Social Media is Changing the World! Will You Get Onboard on Have Regrets?

Social Media is Changing the World!
Will You Get Onboard or Have Regrets?
Presented By:
Francine Allaire, Revenue Acceleration Strategist
1

The New Landscape
• 101 million web users read blogs – Comscore
• 17% of time online is spent on social networking and reading
blogs/reviews – Nielsen
• 70% of bloggers write about brands organically, almost half post
product reviews – Technorati
• 65% of blog readers access blogs to get an opinion – Synovate
• 92% of people trust user reviews over sales people – Penn Shoen
and Berland
• 52% of readers said blogs factored into the critical moment they
decided to buy – Jupiter Research
• 78% listen to someone else when it comes to buying not the
company – Forrester Research
• 70% of people turn to family & friends for advice when making
a purchasing decision – Nielsen
• Fact or fiction? Most customers seek out deals, discounts,
promotions online – CIO Magazine
Presentation by Red Carpet Strategies. You may not reproduce or resell the content in any manner. All Rights Reserved. Copyright © 2011

“New” Customer Decision Cycle
Harvard Business Review – December 2010
Evaluation Stage = Seek Input from
Peers, Colleagues, Friends, Fans,
Followers, Reviewers, Industry Experts
BUY ~ Most powerful influence
is someone else’s advocacy
Consideration Stage =
Selection of Multiple
Brands
Enjoy,
Advocate
and BondEnjoy, Advocate
Bond

Why Social Media?
• Engage, educate and energize your audience / community to
fuel the conversations, the experiences, the recommendations
• Plays a critical role in building relationships and in creating a
bond with your brand
• Brand awareness and value creation make it easier for
your customers to find you, to trust you and to
recommend your products or services to others
• Provide the ability to demonstrate your expertise, thought
leadership and differentiation
• Ability to attract new customers, skilled employees and
strategic partnerships
• Generate sales, improve customer service and reduce
support costs
• Help foster brand and customer loyalty

Why Social Media?
• Go to market, communication and marketing strategies must
evolve because people and companies are buying differently
today
• Buying patterns and customer dynamics have changed –
companies/people look at the Internet, read blogs, check
forums, online groups, get feedback on Twitter or other tools,
ask friends, peers, colleagues, industry experts and other
trusted sources on social networks
• Social media is not a fad. Conversations are happening with
or without you, are you listening? Better yet, are you
participating, igniting the conversations? The debate as to
whether or not you should.. is over! The Question now is
how?

The Money Statistics
• Companies are now building their own audience – from
traditional rented audiences (print, radio, TV…) to owned
audiences (Blog, Social Media…) to match the behaviors of the
businesses/consumers
• Top 25 newspaper readership 12M people, market share
16% year
• Coke Fan Page has over 24M Fans 22% per month
• Cost 80K for a full page ad in the NY times – finite shelf-life
where the value diminishes over time, digital media has a long
trail effect and the value increases over time
• 310M people in the U.S. 200M on Twitter, 100M on YouTube,
600M on Facebook
• 70% of people search online prior to making a
decision/purchase

PARTNERS
EMPLOYEES
CUSTOMERS/PROSPECTS
SUPPLIERS
Your
Company -
Social
Business
In the Network Economy Everything is Intertwined!
Your business ecosystem of customers, prospects and partners together are very powerful and should
be leveraged. Make your customers talk to prospects. Make your partners evangelizers of your vision.
Let your alliances speak for you. Let your suppliers help you. Hire passionate/caring employees and
entrust them with doing the right thing.

Make Social Your Business™!
IBM conducted a study with 1,600 CEOs worldwide
• Number of CEOs who are now crowd sourcing with
partners and customers, outside of their firewall, has
increased by 60% over last year
• 50% of the outperformers leverage their ecosystem
of partners, customers, suppliers and employees
• The net net: when you go outside of your firewall your
build higher brand loyalty, increase your level of
influence, add value and gain a competitive edge

Challenges to Social Media Adoption
• Social media takes time and requires new skill sets
• The emphasis is on near-term cash generation and survival “not
community” (especially for public companies)
• Lack of understanding in the power shift happening in marketing
channels, customer dynamics and behaviors and their full impact on
your business
• Lack of an effective social media marketing strategy and integration
into an overall communication, marketing and business strategy
• Measuring and proving the ROI of social media programs
• Getting the budget and resources social media deserves
• Finding experienced and proficient social media marketers
• Management resistance to sharing information online “we need to control
our message”
• The myth that social media works only for startups, lifestyle or tech brands

Campaigns to Conversations
Caring and connecting = Profit
• From self-proclaimed marketing messages and campaigns to
Conversation marketing – transparent, two-way talk which
creates an emotional bond with your product or service
• Change the focus of your marketing efforts and where you
spend your marketing dollars
• Allocate less resources building awareness through
advertising and promotions and make marketing investments
of time and money that help your customers navigate the
evaluation process, engage with them to build trust,
continuously improve on your customer experience to foster
loyalty - customers will reward you with their wallet and by
spreading positive word of mouth
10
Presentation by Red Carpet Strategies. You may not reproduce or resell the content in any manner. All Rights
Reserved. Copyright © 2011

