James E. Bishop

Social Media or Social Marketing is overwhelming. This is especially the case for the B-to-B world since, in many ways, this group has moved slowly in embracing the Internet for the purpose of marketing and communicating. Now, on top of all of the other caveats to Internet Marketing, many are seeing this dimension come into play and there is more to learn. Going forward, this will be a critical component to your business and it is not a matter of “Do I want to develop a Social Media plan”? It’s a matter of HOW SOON can you develop and implement a Social Media plan? This is what this writing is about.

A recent study released by Business.com of 3,000 Professionals across the United States indicates that Social Media is alive and vibrant within the professional environment. Some of the compelling statistics that stood out:

-69% indicate they use Webinars and Podcasts to obtain business information
- 83% Chose Facebook as the overriding favorite of the social networks
- 7 social sites - The average company that responded stated they participated in
- 65% of them staffing the initiatives in-house
- 71% of responding companies had less than 2 years experience using social networks

If this doesn’t validate that business professionals use social media then perhaps the fact that LinkedIn (a business social site) has over 50,000,000 registered users or that Facebook is adding 500,000 New Users each day should confirm this.

Data is out there to support the growth of Internet usage, for social purposes, among business professionals. As a result of this expansive growth, many sites have risen to the heights of popularity and each of these domains has unique functions that have propelled them to this status.

The more that a company looks at this as an expense of resources and weighs the pros and cons of such an endeavor, the more risk they face at missing the opportunity to get people connected to them. Meanwhile, their customers and prospects are thriving online and excitedly, they’re connecting with like minded individuals in many different ways. They’re connecting on Community sites like LinkedIn, Plaxo, CR4, Facebook, or any of the other popular domains. More myopically… they’re connected in Groups within these sites. They are most certainly connecting! Realistically, a company should look at this more as an investment of resources than an expense of resources.

In the following paragraphs I am going to explain the core components of what you can do to begin this plan and start servicing the people that matter most to your company. By no means is this a detailed plan. I will make suggestions using components that are FREE or of minimal cost. The most costly component will be time.

At the end of the day what you hope to create is a funnel. At the wide end, you message the masses in many ways in order to create interest in you and your Community. In the middle, you have your Virtual Community which is where your clients and prospects interact with peers and your company’s pros. The small end of the funnel is your website or your company directly. The result is keeping your people close to you and doing so in a way where they do not feel the pressure of sales but feel the essence of inclusion and bond.

The components that you should look to utilize in fulfilling the core of your initial plan are Management, Messaging, Community, and Participation.

Management – Designate a person or team that will dedicate time to organizing, implementing, and managing this side of your business. This is not a full time responsibility yet but it will be down the road. In time, you will want to create a position to act as the liaison to the aggregated Community. In the interim, it can be managed simply as part of the day to day tasks of your current team with an understanding that this piece of your current marketing effort will undoubtedly grow.

One of the initial responsibilities will be research identifying where the hot spots are on the net that attract your buyers. You can find this out by simply polling your current database and asking them directly where they go, what they do, and why they see value in these venues. You should also look to your current advertising partners and vendors. Ask them what they’re doing to satisfy their subscriber’s desire for Community. If they are active, they are working right now on this very same service. You will want to know what they are doing. Spend time using Search Engines to locate all of the domains that operate in the fields of expertise that your clients and prospects do. Search the groups and gatherings within these popular sites (And join them). Also, consider spending time speaking with some students at colleges that are pursuing careers in your target markets. Why? These important people will be buying your stuff in the coming years. They have their ear closer to the ground regarding the Internet and emerging technologies than you could possibly imagine. These folks will keep you ahead of the curve going forward.

You are gathering this information for two reasons. First, you’re going to be engaging with these resources to capture mind share, develop a following, and ultimately bring awareness of your Community. Secondly, in this process you will be developing an understanding of how this whole Community thing works. You will gain valuable knowledge that can then be leveraged in the construction of your own Community..

