Social Media: Who Should Own It?

The topic of "who owns social media" came up around a family dinner when my parents were curious why social media roles exist under different departments depending on the company. In actuality, the answer is a bit more complex.

The key lies in how a company wants to approach it's social media engagement. The uses for social media can range from support & technical assistance to brand evangelism to lead generation and sales. Often companies find that one of these areas presents itself first. They then opt to create social media plans based on this need. What they don’t plan for is that the moment that they start engaging, they have opened the doors to all social engagement. Even though their best intention was to fulfill a need in one area of the company, the users need to connect to the company is still greater.

Without creating a framework for how to engage socially, a company’s social media will be incomplete and will risk confusing employees, disappointing customers, and ultimately leading to failure.

AUDIENCE
The question shouldn’t be, “who owns social media?” It should instead be, “who do we want to engage on this medium, and why?” In answering this question, you start to create a framework of what do and don’t we want to talk about? How do we want to engage? Which teams or functional areas are involved? Developing engagement guidelines is basically brand management but with new participation rules. Brand guidelines ensure that the visual representation of your brand is controlled down to imagery, text, color, etc. Social media guidelines are similar in that a company’s employees understand the parameters in which they can engage socially.

FRAMEWORK
Setting social media guidelines is beneficial for both the employees who are willing and eager to participate as well as the hesitant employees who want the reassurance of a virtual safety net. As with sales, marketing, even dance or music, you have to go back to basic structure. It may sound cliché, but it seems this step is all too commonly overlooked. Perhaps it is because social media is perceived as being a new and cutting edge topic, people jump the gun and forget. Don’t allow yourself to get sidetracked by the technology, the platform, or the buzz-word.

Before you hire that intern to take the task of updating your Twitter and Facebook accounts, sit down with people from each department and understand what it is that you are trying to accomplish as a company. Ask yourself a few questions:

Who are our customers and how do they want to engage with us? Understand which platforms are best for your customer base. Twitter users are typically older (45-55 are the top demographic, 23-34 year old following closely behind -comScore). If you are trying to reach the younger crowd, don’t waste your energy. Spend your time wisely.

How do we want to engage? Is your objective to convey marketing promotions? Do you want to offer support? Are you looking for ideas to make your products better? In order to have conversations about varying topics, you will need to cover more than one base. YouTube, Facebook, perhaps even develop your own online support forum where you can not only help your customers find technical assistance, but ask them questions about what they would enjoy in future generations of your product.

What are our limitations for engagement? I’m a big fan of adding character and allowing your customers to interact with the many personalities that comprise a company. Decide if it is OK for friendly and benign commentary (ie “Go Red Wings!” or “I love My Morning Jacket, too!”). Understand that sometimes your customers will be mad. One of the biggest fears of companies is “what if someone says something bad about us? Then it will be on our wall/thread/page!” Well, there will always be customers who are not happy with your company. It is OK if they post something negative. I have found more value in customers who come in and leave a negative comment on our wall because it allows us to understand that there is (or may be) an issue somewhere that we have not seen. It also allows our community to see that our company is listening & that we care. My team addresses all questions on our Twitter/Facebook/YouTube channel, regardless of if they are positive or negative. In doing so we allow the entire community to see that we are all trying to work for the benefit of the customer. Recently, we have had a few instances where new members come in and write negative comments (also known as “trolling” when they are just looking for a fight) and our established community answers their questions before our company can participate- letting the trollers know that there is a solution to their problem & not to attack our company. We have clearly nurtured advocates of our brand by showing we are human, that we are listening & that we participate.

Once these questions are answered, each department can then participate in social media in a way that is not only beneficial to their distinct area, but to the company as a whole.

