Transcript

Social Media: Background, Strategies & Success

Tom JensenBy:

Masters of Marketing, Deakin University, AustraliaDegree:

October 2013Date:

Industry Talent Initiative Internship Project

To access the full range of resources from PMA Australia-New Zealand, please visit: http://www.pma-anz.com/information-centre

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Scope of report This is a broad research document that examines what social media is and how best the membership of PMA A-NZ could integrate a social media strategy into their core business operations to simultaneously improve customer relationships and ultimately provide greater value to the business. The report highlights some aspects of how to engage with customers on social media as a form of lead generation.

Key Findings: -

Social Media can be a useful tool in the B2B sphere

Strategy is key in implementing effective social media engagement

Asia Pacific region will be home to the largest group of social media users by 2017

Choosing which social media platform is a vital factor in determining success

Measure your performance

Integrate social media into your core business undertakings

90% of B2B decision makers use social media somewhere in their buying process

Good place to connect customers, create leads and tap into new sources of innovation

Australian organizations have room to improve their levels of engagement

Untapped channel in relation to retaining and gaining top human resources

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What is social media? Social media, then, can be defined as “the technological component of the communication, transaction and relationship building functions of a business which leverages the network of customers and prospects to promote value co-creation.” As such, social media must be managed as an explicit strategic activity. It cannot be left to define itself in a firm’s relationship with its lifeblood—its customers.

Social media is about engagement and collaboration. The benefits cannot be unidirectional or one-sided. Customers need to receive, or at the very least perceive, value from the social media effort. This will vary by industry, company, and even customer. There will always be a conversation taking place online and a large proportion is now occurring on social networks. It is important to be involved in the conversation when it is related to the key part of your business, at this point it is possible to influence the flow of the conversation and ultimately provide value to your business. Being a relatively new channel and such a dynamic field there has yet to be agreement on what constitutes best practice, but they do agree on several points. First, it is important. Second, “the balance of power has moved, inexorably and forever, from the company to the customer”. Last but not least, it requires commitment, resources, and seamless integration with not just the sales organization and its strategy, but with all elements of the organization and its overall strategy.

It is not possible to be everything for everyone. There is no one size fits all, or flip the switch and forget about it approach to which a CEO can simply assign budget. Social media, at its heart, involves collaboration inside and outside the company, which means that partnership between sales and marketing is paramount. Acknowledging this will aid in making the correct strategic decisions relating to how resources can be better utilized in a targeted manner. What is clear though is that ignoring social media is not an option as the scale represents great opportunities. Understanding how best to harness the value is key to any business. Also worth considering is that the Asia-Pacific region will be home to the largest group of social media users by 2017 and as such can place Australian businesses right in the middle of the action.

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Current Active Social Media Users Facebook 701 million Google+ 359 million Twitter 296 million LinkedIn 160 million

Lead generation

1. Why Social Media? a. EARN YOUR CUSTOMERS' TRUST

Whether in a B2B or B2C environment, according to Nielsen Media Buzz Metrics, more than 90% of consumers trust recommendations from people who they know: i.e., through friends' Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn posts. These brand advocates are critical endorsers for your business because they are so influential in what some have branded the ‘New Age hyper-communication paradigm’. Consumers are becoming more skeptical of advertising and marketers need to embrace new ways of communicating to their target audience. Today consumers put faith in unsolicited, unfiltered, and raw third-party testimonials from independent sources. Consumer behavior changes as the world's technology evolves. Social media allows companies a platform to humanize their brand and communicate with their target market using a two-way communication model, which is unlike traditional TV, or print advertising. Social media allows customers to share their brand experiences in a viral manner that can either help or hurt your brand.

B) MEASURE YOUR PERFORMANCE

Social media can be measured through a number of contexts depending on your company's strategic objectives and goals. The biggest misconception for not only social media, but also all marketing communications, is that you can somehow track

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every last cent spent and generated. It is not possible as marketing to consumers is a complex set of actions that are difficult to accurately pinpoint. Their environment can easily sway their purchasing behavior and the organization’s social media presence is just once element of the environment. Measure your Social Media success through Google Analytics as well as Facebook Insights; website referrals, new fans, links shared, comments posted, etc. These are statistics that can prove valuable to businesses as they can review their performance over a week, month, and year. It's intuitively obvious that someone who "Likes" you on Facebook is more apt to purchase from you and recommend your products to their "network." Return on investment (ROI) cannot be strictly calculated by financial return, but rather brand awareness, brand recognition, brand perception, and using analytics or statistics from each social network.

