Working Three

The following article is a response to an article published in the June 17-23, 2010 edition of BRW…

I recently read an article in this magazine written by Mark Ritson titled “The Emporer’s New Tweets”. In essence the article argued that Twitter was a waste of time. It made some interesting points but it’s logic was flawed. To make a coherent comment on Twitter as a marketing tool, or for that matter any social network, you need a deep understanding of social media strategy and the technology behind it and that wasn’t displayed in the article. So let’s explore…

First the facts. Ritson asserted that Twitter’s brand is in decline because it has been losing visitors to its site. Indeed the Twitter site has been losing visitors. But that’s because increasingly more account holders access Twitter through mobile devices. It’s worth remembering that Twitter was originally intended to be a service that could be updated via SMS, hence the 140 character limit. So an increase in mobile users is actually a sign of the platform maturing and succeeding.

Twitter is a “micro blogging” service and it has gone through the same sort of evolution as full scale blogs. People create accounts, then realise that there is commitment involved. So some accounts become inactive but the users with a strategy and commitment use it to their advantage.

So while traffic to the Twitter site is declining the actual usage of Twitter is rising. In fact, one of the biggest issues Twitter is facing is keeping up with demand. The World Cup has caused so much Twitter traffic that the service has been near collapse from the pressure.

The article also critisised Twitter’s 140 character limit. That misses the point. Twitter is used as an information stream. Each tweet can link to pages, videos and images – all with as much content as is necessary to get an idea across. It’s like picking up the paper and scanning the headlines for stories you may be interested in.

Next let’s look at the companies that the article highlighted. Ritson was right. Some of these companies seem to be wasting their time. But not because the platform has no value. Rather it’s their strategies that are failing. The article focused almost exclusively on the number of followers these brands have. Wrong call. Social media engagement is about creating brand evangelists – or true believers. Australian’s are some of the highest consumers of social media in the world, in both ‘per capita’ and in ‘time spent’ terms, so any social media strategy needs to address that fact.

CBA and Telstra are currently doing a pretty good job on Twitter. They simply need to develop recruitment strategies, and learn to stay focused. They started by just pushing out messages but now are engaging with customers directly. The engagement is good. Sticking with it and making their customers feel heard should become most important part of their strategy. They may also want to think about relevant messages that are worthy of being passed on – environmental, social or charitable work they doing for example. This type of information creates discussion in the social web.

The big challenge these two brands are facing is defining how Twitter fits into a wider social media strategy. Twitter seems to be a bit isolated. Telstra for example has over 14,000 fans on Facebook. How are these two platforms working together?

Rio Tinto, on the other hand, seem to be completely oblivious to how the social web operates. The messages they post have no coherency and seem to be random at best. The brand has a lot of information that members of the public would be interested in. They simply need a way of engaging and communicating that makes sense. They also need to focus on getting influential followers to ensure the right information gets in front of the right people.

Ford in Australia has a lot to learn from it’s American parent. The engagement that Ford has created in the US is regarded as a social media case study. They create activity across the whole social web, and each platform – Blogs, Twitter, YouTube and Facebook – work together. Visit http://bit.ly/GwZUa to read more. What is obvious is that Ford USA are employing social media monitoring tools.

What then does a good social media strategy look like?

Social media, if used correctly, can be the biggest and most honest focus group imaginable. So you need to start a strategy by listening. There are many ways to do this. Companies need to focus, not only on what people are saying about their brands, but also what is being said about their competition. Indeed their entire industry. Listening is a very important step because it provides context. Understanding how your market is communicating is important if you are going to engage with it.

At the Gatorade headquarters in Chicago staff are taking this strategy all the way. In the middle of the marketing department sits a room called Mission Control. The room is filled with screens showing social media data visualisations so the marketing team can always make informed strategic decisions. This data is feed into every element of their marketing strategy – online and offline. They understand the importance of monitoring and facilitating conversations.

Once it is actively listening a brand needs to define it’s goal. Social media can be used for customer service, customer acquisition, brand awareness or public relations. But trying to do everything at once will produce unfocused results.

Next the platforms then need to be carefully chosen. Twitter, Facebook and YouTube are a few of the big ones. But there are many more, each focused on a different demographic. There is also the possibility of creating a platform that fulfils a need that may only exist for your market.

Establishing performance measures and KPIs is an important step of any social media strategy. There are many ways to do this. One of the most effective measures is the increase in positive sentiment – basically getting more people on side.

Finally your social media strategy needs to create a voice. A tone for how you will communicate. Get this right and your market will follow.

Towards the end of his article Ritson suggests that marketers are ‘fickle’ and social media is comparable to “the emperor’s new clothes”. I disagree. Smart marketers now realise that their customers no longer trust conventional techniques. They want to be heard. Social media makes this possible and it provided measurable results compared to some of the fuzzy numbers that other forms of marketing produce.

The closing sentiment in Ritson’s article was spot on – we should take note and take action. Treat your market with the respect it deserves and customers and other stakeholders will listen. That’s what a social media strategy does.