Engaging with Social Media: Busting Common Myths

Engaging
with social media

Angela Schuster
SCHUSTER CONSULTING

Who am I?

INTERNATIONAL AND
NATIONAL B2B MARKETING
(US, UK, Europe, NZ, Sth Asia, AU) – 15 years +

BUSINESS OWNER –  Strategy & Planning
SCHUSTER  Project Management
CONSULTING  Extension & Engagement
GROUP

RELATED WORK
RIRDC Website, RWA and HS social media strategies.

WWW.SCHUSTERCONSULTING.COM.AU

Who am I?

PRIMARY PRODUCER
cropping and livestock CW NSW

SOCIAL MEDIA SUPPORTER
and skeptic!

MUM, WIFE
and coffee addict!


What will we cover?
SOCIAL MEDIA

 What is it? 24% of people
 Is it for me? have missed
witnessing
 Myth busting important
 Stats and facts moments
because they are
 The good, the bad and the ugly too busy trying to
 Platform dichotomy write about them
on social
 Outreach networks…
 Staying safe
 Q&A


Lets get
Started…


What is Social Media?

Social media employ web- and mobile-based
technologies to support interactive dialogue
and
introduce substantial and
pervasive changes to
communication between
organizations, communities,
and individuals.
Social media are social software which mediate
human communication.
Wikipedia



Ok, let’s break that
down:
 Interactive
dialogue
 Communication
between
organisations,
communities and
individuals
 Facilitates human
communication



 A blending of
technology
and social
interaction
 Facilitates
interactive
human dialogue
AND interaction
 ONE tool in
your tool box
 Not the be all
and end all of
communications



Collaborative Blogs Content Social Virtual Virtual social
projects communities networking gaming worlds worlds

Wikipedia Twitter
Twitter YouTube
YouTube Facebook
Facebook World of Warcraft Second Life
Forums WordPress Flickr Linked In
Linked In RuneScape Active Worlds
Central Desktop Blogger SlideShare Google+ The Sims Online
Delicious Pinterest
Pinterest
StumbleUpon MySpace
Digg Yammer
Reddit
Wikimedia
Wikinews
WikiLeaks
Skype

WWW.SCHUSTERCONSULTING.COM.AU White = 5 most popular platforms in AU

Is Social Media for Me?

 It’s not for
everyone
 One size does
not fit all
 Social media
suits some
offerings better
than others


Is Social Media for Me?

Consider: Put these items
together and you
 Objectives have your social
 Target audience media strategy…

 Tactics
 Resourcing
 Outreach activities
 Protection policies


The good

 Reach
Access to a broad audience (and one-to-one)
 Accessibility
Anyone can interact using social media
 Recency
Deliver information in real-time
 Quality Insights
Immediate access to insights and feedback
 Engagement
Direct communication and relationship building


The bad

 Information pollution (spam)
 Social obligation (productivity/reputation)
 Information overload (ignored)
 Arbitrary filtering (bad crowds out the good)
 Activism
 Accessibility - anyone can interact using social
media tools
 Reputation management and policy


The ugly

 Accessibility - anyone can interact using social
media tools
 Identity theft
 Cyberbullying (trolls)
 Hijacking (redirecting conversations/bashtags)


Some stats and facts

 40% of people spend more time socialising online than
they do face-to-face
 74% of brand marketers saw an increase in website traffic
after investing just 6 hours per week on social media
 Women are more active on social media than men –
55% vs 45%
 55% of journalists worldwide use Twitter and Facebook to
source news stories and 43% to verify stories
 52% of journalist's employers have Facebook pages and 46%
have Twitter profiles


Some stats and facts

 70% of brands ignore complaints on Twitter

 9% of companies do not track their social media responses

 55% of companies ignore all customer feedback on
Twitter and Facebook

 71% of the millions of tweets each day attract no reaction

 40% of Twitter users don’t tweet, but instead use it to
keep up-to-date
 54% of Australian Facebook users are female, 46% are male
 64% of Australian Twitter users are male, 36% are female
 55% of Australian Linkedin users are male, 45% are female


Myth
Busting


Myth busting!