C) MARKETING TO TODAY'S NEW AGE CONSUMER The key to traditional selling is based on features, benefits, and solutions for your customer. However, the modern context allows all forms of communication to be accessible at all times and now affords marketers the ability to broadcast to an ultra-connected network instantly. The new focus of sales should now involve leveraging technology for both efficiency and effectiveness through the Social media platform. Imagine posting something on your Facebook Page and having a "fan" "share" it on their own personal profile. Now new people (their friends) are reached, who may have never heard of you before, in a "word of mouth" kind of way, hence the social term "viral." The ability to collect vital information and consumer data from prospects via Facebook is unprecedented and is now easier than ever to collect e-mails, ask your consumer questions, and put your brand "in their hands". The only way to stay competitive in the marketplace is to satisfy the palette of your customers by listening to their needs. By harnessing social media effectively it is now possible learn valuable consumer insight in a very efficient, cost-effective way.

D) Cost Effective Social media is one of the most inexpensive avenues to reach new and existing customers, from anywhere in the world, at any time of the year. In fact, it is the cheapest and, if implemented correctly, one of the most effective marketing methods. There is no other marketing resource that has the same power, versatility, and capability as social media. By being able to engage with your customer base daily, they become more aware of your products, services, and brand. As they become more aware, they get more comfortable with your company and this increases your chance of earning their loyalty.

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B2B Tend to have longer purchase decision cycles Despite B2B firms still favouring a more traditional one-directional form of communication, in the new era it is possible to foster a form of two-way-communication. B2B marketing is in essence about one central thing: knowledge. How best to share it, create it and how best to make it more available to the people who need it. Enhancing it, adding value to it, offering new points of view on things we think we already know. Positioning a B2B company is about how you can help your customers do their jobs better. Social media now provides a new channel to effectively direct this knowledge. The B2B world is in essence still people talking to people; the big difference is the amount of money spent and a possible increase in the complexity of a decision. These decisions however still get made around individual connections and networks, something that social media can help leverage. A study by Accenture found that while B2Bs lag in integrating social media into marketing plans, they are realizing the value of social media use. Nearly two thirds of marketing executives questioned said they believe social media is an important way to reach customers. Even though there has not been a huge increase in social use with B2Bs, particularly in the Australian market, the trend toward using the channels more actively proves that marketers will need to acquire tools and technology to successfully leverage a social media strategy. Figure 1: Process evolution of Social Media in Sales

It can be argued that using current social media applications must be viewed as a living, dynamic process in the firm. It is a strategy that will require substantial commitment and continuous monitoring. In fact, parallels to the adoption of the Internet by companies just over a decade ago can easily be drawn. Much in the same way that companies entered the Internet age with a simple, one-way (and often just

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one page) Internet presence years ago, they must now realize that social media is a tool, strategy, or way of doing business that will evolve through its own life cycle that has yet to be written.

The earliest Web sites were primarily informational. They provided little opportunity for two-way communication, perhaps at best providing a mailing address, e-mail, or phone number for any further contact that might be required. They existed because prevailing thought at the time told firms they must “be on the Internet,” even if the business case as to why had yet to be fully made. In the same way, some companies today will decide that social media means creating a YouTube channel, or perhaps a LinkedIn or Facebook page simply for the purpose of “having a social media presence.” This simple approach may satisfy some customers, but it will do little to enhance a firm’s value proposition. It will be, essentially, the equivalent of being listed in the White Pages. Customers can find you, but for answers to questions or for more substantive information they will eventually demand more.

Social media already, in some instances, has the ability to resolve customer issues in real time, mitigate crises and provide real- time pricing offers to attract and influence customer purchases, and this is just the start. Ultimately, it may be the case that Internet e-commerce adoption and social media are not so much on parallel lines of development but, rather, just a short distance from intersection as the two technologies/strategies/approaches become seamlessly intermingled, essentially one and the same.

Social media is different for different customers and companies. It does not seek to replace telephone or e-mail communication, or even transactions. Instead it seeks to complement them or augment the value of each interaction with the customer, existing or future.

