1. There is N such thing like “social media
strategy”
N

2. Social
Business
Strategies
Social
Corporate
strategy
Online
Strategy
Social
Marketing
Techniques
Promotion
Strategy
Content
Strategy
Platform
Strategy
There are however, things like social corporate strategy, online strategy and social
marketing techniques…

3. Co-ops/Non-profits
Not profit driven, The
goal of the company
is transforming
society by educating
and empowering
people
Very Social
Corporations
Has own social media
platforms, social media is
the main focus of the brand,
uses crowdsourcing as
much as possible, Value co-
creation is the main focus,
Business model is based on
a social premise
Social Corporations
Uses crowdsourcing and
value co-creation
occasionally, very active in
social media, has some CSR
activities, allocates a
significant amount of
budget for social media
Ordinary Corporations
Uses social media because
competitors are using it,
uses only major social
media tools, does not
allocate a significant
amount of budget for social
media
Some B2B companies
These companies do
not openly engage
with their clients in
social media. They
are not concerned
about not being
“social”
Social As a Corporate
Strategy
Coca-Cola and Toyota
They use social media
as much as possible
and they use various
platforms but for
them social media is
just a tool to drive
sales.
Starbucks, Tom’s Shoes,
Etsy, Danone
All these companies have
a very clear social mission
and they cannot function
well if they don’t actively
interact with local
communities and their
customers
Grameen Bank’s goal
is reducing poverty
not giving dividents
to investors. It is
owned by the poor
people and the goal
of the corporation is
not profit
maximazation

4. Value Co-creation and Social Corporate
Strategy
Customers are
happier and
feel more positive
about the brand when
they get involved with
the creation and
production of goods
and services
Value Co-Creation marketing
Goods are indirect services. Any purchase can
be turned into an experience or a customer
journey
Value should be created together with
consumers
Marketing should be relationship based
(brands and consumers establish
relationships)
Brands should initiate conversations and
dialogs
Brands should teach new skills to consumers,
community members
Knowledge and know-how are the biggest
assets of brands
Companies should sell goods
Marketing should be transactional
Marketers should run promotional campaigns
Marketers should educate customers

5. Crowd-sourcing as a corporate
strategy
Low-cost access to
experts and enthusiasts
in any area
More new and creative
ideas
Faster business solutions
Lack of control
Lack of traditional
business structure
Quality of the outcome
Ownership of intellectual
property
Security and privacy
Crowds
market it
Crowds
support
it
Crowds
test it
Crowds
build it
Crowds
design it
Crowds
think of
it
Crowdsourcing means outsourcing the
company’s problems and needs to people
(mostly the customers of the brand,
people interested in the area or anyone in
the world)
Source: Social Business by Design

6. Crowdsourcing Examples
MyStarbucksidea.com
A special social network that creted by
Starbucks. Members can 1- Share their ideas
about Starbucks’ products 2- Vote for other
members ideas 3- Discuss about currently
available ideas 4- See the feedback from oher
members and the results of their ideas.
IBM Idea Jam
IBM employees, customers and the familiy
members of employees help IBM solve its
problems and come up with new ideas on a
platform called IBM Idea Jam. In some
occasions IBM posted the problem and pledged
to $100 dollars for the solution of the problem.
Innocentive
Started as a solutions for chemical problems.
Chemical companies post their problems and
people provide suggestions. If idea is selected
by the sponsor company who posted the
problem the solver gets a cash reward.
Secretlondon.com
People were asked to share secret tips and
their photos and their photos of London on a
Facebook page. After the initial success the
page became and independent website and
replicated for other cities.
Pepsi
Asked its fans to come up with a new design for
its cans. The wining design won a $10,000 cash
prize and also used all around the world.
American Express
Although company sponsored forums are not
rare, American Express created the OPEN
forum for small business owners (to promote
its small business credit) which was like a social
network that allowed small business to friend
other small business and exchange ideas. It
became very popular in a short time.
Loreal
Created a Facebook toolkit for the stylists
create a personalized Facebook site very easily
and set up appointments with their customers.
Owens & minor
A healthcare products supplier company
created an open social network platform for its
suppliers where any suppliers can see the flow
of supplies , submit documents and can easily
contact one of the 7000 employees of the
company.
HP
HP tests its printers , both during the concept
phase and the post concept phase by giving the
task to its customers who sign up for the trial
service.

