Your 2013 Social Media Strategy: Grow a Pair.
Dec 2nd
First I would like to explain this strange headline to my international readers. “Grow a pair” (not to be confused with “grow a pear”) is American slang for stepping up to be tough and bold. Now, on with the show.
There is an infection overwhelming social media strategy development and the virus is fear.
I just read a number of reports all showing how CMO’s are still confused about what to do about social media. Really? It’s been on the table for at least 3-4 years now. Isn’t it time to figure things out?
I’ve had the true honor of working with some of America’s most beloved brands over the past few years. And I can report that the overwhelming reaction to social media by many successful companies is: “Can we please just make this go away!”
Once they learn that they can’t make it go away, they do the next best thing: Shove it off to an advertising agency.
The fact of the matter is, “fear of change” is always the biggest obstacle to progress. Many of today’s CMO’s did not cut their teeth in the digital world, have not immersed themselves in the social web, and simply do not understand it.
It’s time these business leaders stop whining about social media, shatter the status quo, and grow a pair for the new year.
- Stop abdicating leadership to advertising agencies who just made Timmy from Accounting your community manager because he’s 23 and enjoys Facebook.
- If you still have a firewall to keep employees from the social web, grow a pair. Are you shaking your employees down for crossword puzzle books when they punch the time clock?
- Quit fighting over who owns social media strategy. It’s Marketing. Glad to be of help.
- Stop hiding behind your legal department as an excuse to not do anything. If you help them understand what’s at stake, they will help you. Lawyers care about your business too.
- Quit whining about how much time it takes to do social media. Take a little of that newspaper ad budget you’re wasting and re-direct some resources to the digital space.
- If you’re in pharma or another highly-regulated industry, stop waiting for guidance from the FDA or whatever agency and just figure it out. Whoever finally does that is going to have a remarkable competitive advantage.
- If you’re in the insurance, banking or wealth management industries, grow a pair and stop treating your employees like idiots who could not manage to send out a tweet without violating a freaking SEC regulation.
- Stop following a soul-less, cookie-cutter social media playbook devised by your agency. Learn enough about this new channel so you can ask the right questions and be a real leader in this space.
- If you are overwhelmed about social media and don’t know where to start, bring in help. If you want to find an advisor you can really trust, call me. I know a few I could recommend! Also, I recommend the Rutgers University CMD program (where I teach). In this remarkable executive program, you can get up to speed on the digital marketing landscape in one week.
- And most of all, please, please, please quit asking about the ROI of social media when this is simply code for: “If I keep asking for spreadsheets I can stall this thing until I hit retirement.”
So there. (Taking deep breath).
Please. Look around you. Which companies are creating new value today and achieving breath-taking business results? Which companies are declining quickly, and why? You’ll discover that if you don’t have a digital strategy, you are most likely on a path to irrelevance. Don’t go there.
In 2013 it’s time to do this thing. How are you going to integrate social media and digital marketing so that you’re not just checking a box. It’s time to master these platforms to make them work for you. Are you with me?
The ultimate content marketing challenge
Oct 30th
The other day I was a witness to content marketing murder.
I was eating breakfast in a hotel dining room which was partially occupied by a BNI networking meeting. A local marketing “expert” was describing how he propelled a new dentist’s office to the top of the Google rankings through his content marketing genius. His story went like this:
“I found that one of the most popular search terms in the dental category was asking about dental care for children. So we created three videos answering those questions. Then we made very small changes to those videos that resulted in 50 more videos. By placing them in many online channels, we actually created 300 different content placements from the original investment in three similar videos. We now own the first nine spots on Google for this search term.”
Here is the sneaky little secret of content marketing. You don’t need to have the best product or service to win. You don’t need to be the best marketer to win. You don’t even have to create the best content to win. You just need to be first and overwhelming.
This is something that bothers me about the SEO-driven content marketing system. There seems to be such a huge advantage to the first-mover who creates a steady stream of content that I’m not sure there is a cost-effective way to catch up. I know some commenters will say that the key is to create even better content. But we all know that better content can’t win if it can’t be found in the first place.
So here is the ultimate content marketing challenge — what if you DO have the best product but you’re second to market? How do you cut through the persistent clutter of determined SEO gamesters to even have a chance in the search ranking war? What if you’re very late to the party and you’re getting your ass kicked?
Image courtesy BigStock.com
How do you budget for social media marketing?
Oct 9th
I had a long discussion this week with an analyst trying to figure out how companies should be budgeting for their social media marketing efforts.
It’s always frustrating trying to answer a question like this because of course there is no cookie-cutter answer. A marketing strategy — and the appropriate budget — is going to be determined by your organization’s goals and the competitive structure of your industry.
