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Using Social Networks for Business – What Are Your Goals?

In the first post of this series, What Social Networks Should I Join to Promote My Business Website?, I gave an overview of some questions you should ask (and try to answer) to decide which social networks are best for your business.  The first question, is the most important:

What goal or problem am I trying to solve?

It may help to take a look at some possible answers:

  1. Increase Sales
  2. Increase Traffic to the Website – Why?  This is a common answer, but what does more traffic give you?  One would hope you’re actually trying to increase sales (see #1).
  3. Increase Customer Satisfaction – Good.  This should also lead to #1.
  4. Need more information on how our products/services are doing.  – Also good (and should lead to #1 – see a trend?)

Businesses often lose sight of their main goal – to increase sales.  Don’t become bogged down with all these new technologies and buzz words.  If sales are hurting because you have a customer serice or research problem, then use social networks and your website to solve that problem.

Take a deep breath.  Visualize what you’re trying to do and why.  Now we have a good foundation to move forward.

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Internet Strategy Forum Summit – End to End Marketing: A Fundamental Shift

Presented by Nancy Bhagat, VP Sales & Marketing Group, Director Integrated Marketing, Intel

Cost of media is low per person, but is unfocused.

There is a 300% growth rate in timeshifting TV.  But TV is not media, it’s a delivery.  Video will continue to exist, just in different places through different delivery strategies.  Behavior has changed in how people interact with ads.  56% say skipping ads is important part of timeshifting.

Technology is no longer about who is tech saavy and who is not anymore.  It is about the desire to purchase.  80% turn to Internet for information to make a purchase decision. Our targets are online.

People are looking for a person like them, but they don’t need to see or know them directly.  This is defined much differently than previously.

Great brands are no longer the brands that tell the best stories, but are the brands that have the best stories told about them. (needs source)

Power of online marketing:

  • Impact
  • Agility
  • Targeting
  • Scale

Leadership requires flexibility and focus. Online vehicles offer speed and flexibility to test multiple content types in one place and to determine what content is best.

Success metrics are shifting away from traditional impressions and CPC. The ability to evaluate success is critical.  Content is increasingly delivered through social media which is difficult to measure.  We now need to measure what matters – user engagement, behavior, movements & trends.  Data that is not actionable is meaningless.

We need to know what place people are in the buy cycle/qualification.  Data without valid business context is meaningless. We need to understand what activities are valued.  And if things don’t go well in those activities, we need to know what and why.

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Internet Strategy Summit Forum – Mapping the Digital Landscape: A Strategic Guide

Presented by Geoffrey Ramsey, CEO of eMarketer

Data can be made to say anything you want.  People don’t trust advertising or marketing.

The growth rate for total media spending is only 3.3%.  The growth in traditional media – radio, tv, print is negative.  All the growth is online.  eMarketer is predicting 22.2% growth in online media spending, which includes online video and rich media.

Advice: Learn about communities. Test new marketing concepts without spending much money.

73% of online americans watch video online.  27% of online americans watch full length tv shows online.  47% are more engaged in the ads and 25% more engaged in the show than with traditional tv.  However – the audience is much smaller and spends less time per day watching.

Advice: Spending on online video ads should increase. They allow more measurability, target-ability and share-ability.

There are a few ways to use online video:

  1. Post video footage of your products and services on your website.
  2. Post video ads on content video sites (YouTube, etc.).  Relevancy is key.
  3. Create webisodes (ex. Will It Blend)

30% of US marketers are using blogging as a tactic.  Watch for what people are saying about your company.  It may appear higher in search results than what you say.

Strategies for social networking:

  1. Look, Listen, Lounge, Learn
  2. Advertise – Improved Targeting
  3. Advertise on smaller niche sites – be relevant
  4. BYO (build your own) social network – remember its not about your product or service – create something of value to your customers

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