7. Social As a Corporate
Strategy

8. Social Media Strategy
Business strategy
(Priority)
Using social media for
Direct Sales
People already know
about this
Using social media for
CUSTOMER SERVICE
If this is the priority, then
use social media for CRM
and educating customers
Using social media for
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
If this is the priority then
generate interesting
content and make people
click on the links
Using social media for
PUBLIC RELATIONS
If this is the priority then
post every single
company activity in social
media and promote it
Using social media for
HUMAN RESOURCES
If this is the priority then
use applications to reach
potential new hires
Using social media for
RESEARCH/SOCIAL
LISTENING
If this is the priority use
social media fans as a
focus group or a research
panel. Ask fans questions
about new proudcts, etc.
Social as a business strategy
Social media can be used for many different business
purposes and ideally companies should have
priorities. Companies should not say we will use social
media for everything and everything is our priority.

9. Brand’s Blog
Generate Content
(e.g. useful
information about
your category)
High ranking
on search
engines
Blog
Facebook
Twitter
Youtube
linkedIn
Google+
MixiPinterest
Cookpad
Cosme
Nico Nico
Douga
Hatena
More
referrals
from search
engines
SEO-Focused Social
media strategy
Social media can be a very effective tool
to drive traffic to a brand’s blog or
website. When many people click on links
in social media to go to a website, that
web site’s ranking increases among the
listings of search engines. This is also
known as search engine optimization.
Other social
media

10. Social Listening Based
Social media strategy
• Understand mind-sets (peoples ideas, lifestyles, way of doing
things)
• Profile customers and prospects (Use of consumer insights to
create new consumer segments)
• Sense early market shifts (Spotting marketing trends earlier by
assesing what kind of messages are posted publicly)
• Detect problems (Analysis of public messages about a brand can
identify branding problems)
• Analyze competitors (tracking competitor activity and what
people are talking about competitors are very easy)
• Uncover sales drivers and predict sales (Analysis of reviews on
Amazon showed that not the price but comments about “ease of
use” and product features were better predictors of future sales.
• Test concepts & co-create value: Crowdsourcing of new ideas and
having people to decide the future products.
• Develop and evaluate messages (Before mass marketing
practitioners can sense what kind of brand messages are shared
and what kind of messages are not cared by customers)
• Identify threats to reputation (PR crises can be easily handled
through social media before they become bigger problems)
• Identify which voices to listen (not everyone, not every platform
and not ever comment can be tied influence sales. Some
platforms, some influencers and some comments about certain
types of product characteristics may be more important)
Post volumes (total number of mentions on the internet)
Tweets & status updates (sentiment analysis, RTs, mentions in
social media)
Search trends (of the number of searchers for a certain brand or
a product category is increasing or decreasing)
Tracking the advocates of own brand and competitor brands
online. These people also can be found offline by asking the
customers “how likely are you to recommend our brand or the
competitor brand to your friends”
Product reviews (sentiment, reviewer influence (e.g. top
reviewer, etc.), specifity and objecitivity of the review 8this
product is bad vs. this products’s X function has Y problem)
Understand
consumer needs
and market
shifts
Listen online
conversations
More effective
brand
communications
Develop
targeted
messages
Source: First Listen

