Why your social media strategy is the equivalent of sitting in a conference room and reading out each other's social media posts
Timothy "Tim" Hughes 提姆·休斯 L.ISP
Should have Played Quidditch for England
Conference rooms , I've sat in many a conference room and I'm sure you have.
Small ones, big ones, ones where the equipment never worked and conference rooms will amazing?audio visuals ?(AVs).
I have to admit over the?covid ?years, I haven't been sitting in very many.
So what has this got to do with?social media ?
Imagine this
The whole of your team go into a conference room and you read out each other's social media posts.
You read out your colleagues and they read out yours.
All sitting within the bubble of your own internal conference room.
This will mean that nobody, apart from your own company will hear your what you have to say.
You will just influence each other.
In fact, nobody outside your company or outside the conference room will hear you.
Pretty pointless, yes?
The whole point of social media?is that you are going to influence the people you want to influence and you?get a steady stream of?leads , conversations and new?logos . Yes?
But did you realise that what you are doing on social media right now is the equivalent of sitting in a conference room and reading each others posts out.?What do I mean?
What your current social media looks like
Currently your social media is like this.?Somebody from your company posts something and then an?email ?goes out and you are all asked to like it.
This is no different from you all sitting in a conference room and reading each others posts out.
Pointless.
What your social media should look like
1.?Each employee you have on social needs to look interesting to your buyers,?your?LinkedIn ?profile is your shop window to over?810 million people .?Every employee needs to look interesting.?Now don't forget that?"interesting" to a buyer is different from "interesting" to a seller.
2. The average person on?Linkedin ?has 930 connections, they will be existing colleagues, ex colleagues and recruitment consultants.?This isn't any of the people you are trying to influence.?Your business needs to be connected with the people you are trying to influence.?Let's not forget that people hate being sold to and connecting and pitching is?spam .?As a business you need to learn how to connect on social without being spammy.?
3.?The 800 million people on LinkedIn are looking for insight, looking to be educated, they are looking to be entertained.?They are looking for solutions to their business issues.?
It will surprise many a company that?the answer to that is not a?brochure .?It's insight and the more you post insight and the more engagement you get the more the LinkedIn algorithm will reward you.?If you just turn up to social randomly and post brochures or corporate content, the more this trains the LinkedIn algorithm to ignore you.?
Probably worth me mentioning that?our ?social selling and influence course will train and coach you to stop wasting time on social and actually get business benefit out of social.??Business benefit being leads, meetings, conversations and new logos.?Just think, loads of pipeline and loads of revenue from your activity on social.?Now there's a plan.?
What is social selling?
Here at?DLA Ignite , we define social selling as
"Using your presence and behavior on Social Media to build influence,
make connections, grow relationships and trust, which leads to
conversation and commercial interaction."
It's not?witchcraft , it's?enabling your salespeople to work from?home , (or the?office ) and create conversations with prospects and customers.?Conversations on social media and conversations that convert.?
The problem with the name "social selling" is that people think that this is selling on social.?All these pitches that you get on social are not social selling, they are?spam .
The other thing you need to know about?social selling?is that this isn't about "putting out some videos" or "putting flowers on your profile" or "going viral" this?is about?revenue ,?EBITDA , you winning business from the competition and having a competitive advantage.?
With anything you do on social there are two questions you need to ask
2. How much revenue / EBITDA am I getting as a business?
So who's social selling?
In case you missed it, the?Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch ?have?banned cold calling ?and have moved all their people to?social selling . This isn't some trendy tech company that might have decided to do this on a whim, this is a very conservative financial services company that has made a decision based on data.
But surely cold calling has a better ROI than social selling??Not according to Merrill Lynch.
"They will also be encouraged to contact prospects over LinkedIn, which has a higher hit rate than cold calling"
The?CRO ?(chief revenue officer),?Richard Eltham ?of?Namos Solutions , of one of clients posted a comment on LinkedIn about?social selling . See?here .
“Social selling is not an option now it is the way of the world and you either learn and execute it or fear getting left behind”?
Kevin Murray ?who is the Head of Sales at?MacArtney ?Underwater Technology recently posted about his success with social selling?here ?and wrote an article about the transformation that has happened in sales?here .
Andrew Ferrier ?who is the?CEO? of?Display Technology ?Ltd and in this?article ?it talks about why?Display Technology ?have adopted social selling.?His team have also created a social media strategy with help from our partner,?Crux .
Their social media mission statement is
“We want to position ourselves as a forward-thinking, knowledgeable team of individuals who are all experts in our own right, therefore, collectively awesome!”
Andrew also says in that post
"Adopting this (social selling) strategy has taken all of us well outside of our comfort zones but the rewards we have seen in a short period of time have created an excitement within the business development team (new term for sales team).
Because of the nature of social media, quite often you can get instant results.?Even if that is just a comment left on your post, or a like, or someone taking the time to want to connect with you.
The excitement around the sales team is infectious, it’s no longer a chore to reach out to the market place?because the results can be instant and are there, right in front of you."
What sort of results can you expect?
If you check out this?video ?of?Chris Mason ?CEO at?Oracle ?reseller?Namos , fast forward to 19 minutes 55 seconds. Chris talks about a?$2.6 million win from being on social, after completing the?DLA Ignite ?social selling and influence course.?
What happened??They buyer was on social media looking for a solution to their problem, spotted one of the Namos salespeople, who had a buyer-centric profile and asked if the salesperson could help them.?That turned into a $2.6 million deal.?
Contact any of the?DLA Ignite ?team,?Eric ,?Adam ,?Nick ,?Vanessa ,?Lorena ,?Brentney, ?Priscilla ,?Lenwood ,?Alex ?and they will be more than happy to help.
Go and look at their?LinkedIn ?profiles .... look how they can have digital conversations, create insightful content.?This could be your company!?
We are the only social selling and influence company in the world to offer a certificate in social selling provided by an independent qualification body (OfQual ) and sponsored by the?Institute of Sales Professionals ?(ISP).
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Our VP of Sales Just got 83 likes on a LinkedIn post, so that means we are social selling? No!
Monopoly, Charades, and Rummikub -- dominating family game nights for 30 years and counting
2 年Great analogy, Timothy (Tim) Hughes 提姆·休斯! People can do so much more by engaging their social connections and drawing other people in.
Digital Commercial Strategist - Developing people and organisations to become leaders in their sectors - TedX Speaker - Keynote speaker, event host/compere/moderator - Artist
2 年It amazes me that millions in profit is burned every year in pursuit of unmeasurable 'visibility' when someone can do a better job of influencing a business sector with a smartphone, their intelligence and their personality.
Solving the motivation problem in employee advocacy | CEO: TOGETHR | Speaker | Podcaster
2 年Nice analogy