Plot your objectives and strategy.
You didn’t become successful in the metal business by jumping into it with some vague notion of how the business works. I’d advise you to handle the topic of Social Media (SM) the same way. It could be hazardous to jump in without some knowledge of the medium; it’s tools and the marketplace. After all we don’t want to embarrass ourselves. But I also urge you to get in as soon as you can. It’s easy to play around with it first, and see what others are doing. Like I’ve said before, this is new territory for most of us. To maximize your ROI, plan your moves carefully. Devise your own SM business strategy a step at a time.
By the way, if you’re new to Industrious Bastard and you’re not sure about the relevance of Social Media to industrial metals products and services, check out the July 2, 2010 post: Name an irreversible trend that your business cannot ignore.
In this post, I continue with the series I began with the May 2010 Industrious Bastard blog post: Plan social media strategies like any other major initiative. The first two steps discuss the importance (and liability) of transparency as it relates to the social media environment and your company’s culture. The “social” medium, by definition, demands clarity and that must happen on the inside before you can expect success on the outside.
Step Three. Tap in and listen to the marketplace.
Finding out where, if any, your current and potential customers are playing could be a huge motivator to get your team started. The potential market intelligence this kind of insight could provide is invaluable to strategic business development. But here’s the thing: These guys are likely to be no further along in social media engagement than you. Niche industrial, business-to-business companies might be the least engaged, most laggard, segment of all at this juncture. But wouldn’t you agree, they’re probably on the sidelines somewhere, watching—just like you?
Divide and conquer.
Here are 6 listening tools that allow you to tap in and listen to what is potentially being said about you and/or your industry. Have your team try these tools out; go on a hunt for others, and then circle back to compare notes. You might not find anything directly related your business but you will at least become familiar with ways to measure the change. It’s called social media monitoring, and it’s a great way to get your team talking and working together. Two things that will be critical to a successful SM strategy.
1) Google Alerts
Type in keyword phrase “rust prevention” and receive an email whenever the topic is mentioned in any form of online content. Keywords can include an industry term, a product name, a company, even a president or CEOs name.
2) Google Blog Search
Find out who’s blogging on industry topics you search. Use keywords to scan the blogosphere, Google lasso’s the most relevant blogs.
3) Jodange
Beware, most of the monitoring tools your team will uncover will be fueled by consumer sentiment—Jodange is no different. But hey, where do some of your products end up? This monkey produces leading indicators of TOMA (Top of Mind Awareness) for just about any brand or a product across the Web.
4) Twitter Search
You can scan all Twitter posts (tweets) for any keyword or name or phrase as well. See how people are pimping their content and staying in touch with each other.
5) Trendrr
Find out how the growing concern for Mother Earth’s well being will affect the demand for some of your products. Or monitor how your brand or product is trending compared with others. Trendrr uses comparison graphing to show relationships and discover trends in real time.
6) Trackur
For a small fee you can you can create a custom social media monitoring dashboard. Monitor your own reputation, check on trends and analyze media mentions for your company, brands, or clients. This robot scans “hundreds of millions of web pages”–including news, blogs, video, images, and forums–and lets you know if it discovers anything that matches the keywords you care about.
Take the next step, investigate these and other social media monitoring tools. Get your whole team involved in an honest assessment. It could save you precious limited resources later.
Credit: Segments of this post adapted and condensed from “A Step-by-Step Guide to a Successful Social Media Program” by MarketingProfs—Kimberly Smith author