by Tim Hughes | @Timothy_Hughes | LinkedIn
Yes that’s right.
I was reading an article about Kathryn Parsons in The Sunday Times, she started a tech education company Decoded in 2011, promising to teach everyone and anyone to code in one day. The business in now active in more than 85 countries. And it got me thinking.
Here at DLA, we have a similar purpose, but it’s not to teach everybody to code, it’s to place social media at the heart of every company.
But I Thought You Were A Social Selling Company!
Well we do transform sales team to increase their incremental revenue, accelerate sales and competitive standing but it’s not all we do.
We recognise that social selling training in isolation is just a random act of social. We all know that social Selling is a change in a way of working and that fact based / hints and tips training does not work. This is a change. Yesterday we couldn’t talk to the press and were 100% cold calling. Suddenly turning on the social tap, is a change. We also know that change does not come about though webinars. We have had to clean up after a competitor of ours to understand why webinars don’t work.
So What’s Wrong With Social Today?
In October 2017 we organised a dinner with a well known software supplier in London. 25 CMOs in one room. Anyway we asked the CMOs to score their social media from 1 to 10 with 10 being high. One CMO gave herself a 7, where as her Sales Director was there and gave the company a zero. In fact he wanted to give a minus number.
And this is the problem with social media. It sits in a silos. In many cases companies have pockets of excellence. Social often sits in digital marketing, which is a subset of marketing. Social also sits in customer service, it’s a common theme that cost can be stripped out of call centres. Social also sits in Human Resources (HR), Procurement, Supply Chain etc. again, all in silos. This isn’t strategy, it’s all tactics.
And we know as business leaders we cannot run the business on tactics.
So How Do You Get a Strategy?
First you need to get the Board (as we say in the UK) or the C-Suite (as you say in the US). Either way the top management need to buy into the idea and understand why Social isn’t about cat photos and taking photos of your lunch. But a strategy to increase revenue, accelerate sales, increase competitive advantage and increased profitability!
Obviously you can try doing it yourself, but most companies use an outside third party.
Who you going to choose?
While I’m biased, may I suggest any company you get in to do this, you MUST check them out. Also, the people involved in helping the board MUST have a social profile, in fact a decent social profile. If anybody is going to stand up in front of business leaders and say “follow me” and they are not doing what they are telling people to do. I’m sorry but this will fail and you will probably lose a lot of political capital.
People who read this article also read these:
https://www.social-experts.net/why-my-leads-are-fully-bant-and-yours-are-not/
https://www.social-experts.net/14-sad-truths-about-sales/
https://www.social-experts.net/write-whatever-you-want-say-whatever-you-want-on-one-condition/
