One of the challenges in measuring the ROI of social media marketing is that the use of social networking and social sharing tools isn’t confined to the marketing group. Social media is being used in multiple functions across the enterprise, from product development (e.g. through co-creation and crowdsourcing) and customer service (Best Buy and Comcast for example) to human resources (outstanding HR tweeps: Sharlyn Lauby and Alicia Arenas) and sales groups. Although the efforts may be separate, success (or failure) in one area can certainly impact the effectiveness of social media efforts in other areas; for example, developing a reputation for delivering reliable customer service through social media channels will almost certainly help make social media marketing and sales efforts more rewarding.
In terms of revenue generation, the effective use of social media by both sales and marketing teams is critical. It may be even more important in sales, as sales professionals deal with prospects as individuals (the level where social media can be most impactful) while marketers still for the most part deal with prospects in groups. The opportunities to use social media in the sales process are limited only by the creativity of sales pros, but three critical areas stand out.
The first is for the sales team to understand what their own company is doing with social media, and how customers and key influencers are responding. This means working closely with marketing to understand both what messages are being communicated and how the market is reacting. If customers are praising the company’s service through social media channels, that is a strength the sales person can play to. If they are pointing out quality issues with a specific product, that’s an issue that members of the sales team need to be prepared to address. Sales professionals will be more productive with a solid understanding of the social media monitoring, interaction and promotion activities being conducted by the marketing group.
For more information on essential tactics for social media use by sales pros, see my recent guest post on the Your Sales Management Guru blog.
Great information. Although I have a great interest in marketing, I am a salesperson. In my experience, I have found there to be varying degrees of disconnect between Sales and Marketing. This never made sense to me since these two areas are integral to making the other effective. I’m glad to see you address this issue.
Brian
Thanks Brian! It really is critical for the two groups to work together, particularly to make any type of marketing automation or lead nurturing process effective.
While there are ways companies can leverage more sales via social media, they need to realize that consistency is what makes it happen.
Social media is the best platform for marketing. Today, marketers are widely using various social media platforms to create awareness of their brand among customers and new users. It is the fastest medium of promotion. definitely, social media helps marketers to generate more leads and more the number of leads more will be the probability of sale and more profit.
It needs to be part of the mix, certainly. Social media isn’t always best for direct lead gen, but supports other search and content marketing efforts.