Chapter 21

The Social Marketing Compass

Failing to plan is planning to fail.

—UNKNOWN

THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM

Depending on the drivers for engagement and the state of adoption in the Social Web, our first steps might require a Day Zero approach. What if we could just start from scratch, what would we do differently? In most cases though, we have to recognize existing programs. Our work in the Conversation Prism and establishing the Conversation Index must prove complete and irrefutable. It serves as the social map for planning and defining our approach.

Now we have one more step to undertake before we are ready to draft a market-ready social media blueprint. For smaller companies, this process is straightforward. Nonetheless, we must conduct an audit that surveys the Social Web for any existing social profiles, objects, and accounts that are already in use or were created earlier and now remain dormant. This allows us to assemble the fragmented pieces that may exist and also assess the state of affairs, caliber of content, and relevance of accounts to evaluate and regroup. As a result, some accounts may remain, some may be reorganized, and others may become inactive or erased altogether. These actions will be determined by the results of the Conversation Prism research.

For intelligence purposes, we should also review the activity of our competitors. This deserves ongoing attention.

This step is designed to unearth any potential land mines or surprises to ensure that anything you do from this point forward is highly orchestrated. Contingent upon the specific results of this internal probe, our next steps may differ a bit. The risk that we're attempting to minimize right now is the dilution of the brand through rogue accounts created by individuals with good intentions, but not bound to a plan or centralized purpose. Without governance or organization, the brand's image can quickly spin out of control with each new unplanned profile or social object created and placed into practice. For larger enterprises, this threat may already be a reality, and the extent of the damage caused will vary.

Your job is to reel in everything that is already in play concerning your brand, or spark new programs for the uninitiated.

THE SOCIAL MARKETING COMPASS

Before we tackle the official process of creating a plan, here is one last exercise that will help us maintain focus and perspective. The fabric of our plan should be woven from threads of ethics, purpose, and principles and bound by salient business goals and objectives. Remember, social networks are emotional landscapes. As such, I'd like to introduce you to the Social Compass. Inspired by the term moral compass, I created the Social Compass (again with the artistic talents of JESS3), to serve as our value system when defining our program activities (see Figure 2.1).

Figure 2.1 Social Marketing Compass

Source: Brian Solis and Jesse Thomas (http://Jess3.com).

A compass is a device for determining orientation and serves as a true indicator of physical direction. The Social Compass points a brand in a physical and experiential direction to genuinely connect with customers, peers, and influencers, using emotional hooks.

No infographic is complete without further explanation, and while its design may be extraordinary, it means nothing if we don't understand how to use it. When we listen and hear what's taking place in the conversational ecosystem, the compass works from the outside in, moving from the edge to the center. When we engage, we move from the center to the outside edge.

The Brand

At the center of the compass is the brand; essentially, everything you do will revolve around it.

The Players

Fundamental to any program, the players define how, when, why, and to what extent our activity is intermediated across the Social Web. They include:

• Advocates and stakeholders: Those individuals who maintain a stake in the brand and the success of the company, through emotional, strategic, or financial investment—and are usually among the first line of external champions.
• Traditional media: Reporters, journalists, analysts, and other forms of mainstream and vertical media who already reach our intended audiences.
• New influencers and trust agents: Individuals who focus a noteworthy portion of their updates, content, and voice on particular topics, industries, or markets.
• Champions: Whereas advocates and stakeholders have skin in the game to some extent, champions are merely inspired to share their experiences and views because they are passionate, compelled, or incentivized.
• Bloggers and market makers: Bloggers and market makers represent what some refer to as the A-list. This elite group can steer, shape, and galvanize activity that moves markets on the basis of their views.
• Tastemakers and the magic middle: Tastemakers and the magic middle are distinct from new influencers and trust agents, and, depending on the industry, serve as a subset of them. In their own way, they make markets and spark trends based on their activity. Tastemakers are the trendsetters and, in the Social Web, they usually boast notable followers and connections that emulate their behavior, whether it's explicit or implicit, on behalf of the tastemaker. The term magic middle was coined by David Sifry,1 who at the time was CEO of Technorati, the world's largest blog network; he defined this group as bloggers who maintained an inbound link volume of between 20 and 1,000 links.

