Archive for January, 2011

How To Plan a Global Social Media Initiative

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

Putting together a social media plan in general, is not all that difficult for many companies.  This is not because setting up a social media plan is necessarily easy to do well, just that most companies have low expectations and therefore low levels of execution and most importantly integration.  The other part of this is there are really no right or wrong ways to build a social media plan.  Ultimately, if it delivers enough value back to the organization to off-set the costs of time and capital, then the company can/should claim success, right?  One difference is in the company’s tolerance for incremental success vs. transformative leadership.  Often, social media is a way to achieve both, depending on the ability of the enterprise to adapt and execute in new and different ways than are comfortable or proven in the past.

Whatever your reasons for deploying a social media plan, just makes sure it maps back to your corporate objectives.  A plan and executables without demonstrable value back to key objectives will not be well received, funded or supported for very long.

What is not discussed often enough is the difference of having a social media plan for a local geography vs. a social plan across the globe.  First there are simply more small to medium sized businesses who only need local or country specific penetration, next, social is just now becoming “socially acceptable” as a key differentiator in the c-suite.  This new focus and attention is sure to stretch even the most senior social planners at global companies.  While trailblazers like Dell’s Vice President of Social Media and Community Manish Mehta are paving the way for global practitioners, there are still very few and far between.  Why is it so hard?  Developing a plan and developing a plan at scale at two completely different animals.  A few key reasons are:

  • Sheer volume of potential conversations
  • Vendors with a lack of multi-language support
  • Having enough quality personnel
  • Too many point systems and platforms
  • Differing behaviours of social usage (online, mobile, short messaging, etc)
  • Lack of proven governance models (managing risk, escalation procedures, training)

There are not a lot of good examples in the market on how to tackle a global social media plan and pull it off.  As companies attempt this, it requires some know-how, a lot of creativity, perspiration and follow through.  There are not a lot of people who know that as well as Ken Burbary.  Ken is the Vice President Group Director, Strategy & Analysis at Digitas and will lead the discussion on this topic for #sm95.  The topic and questions are as follows:

Topic:  How to plan a global social media initiative

Q1 – How is social media consumer behavior evolving globally?

Q2 – What model should companies use to manage social media initiatives globally? (centralized, decentralized, hybrid)?

Q3 – How can companies understand consumer social media usage across different markets & countries?

Please join us in this online chat on Tuesday, January 25 at noon ET.  Follow #sm95 from your favorite Twitter client or simply go to our LIVE page at www.hashtagsocialmedia.com/live.  The format will stay the same with the first question starting at noon and a new question coming every 20 minutes at 12:20 and 12:40.

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Posted in corporate | 2 Comments »

Facing Conflict On Social Networks

Tuesday, January 18th, 2011

Conflict is a fact of everyday life.  Whether between family members, workers, or strangers in the coffee line, conflict is all around us.  Some people thrive on it, others shy far away from it and at work it can be a significant drain on productivity if it is not dealt with.  Besides productivity, conflict can result in increased levels of stress, missed work and, in extreme cases, even escalate into violence.  There are departments within companies that are set up to manage conflict, companies focused on solving the problem and employees who are better at managing it than others.

This type of conflict (in the work place), if addressed, is manageable.  If not addressed it can ruin your culture, destroy productivity andultimately drive down shareholder value.  There is a newer type of conflict emerging though.  You cannot see the people in this conflict or hear tone or voice inflection to see if they are kidding.  This conflict is often anonymous and most of the time relatively meaningless.  This conflict is digital.

Just like ignoring conflict in the offline workplace is imperative, managing conflict in the online workplace is just as imperative.  It comes in many flavors though.  Conflict can come from people who do not agree with your products, geography, employees, sustainability efforts or anything else and they can present themselves anywhere online at anytime.  Some of it is deserved (like this) and some of it is not, (like this).

