4 Steps for Evaluating Social Marketing: Using MarketingSherpa’s Social Marketing ROAD Map as a Guide

Last week I wrote a post about MarketingSherpa’s Social Marketing ROAD Map Handbook which included eighteen lessons I learned from the report.

This is a true story. Yesterday morning I met a friend for coffee. She’s owned and operated a business in the design industry for many years where she’s worked with both B2B and B2C customers, and lately has grown more curious about social marketing.

My friend told me that she’s always been an early adopter of technology and has even been a little surprised that she hasn’t considered social marketing earlier. Like so many other business people, she hasn’t known where to begin.

It wasn’t until driving back to my office after the hour we spent together that I realized I had used the ROAD map as a way to walk her through the basics of social marketing. As a refresher, MarketingSherpa identified ROAD as Research, Objectives, Actions and Devices.

Here’s how we approached the topic together for her first time:

Research: My friend told me that she reads a number of blogs in the creative design industry and has for some time. There are blogs she’s come across which she thinks are excellent and others that in her opinion, don’t provide any value. This is an excellent first step and I suggested that she take it a step further by trying to identify what she thinks are good about the blogs she likes. What could she emulate in her own blog if she were to start one? What would be the topics and focus? What content would best demonstrate her firm’s expertise? What would set her company apart from others? Ongoing research of blogs and other social media channels will be an important part of the process.

Continue reading the full post on Impressions through Media.