Now, I refer to the magic middle as any group of content creators who remain focused on a topic and have earned a substantial audience because of their experiences, views, and perspective.

Platform

Every initiative, inclusive of those groups of individuals who define our markets and ensuing behavior, requires a platform upon which to connect, communicate, and congregate. These platforms represent existing and also emerging categories that are worthy of our attention today and tomorrow.

• Mobile: Any network that unites groups of targeted individuals through interaction on mobile devices.
• Social dashboard, or microsites: As discussed previously, social dashboards and microsites aggregate distributed social presences into one experience for channeling activity, providing information, fostering community, and guiding perception and impressions.
• Widgets and applications: Widgets and applications are portable services that spark interaction in a variety of networks, from mobile devices to Web-based social networks. They create an immersive experience designed to perform a dedicated function, including tasks, games, interaction, learning, and other forms of entertainment and engagement within a dedicated, embeddable environment, while branding or conveying messages in the process.
• Forums and groups: Web 1.0 still rules, and through research we learn that communication and influence is still widespread in forums and groups where people not only communicate with one another every day, they also organize events, manage projects, and teach and learn from one another on almost every topic imaginable and unimaginable.
• Blogs: Web-based blogs, in all of their shapes and sizes, deserve a tremendous amount of attention, as they are still among the most active and influential news sources besides traditional media. Not only do they hit mainstream audiences, they also focus on dedicated, vertical communities and nicheworks that equally contribute to your total market.
• Social networks: Of course social networks are a primary forum for today's social media interactions and therefore require a dedicated focus. As we've repeated so often in these pages, our attention is necessitated in popular networks as well as the nicheworks dedicated to our areas of interest.
• Content creation: The development and syndication of social objects carries the ability to reach people in almost every medium today, and will only continue to expand as technology advances. We are now in the content publishing and distribution business.
• Events (offline and online): The cultivation of communities is important online and also in the physical locales where we meet our customers, advocates, peers, and influencers. A fusion between online and offline communication is critical, and therefore mandatory.
• Microcommunities: While many refer to these services as microblogs, the truth is that they are not in any way, shape, or form reminiscent of blogs, nor is the behavior that they stimulate. We focus on them as dedicated platforms because of their unique interactions, communities, efficacy, and reach.

Emotions

The socialization of the Web is powered by people, and it is a movement that is bound by the same natural laws that govern human behavior. Successful branding is made possible when individuals can establish a human and emotional connection. In social networks, the brand is represented by you and, for that reason, we must factor compassion, care, and feeling into our planning. Connect from the heart.

