CMO/CEO to Bob – Marketing VP:
“Ah Bob, we need to be on Facebook and Twitter and let’s start a blog too. Our sales are way down and I see our competitors are all over social media and their sales are up… so obviously the missing ingredient for our business is social media, so get to it.”
Bob: “You got it, we’ll get started right away.”
Fast-forward a month or two after the company started their Facebook, Twitter and blog accounts.
CMO/CEO: “Bob, our sales are still way down, what’s going on? Why hasn’t social media helped our sales liked it has our competition?”
Bob: “Um…”*
Has a similar discussion happened inside your business?
Is your Social and Mobile Media generating the sales dollars you’re expecting?
If not…why not?
My online experience dates back to the mid 90’s, way before anyone was talking about social media. As part of my current role at ShoppeSimple, I provide consulting for our clients. I help them understand their specific online channel issues and objectives along with why their current Social and Mobile Media programs are not generating the results they expect.
The reasons why…
Social is about consumer engagement wherever consumers are
For those not succeeding with social or mobile, we find that the thought process has typically fallen into the philosophy that “consumer engagement has to happen on my website”.
For Mobile, it’s likely all about building Apps (but which ones) along with a “field of dreams” mentality around Apps marketing.
From my point of view, I always encourage companies to pivot off these positions and acknowledge that social and mobile conversations and sharing are happening all around their business and through a myriad of channel touch points.
Holding firm to a mindset that everything must happen on “my website” is like setting your business up to fight against the exponential growth tide of social and mobile. If you truly believe you can position your business to fight the social battle ground against Facebook, Twitter and Mobile enablement, I have some social and mobile swampland to sell you in Arizona.
Social and mobile should be all about distributing relevant product offers to your consumer. Having your consumers willingly accept your offers under their terms, permissions and in their Social communities and on their mobile Smartphone.
Is your business in a position to enable your consumer to personalize product offers they want to receive from you and with just one click place them into their social, mobile, email and bookmarked customized landing pages?
I am not speaking to using the Facebook and Twitter share icons, which just congests your consumers Facebook’s Wall with more billboard like advertising. This builds the Facebook and Twitter brands, not yours.
Do you really believe it is sophisticated social marketing to clutter up your consumers Facebook Wall with advertising just like their email inbox?
When you reach a highly focused and sophisticated level of consumer engagement through the delivery of consumer selected product offers into your branded store on the Consumer Facebook Page (on the left navigational rail . . . not the Wall) the result will be sustainable incremental sales. We’ve proven this to be a successful formula time and again.
But you may be asking yourself . . . how can we distribute product offers that are highly relevant to social and mobile spaces when our IT team holds us back from working at our marketing best? We have heard the same frustrations from marketers time and again. They want to test Social and Mobile but their internal IT complexities, inflexibilities and archaic web infrastructure prevent them from doing so.
Enter ShoppeSimple . . .
No two businesses are alike…
ShoppeSimple is not a cookie-cutter social and mobile marketing solution. Our consulting is a key part of what makes ShoppeSimple successful for our clients.
We don’t simply hand over our technology and leave you to figure out how to apply it. We properly fit our solutions inside our client’s business and assist their Team in driving Surround-Sound™ Social Business through all consumer channel touch points.
We assist your business monetize social and mobile horizontally across the organization and create a sustaining incremental Social Business that you can bank on.
I welcome the opportunity to visit with you about generating new incremental revenue for your Holiday season, or to discuss how you can integrate ShoppeSimple into your Marketing Plan for Q1-2012.
To get our conversation started, call me at 612-349-2740 or email me at jeff@shoppesimplenetwork.com.
Best,
Jeffery
Jeffery Giesener
Founder/CEO
ShoppeSimple Network
PS. Please feel free to forward this email to a friend or colleague.
* from a blog post by Steve Olenski/Social Media Today