do you need social media?

WHAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA?

Social media is like teen sex.Everyone wants to do it. Nobody knows how.When it’s finally done there is surprise it’s not better.”

Avinash Kaushik, Analytics Evangelist, Google“

photo by Zellaby on flickr.com

Officially, though, social media is not like teen sex. *

Officially, social media is “an umbrella term that defines the various activities that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos, and audio.”

http://www.wikipedia.org



IT’S ALSO A FANCY WAYTO DESCRIBE THE ZILLIONSOF CONVERSATIONSPEOPLEARE HAVING ONLINE24/7.

photo by Kris Hoet on flickr.com

WHY SHOULDI CARE?

BECAUSE 3 OUT OF 4 AMERICANS USE SOCIAL TECHNOLOGY.Forrester, The Growth Of Social Technology Adoption, 2008

REASON #1

BECAUSE 2/3 OF THE GLOBAL INTERNET POPULATION VISIT SOCIAL NETWORKS.Nielsen, Global Faces & Networked Places, 2009

REASON #2

BECAUSE VISITING SOCIAL SITES IS NOW THE 4TH MOST POPULAR ONLINE ACTIVITY—AHEAD OF PERSONAL EMAIL.

Nielsen, Global Faces & Networked Places, 2009

REASON #3

photo by Bruno Girinon flickr.com

BECAUSE TIME SPENT ON SOCIAL NETWORKS IS GROWING AT 3X THE OVERALL INTERNET RATE, ACCOUNTING FOR ~10% OF ALL INTERNET TIME.Nielsen, Global Faces & Networked Places, 2009

REASON #4

Rupert Murdoch, Global Media Entrepreneur

Technology is shifting the power away from the editors, the publishers,

the establishment, the media elite. Now it’s the people who are in control.”

BECAUSE SOCIAL MEDIA IS DEMOCRATIZING COMMUNICATIONS. BIG TIME.

REASON #5

“

BECAUSE SOCIAL MEDIA IS LIKE WORD OF MOUTH

ON STEROIDS.

REASON #6

BECAUSE, DEAR FRIEND, SOCIAL MEDIA

photo by Balakov on flickr.com

IS THE HUGE FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH.

13 HOURS

13 HOURS The amount of video uploaded to YouTube every minute.

412.3 YEARS

The length of time it would take to view every YouTube video.

412.3 YEARS

100,000,000

100,000,000The number of YouTube videos viewed per day.

13,000,000

13,000,000 The number of articles available on Wikipedia.

3,600,000,000

The number of photos archived on Flickr.com as of June 2009.

3,600,000,000

The number of photos archived on Flickr.com as of June 2009.

3,600,000,000That’s roughly 1 photo per every 2 people on the planet.

1382%

The monthly growth rate of Twitter users from January to February 2009.

3,000,000

3,000,000 The average number of Tweets per day on Twitter.com

5,000,000,000

5,000,000,000 The number of minutes spent on Facebook each day.

1,000,000,000

1,000,000,000 The amount of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) shared each week on Facebook.

The word blog is irrelevant. What's important is that it is now common, and will soon be expected, that every intelligent person (and quite a few unintelligent ones) will have a media platform where they share what they care about with the world.”

Seth Godin, Author

“

5,000,000

photo by jmtimages (better!) on flickr.com

5,000,000 The number of active Barack Obama supporters across 15 social networks.


photo by EricaJoy on flickr.com

14,200,000

The number of views Obama’s famous “Yes We Can” video got on YouTube.


14,200,000

The number of views Obama’s famous “Yes We Can” video got on YouTube.


14,200,000

An additional 15 of the 1,800 official and 139,000 unofficial Obama videos received over 1 Million views.

$6,500,000


The amount of money 3 Million online donors contributed to the 2008 Obama campaign.

$6,500,000


IF FACEBOOK WERE A COUNTRY, IT WOULD BE THE 8TH MOST POPULATED IN THE WORLD, JUST AHEAD OF JAPAN.Mark Zuckerberg, January 7, 2009

BUT WAIT,THERE’S MORE.

