Social Media is one of the big buzzwords going around right now and everyone is saying that you or your company needs to get onto the bandwagon, but lets think about this. Social media is just like every other aspect of marketing. You must first understand what it is you are trying to accomplish before you invest time, effort, and money into it. You may have the best Facebook page with the most fans, but if it doesn’t translate into business for you in some way or another, it may be a waste of time. Then again, maybe gaining business isn’t what you are after. Here are a few examples of Social Media strategies that we have seen.
Ford Motor Company
Ford uses the Twitter name @ford. In all the years of buying cars I have never visited ford.com when wanting to make a purchase nor would I tweet them to find out what kind of car I should buy. I just go to a local dealership. With this in mind, Ford uses twitter to enhance customer service and announce new things they are doing. Ford’s strategy is focused on enhancing and promoting their brand, meanwhile giving consumers direct access to the corporate Ford Motor Company.
Starbucks
Starbucks has a Facebook page with over 23 million fans. However they don’t use the platform to promote their company. Instead, Starbucks offers their page as an open forum for their customers to talk about the company, their favorite coffee or whatever else they wish. They created a community with their customers where they can interact all under the Starbucks umbrella. The Starbucks strategy for social media is to foster the culture they have created.
Chevron
Chevron uses LinkedIn to aid in its search for high quality employees. In a world where it’s not just who you know but also who knows you LinkedIn enables Chevron to view more than just a person’s resume, but references and much more detailed work history. Chevron’s approach is not to sell anything, but to “shop” for employees. Chevron’s strategy is to use information made available through social media to gain qualified employees, a direct benefit to the company.
These are just three examples of how Ford, Starbucks, and Chevron have used social media, and from the outside looking in, they are using it well. These industry heavyweights use social media to benefit their company as a whole. They drew out a strategy and have set out to accomplish it. We at Marion feel social media has potential to expand the reach of your business and enhance your brand. However a well developed strategy is the key to turning the “latest trend” into something that can be worth its investment, giving you a return that engages your clientele, brings more prospects and deepends your overall market penetration.
Contact us for help with your social media strategy, whether you’re a Business to Consumer or Business to Business.
I like your big three examples here. They really set the wide table. But as you suggest, by industry, brand, market there are so many differences too. I appreciate your emphasis on ends. A lot of people get caught up in numbers, when actions are really the name of the game.
Totally agreed. The strategy must be for your company in direction of your target audience. There is no one way to do it all.
Glad you liked it.
I totally agree with your examples, but….. what if the customer service/customer experience doesn’t live up to the social experience? One of those companies listed above has demonstrated to me they could care less about keeping their customers.
If the said company lives up to the expectation is on all on them. At the beginning they all determined the strategy and the beauty of it is that say after 6 months they can review and see if they are actually accomplishing what they set out to do and make the necessary adjustments.
Social media though is still pretty new and its easy to forget that it needs TLC.
Cool story bro. Tell me more!
I think that a company’s social media strategy should focus on the place where their customers are. Some companies will be surprised to find that most of their clients (or potential clients) are on Facebook or Twitter but not both.
All the more reason to a company to set up their strategy in a way that compliments their brand and builds report with their clients. As far as groups being on Twiiter or Facebook but not both, we have found that to be the case as well.
I’d argue that Ford gets almost as much – if not more – social media “juice” from Scott Monty’s personal Twitter account than from the main Ford account. Whether that’s a good thing or it just underscores the shortcomings of the brand, I’m not sure. But having a “Twitter celebrity” on staff certainly generates discussion, so that’s why I’m hiring Lady Gaga to promote my company!
Well I think the only respectable thing for us to do would be to hire Justin Bieber and get this war started.
Bring it on, fool! (I forgot to mention I hired Mr. T to leave all my blog comments.)
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