Social media, at every step of the sales process, requires a strategy and a framework for implementation and transformation as it grows with the customer. Absent that, social media will likely become another unharnessed element of strategic drift as countless practitioner tactics are employed with no clear direction in mind. Make no mistake, social media should not be rigid or inflexible, but rather that it should be directed at every step, and should be owned by a core function.

How to benefit?

Before a firm can enter the social media arena, it must determine the appropriate goals associated with the social media implementation. It needs to identify and understand the value proposition for the customer, not just the company. A savvy sales or marketing organization will likely have some knowledge of what current and prospective customers want and will want from their relationships in the future. If organizations do not realize what customers want, they will need to acquire this knowledge, perhaps through a “social audit”. It is this information that will drive, in

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part, the initial selection of which types of social media (and specific platforms) to pursue.

Are customers simply looking for a forum to better understand a product or service? Do they want to interact with experienced customers to allay their own fears before making an investment? Some businesses may need to consider a simple blog, whereas others may need a Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn presence. Still others may find the most value in educational videos posted on YouTube. The customer drives this decision. Establishing a social media presence that does not attract customers or deliver additional value is a potential waste of resources and a lost opportunity to connect and collaborate.

Creating content of every type is more difficult for marketers of business products and services, but where the focus should be on is increasing the use of LinkedIn & quora.com (an open source knowledge base) to assist in lead generation. Use the knowledge that you have been able to acquire in your own industry to power lead generation.

Many affiliates and online sellers rely on social media to build a reputation and make it easier to earn the trust of buyers. Compared to random selling on the Internet, you create an account and develop a personality to cater to specific needs of individuals. Over time, people will point out some of the experts in specific fields and avail of offers based on the information they have. Having your own social media account as a seller will also make you more approachable and trustworthy. When engaging in social media with a B2B focus, one of the main objectives should be to generate positive word-of-mouth advocacy. The sheer number of people on social networks is impressive (LinkedIn: 225 million users, Twitter: 200+ million active users, Facebook: 1.1 billion users) and these are increasing every day.

Some claim that B2B marketing on social media is a bit like finding a needle in a haystack. You are looking for that golden conversation that turns into a real opportunity. However, for B2B marketers, the typical deal size makes a single-source opportunity extremely compelling. With many social media sites to cover, your time is best spent targeting the sites with the largest community of users and using keywords and highly relevant messaging to get in front of these individuals. Capturing mindshare on social media is a difficult task based on the sheer volume of content produced. But some social sites will allow you to target users more effectively than others. When it comes to Top Performers, B2B marketers ranked the top four most effective social media sites as LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, and SlideShare.

A critical point to note is that Asia Pacific region will be home to the largest group of social media users by 2017. For organisations that are looking to expand their operations in this region, social media provides a cost effective method of lead generation.

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LinkedIn: Engaging buyers on LinkedIn is primarily about sharing relevant content and participating in Discussions and Groups. B2B marketers should target industry- and role-specific LinkedIn Groups and make it a regular practice to share thought leadership and blog posts with these individuals. B2B sales reps should try to inject themselves into discussions or questions by adding value, not selling. Additionally, it’s bad form to use Discussion forums for promotion.

Twitter: For B2B marketers Twitter is largely a volume play. Hashtags should always be used to target specific buyers with relevant messages about products and services. Generally, short and compelling insights or Tweets are most likely to get clicks. Twitter is essentially a fire hose of unstructured information, so mindshare is largely a function of volume. Top Performers indicated that on average they tweet 12-15 times a day using the company twitter handle. Tweets could include recent product news, events, or relevant industry best practices. It’s generally a best practice not to blatantly promote services on Twitter. Use Twitter to keep the brand active and share thought leadership in the form of blog posts, videos, website links, or links to other social properties.

YouTube: Rich media has become a very popular source of promotion for B2B marketers. Create a company channel on YouTube where you can centralize and align all brand-related videos to one location. Unfortunately, YouTube constantly drives traffic away from your main web properties where forms can capture contact information. Even when videos are hosted by YouTube and posted to a website, it’s easy for users to navigate their way directly to YouTube. YouTube allows you to add links to the descriptions of videos as long as http:// is added to the beginning of the link; it will become clickable when the video posts. Links back to relevant website landing pages should be presented on the first line of a YouTube description when

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posting a video. At the same time, it’s critical to include keywords when posting videos to maximize organic search benefits and brand exposure.

