Random Acts of Social Media Marketing

Captivated by the hype and the ease of implementing social sites, many marketers initially ignored proven marketing principles. Instead of developing a strategy to guide them, they launched their social media initiatives by creating blogs, Twitter and Facebook accounts without a plan or a purpose.

– MarketingSherpa’s Social Marketing ROAD Map Handbook

Are you committing random acts of social media marketing?

Lack of strategy results in random acts of social media marketing.

Many marketers in the initial and even in the mid-term stages of social media engagement pursue social media from a purely tactical perspective. I applaud them for taking an implementation approach, but without a sound strategy and social media architecture, they’re setting themselves up for muted success at best.

Social media has been called the ‘glue that holds social networks’ together. It’s true, in many ways, and well-built networks of customers require proper planning, care and feeding to maximize your potential in social media marketing. You can’t be looking around for a strategy when you get to what we call the “beyond now what” stage where you have people interested in your social media outlets and then leave then hanging because you don’t have a strategy.

Q&A | QUESTIONS & ACTIONS

1. You’re going into a long-term arrangement. Time, work and commitment are required. Get this into your headspace and you’re set for battle.

2. Content. You need to become a publisher. That’s how you build your voice, your brand and your social media presence.
3. Fish where the fish are. You NEED to UNDERSTAND your audience and where they hang out in social and digital media. Spend a day and start searching…and searching…
4. Run it like a business. It’s not about having friends or followers. You HAVE to figure out how YOU will make money from social media. Innovate – implement what works for you!

Where else to look?

So much of our work involves research and reading from a variety of different resources and if there are additional resources that went into each week’s theme, we’ll share them with you here.