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Social Media Marketing vs. Influence Marketing
Everyone is not equal. We do not all win prizes for showing up; we must put in the work. That is how grade schools operate now; everyone wins, no matter how bad the performance. We’re told we can be whatever we want, but we don’t all get to be astronauts when we grow up. It’s unfortunate for egalitarians to hear, but some people are a more valuable use of your resource than others, especially when marketing to them.
When brands first start to market themselves with Social Media, they falsely believe that likes, follows, and impressions are great indicators of success. Although that can be useful data, it’s only as useful as it is to say one million people drive by this billboard every day. It’s not indicative of success, just views. Let me test you to illustrate my point with a made up restaurant brand called Badass Barbeque.
Which of the two scenarios is more valuable?
1. Badass Barbeque opens with a general admission Grand Opening Party, inviting 300 potential customers excited to try the restaurant.
2. Badass Barbeque opens with a closed event, inviting 50 of the most read BBQ food bloggers, Yelp! reviewers with Elite Status, and a couple of popular writers from the local newspapers.
What did you choose?
In scenario 1, the restaurant is exposed to 300 customers as opposed to only 50 in scenario 2 more eyeballs means more exposure, right? Well, consider this: the 50 influencers you invited in scenario 2 may each have over 100,000 people that read their blogs, reviews or articles. These people create content that dedicated audiences depend on. They hang on their every review or article. They make decisions to go out to eat based on what these critics or reviewers say about the restaurant.
In other words, they have a huge voice, one that reverberates through their audience like an intense echo, spreading your message farther than 300 people randomly picked with an average of 27 followers on Twitter and 130 friends on Facebook (http://bit.ly/qPJX5B).
That doesn’t sound like a lot of opportunity for your message to spread. Youâre going to hit an average of 8,100 users on Twitter and 39,000 on Facebook, if every person who came in shared their experience online. Only one of the 50 invites from scenario 1 will have at least 100,000 people on Twitter reading their posts. On Yelp!, you have the potential to reach anyone searching for a new restaurant by review or even through Google.
The point is stop wasting your Social Media time on reaching everyone. Having 10,000 people like your Facebook page has no impact in comparison to having your product reviewed by Dr. Oz. Klout is a great tool to identify who you should reach out to based on their audience, their influence over that audience, and the topics they are influential about.
Unless, of course, you like wasting time.
Brad’s passion for social media began with his work as the co-founder of Makeshift Productions, specializing in video, web and e-Learning. He helped clients achieve strong results through the power of sharing video on social networking channels including selling a $3 million home through a YouTube video. As co-founder of Speak Social, Brad embraces social media as a way for consumers and merchants to reform customer relationships and interact on a human level. As our evangelist, Brad shouts the Speak Social message on Social Awareness to audiences across the nation. Brad is a sought after speaker and panelist, particularly on the topic of Social Media and the Recording Industry, as well as how to leverage Social Media in brand identity.
Engagement in its simplest form has changed very little throughout history. People still look for answers, and others provide solutions. Social Media marketing 
will not reinvent the engagement wheel. However, it has reshaped that wheel to fit this new vehicle of message distribution. As Social Media marketing moves out of infancy, and is further defined, so are the tactics behind this crucial tool.
Business to consumer (B2C) target marketing, from a Social Media and engagement standpoint, is possible. Very successful campaigns are now available for our review. Coke, Starbucks, Zappos and Dell (to name a few) have case studies and results to justify an absolute need for a Social Media marketing campaign driven by targeted engagement and a successful reputation management strategy. In the future, we will see very little change in engagement tactics for a B2C Social Media campaign.
Social Media marketing for Business-to-Business (B2B) is far from settled. In this arena, we will see the most growth, especially from Community Managers. It is the task of a Community Manager to be the megaphone and voice for a brand. This is the very essence of engagement. It is easy when there are millions of consumers to reach, but what if you are trying to sell your services to another business? The aspect of targeted engagement does not change. However, to be successful with a B2B Social Media campaign, the importance of hyper-targeting conversations and communities is more important. It is not just about engaging in simple conversation. More so, it is about being a thought leader within a specified industry and defining a message as the expert voice.
Andy Engages on several Social Media campaigns. His success as a manager earned the distinction of Rising Star in Social Media from Finger Candy Media. His blogs appear on Social Media Today, USAToday.com, DallasMorningNews.com and FuseTV. Andy focuses on Project Management and client relations for Speak Social. Our campaigns include various moving parts; there is little time to determine who is out of the loop. Andy keeps the Speak Socialteam moving at the speed of Social.
Having a Social Media company up and running for over a year now, I’ve had the good fortune to make many valuable mistakes. I’ve also been around just long enough to see many of my mistakes performed spectacularly by others. One of the most prominent ones I see Social Media managers make is the complete misdirection of focus away from the client and onto themselves.
