Navigating the social media seas at #SMMW14

Top takeaways from Social Media Marketing World

Attending a conference is a lot like managing a business’s social media initiative:

You need to have a content strategy by planning which sessions to attend, engage your audience by chatting with other attendees, and gather feedback by asking the speakers specific questions that will add value to the conversation.

I kept these principles in mind when I attended Social Media Marketing World (#SMMW14), presented by Social Media Examiner in San Diego, March 27-28.

On the plane to San Diego, I highlighted the top three sessions from each time slot to help me manage my time efficiently and give me quick-reference safety valves should I need to switch day-of. I also talked with as many other attendees as possible, and joined in the the #SMMW14 Twitter conversations to share my notes and get an idea of what was going on in the sessions I didn’t attend.

Most importantly, I outlined in advance the main topics to investigate at the conference: corporate blog strategies, social media customer service training examples, trends in the creep factor and the declining News Feed reach for Facebook pages.

I brought up these topics frequently in discussions with other attendees and asked speakers related questions in the majority of the presentations I attended. I’m borderline “that guy who asks questions in every session.” However, my questions are always geared to benefit others in the audience – as well as my agenda. If my question is too specific to my situation, I bite my tongue during the Q&A and try to chat with the speaker after the session instead.

Social Media Marketing World was the biggest social media conference I’ve attended, and I gained new contacts and excellent insight into every topic I outlined in advance. I’m already applying some of the lessons I learned.

To spread the love – and also organize my notes – I’m sharing my top takeaways from #SMMW14. I mix-in my views with those presented at the conference, and I hope this post gives you ideas to consider in expanding your company’s social media strategery.

1. Company blog

In the conference’s opening keynote presentation, Michael Steltzner – founder of Social Media Examiner – talked about seven new trends based on the 2014 Social Media Marketing Industry Report (an annual survey, now in its sixth year, of more than 2,850 marketers).

I had my own ideas on social media and digital trends entering into the event, and his presentation supported my belief that brands need a strong website and blog to serve as the hub of their digital engagement (rather than say, depending on a Facebook page as the focal point).

According to Stelzner, blogging will be a big focus in 2014 with 58% of marketers claiming that original written content is the most important form of content for their business. This resonates with me, since I see many brand social media presences – including the ones I manage for my employer – using Facebook pages as a makeshift platform for what would otherwise be blog content.

This Facebook-focused strategy isn’t necessarily the wrong move, but now that Facebook has dramatically reduced the organic exposure of posts from FB Pages in News Feed, brands need to establish and grow their own platforms for engaging content.

In addition to incorporating basic components such as Like and Tweet buttons, blog posts should focus on good writing more than marketing, feature dramatic images and offer something so valuable to the reader that they’ll want to share it with friends and come back for more.

Blog content must also sync seamlessly when shared on social media channels. One of my favorite analogies from the conference (in a different presentation) came from Aetna’s Lauren Vargas: we need to apply urban design to our digital communities and make walkable connections between social, website, customer service and other touchpoints. Love the comparison, and love Walkability.

Another interesting stat from Stelzner’s presentation showed that 70% of marketers plan on increasing original visual assets. For me this translates to the importance of networks like Instagram and Pinterest. My take is that visual assets can’t be just a stock photo, meme, or an image featuring a few words of text in large font; they need to be compelling, and for the most part, real photos.

2. Social customer care

In another session, I listened intently to a panel of experts speak on best practices, lessons learned and trends in social media customer service. Why so intently? Because at work I recently trained a group of customer service reps to provide round-the-clock customer service using our corporate Twitter and Facebook accounts. It’s been a great initiative and this panel offered some ideas every social customer care manager should keep in mind, specifically from Dan Gingiss at Discover. Most importantly: social care is a marketing advantage. I couldn’t agree more. An excellent, memorable customer service experience is the best form of branding and marketing.

Gingiss also mentioned that people want responses on that channel (e.g. if they tweet to you they don’t want to be told to email or call in to resolve the issue), and referenced a social-friendly customer service chat feature at Discover that opens a chat right in Facebook (or something like that). Sounds like a great idea.

A final note I took from this panel was that when training CSRs to respond on social media, keep any formal guidelines light, and give constant ongoing feedback with praise for great responses, along with suggestions for how to phrase it better next time.

3. Creep factor

We – as in most people – share a lot of information about ourselves online. That means that companies have access to a lot of that data. And when brands reach out to customers in response to that data, sometimes it can be good, useful and fun, and sometimes it can be creepy.

To see what industry experts thought about the topic I attended a panel session on real-time marketing and how big brands engage fans in the moment. More specifically I wanted to gauge how the panelists were navigating the all important creep factor in their social media and engagement efforts.

This is clearly a major issue for all brands and a sensitive topic on many levels (NSA, Target, Big Brother, etc.) How do customers and the general public feel about big brands listening to what they’re saying on social media? Is there a line that should not be crossed when engaging a customer?

In my opinion, every brand should be listening to what their customers are saying about them online, and there’s a huge opportunity to provide value by responding to customers in the moment.

This panel mostly reinforced my previous thoughts on the topic. Vanessa SanDieguez of Hilton gave some great perspective from the @Hilton_suggests Twitter account, which (from what I gathered) looks for tweets from travelers who are looking for tips, and offers (often unsolicited) help with suggestions that aren’t necessarily tied to Hilton (e.g. a good sports bar nearby).

She navigates the creep factor by investigating a bit before jumping in to these conversations, and avoiding situations that have a potential for a negative response from the customer. Metrics for success: replies, signs of appreciation and eventually conversions.

The panel agreed that the creep factor is shrinking, and that that aggressively responding to customers on social media has great potential for a positive experience – as long as they’re handled the right way.

4. Facebook News Feed and Ads

All of us Facebook page managers are losing organic reach and exposure in our fans’ News Feeds and nobody has a clear remedy, except for one: Facebook Ads.

Jon Loomer opened my eyes to the latest changes and tremendous power of Facebook Ads. His was the best presentation of the conference and offered simple, useful tips, data to support his claims along with his touching success story woven in.

The primary eye-opener was when he showed his success and experimentations with Facebook’s website and email custom audience options for ads. Essentially this lets you target people who visited specific pages on your website with ads in their Facebook News Feed. You can also target email lists of people who have say, subscribed to your newsletter.

Lookalike audiences were another option that he highlighted – they let you find Facebook users similar to your FB fans or visitors of your website. Exciting stuff, and Loomer delivered flawlessly.

A couple final notes from Loomer: Target your existing Facebook fans first, and ad clicks don’t matter – conversions do.

Thanks to all the attendees, organizers and presenters for a great experience at Social Media Marketing World 2014.