Developing Conversation Through Social Media

03/12/2009

By Andy Coote

In this Newsletter last month - Embedding Social Media In Business - I wrote about the 3 Cs of modern marketing - content, context and conversation. Having good content has always been a core activity of marketing in corporates and finding the right contexts (or channels) to get that content in front of an audience has also been crucial. The contexts may change (or at least get added to) but it is still a matter of matching content to the right place for delivery.

In that article, I said, "now, with Social Media, it is easier to...

...strike up a conversation with your potential customers. It is a conversation that you can't easily control, but it is one that will take place regardless of whether you, as a business, choose to take part in it." Again, there is nothing new about people talking about your brands - whether product or service. The difference is the accessibility of that conversation and your opportunity to join it without focus groups or formal consumer research.

Customer feedback is an opportunity to improve products and services, to build advocates from critics, to show the human face of the business and to keep senior managers in touch with their end users. Social Media offers customer feedback at your fingertips - use it intelligently.

Many businesses haven't experienced a real two way conversation but will need to do so. It has always gone on but mostly out of the hearing of brand owners. How much would a business pay for the level of market feedback that they can get, for little investment, online these days? You need to take the initiative before your competitors do.

How do you ensure that you are an active part of the conversation?

- [u]Create... continued on page two >

 

 

Advertisement

Advertisement