If you have a digital strategy or not, the chances are, you have conflict online. Whether you know about it or not is a different issue.  Be certain that your customers, employees, stakeholders and partners know about it though.   As a company, you have to plan for managing online conflict and train workers across the organization how to handle.  Clear points of escalation should be in place as well as severity levels for types of conflict.  Response frameworks, filters and notifications and other tools should be in place as well.  Setting this up proactively before you have an issue is a better way to mitigate risk than setting up under the duress of a reactive situation.

You cannot plan for everything, but having certain precautions in place is always advised.  The risk to value ratio is much to significant to ingnore for any business large or small.  This week’s moderator is going to help us understand what’s at stake and how to handle when conflict in the digital or social space occurs.  The moderator is Meg Fowler from communications firm Sametz Blackstone Associates.  Meg brings a heap of experience and a knack for delivering value to this weeks chat.  The topic and questions follow:

Topic: Facing conflict on social networks

Q1: What are the key steps a business can/should take in dealing with conflict online (issues w/ cust. serv., reputation, PR, etc.)?
Q2: How do you face conflict when you’re managing a community? Can communities exist without it? Should they?
Q3: What is your personal approach for dealing with conflict online?

Please join us in this online chat on Tuesday, January 18 at noon ET.  Follow #sm94 from your favorite Twitter client or simply go to our LIVE page at www.hashtagsocialmedia.com/live.  The format will stay the same with the first question starting at noon and a new question coming every 20 minutes at 12:20 and 12:40

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Posted in corporate, Human Resources | 2 Comments »

Social Media for Business: How Do You Cope With Online Distraction?

Tuesday, January 11th, 2011

We come across topics that are very thought provoking, enough that we cannot do it justice by trying to cover it.  Sometimes it’s better to go direct from the source. Below is recent post from our moderator this week, taken from here http://blogs.hbr.org/samuel/2011/01/social-media-in-2011-who-will.html.  We will discuss this POV on our #socialmedia chat this week.

EXCERPT: “Here are the 6 most important choices for you to make this year — the choices that will determine both the quality of your life online and of your relationships offline:

What am I choosing to do on the Web? Imagine turning your computer off every time you turn away from it, and then using the next boot-up cycle to think about what you want to accomplish when you get back online. I’m not advocating that kind of wear and tear on your on/off switch, but I know that our lives online would be infinitely more satisfying if we each took 30 seconds to stop and think about what we want to experience or achieve each time we go back to the Internet.

The pace of our online lives intensifies the need for absolutely clarity about our personal and professional goals: the Internet hurls so many tasks, distractions and genuine opportunities our way that it’s easy to get blown off course. But if you’re clear about what you want the web to do for you — the kinds of relationships you want to build, the conversations you want to have, the ideas you want to express — your time online can actually support and sharpen your vision for a fulfilling life. Make 2011 the year in which the web becomes a means of pursuing your personal and professional priorities, rather than an end in itself.

Who am I choosing to be online? Anyone who has played a video game or hung out in Second Life has encountered the temptation to reinvent oneself as a seven-foot tall werewolf or a voluptuous cheerleader. But you don’t need a salacious fantasy to craft an online persona that is subtly or even dramatically different from your offline self. Your offline self is lumbered with a job, a set of expectations from friends, family and colleagues, and maybe some body image neuroses. Your online self can be anyone you’ve dreamed of being, or someone you already secretly are. And since the persona you create for yourself online inevitably bleeds over to your life offline, creating the best version of yourself online will invariably help you become the person you want to be, online and off. Start bringing that online person to life now.

What problems am I choosing to fix with the help of the Internet? The village that needs a new water pump. The prospect of climate change. The aunt who needs a new beau. The creative vacuum left by the implosion of your garage band. Whether it’s a problem for you, your community or the world, the Internet can help you fix it. Tithing 10% of your time online — from micro-volunteering to online activism to writing a heartfelt note to a lonely friend — is a structured way to ensure that the Internet becomes part of the solution instead of part of the problem. This can be the year in which you get serious about the Internet as the single most promising problem-solver in a world that faces many fast-growing problems.

