“Everybody’s Talking! Are You Listening? How Social Media Technology Brings Online Conversations to You” by Jeffrey Cohen

Jeffrey Cohen's B2B Social Media Book

Question: Is it true that everyone is in sales?

Answer: Yes, and if they know what’s good for them, they better be!

Incentivizing Sales Across Your Entire Organization

Relying exclusively on traditional sales processes driven by “salespeople” is inhibiting your company’s growth potential. Your technicians, the subject matter experts in their respective disciplines, are an untapped source of sales revenue with a much better close rate than your typical 1099. Why? Because customers trust the doer more than the seller.

More and more companies have started empowering technicians to sell by harnessing the power of social media. Incentivizing sales across your organization will encourage team members to productize and share their knowledge online and off in hopes of generating commissions. Social media sites, trade shows, trips to the bar, etc. all become an opportunity for technicians to sell their capabilities.

Within three to six months, people you previously slotted as technicians will have grown equity in themselves by advertising their expertise through sites like LinkedIn and Facebook. The result? Increased sales for you and an extra paycheck for them.

Over time, the published and productized knowledge your technicians share online will perpetually generate sales from customers sourcing subject matter experts – not salesmen. As a strategic marketing solutions executive, I’ve seen firsthand how opening up a “social sales enterprise” can significantly increase business opportunities.

Social DNA

Initial returns from socially integrated sales organizations are showing promise; however, the tools of the trade have yet to catch up with companies seeking to make social networking part of their corporate DNA. The old workhorses, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems, have especially fallen behind the development curve.

Enterprise level CRM systems from SugarCRM to Salesforce.com recently began to awkwardly integrate social into customer lists and at the contact detail level.  However, CRM software disregards the fact that many prospective customers do not engage brands through the traditional sales funnel. Customers are more likely to initiate an equitable exchange with a person, on there terms, versus responding to artificial engagements driven by a faceless corporate entity.

Companies Don’t Do Business with Companies

Social media is literally redefining how we sell. To prognosticate, the role of the salesman will evolve such that the people responsible for closing sales MUST truly becoming active, contributing social professionals in their respective trade or area of expertise.  A salesperson’s vested stake in social groups, industry associations, forums, blogs and other media will directly impact their ability to find and convert leads in the social network ecosystem.

Companies must wrestle with the fact that no one wants to speak with a salesperson when they can network and connect with a professional. As social media adoption grows among buyers, sellers will be forced to adapt company culture to promote buyer/technician relationships.

People Must be the Value Proposition

Social media works best in business when there is an equitable exchange.  We “like” and “follow” content because we see value, interest or amusement in what was delivered.  Businesses of all sizes must ensure EVERY team member understands your company’s value proposition, elevator pitch and the marketable value of their respective role when connecting with clients – both online and off.

Sales professionals who do not “pay the price” to learn their trade, sharpen their saw and dive into their most relevant social and online networks will be challenged to be considered an expert.  We very simply cannot afford to live outside of social networks and expect to sell as efficiently as we used to.

Technology to the Rescue

Emerging software like Nimble is giving SMBs scalable, low-cost options to connect every employee and potential customer into the sales communication process. How? By using the one strategy that absolutely cements social’s inevitable penetration into even the most stubborn enterprises; unifying social media and traditional email into one inbox.

Communications efficiency will ultimately demand that all inbound direct communications be consolidated into one interface. Everyone from the sales team to technicians will have an opportunity to directly respond to social media-generated inquiries. Your entire organization becomes your customer service department, customer retention department and sales department, all without adding overhead. 

It Works, We Proved It

My organization has an initiative called “Operation 3X” where each employee is given a PERSONAL (yet company-owned) social CRM account.  All employees are encouraged to actively participate in online communities that involve their respective disciplines. Content strategists and other specialists live, learn and network on the company dime in exchange for one expectation; they learn the company playbook and share their brand aligned knowledge with peers and clients.

We schedule monthly meetings to give team members the opportunity to share experiences, knowledge and leads gained through social communities. The 3X stands for a goal where each employee triples their network of peer and client contacts each year. The ultimate strategic goal of these efforts is for each employee to generate three times their income in sales each year.

Our results have been amazing. Every team member has a percentage stake in generated business and receives a guaranteed raise when they hit their 3X mark. In less than one year, this program has grown to account for more than 10% of our annual new account sales and double digit increases in bookings from existing customers.

