Practitioners Workshop: Using Social Media for Satellite Marketing

In this workshop, we introduce the concept, principles and process of “Satellite Marketing“.

This highly interactive workshop provides lessons demonstrate and teach participants strategy for their products or services to;

• Utilize social media, networks and functionality for marketing
• Develop relationships with prospects, customers, industry and media
• Promote the sampling and sales of products and services
• Supplement traditional media planning with social media planning
• Increase brand awareness, participation, engagement, reach and audience

Conventional Marketing Diagram v1

The Limitations of Conventional Marketing (15:00)

Conventional marketing uses traditional “in the box” thinking; Marketing, Advertising, Internet, Public Relations, Branding, Design, Multimedia, and Events. The web site URL is added to every piece and the site is updated with the appropriate content, or an offer-specific page is added as a unique destination to track response rates.

The premise is that a prospect will want to read or listen to a sales pitch.

As simple as this sounds, the communications process is complex, and this has historically had meager rates.  Industry lore recounts the prospect usually engages 1 out of every 3 instances, and require in excess of 9 engagements to actually move the prospect towards the call to action. That means it takes 27 instances of communication to get a prospect to the decision point; to buy or not to buy. The Achilles heel of this plan is that there are many steps from the content to the prospect. This only adds to the expense, in time and money, and slows, even impedes, the implementation.

• The print ad in the newspaper with the URL  has to be read on the day / week that it runs.
• The email has to get through the spam filter and not be deleted then be compelling enough to get a click.
• The press release has to be picked up by the news source that the prospect reads.
• The printed brochure has to get into the hands of the prospect and compel the prospect to get online and engage.

To augment the inadequate traffic conversions for conventional marketing clients invest in add-ons, like Search Engine Optimization to supplement the poor conversion numbers. Although enough traffic could eventually hit the number of prospects (leads) required / desired, most businesses can’t afford to buy enough leads (or get them).

And all of these types of engagement are are usually seen for what they are by the prospect: Another self-serving marketing message with little credibility. Is there really any surprise in the reaction to this type of communication? How do you react to unsolicited emails, phone calls, text messages, and junk mail?

The Opportunities within Satellite Marketing™ (15:00)

Satellite Marketing is a strategy that refers to the use of smaller, faster, moving instances of communications to engage prospects where they already exist. Strategically placed (and re-purposed) communications content from existing brochures, ads, web sites, public relations, branding, design, multimedia and events on social media sites are set in “orbit” around the prospect with the same diligence as traditional media but with greater credibility, and with the promise of a customer relationship.

Social Media Categories Diagram v1

Social media sites can be categorized into one or more of the following based on their users, community, functionality and media including;

• (m)icor-blogging
• (s)ocial networks
• (e)vents
• (bo)okmarking
• (b)logging
• (p)hoto sharing
• (ppt)sharing
• (v)ideo sharing
• (v)ideo streaming
• (w)idgets
• (m)iscellaneous

Marketing tag lines, logos, product images, advertising headlines, brochure content, email offers, video, press materials and event schedules can all be applied purposefully to the common form fields found in user profiles and company profiles; name, company, about me, email, image (user icon), links, etc.

In lieu of intrusive marketing, each satellite has a process for participation. Netiquette, protocol, call it strategy. Your behavior in the environment will dictate your success. Transparency (or translucency), in this instance, means that you cannot hide who you are or what you are doing here. Authenticity dictates that you be you; commission salesman, secretary, brand manager.

These sites often share technologies (RSS, API, etc) that enable them to inter-connect and share between each other. This interconnection can broadcast content to an opt-in audience, share and distribute content to a clearinghouse, and multiply marketing efforts exponentially.

Satellite Marketing Diagram v1

The Satellite Marketing™ Process

1. Identify Your Target Market(s) (30:00)

As with any plan you have to know who you’re going after. Documented demographics provide the age, gender, race, and income level, while psychographics address personality, values, attitudes, interests, or lifestyles. Sometimes referred to as IAO variables (Interests, Attitudes, and Opinions), psychographics can be contrasted with demographics, behavioral variables (such as usage rate or loyalty), and bizographic variables (such as industry, seniority and functional area).

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

2. Strategy Development (30:00)

Knowing who you’re going after is important. Knowing where they are is too. And what will you do with them when you find them? Strategy development reviews, explores and selects the most appropriate social media sites to form unique opportunities with your prospects. All of them.

Each category of social media satellite provides options; different ways to get to different people. It also has the ability to engulf your budget of hours and manpower (or womanpower) so finding a balance, being purposeful in your selection and avoiding overkill is important. Identifying roles and responsibilities helps reduce the duplication of effort, and scheduling confirms sales cycles and seasonality, as well as the right communication at the right time is happening as the relationship and technologies require.

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

3. Satellite Development (30:00)

Developing a successful satellite to target your markets is dependent upon the communications assets you have to build it. Its also dependent upon the adaptation of its options, features and technology provided. User names, profile images, links, descriptions, and text fields addressing about me, favorites, hobbies, hometown, status, et al infer asset assignment. Understanding the differences and opportunities between personal, personnel and company profiles can be the difference between Sputnik and Sky Lab.

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

4. Satellite Deployment (30:00)

Launching a satellite starts with the “save profile” button. The user name is now in the community database, listed as “recently joined”, and presented to the rest of the community for engagement. Review each profile in different browsers. Inter-connect each satellite with as many of the others as possible (and practical). This provides exponential return on the manual hours of each communication effort. For instance, when properly configured a video post at 12Seconds.tv updates Twitter with a tweet, a web site from a widget, a Facebook profile and a LinkedIn profile.

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

5. Participation (30:00)

As much as you may want to jump right in there and start creating customers – DON’T! The first thing you want to do is get aclamated to the environment – just listen, watch, learn. Users no longer want or respond to a heavy handed sales pitch. Satellite marketing engages the prospect on their terms, where they live, when they want. Understand that each satellite environment will be different so repeating this process each time keeps you from assuming that one is just like the other. They are not. LinkedIn is a professional environment so don’t do anything that you wouldn’t do at work. Facebook is a personal site, so watch talking business when you’ve run into a neighbor. Use the professional manners and the social graces you’ve learned in your face-to-face world guide your decisions in your marketing efforts.

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

6. Measurement (30:00)

Eventually, someone is going to ask, “how are we doing?” How will you be able to respond if you don’t have some sort of measurement. Many will turn first to a common benchmark; sales. Although a perfectly acceptable unit most sales are not easily attributal to the actions of social media. More often a negotiate metric is a better measurement. Some thing discussed and agreed upon that if some amount of something happens. For instance, the increase of friends or connections would be indicative of how many impressions you are making. The views of a video or photos are clearly valid exposures. Most accurate is a rubric. Borrowed from education, it is a scoring tool for subjective assessments like performance on a social media site. Rubrics allow for standardised evaluation according to specified criteria, making grading simpler and more transparent.

• Questions & Answers
• Group Exercise

“The term “Satellite Marketing™” is a trade name developed by Kevin Popovic and used by him and Ideahaus, LLC, to describe the business process described herein. All rights to the term are reserved, and you may use the term only with the permission of, or proper accreditation to Kevin Popovic and Ideahaus, LLC.”