I recently gave a talk one day to a few Corporate companies on setting up social media strategies for their brands , products and services . What I realized is that most firms have heard of the benefits of social media, but they are clueless on how to get on the social media platforms.
So we embarked on a simple exercise to help them know how to set up social media strategies for their brands, products and services.
It was a simple exercise . Every representative was expected to imagine their product or service as a person and share with the rest of the team:
- Where the product /service would hang out
- Who the friends would be
- What type of character the product would be
Most of the participants had never imagined their product as a person, and would not readily place it in a neighbourhood, with friends and having qualities of a person .
With all statistics pointing out that over 4M Kenyans get online, who wouldn’t want to advertise to all these people? How then do you set up a Social media strategy that will filter out the clutter, connect you to your audience and communicate to them in a language that they can understand?
The most important thing to remember is the generation on social media would like to engage products that think like them, talk to them in their language and basically be their friend .
To understand why you need to think of your product as a human being, have a look at the answers we got from one participant who was promoting an alcoholic beverage targeting women .
- Where the product /service would hang out – in posh bars in the suburbs
- Who the friends would be – classy ladies, professional, independent women
- What type of character the brand would be – fun, good company, loves to flirt, strong ,
From the above answers, we were able to come out with
1 . target audience inform of friends
2 . content inform of character
Case:
Alcoholic beverage targeting women:
We were able to establish that this friend will target other women who are strong, fun and independent online .
As much as this friend will talk about herself, she will talk to women online about health issues, how do wine and dine , how to date . Her content will interest the ladies online .
Remember, your product character has to be their friend, and as friends, we do not like ‘friends who talk about themselves hours on end ‘ . Be a friend who will also talk to the other ladies.
The above is a simple exercise that would help most companies planning to get onto social media. Avoid all the clutter, be defining your target audience, your market and your brand personality . that way , generating content for your brand, product or service will be a home run .