SlideShare: As with YouTube, it’s good practice for B2B marketers to create a branded channel on SlideShare and load as many presentations as possible to the site. Take the time to fill out all of the keywords and description copy because this will help drive organic traffic to your presentations. Links can also be added to the description copy on presentations, but readers must manually copy the text and paste it into a browser.

Even though great numbers of B2B companies are not in direct contact with their end-customers, they can still benefit from social media. Although the connection between social media and B2B is not obvious at first glance, B2B companies have in fact a lot to gain by leveraging their respective positions in the industry, provided they are talking to the right audience. As in everything, context matters, when you have a professional message to put across, you want your audience to have their professional hats on. In turn, such resonance between message creators and their audience greatly facilitate communication and encourage engagement. For instance, a recent Forrester survey pointed out that some 48% of B2B social marketers plan to increase their lead generation usage of LinkedIn discussion groups and pages, due to the high usage of LinkedIn by senior decision makers.

B2B marketing has historically relied on below-the-line interactions – interactions that social media can take to a whole new level. Social media networks such as LinkedIn can also help eliminate or partly replace cold calls. After all, why do you need to do cold calls when chances are, someone in your network can connect you to your target? When executed correctly, and targeted at the right audience, these efforts will drive conversations that can not only boost your company’s ability to strengthen your engagement with existing followers, they will also dramatically expand your reach to new audiences. A recent survey by Marketing Pilgrim found that over 90% of B2B decision makers use social media somewhere in their buying process.

So why is it then that B2B companies are still finding it difficult to demonstrate results?

A large part of the problem has been the inherent difficulty associated with measuring the return on marketing investments at a suitable level of detail, as well as knowing exactly who is actually responsible for social media activity, whether its customer service, marketing or PR departments. Nobody seems to be quite clear.

Unlike their consumer counterparts B2B tends to be less impulsive or price-sensitive so “deals” or “specials” just don’t work so well. When it comes to B2B, social media is about interaction and knowledge sharing. Hard selling will get you ignored at best and hated at worst.

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Do Your Research And Strategize Before Executing

Social media is about building relationships and that takes time. Think about who you want to engage and where they hang out because you’re going to have to spend some time there before things will start to happen. Spend time understanding the social media landscape surrounding your business before you start making any kinds of waves. Plan For Long Term Development Just Like Your Business

Don’t expect immediate results or large numbers of readers or followers over-night, unless of course you game the system which means you’ve got a lot of irrelevant people that will be inactive around your content. Those B2B companies that actually generate a return from their activity established a clear strategy and adjusted it as results came in and sustained this activity over a committed period. Don’t Be Boring And Take A Stand For Your Audience

Business can be pretty boring at times and if all you do is talk about your business, its messages and how great you think you are, then people will switch off, just like the boring person at that party you ran into the other night. Social media is about listening first, understanding second and responding by adding value lastly. Spread references to your own content in amongst other content sources which support your response and most of all deliver relevant and timely information. Get Your Content Out There And Share It

Somebody once said, “build it and they will come”. They won’t though unless somebody tells them about it. Your content is no different. Unless you share and distribute it on-line to make others aware of it and allow them to amplify it by sharing it further, you may as well not have bothered to writ it in the first place. RSS feeds are a great way to distribute content on sites like Twitter and LinkedIn and great place to share and exchange content within the context of meaningful debate.

Be Consistent Across Social Media

Anybody that has a market or customer-facing role will probably have a social media profile of some form or other. There is nothing worse than seeing photos that don’t represent an individual in the context of their involvement in a business. Profile photo’s and messages on B2B social media sites should support the companies and allow for a little bit of individualism and creativity without distancing them from their customers and stake holders or the company they work for. Make Sure You Track And Monitor Activity

Social media is like word of mouth online. People can spread your message or take it to task and challenge it. It’s impossible to try and control every conversation, much better to help shape and direct them or at worst be seen to be listening and taking

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an interest. Monitoring your social media land scape is an important task, in order to understand what people are saying about your business as well as its products or services and for you to thank your fans and deal with critics. This is then able to push out content generated by PMA A-NZ to the audience. Build Your Social Media Activity As Part Of A Bigger Marketing Plan

Like your website, PR and online advertising, social media is not a separate or disconnected part of your marketing activity. In fact these different online marketing channels actually impact each other increasing the value of each by leveraging and compounding returns. Email signatures link to website and social media profiles as do press releases, articles and videos.

