23
2010
The first steps to using Social Media in South Africa
An article by 
Before you jump head first into the Social Media game, it is important to take a careful assessment of your goals, your expectations and your capabilities. If you are in the game already, it doesn’t hurt to re-assess!
To start off with, check off the points below. You can either do this as an in-house strategy task, or ask a digital agency to help you create an initial assessment report, which should include recommendations for the best social media mix, and an approximate budget.
Identify your core communication targets
In a perfect world, would you want to be able to speak just to your end-users? Or do you need to speak to your franchises? Sales chain? Resellers? Media? Each will probably require a separate, and different, approach, so it might be worth your while to prioritise and start slow.
Assess your current communication with these targets
Is it a one-to-one communication? Is it pretty generic across the board? Do you find yourself fielding the same questions again and again? Are you paying for database lists? Social Media can easily be used to ease the cost and resources of each of these methods of communication.
Decide on your social media goals
Do you want to gain new customers? Increase repeat business? Lower cost of communication? Alleviate strain on a call centre? Release new product information quickly? Add an online revenue stream? Once again, your Social Media strategy should be a reflection of your target audience and your end goals. There is nothing one-size-fits-all about Social Media!
Investigate your brand or product’s presence online
Just because you haven’t initiated a social media campaign, does not mean others have not done so for you. Do a thorough search for your key terms to see if the SA audience is complaining, complimenting or talking about you. If you are lucky enough to find an online conversations about your brand, consider that a) a big hint that you should be online and b) a head start as to what exactly you should be doing online, and where.
Investigate your competitor’s presence online Are they more or less prominent than you? Is their presence negative or positive in terms of customer reactions? What about brands/products in the same field as you, but in the US market? What are they doing? How well are they received?
Investigate your target audience’s presence online
Are your customers digitally savvy? Do they belong to an income group that has ADSL connections? Do they use cellphones as their primary means of communication? What (if any!) would be the best method to reach them online. (Be exhaustive here, and don’t just think of the largest segment of your target market. Think of the entire market you want to reach. If you can effectively connect with just 10% more customers, maybe you can increase your revenue by 10% too!)
Decide on resources you want to commit to your social media campaigns
This goes beyond budget, and my bigger concern would be human resources. Even if you hire an agency to manage your social media campaign for you (something I would well advise), that agency will still need to liaison with your company. And that person needs to be web savvy, on the ball, and have time in the schedule to commit to a social media campaign wholeheartedly. You will also have to make sure that your PR, marketing and legal teams are in sync and able to work within the new parameters set by the online space.
Make sure you are committed to the Social Media way of life You can’t pretend that you care about genuine conversations with your customers, or that you value their opinion if you actually don’t. Neither can your company appear open to innovation from the outside, if the inside management and staff are reluctant to embrace this new way of doing business. If the core management is reluctant to change, then perhaps a social media-rich company culture is not a genuine enough proposition for your company.
