Top 3 Reasons You Need Corporate Social Media Training In 2012 -

Top 3 Reasons You Need Corporate Social Media Training In 2012

24 January 2012

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Corporate Social Media
Social Media Training

Last month AdAge printed an interesting story on the “Social Media Blunders of 2011”, they are on target, and quite entertaining. When you read the “blunders” you see a number of similarities of which show … ZERO strategy.

A recent IBM report pointed out the need for executive social media training. This study asked over 2000 companies their “reservations” in adopting social media. The research concluded that security, adoption, culture, and compliance are the main obstructions that executives are most concerned with. Though important, these should not be stumbling blocks for going forward with a digital marketing plan, and eventual training. Why?

The following 3 reasons help you with a social media plan for 2012 and give support to scheduled corporate social media training sessions.

1 – Rogue Strategy

Because we are a corporate training agency, we see this almost 99% of the time in our training’s & workshops. Brands, large and small, still do not have a social media strategy in place thus, have rogue, unorganized channels, orphan pages, and most important have lost its true business objectives. When you don’t have a sound strategy map, the following will always be the case:

Unorganized social media community management
No clear objectives
Sloppy social media guidelines (if any)
Posting content to the wrong audience
Posting content at the wrong time
Lack of communication within departments
Nobody is held accountable
Using “tools” without knowledge of them, or how they fit into your overall strategy

Solution: Develop a solid social media strategy map with clear goals, objectives and internal education of all team members.

2 – No Social Media Assessments, Monitoring

In everyone one of our trainings, we incorporate an assessment of their brand, as well as competitors to give proof positive of what, who, and where people are talking about their brand. Today, there are incredible tools for monitoring that are “growing up” and getting even better with crowd-sourcing, allowing actionable engagement notifications to community departments and more. Getting corporate training on these tools allows for the following:

Allows for predictive analysis strategy
Helps shape your social strategy (Strategy Map)
You get a clear view of your current social ecosphere
True conversations about your brand, product
Find potential influencers
Word cloud, crowd sourcing results instantly
Organized reputation management (Complaints and Compliments)
Crisis management
What your consumers are talking about and where
B2B (Business to Business) and B2C (Business to Consumer) data

Solution: Get comprehensive training on proprietary & enterprise level social monitoring tools to remove apprehension on executives, and management. It’s hard to argue with true data and showing a corporate scorecard with ROI, or as I call it ROR (Return on Relationship)

3 – Sloppy Execution

Ok, here is pretty much my concern with corporate today, poor execution of social media strategy…period. According to one study, 95% of Facebook wall posts are left unanswered. Really? Poor execution, or lack there-of. According to IBM’s report, in my humble opinion (IMHO), most of these corporations “Good ole” boy leaders are refusing adoption and compliance because they are still relying on dinosaur, traditional techniques. If “C-Level” is not “all in” than of course this will result in a POOR execution of a social media campaign, lack of strategy. (Proof, read the AdAge post I referenced above)

In speaking at a conference recently, an audience member asked me “How do I convince our leadership to get on the social media bandwagon”…hmm…know what I said? First of all this is not a “Bandwagon” anymore. If your leadership cannot see what Google+ is doing, how search has changed, Facebook’s domination, mobile & Smartphone proliferation, than I am at a loss. Thinking social media marketing is still a “Bandwagon” in 2012 is like saying TV and radio would never work…or they were a “bandwagon” If you think this way, you may very well be extinct in 2013. If you don’t have social leadership, bye bye.

However, here is a solution we offer and suggest:

Corporate Social & Digital Media training

This training should address all concerns as IBM’s report motioned, security, adoption, culture, and compliance, and more;

How to create a strategy with business objectives in mind
How to implement & execute a strategy map
Isolate key point personnel for community managers, and manager
Corporate training of these personnel on: tools, engagement techniques, tracking, organization, social media guidelines and more
How to measure success, failures (ROI, ROR)
Brand unity across all social channels (Creative and design)
Organized execution of campaigns across all departments
Current tools for social & digital management, training, education
How to use Google+, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other tools of engagement

In the end, we hope you kick 2012 in the rear with a coordinated plan for corporate social media training, so schedule it now! It’s already Q-1, so time’s a ticking.

If you are a large enterprise company, or small business, you owe it to your brand, and to your brand advocates to have continuity with a social media strategy resulting from training. Results by trained professionals are extraordinary. There are a few good companies out there, but feel free to check us out as we have had several years experience with USA and global International companies.

Have a fantastic 2012!