They asked, “Do you facebook?” I said no

They asked, “Do you Facebook?” I said no, (ok I fibbed, I am on it, I use it to stalk my wife, it saves having a conversation later) joke hunny!

They said this would be an eye opening webinar, that Facebook was a sales tool in disguise, that sales people could build better relationships, reach new clients and drive sales. I was intrigued because I and I will be honest, dislike Facebook. But as always, I was receptive to being converted, so I allocated an hour of my time to revisit and maybe discover this potential.

I wasn’t converted and for 24 hours I struggled to understand why. I understood the privacy settings, the creation of groups and how you can feed different messages to different parts of your network, I get that, much like Google+.

My conclusion was that it must be more than just one thing, so here are three.

1) The webinar was run by a marketer, (nothing wrong with that of course.) But the conversation revolved around demonstrations of what brands were doing. Not what or how an individual sales person could benefit.

2) I have yet to hear someone in a B2B environment say “hello C’suite, will you be my friend on Facebook?”. Even rephrasing it to “Join my network on Facebook” doesn’t sound right.

3) With other platforms that I use for business, engagement and relationship building cant I just have one place that is mine where I can relax, chill out and if I feel the need to just talk rubbish I can. Yes I know your can separate by using the groups, but it just means they’re in the room next door.

So here’s my question? Can I convince you, the sales person, that Facebook is not the place for connecting with your clients?

Twitter – Business Networking on Steroids!

(also written from a Brand perspective just to be fair)

Seventy nine percent of Twitter followers (versus 60 percent of Facebook fans) are more likely to recommend brands since becoming a fan or follower.
Sixty seven percent of Twitter followers (versus 51 percent of Facebook fans) are more likely to buy the brands they follow.
Facebook’s shared links average three clicks, while Twitter’s tweets generate nineteen clicks on average

Want more? Ok!

Twitter users generated double the median monthly leads of non-Twitter users.
Consumers active on Twitter are three times more likely to affect a brand’s online reputation through syndicated Tweets, blog posts, articles and product reviews.
Twenty percent of consumers indicate they have followed a brand on Twitter in order to interact with the company – more than e-mail subscribers or Facebook fans.

If that doesn’t sway you, then there is always LinkedIn – where it does feel right to say “Join my network of business professionals”

See my LinkedIn posts

Statistic credits to
http://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-destroys-facebook-2010-12
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007639
http://www.exacttarget.com/

Category: FaceBook, LinkedIn, Sales, Social Business, Social Media, Twitter | 6 Comments »

The Cost of Social Media

The Real cost of Social Media

With social media at the height of its popularity, advertisers and companies find it an easy and trendy means of expand their marketing horizons. While many companies may be fooled by the free cost to open a social media account, many fail to consider the expense that goes into running a social media campaign. Do the benefits really outweigh the costs?

“How can you squander even one more day not taking advantage of the greatest shift of out generation? How dare you settle for less when the world has made it so easy for you to be remarkable?” – Seth Godin

Cost

The true cost of a social media campaign depends on the size and reach of the campaign itself. These are some factors to consider:

  • Staff costs – Once cost often overlooked is the cost of your marketer’s salary. Without a dedicated social media campaign manager you will need to work out the amount of time your other employees will spend maintaining the social media site. Community managers are also need to answer customer inquiries and to maintain a spam-free zone for your clients and customers.
  • Advertising – The biggest myth about social media is : “if you build it they will come.” Merely setting up a Facebook page or a twitter account will not guarantee any ROI. It is necessary to add your own advertising to the mix. This can include targeted adds on the platform, adding follow buttons, share buttons on your companies website or email advertisements.
  • External Fees – If your campaign is not in-house, do you out source all parts of your social media campaign? If thats is the case then you will need to figure out the breakdown in billing and how you will be charged. Since different agencies have different rates for different strategies, you’ll need to work out if this is a continuous cost and whether it affects you return value.
  • Other – While many basic tools for social media are free, more in depth tools, such as tracking, require some escalated cost. Any other technical and creative costs may also be assumed. What happens if you are highly successful? Do you have the backing and budget to expand?