1. Social media is free (and easy)
2. Build it and they will come
3. [Likes and followers] = ROI
4. Only young people use social media
5. Social media is a magic wand


Myth busting!
SOCIAL MEDIA IS FREE (AND EASY)

 Social media requires an investment of time
 Social media requires a commitment
 Social media takes persistence
 Social media needs a proper strategy
 Your time has a value
 Consider “opportunity LOST”

1
 What will you get for your time investment?
(Better be something worthwhile)


Myth busting!
BUILD IT AND THEY WILL COME

 No one will find your platforms if you don’t
promote them
 No one will engage with your platforms if you are
not [strategically] active
 Not everyone you want to target will be on
social media

2

Myth busting!
[LIKES AND FOLLOWERS] = ROI

ROI comes back
 More does not = better to what you are
 Family and (unrelated) friends don’t really count trying to achieve.
Can you connect
 Spammers don’t count at all these goals to
your social media
 Followers/Likers unrelated to your offering don’t activities?
really count
…Then you see
 Your competition doesn’t count the ROI.

3
 Social obligation has a big impact here – not real
metrics if they feel obligated to Follow/Like!
 Potential to just “preach to the converted” rather
than achieve true influence


Myth busting!
ONLY YOUNG PEOPLE USE SOCIAL MEDIA

 Over 50% of workers aged  The largest age group of  80% of active
over 50 use social media Twitter uses in Australia is internet users visit
every day at work 45-54 year olds (32%) social networks
 LinkedIn Age demographics  55% of journalists worldwide and blogs
are: 21% 18-24, 36% 25-34, use Twitter and Facebook to
36% 35-54, 7% 55+ source news stories
 The largest age group of  43% of journalists worldwide
Facebook users in Australia is use Twitter and Facebook to
25-34 year olds, followed by verify stories

4
18-24 year olds  52% of journalist's employers
 BUT, more than 28% of all have Facebook pages and
Australians on Facebook are 46% have Twitter profiles
35-54 year olds


Myth busting!
SOCIAL MEDIA IS A MAGIC WAND

(or a magic 8 ball or a silver bullet)
 Social media is one tool in your marcoms toolbox
 It may not even be right for your offering
 It takes commitment and persistence
 It does not work in isolation
 Not everyone you want to target will be using

5
social media
 Not everyone using social media is necessarily
whom you want to target
 Potential to just “preach to the converted” rather
than achieve true influence


Platform
Dichotomy


Facebook

www.facebook.com 11 million
 Social networking site Australian’s
visited Facebook
 Individuals can have pages and Friends during March
 Businesses can have pages and Likes 2012.

 Groups are more personal
 Good for networking and connecting
 Aim for Comments, Likes and Shares


Facebook
EXAMPLES

www.facebook.com/RuralWomensAward
www.facebook.com/agchatoz
www.facebook.com/target100AUS
www.facebook.com/askanaussiefarmer
www.facebook.com/AustralianAlmonds
www.facebook.com/blackdoginst
www.facebook.com/honesttoddler


Facebook
WHAT WORKS?

 Well designed pages
 Picking a page name with meaning
 Providing a full description, website address,
background information and uploading imagery
 Leveraging the Timeline layout rather than starting
with when you joined Facebook
 Photos, videos, podcasts
 Events, Notes etc
 Being real
 Questions!
 Funnies


Facebook
WHAT WORKS?

 Capitalising on holidays and events (Christmas)
 Leading and guiding (suggest resources, redirect)
 Courtesy/pure engagement messages (have a great
weekend)
 Contests, polls, giveaways (in line with Ts & Cs)
 Liking, sharing or commenting on other organisations,
products, peoples Facebook pages
 Incentives for Likes
 Adding your Facebook page to your other comms
(email signatures, website, brochures etc)


Facebook
WHAT WORKS?

