More and more businesses are experimenting with social media as a marketing channel; and there are quite a few printers dabbling in it. I took the opportunity to ask a number of printers how they have been using applications like Twitter and Facebook. Read what seven of them had to say about their experiences and results. Then get their advice about the 12 Things You Need to Know Before You Get Sociable.
Seth Godin, author and marketing guru extraordinaire (and keynote speaker at OnDemand in 2004), has published more than 3000 posts on his blog - one form of social media. He has this to say about "social media marketing:"
Things have changed, far more dramatically than most people realize. Not just what marketers buy, but what the media does all day, and what marketers build, and what we get paid to do and what and where we pay attention...Social media, it turns out, isn't about aggregating audiences so you can yell at them about the junk you want to sell. Social media, in fact, is a basic human need, revealed digitally online. We want to be connected, to make a difference, to matter, to be missed.
Aberdeen Group's The ROI on Social Media Marketing: Why it Pays to Drive Word of Mouth (Jeff Zabin, February 2009) points out that social media marketing is still in the early stages. Aberdeen advises companies to look beyond their own industry and adopt successful approaches, regardless of where they originated.
The study concludes with:
Making marketing programs conversational with and contextual to niche audiences that naturally gravitate around a specific theme … is the essence of social marketing. It may also hold the key to surviving and prospering in the recessionary economy.
Those are pretty strong words!
Printers are experimenting with – and benefiting from – social media marketing. To find out more, I posed a series of questions to a number of printers about their use of applications like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and others to promote their businesses.
At the end of our discussion, you will find 12 Things You Need to Know Before You Get Sociable and additional resources to learn more.
Contributors to this article are:
Lisa Bickford (@Printing_Mojo), Highlight Printing
Sue Wampole (@MsPrint), Corcoran Printing
Jim Cunliffe (@flyerboy_uk), Face Media Group
Laura Beulke (@VPG_Printing), Vertical Printing & Graphics
Steve Tingiris (@enthusem), Enthusem
Anne Stewart (@hotcards), Hotcards
Louis Crockett, Keiger Printing, Facebook pages: see the left sidebar at www.keiger.com
Printers who Twitter
WTT: Twitter – the microblogging tool – has become a new communication medium for a few printers. When did you start using Twitter? Tell us a little about your experience.
Sue: I signed up for a Twitter account about a month or so ago. So far, I'm enjoying building a network of interesting people. I'm glad to see printers and designers using social media; and I’m finding a lot of valuable information.
Lisa: I started using Twitter about a month or so ago. I like Twitter and wish I had more time to devote to it personally and for business. In the beginning, it’s a little difficult to get into a rhythm and to understand what is going on.
Pretty soon you understand how it works – and who’s trying to sell you something (multi-level marketers and 6,000 tweets in 30 days!), who’s on there for personal use (enjoyable to read, but not very beneficial for business) and who is on there to network and do sort of a more “organic” bonding that may turn into business relationships of some sort.
It really has been amazing for creating long distance, yet enjoyable and mutually beneficial relationships with folks I wouldn’t normally have the opportunity to talk to.
Anne: Hotcards started Twittering last June. At first, we twittered pretty infrequently, but as we developed a small community, it started to get more addictive. So far, it’s definitely been a great way to connect both with others in the printing industry, with prospective clients, and with interesting people of all kinds. And at this point, we’re only just starting to get serious enough about it to gain some momentum.
Steve: We started using Twitter a few months ago. It’s a great tool for connecting and keeping pace with the “buzz” in our industry.
Jim: I started using Twitter only a few months ago, after being goaded by colleagues to try it out. So I did... and began to grow my followers, and it all suddenly clicked.
Laura: Seriously in July 2008. I have had great experiences with Twitter; everything from gaining new clients to making new friends.
Social Media More Than Twitter
WTT: Are you using other social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and others? What are your favorites?
Louis: We currently have two Facebook pages: one for Keiger Printing and one for Keiger Direct. This has caused many of our employees to discover Facebook. I think it has created a closer bond between employees because we communicate with each other outside of work.
At the moment, I think Facebook is my personal favorite. It allows for so many different contact opportunities and outlets. When we have a new product or promotion, we can push out those specific announcements to our Facebook fans before anyone else. Our RSS feeds directly into the page.
We were able to upload pictures of the installation of our new press and our open house and tag our customers in the pictures. Fans can leave messages or start discussions. It’s just a fun environment to do business in and lets us reach a broader span of potential clients. The Facebook pages are also searchable on the web and show up in the top results on search engines.
