Social media “engagement” is not a strategy
Jan 6th
Back in the early days of the social web, the leading “gurus” were actively anti-business.
They made fun of measurement, strategy, objectives and any hint of trying to monetize a social media effort. I know that sounds weird today, but it’s true. The mantra was “Social media is not about your stupid company. It’s all about the conversation.”
We’ve come a long way and even the “purists” have relented. Today, social media is being mainlined into the traditional marketing, PR and advertising initiatives, for better or for worse.
But despite this progress, every now and then I catch a whiff of the old days hanging around. Such was the case on a recent blog post when commenters vigorously defended the “true goal” of social media as being “engagement.”
I am sufficiently disturbed by this conversation that I think it’s time for a reality check. Here we go.
Engagement is not a strategy
A strategy is a direction that ideally capitalizes on a unique value proposition that serves un-met or under-served customer wants and needs. In other words, are you creating something that would be difficult or impossible for your competitor to copy? Is it possible to truly be strategic by “engaging” with customers in a singularly unique way? Difficult, I think.
I do believe it is possible to create strategic advantage by delivering great content and executing a social media initiative well. But the entry barriers to creating a Facebook page and initiating engagement, for example, are so low, I think it is unlikely that this can truly be “strategic.” Engagement should more likely be viewed as a tactic that supports an over-arching marketing strategy, unless you truly have some super-human community management skills that consistently bring customers in the door.
Social media’s place in the marketing mix is to provide consistent, small provocations and conversations through content that lead to engagement and interactions. Skillfully done, that engagement ultimately results in consumer interest, and hopefully loyalty and meaningful activity (like a purchase).
Engagement must lead to stakeholder value
The most valuable brand in the history of the world, Apple, has no social media engagement. By comparison, Dell, the gold standard of social engagement, is floundering and has a stock price hovering near a five-year low. So “engagement” in and of itself is not a predictor of success, is it? That’s why “engagement” is not a valuable activity unless it is tied to some organizational goal such as:
- Customer acquisition
- Brand awareness/defense
- Investment
- New product development
- Registrations
- Service
- Employment/recruiting
I would not invest in a company that is driving engagement as a goal without tying it to some business objective that moves the needle. Engagement, yes. But only in the context of business results!
You can talk yourself broke
One commenter on my blog argued that a company’s goal should be to drive engagement ever upward and pointed to her success in moving a brand from a 10% engagement level to 25%.
Again, without the tying this to a goal, that seems like a silly way to describe success. In fact, you could be hurting your customer.
Let’s not forget that all that engagement comes at a cost! We have to be careful that we’re ready to staff-up to effectively meet those demands. And for some companies, that may not be a good business decision.
Let me give you a micro-example. Last week I wrote a blog post that had more than 100 comments. As a small business owner, if I had this level of engagement every day, I would not have time to work on the consulting and teaching activities that feed my family.
Now if I really wanted to, I could pump up this level of engagement all the time … but it would be foolhardy for me to do so. I need to strike the proper balance of commercial activities across my customer base that optimize my business results. In fact, I purposely plan my blog postings to DEPRESS engagement on days when I don’t have the time to properly handle it.
In other words, if you’re not careful, you can talk yourself broke.
There is a level of diminishing returns to any economic activity and engagement is no different. Having a goal to “increase engagement” for every customer in the absence of strategy is irresponsible.
The conversational brand
Finally, a successful engagement level must also be considered in the context of the type of company and product. An engagement level which would be disappointing for Disney might be thrilling for a niche B2B chemical manufacturer because it is not a very conversational brand. There are no absolutes in this business.
Likewise, not all conversation is created equal. A company may drive an artificially high engagement level simply by posting inane polls and cat pictures that don’t contribute to business objectives in the least.
So if you’re striking out on a new social media strategy, I hope you’ll consider these take-aways:
- “Engagement” needs to be evaulated and supported in the context of company objectives
- Engagement level alone is not necessarily a meaningful indicator of marketing success or financial performance
- Engagement comes at a cost and must be considered as balanced part of an optimized marketing mix
Those are a few observations on engagement but I would welcome your views, dissent, and additions in the comment section! It’s your turn (and yes, I want the engagement!).
Illustration: “Conversation” statue in Calgary
Enough is enough. A {growtoon}.
Jan 4th
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The Three Words for 2013
Jan 3rd
I first saw Chris Brogan use this technique a few years ago — distill your annual goals into three focused words. C.C. Chapman explained this process in his nifty book Amazing Things Will Happen
As I had some down time over the holiday, I reflected on where I needed to grow and it did seem to distill into three themes. Here are my words for 2013:
Journey
No, not the rock band (Although I do love “Wheels in the Sky”). What I mean by “Journey” is enjoying the trip as well as the destination. And I literally mean the trip!
I travel a lot for my job and life on the road wears me down — the crowded airports, the delays, the seemingly endless hours of wasted time. It’s stressful being away from my home and family. Travel also disrupts my healthy eating and exercise habits. I dread it.
Yet travel is an unavoidable part of my career path right now. In 2013, I need to make changes to make travel less stressful, more productive, and more enjoyable. Any ideas?
Conversational
I have worked really hard to make the content on this blog great. But the bar is raising every year as the information density on the web explodes. How do I stay relevant and conversational? If I provided excellent content in 2012, how do I really “WOW” my readers in 2013? What would you like to see? How do I create a blog that people adore, posts that are creating conversations all over the web? How do I up my game in writing, public speaking, and teaching to get people talking?
