Wednesday, 10 February 2010

Who manages Social Media for ACME Ltd?

I see a 'land-grab' going on. There is a fight happening on who is best to manage 'social media' for ACME Ltd?

ACME's PR's agency are offering themselves up as the right people (with seemingly good credentials). ACME's ad agency don't seem to get it and are a bit sniffy about this social stuff. Bob in ACME's accounts dept and Hayley in ACME's telesales dept both use social media sites for personal use and seem to "get-it", so they could probably do a good job. The Marketing dept see it as their domain, but they are too busy to keep on top of it and they are only interested in 'controlling' the message. Sales are looking for referrals from existing customers, so they are focused on other reasons. Customer service dept are always in the front-line managing complaints and seem to know whats happening on the street, so they could easily manage some of the issues.......

Mmmmmm......who do we choose?

Well, a good starting point is to say "What are we trying to achieve"? Managing reputation is a worthy objective and maybe PR's are best skilled for this. Talking to customers about specific issues is something that the customer service dept are best equipped to handle. Getting referral sales needs creative strategies. Talking about new products and new initiatives is marketing depts forte. Explaining company procedures and how things are done around here can be managed by many 'back-room' staff.

And that's the point - it shouldn't be the responsibility of one single dept of ACME. Many people can contribute - and should. Create a Code of Conduct and let as many ACME staff as possible (and are willing) interact with the 'market'. It adds authenticity and real character. After all - we gave them all a telephone and an email account, so I guess they are free to "talk" to the outside world if they want!!!!

The phrase horses for courses springs to mind. Decide on your objectives and then who is best to deliver the message.

It might well be 'Bob' from accounts....!!

4 comments:

  1. Nice post Philip. Like you say, whilst Social Media may well fall under the marketing ‘domain’, it’s a revolutionary and evolutionary beast, so cannot readily be assigned to a specific department.

    As you suggest, if ACME company is engaging in SM simply to ‘manage reputation’, then PR and marketing bods may well be the best people to serve that objective. If you’re looking to engage and connect with consumers, then there’s no reason why anyone in the company shouldn’t be acting as a brand ambassador.

    The key thing with SM is that credibility comes from users that *want* to use it. Manufactured ‘marketing’ social media is transparent and forced. *Real* social media is people engaging out of their own free will.

    If this means that Bob in accounts wants to run the show, then let him – your customers will get an infinitely better SM brand experience than a contrived ‘effort’ from someone who is doing it purely to ‘control’ the marketing function and online reputation.

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  2. Hi Phillip. Agree with the above. I think we will see a merging of Sales and Marketing functions in years to come as social media, and indeed social media in particular blurs the line between the two.

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  3. Nice post Philip! If we are talking landgrab, you missed a group out - HR! They are fighting for the ownership too, given the impact on the employer brand and the amount of time Bob and Hayley are wasting on social media sites during the working day! ;)

    Who knows where it will end up, but your point is right, it shouldnt be one person's or departments domain. And Cal, PR manage the 'reputation' through social media??!! No! Please no!! Lack of authenticity #fail!

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  4. Well, I can't not comment here can I! I seem to remember blogging about Bob not all that long ago! (http://www.willoughbypr.blogspot.com/) So, here's my thinking. Get a code of conduct, get everyone blogging (when you've established and published your blog rules) and appoint a team of "social media heroes" (for want of a better word). Use a Twitter takeover scheme - that's what we do at twitter.com/willoughbypr. People take it in turns to Tweet and we announce it everytime the batton is passed on - BUT think long and hard before you try to copy this on Facebook - and this is where my gripe lies. Facebook is people's personal space and where -as a brand - you can go wrong; really wrong. You need a campaign based approach and to come up with something that will "entertain" not "educate" - and here is where PR beats Bob, hands down. See what Cake did for Ikea, what Westfield did down under (All I Want For Christmas) and see the Burger King Whopper Sacrifice. This got the world talking, customers buying and sales flying. I can't see Bob doing that. One of our more recent social media campaigns increased our client's already impressive web traffic by 30% - and I challenge Bob to better that. Get him blogging, get him tweeting - but when it comes to social media "campaigns" - get him out of the way!
    Jane Ainsworth
    Willoughby PR / www.willoughby-pr.co.uk

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