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MIB605- Lecture 11Strategic Planning with Social Media

Prof. Cui

� Strategic Planning and Social Media Marketing Planning

� Three phases of social media marketing maturity

� Social Media Planning Process

� The social media policy

� Develop a Planning Structure in the Organization

Learning Objectives

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• Marketing Planningis a written, formalized plan that details the product, pricing,distribution, and promotional strategies that will enable the brand in question toaccomplish specific marketing objectives.

• Strategic Planningis the process of identifying objectives to accomplish, decidinghow to accomplish those objectives with specific strategies and tactics, implementingthe actions that make the plan come to life, and measuring how well the plan met the objectives.

Strategic Planning and Social Media Marketing Planning

Most Social media marketing plan is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote aproduct or service.

Most of these social media platforms have their own built-indata analysis tools, which enablecompanies to track the progress, success, and engagement ofsocial media process.

On a strategic level, social media marketing plan includes the management of the implementation of amarketing campaign, governance, setting the scope and the establishment of a firm's desired socialmedia "culture" and "tone".

Corporatelevel Business level

Functionalareas of theorganization

identify the overall objective develop the specific tactics they will use reach goals

Social Media Marketing Planning

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� Of the top ten factors that correlate with a strong Google organic search,seven are relate to the social media. If brands are less active on socialmedia,they tend to be less on internet search.

� Social media can be acommunication tool to create buzz and e-word ofmouth communication, which deliver promotion offers to customers.Consumers interact with the social website directly, which can be morepopular to users.

� Social media also serve as an efficient way to manage customer servicerelationships and build relations withloyal consumers.

Characteristics of social media marketing planning

Typical marketing plan Social media marketing planInternal environment Internal environment

External environment External environment

SWOT SWOT

— Set marketing objectives

— Gather target audience

4P Strategies• target and positioning• product• pricing• promotional• supply chain

Create social media zones and vehicles• community zone strategies• publishing zone strategies• entertainment zone strategies• commerce zone strategies

Implement plan Create an experience strategy

—Manage and measure Establish plan

— Manage and measure

Structure of marketing plan VS social media marketing plan

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Social media marketing maturity in three phases

• Many marketers currently use social media marketing tactics without that level ofmaturity. Many just experiment with infant stage (like creating a Facebook page)rather than include social media as a fundamental component of their marketingstrategy.

• A major study of marketers in both Europe and North America found huge differencesin the level to which respondents use social media and integrate it with theirotherinitiatives.

Social media marketing maturity in three phases

• Companies are eager to jump into the social media game, but many still in theprocess of figuring out just how these approaches can go beyond the novelty stageand actually help them to meet their objectives.

• In 2010 Social Media Marketing Benchmarking Report surveyed 2,300 marketers.The findings suggest that marketers are spread among three phases(trial, transition,and strategic) of social media marketing adoption.

TrialPhase

Transition

Phase

Strategic

Phase

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The Steps of Building a Strategic Social Media Planning

Situational Analysis: LU an example!

� Review the firm’s environmental and SWOT analysis

� Reviewing the existing marketing plan and any other informationcan be obtained about the company

� Review the competitors approach

� Reviewing the firm’s objectives, strategies, and performance metrics

The internal environment refers to the strengths and weaknesses of the organization.

The external consists of those elements outside the organization-the opportunities and threatscurrently occurring in the whole industry.

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Situational Analysis: Benjamin Moore

With a history going back to 1883, recognized as a manufacturer of high quality premium paints and finishes,Benjamin Moore has weathered many changes in the “build” and“home improvement” industries. However, therecent past has been difficult for the brand as it faced a challenging external environment and limited internalresources for brand building. As the United States dealt with a debilitating housing and construction slump, sales ofpaints and finishes declined. Not only did demand fall, but buyers were more price-sensitive. As a premium paintbrand, the company was hesitant to discount on price-thoughthe leading competitor offer big discount for customers.

To add salt to the wound, other premium paint brands had much bigger budgets for promotional spending. Buthere’s a case where an apparent weakness presents an opportunity: Necessity is the mother of invention, as thesaying goes. Because they had high budgets to buy advertising in traditional media, competitors had not yet tappedsocial media as a promotional channel. For instance, Duron Paint and Valspar both had Facebook pages, but bothbrands had under 200 friends and low levels of activity.

SWOT Analysis

Strength:• Loyal customers• High brand equity• Unsolicited testimonials from design

community• Quality products• High levels of earned media in traditional

media outlets

Weakness:• High price point• Limited media budget

Opportunities:• Social media as a cost-efficient channel• Do-it-self mentality • Competitors focused on traditional media

or in trial stage of social media marketing

Threats:• Declining demand in hard-hit industries• Competition with large media budgets and

lower-priced products

Benjamin Moore’s SWOT Analysis

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Identify Social Media Marketing Objective and Set BudgetsIncrease brand awareness

Improve brand or product reputation

Increase website traffic

Amplify or augment public relations work

Improve search engine rankings

Improve perceived customer service quality

Generate sales leads

Reduce customer acquisition and support costs

Increase sales(sales revenue)

Budgets Objectives

� Be measurable� Include a time line� Be specific (what, who, when, where)� Specify the desired change (from a baseline)� Be consistent and realistic

(given other corporate activities and resources)

The characteristics of a well-stated objective

Against which to be

measured!

