Social Media Strategy

10 Better Ideas Than Looking at a Top 10 List for Advice

by Andrew Hanelly · January 10, 2012

Top 10 lists are like new year’s resolutions. They seem great at first, but they quickly make you feel bored, hopeless, and like you’ve wasted your time.

And that’s usually because they are filled with things you know you should do but can’t commit to doing. They’re too aspirational. Too shoot-for-the-moon-y.

Which is why I’ve kept this one bare-bones, tactical, and hopefully useful for you beyond the 4 days it typically takes us to crash and burn through our empty new year promises.

4 comments

5 Little Wishes To Revolutionize Social Media In 2012

by Mark Ivey · January 6, 2012

In many ways, 2011 was a fulfilling one for social media marketers/managers. Many companies finally “get it”-they acknowledge that social media is real and it’s not going away. The main social media platforms, led by Facebook, continued to grow. Twitter didn’t explode. Google launched Google+. Social content became a very big deal for marketers, and so on.

These are all important. But somehow it feels like we fell short, sort of like we marched to the 50 yard line of the big game and stalled. Some companies kept running the same plays, hoping for different results. Others tried Hail Mary passes.

5 comments

Why Businesses Struggle With Social Media … And What To Do About It

by Jason Falls · December 20, 2011

Social media marketing is not easy. At its core, you’re trying to market to audiences that broadly do not wish to be marketed to. While there are exceptions, and mainstream consumers aren’t as fervent about getting rid of advertising messages in their precious social spaces as the echo chamber, you’re still pushing a boulder up hill.

People don’t go to Facebook looking for commerce or brands. They go there looking for their friend’s latest update on her kids or a family member’s update on his job search. They go there to play silly games and waste time.

17 comments

The Content Strategy Burger [Infographic]

by Mark Smiciklas · December 8, 2011

A good content marketing plan contains a number of different elements including theme, audience, tone, publishing channel, etc. But how do all of these components come together to form a cohesive strategy?

After reading 6 Layers of Social Media Content Strategy by Jeffrey Cohen over at Radian6, I was inspired to create a visual metaphor that assembles all these content marketing ingredients.

Although I agree with the layers discussed in Jeffrey’s post, I have a slightly different view about what makes up the ‘meat’ of an effective content strategy. Check out the inforgraphic and read the Radian6 post.

24 comments

Facebook Contests, Fan Acquisition and Business Value

by Mark Smiciklas · November 16, 2011

There seems to be strategic flaws with many of the ‘voting’ contests hosted by brands on Facebook. On the surface, promotions are often deemed successful based on buzz and ‘likes’.

But what about relevance? Awareness and acquisition are meaningful, but only if they are tied to the right audience.

10 comments

Foxes, Hedgehogs, and Social Media Myopia

by Jason Falls · October 13, 2011

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Ian Greenleigh, social media manager for Bazaarvoice.

“The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.”

- Archilochus, as quoted by Isaiah Berlin

Penn psychology professor and noted author Philip E. Tetlock found that the people who are most visibly making predictions in our society, political pundits, have a rate of success that is only slightly greater than that of random chance. He discovered that “hedgehogs,” those that use one “big idea” or principle to guide their conclusions about nearly everything else, make more confident predictions but are correct less often than “foxes,” who use a larger and less-consistent set of inputs to draw conclusions that lead to qualified, nuanced predictions.

11 comments