DMN3 Blog

Social Media is now a significant part of online marketing efforts. The question is how to find the resources you need to develop and implement an effective social media strategy. As you look for a social media strategist, here are some things you should think about…

Given the critical nature of social media marketing these days, you should give a lot of thought to your approach to social media and who you assign with overall responsibility for it. Too often I’ve seen organizations assign this role for the wrong reasons, including assigning on the basis of:

• Social Media Engagement: Just because an employee is very active and appears savvier with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, etc does not make that person a social media strategist. That’s equivalent to using a decorated and experienced enlisted soldier to create war strategies. While you want the enlisted soldier on the battlefield, you do not want him or her deciding what battles to fight, what weapons to use, how many soldiers to employ and what the terms of success are. Hopefully you get my point.
• Having Time or Flexible Job Duties: “We can just assign this responsibility part time to another employee who has enough time to do it. Or better yet, let an intern do it. They can learn what they need to know”. Hopefully businesses have figured out that social media is more than a Facebook page and Tweeting.  Today’s social media marketing requires a much higher level of organizational clout and social media understanding to develop and implement an effective social medial strategy.

Remember Social Media should be an integrated part of your overall marketing and customer service strategies. The social media strategist position is the key. Two key roles of the social media strategist are:

1. Provide strong leadership to the business of social media. They must be in a position to make business decisions based on a strong understanding of the organization as well as the social media strategies needed to attain business objectives. They must also be able to influence senior management in strategic ways.
2. Create a Social Media Strategy Plan that spells out the specific objectives that will be attained through the use of social media. It will also specify the strategies, resources required and the mechanism for measuring whether or not objectives were reached. It should also provide for flexibility as social media marketing and measurement continues to evolve.

The questions you should be asking include:

• Do you have the person with the background to be your social media strategist?
• Do you have the necessary people and resources to undertake an effective social media strategy? The answer to this question must wait until a social media strategy plan is in place. After all, resources are dictated by strategies and strategies are dictated by objectives.

Given the first question, your options are to grow, hire or buy your social media strategist. 

• You can re-purpose an existing employee who has the business acumen and a broad understanding of social media.
• You can recruit a new employee who comes with the knowledge and track record of implementing effective social media programs.
• You can hire a consultant or agency with a demonstrated track record to help you develop and implement a social medial strategy plan. Once the plan is in place, you can assess the resources required to implement it. The choices are simple: do it entirely in house; do some in house and outsource some; or entirely outsource the implementation and monitoring.

No matter which way you go, you want to hire the right person(s) or organization.

In my next post, I will discuss some thoughts and questions you can use to assess the ability of an agency or individual to be your social media strategist.