Paul Miser

This time every year we see social strategists and gurus come put with their take on what the next year will bring. Top 10 Trends… or 5 Things to Watch…. Many of the predictions will come true and some brands will catch the wave and ride it. But what about those companies who haven’t adopted last year’s trends? Or the year before? What’s to come of them?

It’s an uphill battle for the laggards when it comes to social media. It moves at such a fast pace, to capture this year’s trends they would need to play catch up, quickly. I say start where you are and grow from there. If you try and ride the new trends you will most likely fail. Hedge your bets and start. Who cares what’s happening with “big data” if your Twitter account is still locked with no tweets. You shouldn’t jump onto the “gamification” bandwagon if you’ve never attempted a Foursquare deal. Start where you are and grow.

The idea of “scale” in the digital, social, mobile world is something that has perplexed me over the past five years or so; really ever since the masses started pushing towards the adoption levels of maturity. Scale, to me, is a bit of an antiquated measurement in the “new way of marketing.” The idea that each message, regardless of media, must reach a massive amount of people in hopes that a decreasingly small fraction of individuals take action on a lead or purchase, is one that doesn’t begin to take into account the paradigm shift that digital has created; an individual paradigm. The role of a message or interaction in the digital space, most likely, isn’t for reach or scale for the consumer. It’s about something deeper, something more intimate.

Digital has the ability to segment or even dynamically personalize messages, offers, or experiences that produces a more profound output for a brand than a simple blanket message to drain money from an unsuspecting small percentage of the communicated universe. It allows for dynamic interaction; in real-time, wherever the consumer may be.

So when thinking digital, please don’t ever say the word “scale:” for it kills the opportunities before anything commences. Instead, think loyalty, advocacy, passion, lifetime value, and incremental purchase… Expand a relationship, don’t squander it by treating people like sheep. We have a great opportunity to think beyond traditional and think about the future of our brands.

Scale is in the long term, lifetime value of consumers, not universes reached.

*** Caveat, I’m not saying that awareness building campaigns shouldn’t be a part of the overall marketing strategy. They most definitely should be discussed and executed, even in the digital display arena. What I am saying, is allow yourself to segment, allow your consumers to segment themselves, reward them for doing so.

Today launched the awesome incubator TechCrunch Disrupt here in NYC. I, however, was unable to attend, but was glued to my monitor like it was March Madness or the Tour de France. Some great things are happening in the world of technology. Apps connecting the dots of individual user behavior, location, customizable offers, gamification, and shiny new technologies on smartphones and other mobile devices. And as a Physical / Digital Convergence nerd, I’m excited to see what comes from each of these new startups as well as some of the others coming out of TechStars and Y Combinator.

As an advocate for transparency, efficacy and consumerism in today’s business environment, I am, however left wanting a bit… I mean we have these great technologies, we have some “fun” things happening, but what are we really doing? Are we solving anything, or are we just showing off our geek-ness and ability to make a mobile device do something cool? With the speed to market being in an increasingly quick turnaround with agile iterations happening on an almost daily basis, the rush to ship is daunting.

Are we solving anything, or are we just showing off our geek-ness and ability to make a mobile device do something cool?

What if we take a step back and start with a real problem? What if use our collective genius to collaborate and create a technological advancement to solve these real issues? We have the power to completely change the way we live, the way we educate, the way we govern, the way we support one another as human beings. I see a huge need for a new type of incubator… one that starts with a problem and the solution is in the brainstorming and innovation.

Solve First… Then Ship.

What do you think? How would you use collaboration to solve real issues?

Social media is a strong force in the marketing world today. By utilizing the power of trust, sharing and interaction, brands can build personal relationships with individuals within a community to help meet business objectives (increased brand awareness, enhanced conversions, amplified customer service, etc). However, social media takes time and diligence to not only engage a community, but acquire and invite individuals to a value-added community.

The first step to a strong social media strategy and presence is the foundational community. Below are tactical activities a brand can perform to develop an acquisition strategy to build the most targeted, highly engaged community base and foundation. Working with a combination of Paid, Owned and Earned Media strategies, a brand will enhance its digital footprint and build the social credibility necessary to acquire the best community members.

