Question

Topic: Social Media

Need Ideas For Those Slow To Join The Movement

Posted by Anonymous on 4/8/2011 at 8:24 AM ET 125 Points
We are struggling to develop an effective strategy to drive a specific audience to engage in social media. The audience is in an industry that has been slow to adapt to the whole idea of social media; they don’t understand how it’s relevant to them or can be a good tool for them. Is it okay to force them to use social media in order to gain access specific content they need? We think it’d be more effective to get them to gradually buy into the idea of using social media on their own, but we don’t know the right steps to move them in that direction. Can someone share an experience of dealing with a similar audience and successfully getting them to engage in social media?
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  • Posted by mgoodman on 4/8/2011 at 12:20 PM Moderator
    Swimming upstream is difficult. You're trying to force your values on an audience that doesn't share them (yet).

    My suggestion: Slow drip. Don't "force them." Just be ready when they see the light on their own. You're not likely to be able to change an industry all by yourself.
  • Posted on 4/8/2011 at 1:27 PM Accepted
    Companies are not interested in social media as such. They, and above all their marketing managers and salesmen, are interested in sales. Therefore you need to present social media as a business driver for sales -- also in their industry.

    How does this industry use advertising agencies and PR firms? A relatiionship with such firms could be a Trojan Horse for you. If you have to go it alone, than evidence from the "expert from afar" may lend you some crediblity.

    A possible "persuader" here could be Jeffrey Gitomer, one of the leading sales trainers in the U.S., with a string of bestselling sales books, e.g. The Sales Bible, and a free weekly E.zine, "Sales Caffeine." Although he is 65 years old, he is adamant about the benefits of social media. In fact his newest book is on this subject "Social Boom," cf. www.amazon.com

    A book with more academic authority would be The Dragonfly Effect, by Jennifer Aaker and Andy Smith (one a Stanford professor). However this book is less oriented towards "hard core selling," again cf. www.amazon.com

    With some ammunition from the above books, among other sources, consider a program aimed at industry decision makers. The program should be oriented towards marketing in the electronic age, solution selling as innvotion accelerates, or other (industry appropriate) tag. The focus should be on increasing sales, and the best tools and training to give the sales force to do that.

    That presentation might be held by a respected marketing authority in your industry. He then introduces an exciting case study, and your firm appears with a social media WOW presentation. You show social media actually working in real time during it.

    Getting even the most daring pioneer customers is not a one shot (single presentation) deal. Mgoodman is absolutely correct when he refers to a "drip" approach. And be darn sure not to raise unrealistic expectations about social media being a magic bullet, that it is easy to go viral, easy to generate massive sales leads. Over-promise and under-deliver is remembered a long, long time.
    Regards, J. Hamilton


  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 4/8/2011 at 4:43 PM Member
    Where ARE your target audience online (can you place your message in places they are already, instead of making them do something special because you want them to)? Why do THEY need social media? Can you prove it?
  • Posted by donaldtepper on 4/11/2011 at 2:01 PM Member
    No.

    It is not okay "to force them to use social media in order to gain access specific content they need."

    First, let's distinguish between "content they need" and "content they want." There's a difference. They'll be more motivated to use social media to access content they want. It may or may not be important. It may or may not be necessary. But if they're already motivated to acquire that information, you've lowered that hurdle of getting them to plunge into social media.

    On the other hand, you're doing your audience a major disservice if you're depriving them of content they truly need.

    And as J. Hamilton points out, social media is a means to an end, not the end itself. That applies both to you and to your audience.

    You force them at your own--very distinct--peril.
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