With so much noise in the social media space, it can be hard for smaller brands to get their message across. Here are some top tips to make your presence count

Social media platforms have huge potential to foster innovation in businesses of any size. They offer a space in which companies and individuals can benefit from having access to creative clusters of professionals who are willing to share their ideas.

However, this creative stock of ideas is very difficult to properly exploit, because there is also a huge level of fragmentation: the conversations are going on everywhere, all the time, and it can seem that you need significant resources to explore these virtual spaces properly.

However, small businesses can adopt some strategies learned from large corporations, in order to benefit from social media innovation.

Be in the right places

Big companies have the resources to invest in having a broad presence in the social media sphere. SMEs start from the opposite perspective, of working with fewer resources.

The best strategy in this case is to focus your attention on the social media spaces in which interesting content is more likely to appear, either from current and potential customers, or from other conversations. Instead of trying to be everywhere, an SME should start with cultivating a community in one or two social media channels at the most.

The company should investigate where its current and potential customers are, and design a strategy to reach them. A company which sell services to other companies, or small consultancies and professional firms, for instance, may find it is easier to connect using LinkedIn as the main social network.

The company should focus on matters that interest audiences. Big companies have realised social media is a space for marketing, but people become very tired of marketing-only interactions. Time is a scarce resource on social media: there are so many things to be seen and read, so people become selective about the conversations they wish to engage in. The only way of really engaging people is to start conversations which are in their interest. High quality, relevant content, from the perspective of a particular audience, is necessary to attract people to the virtual space, in order then to encourage their participation and for innovative ideas to emerge. People need to perceive a direct benefit of being connected to that particular space.

Cultivate customer communities

In addition to sharing interesting content, it is necessary to go a step further to benefit from the innovative ideas given by customers and potential customers.

Ideas come organically in any healthy community. In addition, companies may encourage the generation of ideas, for instance, by posting questions about the areas they believe it is possible to foster development. A simple question to the community may trigger an interesting discussion, bringing innovative ideas to the fore.

People give contributions when they believe their opinion matters, and when they believe their ideas will benefit themselves or others in some way. Translating these aspects into action, companies should keep up the dialogue with contributors. When a suggestion comes, the company always should give feedback, motivating the same people and others to participate.

Competitions and polls are also interesting ways of benefiting from the engagement with virtual communities. Polls are a more straightforward method for discovering particular opinions when the company already has an idea about the options to be tested with customers. In general, a poll offers a closed set of questions, thus it only works when the company wants to ask specific questions.

Competitions are more open, mostly starting from a problem to be solved, which allow contributors to bring a larger variety of ideas, from different perspectives. For instance, an SME may open a competition to choose a new logo or a new slogan for the company.

Additionally, companies should give a sort of reward to those customers who have given useful ideas. A straightforward gift (money, products or services) may be an easy solution, but is not always appropriate or possible. Especially in competitions, a gift reward may be the best option. In any case, the contributor should be praised publicly for the benefit the idea has brought to the company – and even better to the whole community – improving the quality of a product or a service. Some big companies even keep track of the best contributors, and regularly call them to networking gatherings. This is a good idea: invite the best contributors to an event, to share ideas and feedback with the company and other contributors.

Be prepared for the downside

Big companies know very well that social media can also damage their reputation. This may also happen with SMEs. Any space of interaction can bring great ideas for innovation, which may be utilised. It may also bring to light strong criticisms. Thus companies should be prepared to cope with both, with a high level of professionalism. In addition, companies need to be very diplomatic in coping in a sensible and sensitive way with those vocal contributors who have not much to say.

Magda David Hercheui is senior lecturer in project management at Westminster Business School, editor of New Media Knowledge

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