[ITWeb Social Business Summit] Get busy, social is here

This was the advice of top social business expert and author, Neal Schaffer, who delivered the keynote address at the recent ITWeb Social Business Summit that took place in Johannesburg.

So you have manged to convince the CEO that social media is the way to go and you have been given the go ahead and the resources. Now what? For social to add value, companies need a distinct visual content strategy or visual voice for each channel that the audience or community in that channel can engage with them.

This strategy can be made up of the following:

What pay to play?

Social media is never free. It requires people and people cost money. It is hard to be heard though the noise but for very little paid media lets you be heard. It allows micro-targeting options but most importantly gives you analytics. These include demographics, interests and behaviours and many, many more. (It raises serious privacy issues but I am not addressing these here today.)

Image via Pixabay

Paid social media is becoming mainstream with 92% of companies in the US having used it. You might think we are all on Facebook so why pay on Facebook? But paid media gives you the exposure to find your audience. Facebook advertisements are also cheap, and they will not be cheap forever, so take advantage of this now.

Employee advocacy and social selling

Seventy-eight percent of sales people using social media outsell their peers. This social initiative more than any other strategy will evolve your business into a social media business says Schaffer. "Employees are the most trusted people in your organisation and viewed as experts. They are the long tail of your company and are part of your network.

Their network is larger than you think and consumers trust them more than brands. Start with employees that can share their expertise.

However while employees are brand ambassadors, employee advocacy only works if you have happy employees. Social selling also requires content to bridge the gap - a hidden gap.

Sharing content allows sales people to engage with old and new clients and helps them leverage new business. Social media users can also be advocates of your brand.

Future proofing your social

Two years ago what a brand did on social media was not as effective as it is today. Social media is a grand experiment and is always in flux. To maximise your social you need a framework. Start with a plan and Key Performance Indices (KPI) then tweak it over time. Social must be data driven and managed by KPIs. Let the data do the talking as to what you should be doing next.

There are three different metrics in social media: comparative, secondary, primary. Comparative is how effective your social compares to your competitors, primary is how it ties into your business objectives (social media ROI) and secondary is how you have increased the effectiveness of your social media.

Scale your social media

People do not scale and are one of the most expensive components of social media. Instead of hiring more people, look elsewhere he says. "The strategy you begin with will dictate your tactics. People's work flow and analytics will feed into this. You can automate, outsource and source content - there are tools that support the entire system. Besides paid media there are literally hundreds of tools available for listening, publishing, CRM, content, etc. Over time you need to invest in these."

Why bother doing all of this? Because social media is where people are, where your customers are. In the US social is not a nice to have but an imperative. The future is now and if you don't maximise your presence on all these channels, stop asking about the future because there will not be one.