Overall, social media has a place in an enterprise and certainly in a sales organization.  The technology to fully integrate social into companies of all sizes is literally months away and the rules are changing such that everyone can and should be a driver of business.  It can be and should be in our personal and corporate DNA.

The Social Imperative: Why Online Businesses Must Adapt — Presentation Transcript

• 1. The following slideshow was presented by Gigya’s CEO Patrick Salyer at Murmuration 2012 Learn More About The Industry Collective: Like the Industry Collective on Facebook Follow Industry Collective on Twitter Check out the Industry Collective Website for all the latest news
• 2. Trend 1: Social is “The Next Search” Referral Traffic Social Networks vs. Google 26% 15% 21% 6% 21% 17% 19% 16% 18% 5% 16% 7% 15% 6% Social Networks 14% Google 5% 13% 10% 13% 9% 11% 8% 9% 5% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
• 3. Trend 2: Lifestreaming
• 4. Trend 3: People are bringing their “real” identity online
• 5. Trend 4: It’s all about the influencers
• 6. Trend 5: Users want personalized social experiences
• 7. Trend 6: Users want to interact with friends
• 8. Trend 7: Social game mechanics drive engagement
• 9. Sites need to reconfigure for social to be successful Leverage Social APIs Facebook Connect Twitter for Websites LinkedIn Connect Google + Leverage Social Plugins
• 10. Connect to the Social APIs &Gain Access to Social Identity
• 11. Social Login – Gateway to Rich Social Data
• 12. Social Login – Authorization – Permission Based
• 13. Social Login – Access Rich Social Identity Data
• 14. Social Identity Data – Profile, Friends, Interests & Activities
• 15. The Connected Experience:Leverage Social Plugins to DriveOn-Site Engagement
• 16. Social Activity Feed
• 17. Social Content Creation
• 18. Social Interaction
• 19. Social Gamification
• 20. Snapshot of a users social data Profile Information Name: John Smith Email: email@gmail.com Gender: Male Birthday: 08/18/83 Location: New York, NY Education: Stanford Graduate Marital Status: Single Interest Graph Interests: Marathons, Surf Trips, Web Design, Music Festivals, NY Sports, World Cup Activities: running, surfing, soccer, camping, kayaking Music: 50 Cent, Run DMC, Black Eyed Peas, Foo Fighters, U2, Kanye West Movies: Inception, The Shining, Jaws, Caddyshack, Seven, Forrest Gump TV Shows: Parks and Recreation, The League, The Soup, The Colbert Report Books: Steve Jobs, Hunger Games, Outliers Games: Farmville, Medal of Honor, Assassins Creed, Madden, Angry Birds, Gears of War Social Graph # of Friends: 222 # of Followers: 4,256 # of Connections: 500+
• 21. Email Marketing Integration Profile Information Name: John Smith Email: email@gmail.com Gender: Male Birthday: 08/18/83 Location:New York, NY Education: Stanford Graduate Marital Status: Single Interest Graph Interests: Marathons , Surf Trips, Web Design, Music Festivals, NY Sports, World Cup running, surfing, soccer, camping, kayaking Activities: Music: 50 Cent, Run DMC, Black Eyed Peas, Foo Fighters, U2, Kanye West Movies: Inception, The Shining, Jaws, Caddyshack, Seven, Forrest Gump TV Shows: Parks and Recreation, The League, The Soup, The Colbert Report Books: Steve Jobs, Hunger Games, Outliers Games: Farmville, Medal of Honor, Assassins Creed, Madden, Angry Birds, Gears of War Social Graph # of Friends: 222 # of Followers: 4,256 # of Connections: 500+
• 22. Product Recommendation EngineProfile InformationName: John SmithEmail: email@gmail.comGender: MaleBirthday: 08/18/83Location: New York, NYEducation: Stanford GraduateMarital Status: SingleInterest GraphInterests: Marathons, Surf Trips, Web Design, MusicFestivals, NY Sports, World CupActivities:running, surfing, soccer, camping, kayakingMusic: 50 Cent, Run DMC, Black Eyed Peas, FooFighters, U2, Kanye WestMovies: Inception, TheShining, Jaws, Caddyshack, Seven, Forrest GumpTV Shows: Parks and Recreation, The League, TheSoup, The Colbert ReportBooks: Steve Jobs, Hunger Games, OutliersGames: Farmville, Medal of Honor, AssassinsCreed, Madden, Angry Birds, Gears of War, FIFA 2011Social Graph# of Friends: 222# of Followers: 4,256# of Connections: 500+
• 23. Results?
• 24. Social Login and Engagement Metrics On average, sites see an 23% overall increase in registrations by 23% after implementing Social Login. On average, users who 52% login with a social identity spend 52% more time on site than a traditional site user. On average, users who 179% interact with social applications view 179% more pages on site than users who do not interact.Source: *Gigya Analysis; December 2011
• 25. Gigya’s integrated, end-to-end social infrastructure
• 26. Gigya’s Super Social API • One implementation • Automatic updates in the cloud • Support for new providers • Support for account linking +22 more providers • Multiple SDKs (REST, JS, AS, Mobile)
• 27. Gigya supports 1 billion unique users across 500+ clients
• 28. Thank You Patrick Salyer Email: patrick@gigya.com Twitter: @patricksalyer Call us at: 650.353.7230 or email: sales@gigya.com

