Who’s The Hardest To Persuade When Implementing Social Media Initiatives?
May 27, 2008 – 10:24 pm | by Daryl TayThis came up in a couple of conversations during Social Media Breakfast: Singapore 2. Who’s the hardest to persuade when trying to implement a social media initiative? I’m guessing there isn’t a singular person, but clumps of people:
1) The C Suite
I hear conflicting stories here. Some C Suite individuals are very keen to get into social media (whether they know what they’re doing is another matter). Others are firmly entrenched in the delusion that this is a fad and will go away, and that one-way messaging continues to work and that mass media is king.
2) The Marketing Department
This one I’m guessing. The social media budget has to come from somewhere, and the most likely avenue probably sounds like the in-house marketing/communications department. Money spent on social media = less money for them to by 30 second spots and billboard ads.
3) Customer Service
These are the low-laid, unmotivated staff that come into contact with customers every day. And these are the people who will be online joining the conversations. Speaking as someone whose job was to answer the phone and prepare medical records way back when, it’s really hard to persuade this class of people to care for the customer.
I’m sure I’m missing out some possibilities, so what do you think? Also, do you think the “culture” of embracing social media should come from the top (ie C Suite) down and enforced? Or bottom up? Is one way more effective? Or do different methods work for different companies?
Tags: 30 second spot, billboard ads, c suite, customer service, in-house marketing, marketing department, mass media is king, one-way messaging, persuading organisations to use social media, social media breakfast singapore, social media initiatives, social media is a fad
3 Responses to “Who’s The Hardest To Persuade When Implementing Social Media Initiatives?”
By Yuhui on May 28, 2008 | Reply
If you’re talking about a local company, then most likely it’s The C Suite, since they make the final decision. In MNCs, it’s more likely to be the Marketing team. I don’t think Customer Service is even on the radar.
Having said that, more and more locally based MNCs are embracing social media, e.g. blogs, RSS, video, social bookmarks, etc.
By Mark Khoo on May 28, 2008 | Reply
I think culture plays a huge role in the company’s influence of using social media. I guess it should start intenrally from the bottom up, employees and mid managment might be resistant if it came from the top, “Just another initiative to hold their jobs” would be their thoughts.
But i think its the operations and finance deparments which are gonna be the hardest to persaude. The ROI on social media is not structured enough to get solid returns and numbers, so that’s gonna be a real problem just to get the budget to go ahead with the initiatives.
Check out my post on ROI and let me know what you think? Cheers!
By Daryl Tay on May 28, 2008 | Reply
@Yuhui: I think I might agree with that a little. I guess customer service reps aren’t on the radar as in they don’t need to approve the decision, but they need to be persuaded to “buy in” for it to work holistically.
@Mark Khoo: Yeah I just finished Joseph Jaffe’s book “Join The Conversation” this morning and cultural buy in is definitely high on the list of “must haves”. Reading your post now, will comment when I’m done!