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Similar to South African Airways: 10 tips for running a social media strategy in international markets #ETAS14
Similar to South African Airways: 10 tips for running a social media strategy in international markets #ETAS14 (20)
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South African Airways: 10 tips for running a social media strategy in international markets #ETAS14
- 1. 10 Tips For Running Social Media in International Markets Sizwe Mdladla SAA @flysaa Tara Turkington Flow Communications @flowcomms
- 2. Introduction The past, the present, the future
- 3. Tip #1: Be honest, be yourself
- 5. Tip #2: Decide what work you want your social media to do
- 7. Tip #3: Find the right partners
- 9. Markets we are currently working in specifically South Africa Ghana Nigeria Australia New Zealand Hong Kong Mainland China Global
- 10. Tip #4: Know your market, know your product
- 16. Tip #5: Choose platforms for markets. One size does not fit all.
- 19. Tip #6: Make it visual
- 21. Tip #7: Content is king. Have a king-sized content plan.
- 23. Tip #8: Get your page verified. And consolidated on Facebook.
- 25. Tip #9: Take risks. Be adaptable.
- 26. Tip #10: Be positive
- 29. Summary: 1. Be honest, be yourself 2. Decide social media strategy 3. Find the right partners 4. Know your market and product 5. Choose platforms for markets
- 30. Summary: 6. Make it visual 7. Content is king. Have a king-sized content plan 8. Get verified 9. Take risks 10. Be positive
- 31. Thank you Sizwe Madlala SAA @flysaa Tara Turkington Flow Communications @flowcomms
Editor's Notes
- The context: where we came from and where we’re going to. We were faced with a fragmented set of social media platforms, and overwhelmingly negative comments on them. We were afraid to engage. We wanted to turn this around, make the engagement positive, and start using social media to build the brand and sales rather than as a place for complaints.
- Decide your tone and your personality, and stick to it. SAA is corporate and friendly. It’s sells a service and South Africa and many other destinations. As the national airline, it needs to have gravitas. To a degree it represents the country.
- An eg of friendly + corporate - showing the faces behind SAA
- Social media can help you do 3 things very well: build your brand, make sales, sort out operational issues. Decide which of these is important and find the right balance in your social media and content strategy.
- Eg an example of brand building and destination marketing, and sales, all in one
- It’s essential to work with the right people. What we’ve done is look for individuals/companies in local markets and developed our strategy with them. Also our partnership with South African Tourism has been crucial - in sharing content and promoting one another when appropriate. In addition to this, partner with a social media partner that understands you, understands your brand and who ‘gets’ you. Essentially, you are not looking for a social media service, you are looking for a collaborative partner. A part of your team. A cultural fit.
- We have specific in-country partnerships for the following markets.
- SAA is corporate and friendly. It’s sells a service and South Africa and many other destinations. As the national airline, it needs to have gravitas. To a degree it represents the country.
- Here is an example of how we approached the Ebola outbreak in our Hong Kong market. We did not want to mention the outbreak per se, but in a germ-a-phobe market, where perception is that South Africa is province in Africa, we needed to use educational type content to inform our market about the size of Africa - and South Africa in relation to the rest of Africa. This strategy was very successful, and we re-posted this type of post several times within our strategic content plan. It received a great deal of attention.
- Competitions that incorporate both social media and above the line marketing initiatives have proved very successful. Here is an example of a FB app rolled out in Hong Kong that has received over 1000 likes to date.
- Ghana is a very celebrity conscious - and we use local celebrity as a part of our content strategy in this market.
- We also make use of a cross platform content propagation strategy in new markets - which helps build communities very effectively. In addition - we make sure we understand what our markets are passionate about in order to build our audiences.
- Here are examples of content localisation for Hong Kong and Australia.
- For eg at SAA, we focus on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Instagram, and in China, Weibo and WeChat. There are hundreds of major social networks in the world - concentrate on the ones you know deliver results in the markets you are operating in.
- Wechat page for Mainland China. Consumers can see content in Mandarin or English or both if they wish. WeChat is a mobile-only platform that is at the forefront of CRM strategy for SAA in China.
- WEIBO -
- People respond better to images and video than just plain text. Never post something to FB or Google+ for eg without a picture or
- Create one plan with basic messaging, then tweak it for local markets.