Am I choosing to be a brand or a person online? Much attention has been paid to “personal brand management” or “reputation management” online. You can choose to live your online life as a brand, and commit yourself to a strategic online presence that is based on maximizing the ROI of your every online utterance. Or you can choose to be a person, committed to online authenticity not because it’s a best practice for social media marketing, but because it’s an extension of your offline integrity. You get to choose whether you live in an online world that’s made up of the interaction among brands or one that’s made up of interaction among people. The way you (and the rest of us) engage online in 2011 will set the pattern for our future.

How am I choosing to use boredom? Recent research reveals that our brains need a certain amount of downtime, that is, boredom, in order to be productive. Those moments when our minds wander are the moments that give us breakthrough thinking, insight and innovation. Reaching for the Blackberry when you’re stuck in a line-up, or processing e-mail during tedious meetings: these activities displace the former vacancies from which aha! moments once emerged. This is the year to commit to a minimum RDA of boredom, to foster habits that keep you from filling every moment with productive or engaging activity.

How am I choosing to live online? Your time online is full of frustrations, from web sites that crash to people who write flames instead of comments. You can let these frustrations turn you off of social media. But remember that in 2011, as in every previous year, the amount of time you spend online will increase. The Internet is woven into the fabric of your daily life. In a very real way, you live there. It’s up to you, to each of us, to make the choices that will make it a good place to live.

Where are you going to ask for help online? We’re all struggling with the choices that the web now asks us to make on a daily basis: choices that were unimaginable even a decade ago. Identifying the challenges where you need some support, and the specific networks or communities where you are going to look for it, is crucial to moving forward in your life online.

What are the online challenges you’re facing? Leave a comment so that we can start tackling them right here.”

Alexandra Samuel is the Director of the Social + Interactive Media Centre at Emily Carr University and the co-founder of Social Signal.  Our topic this week and questions for the chat will be:

Topic:  How do you cope with online distraction?

Q1: How can you determine if something you are doing online is productive or merely distraction?

Q2: What strategies and tactics can business people use to focus their attention online?

Q3: When do you deliberately use social media as a distraction?

Please join us in this online chat on Tuesday, January 11 at noon ET.  Follow #sm93 from your favorite Twitter client or simply go to our LIVE page at www.hashtagsocialmedia.com/live.  The format will stay the same with the first question starting at noon and a new question coming every 20 minutes at 12:20 and 12:40

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Posted in corporate, Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

Social Media and Commerce for Business

Tuesday, January 4th, 2011

The holiday shopping season is behind us now and everyone can catch their breath.  A lot of companies tried out some new approaches to their traditional e-commerce strategies by adding in touches of social.  It is still too early to tell what worked and what did not for sure but it is time to start talking about real strategies for social commerce in 2011.

Based on your business there are a number of approaches to take with regard to social commerce.  Looking online, there are a lot of ways to drive new sales.  These would include setting up proper descriptions on review sites like Angies List, Yelp, Google Places, etc.  It might also include considering product ratings, comparisons and customer reviews on your own site.

Regarding walk-in or foot traffic, how does social come into play here.  Certainly there is the daily deals phenomenon that Groupon started and now hosts dozens of competitors including Wal-Mart.  Is Groupon the best avenue for your business?  Other offline successes have come through checkins and scavenger type of hunts that bring in gaming type of incentives.

What is the best approach for applying social to your 2011 e-commerce strategy? What’s working and what’s not?  We brought in the big dogs for this discussion.  One of Forrester’s leading analysts covering social media, Augie Ray will moderate today’s chat.  Augie brings an entire industry worth of research to help us discerne the right values and help spots some of the early trends.  Our topic and questions this week are:

Topic:  Social Media and Commerce for Business

Q1: How is social affecting online consumer purchases?

Q2: How is social affecting off-line/in-store purchases?

Q3: What are top 10 things to consider when setting up social commerce?

Please join us in this online chat on Tuesday, January 4 at noon ET.  Follow #sm92 from your favorite Twitter client or simply go to our LIVE page at www.hashtagsocialmedia.com/live.  The format will stay the same with the first question starting at noon and a new question coming every 20 minutes at 12:20 and 12:40.

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Posted in Commerce | Comments Off