When I first began trying to make a living doing Social Media for others, I started with an orgy of event participation. I went to every tweet-up, meet-up, Social breakfast, Social Media club, conference, seminar, power group and so on, that I could find. In the process I made sure I was tapped into the movers and the shakers. I followed them like crazy, just waiting for the perfect opportunity to @-mention them in the correct way so that I might get a retweet and from there, who knows? Maybe a direct message. After that it’s only a short trip to Facebook friendship and next maybe Chris Brogan shares my blog to his 18 billion followers and Social Media stardom is mine!
Along the way I was singing to the choir, hard. Social Media is important. Every business needs it, Brian Solis said this the other day. I agree; the revolution is here! Did you know what Seth Godin had for breakfast yesterday? Wheaties!!
And I was getting great response: “I agree Adam, Social Media is important! Have you seen this infographic!?”
My Klout was rocketing! My followers hit the thousands! I was throwing up articles all over guys like me and they were throwing them up on guys like them. And guess what? My clients could care less. I would have better luck talking about Criss Angel, Mind Freak, than Chris Brogan with my clients. They didn’t care about my Klout score either. Why should they? I was spending all this energy and why? I looked at my feeds and realized my feeds were intensely boring. A bunch of self-proclaimed Social Media people like myself talking about Social Media, using Social Media to do it. How was this helping me grow? More importantly, how was this helping my clients?
So I made a simple adjustment. I started listening to the customers of my clients. I studied their voice, their frustrations and their preferred topics of conversation. I monitored active and non-active times and what articles they liked to share. I engaged when it felt right and when I thought I had something to offer. My Klout score dropped like a rock, but an interesting thing happened. I found I could talk to my clients about their customers in a real way. I could give them insight that they weren’t able to glean from other sources and I could develop campaigns around micro-targeted segments of the client’s customer populations. This did wonders for my client base. I make a living now.
I sometimes miss the old echo chamber, but I don’t think you would be surprised to learn that when I left no one even knew I was gone. Then again, what I now lack in Top Ten Ways to use Facebook for Business lists, I make up for in true customer insight. So it’s a good trade.
As a co-founder of Speak Social, Adam strives to spread the word about our Social Media campaign process, which can close the gap between brands and the people that use them. His continued study of online media and marketing allows him to construct unique strategies that best serve the client’s message and goals. He analyzes the client’s target audience to determine where they live online and how to adapt the client’s voice into an understandable format. Adam went to school in North Carolina and focused on Marketing and Sociology, and then devoted the early part of his life to working for nonprofits including Habitat for Humanity and World Vision. He helped community leaders reach-out on a grassroots level. After moving back to Austin in 1997, he led teams at DELL and SONY.
via whitefireseo.comPosted via email from Avi Joseph | Comment »
Social Media: How to Reach More People & Have Greater Impact with Your Marketing Message - a new video by Speak Social’s Brad Bogus!
Learn how to be more effective by targeting your audiences rather than marketing to the masses.
Global Social Media revenues are on a roll, according to latest statistics from Gartner. The worldwide market is on track to hit US$10.3 billion this year, a 41.4 percent jump from US$7.3 billion in 2010.
It will reach US$14.9 billion by 2012 and by 2015, nearly double this amount at US$29.1 billion.
The biggest contributor behind the ”consistent growth” is advertising revenue, Gartner said Wednesday in a statement.
The research firm predicted that Social Media advertising revenue, including display advertising and digital video ads, will clock US$5.5 billion this year and grow to US$8.2 billion in 2012.
Marketers are allocating more of their advertising budget to Social networking sites, as they move from “onetime placement and click of ads” to having ongoing engagement with online users, said Neha Gupta, senior research analyst at Gartner, in the statement.
The shift toward Social Media advertising is that with social analytics, social networking sites can now “unlock the interconnected data structures of users—mapping lists of friends, comments, messages, photos, and all their social connections, contact information and associated media”, the New Delhi-based analyst added.
After advertising, Social games revenue was the next major contributor. It will grow from US$3.2 billion this year to US$4.5 billion in 2012, Gartner estimated. This includes the revenue Social networking sites earn directly from Social gamers, such as through virtual goods, as well as from game developers or publishers who host their games on these platforms.
Social networks have taken a platform-oriented approach to game monetization, publishing APIs (application programming interfaces) that help build an ecosystem of developers and publishers, and replying on mainly ad-supported or freemium models, Gupta said.
In contrast, Social Media subscription revenue estimates were lower—the forecast for 2011 was US$236 million, which will increase to US$313 million next year. Few social networks charge subscription and revenue is typically derived from premium or enhanced services, according to Gartner.