93% OF SOCIAL MEDIA USERS BELIEVE A COMPANY SHOULD HAVE A PRESENCE IN SOCIAL MEDIA.Cone, Business in Social Media Study, September 2008

BELIEVE IT OR NOT, THAT DOESN’T MEAN THAT 93% OF SOCIAL MEDIA USERS THINK COMPANIES SHOULD TREAT SOCIAL MEDIA AS YET

ANOTHER CHANNEL FOR BROADCASTING BULLSH*T.

YOU SEE, IT’S SUPPOSED TO BE A DIALOGUE,

NOT A MONOLOGUE.

“Marketers don't understand channels where you have to talk and listen at the same time...

The marketing industry's idea of a two-way communication is to put an 800 number or a web address in an ad and take orders.”

Josh Bernoff, Why marketers have trouble with full-duplex social technology, June 30, 2009

This couldn't be more obvious than with email. Your company has a chance to turn its email list into a two-way communication. Except that most mass emails from companies are "do not reply".

"We want to talk to you," they say. "But we don't want to hear back from you. Unless you want to place an order, and if so click here."


The people in charge of talking are in the marketing department.

The people in charge of listening are in the research or service or sales department.

They hardly ever talk to each other, let alone have full-duplex conversations with customers.”


“

photo by Jamie Mellor on flickr.com

This won't fly in social technology because the minute you talk, people expect you to listen.

And if you start to listen, you'll be tempted to talk.

It's a full-duplex channel that befuddles one-way-marketers.”


“

FACT:SOCIAL MEDIA PLAYTIME IS OVER.

*See http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,47665,00.html for more on that topic.

*

http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,47665,00.html

http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,47665,00.html

SO, PLEASE.

SO, PLEASE.

& GET SERIOUS ABOUT HARNESSING THE POWER OF THIS THING.

*STOP HANGING AROUND

85% of social media users believe that a company should go further than just having a presence on social sites and should also interact with its customers. Cone, Business in Social Media Study, September 2008

For companies, resistance to social media is futile.

Millions of people are creating content for the social Web.

Your competitors are already there.

Your customers have been there for a long time.

If your business isn't putting itself out there, it ought to be.”

BusinessWeek, February 19, 2009

“

photo by Archie McPhee Seattle on flickr.com

UNFORTUNATELY, MOST COMPANIES ARE STILL TREATING SOCIAL MEDIA LIKE JUST ANOTHER MARKETING CHANNEL.

*Oops.

*

WHEN IN FACT, IT’S SO MUCH MORE.*

*Wait for it...

1: PUBLIC RELATIONS

2: CUSTOMER SERVICE

3: LOYALTY-BUILDING

4: COLLABORATION

5: NETWORKING

6: THOUGHT-LEADERSHIP

AND YES,CUSTOMER ACQUISITION, TOO.

SO,HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO DO:

DEFINE YOUR COMPANY’S

SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY.

photo by cyndie@smilebig! on flickr.com

HOPE IS NOT A STRATEGY.photo by quest for the heartstone on flickr.com

STOP THINKING “CAMPAIGNS”. START THINKING “CONVERSATIONS.

photo by eye2eye on flickr.com

ASK FOR HELP, IF YOU NEED IT.

photo by Malingering on flickr.com

AND BECAUSE I’D HATE TO SEE YOU

I’LL ADD THIS TINY BIT OF ADVICE :

MESS IT ALL UP,

DON’T ASSUME SOCIAL MEDIA

IS THE ANSWER TO EVERYTHING.

IF YOUR PRODUCT SUCKS,SOCIAL MEDIA WON’T FIX IT.

photo by arlen on flickr.com

(HOWEVER, IF YOUR CUSTOMER SERVICE SUCKS, SOCIAL MEDIA CAN HELP.)

IF YOUR REPEAT BUSINESS SUCKS, SOCIAL MEDIA CAN HELP.

photo by gari.baldi on flickr.com

IF YOUR COMPANY’S WORD OF MOUTH SUCKS, SOCIAL MEDIA CAN HELP.

FINAL WORDS OF WISDOM :

NEVER FORGET THE BASIC RULES.

• Google Alerts• TweetDeck• SocialMentions• RSS

(FOR STARTERS)

RULE #1: LISTEN

RULE #2: ENGAGE

RULE #3: MEASURE• Audience• Engagement• Loyalty• Influence• Action

(METRICS SHOULD MAP TO GOALS. PERIOD.)

NOW GO OUT THERE& GET SOCIAL!