Building specific microsites can also help to increase cross-linking and rank by providing better information management and relevancy. The bottom line is that each will raise the power of the other and in turn maximise the return from your online marketing presence. It is hard to sometimes realise that social media is not only for the high profile consumer brands. What you do and how you act and where you’re active will most likely be different as a B2B brand compared to a B2C brand. If the business closes off the notion of conducting business on social and chooses a path of a more traditional approach, there may be many opportunities missed.

Busting MYTHS about B2B & Social Media

Fastest growing segment are users over 30 years old

Social doesn’t apply to B2B – not true. Word of mouth has always been important when conducting B2B transactions, it is just that social media has made the process visible.

o In 2007, 15% of B2B Marketers said they used social media o Today, that number has nearly quadrupled to 57% of B2B Marketers

currently using some form of social media to connect customers, create leads and tap into new sources of innovation

Social Media is Obscure, Niche Content In fact, social media is a trusted source of information for many purchase decisions and product opinions - especially in B2B

Social Media is Not Worth the Risk Social media has become a critical component in building lasting, positive relationships. This can be achieved by search results, increasing visibility and promoting thought leadership to perspective customers.

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When things go wrong?

You’ve Assumed Your Audience Is All the Same

While we may have incredible insight into our audience, we’ll never be able to make everyone happy at the same time. While marketing to the majority, you could lose sight of the impact the minority can have. Not pleasing every person in your audience is okay, but you still need to treat a one-to-one conversation with a follower like a real-life conversation. Social media software can make it easier to monitor and respond to relevant conversations with strangers, leads and customers in your social media community.

What Else Do We Get Out of Social Media? Human resource benefits – attracting talent One of the most commonly used social media platform when it comes to finding jobs or hiring employees is LinkedIn. The website is basically a human resource platform that aids individuals in locating the right job that matches their interests. The approach is more unique than merely submitting a resume online. When human resource departments or companies tap into social media, they create relationships and connections with potential employees and workers. The network can span greatly, involving former and current clients, previous colleagues, entrepreneurs and even family and friends. People can introduce new potential employees for companies as the network increases.

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Who is utilizing this channel well?

Dole Bananas US – focus on building the brand with consumers and 672K ‘Likes’ and whilst increasing product usage.

Engages their consumers

Focuses on building a community

Fosters two-way communication

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Australian Avocados on Facebook 70K likes.

Focuses on increasing usage with recipe ideas.

Alternative uses for avocados

Help improve the consumers’ relationship with local produce

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Maersk Global Freight & Logistics Company

44K followers

Position themselves as a ‘Knowledge Centre’ – a leader in their field.

Have created and are active in Groups that aim to provide insightful and thought-provoking discussions around the challenges and the future of the shipping industry. Despite being created by Maersk, they also specifically encourage open participation by other shipping and logistic providers.

Provide relevant news pieces that may be of interest to those active in the industry.

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Australian Bananas

183K likes

Focus on building a relationship with consumers

Creating a mixture of unique content that aims to be ‘shareable’. There is a focus on topical events such as State of Origin, the Royal baby.

Personalizing the farming process – creating a narrative behind banana production.

Competitions

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Ocean Mist Farms Artichokes

11K ‘likes’

Competitions

Alternative uses

Recipes

Trying to educate the consumer that an artichoke is not a commodity, rather a branded artichoke is to be the preferred purchase.

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About this project This project was undertaken by Tom Jensen, a Masters of Marketing student at Deakin University, as part of an internship project on behalf of PMA Australia-New Zealand (PMA A-NZ). PMA A-NZ currently works closely with Deakin and a number of other universities to provide internship opportunities in the fresh produce industry for undergraduate and post-graduate students. Students are selected by their Faculty to participate in the program, and while the student selection process varies with each school, PMA A-NZ are careful to pre-interview each student to make the best match possible with each company. The Practicum and Internship program is managed by PMA A-NZ as part of its initiative to attract, develop and retain talent for the produce industry. To find out more, please visit the Industry Talent section of the PMA A-NZ website at: http://www.pma-anz.com/industry-talent-initiative/industry/attract-talent © 2013 by PMA Australia-New Zealand Limited. All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of PMA Australia-New Zealand Limited.


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