Reblogged Article Written By Jamie Yap , ZDNet Asia on October 12, 2011
Social Media created a power that everyone wants to harness, for several different reasons. Many people use this power for good, and those that try to use it for evil will quickly be burned. I am referring to the Influencer Model, a marketing method previously known as Brand Ambassadors. Sex is the most common example of a Brand Ambassador: and boy did it sell.
The Brand Ambassador is responsible for increasing company awareness, and spreading product details. Prior to web 2.0, and long before Social Media, we based our purchasing habits on TV and print advertising. We received marketing messages through attractive, bubbly individuals that only needed to know what was printed on the company one-sheet. Many brands, aahhhem … beer industry … only needed a hot girl to smile, and in rolled the sales.
Under that system, brands controlled the information. Companies could write anything, and feed it to the masses through flesh. Nowadays, Social is sexy, and boy does it sell too, but in a different way. People turn to bloggers, videocasters and photographers to give honest opinions about food to eat, places to visit, and entertainment to enjoy.
Who are the Brand Ambassadors in today’s Social market? First of all they are Influencers, and there is a lot of power in that name change. The traditional Brand Ambassadors setup an image of attractive droids chosen by the brand to spew jargon. Influencers are representatives of the people. These Influencers have a trusted following because of either their particular expertise on a topic, or ability to communicate loudly within a vast network. They create buzz.
People are busy, the world is moving unreasonably fast, and there are WAY TOO MANY options for good food and entertainment. We NEED Influencers to find the hidden gems, and report-back with reviews. Otherwise, I ‘m grabbing the $5.99 special at the same place I currently dine three nights per week.
This marketing shift creates an interesting situation for companies looking to gain eyes on their brand. They need Influencers to drive business through the doors; however, Influencers promote companies by blasting honest opinions about the product, service, and the value it has over competition.
Hey business owners, does honesty sound intimidating? Good, it should. Brands that want millions of followers and astronomical sales must put forth a superior product, and get it into the hands of Influencers, before someone else does.
A smart business owner recognizes the power of Social Media marketing, and respects the people in this world that hold the public’s attention. What makes this “word-of-mouth” method different from the mob bosses of the 1920s is that these community reporters do not demand a cut of the pie. Influencers respond to perks.
If you have a message to release to the world, you need to go through the gatekeepers. Send them your products, invite them to your restaurants, and show them why your brand can benefit our world. I promise you that they will return in kind, but heed warning. Honesty is a two-way street, and you don’t want to be caught on the wrong side.
Social Media changed the world. From dramatic images of revolution in Egypt, to people sourcing friends for restaurant recommendations, Social Media integrated perfectly with our obsession for communication.
Social Media is the desire to share, and globally we are at a peak in connectivity. We tell our stories, give our opinions, and connect with people beyond our physical location in hopes to gain just a moment of attention. The architecture of everything that we once knew is shedding its skin, placing the world in a transition not seen since the Industrial Revolution.
A new and exciting world waits at the finish line of this transitional phase, a world where every man, woman and child is just one click away. A homemaker in the Midwest, who reads and reviews books on Amazon will help to determine what books are published, and how they are released. At the same time, a young boy on the other side of the world will raise money and awareness to bring running water to his village. The possibilities are unimaginable.
Learning to speak in a Social language is already a valued trait in business. Hiring is, in many ways, determined by Social knowledge and Social perception. An organization can no longer rely on the previous model of blasting messages through a megaphone, built on traditional press and television, to a non-targeted market.
Today most audiences ignore this methodology because each of us holds a megaphone of our own. Influence no longer sells to the highest bidder, but brokers between those who successfully speak within Social channels.
We are writing the next chapter of history, defined by how we respond to Social Media. Our level of influence online will open new economies. Although we all possess the inherent right to information, to this point that information always came at a price. Soon, companies, politicians – really anyone who want to speak to us – will have to learn to speak with us.
By the end of Web 1.0, the Internet was a shouting match – a marketing battleground that tested the strength of junk mail folders across the world. Brands blasted messaging to unsolicited, and frequently purchased, lists of people; regardless of whether that person matched the company’s target audience. Page links trapped you in a web of “if you like this, you’ll love that” advertising. Spamming and jargon muted real communication, and eventually people stopped listening.
Now here we stand, experiencing first-hand the youth of web 2.0 – a virtual world where Social programs promote user-generate content. Now that everyone has a voice, audiences are particular about the messages that drive them to action. Begging the question, can your target market hear you?
There was a time in this world when only spoken or written forms of communication drove commerce, but no more. Now people respond to videos, pictures, animations and 140 characters. The challenges lie in deciding whom you want listening, and what content or conversations will spark action.