63%

52%

52%

49%

34%

33%

30%

22%

18%

15%

47%

43%

33%

42%

28%

23%

19%

14%

11%

8%

40%

34%

33%

33%

27%

24%

17%

6%

8%

8%

Increase brand or product awareness

Improve brand or product repuation

Increase website traffic

Improve public relations

Improve search engine rankings

Improve customer support quality

Increase lead generation

Reduce customer acquisition costs

Reduce customer support cost

Increase sales revenue

Social Media Objectives

Phase I: Trial Phase II: Transition Phase III: Strategic

Identify Social Media Marketing Objective and Set Budgets

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Set Social Media Marketing Budgets

Website

27%

Paid search

21%

Email

19%

Search

engine

optimization

SEO

10%

Online display

advertsing

6%

Other online

marketing

6%

Social

media

11%

Marketing Budget Allocated to Social Media

Where will this money be spent?

Social media is not free?

social media budget

Software

and tools

Management

Creativeand

Branding

Content

Paidadvertising

Campaigns

and

promotions

Components of Every Social Media Budget

� Software and toolsAn all-in-one social media management

� ManagementThe person or team management fees

� Creative and BrandingDesign the look and feel of your online presence

� ContentHire freelance copywriters and copy editors

� Paid advertisingPromote social message performs well• Cost per click (CPC)• Cost per a thousand impressions (CPM)

� Campaigns and promotionsHire an agency or consultant to help launch and drive the campaign

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Software and tools - Hootsuite

How should it allocate?

1. Variation methodallocates a percentage of online marketingfunding to social media.

2. Competitive parity methoduses competitors’ spending as a benchmark.

3. Objective-and-task methodconsiders the objectives set out for thecampaign and determines the cost estimatesfor accomplishing each objective.

Start-up costs

Planning and development $25,000

Training for blogger $10,000

Ongoing costs (annual)

Blogging platform $25,000

Brand-monitoring service $50,000

IT support $3,000

Content production $150,000

Review and redirection $20,000

Total costs for first year $283,000

An Illustrative Budget for a Corporate Blog

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• The target market for the brand will have been defined in the brand’s marketing plan in terms ofdemographic, geodemographic, psychographic, and product-usage characteristics.

• It will include the market’s social activities and styles such as their level of social mediaparticipation, the channels they utilize and the communities in which they are active, and theirbehavior in social communities.

• The strategic planner must assess what it means to speak to the audience in the social mediaspace.• Who is the core target?• How can we describe the key segments of that core target?• To whom will the conversations in social media be directed?• How do they use social media?• How do they interact with other brands?

• The insights from the consumer profile that was done for brand’s overall marketing and marcomplans will be useful to understand the overall profile of thetarget market.

Profile the Target Audience of Social Consumers

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Industry Professionals

Architects

Contractors

Premium choice:

paints & finishes

End Consumers

End Consumers

Do-it-yourselves

(remodeling, renovation,

construction)

Interested in working with

designer

Planner should understand:

Differences

Two existing markets

Platform

Strategy

Profile the Target Audience of Social Consumers

How and when to interact in communities

Select Social Media Channels and Vehicles

Industry Professionals

End Consumers

End Consumers Link(off-site) Facebook Post

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Select Social Media Channels and Vehicles

Industry Professionals

SMO (Flickr photostream)

Select Social media channels and vehicles

Industry Professionals

SMO (Flickr photostream)

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Paid Media:

• Magazine ads• Co-branding with

other brandings

Owned Media:

• BenjaminMoore.com• Living in Color blog• Facebook profile and

Experts Exchange posts• YouTube channel• Retail storefronts

Earned Media:

• Influence impressions generated throughout social web• Influence posts shared via Benjamin Moore’s social experts• Questions and comments posted by brand fans to Facebook Walland

to Experts Exchange, and as comments to social publishing onblog.YouTube, and Flickr.

Paid mediaDrive traffic

Social Media platform and seeding technologies

You are seen as an

important source of

information and an

influencer!

Once the organization understands who it wants to reach, it’s time to select thebest social media mix to accomplish this. The zones of social media make upthe channel and vehicle choices available forsocial media mix.

Select Social Media Channels and Vehicles

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In Benjamin Moore’s case, the brand’s position is the choice of experts and the social persona that supports that position

Invite experts to do endorsement for this brand

Create an Experience Strategy

Establish Campaign Timeline

For social media, though, campaigns are not necessarily events with fixed start

and stop dates. Conversations in communities continue over time, and a

brand’s social media marketing presence should do this as well. This is

particularly true for brands that rely on social media for customer service and

customer relationship management.