However, to optimize the opportunities behind a social media effort, I do believe organizations need to commit to budgeting in a consistent and patient way. Here’s a traditional view of funding an advertising or promotional program:
Of course this is a very simplified view, but in a traditional media spend, you might run an ad campaign and, after some lag, awareness increases and then abruptly drops when the ad campaign spending is over. Of course this could be repeated over and over again and the persisting level of awareness would eventually increase because of the long-term commitment to advertising.
When approaching social media or content marketing, the commitment should be for the long haul. It’s unlikely that you’re going to strike lightning with your first few blog posts or Facebook updates. The idea is to drive relationships through consistent small engagements that eventually lead to awareness and bigger interactions, like a sale.
The idea behind this graph (again, very simplified) is that there is a start-up cost to build a social media competency but that it should become more efficient over time. Your costs will be level or perhaps even go down as you get into a groove. At the same time, there is no immediate affect on awareness like you might get with an aggressive advertising campaign. Unless you are already a well-established brand, it takes time to build an audience that trusts you and looks to you for meaningful content and engagement.
It’s likely that your company will invest in both paid and earned media and that the two will be integrated in some way. In that case, the expense of the integration and the effect on awareness would be blended:
So that is a basic framework to consider if you’re in the middle of your annual budgeting process. Again, there is no one-size-fits-all strategy or budget that you can apply uniformly across every company but I hope some of these fundamental ideas will help point you in the right direction. Make sense to you? How do these basic strategies differ in your company?
Content Marketing strategy: Are you good, fast, or cheap?
Sep 26th
By {grow} Community Member Andy Crestodina
There’s a saying in the manufacturing world: “There’s good, fast and cheap. You can choose two.” No business can offer all three.
It’s true throughout the service industry and in all forms of production. It’s why you can’t order a sirloin steak for $5 at a drive-through window. It’s simply a law of business, like the law of gravity.
I thought of this after reading one of Mark Schaefer’s posts last month, How the physics of social media is killing your marketing strategy. It was a straight-forward post with a powerful message: We’re entering an era where the content is being produced faster than ever, but our attention spans are not. Comparing this to colliding forces in physics, Mark points out that it’s going to get a lot harder to “maintain mindshare.”
He suggested three possible responses:
- Create increasingly spectacular content (be more amazing).
- Create content at a lower cost (reduce the time invested in generating content).
- Place your content in front of existing audiences (PR, News-jacking, guest blogging).
Sound familiar? These align with the three possible approaches in business. When we think about Mark’s recommendations, we see that they align with strategies which, in turn, align with specific tactics. Let’s take a look …
You can be GOOD
Produce the best content you can, even if it means staying tightly focused on a few topics. Survive by becoming the trusted authority on a narrow topic.
- Conduct and publish original research.
- Write the ebook/guide that answers prospects’ questions.
- Produce infographics, videos and epic posts.
High quality content with specific focus is just what Google loves, so this strategy works well with search optimization.
You can be FAST
Produce content quickly and efficiently, by delegating and curating. Survive by producing lots of content and making lots of connections.
- Email interviews to thought leaders, turn their responses into posts.
- Source topics and content from sources inside your company.
- Solicit guest posts from influencers through guest blogger outreach.
Since you’ll be involving more people and keeping frequency high, this strategy works well with social media.
You can be CHEAP
Publications have pre-packaged audiences that you can leverage by paying close attention to the changing interests of the press and popular blogs. Survive by being at the right place at the right time.
- Find the sites where your audience spends time, and submit guest posts.
- Nurture relationships with editors and journalists. Establish yourself as a source.
- Watch HARO and Reporter Connection. Respond quickly to relevant topics.
If you’re able to jump in when the timing and topic are right, this strategy works well with PR.
Adapt and survive
Yes, there is a crush of content coming. But you can avoid getting sucked into the black hole if you have a plan. Consider your goals and your strengths, and then choose your survival strategy.
Which survival strategy are you using? (Please don’t tell us it’s a combination of all three!)
Andy Crestodina is the Strategic Director of Orbit Media, a web design company in Chicago. He is also the author of an upcoming book called “Content Chemistry: The Illustrated Handbook for Content Marketing.” You can find Andy on Google+ and Twitter.
Welcome to {grow}
You’re in marketing for one reason: Grow.
Grow your company, reputation, customers, impact, profits. Grow yourself. This is a community that will help. It will stretch your mind, connect you to fascinating people, and provide some fun along the way. I am so glad you’re here.
-Mark SchaeferFollow Mark
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