7 Tips for Healthy Social Media

Part of the difficulty with working in Social Media is when "measuring success" comes into play. In traditional forms of sales and marketing one has quotas or objectives to meet. This system is fairly fool proof, it is easy to know did we sell 1,000 units or didn't we? Did we get the ad with CBS or didn't we? Social Media is nebulous because the platforms that they are based on are nebulous. Facebook is constantly reiterating itself, Twitter is still evolving, and YouTube is still trying to keep up with how fast it's user base is growing.

Facebook and YouTube have "insights" which allow you to see basic metrics. Twitter has yet to implement any form of metrics, which begs the question is Twitter really meant to be used for business. Perhaps that topic is better dissected at a later date. These dashboards only allow you to see a small numbers-based mapping of your community. You can see that your numbers are growing or dwindling, but knowing the numbers is not enough.

When I was interviewing for jobs with companies in the SF Bay Area, I got the impression (either from the way they seemed to understand/not understand about social media, or because they flat out told me) that they knew "social media" was important but weren't really sure where to go. Companies get the impression they "need" to be on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube but they aren't really sure why or what they need to do once they are signed up. Success doesn't come from registering an account on one or many of these sites. Success comes from truly understanding your audience. You have to understand their behavior, their desires, and know when those desires change--because believe me, they will.

That is why I don't think numbers are the most important part of social media success. It is certainly important to grow your numbers, but don't get blindsided by increasing numbers and miss out on the most important part: health.

When I started with Creative, there was a Twitter account and a few different Facebook Pages. The two pages I selected to dedicate the majority of my attention to were our Sound Blaster gaming page and our Vado HD pocket video camera page. The trouble (and the great thing) about Creative is that our product offering is vast. We sell speakers, headsets, MP3 players, sound cards, HD video cams, web cams--the list goes on. When setting up a Facebook account, or any account for that matter, you have to take a few things into consideration:

• Make the subject of your account broad enough that you will be able to consistently update it with new and relevant information while still remaining targeted enough that your users are all like minded.
• Leave room for growth. As your company grows & your product lines potentially increase, will the new products fit under the umbrella, or title, you have labeled this account with?
• Allow for personality changes. As your brand evolves and your marketing message changes, will your title still remain relevant?

In our case, Creative set up individual product Facebook fan pages. A classic case of this is our MP3 line. We have a facebook page for Zen X-FI, Zen X-FI 2, Zen Mosaic, Zen...do you see where I am going with this? Creating multiple pages means that your like minded audience are all compartmentalized based on their one time purchase. When the technology improves and new generations of the product come out, the fan page they are attached to is no longer relevant. Also, creating tons of pages is too cumbersome and makes managing fairly impossible. Instead of separating your fans bi-product, group them together by lifestyle. A label of "Creative Music" would be much more fitting. It would allow us to capture the audience of all our Zen MP3 players while still permitting us to cross promote our headphones and wireless audio product like the Sound Blaster Wireless which streams music wirelessly to any room in your house.

We are all well aware of people's changing taste and multi-tasking brains. Hardly ever will you see a person who wants to join a fanpage and get monotonous, homogenous updates. Entertain your audience. By playing to their many tastes & providing them with interesting content, they will in turn be brand evangelists and happy customers.

As I mentioned, growing your numbers is important, but health is number one. It is important that you pay attention to your user-base. Be genuinely interested in them, learn from them so you can provide them with information that you know they want and need. If you do not nurture your community, your community will not grow. And then, where will your numbers be? Numbers are just a bi-product of health.

Tips for a healthy community:

• Q&A: When users ask you questions, give them answers. "I don't know" is considered an answer in my book. It is always OK to give your community some visibility into what your company is doing. For instance, "I sent a request out to our engineers after your request for a firmware fix. We are working around the clock, testing on Mac and PC and we will keep you guys up-to-date on our progress."
• Identify yourself: Tell people who you are, let them know your personality. Write emoticons if that's you're thing. It's easy to tell me and our Social Media Intern, Kristen, apart (aside from actually signing our names) because she uses =) and I use :) amongst other typical terms that we use. (one of my favorites is "Ace!") It allows your community to connect and identify with you. If they post a video of a band you like, have a conversation with them about it. Let them see you--better yet, start making videos that actually allow them to see you. Even though our era lives on computers most of the time, we still connect when we make eye contact.
• Encourage your most active users: Let them know that you appreciate them, site them when you answer other questions if they provided you information you didn't already know. "Bob Foundry let us know there is a sale on Vado HD cameras on Buy.com, go check it out and be sure to thank Bob for the good find!" People who are most active in communities, better known as "Super Users", love notoriety. They don't necessarily want rewards in the form of prizes, they want their own slice of fame, right there with your community members. They want to be known as the smart ones, the crafty ones, the funny ones.
• Give your community incentives: be creative (pardon the pun) with how you reward your community. Try having them participate in contests that not only allow them to win cool things, but allow them to pitch in. We did a contest for our Sound Blaster World of Warcraft headset where we asked them to tell us their favorite part about the headset. This gave us a better understanding of what features were most coveted and what their individual personalities were.

What kind of issues are you encountering with your social media implementation? I am always happy to discuss and brainstorm.

Also, for similar discussions about "health" check out Lithosphere from Lithium. Lithium is the leading online forum platform & they are at forefront of understanding precisely what "community" is and does. They even have a measurement called CHI (community health index) which calculates precisely what I am talking about above. The only difference is, this measurement tool calculates CHI on their community platform- they don't (yet) measure in social media. With their recent acquisition of Scout Labs, I am hoping that will all change.

Whats the good word? Network World recommends Juniper Twitter Stream

Media mentions Twitter over 8,000 times per week, so says Twitter. On Friday the 3rd of March, one of those media mentions mentioned Juniper's Twitter. You're following me, right? Bob Brown of Network World suggested @JNetTawnee twitter stream as one of the "IT Security Vendors worth following on Twitter."

Brown writes that "The most dedicated security Tweeters seem to come from the labs, though others such as...Juniper...are also quite active." He also points to a much larger list of enterprise IT and network companies on Twitter. Juniper's three twitter streams, @JuniperNetworks, @JNetTawnee, and @JUNOSJeff are all on there. Although, for some reason Jeff's and my twitter stream are listed under "Intel"--two above Juniper's listing. A mistake, I'm most certain.

It's wonderful to have a bit of recognition and promotion surrounding our social media efforts. I encourage all of you to contact me, either via Twitter or comment on this post here to let me know if you have any questions, suggestions, or feedback. Let me know what type of content you want to see more of, or how we can improve your twitter-experience. Are we giving you everything you want? Let me know.

My Take on Twitter: Useful or Addictive?

I came across this video about a young man struggling "against the pressure to Twitter his life away" thanks to Jeremiah Owyang. It is hilarious, to say the least.

I was recently asked by my friend Charlie how I felt about Twitter. He has his own dance company in SF and was curious how he could use social media to promote his company. I am a believer that Twitter can do many a good thing when used for business purposes.

First of all, it's a great way for me to connect with people who use Juniper, love Juniper or have yet to figure out how much they love Juniper. Twitter allows me to be a quick reference point for everyone. By finding people who are interested in Juniper specifically, or just want to talk about expanding their network, find information about the data center, or switch technology, I am able to get information to them that they wouldn't ordinarily know to seek out for themselves. I may not know the answers for their questions, but I have access to the people inside the company. I know where to ask, and it's a great way to connect to someone who actually has a personality rather than filling out a support form or sending an email without knowing if you'll ever get an answer.

This video is hilarious because of the parody it makes of our social reliance on Twitter. I laughed at the desperate screaming of the people when the twitter whale came and shut them out. I remember the first time Twitter went down on me-- wondering what I was going to do with this thought I wanted to import. Apparently, "waiting" is not an option. My thoughts stream through my head at an alarming rate. How can I be expected to hang on to a thought for longer than the moment I am thinking it? What absurdity! Not to mention, by the time Twitter does come back up-- my thought will already be irrelevant. I NEED IMMEDIACY!

