Typical of a lot of marketing, social media strategic plans are usually missing the complete ‘plan’ and ‘strategy’! Because it is so easy and inexpensive to start with social networks, people usually rush to create ‘tactics’ (detailed actions) without any direction (mission/ goals/ objectives), research (environmental scanning) & analysis (SWOT) , Segmentation/ targeting/ positioning. After all of these steps, strategy is finally formulated. Once the social media strategy is in place and providing a broad direction and action, very specific and detailed ‘tactics’ are created. This is suppose to be followed by detailed execution and evaluation phases. Many of the steps in planning are usually skipped over by going directly to creating content at the micro-level, or tactics.
Unfortunately, the concepts of strategic planning and ‘strategy’ are widely misinterpreted, misunderstood and inappropriately applied. For example, most people put the horse before the cart and become impatient to get to the tactical level. They immediately start signing up for social networks or engaging in creating content for social media channels.
It is good to remember that the word ‘strategy’ is derived from the Greek word, ‘strategos’ , which means ‘the art of the general activities’ versus ‘tactic’ from the Greek word, ‘taktike’, that means ‘organizing and using the army in detail’. Most of the development of ‘strategy’ came from military activities thousands of years ago. Strategic planning took strategy formulation, execution and evaluation and created a process that determines an organization’s goals and then identifying the best step-by-step approach for achieving those goals. It can become a highly flexible discipline for making decisions that determine what an organization is, what it does, why it does it and where it is going in the future. Social media activities deserve a well-thought out plan.
The beginning of ‘strategy’ becomes the ‘thinking’ and ‘analysis’ components of strategic planning that provides an overall purpose, direction, intent, vision, mission, goals and measurable objectives. Then based upon all of this foundation and market research/ analysis strategies and tactics are created to satisfy select goals and objectives, reach select targets and provide a step-by-step execution guideline.
A ‘strategy’ does not, however, tell us exactly how to achieve the goal or go in a specific direction. Strategy is usually broad and shapes the eventual tactics and execution. It is more flexible, fluid and interactive while a tactic offers specificity, action, order, steps and can be rather rigid. Therefore, strategy is the culmination of prior decisions and analysis to provide the strategic plan with broad steps, direction and policies for outcome attainment. Hopefully, a successful strategy strives to add value for the targeted stakeholders by consistently satisfying their needs better than any other organization.
Social media has matured to the point where marketers are no longer asking ‘If’ it should be part of the marketing communications mix but ‘How’ and ‘Where’ they should participate. They are moving in 2010-2011 from the trial phase to the strategic execution phase of the strategy learning curve. However, before allocating significant resources in formulating, implementing and evaluating social media campaigns, a well-thought out strategic plan is necessary. This means that organizations cannot immediately jump in and sign up for specific social networks and create content without a plan that has identified and created strong social media strategies.