There are many employees within our company that have LinkedIn accounts. One of our sales reps uses his quite frequently. We’ve also noticed that a lot of our vendors have LinkedIn accounts. In the future we hope to delve into this media a little more and view the possibilities there.
We are in the process of developing a website for Keiger Direct, which will rely heavily on video demos, so we are considering the possibility of using YouTube. We are currently utilizing YouTube by linking to videos of interest on Keiger Printing’s website. We have talked about getting on MySpace as well but do not currently have anything.
Steve: We’re on Facebook and LinkedIn and use YouTube. LinkedIn is my favorite; the LinkedIn groups allow you to connect with other industry professionals and dialog in a very efficient way.
Sue: I'm also using Digg and Del.icio.us. Others in the company are using LinkedIn and Facebook. We plan to expand to YouTube and others in an effort to connect with a larger audience.
Laura: I currently use Facebook and LinkedIn as well as Biznik and Plaxo. I would say that Facebook is my other main source for social media; I get more from Twitter and Facebook than anything else.
Jim: We use Facebook and YouTube, but not yet had much faith in LinkedIn. We use the new Facebook comments on our site; it lets visitors comment like they would on a blog or WordPress site. We use YouTube to host related videos, and then bring them back through to our site. Why link to other peoples’ stuff? Keep the credit for yourself.
Anne: Hotcards is all over the web – on Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, and on community-based news aggregators like Digg, Reddit, and DesignFloat. I really like what’s happening on YouTube right now because video is becoming an increasingly integral part of search engine results, and because videos are super fun to produce. It’s a great way to get face-to-face with our community.
Lisa: I am using Facebook and LinkedIn. For business, I prefer LinkedIn to Facebook. LinkedIn has given me the opportunity to re-connect with long lost business friends. Facebook has, too…but to a lesser degree.
It is very clear to me that Facebook is for my personal life (I’m not going to “poke” a business contact), and LinkedIn is for my business life. That being said, my SEO guy says I HAVE to be on Facebook.
Using Social Media to Promote Your Business
WTT: Are you using social media to promote your printing business? If so, how?
Sue: Not yet. When I think of social media, I think it is to be used more as a connection tool. I see it bringing traffic to our website and that's the intention. I have no expectations of doing business directly through Social Media. But I do plan to consistently bring traffic to our website as we expand the site with a blog and more resource material.
Jim: We use social media as part of our networking mix. It wouldn't work alone for us, but mixed in with our local Chamber and business networking, Twitter and Facebook work very nicely indeed.
We can see the power of Twitter and Facebook from our stats (Google Analytics) to see who orders a sample pack. We currently don't track orders that come in through social media.
It's great to have an out-of-the-blue tweet saying, “Hey, just got my print delivery, excellent quality.” That’s always nice to hear.
Laura: I use Twitter and the feed into Facebook for business everyday. I offer specials and weekly freebies. Doing both of these have attracted tons of new followers and referrals from current followers. It has brought many new connections to me and to my business.
Louis: Facebook was the only way for Keiger Direct to have a web presence in the beginning. We announced the unveiling of our page on Keiger Printing’s website and sent out a news blast letting everyone know about the page. We also have the constant push from our email footers.
Steve: We use social media mostly to keep up with our key prospects and to create relevant messaging when we attempt to engage them in a sales conversation.
Anne: Because customers can order print directly off Hotcards.com, all types of online visibility are important to us. In terms of social media, the real benefit is that you connect with other businesses, designers, and all kinds of cool people that might not need printing TODAY, but who will think of “that printer they’ve got on Twitter,” etc., whenever the need for print does arise. Online communities really afford visibility, over the long term, in places where you might otherwise never make a connection.
Lisa: Here’s how I see it – I don’t expect to get one single order from Twitter, but if raises my search engine rankings so I am on the first page organically, I will get orders that way. LinkedIn (and to a lesser degree Facebook) is just another way to stay in touch with some really great people I have worked with over the years – maybe that will turn into sales eventually, too…we’ll see.
Tracking Sales or ROI
WTT: Can you track sales to your online sales efforts? Do you see social media as an effective sales tool or should we consider it something else, like a customer relationship tool?
Lisa: Yes, we will be able to track the sales that come about because of our on-line efforts…when we finally get a sale that way. I think it is both a sales tool and a customer relationship tool.
Anne: Sales tracking is a great way to target your efforts towards what’s giving you the greatest return, but to me, the key to success in social media networking is simply friendliness, and an ability to engage without always focusing on sales. Maybe it is more about relationship building than making the sale, but that being said, social media has definitely led to some valuable connections coming from unexpected places, enough so that we consider our efforts consistently successful.
