B2B SUMMIT 2014 - CASE STUDY: How BT Global Services increased its social engagement through the empowerment of its own people

1. Craig Chadburn
BT Global Services, Social Media Manager
June 2014
BT Global Services
Increasing social engagement
through empowering our
own people

2. Our campaign was the first step to
becoming a ‘social brand’
© British Telecommunications plc 2
Social marketer1
Social brand2
Social business3
• Defined social
Key Performance
Indicators (KPIs)
• Company’s Tone of
Voice established
• Channel managers
assigned and active
• Social research
integrated into
comms planning
• Social insights help
develop content and
comms activity
• Customers engaging with
social channels to
develop campaigns
• Social findings and
customer insights
integrated into product
development
• Social activity fully
integrated into the
businesses day-to-day
running of business
• Vital to product
development and
internal comms, used to
maximise productivity
Time
Maturity

3. 3
We aim to fully integrate social media into the
business strategy to reap the complete benefits of
being an active social business.
Key objectives are:
© British Telecommunications plc 3
Our social media plan
Increasing activity and visibility of BT social media
Increasing customer engagement levels with
BT social channels
Empowering our people to engage in social
Moving BT from being a social marketer to
becoming a fully social business.

4. Social activity is led by marketing
and sales departments
© British Telecommunications plc 4
Marketing
Sales
Customers and prospects
Key influencers
Critical social groups

5. © British Telecommunications plc 5
Engaging in social media comes
with an element of risk
Risk =
Emotion
Rational
thinking
x Volumex Awareness
By fully understanding this risk, your strategy can be built around it

6. © British Telecommunications plc 6
Having an accurate picture of those
involved leads to better success
• Our strategy meant primarily targeting the sales teams, marketing and comms and
internal subject matter experts for involvement, aiming to give them the knowledge to
make social media part of their job role and integrating it into company ethos.
• We found varying levels of social responsiveness:
80 per cent
‘should-do’s’
who want to take
part but aren’t sure
how to get
involved due to
the fear factor.
10 per cent
‘cynics’
who don’t believe
social media works.
10 per cent
‘social advocates’
who are already
socially active and
provide internal
case studies.

7. BT is at the end of a three-year strategy
• De-cluttering and
aligning all BTGS social
media channels into one
hub, ‘BT Let’s Talk’
For BT, this meant
• Training people to
write using the
BT Tone of Voice
• Empowering people to
contribute content
• Training marketing and
comms, sales teams and
subject matter experts
to use social media as
part of their job function
• We gave workshops that targeted key business functions for marketing and comms,
sales teams and subject matter experts. These were delivered in stages, based on
corporate strategy.
• We also provided separate training sessions for LinkedIn, Twitter and the blog.
• They started at a basic level, then progressed and could be tailored to job roles.

8. Topics,
whitepapers,
external/internal
SME leading
discussions
supporting key
messages, see what
we can do (links to
the website), or see
what we think
(blog)
Community
Personal,
engagement,
demonstration
of what we can
do and what we
know (links to the
website), or see
what we think
(blog)
Subject community
© British Telecommunications plc 8
The customer defines the channel
BT Tone of Voice
(unless technical),
fact-based, what
we do and how to
engage with us,
links to social
media
Global services
website
Personal ,‘my’
opinions, how BT
has helped ‘me’,
discuss and engage
with ‘me’ and SMEs,
links back through to
website
Blog
Personal, shows
what we can do,
links to website and
chances to see
what other people
think (external
sources), links
to blog
Twitter
Personal,
engagement, see
what we can do
(links to the
website), or see
what we think
(blog)
LinkedIn to contacts
One message

9. © British Telecommunications plc 9
Metrics of success
Total views
Total posts
Average monthly
engagement
0
100000
200000
300000
400000
500000
600000
700000
800000
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700

10. • The amount of content posted isn’t as directly linked to monthly
engagement as previously assumed
• You need to be able to spot and make the most of trends
• Having a fully-engaged team of enthusiastic and skilled people makes
all the difference
• It may be more fruitful than you think…
There are many factors that drive engagement

11. © British Telecommunications plc 11
The success stories
Blogger outreach:
“$2.9 million of closed sales
through new connections made
on LinkedIn”
A customer approached a BT
account manager for thirteen
new data centres
Marketing Manager
“LinkedIn — my god, it does
actually seem to work”
Got a ‘foot in the door’ with key
clients in retail, media and
banking sectors
“£25–30 million of opportunities identified in the UK public sector”
PR and Analyst teams developed new connections
Campaigns: 42 new leads for the Benelux cloud campaign
Switch on Utilities
Event —
42 per cent of
attendees sourced
via social

12. Any questions?

13. bt.com/globalservices