May 30

Is social networking right for all brands?

As more and more brands leap onto the social networking bandwagon, it becomes increasingly clear - many of them are doomed to egregious failure. Social networking, while a relatively cheap venture, is simply not right for everyone. With a little consideration and careful observation, it begins to make a lot of sense. Think about what social networking truly is - a fabric of conversations woven by the participants and their friends. Most users are trying to build or maintain communities of friends. They aren’t there to shop, they aren’t looking for the Next Big Thing - they simply want to stay informed with what is going on. So when a brand tries to barge into the conversation, and they aren’t something that the user welcomes, or wants to associate themselves with, it’s bound to fail. Success depends on brand affinity; when consumers like a brand and want to identify themselves with it, the organization putting themselves out there is much more likely to see positive results from their campaign. So before embarking on the social networking adventure, think about your brand, and how your customers relate to it. Large consumer brands, such as sportswear or certain computer and audio device manufacturers, are much better suited to it than packaged goods, for example. Even then, it’s critical that the brand manager thinks critically about how to engage the consumer, and understand the goals of entering a social network. I’ll be writing about this more in an upcoming iMedia article about why some businesses fail on social networks, but would welcome your comments if you have thoughts in the interim.

posted to: Web 2.0 & Social Media

Comments

Hilary Coolidge said on May 30th, 2008

As you’ve stated, Evan, the passion has to come from the people. Brands can suffer from the “build it and they will come” mentality or try to tie in a campaign of some sort in with a social networking experience. Before deciding on what kind of space a brand should provide for its fans, they should do some on the ground research and see what the fans, friends and contacts are already doing on their own or via alternative channels. If the brand can provide a more valuable experience for the group, or can non invasively find ways to support the current environment, then it may warrant jumping in. Social networks that smack only of brand promotion are easily smoked out. Entering a network takes time, energy and persuasion - building your id, profile, importing your content and buddies (who also have to buy in to make it valuable). Walled gardens need to add extra value to show that the non transportability of data is worth the investment.
Kristen Yerardi said on May 31st, 2008

It’s also important as consultants to help clients understand when social networking would/could work for them and not. We have a client that is in a specific industry that is in my opinion not a place where social networking would work at all. In working with this client, we had to get them to see that other “Web 2.0″ conventions were better suited to to their business, industry and customers than social networking.
Evan Gerber said on June 6th, 2008

yeah, that can be the tricky part. or, if a client has grandiose fantasies of how to use social networking on facebook, but it’s going to take a few years to build their site, then it becomes a question of helping them understand just how quickly things are going to change, and that they ought to focus on fundamental portability, vs targeting one specific area.

MolecularVoices

Is social networking right for all brands?

Comments

Add a comment

Categories

Browse posts by month

Browse by author

We're hiring!