The Social media ladder
Before you can accurately target a social media campaign you must first understand all the different users of social media and how they can help you. Finding the social media influencers in your industry and positioning your content to them is the key.
The Spectators – These are people who read blogs, watch videos, listen to podcasts, read customer reviews and browse online forums for information. The Spectator does not comment, create content or even have their profile on a social network. They use social media platforms to gather information in order to make a purchasing decision. Many of these people will be your customers.
The Joiners – These are people who create and maintain their profiles on social networking sites. They also visit them on a regular basis to keep up to date with their friends and the people they may be following. They rarely add content of their own and spend most of their time gathering information in order to make that purchasing decision. Many of these people will be your customers.
The Collectors – These are people who are active on social media sites and they like to subscribe to RSS feeds, add tags to web pages or photos, vote for web sites online and use social bookmarking sites for easy reference back to the information they have found. A collector will rarely create content and as the Joiners and spectators mentioned before they will gather information to aid a purchasing decision. Again many of these will be your customers.
The Critics – These are people who are highly active online and on the social media networks. They will post reviews on products and services, comment on content created by other people and edit wiki articles. These people will influence the decisions of the Spectators, Joiners and Collectors and therefore you need the critics to find your content and spread the word.
The Creators – These are the most active group of people online and are also the minority. They will write blogs, articles or stories and publish them all over the web. They may even create music or videos and upload these to media sharing sites such as YouTube. Some may even go as far as creating web pages all about a topic, product or service that interests them. These people are the main influencers online and knowing the right creators is vital to the success of any social media campaign.
The Spectators, Joiners and Collectors are the majority of your customers no matter whether you sell DVD’s, a general medical service or a highly specialised consultancy service. The Critics and the Creators are the people who will influence your customers to either buy or not to buy from you so you need these people to help make your campaign a success. Don’t even consider a social media campaign until you have identified the key web influencers in your industry.
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