3 Stages of Social Media Monitoring
Today I was taking part in the twitter chat that happens Thursday called #smmeasure. Its hosted by Marketwire/sysomos (a Social Media monitoring service). The first question, instantly called for a higher context than 140 characters so I came here!
So lets start with the question
@smmeasure: QUESTION 1: In 3 steps, explain how to build relationships with customers in social media.
This is really a two parter, because in my experience monitoring happens in 3 stages!
Stage 1: Mapping… Mapping is a completely passive (and important) activity. When I map I am finding the culture of the group I am looking to engage with. What as a group is against their culture? What as a group do they like? What customer groups are left out? On and on it goes! Generally this stage lasts 3 to 6 months before any engagement happens. In my opinion mapping is the listening phase, and if you don’t get it right its hard to get anything from a community management stance correct.
Stage 2: Finding… Finding is what I would call an overlap stage. Find the consumers that have a need, use your product and love your product. Profiles should get built for key influencers so when you reach stage three you know who they are and what they like. The question starts here… Steps 1 and 2 are Finding and Knowing… and then we go to Stage/Step 3.
Stage 3: Engagement… Taking the lessons learned from Stage 1 & 2 engagement can start. A successful SM launch (from the ground up) will take the profile data find and opening and go for it. There can be several launch points or build points, but there should be a point when starting the SM push makes sense.
The only passive section in this entire post is the mapping. Mapping is squarely where the listening falls. Finding/knowing is something more intense and intentional.
