Guest post by Josh Lysne, Director of Digital Strategy for the Flint Group of agencies and AdFarm, specializes in the development of multi-channel communication strategies for a wide range of clients ranging from small businesses to large global corporations.
When it comes to creating a social media strategy, there is one, often overlooked piece of the puzzle that falls through the cracks. The who is doing what piece of the puzzle.
I work with clients to create communication plans and digital strategies that usually include some form of social media. I often get an objection when the social elements of the program are introduced. Something along the line of “we tried a blog but it wasn’t a success” or “we have a Facebook page, but it isn’t doing anything for our business.”
Who’s Doing What?
Digging deeper into the failure, many times it is because the business did not understand who is doing what. The blog was a failure because posts were not written on a regular basis. The Facebook page was a failure because they were not engaging their audience, they were just collecting names. As Jay preaches, social media is not about collecting names, it is about activating your fans. That can only happen if you know who is doing what.
It can get complex depending on the size of your social media program, but here are some tips to help make sure you’re managing social operations appropriately:
- If you are blogging, create an editorial calendar. You don’t need to know the what, just the who and when.
- Again with the blogging, make sure your blogger or bloggers want to do it, if they are forced into it, you won’t get your posts on time.
- If you have a Twitter account, set up a CoTweet account to help manage interactions, and define who is responsible for interaction.
- If someone asks a question in a social space, make sure you have an expert on hand that can answer the question if it gets too technical for the day-to-day social listener.
- If you are being badgered by someone that continues to post off-topic or negative comments in your space, what is the plan to engage them, and who is going to do it?
- If you have a Facebook page, know who is responsible for engagement. Who is responsible for adding content? Photos? Videos? It might be different people for each task.
- Who is monitoring social spaces where you don’t currently have outpost? There are tons of free and paid tools out there that help you to monitor the conversations taking place.
Take a look at the Social Media Responsibilities Worksheet we use at the Flint Group. Hopefully it will help you figure out who is doing what.
Social Media Responsibilities Worksheet
What are your thoughts or comments?
(photo by KoalazyMonkey)
The biggest stumbling block to implementing a social media campaign after a company have given it the OK is finding the right people to drive it. In small businesses or one man bands it's easier to get an overview of who's responsible for what. But often in bigger corporations things get messy because there's simply not a clearly defined position for "creative blogger, social media engager, etc" because the C-suite, although they pay lip service to social media don't really get it yet.
Strategic planning and execution, say following an outline like the one you shared (thanks!) go a long way to help people (and mangers) understand what's expected and how to deliver.
Great post!
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