When marketers decide to use any marketing channel, they should always ladder back to the brand’s objectives. This is hardly a novel concept and is part of any strategic process, such as the famed Forrester POST methodology, that many use to determine a Social Marketing plan of action.

When it comes to Social Marketing specifically, those objectives can often range from increasing brand site engagement and traffic to Public Relations and everything in between. Just like any other channel, it can be used as a funnel for a variety of types of messaging that is targeted at a varying set of objectives.

Enter an interesting little chart (embedded here).

Like many other marketers, I subscribe to Marketing Sherpa’s Chart of the Week.  These handy charts often give a snapshot on one element going on in the world of marketing that they’ve done a broader research initiative surrounding.

I thought this week’s was particularly interesting. It measures the objectives, targeted and measured, by marketers within the social sphere. The big “aha” finding in this is that 3/4 of marketers claim that site traffic increase is one of their key objectives for deploying social tactics.

Marketing Sherpa’s conclusion is the same one that I would come to – while an increase in time on site, overall site traffic, SEO optimization and other objectives within that zone are great secondary benefits of Social, there is a larger opportunity to leverage social in a scalable way to provide self service tools and information to consumers that can then, in turn, reduce overall brand cost that can be very heavy when dealing with and addressing customer needs.

There are several brands who actively leverage social platforms to reduce these customer support costs including:

• JetBlue and Virgin America – who actively tweet and provide information about flight delays, schedule changes, weather alerts, and responses to specific customer inquiries
• Best Buy’s “Twelpforce” – integrated from Twitter all the way to in-store Point-of-Sale (POS), this massive program helps answer customer questions, provide product information, support, etc in a scalable way
• Comcast’s service guru Frank Eliason, who has been deemed the “most famous customer service manager in the US” by Brandweek for his work primarily in the social space (major points for early adoption)

Have you seen any other examples of brands leveraging Social Marketing to help create a supportive consumer environment?

Quite an interesting question indeed. With Social Media being a super hyped little pair of buzz words, every agency, self-promoting fameball, or major brand who follows trendy little buzz words has jumped on the tweeting, wall-posting, super-poking bandwagon.

While they are most definitely right to be on the wagon, the deployment of a Social Media initiative is not something one embarks upon without any planning or experience. It is one thing to be a celebrity building your own online brand, but even then you have to be wary. The room for interpretation on the context of your tweets, blog posts, or status updates is a pretty big room and the elephant in it is that whether you are a brand or Demi Moore, the online world of snark just wants to see you stumble.  Just like that photograph of you on Page Six in your unflattering sweats or that consumer complaint about an experience with your brand or one of your employees that now has 50,000 views on Consumerist, dipping your toes into Social Media has to be done clearly and with purpose.

Even without the fear or risk of negative backlash, in order to make a lasting impression that positively supports your brand and that has a trajectory for growth and “viral” legs, one must have a firm foundation based on knowledge and experience, on what works and what doesn’t.

Which is why, as with every other marketing tactic or medium, having a strategy is important.  Your Social Media initiatives should be integrated with your overall brand strategy, whether you are trying to peddle a product, fameball, celebrity, or brand.  There should be goals, objectives, benchmarks, and a thought out approach that makes sense for what it is that you want to communicate and how you wish to communicate it.

In this Marketing Sherpa study, they concluded that ” Two-thirds of marketers who work for organizations that have not used any form of social media marketing or PR consider themselves “very knowledgeable” or “somewhat knowledgeable” about this emerging strategy. Their overconfidence in unproven ability can doom social media initiatives to failure.”

It is a mistake to believe that if you build it, they will come.

To believe that you can set up a YouTube channel, upload a few videos, and boom, there you have viral video is about as logical as believing that people with a video camera can create a Super Bowl commercial. Although in some cases, the former does happen, more often than not  it doesn’t and won’t.

In the same manner, it is foolish to believe that just because you create a Facebook or iPhone application and put it out in the universe, people will use it. The application directory on Facebook is flooded with applications, most of which (the most recent stat I heard was 99%) are basically inactive. Even the top Facebook applications that were previously deemed “successful” have seen a decrease in usage that averages between 15-24% with the new Facebook redesign.

While I do believe that it is possible for some brands to embark upon a Social Media plan “in house”, it is increasingly important to do so with someone taking the reigns who has Social Media experience and expertise. If you want to cut through the clutter, ward off any potential viral embarrassment, and most importantly, have a successful initiative having someone on board who knows the space – not as a user, but as a marketer, is key.

As an employee of an agency that dipped its own toes into Social Media before it was so totally trendy and part of a majority of Fortune 1000 marketing budgets, I can say that the overzealous nature of marketers to believe they fully understand Social Media is partially exciting. It is nice to have these mediums & tactics that we believe (and have for quite some time) to be viable be recognized and appreciated by the more traditional marketers.

I just urge you to remember that just like other traditional and existing non-traditional tactics, strategy is key. While a rogue effort by someone with no experience could prove to be successful, lightning rarely strikes in the same place twice.

It is best to consult with, hire, or bring to the team, someone(s) with a true passion for and expertise and experience in Social Media.

These two buzz words are best buzzed about by someone who knows how to properly buzz them.

It is awesome (and for us at Affinitive, very validating) to see how many different elements that are key to a brand’s success are considered to be grown positively the most by Social Media (outlined in the chart below) over other tactics like advertising, direct marketing, POS promotions, etc.

“More than 90% of companies believe that social media is most effective in building brand reputation and awareness. That result is followed closely by goals for attracting website visitors, according to exclusive research in MarketingSherpa’s new Social Media Marketing and PR Benchmark Guide.”

Indeed.