Kmh social media top eight

C-Suite: It’s Time to Step Up

Sandi Hester
Kathleen Holland
Katherine Magee

© January 2013 KMH Associates

Don’t Be An Ostrich!

Executives have a critical strategic role to play in guiding social
media across their organizations

Do you know why? Do you know how?


Why Social Media? Why Now?

57% of businesses plan 95% of the top 100
to increase social companies use Twitter;
YouTube has 490
media spending 23% of these use it as a
million unique users
customer service platform*
who visit every month

Wikipedia
There are 465+ million LinkedIn is the 36th authors total
Twitter accounts most visited website in over 91,000
the world contributors

Each FaceBook user
spends on average Google+ has more
15.5 hours / month on
But…only 38% of CEO’s
than 25 million users
the site label social media as a
high priority

Source: www.jeffbullas.com and *simplymeasured.com 2012


Why Social Media? Why Now?

People use social media every day without thinking about it.
Think about it!

It’s time to stop relegating a critical business lever to the most
junior people in the company.

It’s time to step up and provide the oversight to effectively link
social media with your corporate objectives.


Eight Things to Think About
1. Keep your eyes on the prize
2. RIP: Silos
3. Make social media part of your culture
4. The bigger the reward, the greater the risk
5. The power is shifting: Your corporate reputation is in the
hands of many
6. Make the customer your Chief Content Officer
7. The Earth loves social media
8. What’s old is new again


1. Keep Your Eyes On The Prize!

What are your corporate mission / vision / values and
objectives?

How are you measuring them?

How does social media impact, enhance or detract from your
achievement of those key performance indicators (KPI’s)?


1. Keep Your Eyes On The Prize!
Corporate Mission/Vision/Value/Objectives

Marketing Research Customer Serv HR
Objectives Objectives Objectives Objectives

Marketing Research Customer Serv HR
Strategies Strategies Strategies Strategies

Marketing Research Cust Serv HR
Implementation Implementation Implementation Implementation

Traditional Social Traditional Social Traditional Social Traditional Social
Activity Activity Activity Activity Activity Activity Activity Activity

Traditional Social Traditional Social Traditional Social Traditional Social
KPI KPI KPI KPI KPI KPI KPI KPI
Insights
Results/

Insights
Results/

Insights
Results/

Insights
Results/
Note: applicable to all corporate departments Total Results/Insights


2. RIP: Silos
Social media is not a strategy, and it does not belong to the
marketing department alone. To drive meaningful business
results, social media must be integrated across the whole
enterprise.

RIP RIP RIP RIP
Marketing Human Research Customer
Resources Service

Note: applicable to all corporate departments


2. RIP: Silos
Silos inherently create inefficiencies, inconsistencies in messaging and confusion
both internally and externally.
Bring together senior representatives from HR, Legal, IT, Marketing, Risk
Management, PR, Sales, Customer Service and any other affected functions to
ensure consistency and clarity around your messaging and alignment to
corporate goals.

Human Find your
Marketing / Resources point of
Sales social media
optimization!

Customer
Legal
Service

Note: applicable to all corporate departments


3. Make Social Media Part Of Your Culture
Social media is a powerful communication tool that should be
embraced across the organization
External Platforms
Corporate Brand Building. Beyond the official spokespeople, employees
can play a critical role in building your corporate brand. It is very powerful
for customers to hear an employee endorse where (s)he works and/or stand
behind the products they make. This helps you not only sell more product
but also attract great talent.

Internal Platforms
Employee Engagement. Social media enhances internal communication
objectives. It is especially powerful if the employee is encouraged to
comment and is heard.

Innovation. Social media enables greater innovation within the
organization by encouraging ongoing collaboration and ideation.


3. Make Social Media Part Of Your Culture
Things to think about:
1. Policies and training. A social media policy should clearly outline the “do’s
and don’ts” as well as why social media is important to the organization and its
role in achieving the corporate objectives. Then train, train and retrain.

2. An internal social media network. Building internal tools that mimic well-
known external tools will facilitate the social communication in a protected and
confidential environment.

Examples:
• on line profiles (think LinkedIn)
• blogs
• chat rooms (by topic or function)
• recognition boards (think Pinterest)
• webinars
• games


4. The Bigger The Reward,
The Bigger The Risk
Success in social media is measured by greater visibility for your company and your
employees; however, as the number of “eyes” on your organization increases, so
does your need to manage the potential risks that come with greater transparency

EXPOSURE

REWARD
(Audience/Klout)

RISK
(Reputation/Security/Legal)


4. Mitigating Potential Social Media Risk
Things to Think About:

1.Before embarking on your social media initiative, perform a risk
assessment & identify controls that could mitigate a portion of the risk.
2.Establish clear policies that dictate what can and cannot be shared. Create
the capability to capture and log all communications and monitor on a
regular basis.
3.Make sure you have the resources (human, financial and digital) in place
to handle the social media attention
4.Implement safeguards: social media is a channel unprotected by typical
information security safeguards
5.Have a plan to monitor social media channels on an ongoing basis: your
company needs to stay current on social media chatter