Turning Customers into Advocates
According to an IBM study of online retail consumer buying patterns:
• Advocates’ share of wallet is 33% more than that of customers
who aren’t advocates
• Advocates spend about 30% more dollars with their favorite online
retailers than non-advocates do
• Advocates stick around longer, proving themselves less likely than
other customers to switch to a competitor even if it offers similar
products at similar prices
• Advocates have significantly higher lifetime value than regular
customers, for not only do they spend more now, they are more
likely to keep spending, and even increase their spending, as time
goes on

Wowing Your Customers Pays Off!
According to the Customer Experience Impact 2010 Report, sponsored
by RightNow®, consumers are willing to pay more for a great customer
experience and switch brands if there are getting a negative
experience.
• 82% of consumers have stopped doing business with a company as a
result of a negative experience
• 55% became a customer of a company because of their reputation for
great customer service
• 40% began purchasing from a competitive brand simply because of
their reputation for great customer service
• 66% said that great customer service was their primary driver for
greater spending
• 85% of consumers said they would be willing to pay between 5%
to 25% more over the standard price in order to ensure a superior
customer experience

Setting the Stage for
Social Media Success
• Develop a comprehensive strategy – don’t jump in without
proper research / listening
• Don’t fixate on technologies but on defining clear objectives
• Set guidelines and policies for using social media
http://socialmediagovernance.com/policies.php
• Use internally first to train and teach people - ROI internally to
Showcase the value of social
• Don’t treat social media like a campaign - with a beginning and
an end – social media requires consistency and commitment
• Listen, Monitor and Analyze before doing anything else
• Measure, Evaluate and Adjust constantly
• Think of Social Media as leverage, influence and adding value

Social Media Success
Marketing Cycle
YOUR COMPANY
BRAND,
PRODUCTS
SERVICES
YOU

80% THE PLANNING, STRATEGIES, OBJECTIVES SET, PRIORITIES
Your Success Depends on…
20% TECHNOLOGIES, NETWORKS, TOOLS

Nail the Strategy first to:
• Give yourself direction and help you see the big picture
• Set clear goals, objectives and priorities
• Establish a baseline for where you’re at right now
• Align your online efforts with your strategic objectives, corporate and
marketing initiatives
• Spend budget more efficiently and effectively
• Reduce overwhelm & keep you focused on your goals
• Help you determine what works and what doesn’t work – measure
and adapt based on results
• Avoid choosing the tools based on popularity
• Recruit your social media team – resources from product
management, marketing, communications, sales, customer service
= integrate social media into your traditional marketing and PR

Your Core Message /
Ideal Customers
Every day you introduce your
business to the millions of people
on social media platforms.
It is essential to present a clear
core message to attract your ideal
customers
It’s imperative that you know where
your customers are “en masse”
Clear Message + Ideal Customer =
Visibility, Credibility, Marketability,
Profitability

Unique Value Proposition
In one sentence or two max, what does your
business offer that is unique and solves a
problem that your market is willing to pay for?
Remember that you need to be able to
substantiate the value you provide.
80% of companies believe that they provide
value but only 8% of their customers agree.

Your Keywords
• positive characteristics
• pain points
• problems your
product/service solves
What words would you use to
search for your company,
product or service on Google?

Listen, Monitor and Analyze
• Establish a baseline, analyze the landscape
• Listen to what your customers are saying about you, to you
and for you - Spend 50% of your time listening - be aware and
mindful of the conversations
• Monitor #Hashtags
• Observe and Monitor - create a list of search phrases,
keywords and influencers:
– Major customers, competitors, industry experts, your
brands, products, companies…
• Segment, Profile and Rank Your Customers to craft
messaging and programs that would please and benefit them
Presentation by Red Carpet Strategies. You may not reproduce or resell the content in any manner. All Rights Reserved. Copyright ©
2011

Listening is Free
Monitoring the Marketplace is Priceless!
The good, the bad and
the ugly
(let’s hope not),
You NEED to know.
SocialMention.com
GoogleAlerts.com
Tweetbeep.com
Search.Twitter.com

Communicate Authentically
and Add Value
Use the best medium for engaging with your audience –
create content that is helpful, useful and interesting.
WIIFTM
Blog is the Hub
• Tell Stories (text, audio, video)
• Create Irresistible Content
• Create Your Own Channels:
YouTube, Blog Talk Radio,
Ustream.TV

 Links to your blog posts or articles about your industry
 Inspirational thoughts to attract your ideal client
 Tips that show how much you know & love your business
 Valuable advice your network can use, even without you
 Share new resources that you discover
What to Post?
2011