11. Content Strategy
Brand Priority
-Brand Awareness
-Image building
-Community building
-Web traffic generating
-Sales promotions
-Improving customer loyalty
Brand type
Business :B2B, B2C, non-profit
Category: Service, consumer goods, etc.
Audience :male, female, mixed, young, old,
experts, novices, etc.
Audience expectations: Learn, enjoy, interact,
etc.
Content
What to post? Information, entertainment,
etc.
When to post? Once a day, once a week, etc.
Where to post? One platform, multiple
platforms, etc.
What to focus on? Products, users, CSR, deals,
etc.
Answer these questions first
Then Make sure to post
-Recent things (what happened recently,
what is happening)
-Brand’s social mission
-High resolution photos
-Desires or concerns of the category users
-Emotional and surprising messages

12. Information about the
brand/product, brand
attributes, etc.
Image(s) of a product
Benefits of or feeling of using
the brand in a
fun/interesting/unique way
The results of using the brand
(e.g. a picture taken by the
Nikon camera, a testimonial
by a user, etc.)
Brand’s advertisement or
brand’s promotional or
informational video/image
Brand, package logo or
branded material is an art
form or part of nature
Brand serves community,
brand supports a person,
people, a cause.
Sponsorships, events
organized by the brand,
events related to the brand,
TV program related to the
brand or mentions the brand
etc.
Suggestions,
recommendations about the
brand or the product
category (recipes, fashion
tips, etc.)
Expert advice, interviews with
experts, experts picks,
experts’ favorites.
Behind the scenes (how the
product is being made, the
research lab, how employees
are preparing, etc.)
Brand is part of users’ life
(e.g. a user has a coke tattoo
on his arm, user is holding
brand’s logo, or coke bottles
in ones room)
News, blog posts, videos
related to the brand,
corporation, product
category, etc.
News, blog posts, videos
unrelated to brand/product
category
Questions:
fill-in-the-blank
either Or, which one
polls
Questions:
Related with the brand,
brand’s history
Unrelated to the brand
Photo question
(where’s this photo taken?
Come up with a caption for
this photo. what goes well
with this t-shirt? Etc.
Reminders about campaigns,
promotions, events offers
Celebrations, holidays, happy
birthday, special days,
congratulations, cheers,
related with celebrations
(happy 4th of July, happy
Friday, etc.)
Cute , funny, humorous,
interesting, relaxing
image/text unrelated to the
brand or product
Quotations, Cartoons,
Sketches
Appreciation, gratitude
(thanks for following us)
Sharing a fan’s or another
user’s post
Intriguing posts (share this if
you feel happy today, like this
if you can spot the elephant
in this photo, etc.)
Featuring the company’s
employees, employee’s
favorite products, employees
picks, etc.
Brand in the media, brand
covered by the media organs,
blogs, etc.
Spotlighting partners,
spotlighting fans
News (what is going on, what
is new)
New profile photo, new
profile cover
User tips, tricks, How-to’s
Over 40 types of posts:

13. Platform Strategy
1- Social media is very important, spend as much money as needed.
2- Always be the first on new platforms. Be the industry model for creative usage of new platforms
3- Be active on all major platforms. Use all platforms for the same purpose with similar content
4- Use paid advertising and paid promotions to promote the fan page and the posts in social media.
5- Use multiple accounts and build multiple brand communities even on the same platform
6- Create own social media platform
7-Use offline media to support social media activities
8-Generate content in house
9- Mobile and offline touch points should be combined with social media activities
10 -Work with influence-marketing companies, influencers, paid bloggers to expand the reach
1- Social media is not that important. Social media should be free, the brand should not spend any
significant amount of money on it.
2- The brand should not waste time and money on new platforms.
3- the brand should only focus on what works (clicks, referrals, sales, etc.)
4-The brand should use all platforms for the same purpose with similar content
5- The brand should not have multiple accounts and build multiple brand communities on the same
platform.
6- The brand does not need to spend time and money on creating new apps, APIs, customized tabs, etc.
7- The brand should use social media to support offline activities
8- The brand can outsource the content or promotion management
9- Mobile and offline should be independent from online social media activities..
10-No need to work with influence-marketing companies, influencers, and paid bloggers.