5. The Power Is Shifting!
Your corporate reputation is in the hands of many
Balance of Power Balance of Power
Less than 5 years Ago Today
Employees as
Corporate Communications Subject Matter Employees as
• Carefully crafted messaging Experts Ambassadors
• Selected targets and media Building Their
own Brand Etc, Etc, Etc

Opinion
Suppliers Your Leaders
Brand
Customers
Networkers

Corporate Corporate
Communications Communications
Carefully Crafted Social Conversations
Messages


5. The Power Is Shifting!

Social media facilitates the inclusion of all stakeholders in forming a
brand. It can be highly beneficial as advocates are more credible
than corporate spokespeople.
Be Aware:

1. Consistency. This means “living your brand” or practicing your brand values
when dealing with all stakeholders. Treating a supplier unfairly becomes part of
the collective discussion with customers.
2. Transparency. People expect it. Everything you do is up for discussion, from
employment practices to material sourcing to production methods. Be prepared
to talk about all aspects of your business.
3. Engagement. Ensure that you are part of the conversation in a meaningful
way. Don’t let your brand image develop by default, but remember – be social.


6. Make The Customer Your Chief Content Officer
Customer retention and attraction are key business drivers. Social
media plays a role both in reacting to any potential issues and
proactively engaging customers, ultimately creating brand advocates.

Content is the top challenge faced by social media experts today. Both
the quality (engaging) and quantity (maintaining an editorial schedule
in perpetuity) of content keeps them up at night.

To tackle this challenge, think of your customer as your Chief Content
Officer.

Create content that speaks to their agenda not yours. Seek out
content in areas where they have interests and passions. But…make
sure you know how it links to your objectives.


Consider setting your objectives from the customer’s perspective:

I want to be treated with respect
I want to be more environmentally conscious
I want “no hassle”, a simple, easy buying process
I want more value
I want…….
“Focus on how to be social
not on how to do social”
Jay Baer,
Author The Now Revolution



Critical Success Factors:
1. Understand your target market – their passions and interests.
2. Engage experts / influencers in areas of interest / internal thought leaders.
3. Leverage content across multiple platforms & communication touch points.
4. Encourage customer participation. Ask for comments, feedback, ratings, etc.
5. Make it shareable.
6. Have a content plan that includes all touch points. A customer interacts with
a company through many touch points. It is critical to ensure consistent
messaging AND not to inadvertently create over messaging.
7. Have a rolling content plan (know what you need for the next 6-12 months).
8. Monitor & Listen. Ensure you are using effective social media monitoring
tools. This will allow you to not only respond to issues but also to learn more
about your customer base, its needs, and potential content topics.
9. Write the unexpected.


7. The Earth Social Media

Social media supports the planet in numerous ways:

• Social media is ALL digital (no paper)
• Companies can operate and sell on a global basis with
reduced travel (lower carbon footprint)
• Companies and employees can actively engage local and
global communities in their CSR initiatives (increased
impact for CSR initiatives)
• Companies create a conduit for those that may not
otherwise be heard (ie. whistle blowers)


8. What’s Old Is New Again

Social media has entered our world with a bang - there is much
hoopla about it changing the face of business.

It’s complex, it’s dynamic, it’s highly reactive, it’s decentralized
and ROI is elusive.

It is often not underpinned by proven best practice business
principles and processes.

It’s time to go back to basics and ground social media in solid
strategic processes to make it less daunting, elusive and more
connected to delivering growth and profitability.


8. What’s Old Is New Again
A proven disciplined business process that hasn’t changed

1. Insight/ 2. Vision / 3. Organizational 4. Effective 5. Measuring
Foresight Strategy / Plan Development Implementation Results

Tailored to address social media in your corporate plan.
• What are your • Integrate social media • Properly resource. • Regularly publish • Evaluate results,
stakeholders saying into your corporate & engaging/relevant gaining insight
about you and the departmental plans • Build into your content that inspires into what’s
competition? with purpose. corporate culture connection and working, not
sharing. working and
• What are they talking • Clearly define it’s role • Mitigate risk with where to focus
about and what sites & success measures. corporate policies, • Listen and respond. efforts for
are they on? best practices and greatest return.
staff training.


There’s no magic bullet.

Just as it takes time to deliver long term sustainable corporate growth, it
takes time to build a solid social media reputation - internally and
externally - which will result in long term profitable growth.

KMH Associates can help organizations effectively integrate their
social media practices into their corporate strategies and objectives.


Strategic business consultants with a triple
bottom line approach.

The KMH team helps inspire organizations to develop and
implement sustainable growth plans that deliver results.

www.kmhassociates.ca


Kmh social media top eight

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

Similar to Kmh social media top eight

Similar to Kmh social media top eight (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Kmh social media top eight