If you didn't know any better, you'd think it was Paris in 1789. The old regime has been toppled, and social media gurus are telling you that the revolution has come, and you have to let go of your brand and let consumers own it.

Nonsense. You can open up your brand without letting go of it. You can use social media to engage consumers and other influential groups in an open, spirited online conversation in which you set the ground rules. Some companies are implementing free-for-all social media experiences that allow everyone in the company to participate. These are wonderful experiments in Jeffersonian democracy, but they don't offer much in the way of useful content or communications, and they don't seem to have much connection to what the company does and what it stands for.

Your corporate blogs, for example, should be seen in the context of your overall communications strategy. Your bloggers are spokespeople for your company, and they are part of your brand experience. It's OK to be selective about who blogs, and to give your bloggers some guidance on which topics to blog about, which ones to avoid, how to reinforce the brand and the company's strategy, and how to avoid making mistakes that could embarrass the company or its customers, or worse still, open the company to financial and legal risk.

There are dozens of other ways you can provide some structure and gentle leadership for your social media programs without inhibiting their spontaneity or relevance.

Be authentic

In the adolescence of the social media movement, sadly, many of the campaigns that have the most enduring effect have been those built on deceit. Edelman/Wal-Mart, Sony, and many other marquee companies have learned (one hopes) that you can't fake an engaged consumer experience. And while you're probably not contemplating the launch of a fake blog, there are steps you can take to ensure authenticity in your social media effort.

Start by keeping the messaging police at arm's length from your social media initiatives. Social media are communications tools, distinct from pure marketing vehicles. The marketing value of social media is in engaging customers, media, shareholders and others in a conversation that will improve perceptions of your company, its brand, its products and its leadership.  

And don't let marketing, or anyone else, ghostwrite your blog posts. Readers will see through this immediately, they won't come back, and many of them will openly criticize your company's communications.

Find authentic voices in your organization – articulate, engaged, enthusiastic people who can communicate something of interest to your community. Let your bloggers and podcasters share their areas of authority and comfort. If your CMO is an expert in corporate social responsibility, let him or her blog about that. Look outside the senior management team for interesting people with something worth saying. Find a systems administrator or a field sales rep who can blog or do a podcast. These people will engage with audiences your traditional media programs don't reach. If you could choose the most interesting person in your company, someone you would be willing to spend 30 minutes of your valuable time to sit down and chat with, who would that be? That person should be blogging.

Provide real value

You're in business, and the temptation is to think of all your communications channels as sales and marketing opportunities, but the culture of social media requires a more subtle approach. Sometimes it's OK to pitch your company's products and services. Maybe you've just announced a groundbreaking new technology, or you've had an impressive customer win. The most successful social media initiatives, however, develop a loyal and growing user community by minimizing hype in favor of a value-based content strategy.

Let's say you're in the storage industry. A genuine discussion of the application, architecture, and cost/benefit considerations of SAN vs. NAS vs. DAS, etc., fairly and fully exploring all the available options (whether your company offers them or not) would be extremely compelling to IT professionals, journalists and others.

If you think return-on-investment is important to customers, offer a vendor-neutral ROI calculator and an explanation of how to use it. If you give people real information they can use, they will value your communications and your company, they will return to your blogs and communities, and they will encourage others to do so.

Think business and communications strategy, not social media strategy

Don't do social media projects because they're cool, or you feel pressure to keep up with competitors. Your business and communications strategy should drive your choice of tactics. A sound communications strategy must achieve measurable business results. If social media can help you achieve these results, then they can be powerful business and communications tools. If not, then a new podcast or wiki might impress your colleagues with your social media prowess, but your management and your shareholders won't be so enthusiastic.

Choose your social media initiatives based on your audience, your message, your budget, your objectives and your overall strategy. Let's say your company makes chips for the video gaming industry. Your business goal for the first half is to grow your developer base by 30 percent. An online community for video gamers might be really cool, and could drive thousands of people to your site. But would it be an effective way to persuade developers to adopt your technology? Probably not. But a developer community would.

There, then, are a couple of ideas on how to make the most effective use of social media. I hope to have the chance to share many more with you, and to chat with you about your ideas on integrating social media with a corporate communications strategy.

Drop me a note and visit eastwikkers, our agency blog. I look forward to conversing with you.

Joel

joel@eastwick.com