social media in the workplace is it risky business?
TRANSCRIPT
Social Mediain the workplace
Is it risky business?
Traditional Media versus Social Media
Traditional media Social MediaOne way communication Many to one – multipath dialogue
“Here is what marketers think the brand value is”
Consumers express how they perceive the brand
Consumers segmented by their demographics and viewing behaviour
Consumers segmented by their social behaviour
Buzz driven by what’s cool Buzz based on message content – WIIFM?
Expert recommendations (e.g. Michelin Guide, Good Food Guide etc)
Peer and influencer recommendations (i.e. Amazon etc)
Content publishers control all channels Users opt-in for publisher’s content
Information managed by hierarchy Information provided on demand
Top-down strategic approach Bottom-up voice of the consumer strategy
Motivators for Social Media
• Research
• Reading
• Engaging in conversation
• Creating blogs, writing articles
• Instant access to wide audience
Strategy
Three tiers of social media strategy
Target Audience Listening Data Collection, Analytics
Objectives Answering Measure results vs. Goals
Capacity Social Tools Refine – Adjust & Test
Policy Content Strategy Iterative
Translate strategy into action
Again, we must have strategies and tactics operating at 3 target audience categories:
• Influencers• Individuals• Consumers
Influencers
• You must provide value to influencers so that they will promote your message;
• Objective is not necessarily to have influencer purchase;
• Ideal outcome is that they forward positive message soon and often!
Consumers• In the past, traditional media was used to deliver
the message of value, so that the consumer could make a decision based on functional and emotional value.
• In social media, you must still deliver the message highlighting value of the brand compared to other brands, so in this category not much has changed, except you now have many avenues to get your message out there.
Individuals• Engage with individuals who use Social
Media effectively, so that they will either become consumers or influences of your products/services
• Alternatively, release a series of brand-related posts, creating reviews that are read
after being picked up by individuals using a search-engine
Your brand – the impact
• Influencers like to endorse a brand with high equity – i.e. Coca Cola. Your task is to build and protect your brand equity so that influencers will engage with the brand.
• Consumers now have many perspectives on a brand as they read comments and feedback
from influencers and other consumers
• Individual’s participation in a brand experience is partially driven by the brand image, in addition to commentary in social and other media.
Social Media in the workplace
Statistics53% Look for information on Twitter Pew Internet
2011
50% Chief Marketing Officers in US Fortune 1,000 companies lunched a corporate blog because “it’s the cost of doing business today”
eMarketer 2011
$3.08 Bil USD Will be spent to advertise on social networking sites in 2011, a 55% increase over 2010
eMarketer 2011
200 Mil Registered user accounts on Twitter (January 2011)
Twitter 2011
110 Mil Tweets are sent per day on Twitter Twitter 2011
Talking ‘bout Generations
Who they are Silent Gen1925 – 1945
Baby Boomers1945 - 1964
Gen X1965 - 1977
Gen Y1978 - 1995
Tagline When in command, take charge
Live to work Work to live Like Xers on steroids
Values Work itself, and colleagues
Respect, empowerment, challenge & growth
Work/life balance, individualism, entrepreneurialTechnology
Immediate feedback & payoffHard work pays offTechnology
Preferences Work with strong leaders
Results oriented work environment, stability
Harmonious work environment. flexibility
Challenging meaningful work, high expectations of success
Relationship to employer
Willing to learn new skills
Be included in decision making
Not intimidated by authority
Little loyalty to employer
Generation Y?
“The problem with today’s youth is that they think they know everything, they are impatient to make their mark and change the world and just want the older generation to step aside and let them take over before they have even learned what needs changing” Anonymous
Introducing the “C” Generation
• Connected
• Communicating
• Content-centric
• Computerised
• Community-oriented
• Always Clicking!
What are they looking for?
• Workplace flexibility
• To be technology enabled
• Relationship based interactions
The Benefits
• Staff members share their positive views of your brand
• Staff members can distribute news fast, to a massive audience
• Uncovers public opinions of organisation being shared via social media
• Workers will self-organise by mixing business and personal matters
The Risks and Opportunities
Department Risk Opportunity
Human Resources Violation of existing policies Attract, engage, retain
IT Information security, data loss Reduce network and desktop support requests
Legal Copyright, freedom of speech, libel, audit trails
Better corporate oversight, tighter controls
Marketing Aggravate brand fracture Enable market to self-educate
Customer Service Perceived productivity loss Reduce call centre demand
PR Negligible Unfiltered communications
IR Selective disclosure Better shareholder communications
www.erickSchwartzman.com
Before you stop, stop and think!