I have the benefit of having two Twitters: one for personal and one for work [@JNetTawnee]. I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that my personal twitter serves no purpose, and more than likely does not better the world in any way. It does serve to be a way for me to track my silly train of thoughts, pictures, and responses to friends. Being someone who has journaled from the ripe age of 10, micro-blogging is near and dear to my heart. When I was 10, I had the time to write pages describing what I did that day-- but for my fast paced life, Twitter is a great substitute until I can actually sit down on LiveJournal or--who knows--maybe even an actual journal and transcribe my thoughts on the day, the world, and what's to come.

So what do you think? Is Twitter as mindless and nonsensical when used in moderation and for appropriate uses? Or are we just insane addicts who take too much and freak out when we can't get our next fix?

By the way, when I finish this post, I will be twittering about it. Perhaps that's how you got here. If so, I guess it served me well. Thanks Twitter, and thanks to you for clicking.

The Sea of Screens

I was just sent a link to a Gizmodo article written by Adam Frucci where he brought up the notion of "obsessive documentation." As the photo (taken by Kate Heffernan) clearly shows, we are obsessed with digital documentation. Adam closes his writing by stating, "And in the end, what will help you remember an experience better: taking a not-great picture that's 80% crowd, or giving that experience 100% of your attention? You can always find photos online later, but you'll never be able to go back to that moment again and, well, pay attention to it."

In some respects, I agree with Adam's point of view. We should be able to be more zen, be in the moment, experience the experience and all that goodness. On the other hand, I think that the only way the current 'digital generation' actually feels they have experienced something, is if they have a digital account of it. This premise is what makes microblogging sites so prominent. The amount of information that we consume on a daily basis is vast and abundant. I read so many articles every day that it becomes hard to remember what the messages of each piece was or where to find it again. And so, I twitter it, I forward it and create a digital log of it.

In the case of the Inaugural address or the Youth Ball, there is no chance I could forget attending something like that, with or without having a camera attached to my hand. It's a bit of a double-edged sword because taking pictures means we don't have to remember since we have the pictures, yet at the same time, taking a picture solidifies that we have the memory. We are currently living in an age where digital proof is just as important as actual experience. Even if I attended the Youth Ball with a group of friends, I would still want to take my own pictures despite the fact that all my friends would be doing the same. My camera, my pictures, my memories. There is a degree of identity that is embedded in each digital account. Even if the pictures are seemly all the same, as Adam points out, and there may be 100 photos on flickr that are technically better than the ones you took... you still took it. You were there, you saw, you snapped.

Adam reflects on when he saw Radiohead play live and everyone had their phones out. He says, "people are more interested in taking photos of something they're witnessing than actually, you know, witnessing it." And sure, that might be the case, I understand that he might feel he missed the show if he watched it through a 2x3 inch screen rather than just looking up. If I watched an entire Radiohead show like that, I would feel a bit cheated as well. I saw Radiohead play at Outsidelands in SF this past August, and took a photo of it with my phone. There is NO way anyone would have any idea what they are looking at by viewing the photo posted to above. Me on the other hand, I do. I remember everything about that night, taking that picture, getting trampled by thousands of people. I remember where I was, trying to heave myself out of a wild crowd while 'Talk Show Host' played. That entire night was significant to me. My digital accounts and microblogging from that night are equally important to me. Rather, they were shoddy attempts at microblogging seeing as how 60,000 people were tyring to text, call, twitter, etc. all at the same time which basically arrested the network.

So yes, I wholeheartedly agree with you Adam. We are obsessed with digital documentation. Frankly I wish the other 59,999 people at Outsidelands weren't as obsessed with digital documentation as I am so that my twitter updates would be sent directly after I pressed "send" and I wouldn't have to "miss the show" trying to find a signal.

Check out my photos from Outsidelands and Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Music Festival.