Years ago social networking was just a way for cool kids to talk to each other but now it’s the hottest trend in marketing. Smart businesses know it, and it’s clear resellers that do not get involved will lose out. It wasn’t that long ago everyone expected a company to have a web site; now consumers expect them to have a presence on Facebook and Twitter.
Trouble is many Australian businesses are ignoring this trend. According to the latest survey by Sensis and the Australian Interactive Media Industry Association (AIMIA), only half the large businesses in Australia work with social media. It’s a lost opportunity – 62 percent of Australian internet users have a presence on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and LinkedIn. Many are using these sites to research products.
Australia’s enormous uptake of social networking is a big opportunity for resellers.
A number of trends are emerging. The first is that social networking has gone mobile. It fits in with the growth of mobile commerce. With the smartphone, social networks would allow resellers to respond to consumers in real time. Already, interesting trends are emerging. US apparel retailer Express, for example, has a commerce tab on its Facebook page allowing customers to buy from its entire product catalogue without turning up at the store. Facebook’s launch of its “Places” service last year is another case in point. Last November, Facebook launched a deals program in the US allowing retailers and other merchants to offer coupons and specials through a mobile phone and linked to the spot identified in “Places”. Retailers can tap into this feature with products, sales, and buying ideas.
This means resellers should look at getting Facebook pages as well as Twitter and LinkedIn accounts. They could even look at a YouTube account to present videos. Imagine the impact of running case studies of clients using your products.
Companies active in the social media space include Absolut vodka, which uses an online video ABSOLUTworld and has a Facebook page, Boeing, General Electric, Motorola and Dell which run blogs. They are using it to build credibility, foster communication with customers and boost sales.
Many companies, such as Ernst and Young, now use social media for recruiting. Smart resellers should look at using LinkedIn to recruit quality switched-on staff, particularly generation Y.
A survey out of North America found that generation Y is turning to LinkedIn instead of newspapers to find jobs. According to the survey, 28 percent say they will use LinkedIn to find a job, compared with 7 percent the previous year. Newspaper ads are becoming less popular, with 28 percent saying they would turn to newspapers, compared with 34 percent for the previous year.
Other companies are using social media to drive innovation and ideas. Many companies are now turning to the people most engaged with the product and brand. They are creating public online forums that tap into customers’ ideas.
In 2008, for example, Starbucks launched a major initiative called My Starbucks Idea that polls members on decisions that would most directly impact them. This has been hailed as the “poster child” of social media success. Many people have pointed to it as a shining example of what you can get when you listen to your customers.
But it’s not that simple and creating these sorts of social media interactions are fraught with challenges. If resellers don’t implement customers’ suggestions,
or at least show signs that they are taking them on board, the entire exercise would come across as a shallow promise and would do the brand a lot of damage. If it’s just a gimmick or if you’re doing it to be like your competitors, customers will sniff it out quickly.
Social media can also make executives more accountable to staff. One of the best examples is accountancy firm Deloitte which is very much a pioneer in the social networking space. It has a community online platform called Yammer which includes an “ask us” function on the firm’s Facebook page. Yammer works like an internal discussion board. Anybody can post a response to a message. People can exchange ideas and send real-time messages. Yammer works as an “enterprise-Twitter” that helps break down departmental walls. The company’s chief executive officer, Giam Swiegers, says it means employees can discuss issues with managers on Yammer, even disagree with them. Managers need to take it on board.
At the same time, if companies are taking to social media they need to follow certain rules. They have to be upfront, and truthful, relevant, tactful, polite, guarded so as protect confidential information and not get themselves in legal hot water and comply with all regulations, laws and rules.
Social media has become the way of the future for business. But it does create management challenges. For resellers, it’s a great opportunity to get closer to clients, tap into more prospects, recruit talented staff and develop new ideas by generating conversations with customers. In a crowded market space, that would be a competitive advantage.
Talking, and listening, to the customer
It’s an acquired skill that places demands on an organisation, but the rewards of using social media are cost-effective marketing
Service provider Brennan IT has taken to social media to get into conversations with its customers. In June, the firm repackaged its web site to include blogs and links to its accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube.
Brennan’s marketing campaigns manager Robin Marchant sees it as a way of creating deeper connections with the customer and drawing in new prospects.
“We are creating something that’s a lot more engaging and conversational,’’ Marchant says. “We are engaging through communication and conversation.”
Customers and prospects are invited to post comments on the company blog, or post a comment on YouTube when Brennan runs a video. Marchant says it’s not about selling, it’s about getting the customer to think about how they could do things differently.
The blogs and YouTube presentations, for example, might look at matters like tax tips, how to improve the bottom line by saving money across the business, how to create a consistent set of costs instead of something that fluctuates wildly, where to find smart iPhone apps that make the business more efficient or how to create business efficiencies through Green IT. It’s not a hard sell, it’s just raising issues.
“As opposed to saying you get all these benefits with this product we are selling you, we are instead saying have you thought about it from this point of view?” Marchant says.
“These days we are bombarded with messages left, right and centre so this is a way of creating a platform where we can get a thought leadership approach and a bit more dialogue with our customers.
“We are not just a blank face between four walls, there are people within the organisation you can connect to. It’s something that’s transparent but equally tangible as well. If you are offering products and services, it’s important to turn the intangible into something that is tangible. We are trying to open people’s eyes to a different way of thinking potentially.
“It’s about thought leadership where people can trust and rely on us to provide some good content that they can take away. We are hoping to educate our customers and consumers.”
The company, for example, is planning to run one or two video case studies a month showing how customers and companies use Brennan products and services to tackle particular issues. Brennan IT will make sure the issues are similar to those others face. “It plants the seed in someone’s mind if they’re experiencing the same issue,’’ Marchant says.
It’s all very new so Brennan at this stage is targeting the entire space occupied by its customer base.
Its KPIs are simple: traffic generated and brand awareness. “We want people to be viewing it, it comes down to the traffic and how many hits on the video,’’ he says. “It comes down to brand awareness, we want to see the benefit of pushing the brand out because we are a business and that’s what we do.”
Marchant says every comment needs to be responded to. The company has people inside who have the job of monitoring anything that comes in and responding. Not to do so would create a lot of damage.
“If somebody posts a comment, you have to be on to that very quickly. It’s not a matter of fire and forget, it’s a matter of constant monitoring and constant activity,’’ he says.
“You can do damage if you post a video and leave it there and say it has 500 hits, isn’t that wonderful, but at the same time, you have 27 messages in your inbox and you don’t respond. You have to respond to those very tactfully and efficiently. You are engaging with someone you have never spoken to before”.
As a marketing tool, he says social media is more cost effective. That’s one of the things that makes it so appealing as a business tool. “At a time when budgets are being looked at and you pretty much have to have an RoI on everything that goes out to the market place, it helps create an activity of cost effective marketing,’’ he says. “A lot of the tools are free; the only cost is the time in the business.”
But, as he says, there is a catch.
“It’s only cost effective if you’re managing it. You need to make sure somebody is taking responsibility and ownership.”
He says social media is a marketing model that has a very different target. “You are targeting business but it really is the people within those businesses you are connecting to. They have their own personal agenda, their own personal likes and dislikes. You have to try and come to those people versus the very large machine that’s the organisation.’’
And that is a completely different marketing proposition. It’s not something that’s mass produced; it’s more finely targeted.
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