Estimated Cost
Below is a breakdown of what a fallout social media campaign may cost in a year. The amounts are estimates released by Danny Brown, CEO of Bonsai Interactive.

Benefits

Considering the potential cost if a target social media campaign, are the benefits really worth the effort and money?

In a recent survey, marketing executives where asked what they felt were the main benefits of marketing through social media. Not surprisingly, only half the respondents felt that ‘low cost’ was a benefit.

So what is the economic potential of fans on Facebook. Syncapse took a look at twenty brands – here are the results:


On average, fans spent an additional $71 on products for which they are fans of, compared to those that are not fans on Facebook.

Twitter has also provided some great case studies.  Take DellOutlet, they sought to expand their brand awareness heavily through twitter. Soon after their  pages where launched thay had generated over $3m worth of business from followers who clicked on links for purchases.

Sometimes the ability of social media is the ability to create a central forum fopr new consumers. Take the case of the Old Spice brand, a new commercial was launched which generated alot of media attention. The Twitter and Facebook pages became a rallying point for these new adopters.

2700% Increase of Twitter followers – 800% Increase in Facebook followers – 300% Increase in traffice to their website

So do the benefits out weight the costs? Tell me how you get on or if you like give me call and lets chat.

Category: FaceBook, Sales, Social Media, Twitter | No Comments »

Social Brand Ranking – Insights

Getting Personal

One of the biggest insights from this year’s findings is that it is those brands that have the skill, and the will, to engage with individuals on a one-to-one basis that stand out. By creating this personal engagement, these brands benefit from a ripple effect into the rest of the community, which is strengthened and invigorated as a result.
The brands that are doing this most actively typically scored highly against our Facebook observable markers of ‘Fan post:Brand post ratio’ and ‘Fan posts interacted with by brand’. On Twitter, ‘Mentions of third party @accounts by @brand’ and ‘Timeliness of response’ were key.
An analysis of patterns around these markers also indicated some interesting differences between approaches to community management in different sectors. While Entertainment brands can create significant reaction to content that they post on social platforms, and have high percentages of fan generated content, the markers showed that they are less likely to respond to fans on Facebook, and on average are slow to respond on Twitter.
Conversely, FMCG and Travel & Leisure brands are the most prolific at acknowledging fans on Facebook, while Media, Travel & Leisure and Services brands are amongst the fastest responders on Twitter.
This poses the question: are Entertainment brands relying too heavily on the value of their naturally shareable content, while missing opportunities to provide value to their communities through one-to-one interaction? The effect of doing both at the same time would seem certain to enhance their social performance even further

Twitter Room for Improvement

While the report card for Facebook makes for encouraging reading, the data shows that brands could be making more of Twitter.
Looking at the brands in the 100 as a whole, the fact that Twitter demands timeliness appears to have been absorbed (see diagram page 20). The top 50 brands for the ‘Timeliness of response’ marker on Twitter scored over 75% of available points, and even the lower quartile were at nearly 50% of available marks. Brands that have set up Twitter with a specific customer service purpose were well represented amongst the fastest responding brands. Media and Travel & Leisure brands featured heavily in the list of those brands doing this well.
However, on the measure of ‘Mentions of third party
@accounts by @brand’ even the highest scoring brands are failing to reach 50% of the total potential scores, and the average score for the 100 was 6 out of 20. This marker, what you might call the ‘conversation marker’,
is the best indicator of a brand’s willingness to employ effective active listening on Twitter, and to use the platform for conversation over broadcasting. On this evidence there is greater potential to be realised here. Technology and Travel & Leisure brands are doing this best at present.

Here are the top 24 – for the full list go HERE

For the full report by Social Brands 100 click HERE

Category: FaceBook, Social Media, Twitter | No Comments »