Global Roadmaps to Traverse the Social Ecosystem

Traversing the social space right now, for any organization, could become very confusing and treacherous, but especially with multi level, multi-brand companies. With new platforms and information launching daily, constant shifting consumer behaviors, and the ever-growing disjointed, siloed environment where many of our organizations live, we, as marketers, are in position for complete and total social devastation… if we don’t play our cards right and build a roadmap to traverse this dynamic Social Ecosystem.

Siloed Companies

Many companies we work with have a hierarchy of brands with many different subsidiaries. All of whom, have their own agenda and strategy for marketing, separate from any “global” brand messaging that should ring true through an organization in its entirety. This type of ownership and siloed-thinking, has created disjointed communication, not only within the organization, but also in outward, consumer facing communications. The innate need for a separate marketing strategy for sub brands and brands alike, we are seeing a tremendous confusion when it comes to communication, let alone social strategy.

A Roadmap

To combat this siloed approach and segmented communications in social media, we need to develop a global roadmap that would define the communication flow, brand/sub brand responsibilities, and information within, throughout, and around the brand and sub brand relationships. Where are the touchpoints for the parent brand? Where are they for the sub brand? What information is shared between the brand and sub brand? What impact does the global brand message have on the sub brands? All questions to ask while devising and building the global roadmap for the social space. Once we have these answers, we can build a strategy to visually map out what our Social Ecosystem looks like and on what levels we need to communicate in the social space as well as what to say on the different avenues.

sGPS  (social GPS)

With this roadmap created and the complete overall understanding of the entire organization throughout the social space, we can navigate accordingly to engage customers in the correct way, with the correct messaging. We would basically have a Social GPS (coming soon from Garmin) to give us control to not only navigate ourselves, but empower our consumers to navigate as well. This dynamic strategy would give us the power to adapt in the social space and ensure the path to conversion is illuminated for the consumer.

With a Social Roadmap, we will know where, when, and how to go and with whom to communicate. Without, we are lost, disjointed and segmented in our customer relationships, communications, and organizational objectives. One of the hardest things to do is to sit down and develop a strategy. We are in a culture of build now and strategize later… unfortunately later never comes. There’s no better time than the present to plan success.

Photo Courtesy of Flickr – ♥ China ♥ guccio