Centered
This is very rewarding business but a really weird business. The more you succeed:
- Your ability to connect, engage, and be helpful declines precipitously. Yet, these are the very traits that made you successful!
- A mantle of “celebrity” is thrust upon you. This is extremely uncomfortable for me, yet unavoidable.
- You are increasingly brought into petty fights and targeted by “haters.”
Once in a while I get caught up in the BS of social media. I get knocked off center by attacks and can be irritable and even short with people who are fakes, spammers, and trolls. I get weary from the unrelenting barrage of strangers who want to “pick my brain.”
These undesirable consequences will undoubtedly intensify as more people consume my blog, books, classes and speeches. I realize that I am a very blessed individual and that I need to handle the negatives with grace, kindness, and patience no matter what is coming at me. That is who I want to be under all circumstances.
I think if I focus on these three words I’ll have a happier and more productive year. What do you think? What are your words for 2013?
The link to Amazing Things is an affiliate link.
Social media trends that are colliding in 2013
Jan 2nd
There is nothing more fun than thinking about how tech trends and humanity are colliding and there is no better time to write about it than the beginning of a new year. There are lots of things to be excited about, but here are a few of the trends that I see colliding in 2013 and what might happen when they do …
The optimized self
Colliding trends: 1) The cost of collecting, storing, and analyzing big data is dropping; 2) The desire to live smarter and healthier is going up.
New trend: The optimized self. The Nike Fuel Band
We will increasingly turn healthy living into a fun competition with daily objectives and rewards from brands. Huge sponsorship opportunities.
Facebook Financial Fatigue
Colliding trends: 1) Facebook faces unrelenting shareholder pressure to meet quarterly financial goals; 2) Consumers weary of new ad schemes
New trend: Facebook Fatigue. Didn’t you think the latest round of announcements, apologies and counter-announcements by Facebook-owned Instagram were bizarre?
This is a signal that Facebook will be aggressively pushing the limits of our tolerance for monetization schemes. As I wrote earlier this year, the most disruptive event in the development of the social web was the Facebook IPO. This is a company that now has to deliver the goods to shareholders every quarter, without fail, without end. And the only way to do this is to draw more money out of me and you.
I believe this will take the form of a constant experimentation with monetization models … some intrusive, some helpful … but at some point they will risk fatiguing users with the constant changes and increasingly prevalent sponsored posts from advertisers. Will there be a crunch point that opens the door for a more-user-friendly competitor?
Social learning creates crisis for traditional universities
Colliding trends: 1) Unaffordable college tuition; 2) Highly-endowed universities offering free online classes
New trend: Traditional universities in crisis. On top of ridiculous tuition costs, we are at a tipping point where many young people are wondering about the relevance of a college degree in many professions.
Coursera, a start-up online education company, has enrolled 1.35 million students in its free online courses since it began in early 2012. In just a few months it added 33 partner universities, including Brown, Columbia, and Weslyan, to provide more than 200 free “massive open online courses,” known as MOOCs.
Could there be a time in the near future where the richest universities simply give away their “content” for many undergraduate classes? Could this be the next wave of “content marketing” that may depend on monetization through adjacent products and services?
Universities are among the most inefficient and slowest-moving institutions on earth (speaking from experience!). They could be facing severe and rapid financial consequences if they don’t find a way to maintain their relevance in the digital age.
Entertain me
Colliding trends: 1) Internet information density 2) Even more information density
New trend: Emphasis on entertaining content. Let’s face it. It’s not that hard to be in the content marketing game today. But the bar for quality content is being raised day by day. What will it take to cut through? Entertainment!
Companies will have to continuously push for more interesting, timely and entertaining content to remain relevant. Here are the implications: The need for exceptional content creators will be high. The cost of content marketing is going to go up over time as we place more emphasis on design and entertainment value. Coke just turned their website into a news magazine. That’s where the market is heading. How are you going to stand out?
The singularity in sight?
Colliding trends: 1) Man-machine interface, 2) Rapidly-improving artificial intelligence.
New trend: The “singularity” is the emergence of greater-than-human superintelligence that has long been theorized by science fiction writers. It is a controversial and yet nonetheless fascinating topic. Is it coming into view?
A hyper-intelligent IBM computer (Watson) being training to be a medical doctor. For $1,500, Google glasses can take you another step toward the man-machine interface — ubiquitous information as part of our bodies. Mind-controlled exo-skeleton connected to humans are helping parapalegics to walk, and robots can be controlled by human brain implants. Japanese researchers are building humanoid robots with bones and muscles. Eureqa is a software system that uses evolutionary computing to discover laws of nature that scientists haven’t been able to solve on their own.
And the rate of progress is accelerating. Can we doubt that many of us will live to see the day when machines become self-aware?
A revolution in design
Colliding trends: 1) Rapid digital replacement of bulky physical assets; 2) A need for more compact urban living spaces
New trend: Empty design. This is a bit of a wild idea but I was moving a box of old records and began thinking how the bulk we used to have to deal with is going away — books, paper files, records and CD’s, huge stereo systems, TV components.
Think about the effect this must be having on the world of design. Most furniture and housing units are designed to maximize storage space but this is no longer a primary requirement. What will we do with all this extra space formerly devoted to shelves, closets and drawers? I think the consolidation of gadgets and cloud storage will revolutionize urban living.
OK, I’ve had my fun. Now it’s your turn! What do you think of these prognostications? What trends are you watching in 2013?
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