Did you know that 84 percent of B2B marketers use social media, and that social media has a 100 percent higher lead-to-close than outbound marketing?
Most organizations have come to terms with the importance of social media and have the right teams in place to manage their channels. But when it comes to strategy for a smaller organization that doesn’t have social gurus on staff to develop a strategic campaign and execute on building a relevant following, what’s a marketing manager to do?
Here’s an easy way to determine what your social strategy should be:
What is your perception of your following across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.?
- Impressive in terms of numbers and relevancy
- Decent
- Small
Do you have a marketing and/or PR agency that can support your social needs?
- Yes
- Maybe
- No
Can someone within the company comment on industry related topics, regardless of whether topics are directly related to your line of business?
- Yes
- Maybe
- No
If you answered mostly A’s:
It’s time to develop a through provoking, intriguing and fun social campaign. You’ve gathered all of these great followers to your social channels and they shouldn’t be fed marketing jargon, vendor specific news and sales promotions for products/services. While social platforms should be used in part to promote your company and its offerings, these platforms should also be used to engage with your audience in a way that is mutually beneficial. Offer industry neutral tips and insights, conduct a trivia game or giveaway or share funny cartoons that might be relevant to the business segment you are in.
If you answered mostly B’s:
Work on populating your accounts with content – anything from company news and blog posts to your thoughts on the latest topics of interest to your industry. This is a time to experiment with smaller social campaigns to see what your followers react to. Continue garnering relevant followers by using the right hashtags, following those conversations and offering your unique insight into conversations. Get your executive team on Twitter, and as many employees as possible – first and foremost these are the people that should follow your company’s pages and engage with them, like status updates, share stories and retweet.
If you answered mostly C’s:
It’s simply not the right time to invest energy and resources into developing comprehensive social campaign plans only to see them fall flat due to a small following and sub-par social page management. Right now, you need to focus on sharing relevant content, inserting yourselves into conversations where you can provide some sort of value-add and most importantly, building your following.