Prof. Ashwin Malshe
Assistant Professor, Marketing Department ESSEC Business School 100 Victoria St, #13-02 National Library Building Singapore 188064
1 Social Media Marketing Syllabus Prologue Conversations are us Words are aplenty but inept Encrypted in each whisper is a message And thousands in a fleeting glimpse glimpse
When was the last time you conversed with someone? About anything...that new song you heard on the radio or the semester that is ahead of you? Anywhere…on the phone, in person, on Facebook? With anyone…friends, parents, siblings, or that random guy on the elevator? Perhaps you are conversing even now while reading this text! Conversations are fundamental to our existence. As human beings, we tried hard to achieve the ability to converse. We invented languages— languages—thousands of them— them—in order to make our communication efficient (Then we decided that words were too easy: “Talk is Cheap”). We continued continued to converse. That’s how we shared our stories with others—with others—with those who matter as well as with those who don’t. The conversations are already happening for ages— ages—by hand gestures, sounds, and written symbols. We evolved from meeting personally to writing letters to making phone calls to sending emails. And then we evolved again. We created the Internet and online social networks. This is the latest and the most evolved medium for conversations. This is the social medium. You and I are already already here. Now the firms want to join us too. They were part of our conversations in absentia. Now they want to take part in these conversations. The question is “Will they add value to our lives?” Remember that it is not us who are entering their world; it is the businesses that are knocking on our doors to let them in our social networks. As future employees, you will usher into the corporate world that is desperately trying to understand the conversations of its consumers. Their focus on social media is not just a fad or a spark in the pan. There is serious money riding on it. The businesses that ride this trend will survive or even thrive. The ones left behind will die. You want to join the living, thriving companies. You want to shun the ones that are dying, decaying. Embracing social media for businesses is not just a shift in the communication strategy. It is a part of the fundamental change in the corporate culture that is antiquated. It demands transparency. The consumer doesn’t want to be treated like a king, rather just a human being. But treating people like, say people, is the toughest task for the businesses. Their current marketing strategies are influenced by industrial manufacturing practices. “If the goods can be grouped together, why can’t be the people?” ask the marketers. They then segment the human race into “homogenous groups”—each groups”—each person in the segment is the same as the other. They position their brands in our minds— minds—every consumer perceives the brand the same way. This has to change. The businesses have to be more than just legal entities— entities—nexus of contracts. They are run by people for the people. It is high time we bring out the human elements within the businesses in order to converse with the consumers. Remember the consumers have a choice. If they don’t want, they will not include a “legal entity” in their social networks. Why in the
2 world should we share our interests with a cyborg? Why should we make our memories, pictures, and opinions, however plain they may be, available to a non-human? If businesses have to converse with humans, they have to become human. And converse they must! Because if they don’t, they will be left behind to fail and fade into the oblivion. Introduction
In a recent survey of the 100 largest la rgest Fortune Global 500 companies, public relations firm Burson-Marsteller (www.burson-marsteller.com www.burson-marsteller.com)) found that more than three-quarters (79%) of the top 100 companies are using at least one of the f our social media platforms: Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or corporate blogs. The study reported that people are following companies for news and information about the company, products, and promotions, to offer feedback, and to enga ge customer service. In another study, eMarketer reports that the US social media advertising spending will hit $2.0 billion. Clearly, social media marketing has emerged as an important marketing strategy. Course Objectives
In this course we will focus on understanding the following: • Why social medium has become important for the future of business • How can social media marketing strategies be constructed and implemented • What changes in the corporate culture are required • What the limitations of social media marketing marketing are • How to (or try to) measure the eff ectiveness ectiveness of social media strategies This course requires you to modify the current marketing strategies such as segmentation, targeting, and positioning. We will learn how the traditional business model of mass production of communication is meaningless and irrelevant in social networks. Course Requirements
• Reading, and lots of it. I will make available tons of articles every week. You will construct in your mind your own versions of the past, present, and future of social media and share with the rest of us in the class. • Carrying out a real life social media marketing project for a real business. More details about the project are given below. You should be able to design and implement a social strategy that involves different aspects of marketing strategies. You may need to overcome barriers within the organization and recommend changes in other aspects of the business such as human resources. • Attending the classes regularly and participating in the class discussions of case studies that will be assigned to you from time to time. • Creating and managing your own blog/website, setting up a Twitter account, etc. I will show you the tools to help you in this. You don’t need the knowledge of computer programming to do it.