 Sending an EDM to your customers, prospects,
stakeholders etc announcing your Facebook page
(give them an incentive to Like!)
 Asking staff to spread the word
 Responding publicly
 Posting 2-4 times per week
 Posts that: Involve a charity, specifically ask for fans
to Like or Comment or ask for feedback
 Posts posted during work hours
 Shorter posts (1-3 lines)


Facebook
WHAT DOESN’T WORK

 Obvious self promotion
 Not allowing people to post (or deleting posts)
 Getting defensive about negative comments
 Posting testimonials yourself (get the
client/stakeholder to do it)
 Looooooong posts
 Content repeated from one platform to another
(get creative - repurpose)
 Not listening, not responding
 Repetitive posts (verbatim)


Twitter

www.twitter.com Twitter users
 Microblogging report liking only
36% of overall
 Restricted to 140 characters tweets; actively
 Username or handle - @yourname disliking 25%;
and having no
 Jargon: Retweet (or RT), hashtags, bashtags, DM, strong opinion
followers about 39% of
 Good for news, updates, networking tweets,
indicating a
waste of the
tweeter and
tweetee's time.


Twitter
EXAMPLES

@RIRDCRuralWomen
@agchatoz
@AAAFarmer
@ABCRural
@our_NRIA
@HonestToddler


Twitter
WHAT WORKS

 A good profile and well designed background
 Questions
 Shared information and valuable content
 Facts, stats
 Adding to a RT with facts and opinions (although
these can be off putting too!)
 Professional insights
 Real-time information
 Teasers (with working links!)
 Regular posts - but don’t flood your followers


Twitter
WHAT WORKS

 Short tweets in context so people can comment
when RTing
 Reply to people publicly (not DM)
 Strategic following
 RTing others Tweets
 Asking for RTs (amazingly it works)
 Link shortening (bitly.com, tinyurl.com – save
precious characters)
 Acronyms and abbreviations (within reason)


Twitter
WHAT DOESN’T WORK

 Too many hashtags
 Too many @mentions
 Too many abbreviations
 Boring updates about what you’re doing/
where you are
 Habitual complainers
 Old news
 No context
(links with no explanation, too short tweets)
 Random following
 Too much self promotion
(self = you, company, product, service)


YouTube

www.YouTube.com For every
 Video sharing ‘dislike,’
YouTube videos
 Best to create a channel get 10 ‘likes’-
 Jargon: Tags, like, dislike, share people like to tell
other people
 Good as a support platform about the stuff
they love.


YouTube
WHAT WORKS

 A dedicated channel
 Customised profile (description, branding, logo,
background, colours etc)
 Video testimonials or case studies
 “A day in the life of”
 How tos, tips and tricks
 Interviews (real ones)
 Unusual content
 Presentations you gave


YouTube
WHAT WORKS

 A username that reflects your brand
 Videos should be less than 15 minutes
(2 minutes is better)
 Include searchable titles, descriptions and tags for
each video
 Allow comments on videos
 Regular uploads
 Cross promote with other social media platforms


YouTube
WHAT DOESN’T WORK

 Stale content
 Repeated content
 Really loooooong videos
 Lack of description or further information
 Inhibiting sharing


YouTube
EXAMPLES

www.youtube.com/user/ruralwomensaward
www.youtube.com/user/BioFarmersofAus
www.youtube.com/thewhitehouse
www.youtube.com/user/infogunnedah
www.youtube.com/user/bessidy


LinkedIn

www.linkedin.com There are
 Professional networking 2.8 million
LinkedIn users
 Individuals have pages (like an online resume) in Australia.
 Companies are created based on individuals
 Jargon: Connections, groups


LinkedIn
WHAT WORKS

 A complete profile – summary, experience,
qualifications, skills, projects etc
 Personalised URL
 A good, professional profile image
 Linking to your website/s
 Asking for connections - regularly
 Sharing Twitter updates via LinkedIn
 Using status updates
 Including LinkedIn URL in your email signature
 Joining or creating a group – and participating


LinkedIn
WHAT DOESN’T WORK

 Overt self promotion
 Incomplete profiles
 Inactivity (no connections, status updates)
 Personal status updates
 Unprofessional status updates