1. Create a Facebook profile & business fan page
2. Build a LinkedIn Profile & Business Page
3. Create a Twitter Account
4. Begin a blog using Wordpress or Blogger
5. Set up a G-mail account for Google Alerts/RSS
Feeds
Platforms to engage and participate
Presentation by Red Carpet Strategies. You may not reproduce or resell the content in any manner. All Rights Reserved. Copyright ©2011

Measure Success
– Create a Social Media Dashboard (free or use paying tools
like: Radian6, IBM/Cognos Consumer Insight)
– Track # of inquiries, leads from social campaigns, from
Twitter and other social sites
– # of leads provided to sales
– Measure engagement and loyalty –how much does your
audience engage, how many
conversations/comments/reviews/testimonials
– Track sentiment
– Track Conversion to sales revenues

Social Marketing Objectives and Metrics
Social Marketing Objectives
• Increase number of leads
• Increase engagement
• Increase product awareness
• Improve brand reputation
• Increase product education
• Increase information sharing
• Increase number of
participants in events
• Increase traffic
Social Marketing Metrics
# inquiries/leads/qualified leads
# of new discussions/comments
Reach
Track Sentiment
# of content downloads
# RSS, tweets, posts, comments
of blog posts, RTs
# of registrations/
Inbound links, sharing
# of unique visitors,
RSS feeds

Create a Social Media Dashboard
Blog Metrics: # of posts per week
Comments/posts (your company vs. competitors)
Estimated Audience
New RSS Feeds
Unique visitors
Facebook Fan Page
# of Wall Posts
Comments and Likes
Fan Page Comments – Tuesday
Daily Likes – Tuesday/Thursday
Page Views – Thursday
Impressions versus post times – end of day
…
Measure Everything
2011

Social Media Cheat Sheet

Strategy – Action Item #1
Buy your own domain name
www.FrancineAllaire.com ($10year -
GoDaddy.com)
Use it to host a blog, or simple one page
“ABOUT Me”

Register your Facebook & LinkedIn unique URL
Before 
http://facebook.com/francine.allaire
http://facebook.com/RevenueAccelerationStrategist
http://facebook.com/RedCarpetStrategies
http://linkedin.com/francineallaire

• Write a short professional bio highlighting your differentiators,
your skills, experience…
• Ask yourself
“what will someone gain by hiring or working with me?” what would
they be searching for to find me?
• Make your bio Keyword rich to make it easy to find you in search
engines i.e. Business Development Executive, Marketing
Executive, Leadership Development Executive
• List this Brand Bio on all your social media profiles
Build Your Brand BIO

• Remove any posts, pictures that don’t
show you in the best light
• Remove posts from people who use your
wall to promote their stuff or games
• Un-tag yourself in friends’ photos
• Join groups & pages to grow your network
and offer value
Clean up your existing profiles

Connect with other brands and professionals
Show interest in their company by
• Posting on their Facebook business pages
• Congratulating them on new product launches
• Sharing their news with your network

The good, the bad and
the ugly,
You NEED to know.
SocialMention.com
GoogleAlerts.com
Tweetbeep.com
Manage Your Reputation

• Give away your best information,
• Share your thoughts on your industry,
• Answer questions and give feedback in blogs and
groups.
This could lead to quality referrals, job offers,
speaking engagements and top-notch clients.
Become a Thought Leader

• Use video to make an emotional connection,
if pictures are worth 1000 words than videos at priceless.
• Videos can bring you instant credibility and expedite the
know, like and trust factor.
Create an Emotional Connection

Resources - Case Studies
• Jive Software – B2B
http://www.jivesoftware.com/customers/case-studies
• Womma http://www.womma.org/casestudy/
• Social Marketing Results from 93 companies (Book $19.95)
http://www.socialmedia-marketing-results.com/Social-Media-
Marketing-Results-from-93-Companies.html
• Very comprehensive list of books, sites and case studies
http://www.interactiveinsightsgroup.com/blog1/social-media-
examples-superlist-17-lists-and-tons-of-examples/
• Social Media Examiner
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/category/case-studies/

Companies, Blogs
• Few companies to look at: Cisco, Intel, IBM, Dell, Martell Home
Builders, Zappos, GiantNerd, Ford Motor, Cree, San Chez Bistro…..
• Great blogs to follow:
– Sandy Carter - Vice President, Software Group Channels at IBM
http://socialmediasandy.wordpress.com/
– Michael Stelzner http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/ /
– Social Media Today http://www.socialmediatoday.com
– Mashable http://www.mashable.com
– Brian Solis http://www.BrianSolis.com
– Chris Brogan http://www.ChrisBrogan.com
– Francine Allaire http://www.FrancineAllaire.com
– Red Carpet Strategies http://RedCarpetStrategies.com
– Social Media Academy for Women
http://SocialMediaAcademyforWomen.com

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