business hours (Monday through Friday, 8:30 - 5:30).”

Let’s Review Listen. Find and profile your customers

and prospects. Search is essential to success. Content is key. Allow users to share. Chose the social network that’s

right for you. Branding your social presence. All of these elements must map

to your specific business targets. Institute a policy or guidelines Be sure to have a plan in place

for both positive and negative user comments.

Questions?

Thanks for joining us!