I read an article this morning by Tara Hunt, and it answered a lot of arguments that I had with my clients.
I have always believed that Social media helps create awareness around your brand and makes people more familiar with it.
It would drive sales in the case of promotions, and still this only works with popular brands rather than brands that address high society and elite people, who sell products for at least $5,000 a piece!
Social media definitely serves the purpose when a customer is trying to look you up.
But when a customer is making the purchase decision, he needs to hear about it and talk about it.
And this cannot be done solely by posting on social media or by conducting paid campaigns.
For that we need to create a strong Word of Mouth.
Hunt says YOU CANNOT FORCE WORD OF MOUTH.
It's not that a social media strategy is not working, nor that you social media team isn't effective.
The fact is some stuff just don't spread. they do not appeal to people or represent something they need or something new they just discovered and have the need to share it.
So why pay for online marketing when the results aren't guaranteed?
It HELPS with the sales. it is not the key ingredient that DRIVES sales.
- To start, as I already mentioned, it helps people find you. And you do want to be found, otherwise you're losing big.
- You will have more credibility, provided your branding is done by a professional, and is not a cheap design.
- It helps us measure how people interact with your product: did they see the video you have posted? if not, wasn't it interesting enough? if they saw it, did they like it or were they indifferent? Did they like it enough to share it and talk about it?
- It allows people to give you feedback: they may like or criticise, either way this should help you work on your brand or service and make it better.
- It helps you create a relationship with your customer, the thing you can never do with a print ad or TV commercial. Through social media you can find out a lot about your customers and hence bond with them.
Most importantly, before starting to ask for ROI, this takes time people.
Social media definitely needs a strategy. You cannot hire junior people just to "post a couple of things" on Facebook. And you cannot expect immediate results.
It's the process of interacting with fans, get to know their likes and dislikes, which post do they interact with the most, which conversation topics are interesting to them, etc…
Actually the ROI of social media is not money.
It's rather far from materialistic:
- SM helps you LISTEN.
- SM helps you seize the opportunities and trends that people are talking about to start a conversation yourself.
- SM helps you build a COMMUNITY rather than a customer base. It is the community that drives the word of mouth and not the customers.
So bottom line, have a long breath. Patience is the key. Stop expecting immediate results. That's not how it works.
I have always believed that Social media helps create awareness around your brand and makes people more familiar with it.
It would drive sales in the case of promotions, and still this only works with popular brands rather than brands that address high society and elite people, who sell products for at least $5,000 a piece!
Social media definitely serves the purpose when a customer is trying to look you up.
But when a customer is making the purchase decision, he needs to hear about it and talk about it.
And this cannot be done solely by posting on social media or by conducting paid campaigns.
For that we need to create a strong Word of Mouth.
Hunt says YOU CANNOT FORCE WORD OF MOUTH.
It's not that a social media strategy is not working, nor that you social media team isn't effective.
The fact is some stuff just don't spread. they do not appeal to people or represent something they need or something new they just discovered and have the need to share it.
So why pay for online marketing when the results aren't guaranteed?
It HELPS with the sales. it is not the key ingredient that DRIVES sales.
- To start, as I already mentioned, it helps people find you. And you do want to be found, otherwise you're losing big.
- You will have more credibility, provided your branding is done by a professional, and is not a cheap design.
- It helps us measure how people interact with your product: did they see the video you have posted? if not, wasn't it interesting enough? if they saw it, did they like it or were they indifferent? Did they like it enough to share it and talk about it?
- It allows people to give you feedback: they may like or criticise, either way this should help you work on your brand or service and make it better.
- It helps you create a relationship with your customer, the thing you can never do with a print ad or TV commercial. Through social media you can find out a lot about your customers and hence bond with them.
Most importantly, before starting to ask for ROI, this takes time people.
Social media definitely needs a strategy. You cannot hire junior people just to "post a couple of things" on Facebook. And you cannot expect immediate results.
It's the process of interacting with fans, get to know their likes and dislikes, which post do they interact with the most, which conversation topics are interesting to them, etc…
Actually the ROI of social media is not money.
It's rather far from materialistic:
- SM helps you LISTEN.
- SM helps you seize the opportunities and trends that people are talking about to start a conversation yourself.
- SM helps you build a COMMUNITY rather than a customer base. It is the community that drives the word of mouth and not the customers.
So bottom line, have a long breath. Patience is the key. Stop expecting immediate results. That's not how it works.
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