Community – All of the research that you have accumulated is for the purpose of escorting people into your Community of clients, prospects, and in-house pros. One of the benefits of having an established Community is that you can communicate, in near real-time, with your constituents. You can immediately get messaging out that could influence positive perceptions and have them work for you in utilizing the tools of Social Media to spread the word. Adversely, you can address and resolve many situations that could point a negative light on your company in venues that you are not active in.

A good place to start would be a facebook fan page on facebook.com. Developing this area is pretty simple and I’ve provided a link on the right (and within). From a personal perspective, your targets have a familiarity with this venue as it pertains to keeping up with their own personal networks. Facebook gives you the opportunity to be where they are. It means that you are in their neighborhood. Your clients and prospects can become “Fans” of your business page and they can see what other “Fans” have to say about their experiences with your company. Facebook, like a mini-site within a site, also gives you additional functions to provide for your “Fans” including Events, Additional Info, Press, Discussions, Video, and a “Wall” which becomes your primary landing page. People speak on your wall in the form of brief messages. The nuances of this informative resource can be discussed in a later writing but it is a powerful ancillary benefit of Social Media.

I referenced Facebook and strongly encourage you to have a presence here but you will find other reputable venues that offer similar functions. You should be there too. Do not limit your exposure and take advantage of every venue out there that is relevant to your demographic. However; you should make every effort to point them to a single source and I do think that Facebook is a good place. It is all about Aggregate and the more people that you can get to stick to your Community the better off you will be in terms of management, analysis, and messaging.

Good examples of Business Fan Pages: Sprint - GM – Girl Scouts – Papa Johns Pizza. (Require facebook registration to access)

Messaging  – This is the fan to the fire of your Community build and management. NO ONE will know that your Community exists unless you make them aware. You will want to harvest your House List and create an ongoing campaign that encourages them to seek out and join your Community. A series of email messages incorporating the link to your Community and informing them what you hope to accomplish with their involvement. Additionally, this message should be included in your periodic Newsletters and informative correspondences. Many of the resources outlined above offer the ability to embed your link to your representation in the form of a graphic in your emails and websites. USE THEM!!!

Going forward, this will become a permanent inclusion in all of your marketing and communications. Hundreds of millions of connected individuals have spoken in the form of action that this is here to stay. Once you create the Community you will always see the need to feed it. You should require the links as part of the email Signature of each employee, include logos and links on letter head, speak of it in your automated telecom systems, and include it in ALL Mar-Com materials. You need to drive people to your Community page. This is NOT about traffic. The more encouragement you give to your prospects and clients to enter and contribute to your Community, the more effective it will be for you. The best way to encourage is to consistently keep access to this portal at the fingertips of people you want to be close to your company.

Participation – This is where you get other members of the company on board and involved with your Community. Designate a representative from Customer Service, Sales, IT, etc. to keep an eye on the subject matter being discussed and to access the messaging features that you choose to utilize. Near real-time response goes a long way today in satisfying a question, comment, concern, or buying question. Put your best people in line to represent your company to your Community.

In addition to your own Community site, your company can gain a lot of credibility in other forms of participation within the sites that feed your Community. I have referenced LinkedIn a number of times and I do so as I believe that this is a great resource in meeting and connecting with like minded professionals across all spectrums of careers. In the sense of participation LinkedIn has a fantastic number of Groups that represent everything from Candy Makers (1,900 Members) to Orthopedic Surgeons (295 Members). In these groups are ways to seek job opportunities, review the latest news, and post & participate in discussions. It would only add value to your brand and the build of your Community if you had people from your company involved in these Groups as well. Again, you will want your company representative to communicate their messaging in non-salesy language and provide access to your Community page or corresponding web page (which also will have a link on it that can allow a person clicking-through to join your Community / Fan Page). Also you can look to your Vendors and their websites as a forum to leverage your community. Talk with them to understand how you can interact with their members as well. It could be through editorial content, sponsorships, advertising tools, or they could have Groups within their domains that allow your people to participate in discussions or answer relevant questions. The objective is introducing people to your Community.

