| Enhancing Email with Social Media: Q&A with Lyris and You? |
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| Integrated Marketing | |
| Written by Erick Mott | |
| Tuesday, 25 August 2009 | |
 Email and social media integration is a hot topic among today’s marketers and business executives. As companies look towards integrating the two channels they are left with countless questions about where to start and what to do. To that end, more than 3,000 people registered for our recent July 28th webinar, Enhance Your E-mail with Social Media Marketing.
Since the webinar (now available on-demand), we have reviewed all questions and consolidated them in this article with answers grouped into four main categories: 1) goals; 2) strategy; 3) content; and 4) resources. Included below are example-questions and tips to help provide context and key take-aways for each category. By the way, we’re also fielding live Q&A on our LinkedIn Group page based on detailed questions we received during the webinar. Come join in the conversation and share your thoughts and ideas. But first, here’s a summary to create some context. 1) Goals
"Who should I work with at my company to drive social media marketing initiatives?" As with other marketing and business initiatives in general, it’s best to start with some measurable goals and clear objectives. We covered four goal-oriented topics in the webinar including brand building, customer acquisition, customer retention and product launch. Once you decide where you want to focus in terms of specific achievements it’s far easier to determine your social media marketing strategy, choose social networking channels, orchestrate content development, select tools, organize staff, etc. We recommend enlisting help from appropriate executives or leaders within your company. Since social media marketing often requires changes in business processes, it’s best to get buy-in from those who are ultimately accountable for operations and budgets. Further, don’t put the cart in front of the horse. Instead, know where you want to go and what you are trying to accomplish, involve the right people in your company, and strategize and collaborate from there to agree on strategy. Tip: Remain flexible because your goals will likely change over time as your organization learns new skills and implements new processes. 2) Strategy
“Is it advisable to "re-publish" into print media the feedback you get from social media?” The bulk of the questions we received fell into the “strategy” category. The two examples above illustrate a range of inquiries that revolve around how to leverage social media to achieve desired goals and objectives. Again, your strategy depends on what you’re trying to accomplish and the nuances of how social media can help you manage execution. Note, social media marketing is much like any other communication activity where conversations and content are at the core. For example, let’s assume you are a marketer at a conference and one of your customers comes to your crowded booth and says, “I have been using product ’x’ for one year and I’m not satisfied with the quality. I like your brand, but you really let me down with this particular product.” What communication strategy would you apply in this circumstance? If you’re a smart marketer, chances are you would thank the customer for their business and for being candid about their feelings. Further, you would take notes and promise to pass along their feedback to the appropriate colleague so the quality issue--and impact to this particular customer--could be addressed as soon as possible. You may even ask the customer if you can follow-up with him/her at a later date to discuss how the issue was resolved. Tip: Essentially, the same communication etiquette and principles apply via social media as they do when having conversations with people. That is, to focus on serving target audiences and being open and honest regarding your intentions. 3) Content
“How many tweets are recommended per day for a brand?” Many of the questions we received that fell into the “content” bucket tended to address relevancy, frequency and response issues. As with other business initiatives that rely on communications, it’s best to listen to and get to know target audiences as a first priority. Seek to understand before being understood; this approach is repeated over and over in social media marketing. When business people spend time understanding what customers and prospects, for example, are saying about their brands and products, and what they are expressing in terms of needs--it becomes much easier to participate, respond and add value with social media. True, companies often have established and time-sensitive messages they wish to deliver through various communications channels including social media. This is fine as long as the business is authentic and transparent about its intentions, and keeps in mind that the people a business is trying to engage are, for the most part, in control of social media. Just like email marketing, social media marketing is very much an “opt-in” activity, so similar rules and etiquette apply in terms of what to write/talk about and how often to post/tweet messages. For example, when someone is following you or your business on Twitter, they have an option to tune in (pay attention) and get personal (do direct messages) or not. Email plays a key role in the Twitter experience with notifications and direct messages. The same thing applies to blogs, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.--RSS feeds and email can be set by people as the conduit and opt-in mechanism between them and your social media marketing and networking activities. We recommend that businesses monitor social media and networks daily to listen in and learn about what is being said regarding their brands, products, competitors, industry trends, etc. Just like conversations between people in face-to-face situations, a business that is plugged into social media and networking can help others and benefit directly by being alert, confident, respectful and intelligent. Tip: Essentially, social media content requirements will depend on your commitment and desired engagement levels with social media and networks. However, good content can and will be repurposed and shared--without any direct involvement from your business--and tools like Lyris HQ can help. 4) Resources
“How does a company appropriately organize and staff to accomplish the tasks of program development, deployment, on-going monitoring, etc.?” Determining and assigning resources for social media and networking depends on so many factors including your goals, strategy, industry, markets, etc. You can start with one part-time person or have a full-time team that is working around the clock. Social media teams are often organized with people from various departments (i.e., communications, marketing, customer service, product management, sales, executive management, etc.) to help ensure appropriate resolution, workflow and response when addressing particular problems and opportunities. If you’re thinking about resourcing for social media marketing, and have received executive support, consider three unique disciplines or roles that one person can manage or can be distributed across a team of people: 1) strategist; 2) community manager; 3) analyst. All three disciplines are somewhat obvious by name but just in case, here’s a brief description: Strategist: Responsible for setting and driving the overall strategy. Community Manager: Responsible for day-to-day interaction and communications via social media; integrating resources as needed (such as bringing in customer service). Analyst: Responsible for periodic analysis and reporting to understand and convey relevant insight and trends that impact strategy and day-to-day management. Tip: It is better to decide up front what your social media marketing goals are, and assign people with the right skills and time to embrace social media marketing within your business. This article represents only a handful of the great questions we received during the live webinar. Let’s not stop the conversation here! Let’s use the power and utility of email and social media integration to manage helpful conversations in the “Marketing Leaders by Lyris HQ” group site on LinkedIn. The Lyris Team will start by posting more questions and answers from the July 28th webinar. We look forward to your additional thoughts and knowledge sharing. ### About the Author
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