Social Media Engagement is Not a Strategy
When the Social Media craze started, it was all about getting a page starter, getting fans and keeping them engaged.
But it is no more a brand Goal. In fact it should not be the brand goal. So Engagement can not be a strategy. In fact it is only a TOOL.
Let us discuss a few points:
1. What is your business objective? Every brand has a business objective – make people aware of their products, increase sales online, build a fan base before they can launch a product, new market entry, increase Top Of Mind recall, customer service, acquire new customers etc. In such cases and many more Engagement is the tool which is used to measure and achieve the business objective.
2. How to Measure it? As Engagement is a tool, measuring engagement will not be sufficient to measure the success of the business. Take for example Apple, they are not very active on social media, their engagements will be very low. But if their goal is financial success, engagement is not a good measure for that. Similarly look at brands like Rolls Royce or 3M, if their goal is to sell more to high net worth people or industrial companies, a direct co relation between social media engagement and sales/leads may not be right measure.
3. How to get good Engagement? As the social media platforms evolve, so is the logic of the news feeds and what any consumer sees on his/her time line change. Things are gradually moving away from only Organic content and engagement. Which means the brands will have to not only create good content but also spend money to be able to get the right engagement. We need to help them find a balance between how much to spend and what is their business objectives.
So let us think about how we can use the Engagement as a tool for each of our clients and help them measure and achieve their business objectives rather than just getting them good engagements. It is about using engagement the right way while we work on a strategy/campaign proposal for them. It is also about taking one extra step and telling them what does it mean for them while we report the numbers.
Think about it!
Hi Ashok!
Reading through blogs, and came across yours. I agree with the points, especially for large brands which see engagement as the sole goal. I think it is up to digital experts, such as us, to help them break this misconception and focus on the varying variables and factors that could matter to their brand/s. Good read!