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Brand implements a social media marketing campaign for a specific period of time.� Consider the movie actress Julia Roberts with great fanfarein 2010.� The timing of the social media marketing strategies and tactics were tied to launch date for the movie in

theaters; this allowed time for people to spread the word, talk about the book, and make plans to see themovie.

Establish Campaign Timeline

Execute and Measure Outcomes

• The initial imperative is to have a presence in the community of interest

• Brand assets are underutilized and underperforming in terms of the objectives set for the campaign

• To take it successful, the brand must be active in the space

Staffing

• The failure to introduce new, fresh, relevant content and develop interactivity, respond to visitor feedback

• Require an ongoing humanresources commitment to make it success.

Content

• Take months to build awarenessor fail.

• The overall effectiveness andefficiency of the social model canbe well worth the patience andresources required.

Time Horizon

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• Focus on desired outcomes rather than action steps .Take a short-term tactical approach rather than long-

term strategic approach.

• Social media-the value lies in accomplishing marketing

objectives.

Focus of objectives

• Social media lives or dies on the

quality of the content

• How will we distribute our content?

• How can we engage target

audiences?

• How can we develop an ongoing stream of relevant, fresh content?

Benefits to Users

• Emphasizing the growth and popularity of the media as

reason enough to develop apresence in the space.

• Measuring outcomes ensuresthat the organizations is

learning from what workedand what didn’t.

Measurement

Execute and Measure Outcomes

Increase engagement by

responding to comments on

Twitter and Facebook within

24 hours of posting, posting

three status updates per

business day, and adding

links to social media accounts

on the corporate blog.”

The social media policyA social media policy is an organizational document that explains the rules andprocedures for social media activity for the organization and its employees.

If you plan to tweet about any professional matters (such as about thebusiness of Microsoft or other companies), in addition to referencing yourMicrosoft email address, whenever possible use the service’s profile orcontact information to assert that you are a Microsoft employee and/oraffiliated with a specific group or team at Microsoft.

Whether in the actual or virtual world, yourinteractions and discourseshould be respectful. For example, when you are in a virtual world as a Sunrepresentative, youravatar should dress and speak professionally. We allappreciate actual respect.

Consider content that’s open-ended and invites response. Encouragecomments. You can broaden the on vernation by citing others who are bloggingabout the same topic and allowing your content to be shared orsyndicated. Ifyou make a mistake, admit it. Be upfront, and be quick with yourcorrection. If you’re posting ablog, you may choose tomodify an earlierpost-just make it clear that you have done so.

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� At a minimum,all online statementsabout about thebusiness be honestand transparent.

� Further,good mannersmust be used in social communities.

Standards of conduct

When using posts on social networks, It isrecommended that the poster use hashtags#ad #sponsored to disclose the nature ofrelationships reflected in the posts. If theyare receiving material compensation or giftsin exchange for posting, this must bedisclosed.

Disclosing affiliations ensures that readerscan still find the posts credible andtrustworthy.

Disclosure requirements

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Respect for and Protection of Consumer Privacy and Customer Data

Not to be monetized without consent!

Develop a Planning Structure in the Organization

Who “owns” social media within an organization?

� A discipline “silo” (marketing department)

� A center of excellence model that pulls people with different kinds of expertise from theorganization to participate.（Intel and American Express）

Three basic organizational structures to support social media marketing. This eliminates the

internal political issues relating to who in the company hasprimary responsibility for social media.

Businesses should take decisions on the level of resources to dedicate becausesocial media is an ongoing conversation. Some businesses dedicate multipleemployees to manage the conversation calendar whereas others assign a singleperson to improve social media situation.

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Three basic models for social media structure

The social media departmentfunction at a senior level thatreport to the CMO or CEO and isresponsible for all the social mediaactivations.

Risk: customer care may not begood if social media marketing isunder marketing department ratherthan customer service department.

�Centralized structure

No one owns social media. Soall employees represent thebrand and work social mediain to t he i r r o le s . T h i s i simplemented by training.Rish: Tools can end up offmessage.

�Distributed structure

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This involves both centralizedpractices and decentralizedprocess. The brand establish acommittee of social medialeaders to make decisions onthe social media position andv o i c e , and spread in thecompany.

� Combination structure

The L’Oreal Case:

L'Oreal encourages its staff to use the hashtag #lifeatloreal to showcase the culture of the organisation.

The fairly obvious thinking is that this organisationaltransparency will help with recruitment but also retention, by putting all the perks of the job front and centre.

This is an incredibly simple tactic, and one that other brands have adopted, too (see Oracle, Google, Deloitte and many more).

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NASA’s social media is just as inventive and compelling as their space missionsNASA has over 500 distinct social media accounts.

It’s a bottom-up approach, where all those accounts and programs work directly with their center leads. “When new content comes in, we have a really strong calendar to tell us when stuff is coming down the pipes.”

The NASA Case:

BREAK

• Followed by leading discussion group 8