Paid Media

Paid media is the easiest and most efficient way to generate a large number of Fans quickly. By using a combination of current traditional advertising and strategic social advertising, we can acquire and build a strong foundation of highly targeted, highly engaged individuals to our community. Below are some steps brands should take to begin integrating paid media into their acquisition strategy.

Facebook
Engagement Ads. Drive awareness and engagement through the various types of ads that Facebook has available. The more engaging and relevant the ad, the more likely the user is to click and interact with it. Be sure to target the audience accordingly and align ad content with the interests of the user.

Twitter
Promoted Tweets. Promote keywords or hashtags within tweets to drive awareness of an idea, theme or account. Aligning keywords with the brand message will ensure connection with the message.

Promoted Accounts. Twitter allows for accounts to be promoted on the “Logged in” Twitter home page. The promoted accounts will align with the content that the user has posted or has within his/her profile. Build the best following base by aligning content with brand messaging.

Traditional
Use all paid and offline activities to increase awareness of the social platforms through traditional efforts. Examples could include tags on TV spots, print collateral, callouts on digital banners, in-store signage, etc.

Owned Media

As a brand, we own a lot of assets — website, micro sites, emails, other social platforms, etc. Through strategic placement and use of these assets, we can deliver a high level of community activation through owned media. Below are strategic examples of how to deliver results to community activation.

On site. Promote the social platforms on all websites with relevant and prominent calls to action on the page. For Facebook, a brand can use the “Like Box” plug-in to allow the visitor to “Like” the brand’s Facebook Fan page directly from the brand sites.

Email database. As with all websites, all email newsletters can have a callout and a link to the social platforms. When launching a new social platform, sending an email specifically announcing the launch will provide a great response and community growth.

Email signatures. Promoting all social platforms within company email signatures is a passive approach to drive awareness and acquisition to the social communities.

Cross-promote. When possible, cross-promoting the various social platforms on the other platforms in the community could be very beneficial. Promoting the content that is provided on the other social platforms could enhance this cross engagement and acquisition.

Incent community. Engaging and incenting the community that we acquire during activation or content activities can enhance reach and social credibility. Creating contests or sweepstakes that ask community members to upload content, share content or reach a certain number of fans has proven to be highly successful during acquisition campaigns.

Earned Media

Use the power of influential voices and social credibility to drive awareness, traffic and activation to a brand’s social community. Below are some activities a brand can perform to build a strong earned media acquisition strategy and ongoing stream of activation.

Influencer outreach. Use the power of influential voices by reaching out and building relationships with key influencers across channels. Develop a strategy to incent the influencers to discuss the brand efforts and drive traffic to the social platforms.

Content. Content is a strong driver for enhancing engagement and sharing, which in turn increases message reach, traffic to social sites and acquisition of new community members. The social credibility that the content interactions create builds stronger relationships with influential people in the community.

Enhance sharing. Engaging content is the first step to sharing. The second is to simply ask for it. With a strong relationship with our community members, we have enough trust to ask them to share content if they like it, which leads to reach, social credibility and community acquisition.

Third-party content creation. While building relationships with key influencers (both on and off of our social platforms) we can ask them to produce content for our social communities. This strategy will continue to enhance social credibility and increased reach through the influencer’s community and network.

Third-party content distribution. Vice versa. Influencers are continuously looking for valuable content for their network. With relationships built with key influencers, we can ask what type of content they are looking to create for their community and provide that content for them to distribute through their network. Delivering messages in this way will enhance our social credibility and will drive traffic and acquisition to our social communities.

Conclusion

Building a strong community is a strategic combination of advertising, relationship building and adding value every day for the social media strategy. Brands should ensure their digital and physical footprint is connected and cross-promoted to allow the most effective sharing of content and passing of information —all of which continues the acquisition of a community and adds value for its members.

Download the PDF:  How to: Grow a Social Community