Finding Success on Social Media

Whether its Business to Business or Business to Consumer it is still about people selling stuff to people.

Depending on what you read or heard by word of mouth, everyone this year was buying online, using a tablet, tracking things on a smartphone and seeing digital signage around them. Social media was driving traffic, but tp what end?

According to a report from Custora, an e-commerce analytics company, all that social hustle and bustle didn’t do much to move the sales needle: Only two percent of purchases came from social posts (Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, you name it).

I Know You
One of the best things folks like to brag about – on any social media outlet – is that they can tell you who their audience is, very precisely.

So they crank up their digital marketing machine:

• Content marketing
• Conversion rate optimization
• Social media engagement
• Content optimization
• Mobile optimization
• Brand building/viral marketing
• Marketing automation
• Video marketing
• Social media data gathering/analytics

All of that investment – and more–has one goal in mind: more customers.

What You’re Here For
It turns out, marketing/communications people have a different idea about why people attach themselves to social media sites than the online followers they hope will buy things from them. They think you want to be part of a community; but the truth is, you’re there for the savings–period.

According to IBM’s Institute for Business Value, people follow/like brands and products because they like the product, and they’re just hanging around until you offer them a deal.

Not exactly the profitable answer you were looking for, but then, social media isn’t all about you is it?

All of your impersonal communications, all of your efforts that view what is going on from your side of the screen, rather than her/his side, can be bruised, damaged, wiped out in the blink of an eye.

You can no longer push your product, your brand; the consumer has to pull it.

Of course, that doesn’t mean marketing can’t/shouldn’t assist the consumer.

What the consumer wants is unbiased information they can trust that lets them make an informed decision.

Does the simplified, unfiltered approach really work?

It does for folks like Zappos and Intuit.

The real way Zappos, Intuit and others develop a true strong, loyal, sticky (sticks with you even when things go awry) customer base is that marketing/communications isn’t finished once the sale is made.

That’s just the beginning.

While most brands are signed up and involved with the major social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc. – only 29 percent actively engage with customers, according to a report by Acquity Group.

Seventy percent of Facebook questions are ignored by brands. Only 29 percent of firms that use Twitter actively engage with shoppers, customers.

You can’t make friends or maintain a relationship without engaging with people, talking to them, answering their questions. And a relationship is what you want.