Interested in a Sales/Marketing Position? You’d Better Start Tweeting

Traditionally, companies promote sales by initiating one-way, and often persuasive messages to influence buyers’ purchasing decisions, but social media has destroyed the “one-to-many-communication” model. And because of that, if one wants to work in the field of sales and marketing, s/he must know how to communicate effectively on social media.

Well, many people have already been active on Facebook and Instagram. Isn’t it enough? Probably, at least they know how to “talk” as a customer. The challenge is B2C (business-to-consumer) communications are very different from C2B (consumer-to-business) and C2C (consumer-to-consumer) communications because everything posted on a company’s Facebook page or Instagram profile must reflect a brand’s or a company’s core value. Do you notice any differences between the Facebook messages posted on McDonald’s page and the ones on Chick-fil-A’s page?

A good sales/marketing manager must also know how to measure and document the ROI (return on investment) of a company’s effort on social media marketing. Very likely, most internet users do not even pay attention to how many friends they actually engage on social networking sites. If that’s the case, can they determine if a B2C communication strategy is working or not based on measurable outcomes?

Additionally, a good sales/marketing manager must go beyond Facebook and Instagram. At a minimum, s/he must also be active on LinkedIn and Twitter. According to the Wall Street Journal, Twitter now has over 230 million monthly active users. Some companies have already gained great success in promoting sales on Twitter. For a hotel, Twitter can be an “easy and inexpensive way to get in touch with its audience and to form community bonds.”  

If you still feel doubt about Twitter, let’s hope the following Bloomberg video will add some weight to my argument. In your opinions, what are the important skills that a sales/marketing manager should possess in the social media era? What can a candidate do to better prepare himself/herself for the challenges facing sales/marketing managers these days?


References:
The picture was downloaded from Guladigital.com.

SoLoMo for Social Media Strategists

A successful social media strategy must integrate three key components: “social,” “local,” and “mobile.” According to a recent special report in the Nation’s Restaurant News, $159 billion of U.S. retail sales in 2012 were influenced by SoLoMo. Over 116 million people own smartphones. In July 2012 alone, 90 million American had accessed retail information on their mobile devices. Additionally, 38% of mobile users opted in to receive location-based promotional text messages and that 18% used a location-based social media app such as Foursqure to check in at a venue. How can any business come up with an excuse of not participating in SoLoMo?

The following include some best practices and direct quotes from the report. For example, Texas Roadhouse initiated a “TextUs Loyalty Club” campaign. The redemption rate reached 17% during a six month trial period, much higher than those using other media sources.

Nearly two fifth of Pita Pit’s new likes came from smartphone users on Facebook’s app.

“We listened to our most passionate fans and found exciting ways to get the Cool Ranch (Doritos Locos Taco) in their hands before it was available nationwide… We doubled our YouTube views in one month and saw our engagement go through the roof… (We) start with listening to what is trending and what our consumers are saying.” --- Tressie Lieberman (@tresslieberman), Director of Digital and Social Marketing, Taco Bell, a Division of Yun! Brands Inc.

“We’re just starting to look at Vine and Instagram, and we’re asking our customers how they’d interact on that platform (Vine).” --- Caroline Masullo (@CMM2B), Director of Digital and Social Marketing, Pizza Hut, a Division of Yum! Brands Inc.

“Traffic and sales are the most critical (return on investment) measures. We also measure brand perception and likelihood to suggest the brand or menu item (to friends). We also pay close attention to how our community is growing.” --- Jill McFarland, Senior Manager of Digital and Social Media, Applebee’s, a Division of DineEquity Inc.

“Twitter is a more casual and conversational medium than Facebook and really lends itself to interacting with consumers in a fun way. A&W has such a great mascot that we want to utilize as much as possible, so why not put Rooty in charge of guest listening?” --- Rooty and Great Root Bear, Mascot and Spokesbear, A&W Restaurants Inc.

“When hired, Wion was charged with aligning McDonald’s U.S. social media strategies and tactics with U.S. and global disciplines…We have guidelines on how people talk about their jobs in their own social feeds. Our customer service team has been a part of our social media efforts from the beginning, and our insights teams work more with us, as well, taking what we monitor in social and using it to inform operations, culinary and HR.” Rick Wion, Director of Social Media, McDonald’s Corp.

As a professional in social media field, what lessons do you learn from these best examples and social media strategists? What other best examples may you share with us?

As a customer, which mobile app has the most engaging experience (with you)? What are the cool mobile apps that you are using? Do you mind recommending some of those cool apps to us?

Relevant Discussion: 

“SoLoMo”and Legislation

Is It a Good Business Strategy to Offer Phone-Free Discount?

References:

Nation’s Restaurant News. (April 15, 2013). Special Report: Harnessing the power of social media. p. 12-20.

The infographic was downloaded from Mashable.com. 

Online Albums: The Scrapbook 2.0

Did you have a fun night out with your friends? You typically post a picture. Have a really delicious looking meal? You probably posted a picture. Our personal lives are typically closely tied with our online world, and sometimes even overlap our professional lives. Photo-sharing is often how we keep friends and family both far and near in the loop about our lives. It is like a real snapshot of lives followed by hashtags. However, these regular updates of pictures can have a harmful effect on our lives.

With all of these things that seem normal or just life, there are people who want to use them to make advertisements more personal and less picture-esq. Instagram recently released new terms and conditions that allowed them to harness these pictures for third party use without consent or compensation. The outrage of new terms lead to Instagram losing half of their daily uses a month after they were released. Even though Instagram retracted the new terms many people felt like their personal lives, and up close and personal moments were violated. Even though Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom said that they would be changing a clause of the new terms and replacing it with the original terms. They have decided to gear away from marketing and come back to it at a later date. However, this cut was already too deep and many people moved to photo-sharing sites such as Yahoo!'s Flickr which was created to rival Instagram with similar features, including being an app and having filters.

Many large companies and celebrities stopped using Instagram with the new terms, including National Geographic and Kim Kardashian. The number of users went from 16.35 million users to 8.42 million users in a week. 

Ironically, the parent company of Instagram, Facebook is allowed to access your photos much like Instagram intended to. However, Facebook has always been able to access photos.

A new app allows people to share photos for limited amounts of time, Snapchat. You take a picture and it is gone in seconds once opened, and you even get a notification if your photo was screenshotted by the receiving end. While this technology is new, many arguments against it include that it is the new way to "sext" AKA "sexual texting" or sending inappropriate pictures. Snapchat does not hold pictures so it is still under investigation.

Inappropriate pictures often effect job prospects for people. Many people's personal lives overlap with their professional because they post pictures of them getting drunk. There have been instances when a woman was depressed and took a leave of absence from work. She then posted pictures of her "having
fun and being happy" forcing her to lose benefits. It is still in litigation.

What are your thoughts? What do you think of using an individual's photos for advertisements? How about that Facebook can and Instragram cannot?


References

Bosker, Bianca. "Nathalie Blanchard: Depressed Woman Loses Benefits Over Facebook Photos." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 20 Nov. 2009. Web. 12 Jan. 2013.

"Instagram Loses Users in Photo Rights Backlash." TVNZ. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Jan. 2013.

Kelly, Heather. "Instagram Backtracks on Terms of Service." CNN. Cable News Network, 21 Dec. 2012. Web. 12 Jan. 2013.