Tag Archives: social strategy

social media success: not always just about revenue

As a business, if you are looking at your social media presence and only asking how much money it made you…you’re not looking at the big social picture.  If that is really the only thing you care about…you’re only using sales media, not social.  Some might completely disagree with me, mainly folks from the school of believing that anything and every thing you do absolutely has to tie back to revenue.  It’s a hardcore belief, and, those that do lean towards this theory probably don’t care as much about the actual social community.  Fair enough – everyone is entitled to their own theories and strategy, but with social media as it sits right now for businesses, there are several other measures that spell success.

I do agree that your messaging, content and overall social strategy should absolutely tie back to business goals.  After all, your brand’s social media presence is still your brand.  What you do socially should still resonate with your audience as an extension of your brand.  That being said, that doesn’t mean that your social media presence has to directly gain revenue to be “successful.”  Untitled-1

If you run a print ad in a magazine you might be able to track some conversion based off a specific phone number, a QR code with a tag, or a special url, but for the most part you really don’t know how many people saw that ad and said, “Cool, I think I might act on this, but just not right now.”  That’s a lot like how specific messaging and content works in social media.  If you are trying to push an action, for example, your post has a call to action to click on a link and buy something.  A very salesy post (not ideal).  You’re able to see stats on how many clicks it got and also how many sales transpired through the link from the post, but what about the thousands of people that saw the post and did nothing?  Just because they didn’t create a “stat” doesn’t mean the messaging didn’t work.  Who knows, they might have written themselves a reminder on a post-it note to act on it next week and purchase by another means.  You would never have that stat as a result of your social media campaign.

This is why just looking at direct revenue from social media as the only measure of success is incorrect.

Social media is supposed to be social.  Not just for sales.

You can absolutely track the sales that do occur, but just don’t forget to consider all of the other people your content reached and understand that you just don’t know what affect it might have had on them.  Social stats only tell the story of those that decide to act on a piece of content (a like, comment, share, retweet, etc).  I find myself often times seeing something and really liking it, but not necessarily “liking” it.

What if you are a brand that has a social/digital presence but your products are only sold in person; in a store?  How could you possibly measure social success?  Determine what social ROI means for your company first and foremost.  Is it engagement?  Awareness?  Reach?  Referrals to a website?  Revenue generated via social campaigns?  Other?  There are a slew of things that could be defined as having a return on your social media investment.  Prioritize.  Once that’s nailed down, look at ways that you could actually directly impact the behavior of consumers in store, by way of your social presence.  One idea might be to create a special social-media-community-only loyalty program.  Develop a mobile loyalty “card” that literally can be accessed on their phone to scan when they purchase products in the store.  They get a special social media discount on certain products/LTOs.  You get their data from their in-store action.  Everybody is happy.   This is just one idea – you have to get creative.  There is always something that can be done to break through that clutter.  Social can impact how people behave when not in front of their computer or mobile screen.

I am a firm believer that engagement is where the meat of social success lies.  What stories are people creating from your content?  How “viral” did your content go based on your community interacting with it?  What kind of reach did your content have due to shares and retweets?  This is where you can measure how you are doing with what you’re putting out there.  And I do acknowledge that many people reached don’t act and register an engagement stat (I just said it above).  However, I think this is a far better representation of success as related to the purpose of social media than just making money.

Sales messages and posts are not what people are looking for socially.  Users are not spending hours a day on Facebook to buy stuff, or to be told what they might want to buy.  They want to be entertained.  This is why cat photos go viral.   And while a sales media strategy might work here and there, it shouldn’t be your #1 goal.

Entertain your community with great content relevant to why they liked your page in the first place, establish a content strategy that speaks from your brand, and the loyalty will continue to grow.  Build a solid base of fans and followers (that doesn’t necessarily mean a big one, just a solid one) that actually come back for more because of great content, and these people will be more inclined to eventually spend money with you… Revenue will happen; it just might not happen straight from social media.   So, don’t expect it to.

(The opinions are only those of Jeff Werkheiser)

should your brand be social?

The answer to this question has been forever changing over the last several years.  Brands are fickle.  Some hop on social media right away and ride it out for a while and then get darn right sick of it.  Some think they aren’t seeing any ROI so they peace out.  Some have no idea what ROI means with social media so they pretty much have no strategy, fail, and peace out.  Some partake in social media simply because they think that’s what you are supposed to do in 2012.  Other brands love social media and are locked in for sticking it out.  The latter are typically the brands that know what they’re doing, or, have a community manager that knows what they’re doing.

So, should your brand be social?

This is kind of a trick question because I believe that any brand can utilize social media to their benefit in some way, shape, or form.  So, the answer is yes.

There are a few things brands need to remember when building out a social strategy to make sure this works for their brand:

  • What platform(s) make the most sense? Brands don’t need to be on 14 different social media channels simply because they think that makes them look cooler or more “with it” or whatever their reasoning might be.  Different platforms have different fan-bases, tools, resources, conversations, and methods for connecting with fans.  Some are all visual, some are information-based, some do several different things.  Take a look at the socialsphere and determine that for your brand, with who you are trying to talk to and connect with, what are the best ways to do this?
  • What is your goal for social media? Over the last few years the main version of ROI has always been “how much revenue are you producing through your social channels?”  Not anymore.  That is still definitely a component to some social ROI strategies, but it’s not the only one by any means.  Maybe you are really going after connecting with new demographics and fan-bases, or you just want to build brand awareness.  Or, the engagement piece driven through conversations is #1 on your list.  Figure out by prioritizing – what are your goals?  Revenue?  Engagement?  Brand awareness?  Put your pieces in order and build out from there.
  • What kind of content will you be putting out there? Have an idea in place for what kind of awesome stuff you want your fans to see.  And make sure these aren’t the same across all social platforms.  Again, different platforms have different fans, conversations and uses – don’t be lazy and auto post from one account to all of your accounts.  That is the opposite of social media.  That is robot media.  Do you have great photos to put out there?  Funny videos making your brand and products look more human?  Will you do some contests or sweepstakes?  Embrace your community and you’ll gradually find out what they like as you go.
  • Know your voice. This is an element that perfects over time.  You don’t just kick off a new social media presence and have an amazing voice that everyone loves, however, you can know certain elements.  Short and sweet?  Witty but friendly?  Robotic and sales-pitchy (hope not!)? Helpful and approachable?  Quick to respond?  And probably the most important: human.  You’ll get a feel for how to respond, how to deal with negative posts, and how to put new content out there as you go.  Voice can be tricky, but finding it and sticking to it is huge.  Fans will come to expect the voice you land on, they’ll get to know it, and this will become and extension of your brand and public relations arm.

These four items above are  key components and very important when building out a social strategy, however, they are the tip of the iceberg.  Social community management and strategy can get very, very deep.  Anything beyond what I say above needs to be discussed over beers, however.