Steve: You can track online efforts in a number of ways. And yes, social media is a very effective sales tool - if used properly. Too often however, it seems like businesses think social media can be a place to “advertise” and it’s not. It’s a place to make connections and track target prospects who are online.
Louis: We aren’t really tracking sales off of our Facebook pages but our IT administrator set it up so we can track how many people go to our Facebook pages from our website as well as from our email signatures. The links are also trackable from the backs of our business cards. We can’t tell who the people are that are hitting the page but we can at least gauge traffic and see the source of their visit.
Sue: We have a system in place to track every new lead that comes in. Leads are generated through direct selling efforts, monthly direct mail, and our Google PPC campaigns. Social media sites like Twitter are more of a relationship tool. As people grow to like you and trust you, they will contact you when a need for your service arises. If you walk in the door selling, you won't be noticed, or will be noticed in a negative way.
Jim: We encourage people through our main URL and push them to follow the corporate Twitter user name, then we sweep them up with the personal account to interact. The corporate tweet feeds RSS once or twice a day.
Laura: I can track from my social media advertising. I offer special rates and put specials only good for the day and that helps. Also many people say that they found me on Twitter and wanted to get pricing.
To Blog or Not to Blog
Our panel is divided on whether you need a blog or not: 6 out of the 7 either have one (3), are building one (2), or wish they had one (1). Keiger Printing doesn’t have a blog and isn’t on Twitter, but has two Facebook pages.
Anne had this to say about her blog:
The focus of the Hotcards blog is really to talk to customers, and to anyone interested in printing, about what makes printing interesting and important. We talk about the work we do, as well as issues that are more vital to the industry as a whole. Our goal with the blog is to say: “Hey gang, we’re over here! Come hang out and share your thoughts anytime, because we’re at this every day.”
12 Things You Need to Know Before You Get Sociable
When you’re ready to try this yourself, our panel has some advice for the social media novice; but first remember this:
If you don't want your comments made public, even by accident, don't write them down anywhere online.David Reich’s Marketing Inspiration, on MarketingProfs Daily Fix
For the social media novice, our panel advises:
- Start slow, watch, learn and remember that everything you post online is going to stay with you and/or your company forever.
- Plan your work and word your plan. Figure out how much you are going to give this and stick to it.
- Stay focused on your business goal and be willing to spend some time to make this work.
- Expect to make – and plan for – a serious time commitment. One member of our panel spends 2-4 hours 5 days a week on a combination of Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and blogging. That’s a quarter- to half-time position!
- If you’re going post to a blog, Facebook, or Twitter, do it regularly. The only way to get and keep attention is to be a stable, consistent presence that contributes to the community. One blog post or Tweet a week is simply not going to do it.
- Give it a little time. As you understand more how and why it works, you’ll become more comfortable with it.
- Don’t go out there with the mission to sell, sell, sell. Never try to advertise in online discussions – you’ll be hated and your efforts will backfire in the worst way. Look at it this way; you wouldn’t introduce yourself to someone, say “hello,” and then say, “you want to buy something?” Don’t do it online either.
- Use social media to share your personality, your sense of humor, and your insights and people will like you. People who like you will use your printing services.
- Use social media as a marketing and traffic-building tool. If you start using social media with the expectation of generating business, it will be easy to give up. If you use it as another method of building relationships, you will fit it into your schedule and stay consistent.
- Make sure you have something solid to offer. Free advice is great. Give value to your readers/prospects/clients.
- Market your business consistently through a variety of media. Use as many different pieces of technology as you can to get yourself out there. You never know who will see it or what kind of new business will come from it. Remember, Jim said: “We use social media as part of our networking mix. It wouldn't work alone for us, but mixed in with our local Chamber and other business networking it works.”
- Track your results. From the trenches: “We are still evaluating whether or not that is the best way to spend our time, or if we should be on more traditional sales efforts like knocking on doors.”
You can learn more about using Twitter as one of your social media tools from Rick Littrell, at Magicomm. (The link has been corrected.) Check out his Printer Tweet Tips.
For those who want to take a peek at a “list of print-type people on Twitter,” Markzware has compiled a rather lengthy list.
WhatTheyThink is on Twitter: @whattheythink, Dr. Joe: @wtterc, PrintPlant @printplanet
Discussion
By Ryan M on Mar 18, 2009
Although the 12 steps to be sociable are great, I would like to add a potentially unpopular step 13. When entering into the social networking realm, formulate an official social networking mission statement and code of conduct for your business and employees. These would ideally identify the purpose of the company's social networking objectives while guiding proper employee usage.