Add Joshua on G+

Optimizing your G+ profile is quite possibly the best use of your time on social networks at the moment. Here is the ‘how and why’ of what we recommend you do to take advantage of things.

Why it’s important

Your G+ profile is displayed when one of a few things happens. The most common being that someone searches for something in Google and results are returned from their G+ network (in the way of profiles or shared content), when you as an author have a ‘rich snippet’ tied to an article you wrote, or when someone simply searches for your name. With this latest change, all of these things are increasingly important to your SEO efforts. Remember, with G+, you really do have to treat yourself as a brand.

G+ Profile in Search Results

Metadata still counts

Google+ uses the following formula to generate the meta name=”description” tag:

Your Name + Headline + Position + Company + Current City + Introduction

Here are the steps you should take in order to make the most of G+:

1. Decide where (and what) you’d like to rank for
1. Do you do most of your business in your hometown, or the large city where your office is? This makes a difference when you add a current location.
2. Are you looking for freelance work, a job, or aiming to promote your company page? Keep this in mind when looking for keywords and job titles to use in your profile
2. Do a little research
1. Just like traditional keyword research, look for higher volume, lower competition words and phrases
2. Pay attention to one variable – the fact that people are probably more likely to click through personal profiles when seeking to expand their network (that means city searches, and occupational searches may be much more valuable than generic phrases), and business pages are more likely to be clicked on when someone is looking for a service.
3. Complete your Profile
1. It may sound ridiculous, but when we say “complete”, we mean it. G+ uses bits and pieces of your entire profile to determine the best way to display you and your content in search results.
2. Pay attention to your length of text – especially in your headline, as it appears that hidden information isn’t so relevant when searching inside of G+, although it’s all used in the meta tag for public searches
3. Make sure to add the proper URLs to your profile. There are (2) types of links that affect search results for someone in your network:
1. The ‘Other profiles’ will give Google a clue as to where your Twitter account and Facebook profile or pages live, and will affect subsequent search results
2. The ‘Contributor to’ field will let Google know where you publish content.

NOTE: Make sure you link to an actual author profile page, and not just the blog or publication page. This along with some optimization and rel=”me” and rel=”author” tagging on that linked profile page is required for Google to display rich snippets

Rich Snippets in Google Search

Other Important Steps

1. Optimize outside of G+
1. Connect your other profiles to your G+ profile by adding links where possible
2. Although Google may or may not take it into account for individuals, make sure to be consistent – there is no sense in telling Facebook you live in Monaco and G+ that you live in Arkansas and in the case of a business profile this is likely to have a negative effect
2. Engage, engage, engage
1. Lastly, there is no point to any of this if you don’t build your personal network on G+, so start building circles and contributing to conversations.
2. Try building location or interest specific circles so you can build influence in your own area or the area you do most of your business. For example, for a freelance PHP developer doing mostly local work you might start engaging with people you know are closely related to small business associations in the area and adding their members to your own segmented circles. As more and more business people in the area add you to a circle, you are more likely to be returned as a search result that magic day when they go to Google and type in “freelance PHP developers”.

Other involved parties are rumored to include the associations NAMA, PRSA, NTC, Chamber of Commerce, IABC, AAF, and a few others.

For more information, keep tabs and pre-register at the Industry Collective Website