With over 60% of the world’s population active on social networking sites, no one can deny that social media hasn’t had a profound impact on how we interact as a society today.
The frequent use of social media by individuals in a personal capacity for all manner of purposes quickly led to the discovery that it could be used as an extremely powerful and targeted marketing tool for companies, and while it was seemingly clear how B2C marketers could utilise social media platforms to engage with their customers, the rules of engagement for social media in the B2B world were slightly less obvious.
Social media is still a relatively new and evolving marketing channel which means there are no fixed rules in understanding what works and how it works for each individual company. However, through social media, we are presented with a huge opportunity to directly interact and engage with our stakeholders in a way that we never have done before, paving the way to increased brand awareness, loyalty, and sales growth.
Overcoming obstacles
So you know that your company needs to have a social media presence but what’s holding you back? According to a survey carried out this year by Ascend2, the three main obstacles that B2B marketers believe stand in their way to achieving social media success are staff limitations, inability to measure ROI and a lack of organisational commitment.
Some companies are worried that starting out in social media is like opening up a can of worms.
If like these companies you think social media will take up too much time and budget to do it properly, let me reassure you that your starting point into B2B social media doesn’t need to be overly sophisticated. Some companies are worried that starting out in social media is like opening up a can of worms. They envision that they’re going to be inundated with requests and will spend all their time ‘tweeting’ and ‘Facebooking’ responses, when in fact it’s actually quite passive. You don’t need to spend all day concentrating on social media platforms to ensure they work effectively and efficiently for you.
What you do need to do is distribute content that is relevant and engaging to your target audience. According to 40% of B2B Marketers (Source: Ascend2), creating articles and/or blog content is their most effective tactic. A key point to remember is that all your content needs to include a call to action because this is what will drive your lead generation and lead generation should be a key objective for any B2B social media strategy.
Understandably, every marketing department has to justify what they are doing and if you don’t know how to measure the value of your social media activities then you will have a tough time communicating what you’re doing and if it’s successful.
In the Ascend2 survey, 36% of B2B Marketers said that the inability to measure social media ROI is the biggest obstacle to achieving their objectives. If you want to overcome this obstacle it all begins with setting the right objectives.
Measuring your success
Just like any other communications strategy, the objectives for your social media activities must be S.M.A.R.T (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely). Lead generation should be a key objective for any B2B company engaging in social media, because not only is it a highly desirable outcome, it is also relatively easy to measure.
If your objective was to increase the number of sales leads through using Linkedin for example, then in order to see how effective your content and activity was all you need to do is look at the contact–lead conversion rate. In this way, we are able to demonstrate easily the impact social media has had on contributing positively to a company’s bottom line.
Other measurements are also possible. Some social media experts say that spending time collecting followers on social media platforms is a fruitless exercise for companies in the B2B sector and that counting the number of followers on platforms such as Twitter and Facebook for example, shouldn’t count as a measurement.
However, if you think about it, what those followers amount to is effectively an actively engaged database full of contacts that have opted-in to receive information on your company and can share your content within their own extended networks. When you look at it from this point of view why wouldn’t you want to collect more followers?
It’s really simple.
If your B2B company isn’t already involved in social media then it really should be and the key thing to remember is that it doesn’t have to be overly complicated, time-consuming or costly. Through identifying the key platforms to reach your audiences, setting the right objectives and using the content that is already being generated through your PR activities, you can create a social media strategy that can deliver outstanding results.
