Follow me on twitter
Facebook
Building a social media strategy around products worth talking about
April 27th, 2009
Social media can be extremely profitable for businesses or individuals, and while it is easy to think so, it is not the solution to all your problems. Social media is highly ineffective if you don’t work first on the core aspect of your business: your products. More and more, I have to explain the benefits of a social media strategy and a strong presence on the Web, but it can sometimes be hard as I think a web strategy can be highly ineffective if the products or the services a business have to offer aren’t worth talking about. The good news is that your products don’t necessarily need to be uniques for people to talk about them: sometimes, a unique offering just does the trick.
Understanding social media
With traditional media, advertising is “very simple”: pay to put your products directly into people’s face, whether they want it or not. On the opposite, while it is true that social media is probably a cheaper way to advertise and can be a lot more effective, people have to “accept” your products for it to work properly.
Social media is a cheaper and better way to advertise if you have a quality product or an original product worth talking about. That’s the whole point of using social media: you take the bet that by having a social presence and that by providing new ways for your customers and potential customers to interact with you, they will try what you have to offer and eventually spread the word on their own network. Social networks are only platforms giving a voice to regular people: information does spread faster and on a larger scale, but it is driven by real people and they won’t spread the word about your products if they’re not worth it.
Work on your products before killing your business on the Web
The worst mistake a business can make is to go social too early. Going social with crappy products can only kill a brand, there’s no way it’s going to help it. Whether a business offer high end products or cheap products is not the question, there is a niche for all kind of products and businesses. The real question is: how can you make your products “special” enough for people to talk about them?
Let’s face it, a lot of businesses sell the exact same products. There’s a lot of car companies selling more or less the same cars and a lot of coffee companies selling more or less the same kind of coffee. So, the first step is to stop thinking your products are unique, unless they REALLY are. For most people on the Web, you’re just another coffee, car or web hosting company, nothing else. So, how are you going to have people talk about your products if for them you’re just another company?
So far, we have two important questions to answer, all related to your products:
How can you make your products “special” enough for people to talk about them?
How are you going to have people talk about your products if for them you’re just another company?
So, it all comes down to your products being just like your competitors’ products and your business being just another business for most people. Of course, the best thing would be to have every business work on their products and make them unique, but unfortunately it’s not always possible. So, if you can’t work on your products, how can you make them unique?
If you can’t make your products unique, create a unique offering
Well, if you can’t make your products unique, work on a unique offering around them. Take Volkswagen for example with their new Routan minivan. There are a lot of companies selling minivans, but Volkswagen managed to create something unique around their minivan with a “Baby maker“:
That’s right, you take two pictures and the “baby maker” will make a baby for you! It is obviously targeted at women and you can imagine how easy it is to spread on twitter, Facebook or whatever social network. This is a great example (thanks to @shoesandbooks) of a unique offering around a product that is not so unique. Then, people work for you and spread the word.
We don’t have money
I agree, not all businesses have the money to develop a baby maker. This is where creativity comes into play, but yes, sometimes the best strategies have a price.
Once the word spread, people will try
Once the word start spreading, people will try your products and this is exactly where having quality products matters. You got the people to try your business because of your unique products or unique offering, but now you can’t afford to offer a crappy product or service. If you don’t meet people’s expectations, they simply won’t talk about you.
33 Responses to “Building a social media strategy around products worth talking about”
What do you think?
Subscribe : A new sketch every morning
Receive this blog in your inbox by entering your email address:
Good stuff.
Enjoyed reading your article.
Great article and by the way – the Baby maker is hilarious
Thank you! Yep the baby maker is very funny & a good viral tool
Good points, Ben. It is useless to become a Social Media magnet if your product sucks. All that time will be wasted because you have successfully created a way to drown your business and brand with crappy products or services.
A good social media plan and execution is no substitute for good products and services. Many of us might not want to hear that, but it is true.
Also, I am feeling the new site colors and the fact that you are going with BenTremblay.com. Good move, you are working hard to brand yourself and this is really going to help.
