Why I Can Be A Sucker For A Good Social Media Campaign

A good social media or online web presence strategy has all the trappings of a successful lead nurturing process. Yet when it comes to making a marketing investment, there are still some that that would rather invest in the former than the later. This brings me to why I think this.

A discussion I had with a business owner around two separate topics : lead generation / nurturing automation and social media engagement got me thinking about how different responses to these two marketing tools can evoke especially with more traditional businesses that haven’t been completely sold on the importance of having a social web presence. While discussing lead nurturing and related campaigns, there was no hesitation in investing a significant budget in CRM software, marketing automation, acquiring leads from various sources and developing a nurturing system that would keep an ongoing engagement with customers till they are ready to buy, turn into customers or even repeat customers.

When the discussion turned to social media and developing a long term engagement with potential target customers online, there was a lot more hesitation in investing in an effort that would probably take a good deal of time to yield significant measurable results in terms of a wider online outreach and converting customers.

Note the key words in the intent of lead nurturing systems in any marketing process is :  keep an ongoing engagement with customers till they are ready to buy, turn into customers or even repeat customers

Isn’t that what a good social media and web presence does? When I check my work emails, I am cautious about sales emails and try not to fall victim to smart marketing tactics. Always on the guard so to speak. However, as an individual on the web, I’m always the target of someone’s brilliant web marketing strategy and the subject of someone’s lead nurturing system whether I know it or not! I’ll be the first to admit it.

Real Life Scenario #1

I follow Domino’s Pizza India on Facebook via their page along with 740,000 others. I see something from them almost every day on my Facebook wall whether it’s a picture of a group of friends having a pizza party, a new product announcement, a new funny advertisement video they’ve just released or even a promotion. Now I may not always click on their links and be the most active user when it comes to sharing their updates. However, they are constantly there on my Facebook news feed and last Friday when I had a terrible pizza craving and saw the Friday Freak Outs offer coupon on my wall, I dialed in and ordered. In fact, I added a nutty choco lava cake to the order, because that picture had been haunting me during the week and I just had to have one. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who had a pizza craving on Friday.

Domino’s India 1 – Neil 0 

Real Life Scenario #2

There’s a very talented graphic designer I connected with on Linked In about 2 years ago. We got into a discussion on one of the Linked In groups around marketing and after exchanging a few comments around the same topic, I added him to my network. He would actively share interesting posts around design trends along with general updates from time to time. Occasionally I would re share one of his posts but we never really connected much after the initial exchange on the Linked In discussion. That is until this month! A customer planning a new online publication with us needed a new logo developed. Who is the first person that comes to mind? Exactly! A requirement surfaced and he was there to contact and see if the requirement could be fulfilled.

Pro Graphic Designer 1 – Neil 0

Real Life Scenario #3

My wife and I were chatting with a bunch of friends on where we could go spend Christmas afternoon and not have to spend the days running up to the 25th cooking and baking. While checking my Twitter feed, I noticed a bunch of local Tweeple sharing pictures of the Christmas tree outside the Hyatt hotel in our city and talking about the Christmas brunch spread which promised to be nothing short of lavish. This lead us to the website to check up on the details and after some deliberation, a call to make a reservation.

 Hyatt Christmas Brunch Event 1 – Neil 0

Facebook walls, news feeds, Twitter and Linked In activity streams are nurturing platforms among other things. This is where people spend their time, exchange information, converse, communicate, research and make their decisions too. Only you can’t approach them with the typical sales mindset of bombarding people with emails and marketing messages. It needs a more human engagement and needs to be invested in for it to start working for you like any other marketing channel. That aside, there is no lead nurturing system quite as effective, non intrusive and capable as the social web. As someone looking to market their product, service or brand, a good social media presence can do exactly what a good lead nurturing program can …only better.

 keep an ongoing engagement with customers till they are ready to buy, turn into customers or even repeat customers

It’s time social media marketing is considered as serious a marketing investment worth making as any!