At the recent Gedankenplatz-Event we were invited to be part of a discussion about the impact of social media for organizations. Although this seems to be a widely discussed topic, still a lot of question marks remain on the corporate level. The event title put a nice spin on this concept: “Much ado about nothing? - Social Media, just a hype or essential for organizations”. On the stage were Tobias Mitter from Netmedia, our Social Strategy partner, Dr. Juergen Taeger, a Legal expert and book author, Peter Beer, Assistant Commissioner from the regional Police and ifridge & Company founder Daniel Kraft.
The word of the day came from the Police Officer: “We do Social Media Patrols and you would not believe what some “bad” guys are sharing via social media....”. Amongst the participants a really intense debate excited the audience just about that. But the bottom-line is that Social Media is both opportunity and challenge, but instead of limiting and prohibiting it, we need to educate intensively on how to leverage it for the good.
Shift from Tools to Strategy
Talking to organizations on events like this, we see a shift from “how to setup a facebook page” towards “why social media and what is our social strategy”. This is an important mind-shift, because the business value of social media gets more and more into the minds of the people. Nielsen research reports, that the trust in recommendations from friends (90%) and Customer Statements (70%) is much higher then traditional advertisements. Therefore it is crucial, to think about the perception of your products and your company in the digital world.
First articulate Your Positioning, then the Tactics
Since social networking comes up in many client engagements, we work with netmedia as our social strategy experts. But before you invest in “social” you need to articulate “who you are” and “what you do” as the foundation for a crystal clear positioning. When we get asked, what is the first step to succeed in the digital world, we always recommend to take a step back, clearly articulate the positioning and then plan digital tactics accordingly (and not the other way round). The more clarity the whole organization has about “who we are”, ”what we do” and “what is our next step”, the more the company is able to empower more and more people to share the story throughout all channels.
Articulate and Educate
Here is our recipe for a positioning that resonates. Crisply articulate and constantly educate on:
Who you are and what you are standing for
What you offer and specifically what business you are in
What makes you unique, and distinct
What you do better than anyone else
Who wants to do business with you (your target buyers)
Everybody is Beautiful
Our key message for your successful positioning is “Everybody is beautiful”. And when you know what makes you beautiful in the eyes of your target buyers, you will be very successful to attract them throughout all digital and tangible communication channels.
Atour clients we see a lot of energy in sharing the core elements about the beauty of the organization. And we have learned that once the positioning is clearly articulated it is much easier to your defined go-to-market strategy and you will be able to define which of the digital channels support your beauty the best, how you monitor the digital success and how you leverage social media.
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