Robert Beadle's Social Media Marketing Blog

I speak with a lot of PR and marketing managers who are interested in adopting a social media marketing program for their company and the inevitable question always comes up, “How much is this going to cost us?”

My answer – “Nothing more than you’re already spending.”

This raises some eyebrows.  “How can we get the benefits of social media without additional spending?”

With the economic slump that shows no signs of letting up anytime soon, companies are getting used to tightening their belts and doing more with less.  But if this turbulent time has taught us anything, it’s that we must get the most bang for our buck.

Many companies rely upon advertising as the “safe” marketing activity, yet the return on investment is generally low.  Some companies do not even calculate their advertising ROI.

However, the ROI of social media marketing can be calculated and there are many ways to tie your activities directly to your bottom line.

First, it is important to understand that “social media” are a set of tools, NOT a strategy.  The strategy comes from your public relations department in the form of corporate social responsibility events (CSR).  These newsworthy events, which you run for the benefit of your local community, gain you valuable attention in the local media and generate good will toward your brand.  They are also a mechanism for you to engage audiences on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, your blog and other social media.

Companies that organize these CSR events on a regular basis, promote them via social media and register their participants, will build a database of customer leads and thus have ROI measures pre-built into their campaigns.

It is the job of PR to generate publicity, a positive reputation and leads.  It is the job of your sales people to convert those leads into customers.  At the conclusion of this sales cycle, your company will now be able to cross-reference new customers with the database you created during your social responsibility events and see your rate of conversion on paper.

So how do you do this without spending any more money?  It’s simple.  Reallocate 50 percent of your funding from a low ROI activity, such as advertising, to a high ROI activity such as social media-powered corporate responsibility campaign.  You’ve just multiplied the value of your dollar several times.

I have advised many organizations about how to create newsworthy social responsibility events, which tap the word-of-mouth marketing power of social media networks.  Write me at Robert@northeastpr.com for a no-obligation consultation.

[This is the third article in my “thought leadership” series.]

Now that you have conducted some research on your customers and identified their most common questions and concerns, it’s time to put that knowledge to use in your content marketing campaign.

Sometimes blogging simply does not provide the length or depth needed to adequately cover a topic or answer a complex question for a company’s target audience.  Enter the e-book*.

An e-book is a PDF-formatted document that:

• Identifies a market problem.
• Supplies an answer to the problem.
• Is targeted to a specific group of people.

A typical e-book (a.k.a. free report) is 10-30 pages in length, presented in landscape format with a color design and often includes images, illustrations, charts and graphs, if appropriate to the topic.  In contrast to a white paper, the e-book is designed to have an entertainment and motivational element behind its educational purpose.  It should be fun to read.

This is where your survey system becomes important.  If your company understands customers’ needs and challenges, it can begin to create an editorial plan for e-books which precisely target specific groups and provide answers to their questions.

Types of e-books include, but are not limited to:

• “How-to” (steps to accomplish a task).
• Top 10 lists (to solve a problem).
• Reports based upon research.

The e-book should be posted to your company’s online library or resource page and heavily promoted via news releases, newsletters, your blog, social media sites and other channels as appropriate.

If the e-book is a “hit” among the first readers, they will often share it with their friends, creating a word-of-mouth marketing effect, which will send more interested prospects to your company’s website for more information.

*This term is not to be confused with the type of “e-books” available for purchase and download for an electronic book reader such as Amazon Kindle or Apple iPad.

In my last article, I discussed the concept of thought leadership and how important it is to a successful public relations program.  If you missed it, read it here.

While it may be tempting to jump right in and develop “thought leadership” content for your customers, it is best to start out with a little research.  The best thought leadership programs are developed with a firm understanding of one’s customers.

Customer feedback helps companies offer informational products and content that precisely target common questions and problems while also delivering content in the mediums customers are most likely to use.  Here are some sample questions:

“What are your primary goals for 2011?”
“What are your most common questions pertaining to [your industry]?”
“How often do you use Facebook?”

While there are a number of ways to solicit customer feedback, such as interviews and focus groups, one way to accurately monitor customer opinions is to create an online survey.

One easy-to-use survey tool can be found at ConstantContact.com.  Constant Contact makes it easy to create questions in a variety of useful formats such as multiple choice, Likert-scale or open-ended response.

When you get the results back, pay particular attention to the words and phrases your customers use to describe their problems and challenges.  These are the words they most likely use in a Google search to discover the answers to their questions.  Therefore, these are the terms you should be using to create your content in order to make it more visible in an online search.

In my next article, I will begin showing you some formats for your content and how to get it into the hands of prospective customers.

What distinguishes a good company from a great company?  The answer, as I’ll reveal in this article, is thought leadership.

Today, it is not simply enough for your company to have great products and services in order to distinguish itself as a leader in its market.  Your company must strive to exceed expectations and surprise your customers with free, useful and easily-sharable content that they can’t get anywhere else.

