Building Marketing Strategies in Social Networks

Angela Connor
Social Media Bootcamp
June 10, 2010
Building Marketing Strategies in Social Networks

Let’s get one thing straight
Discounts and Deals
Viagra
A gazillion product mentions
Hard selling
Did I say Viagra?
Friendly banter=ulterior motive

Spam is a canned precooked meat product made by the Hormel Foods Corporation. The labeled ingredients in the classic variety of Spam are chopped pork shoulder meat with ham meat added, salt, water, modified potato starch as a binder, and sodium nitrite to help keep its color.
Spam Defined

“Any unwanted information given to you merely because you exist.
“Anything indiscriminate and unsolicited, including "humor" and urban legends blasted to exposed personal mailing lists.”
“Spam is an "eye of the beholder" issue. I don't believe that it has anything to do with position or industry, or even with the intent of the sender… but rather, with the receiver's state of mind at that particular point in time when they turn their attention to that particular communication.”
Spam Defined

“The most annoying thing about Facebook for me are the endless event invitations and promotional messages in my inbox. If I'm interested in an event, I'll remember - don't keep spamming me a million times a day!”
“The funny thing with spam is that people who send that for marketing purposes do worse job in terms of planning than those who write viruses that spread via email. It would be very easy to personalize the message and to get a target list of people who really might be interested.”
Perceptions of Spam

Shame, shame, shame!

Every community is different

Do Your Research
Learn the Culture
Develop an Approach

Do Your Research
Search relevant topics (social search also)
Visit Boardtracker.com and Boardreader.com
Search Omgili.com
Peruse comments via Backtype.com
Don’t forget Yahoo and Google Groups

Do your research
Identify your targets
“When promoting a food and wine festival, I found communities for wine lovers (such as localwineevents.com) to reach out to that obvious audience as well as communities discussing travel or vacation plans (such as tripadvisor.com) to promote the summer festival aspect of the event.”
“I am active in several coffee forums and drop by daily to contribute to their content. By offering coffee to contests, promotions and having sidebar ads for clicking on these relevant sites, I get business too.”

Do your research
Identify your targets
“It’s been a complete waste of time and money,” Smith says. Most of the people who contacted Brownstone PR via Facebook turned out to be crackpots and frauds who led the firm down blind alleys or tried to get free PR services. Facebook has proven pointless, particularly for our target audience,” she says.”
“The so-called friends one meets there will gladly share their vacation photos with you but they don’t want your business marketing materials,” says Steve Gallegos, a commercial photographer from Dallas who’s spent hundreds of hours on Facebook trying to generate business for his company.

Your target audience may not be on Facebook.
And that’s okay!

5. the behaviors and beliefs, characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group: the youth culture; the drug culture.
Source: Dictionary.com
Culture Defined

Learn the Culture
Read the community guidelines
Get to know traffic patterns
Find what resonates with the community
Identify the influencers
Read a boatload of content

Develop an Approach
Contact the admin or organizer
Identify and communicate with influencers
Become a member
Reach out to specific members
Run for the hills

Our brand is huge, you’re lucky we’re here
People love our products
I’m a big-time popular highly paid executive
We paid a fortune to build/create product X
We’re better than everyone else
None of these will work
Wrong approach

Rules to Live By
Avoid the hard sell
Don’t be obnoxious or pompous
Look before you leap
Don’t argue publicly
Look for opportunities across many networks
Be honest, forthright and transparent

I want to interact in this community because…

Advice From the Trenches
“…Target the narrowest niche possible. Be really specific and find your 1000 or even 100 true fans.”
I get most of my business from a forum for women in business. I've had some from LinkedIn and Facebook as well. In all cases, it was because I offered expertise and tips…”
“Provide information about your company and products, but don't try to sell anything. Let your products sell themselves, and let people come to you.”
“I’m active in several coffee forums and drop by daily to contribute to their content. By offering coffee to contests, promotions and having sidebar ads on these relevant sites, I get business too.”
“specifically target your audience”

Takeaways
Avoid the ‘blanket’ approach
Do more than sell
Talk to people WHERE they are
Develop a voice and approach
Make a time commitment
Understand that not everything will work

Angela Connor of Capstrat
Twitter: @communitygirl
LinkedIn: Angela Connor
Email: aconnnor@capstrat.com
Capstrat Insights
http://www.capstrat.com/insights/authors/angela-connor/
Stay in Touch!

Building Marketing Strategies in Social Networks

by Triangle American Marketing Association on Jun 10, 2010

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Building Marketing Strategies in Social Networks — Presentation Transcript