Twitter - What is it and how can it help me help my business grow? Simply put, twitter is a real-time short messaging service that works over multiple networks and devices.(their words exactly). This is how it works: You set up an account under your company name and you begin “tweeting” (sending relevant 140 character messages from your account to your followers). You get followers in a number of ways. You broadcast your twitter name in all of your media and communications and get followers organically, you can share “tweets” with informative content and your followers will “re-tweet” out to their network increasing followers if your content is valuable to them, and you can share tweets sent to you from your network of followers with the rest of your followers. There are certainly many other ways to increase followers but they are complicated and best saved for a later time. These basic methods will build your following and over time, you will be quite surprised at the ongoing growth. The key to success using twitter is to continuously feed the following with relevant information w/o trying to sell to them. Whether it’s a new Data Sheet, New Product Announcement, Appointment of Personnel, Discount, Recall, Discontinuation, Award, Acquisition, New Technology, New Equipment, New Client, Webinar, On-line Video, Job Opening, Investor Messaging, and anything else that positively influences your company’s perception within your constituency. Twitter allows you to get messages out in real time in 140 character snippets. Twitter, is an extension of your company’s Mar-Com resources and doesn’t necessarily tie directly into the Community environment being discussed here. However, your presence and participation within this domain allows for a number of ways to direct people back to your Community and to your website. This is another piece of the Social Media puzzle.

Social Media on the Cheap is possible and not that difficult an endeavor.

1) Create a Fan Page on Facebook

2) Involve yourself with as many social networking resources as possible

3) Create Profiles of your company everywhere possible

4) Encourage employees to contribute to discussions / answer relevant questions

5) Blog about business issues your company can resolve

6) above all else – point them back to a Community (Facebook Fan Page) and allow them functions to interact with you and with each other.

The reality of Social Marketing or Social Media is that it really is not that overwhelming. It does require an investment of time in terms of management as well as learning the tools that are at your disposal. If you begin by developing a plan utilizing these simple resources you have the starting point in creating your own personal foot print in the world of Social Media. More importantly, you are on the way to creating a long term relationship with all of the people that matter most to your business’ success.

My Two Cents…

I go to your website after seeing an advertisement on another site. After learning a little more about your company and your capabilities, I give you my personal contact information through some sort of registration process as I have an interest in what you do. A day or two passes by and the memory of my visit to your website quickly fades as I have probably been to several other websites. Maybe seeing something on your website prompted me to start researching similar companies to see if their capabilities match or exceed yours. Maybe I registered on their websites too. A week passes and I’m heavy into my analysis for the next project that I am working on. Two weeks removed from my visit to your website and I’ve moved on to my next phase of my project. 23 days after my visit to your website I get a telephone call from one of your sales professionals asking about my interest in your company. She is disappointed that not only did she have to explain to me who your company is but to also hear that I’ve since made a purchase from one of your competitors.

In the new millennium the selling landscape has changed dramatically in favor of the customer. The Internet has erased many boundaries that once existed for us in terms of the amount of ‘pre-purchase’ research we can do. This includes, and is not limited to, price comparison, product comparison (measuring one product against a similar), value-added services (Warranties, maintenance, freebies, etc…), availability, and even finding out what other buyers have to say about it.

Gone are the days when we have to buy what was stocked at our local store/distributor. And when we were only aware of what was being promoted in a favorite magazine or on TV. Gone too, are the days when our local sales rep was the trusted source of all knowledge encompassing “that product”. Heck, even the days when we were loyal to a specific brand are history. We do not live in that world any longer! Today, we have the power of research at our finger tips and most of us leverage it whenever we can. We, as consumers in just about every realm of the buying world (whether in B2B or B2C), are empowered with the ability to make smarter buying decisions. What’s more powerful than that? Well, how about the notion that we can pull the trigger on a purchase when WE are ready?