People invest their money in organizations they trust.  Thought leadership is the concept of earning and managing people’s trust via forward thinking – not just following the industry trends, but by shaping them.  The content you produce via your thought leadership program conveys that your company is smart, understands the market very well, and is a valuable organization with which to do business.

To further understand thought leadership, we must also define what it is NOT.  Thought leadership content never directly promotes products or services.  Instead, it promotes ideas and new thinking.

In order to earn a thought leadership position in the market, your company must begin thinking along the lines of a magazine publisher and develop an editorial plan to reach customers and prospects with focused content delivered in the media formats they prefer.  This content includes news releases, blog articles, e-books, videos, etc.

Great thought leadership helps turn customers into a potential army of sales people, all promoting their company to family, friends and networks, because they are inspired to do so by its content.

In future blog articles, I will discuss several programs which can help your company evaluate the information needs of its customers and prospects, as well as deliver targeted content designed to satisfy those needs and inspire content sharing that drives the word-of-mouth marketing effort.

I had a chance to finish a book this month by my favorite business author, David Meerman Scott.  The book is entitled Real-Time Marketing & PR: How to Instantly Engage Your Market, Connect with Customers, and Create Products that Grow Your Business Now.  You might remember him from the “New Rules” book series which has become so popular in recent years.

In his latest book, Scott proposes a new way of thinking for many business owners – equipping your company to respond to the public in real-time.

Although this concept is not exactly new since crisis communication counselors have been stressing the importance of creating a crisis response plan for decades.  However, Scott updates this idea by demonstrating how companies must factor in the Social Web response as well.

I especially liked how he has dropped the term “Social Media Marketing” and switched to “Real-Time Marketing & PR” which is technically more accurate.  I think sometimes business leaders push back on “social media marketing” (as they should) because it was never about making companies “social.”  It’s about eliminating the unnecessary and outdated communication barriers between companies and their stakeholders (customers, members, donors, partners, etc.).

Don’t make the mistake of thinking this concept is only useful for crisis communication.  There are many practical applications such as new product development, customer service, sales and research, including marketing and public relations.

However, one complaint I have about the book is that, while it paints the real-time response concept in broad strokes, it leaves the reader with only a few of the particulars needed to enact such a plan.  This is not a “how-to” book, but rather an argument for the “why” companies should engage in real-time.

Every chief marketing officer and PR director should put this title on their reading list.   Scott’s conversational writing style makes it a fast and fun read and his interesting case studies show his concepts in action.  And if you haven’t seen his previous book, The New Rules of Marketing & PR, you should definitely pick that up as well.

It may seem like everyone is blogging these days.  No matter what industry you are in, there is someone blogging about it.  You may even have your own blog or read them on a regular basis.

However, blogging is NOT for everyone.  Today’s article is intended to help those people weighing the pros and cons of starting a blog themselves.

Reason #1 NOT to blog:
No Time

Even though blogging is basically “free” (no barrier to entry), it does have a significant time cost.  Depending on how often you intend to blog, be it every day, twice a week or once a month, you must account for the amount of time it will take.  In order for blogging to be worth the results, it is important to set a schedule and commit to it.

Reason #2 NOT to blog:
No Focus

One thing that nearly all respected bloggers have in common is that they have a focus or theme to their blog.  For example, my blog focuses on social media marketing and public relations.  Even bloggers who write about a seemingly wide range of topics (i.e. Tim Ferris) are still focused on a unifying theme such as lifestyle design.  Therefore, your blog should have a common thread which ties all your writing together, or you will find yourself without much of an audience.

Reason #3 NOT to blog:
No Distribution Plan

Most successful bloggers are plugged into several social media networks and are therefore able to spread the word of new blog posts easily.  So if you don’t have at least a Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn account, you will be missing out on substantial opportunities to spread word of your new blogs posts to others.

Reason #4 NOT to blog:
Expecting Instant Gratification

Blogging is something that requires time, effort, patience and lots of experimentation to get off the ground.  If you expect instant gratification and are not willing to put a year or more into it, blogging is not for you.

Blogging can be a very powerful public relations tool, but only for those who are committed and disciplined.  If you have questions about blogging and are wondering if it’s right for your company, please e-mail me at robert@northeastpr.com.

Let’s assume you’ve established an official Facebook page for your company.  You and your marketing interns have been working hard to grow its fan base and engage your customers.  Your team has posted news about your products, social responsibility events, seminars, as well as a homemade staff video recorded on someone’s new Flip video camera.

If you’re like many midsized companies who have jumped into social media, you’re eagerly experimenting with this budding technology.  But have you considered where social media fits into your larger business and public relations strategy?  Furthermore, how will you manage the inherent risks which come with this technology?

The month, the Public Relations Society of America (www.prsa.org) released official guidance for their members about how companies may create a “social media policy.”  A social media policy is a set of written guidelines that a company develops to provide the terms of correct usage of social media websites and tools.  These guidelines are intended for both employees and customers.  A company’s social media policy should be made public and easily accessible via its website.