By Gail Nickel-Kailing on Mar 18, 2009
Ryan - you are so right! That helps avoid the problem that David Reich was cautioning against.
Never put your foot in your mouth!
Thanks! Gail
By Adoniram on Mar 18, 2009
@Ryan
While I do agree that communication around what is (and what is not) appropriate for workplace use of social media is important, it's also important for senior staff and owners to understand that social media will reflect your corporate culture. Often with greater transparency than you might realize. A company with a strict social media code of conduct, a pile of documentation, and some sort of corporate social "identity" will not last long in the social space, principally because your customers and audience will quickly discover that you are crafting an online presence, rather than being yourselves.
Some companies can get away with this sort of behavior (Burger King, under the leadership of CP+B), but for small companies (like printers) this will almost certainly lead to a few outcomes:
1. Your employees simply won't participate because there's too much red tape in the way of communication.
2. Your employees will behave the way you want them to at work, but then will change their persona at home, leading to cognitive dissonance at best and outright corrosion at worst.
3. Your customers will see a disconnect between what you are saying (your brand "promise") and what you are doing (your brand).
I believe it is far more effective for small companies (less than 100 ft employees) to talk frankly with senior staff about social media and what is appropriate versus what is not. Then you allow your staff to disseminate that information, and enable enthusiastic employees to participate in your online space. If this isn't possible, what you are essentially saying is, "I don't trust my employees to behave professionally."
And if the latter is the case, that's not a social media problem. That's a staffing problem.
By Ryan M on Mar 18, 2009
@ Adoniram
I, too, agree with the three potential outcomes you stated when companies are overly restrictive with their online policies.
Your comment about "small companies" being able to "talk frankly" is more in line with my original point of having an official policy (written or oral). Too often companies, both small and large, speak very little or in vagaries as it relates to social networking. This, as you pointed out, can create a high wire balancing act between brand management for the employer and professional growth/fulfillment for the employee.
The consequences of ignoring the topic altogether can have significant impact for all parties in the forms of brand degradation and termination of employment. Perhaps the best approach is a pragmatic mix of open communication and mutual trust.
By Enthusem on Mar 18, 2009
@Adoniram, @Ryan
I think there is a middle ground here. In the analog world, in any business environment there are things you should and should not say when talking to prospects, customers, vendors etc.
In most cases it should be common sense but unfortunately, "common sense" is somewhat subjective. Because of this, combined with the fact that whatever you say online stays with you forever, I agree with @Ryan that it's a good idea to define "common sense" to employees who will be posting online about your company. For example, a recently read a tweet from a guy (not from our company thank goodness) saying he was out at a strip club with a potential client. Worse, he mentioned the client's name. Obviously, this person's definition of "common sense" might not be in sync with what his employer considers "common sense".
That said however, the opposite end of the spectrum which would be a bunch of red tape like what @Adoniram mentions would kill a social networking initiative before it ever got started.
So, in my opinion, have guidelines but they should all be stuff your employees are stupidly obvious. If you do have an employee that doesn't think the guidelines are "common sense" you may want to revamp your hiring process ;-)
By Michael J on Mar 18, 2009
I think the idea that you can manage the message in social media isn't going to work very well. The very thing that makes blogs, twitter, etc is the authenticity of the communication.
People have the most developed bs detectors after a couple of years of internet. Even the sniff of bs is going to be worse than not talking at all.
For organizations that don't have a strong team spirit, I would recommend stay away as a company, leave it to individuals.
The upside is if your company has great customer focused teams it will come through in the talk. If you don't, that will also come through, there is no way to manage this from the top.
By David Dilling on Mar 19, 2009
Great post. Networking is networking, just dress accordingly.
Here is a nice list of printers on Twitter we have been making and plan a new version soon...
http://www.markzware.com/blogs/twitter-list-printers-prepress_v2/2009/01/28/" rel="nofollow">Printers on Twitter (click)
And here is a nice list of Typography on Twitter which may also be interesting:
http://www.markzware.com/blogs/typography-list-twitter/2009/01/21/" rel="nofollow">http://www.markzware.com/blogs/typography
By Phil Spencer on Mar 19, 2009
The people at MyOrderDesk put on a great introduction to social networking for printers. They do it once per month I think. You can contact Joe at their company for more info.
By Rod Key on Mar 19, 2009
Excellent article!
There’s no turning back, social media is here to stay so embrace it.
