What Makes a Social Media Strategy Work?

In my last post (below), I discussed the 4 levels at which companies are using social media. In this post, I look at another key result of my study - the 5 key things a firm needs to get right if its social media strategy is to work.

1. Clarity of Intent. For a firm’s foray into social media to be successful, its intent in terms of what it seeks to achieve from the exercise must be clear. In the case of Ford (the example I used in my last post below), the objective is very simple – position the company as open, honest and transparent. With Zappos they’re clear too – they want to be selling culture not shoes. Kickstarting the exercise with clarity of such nature is key to success.

2. Clear understanding of the medium. Social media works differently to traditional media. There are some things a brand can and can’t do. It would be a mistake for example to sell overtly on certain social media territories like Facebook. Moderation of content while always tempting is frowned upon by communities. They’re there to give opinions – brands that are afraid to accept them shouldn’t play in the space.

3. Adequate resource investment. Social media strategies require resource to manage them. People will comment, and brands will need to respond appropriately. Resource needs to be in place to allow them to do so. Nothing is worse than an untended initiative. And there are many of them by way of corporate pages on sites like Facebook. They get no traffic and damage rather than enhance the profiles of brands.

4. Dynamic not static engagement approach. It’s good to go in with a plan. It’s also good to keep the plan fluid. This can make the approach consistent but also responsive. Things change very quickly in the digital world. One needs to keep a close eye on change to ensure one’s strategy is always dynamic – and aligned to shifts that may be taking place in the market.

5. Management commitment. The last point that’s important for companies, once they launch themselves into the social media arena is to stay committed to it. Many brands, particularly if their strategy is designed to operate at a corporate level receive initial flak based on perception or earlier decisions. We are seeing that happen to the Pope in a big way for example. It’s all a natural process of catharsis. If a brand is serious about its social media strategy it will learn from it. And if it does, it will use the knowledge gained to improve the way it conducts its operations.

Social media is here to stay
It will soon, if it doesn’t already, exert an influence on the way your company is perceived at a corporate, brand, product or service level. By understanding how social media works (see previous post below), companies can harness its might to develop a powerful strategy to build a clear advantage for themselves over competitors.