3 Reading List
See the schedule for the mandatory reading list. Apart from these readings, you will be given news articles and reports from time to time. Here is a recommended reading list: Books
“The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web,” by Tamar Weinberg (ISBN-10: (ISBN-10: 0596156812) “Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies,” by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff (ISBN-10: 1422125009) “The Whuffie Factor: Using the Power of Social Networks to Build Your Business,” by Tara Hunt (ISBN-10: 0307409503) “The Dragonfly Effect: Quick, Effective, and Powerful Ways to Use Social Media to Drive Social Change,” by Jenifer Aaker and Andy Smith (ISBN-10: (ISBN-10: 0470614153) “Web Analytics 2.0: The Art of Online Accountability and Science of Customer Centricity,” by Avinash Kaushik (ISBN-10: 0470529393) “The HyperHyper-Social Organization: Eclipse Your Competition by Leveraging Social Media,” by Francois Gossieaux and Ed Moran (ISBN-10: 0071714022) Websites
Fast Company: http://www.fastcompany.com/ New York Times Business: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/business/index.html Blogs
Jeremiah Owyang: http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/ Mashable: http://mashable.com/ AMEX Open Forum: http://www.openforum.com/ Individual Assignment
There will be one individual assignment during the course. It will require you to describe a real life case of application of social media marketing strategies. The case can be a success or a failure. The report will have the following structure: Brief introduction introduction about about the business business and the the products products Why they decided to take social media route Description of their strategy strategy The discussion about the outcome — success success or failure Recommendations
4 You will not be required to take my approval for the topic of this paper before you start working. The report will be written in Times New Roman 12 point font size in double-space. The minimum length of the paper is 4 pages and the maximum length is 5 pages. The appendix with references to websites, videos, books, and articles doesn’t count toward the page limit.
Case Studies
There are three cases to be discussed in the class. For each case, the groups are required to submit a written solution (4 pages single side-single space, 12-point Times New Roman) before the class starts. The case will be thoroughly discussed along with related readings. Group Project
We will divide the students in groups of 4 with one group with 3 students. The group composition can be done randomly or you may choose your group mates. This will be done in in the first week of the classes. Each group has to work on the same real life project for a business. You don’t have to look for the business; I will get the project for you. The project will be assigned by a company which is interested in social media marketing. You are expected to start working on the project from the first week. The project will advance in the standard fashion: 1. You will meet the business managers to understand their business, the current business environment, their objectives for the long term, and what they want to achieve in the short term. 2. Based on this meeting, you will outline the objective of your social media strategy. Note that there will not be any specific action identified at this time. For example, you need not say that the objective is to get at least 500 fans on Facebook page. 3. You will meet the business managers to clarify that all of you are on the same page. At this point you are expected to make your course objective very clea r to them. You should be focusing only on the social media marketing aspect of their business. 4. In order to get a better understanding of the project you may have to conduct surveys to sense what people think about the business. 5. You will design a social media strategy for the business and present it to the class during the 10th sessions.
The group project carries 40% of your overall grade, which means that this is a very important part of your overall performance. The group as a whole will get the same grade for the project. Your evaluation will have three components: 1) what the managers think about your work, 2) what your classmates think about your work, and 3) what I think about your work. The group will create and maintain a blog of their group project. The blog will be updated at least once a week and disseminate information about their progress. The group may choose to use Twitter in addition to the blog.
5 Project Report
As part of your group project, you will submit a written report along with all the supporting material such as survey questionnaire (if used), raw data, etc. The report will be comprehensive. It will detail all the steps you have taken to complete the project. Ideally, you should start working on the project report right from the first week so that all the details about the project are captured. The project report will be 12-15 pages double-spaced double-spaced excluding all the tables, figures, graphs, and bibliography. You have complete liberty to choose the format of your report, e.g., font, color, etc. However, it should be professional looking since you are giving it to a business owner. Grading
Group Project Project Report Report Final Presentation Presentation Individual Assignment Case Studies Total
40 30 10 30 30 100
6 Schedule Session
1
Date
13-Aug
Time
1:30 PM
Topic
Introduction
Readings
Syllabus, Demystifying Social Media, Tribalization Of Society, What Sells CEOs On Social Networking Case Study: SAP, IBM CMO Study, Social Media? Get Serious! Chapter 3 From Share This!, The Unselfish Gene Social Media Content Strategy At Ayojak Chapters 5,6, And 7 From New Community Rules
2
14-Aug
9:00 AM
Social Media Strategy
3
16-Aug
9:00 AM
Guest Speaker
4
23-Aug
5:00 PM
Case Study 1
5
28-Aug
5:00 PM
Guest Speaker
Chapters 5,6, And 7 From New Community Rules
6
3-Sep
1:30 PM
Hands On With Facebook, Twitter, And Blogs Submission of Individual Assignment
7
7-Sep
1:30 PM
Case Study 2
Decathlon China- Using Social Media To Penetrate The Internet Market
8
10-Sep
1:30 PM
Social Media ROI/Metrics
A Strategy For Managing Social Media Proliferation, Can You Measure The ROI Of Your Social Media Marketing?, A Typology Of Social Media Crises, The True Costs Of Social Media
9
12-Sep
9:00 AM
Case Study 3
Mission Impossible- Measuring Social Media Return On Investment
10
14-Sep
1:30 PM
Final Presentations
