Perspective, common sense break out at Social Media Breakfast
By Francis Moran
I went to Ottawa’s Social Media Breakfast this morning and an intelligent session on strategic customer engagement broke out.
The above paragraph is the calmest of the leads that came to mind as I drove home from the breakfast; the others were far more excitable, reflecting the deep personal enthusiasm I felt after hearing a presentation on social media tools that put them in common-sense perspective. This is a sharp departure from past SMBOttawa speakers who have presented social media as the salvation of all things.
I knew right from the opening slide, “Your social media strategy won’t save you,” that this morning’s speaker, author, entrepreneur and self-confessed Twitter addict Tara Hunt (@missrogue), was going to be something quite different. What I didn’t know was that she was not only going to dynamite the worst of all the social-media-as-brave-new-world myths I have become so tired of hearing, but that she was also going to put the customer back at the centre of the whole value chain.
I live-tweeted a few of her better lines, as did others at the session, and you can see her whole presentation here. In a nutshell, however, Tara told us:
- Social media is a tool, not a strategy.
- Social media has not changed the world, it has not changed how we connect with other human beings, and it most certainly has not changed how we decide to buy, or not to buy, something.
- The customer must be at the centre of every effective business strategy; if it doesn’t make the customer happy, don’t do it.
- Social media has a role, potentially an incredibly potent role, to play in influencing each stage of the purchasing-decision process.
- And she finished with very practical advice on exactly how social media tools can be deployed as part of a customer-centric campaign.
In one tidy presentation, then, Tara managed to hit on what seems to be my two most frequently raised topics these days:
- Social media is not a brave new world; the fundamentals still apply.
- Customer satisfaction is the only sustainable competitive differentiator.
Thanks for not drowning in the Kool Aid, Tara.
One fascinating side note: Early on in her presentation, Tara used Comcast as an example of a company that seems to be doing great outreach via Twitter but still letting down their customers and creating all kinds of lousy customer-service issues. Practically no sooner had she referenced Frank Eliason, who tweets as @comcastcares, than Frank himself was weighing in via Twitter, insisting that customer satisfaction was up 9% at the U.S. cable giant and offering to join a debate with Tara!
