Social Media Success Summit 2011 got started last night, and good grief, I can’t say enough nice things about it. Four sessions so far, featuring the likes of Jeremiah Owyang, Brian Solis, Mari Smith, and Steve Garfield. They’re startin’ strong this year, for sure, and looking at the upcoming roster (at that link, scroll waaaaay down for it), it looks like their freight train’s gonna keep the momentum going quite nicely.
Now, I’m sure the presenters aren’t coordinating their presentations with each other, but sometimes – as we’ve had the pleasure of experiencing ourselves in presenting at other events – some of the themes and topics just line right up from one to the next. And that’s what we’re seeing so far. In fact, three themes in particular seem to be popping up.
1. Engagement. During his session on “Finding and Engaging Your Target Audience With Social Media,” Brian Solis referred to engagement as “a form of aspiration.” In the social biz, engagement is often used as a substitute for the word “dialogue,” and presented as the opposite of monologue-broadcasting activity. The reality is much more complex.
It’s more about the collective way people within businesses and organizations interact with their customers, over time, across all business functions. It goes beyond the conversation, to the holistic whole of experience. We have to get Zen about this, and stop thinking of the “meta” of it. To paraphrase Brian, to be empathetic to your customers, you have to be empathetic. It’s not a pre-programmed set of responses that mimic empathy, it’s the real, in-the-moment, well-worn-and-lived-in thing.
2. Scale. On social channels, as referred to in the presentations, “scale” refers to your ability – or lack thereof – to do it all. You can’t be everything to everyone on your social channels – from sales and marketing to customer service and support, across all the different functions and product lines of your business. And as the number of channels you may have to manage grows, you won’t be able to keep track of them all.
That’s where leveraging the power of your audience comes into play. Jeremiah started on this, Brian continued it, and Mari revealed that the concept dovetails with changes she’s contemplating in her own business right now. Evangelists and loyalists can be tapped to act on your company’s behalf, as brand ambassadors interacting with your customers directly. Often, these superfans are willing to participate for free, moderating communities, creating and posting new content, answering tech support questions, and the like. They’ll do so in exchange for less tangible, but still valuable reasons: Status, insider access, recognition and deeper, publicly-visible alignment with the brand, for example.
3. Influence. You’re now speaking to “an audience with an audience of audiences.” That’s also from Brian, and Jeremiah in his keynote talked about leveraging the crowd, customer advocacy, and the power of communities. It’s no surprise that social media channels create the potential to amplify a message and exponentially expand its reach. We’re not really talking about “viral” behavior, though – in fact, I’m pretty sure that word wasn’t used in either of their presentations.
Instead, the big idea here is influence. It’s becoming a huge topic of discussion in the social media world: who’s got it, how to get it, how to make meaningful connections with the right influencers, and empower them in ways that help them and you at the same time. (In fact, we just conducted a webinar with Meltwater Group on “The Power of Social Influence” last month.) The community, the brand ambassadors you have involved with your company, even certain members of your customer audience, all have their own audiences, and can exert their own interesting, unique, and potentially relevant influence on behalf of your own business or organization.
What about you? What are the big ideas you’re thinking about right now in your own work? If you’re attending the Summit, too, what do you think about the presentations so far?
