WHAT IS THE REAL PURPOSE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN BUSINESS?

According to Dr. Jeff Tanner, a Social Media Expert . . .  “So what is the purpose [of Social Media]? Really, there’s more than one. Social media can support sales efforts throughout the entire buying cycle, which means that the purposes are to stimulate interest, generate demand, shorten the sales cycle, and set expectations for value.

Social media stimulates interest and demand. This function works two ways: First, influence the influencers, and second, identify actual leads.

Social Media identifies actual leads and allows prospects to self-identify. Stimulating interest in people because they expect to receive something of value.”

Most Recently

I found a recent discussion of this at a Social Media Club event! So what happens when you put a number of Social Media managers into the same room? The outcome was some very spirited and intense discussions about Social Media.

The two schools of thought were:

1- Social Media is about branding. Social Media allows you to uniquely Brand and Position yourself in a very competitive marketplace.  Thus, making people feel good about the brand and wanting to tell others about your brand.

2- Social Media is about achieving sales. Let the world know what your brand offers, and drive them to a place (landing page, website, blog, or Facebook), where they can learn more and purchase your product or service, request a demonstration, or take action that drives them further into your Sales Funnel.

Making Noise

From this meeting I also learned of an interesting Social Media case study. There was a bank which ran a Social Media promotion whereby current customers could purchase tickets to a private performance by Justin Bieber, provided they could accumulate the appropriate number of credit card points. For those that don’t know, Justin Bieber is an 18 year old pop singer-songwriter.

The public response to this promotion was an intensely polar reaction, generating comments on their Facebook page ranging from, “Why is [this bank] asking me if i wanna see Justin Bleeber, Miley Cyrus or some other stupid ……. makes me wanna change banks!” to the complete opposite, “Can I please have some tickets - I love him so much”

The obvious question is, did such a promotion connect with their correct target market customer and did it drive real and measurable results? Personally, I don’t know many teenagers that have mortgages or have a ton of money (except Bieber) in the bank. Not to mention the message being conveyed was encouraging young people to spend large amounts on their credit card in order to gain points to redeem them for the tickets.

What the Social Media Manager forgot was the underlying message that increasing personal revolving debit is not a sensible thing to do in these financially challenging times.  Nonetheless, the Social Media Manager for the bank claimed a Victory, for success of the promotion as it “got people talking about the brand”.  I disagree with the Manager; I would consider these as a total Failure.

Results

In my role as a Business Mentor and Coach for a number of clients, I strongly agree that that Social Media (when used well and appropriately), is one of an assortment of effective and successful strategies for generating quality sales leads. As a matter of fact, we see an increase in leads being created by our clients through their Social Media activities, as well as their paid ads in highly targeted Social Media platforms. We know this for a fact, because we have them track everything and they know the number of leads generated, the conversion rate, the average sale and the ROI they generate.

Conclusion

For our clients, it’s not about making lots of noise online, it’s about achieving real and measurable results. So, what is the real purpose of your Social Media activity? Keep in mind that Social Media is just one strategy, that when combined with other key strategies achieve the desired results in a marketing strategy.

What are your goals?  What Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) do you use to measure your results? Do you have a strategy in place to reach your Social Media goals? How do you track and drive performance? What other strategies do you have in place, which you are currently testing and measuring to optimize your ROI (Return on Investment)?  All these questions need to be answered before you put a comprehensive marketing strategy in place.  Here at Focused Business Solutions LLC, we can help you with that.