1.
10 Things to Ask Your Social Media
Team
(snarkiness optional)

2.
1 – Branded vs Common Interest Content
Question:
How much content do we post about our brand and products, and how
much content is of general interest to our community?
Alternate Question:
Do we ever post anything our community is interested in, or do we use
social media as an advertising platform?
Fun Fact(s):
Organizations that do social media well, and get real results (aka
revenue), publish content that is of general interest to the community
80% of the time, and only publish branded (focusing on their products
and service) 20% of the time.

3.
2 – Who are We Targeting
Question:
What market segment are we targeting with our social media activities?
Alternate Question:
Are we actually focusing our social media activities on reaching people
who buy our products and services or markets we’re trying to expand
into?
Fun Fact(s):
The following answers are wrong: Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest users.
While social media activities should not be advertising focused, they still
should target people who will buy your products and services the way
other marketing and brand awareness activities are.

4.
3 – Why These Social Media Platforms?
Question:
Why did we choose the social media platforms that we did to engage
our community?
Alternate Question:
Is Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest/Linkedin where our customers are
hanging out in social media, or are we just using a shotgun approach?
Fun Fact(s):
Each platform, and many independent sources, publish user
demographic information. Number of users, age ranges, income,
education level, etc.. If you’re spending a lot of effort (a.k.a. money) on a
social media platform, it should be one that’s used frequently by people
who buy your products and services

5.
4 – What Stage of our Social Media Plan?
Question:
What stage of our social media plan are we currently in?
Alternate Question:
I assume our social media plan is longer than, “Get on social media?”
How many stages does our plan have, and which one are we currently
in?
Fun Fact(s):
Many expert social media practitioners recommend a continuous
improvement process for social media operations. The National Institute
of Social Media recommends a six stage cycle: audit, planning, content
development, campaign implementation, community management, and
analysis and reporting.

6.
5 – Cross Promoting or Cross Dumping?
Question:
Are any of our social media content streams dumping from one social
media platform to another?
Alternate Question:
If our Facebook fans want our page feed to look like Twitter, why don’t
they just follow us on Twitter?
Fun Fact(s):
You’ll get the best traction and interaction by creating content and posts
for each platform you’re engaging on. This allows you to take advantage
of each platform’s features and capabilities, target your content to that
platform’s demographic, and lets each community know you really care
about them!

7.
6 – When is the Last Time we Audited Ourselves?
Question:
When is the last time we audited our social media accounts and
performance?
Alternate Question:
When is the last time we actually checked up on ourselves to see how
we’re doing on social media?
Fun Fact(s):
The social media landscape is constantly changing. New trends, new
platforms, and new approaches are the norm. We recommend building
regular audits into your social media operational cycle. More
specifically, we recommend you audit yourself and your key competitors
every quarter!

8.
7 – When Did we Last Measure Sentiment?
Question:
When is the last time we measured sentiment?
Alternate Question:
Social media is a forum for opinion, comments, and feedback, so how do
our customers really feel about our brand, products, and services?
Fun Fact(s):
Many social media fails like the recent #MyNYPD come from organizations not
measuring the sentiment of their community. Social listening, and sentiment
analysis can tell you what you’re doing right, what you’re doing wrong, and will
give you ideas on how to make things better. It’s a free, real-time, focus group.
Do sentiment analysis once a quarter. Curious about something and not seeing
feedback? Ask your community. They’ll tell you.

9.
8 – Social Media Policy?
Question:
Have all members of our social media team reviewed our social media policy?
Alternate Question:
We have a social media policy right? Did we create it by doing a search and
replace on the words “public relations” or was it created specifically for social
media? Do all the people on the social media team know about it, and have
they read it?
Fun Fact(s):
Social media policies provide guidance for your social media team and your
employees. Some of the biggest mistakes organization’s make are not having a
social media policy, using some other corporate policy that doesn’t account for
social media realities, and not telling their employees to read it!

10.
9 – Copyright, Trademark, Privacy?
Question:
When was the last time our social media content team received training
on copyright or trademark laws, corporate or consumer privacy?
Alternate Question:
Is it okay to use pictures and content you find on the Internet as long as
it’s attributed to the author? What customer information are you
allowed and not allowed to reference in content?
Fun Fact(s):
Unfortunately a lot of social media practitioners think attribution equates to a
right to reuse content. It does not. Your team should be familiar with copyright,
trademark, creative commons, as well as corporate and consumer privacy. If
they aren’t, your organization is at risk.

11.
10 – What’s Our Social Media ROI?
Question:
What’s the return on the investment we make in social media?
Alternate Question:
How much are we spending on social media, and who much money is it
making for us? Put that data in a report for me with the analytics to back
it up by Friday.
Fun Fact(s):
Only 11% of social media practitioners know how to calculate social
media ROI. Many social media teams don’t track the content they
publish or map social media actions back to first interaction, assisted, or
last interactions conversions on their websites, making it difficult to tell
how social media is benefiting their organization!

12.
11 – Bonus Question: How do we Get Help?
Question:
Are you satisfied with the answers you received?
Alternate Question:
Would you report those answers to your boss?
Fun Fact(s):
Training is the best way to make sure your staff is prepared, and that
your team is following best practice methodologies for planning,
executing, tracking, and analyzing their social media activities. We
believe the best comprehensive course is the one authored by CTC
founder Bob Carver, for the National Institute of Social Media, and
published by Logical Operations.

13.
 Go to http://carvertc.com or contact
bob@carvertc.com learn more about the course or
schedule training.
 Follow Bob Carver for great tips, advice, and news on
social media and web analytics.
 Check out the National Institute of Social Media and
their certification program
 Check out the course published by Logical Operations
and available now!
Next Steps: Get Training