Posts Tagged ‘starting social media’

Marketers are Still Social Media Beginners

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November 13th, 2008

I was reading Mitch Joel’s blog the other day and he had a link to an article that I wanted to share with you. The article was posted on Mediabuyplanner and is titled: “Marketers Still Face Steep Web 2.0 Learning Curve.” I’m not too shocked to read that, are you? I still think social media marketing and strategy is in the infancy phase, those of us that are involved in social media are still early adopters. Just take a look at the survey results that MENG (marketing executives networking group) collected regarding social media tools.

Twitter isn’t even on there yet! Those who participated in the survey were also asked how they would define social media, here is what they said.

So it looks like the most executives surveyed define social media as “media that are based on conversations among users” or “communication that allows for audience input or contribution.” I would be much more curious to see how executives define and understand social media strategy. I don’t think it’s hard to get involved online with blogs/twitter/etc. however making sure your that social media strategies align with your company and business objectives can be challenging.

Here is some more interesting data from the survey:

Among executive-level marketing professionals:

67% of respondents consider themselves beginners at using social media for marketing purposes.
More than 87% of respondents are not regularly measuring the ROI of their social media marketing efforts.
Though marketers are paying attention to social media and see a future in it, they still consider the social media world akin to the “Wild West.”
67% of those surveyed also said that they will increase their social media advertising budget for 2009

Why? What benefit to the executives see in social media? Let’s take a look:

I’m glad to see that executives are starting to understand some of the value of social media. It’s great to see responses like “brand building,” “market research,” and “customer service” in there. I think the list can go on to include such items as product development, PR, and internal communication. Of course I’m sure the responded would vary depending on who you ask, for example a HR person may see the value for recruiting whereas a product manager may not. There is a lot of creativity that comes into play with social media, it can be used for a lot more then what was mentioned above.

So what did you think of the results of the survey? Were you surprised by anything or did you expect those results?

Here is the full report from Mediabuyplanner

Thanks for reading!

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TAGS: marketers are social media beginners, marketers new to social media, social media beginners, social media trends, starting social media

Questions You Should Ask While Creating a Social Media Strategy

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October 28th, 2008

We all hear about social media strategies and how companies need to engage with customers and build relationships. But it’s not THAT easy. I mean you have to start from somewhere right? You don’t just go create a twitter account or a facebook page and then just start posting, you need a foundation, you need a starting point, what you need are questions.

I’ve put together a list of a few questions you should be asking yourself while developing a social media strategy. I want to keep the list as concise as possible and I want to work with all of you to create this list. Below I have put my suggestions, add your own in the comment section and/or tell me which ones I can remove/modify/combine. Once the list is complete I will post a “final” version and give credit to everyone who participated in making the final list!

Here are some of my questions:

Do you have a clear goal in mind for what and why you want to use social media?

Do you have a department that is going to take ownership over the social media strategy or is it a mixed bag? Who is providing budget and who is responsible?