In the realm of digital communications we are seeing an increasing number of businesses feeling that it is necessary to have a presence on all major social media networks and channels.
Businesses are asking users to follow them on Twitter, like them on Facebook, connect with them on LinkedIn, view their videos on YouTube, browse their Flickr photos and visit the corporate website and multiple microsites.
But is this always a good idea?
While some brands such as DELL have arguably conquered every facet of social media having established blogs an open space where users can share their ideas and thoughts about Dell Products, a Twitter account, a Facebook page, a YouTube channel and a LinkedIn profile, other brands have failed in their bid to effectively operate multiple social networks simultaneously.
With a multitude of social networking channels to administer and monitor, corporate marketing teams are falling into a trap where by they are too time poor to craft meaningful content that appeals to the specific social networking audiences.
Some businesses are linking their Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts and posting the one message to their entire audience. Many businesses and individuals believe that this approach is a great way to save time and resources.
However, social media networks have different subscribers, different people and very different communities and dynamics. Providing all communities with the same content simply does not work.
Twitter followers want short, informative posts and updates, while Facebook users may want to engage with the brand on a deeper level through discussion, comments and multimedia content.
Culturally, a presence on all social media channels requires sufficient resources in place to monitor, respond, engage and craft meaningful content for each subscriber base. If a business is not able to do this, then having a presence on the social network may be doing more harm than good.
An example of this is when an individual writes back to a corporate Twitter account and the marketing team only monitors the Facebook page regularly, resulting in the post going unnoticed. The business is not interacting with their followers in a timely manner and is essentially ignoring one of the golden rules of social media.
According to research conducted by Evolve24, seventy per cent of companies ignore customer complaints on Twitter; while studies conducted by Econsultancy highlight that brands only respond to five per cent of all their Facebook Wall questions on average.
It is important to pick the right channel where the vast majority of stakeholders are residing, then create content that is suited to the audience and the channel. It is also critical to monitor the channel, promote engagement and respond to the audience in a timely manner.
Businesses do not need to be across all social networks if it doesn’t make sense from a business point of view.
What are the fundamental questions a business must ask when deciding which channel to engage audiences through?
1. Where is my audience? Establishing which social media channels your audience participates inthrough digital audits and monitoring (listening) platforms. SONAR, our proprietary monitoring service, provides in-depth analyses of these conversations. Custom reports can be created in a matter of hours.
2. What am I communicating to my audience and what do I have to offer? A clear understanding of what messages you want to convey to your audiences, what information they want to share and what they want to offer their audience in return for engaging in dialogue with the business.
3. What are the risks of engaging in social media, and am I prepared? By being fully aware of the risks associated with social media dialogue and having robust and effective crisis plans in place you can save a lot of time and money down the track when something goes wrong.
4. Where are my competitors? It is a good idea to understand which channels your major competitors are involved in. It can help you to decide the appropriate level of commitment required for each channel and establish a benchmark for investment.
Only once you have answered these four questions should you start to embark on developing a program of engagement and dialogue.
It might sound quite rudimentary, but if the social media sphere is any indication, it is clear that many brands are failing to ask these most simple of questions and are trying to be all channels to all people.
