Today’s post is by guest contributor, Chuck Hemann (@chuckhemann). I began following Chuck’s posts a while ago and respect his insights on social media and the importance of measurement. Thanks Chuck for today’s post!
As the number of individuals joining social networks has climbed, so to has the number of brands embracing social networks as an opportunity to engage customers. What is often overlooked is that there is more to social media than Twitter, and Facebook. The brands who are successful using social media follow a very simple, yet often neglected formula: listen, develop a strategy to reach customers, engage the customer, monitor and measure conversations. Unfortunately for them, and for those of us subject to their content, they often neglect THE two most important phases: listening and monitoring
Doesn’t it seem like we get an example every week of a company that could have mitigated a crisis if they were just listening to, and monitoring online conversations? This week’s example: Dominos. The thought of a B2C brand, especially one as large as Dominos, not listening (side note: it is possible that they were monitoring, though the delay in which they responded to this crisis would suggest otherwise) to online conversations is staggering. Just because the examples often come from B2C companies, doesn’t make listening and monitoring any less important for B2B brands.
Back in February, Todd Defren of SHIFT Communications had a great post on his blog, PR Squared, about B2B and social media. In it, he mentions some of the typical responses B2B brands give for not utilizing social media, including:
- “We already know all of our customers”
- “We have a very technical, specialized product”
- “Our customers are very conventional”
The reality though, as Todd notes in his post, is that if your customers are online, you should be considering social media strategies to reach them. And guess what? More B2B customers are making their way to social networks. A recent survey of technology buyers by Forrester suggested that 95% of those buyers were at least “spectators” in the conversations on blogs, Twitter, Facebook, etc…Sure, you could argue that these are buyers who would be naturally drawn to new technology, but do you honestly believe this is a phenomenon that will stay isolated to B2B tech buyers? I don’t.
How would a B2B company ever know if their customers were using social networks without monitoring the conversations first? Better yet, how would they know if customers wanted to interact with them on that level without monitoring? None of us graduate high school and then immediately start giving strategic counsel to our clients do we (Doogie Howser‘s need not apply)? No, we listen to professors and industry experts educate us on the proper techniques and then we engage in the process. Why should social media be any different?
So I will ask you…why aren’t more B2B companies at least listening and monitoring for customer conversations? Is it because they view social networks as a novelty? Is it because they think their customers aren’t using these tools? What could it be? We’d like to hear from you!
Chuck Hemann is the research manager for Dix & Eaton, a communications consulting firm, where he helps lead monitoring, measurement and competitive intelligence efforts for the agency’s clients. You can connect with Chuck on Twitter and at his blog Measurement PR-spectives. The views in this post belong to Chuck Hemann and do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of his employer.