Kill it!!!!
Thank you Freddie for the comment! Yep, I switched everything to BenTremblay.com and yes, it is a "personal branding move". I'm going to have a french section on the site also and probably a "business section" with my services, etc. It's going to become more of a portal as it grows.
Crusshhhing it!
Certainly a good example of a viral marketing campaign there.
I don't know if getting examples of viral marketing is the best idea. It's virtualy impossible to predict what and why will go viral. Sure some things have more potential than others but it's still impossible to be 100% sure.
But you need to be careful about what you do to attract people. I work on a real estate site and it's been suggested I should build a Flash game to draw people in, since I'm good at building them. I always have to explain that a Flash game would not bring in the right kind of people to populate a site about million dollar real estate and that it might even make us look bad in the eyes of our real targets.
But I do think the baby maker brings in the right people. You just need to be careful about being unique with a business.
You are absolutely right Erica, it is important to bring the right people (targeted traffic) to your site, otherwise it won't help.
Again, it's all about what you do with the flash game. If it's some sort of "build your dream home" game or something like that…it could work.
Thanks for your comment.
Hello
This is really a good post. My comment here? Thanks for the great post. A blog owner will be appreciated if a visitor write valuable comment and you are able for this
Yup..a very good post indeed..But I don't agree about bring non-targeted traffic around the application.Suppose to have a right targeting if want to use creativity between application that can we use in social media platform.Otherwise, no use to develop then.
I believe that all the target you bring in should be targetted and should help that person otherwise it is a waste or yours and their time
Fun little app, I'm sure it attracted a lot of links.
Oh wow, this is linkbait at it's finest!
Absolutely, I'm sure it worked very well…
Ok Ben you really got my attention with the "Baby maker" that i just had to click the link! and yes I agree with you, when your product suck, it is practically a waste of time and social media won't do you any good.
I know, the baby maker is so targeted at women!
"hat’s the whole point of using social media: you take the bet that by having a social presence and that by providing new ways for your customers and potential customers to interact with you, they will try what you have to offer and eventually spread the word on their own network. Social networks are only platforms giving a voice to regular people: information does spread faster and on a larger scale, but it is driven by real people and they won’t spread the word about your products if they’re not worth it."
Exactly. This is the part that most people miss, believing instead that the Internet in general and social media specifically is some type of magic bean that will bloom a beanstalk to the sky. Nope, sorry. It's still quality people with quality products that will rise to the top.
Absolutely. It's no different than real life, except it's almost impossible with social media to push really bad products while it's possible with traditional advertising. Quality wins!
The baby maker is hilarious hahahah
Very well said. The post is sure informative and i agree with what you said that If you can’t make your products unique, create a unique offering. Thanks for sharing this with all.
I'm so agree with you, thank you for sharing this information!
Agree that we should have confidence in our product first and then socialize to promote it.Best to have good reviews that no reviews.
I just believe in one thing sell the unique products with effective marketing. Social Media is no doubt helpful but if your product already broadcasted by someone than you are wasting your time.
nice one… lol i mean the babymaker….. cool
definitely this one explains everything
Many people gets confused about social media websites. Social media websites are strongly profitable for business and companies to promote products and it also used to market websites. mainly SEO can do many things with social media websites
Hi, verry nice page.. Thanks.
Hi, verry nice page.. Beautiful knowledge Thanks.
hey, please anyone can tell me more about social media strategy??
You can do many things with Social media and networking. Its a great strategy to interact with people by social media. I agree with you. Really nice post. Thanks
Thanks for posting. Social media must have first, a strategic approach on how to do their stuffs. Thinking it over and aver and in the end putting the strategy into action.
That is the one great thing about social media, once it starts spreading, others will do your work for you! But that can also be bad too if you're product is not good. I know in recent times, there was a movie that did really well on the first day, but everyone posted badly about it across social media websites, and the afterwords not many people went to see the movie in comparisons to the opening day.
Till then,
Jean