Remember a few years back when people said digital printing won’t stand up to traditional printing, the quality is not there, you cannot use it for long runs, its unreliable, it’s not for this or not for that, well if you’re not digital you are dying a slow death.
Social media is no different, there will be a few kinks and hurdles, become a master of it and you will find a way to sail around the headaches and make it a success. See where it’s at in 5 years and think for one second where you might be without it. There are 45 billion images today being shared on facebook alone and I’m about to add a couple more myself today. There’s a need for it and everyone will be using it, except maybe the printer that hasn’t gone digital yet.
Social media is growing during this recession, how is your business doing?
By Eoin Stewart on Mar 19, 2009
As a father of 3, with a range of ages, my own subjective opinion is that Facebook and Twitter may be a dead end. There is, again, a subjective perception by many outside of the sites' primary target audience that they are primarily frequented by young users. Being very familiar with both via my kids I, personally, would take little stock in any company using these sites, unless they were associated with the music industry (as an example).
There "could" be a perception that printers are attempting to be "hip", and as these sites are very "alternative", it could convey an image of inexperience or worse, marketing desperation.
On the other side of the coin, usage is free and if a company does not hold the same perceptions stated above, there is no risk. Marketing for "0 down." Not too bad .
This is simply my own 2¢ so please don't flame me.
By Michael J on Mar 19, 2009
But social media is not a business. Conversation has become free. It's just a better way to move word of mouth.
Word of mouth sales is an old story for printing business and for all business.
What it means is that customer knows alot more about how you run your business. "I'll get back to you with a price" is not going to cut it. "I'll get back to you with when your job will be ready" means the customer will twitter and search and talk, until they find a Printer who tells them what they want to know, when they want to know it.
My take is that it means every printer has to be ruthlessly efficient, with real time status updates and immediate estimates.
Bad word of mouth can now travel much, much faster than back in the day. Screwing up with even one customer, no matter how small can wind up destroying 3 months of twittering.
By Brian Regan on Mar 19, 2009
It is important that you assign someone to act as your firms "Community manager". This person's job is to be your social media ambassador. They interact on the various networks and create dialog with others and a positive, but not too salzy message.
Here is a link to Intel's computers social media/blogs internal policy if you want an idea of a thought out internal policy.
The term ENGAGE is a key one.
http://graphcommnet.ning.com/profiles/blogs/intels-internal-policy-on
By Gina Testa on Mar 19, 2009
Gail, thanks for this article. I love hearing about “plugged in” printers who are helping our industry shatter old stereotypes. I’m having fun getting connected directly with industry peers, colleagues and customers online. I’ll be sure to follow these folks on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook – I’m looking forward to the conversations.
Xerox also has a Twitter feed (@XeroxCorp) and just this week launched a Facebook page - So, what DOES Xerox do? - to provide a more personal look at what we’re all about at Xerox. Come check us out.
-- Gina Testa, Vice President, Worldwide Graphic Communication Industry Business, Xerox Corporation and student of new ways to connect and converse
By Tom Hackelman on Mar 20, 2009
Excellent article! Social media has received such a bad rap and it centers primarily on some of the misperceptions that people have about it. Too many people use it to share information that they wouldn't want their parents to see let alone their customers.
The key is in understanding that, for businesses and business people, social media is a brand development tool. It provides ways for people to connect with you and attract them to your brand. What you do with them once they connect is the next key step.
I recently found a great resource (albeit it has a funky title) that provides great insight on the key social media sites for business and how to use them properly. You can access this information at: http://www.tomhackelman.com/ShamaHyder.html
Thanks again for sharing!
By Michael J on Mar 20, 2009
My take is that it's not about brand development as much as it is about listening very closely. Trying to build a brand on social media is a tough needle to thread.
A much safer approach is to listen carefully. Not say anything until there is something to say. Then say it, then keep listening for the next opportunity.
i know this may sound like splitting hairs, but I think it's an important distinction.
By Carolina Miranda on Mar 23, 2009
Great post, and very timely. We have also ventured into the world of social media with a blog, Twitter, and Facebook and are finding it to be a good way to communicate with clients and build relationships.
By Ken Cring on Mar 25, 2009
Nice article. Thanks for the input.
A hyperlink correction for Rick Littrell's website is needed though. It should be: http://www.magicomm.biz
By Mike Toole on Mar 25, 2009
I had this conversation a month ago with our sales team. I thought it was funny when they were surprised by the new leads generated.
By Gail Nickel-Kailing on Mar 26, 2009
Sorry folks - the hyperlink has now been corrected. For you who want to go to Rick's site, it's here: http://www.magicomm.biz
Discussion
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