Your social media strategy won’t save you
I was lucky enough to attend a Social Media Breakfast in Ottawa this morning – for anybody who hasn’t heard of them or attended one they are events in cities all across North America founded by Bryan Person that bring together social media enthusiasts, entrepreneurs, and startups to hear from guest speakers on all kinds of topics. Despite their early time frame the events attract lots of people – this morning’s breakfast was sold out with over 100 attendees (thanks to Simon Chen for organizing!).
Guest speaker Tara Hunt
Today’s guest speaker was Tara Hunt, entrepreneur and author of the new book The Whuffie Factor, about raising your social capital (it’s a great read – see our blog post about it here). She gave a brand-new presentation entitled “Your social media strategy won’t save you.” It’s a must for any startups who are trying to reach and engage with their audience. The main point of the presentation was that while tools like blogs and social networking sites are great ways to reach your audience they can’t make up your entire strategy when thinking about customers/audience. Tara gave four main reasons why (see more in her presentation below):
- Social media doesn’t scale – Tara gave the example of Craig Newmark from CraigsList - his strategy is to listen to and engage with his audience. He knows that social media doesn’t scale, but creating a useful, working site for his users does.
- Social media is a band-aid – Tara talked about the Twitter account @comcastcares. While they respond to customer complaints online they only reach out to 1/3 of the complaints online. But more than that, their phone customer service isn’t effective, and leads to more disgruntled customers than the Twitter account can address. Make sure you have a comprehensive approach to customer service so customers aren’t disgruntled by one means of support and then followed up with on another.
- Social media is about…being social – As Daniel Goleman said in his book Social Intelligence “we are wired to connect.” People love connecting online, but their primary reasons for being online are to connect with friends and new people – not to be sold to or chat with brand representatives. So while your company should have a presence online, it’s important to remember why people are online and approach relationships appropriately.
- Trust is at an all-time low – If you do a search for “rebuilding trust” in Google News in 2009 you’ll find 4,500 results – and that’s just with those words in the title. Tara suggests that while we trust influencers for ideas and discovery we trust our close network when it comes to actual buying decisions. She suggests that you should be focusing your time on enthusiasts (people who already know and love you) rather than influencers to help evangelize your brand.
She advises companies and entrepreneurs to think customer-centrically – your only customer service strategy should be to ensure the happiness of your customers. She also suggests rewarding enthusiasts, raising your whuffie, and learning not launching – check out the entire presentation and many more of her ideas below:
26 Responses to “Your social media strategy won’t save you”
Leave a Reply
Thanks Erin for the great summary.
I also attended the SMB-Ottawa and I was just talking to some friends and co-worker about it. Now my life is easier, I will point them to your blog, it does summarize the presentation very well and the message is clear.
Take care, see you this evening!
Mathieu.
Nice recap here, Erin. I really enjoyed Tara’s presentation this morning. She didn’t go all social-media-kool-aid on us!
I also liked Tara’s points about designing for “flow,” and building in incremental steps for users that keep them engaged and reward them along the way.
Great catching up with you this week, too. Hope to see you again soon!
Bryan | @BryanPerson
Nice summary from you and great presentation from Tara. Thanks for posting the slides.
It’s one of the few times I’ve heard anyone rightly take on the idea that Twitter used for dealing with customer complaints is not the answer to anything.
Great write up Erin! It’s certainly refreshing to hear a realistic, down-to-earth and very intelligent perspective on social media. Tara was awesome!
A good summary of Tara’s excellent presentation, Erin. As I just wrote (http://bit.ly/3uhBMb) it was phenomenal to hear a social-media enthusiast rein in that enthusiasm and go all practical and common sense on us. It’s an all-too-infrequent element in social media discussions.
Great summary, and I love the presentation. Social media is like community – essential, wonderful, but nowhere near the whole point. It has to be attached to something tangible, like satisfying customers, or driving collective action.
There is, however, a danger of treating social media like icing, and just spreading it on top of the cake we’ve already baked. There’s a fine balance between over-emphasizing it, and underestimating the amount of change that proper social media integration requires.
So that’s what you were typing into your iPhone during the presentation – all the notes for your post!
[...] read an interesting post today from Erin on the Sprouter blog.
[...] blogged the event – I’ll point out a couple from two people who joined us from out-of-town: a recap by Erin Bury and a post event interview by Bryan [...]
Good post congratulations
[...] a Social Media Policy for your Nonprofit, Social Media Usage Guidelines as well as Your social media strategy won’t save you for some important insight into the use of social media in the [...]
[...] this: Creating a Social Media Policy for your Nonprofit, Social Media Usage Guidelines as well as Your social media strategy won’t save you for some important insight into the use of social media in the [...]
Thanks for posting a recap Erin,excellent presentation by Tara. It inspires me to be better, do better.
Thanks for the great posting, really valid points about the uses and limitations of social media particularly in a business context.
The customer centric strategy that is mentioned in the slideshow really brings back the idea of “adding value” to the customer that all businesses need to strive to refine.
You are very welcome! It’s so true – businesses need to focus on their goals, and base a strategy on that – it should include social media tactics but also a value-add for customers.
Cheers,
Erin
http://ringoli.net/
Thanks Erin so much for this post, I enjoyed reading it
Hello Erin! I found your post using google search. This is a greatly written article. I’ll be sure to add to my favortie site folder and regularly visit to read more of your informative posts. Thanks so much for the posts. I will certainly come back
Thank you for another fantastic article. Where else could anybody get that type of information in such a perfect way of writing? I have a presentation next week, and I’m on the look for such info.
When I originally commented I clicked the -Notify me when new feedback are added- checkbox and now each time a remark is added I get 4 emails with the identical comment. Is there any means you’ll be able to take away me from that service? Thanks!
Thank you for another essential article. Where else could anyone get that kind of information in such a complete way of writing? I have a presentation incoming week, and I was on the lookout for such information.
I do not even know the way I stopped up right here, however I believed this post was great. I do not recognize who you are however definitely you are going to a famous blogger if you are not already. Cheers!
Brilliant Idea love it
I think nowadays people can’t get rid of any social media
a company’s fan page will definitely got more traffic than its official website in the future, social media has more interaction with customers
I am curious to find out what blog platform you are utilizing? I’m experiencing some minor security problems with my latest blog and I would like to find something more secure. Do you have any recommendations?