Posts Tagged ‘best practices’

Build Your Social Media Strategy With Rocks and Sand

09.09.18

Social media is taking off right now. It’s all over the traditional media; there are books on it being released in every direction, and everyone seems to be on at least one of the various social networks, be it Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace or any other.

Meanwhile, from a business perspective it feels like every company we talk to is at least including social media in its plans; in many cases it’s front and centre.

Some of those companies immediately look for the “quick wins” – campaigns that will get them immediate bang for their buck. In those cases. it can be difficult to explain what I believe to be the truth:

Quick wins are difficult in social media and it’s often ill-advised to seek them. Social media works best as a long-term initiative.

Can of stonesWe occasionally use (and wreck) a ‘rocks and sand’ metaphor when thinking about social media. You can have a jar full of rocks in it, but there are lots of gaps. To truly full it, you need sand to fill them. Social media is similar – you can have lots of big campaigns, but for your efforts to truly pay off you need the ’sand’ – the long-term foundation that keeps everything in place.

What is that foundation? It’s the infrastructure you build – the policies, training and workflow that keeps things running smoothly. It’s the executive support that lets you move beyond a publicity-based approach. It’s the listening program that lets you identify issues early and learn from ongoing conversation. It’s the ongoing presence that gives you the credibility to maximize those short-term pushes.

Bottom line: it’s the fundamentals.

Try to push ahead with your ‘big rocks’ without the ’sand’ and you’ll come up short, with holes in your plans.

(Image: Shutterstock)

Posted in: best practices, social media

Tags: , ,

30Comments

Twitter Follow-Back Fail

09.01.14

I’ve just crossed 2,500 followers on Twitter; double the number of people who read this site. I follow roughly 680.

That means I follow roughly a quarter of the people that follow me.

I’m no A-lister (I’m many thousands of followers and a large ego short of that). I’m a communications professional, not a professional blogger. I don’t have the bandwidth to follow thousands of people while doing my job.

If you follow me I appreciate it, but don’t expect me to automatically follow you back.

So how do I decide who to follow back? Here are my five suggestions on how to go about it.

@ replies

Far and away the most common thing that causes me to follow someone is them sending me a message or engaging with me in a conversation. I’m looking for interaction and conversation when I use Twitter, so demonstrating that you’re interested in conversations about the same things that interest me raises the odds that I’ll follow exponentially.

Real name

I filter my follower-notification emails into a folder. Occasionally I’ll scan through those emails. If I see a topic or company name, unless it’s a brand I’m particularly interested in I’m unlikely to even click through to the Twitter profile to see if it’s interesting. However, this isn’t enough to guarantee a follow on its own.

Relevant bio

If I click through to someone’s profile, I immediately look at their bio information. I look for people who live near me; people who work in similar jobs and people with similar interests. If there’s no bio, it lowers the chances I’ll follow. If I find the bio compelling, I’ll either follow there and then or keep looking.

Website

If the bio is compelling, the next thing I look at is the person’s website. I’m more likely to follow people who write about things that interest me.

Messages posted

The last thing I’ll look at is the kind of things they’re posting. You might think this would be higher-up the list, but it’s a bit more of a crap-shoot – people won’t always post on-topic. Twitter is all about conversations, and sometimes they veer off-topic. So, a person’s updates are the last thing I look at. I look at how people are posting (if updates are all fed through RSS feeds it’s a no-go), whether they broadcast or converse (the former is a no-follow) and general topics.

There you have it – my five things to look at when you’re deciding whether to follow someone back.

This is a very personal thing – different people look for different things. Some people follow everyone back; others filter. How do you approach it?

Posted in: Twitter, best practices

Tags: , ,

20Comments

Avoiding The Dark Side Of Social Media

09.01.07

If you look at social media as a collective group of instruments, the exciting part is that it’s, well, social. The discussion; the interaction; the dialogue is the game changer here.

Unfortunately, all too often the tone of discussion fails to live up to its potential. Just today, the Globe and Mail (re)stated its policy of closing comments on all Middle East stories:

"Past experience has demonstrated that too many people post racist, vulgar, abusive and offensive comments, often encouraging violence against specific individuals or peoples whenever we open comments on such stories."

air_force_web_posting_response_assessmentThe tone of discussion on other newspaper sites often falls to these levels too. Meanwhile, the commentary on sites like YouTube is notoriously vulgar.

Still, constructive and valuable conversations persist throughout the Internet using "social" tools. It’s these that offer the potential for businesses. The question for us as marketers and communications professionals is, how do we encourage and foster these discussions while keeping out the trolls?

Choose your issues carefully. If you write about politics, religion or similar types of topics, you’re going to attract controversy. Does your company need to wade into geo-political issues? In most cases, the chances are it won’t. If you do, be prepared for (sometimes over-)heated commentary.

State and enforce a comment policy. Set the boundaries on your properties and stick to those boundaries.

Establish a process for engaging online. Decide the criteria that will determine whether you engage with a specific post or not. The US Air Force’s process has done the rounds online recently (thanks to Joey deVilla for flagging it). It features a series of questions which determine whether the post in question is one with which you should engage. Devise your own process, or use this one – it’s solid.

Practice what you preach. Be respectful to others, particularly if they disagree with you or vice versa. Remember, disagreement with you isn’t always a personal attack on you. Criticism can be good.

Don’t poke the trolls. Some people are just out to offend or to pick a fight. Don’t let them. Again, criticism is fine; attacks aren’t. Don’t respond to the latter unless you have to.

Know the rules of the game. Old-school marketing tactics are frequently received poorly in social media forums. Know what you’re getting into and know how to navigate the murky, nuanced waters of each venue in which you engage. If you’re not sure, get some professional advice (ahem).

What other tips would you offer?

Posted in: best practices, social media

Tags: , , , ,

16Comments