• Reciprocation: The gesture of a response is far more powerful than we perceive. It is the act of paying a good deed forward that actually contributes to the caliber, quality, and value of dialogue and interchanges. As influence is both democratized and equalized, giving back is a symbol of respect and gratitude.
• Empathy: Understanding the sentiment of another related to material interaction and experiences humanizes the context of an experience and conversation. You must become the very people you're trying to reach and to best do so, our understanding must extend beyond training, and embrace real-life exposure.
• Recognition: Identifying the contributions of others and promoting or responding to worthy individuals and instances are parts of how we cultivate communities and build relationships. From “thank you” to “I'm sorry,” the symbolic deeds of acknowledgment, admittance, and identification serve as powerful forms of validation.
• Core values: The attributes that define the principles and standards of a brand are reinforced or diminished by its conduct. If we wish to attract influential peers, we must stand for something with which people can identify and associate. We must represent purpose. Our brand and our actions either encourage affinity or they don’t.
• Resolution: The practice of solving problems, disputes, and other correlated issues is a focus and a mission that contribute to those actions that indeed speak louder than words. And if we're to be measured by them, then let our commitment to resolve impediments speak for itself.
• Empowerment: Providing the authority to achieve something not possible before the encounter instills confidence and advocacy and sets the foundation to scale community development. Empowerment alters the balance of engagement and transforms interactions into relationships.
• Humanization: Convey and embody a human voice and character in all we do in interactive media. From the creation and distribution of social objects to engagement with individuals, engagement is most effective when we personalize our approach. The Social Web is alive and powered by our ability to identify with others through direct interaction or by coming into contact with their personas, as attached to the content they interact with, share, or produce.
• Honesty: Be honest and virtuous in all interactions and not misleading whatsoever in any scenario so as to achieve your objective. Be truthful. If you don't have an answer or information, say so. If what you represent doesn't measure up in a particular setting, admit it. Focus on strengths and opportunities. Do not spin or market messages.
• Reward: Sometimes recognition isn't enough to satisfy someone for their contribution. The act of rewarding someone is a sign of appreciation. Rewards can span from monetary items to discounts to free products to access and special privileges. The consistent performance of rewarding community behavior fosters increased activity through positive conditioning.
• Value proposition: When humanizing our stories and interactions, it is the value proposition that speaks directly to specific markets. Many times marketing either attempts to generalize features or capabilities for the masses or simply reiterates the value propositions as dictated by internal management.
• Be believable: Words such as transparency and authenticity are overused in any discussion related to socialized outreach and therefore lose a good deal of their essence and meaning. It is more convincing and consequential in any encounter if you are believable. This can be passionate, exuberant, and contagious, unlike transparency or authenticity. Give me something to believe in.
• Sincerity: Your biggest objective moving forward is to earn and continue to gain trust. To do so, your actions must exclude pretense, and instead enrich interactions through the exchange of genuine feelings and intentions.

CREATING A PLAN: DEFINING THE FUTURE, NOW

To quote personal time management author and expert Alan Lakein, “Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now.”

This may come as a shock, but a standard does not exist for drafting and implementing a targeted social media plan—and for good reason. Its content is unique to your brand, and therefore its documentation and output are also distinct. This section will offer the framework, but will require your perspective and insight to complete the design.

So far, we have assembled the content for this plan with most of the needed items residing in the data collection process that is used to listen and quantify the Conversation Index.

• Volume
• Relevant networks
• Sentiments
• Perceptions
• Reach
• Divisions currently affected
• Share of voice
• Themes or trends
• The state of social affairs
  • Current accounts and activity
  • Competitive intelligence

Now we need to place that relevant information into a plan of action. This sample template for defining marketing plans has been amended to serve our purposes. This example is intended to put into action our recommended programs, based on the strategies that match existing market behavior. Regardless of the size of the organization, this plan is designed to serve at the brand level. Dedicated social media programs will also require specific plans at the program and departmental levels.

SOCIAL MEDIA PLAN OUTLINE2

Remember this, however: with new ideas, new politics and dynamics unravel. You are essentially a change agent helping to solidify the company's ability to compete now and in the future. In the future, those around you will realize the latent advantages for not only the business, but for their individual careers. Stay strong and unswerving. This is your work.

As my good friend Hugh MacLeod says in his book, Ignore Everybody, “Good ideas alter the power balance in relationships. That is why good ideas are initially resisted.”4

Once your idea garners acceptance and velocity, you will find yourself surrounded by supporters and back channel detractors. But make no mistake: It's because your ideas are substantial.

As we learn through success and failure, our nascent acceptance of champions and their creativity enable us to compete for the future and surpass those companies that don’t.

NOTES

1. David Sifry, “State of the Blogosphere, February 2006, Part 2: Beyond Search,” Sifry's Alerts (February 13, 2006), www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/ 000420. html.

2. “Marketing Plan Outline,” Quick MBA, www.quickmba.com/marketing/ plan/.

3. William D. Perreault and E. Jerome McCarthy, Basic Marketing 14th ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 2003).

4. Hugh MacLeod, Ignore Everybody (New York: Penguin Group, 2009).