Blogs

 Short for web log 60% of companies
 Personal online journal frequently updated using blogs say
intended for public viewing they have
acquired
 Similar to an opinion column in magazines and customers
newspapers! through them.
 Often focused on thought-leadership, expertise
and education of readers


Blogs

www.wholelarderlove.com
www.engagement-matters.com.au
www.art4agriculture.wordpress.com


Blogs
WHAT WORKS

 Valuable and useful content
 Community blogs
 Regular postings
 Offering readers the option to subscribe to
updates (via email or RSS)
 Letting people know of a new post (using SM
and/or email)
 Short, punchy content
 Images and video – BUT ensure text provides context
 Allowing comments, tags and archiving
 A professional layout


Blogs
WHAT DOESN'T WORK

 Mundane content that offers no value, insight or is
not informative (unless you’re a real comedian)
 Loooooong posts
 Not promoting your blog using other SM platforms
 Overt self promotion (you, product, service etc)
 Using the standard “WordPress” layout with no
customisation or personalisation
 Not shortening URLs when posting on other
SM platforms


Outreach
Approaches


Outreach
START OUT SLOW

 Be a (strategic) likebacker/followbacker
 Announce your presence to your clients, prospects,
contacts, etc
 Always refer to your platforms (email signatures,
brochures, offline, cross-platform)
 Ask for RTs, Follows, Likes etc
 Engage using your own platform (regular activity)
 Engage on others platforms (RT, RT reciprocator,
#FF, Share, Like)


Outreach
RAMP IT UP

 Join a “promote-group”
 Integrate with other marcoms
 Encourage WOM
 Run competitions, giveaways, offers, polls etc
 Engage using your own platform – heavy activity
 Engage on others platforms – heavy commenting,
RT, #FF etc, Share, Like
 Use hashtag directories to find Twitter users and
then follow them (hashtweeps, wefollow)
 Use alternative avenues to gain Followers/
Likes – don’t “preach to the converted”


Outreach
BLAST OFF!

 Integrate offline processes 100% in SM
 Create and service a virtual community
 Always think social!
 Look at how you traditionally do things and ask –
“How can that work using SM?”
 OR ask “How can we do that better with SM?”
 Or ask “What are we not doing that we would like
to do and how can it be integrated with SM?”
 Use alternative avenues to gain Followers/
Likes – don’t “preach to the converted”


Staying
Safe


Staying safe
PROTECT YOURSELF

 Don’t include personal information
(birth date, addresses, bank accounts – seriously)
 Don’t promote the fact you’re not at home
(or you’re on your own)
 Don’t post pictures you’d hate your Mother
to see – now and in 15 years time
 Think before you Tweet
(or Like, Share, Comment etc)
 Keep your personal profiles private
(ie: on FB only Friends can see your details)
 Carefully screen Friend/Follow/Connect requests
 Make sure you use strong passwords


Staying safe
PROTECT YOUR REPUTATION

 Think before you Tweet
(or Like, Share, Comment etc)
 Carefully screen Friend/Follow/Connect requests
 Think before you Follow/Friend/Connect/Like
with political groups, commercial organisations,
extremists
 Decide what you will and won’t comment on
 Have a reputation management policy:
– What will you do if someone bashtags you?
– How will you deal with complaints?
– How will you deal with hijackers?
– What are the guidelines for staff SM use?


Finishing
Off….


Resources

 Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn Help
sections and guides
 www.Forbes.com (search social media)
 www.JeffBullas.com (social media commentator)
 www.TheSocialSkinny.com (good stats)
 www.google.com (the power is yours!)
 www.engagement-matters.com.au (me)


Questions?
GET IN TOUCH!

angelas@schusterconsulting.com.au
www.schusterconsulting.com.au
linkedin.com/in/angelaschuster
@SchusterConsult or @ange_schuster
02 6887 3780
0438 45 65 45
angelascg
www.engagement-matters.com.au/
flat white, half a sugar


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