All of this plays into the scenario above. With all of the power that we as consumers have in decision making, there are fewer opportunities to get in front of us buyers during the “Selling/Buying Cycle”. The fact is in challenging times the buyers are further apart and harder to get to. What surprises me is the lack of effort that XYZ’s company extended in trying to win my business. They had all of my contact information, knew what I was looking at, and had the opportunity to immediately market or sell to me in a One to One setting. They failed miserably in seizing my attention at a point in time when I was interested in their products. They failed in either not training the Sales group to be more diligent in following up with their ‘leads’ in an expedient fashion or they failed in waiting 3 weeks to act on my interest.

Let’s flash back ten years to 1999. If I was interested in a your product I would call an 800 number from an advertisement in a magazine, call an 800 number that was on a television show, or stop by a local store. In all aspects I would engage with a person who would then have my attention and answer my questions and then direct me through a ‘controlled’ buying process. Today, if I have an interest after seeing an advertisement in a magazine or on TV I can go to several destinations on the Internet, learn what I need to about the product, and buy it whenever and wherever I want..

I posted a poll on LinkedIn for 1 week between March 31, 2009 and April 7, 2009. The poll asked the participants how they would compare a fully registered website generated to the following types of Lead Events:

A Purchased List Lead
A Trade Show Lead
A Call-In Lead
A Walk-In Retail Lead

http://polls.linkedin.com/poll-results/30210/xazce

Not the most scientific poll I agree. It generated 169 responses and was accessible in Groups where Sales and Marketing Professionals frequent. The resulting answers did not surprise me any. 58% Compared a website generated Lead Event to either a Call-In or Walk-In Lead. Moreover, 91% compared website generated Lead Events to a Trade Show Lead or better. NINETY-ONE Percent!

Now, would you wait 3 weeks to call on or market to any of those three Lead Events? Believe it or not, this is not an uncommon story. Many companies do not put enough effort behind the follow up of website generated Lead Events. Unfortunately, most businesses lack a clear cut method or campaign that addresses people that are raising their hands and expressing an interest in the very products that they’re marketing.

This is not to say that everyone that comes to your website or generates these types of Lead Events is coming to your door with a bag of money in hand wanting to buy 6,000 widgets. What it does signify is that these people have intent and interest when they arrive at your website or the portal that provides these Lead types. They’ve given you valuable information in exchange for your information and hence the sales cycle begins (Or should begin).

Companies will spend thousands of dollars to buy lists of people who may or may not have an interest in their products or services only to spend thousands more dollars to market to these maybe or maybe not interested people. Companies will also spend tens of thousands of dollars in marketing to drive people to their website and still approach any lead generation with lackadaisical enthusiasm if any enthusiasm at all.

This ailment doesn’t necessarily limit itself to marketing departments; it permeates the sales division also. All too often the Sales Professional will pick up the telephone on a website generated Lead Event and bluntly ask the prospect “How many do you want to buy today?” Without any sort of qualification, they assume that the person had their wallet out while they were typing in the web address. As with any Lead Generation, Sales Training is important when following up these Lead types. Understanding the motive or intent of the prospect is critical. How did they get there? What did they do while they were there? How does the complexity of your sales cycle influence the type of sales messaging? (If you’re selling valve actuators to the municipality industry your sales cycle is far more complex than someone selling golf clubs)?

These Lead Events can offer a ton of value in the long term as well. With each prospect you are growing your ‘House List’ and increasing the breadth of your pipeline. In challenging times like we are experiencing today, a substantive House List can impact the bottom line with less dollars being invested into external marketing. (See my blog ‘2009 – the Year of Frugality ‘)

In 2009 the buying process has changed. The buyer is now in control and the longer you wait to address them after they have expressed interest you are going to lose the sale. The Shelf Life of a website generated Lead Event is as long as the attention span of an interested buyer:

It lives as long as a gallon of milk left on the breakfast table in direct sunlight.

My two cents…