Ok, I work in the industry so am always going to be opposed to a statement like: ‘Social media‘ and ‘social media strategy‘ are joining the long list of hugely expensive and wasteful marketing wild goose chases’ (Alan Mitchell’s blog post for Marketing).

No, we’re not talking rocket science but this isn’t a medium to go into all gung ho either…

There are many cases of brands which have gone into social media without really understanding the technology or the audience/audience usage and therefore have been left with a social media presence which has ended up being – well, damaging. This includes poorly populated profiles, no engagement with fans (supporters left hanging), off -brand messages issued and lack of consistency with other marketing comms. If social media is deemed as the right route for your business then all these are issues which have to be addressed – otherwise what is the point – why get stuck in at all?

The whole point of doing anything in marketing is to make sure it leads to results. It is also very unusual for any client to want to openly take risks (always an up-hill struggle in social media land) and this means that decisions have to based on strong rationales ‘you have this set of objectives and we are tackling them in this way because of X,Y and Z’. Mitchell’s post assumes that social media strategy is just about generating conversations – it’s not – it’s about the process you go through to get people conversing, to drive those conversations towards advocacy – and this isn’t easy or straightforward.

It isn’t easy because people don’t inherently want to talk about brands in their social space (I do agree with Mitchell on this) but then any brand using social media successfully knows this and knows that they have to add value in different ways – and this may never directly be product/service related but other associations which tie the audience and brand together. (One for the strategy – identifying key themes)

There is a lot of bullshit banded about but then this tends to come from the constant repetition of social media practices which are passed on as new thoughts/suggestions. It does not come from the need to have a social media strategy. This should be inherent to all online practices if they are to be deemed as effective and a useful part of a brand’s marketing mix – whether they play a supporting role or not.