Adopting a social media policy is important for several reasons:

• It outlines a company’s strategic goals and lays out a specific plan to tie social media activities directly to those goals.
• It helps prevent misuse of social media.
• It clarifies employee responsibilities with regard to social media use and provides the rules of conduct.
• It ensures a company adheres to a clearly defined code of ethics.
• It sets forth a plan for preventing and managing conflicts, should such instances arise.
• It provides other important protections for a company.

To create a social media policy, your company should consult with a trained public relations professional to guide the process.  An attorney experienced in Internet matters should be consulted before, during and after the process and also should conduct a legal review of the completed guidelines before the document is posted to the company website.

The guidelines should be designed to evolve and be amended over time as technology and social media usage changes.

Your company may also create branding identity guidelines at this time.  Brand consistency is the process of implementing a brand’s visual identity and tone of voice across all customer touch points.  A unique identity is important because it enables a company to be easily recognized, distinguished from other brands and trusted to deliver on its mission.  This is true whether delivering communications via traditional or new forms of media, which is why we strongly recommend establishing brand guidelines simultaneously with the social media policy.

To arrange a free consultation about how you can create a social media policy for your organization, contact me at Robert@NortheastPR.com.

Happy birthday to Northeast Public Relations, Inc., which is celebrating its fifth year in business!

I want to thank everyone who made this milestone possible: our current and past clients, the Public Relations Society of America, our presentation partners which include the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation, the Small Business Administration and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, as well as our numerous readers, fans and followers who help us to spread our message every day.

We look forward to the next five years as we continue to branch out and help businesses succeed across the Northeast and beyond!

For many people, it can be a hassle to keep up with all the key blogs in their industry.  And with Twitter growing so quickly, it can seem like an impossible task to stay up-to-date with important discussions in one’s network.

If you are not currently monitoring Twitter for key terms, you may be missing important business opportunities or even customer complaints which you could easily rectify.

I have tried several tools, including TweetDeck, to help manage these Twitter conversations. But so far, my favorite program for monitoring both the blogosphere and Twitter is Google Reader.

Many people don’t realize that RSS readers, such as Google Reader, can be used to monitor Twitter as well as their favorite blogs and news sites.  And since Google Reader is a Web-based program, there is no desktop application to download and install.

Here are several simple steps to set up your monitoring system for blogs and Twitter.

1) Set up a Google account by visiting www.google.com/reader. (If you already have a Google account, you may skip this step.)

2) Once you have an account, bookmark the reader’s page on your browser’s “favorite” links.  You will want to check this site at least once every workday.

3) Search for the blogs you want to follow by looking up experts and authors who interest you.  Once you have found their blogs, click on the RSS icon and you will be taken to a page that asks if you wish to add the feed to your Google Reader.  Click “Add to Google Reader.”

4) Now that you have your blogs set up, it’s time to do the same for Twitter. Go to http://search.twitter.com/.

5) In the Twitter search box, enter your company’s name or the name of one of your brands.  Depending on how popular you are, this search may or may not come up with results, but that doesn’t matter right now.  Even if the search comes up with nothing, you will still want to save this term for monitoring.  At the top right of window, you will see the RSS icon and “Feed for this query.”  Click it and add it to your Reader.

6) Repeat the search in step 5 with your name, the names of your officers, brands and other key terms that people might be searching for in order to find you.

Congratulations!  You are now set up to monitor blogs and Twitter in one place.

Set aside at least 5 minutes a day to check your Google Reader for updates in your field and to monitor discussions people are having about you or your industry.  If something interests you, or you find a question you know how to answer, take some time to respond.  You never know if that person you help could become a customer one day!

For additional information about how set up a social media PR program for your business, contact me at Robert@northeastpr.com to reserve a free consultation.

If you’ve logged into your official business Facebook page lately (you have a business page, right?), you may have noticed a small, but useful real-time metric added below each of your Wall posts.

This new line reveals a post’s “impressions” and “feedback” percentage.

Facebook defines “impressions” as: “Raw number of times this story has been seen on your Wall and in the News Feed of your Fans.”

Facebook defines “feedback” as: “Number of Comments and Likes per impression.”

Why is this useful?  Now you can see, in real time, how well your posts are spreading and getting noticed.  If you take note of the type of posts which spread far and wide, you can place more of your time and energy into repeating these successes and stop spending resources on stories that your fans largely ignore.

To illustrate this point, let’s say a credit union has created a blog article about one of its new loan interest rates and it posts a link to the story on its Facebook page.  This post gets 90 impressions and zero percent feedback.  But a blog article on “10 Holiday Scams to Avoid” gets 300 impressions and 10 percent feedback.  This should tell the credit union to stop wasting its time on self-promotional blog posts and put more investment into educational articles.  Maybe a video on the same topic gets three times as many impressions as a blog article.  Now the credit union has a metric to help it decide where to spend its time and money!

Has this new feature helped you learn anything new about the type of Wall posts you are creating?  If so, let me know in the comments section.

Having trouble getting started with your business Facebook page or need some help coming up with a strategy for your existing page?  Write me at Robert@northeastpr.com to set up a free initial consultation.