Loss of control
•Companies can no longer control the message
• The voice of the customer is out there, loud and clear
• Benefits of transparency outweigh the risks
Productivity Loss
• Unnecessary downtime
• Distracting
• Diminished performance
Down time
People who surf the internet for fun, for less than 20% of their time 9% more productive than those who don’t.
Dr Brent Coker, a lecturer in Marketing at University of Melbourne said:“The enjoyable stuff is better for people than mundane stuff….the more escapist relaxing type of feeling (the better). Reading what your friends are saying on Facebook, playing a little Mafia Wars, or whatever, and then getting back to the job.”
Royston Seaward, partner, Deloitte’s technology integration practice, said:“There are now many companies looking at taking social media and seeing how they can apply it internally, to connect people across the organisation. This is being driven by staff and teams working together, taking the initiative themselves”.
Cost of not ‘doing’ social media
Loss of • opportunity to retain customers with negative
experience
• opportunity to win new customers
• access to competitors’ conversations
• ability to respond to your influencers, consumers, and general individuals
• opportunity to initiate positive conversations
Out of the loop/not involved in dialogue that is happening ‘out there’
Manage the risk, change the behaviour
Develop guidelines for governance, aligned with strategy and goals
Develop internal process to provide a flexible and responsive approach to managing Social Media
Assign roles and responsibilities to ensure accountable and shared governance across the organisation
Create policy documentation, and a communication and education plan for new governance approach© Macanta Consulting 2011
Actions: What you need
• A risk taking environment so that you can maximise the opportunities provided by social media
• Knowledge management
• Social media guidelines and policy
• Performance Management
Some examples of Social Media in workplace
•De Loitte Consulting have a “Digital Mentoring” program, where Graduates mentor Partners
• Ernst & Young have a Facebook Page to attract the best Graduates
• At IBM, it’s about losing control.
Social Media Policy Checklist
Is your social media policy:• Collaborative – have you had a discussion on what should
be included?• Positive – teaching engagement between staff and
customers, rather than ‘thou shalt not”?• Public – does it serve the staff or the company?• Extended to Contractors – do the contractors understand
they are bound by same policy?
Case Study #1
Social Media at IBM
“We don’t have a corporate blog or a corporate Twitter ID because we want the ‘IBMers’ in aggregate to be the corporate blog and the corporate Twitter ID,” says Adam Christensen, social media communications at IBM Corporation.
“We represent our brand online the way it always has been, which is employees first. Our brand is largely shaped by the interactions that they have with customers.”
Thousands of IBMers are the voice of the company.
Social Media stats for IBM
• No IBM corporate blog or Twitter Account• 17,000 internal blogs• 100,000 employees using internal blogs•53,000 members on SocialBlue (like Facebook for employees)• A few thousand “IBMers” on Twitter• Thousands of external bloggers• Almost 200,000 on Linkedin• As many as 500,000 participants in company
crowd-sourcing “jams”
• 50,000 in alum networks on Facebook and Linkedin
The Results
• Crowd-sourcing identified 10 best incubator businesses, which IBM funded with $100 million
• $100 billion in total revenue with a 44.1% gross profit margin in 2008
Christensen says to date there’s not an effort to tag a return on investment to its social media efforts.
“I think if you’d ask any senior executive at IBM, ‘How important is it for our employees to be smarter?‘, inherently they understand that these tools can play in helping with that,”
Christensen said.
“I don’t see myself rarely or ever having that hard conversation on the value of engaging employees in these spaces.”
Case Study #2
The Macanta Story
• Founded in 2009
• Fully operational August 2010
• 1st Twitter account 2009
• 2 person company
• Melbourne based
• Focussed on consulting in IT Service Management
Social Media at Macanta
• Facebook page 1
• Linkedin accounts 2• Twitter accounts 3• Regular blogs• Regular White Papers• Monthly Podcast
Results Signed up:
1st USA partner in April ‘11 – met on Twitter 2nd USA partner in May ‘11 - met on
Twitter•Invited to run Antipodean Podcast by industry expert who runs global ITSM Podcasts – met on Twitter•Feedback from industry peers in Australia – we are perceived as a well established player in the industry.•Feedback from industry peers across the globe we are perceived as one of the key players in the industry both globally as well as in Australia
Summary
• Social Media is here to stay
• Plan to take advantage of it
• Plan to manage the risk
• This includes managing staff performance
