NAMA social networking session

It's safe to say there are lots of smart marketers in the ag industry who are trying to figure out how social networking fits into their plans.  The big turnout and great questions at our NAMA session prove that.  I had a great time being on the panel with Dave Coustan and Kyle Flaherty (and with moderator Chuck Zimmerman) -- and I especially enjoyed the interaction with people who weren't even in the room, but were participating via Twitter.  I promised a detailed recap, but this won't be a comprehensive summary.  Feel free to add a comment if there's another issue you want to mention.  (AgNewsCenter also posted a summary of the Tweets during the session.)

As I said in my opening summary, social media is about figuring out what information people want to receive from you, and how they want to receive it. And only after you answer those questions can you determine how using those tools can improve your business.  Here are a few of the highlights as we addressed those issues:

Measurement & ROI
Among the 30 respondents who returned a pre-session survey, the overwhelming concern was tracking results and measuring ROI.   All four of us agree that the first step is to measure the right thing. Don't go into a campaign expecting huge numbers, when you really want to reach 200 people (dealers, or industry influencers, or some other relatively small group). 

From my perspective, the value of social networking is in building relationships, and you don't necessarily need a deep relationship with 1,000,000 people.  Use social networks like Twitter or Facebook to engage people with interesting information and conversation.  And when those deeper relationships have formed, some of the people you've engaged will become evangelists for you, telling others about what you're up to, because you're providing something valuable.

Having said all that, measurement is really not a problem with most of these tools.  As long as you know what you're measuring, it's very simple to track who's reading your content, who's engaged enough to pass it around to others, who's leaving feedback in the form of comments, etc.  And Facebook, especially, has added more tools to help you do that in recent months.

I used a quick example to show how social media helps you reach the right people (even if it's a small group). I work with a state health department to help them promote a statewide fluoride program for kids. They have just 5 employees to cover the entire state, enlisting and training community volunteers to run events.  We put together a Web program using social media tools, and made it an extension of the program itself.  Because they're using social media to communicate more efficiently with a very targeted group of people, they've saved time and money on travel, and grown from 8,000 to 25,000 kids in the program in less than 2 years.

How do I convince a conservative, regulated company to take the plunge?
A couple of things here.  First, many of the social networks do have tools built into them that allow you to control how public your content is.  Look into them -- and if you have questions about that, email me and I'll track down an answer.

Second, it's important that you not try to "sell the tools."  Don't go to management and tell them your company "needs a blog," or "needs to be on Twitter," or "needs to have a podcast."  Instead, point out that your customers are increasingly hungry for valuable information about your industry -- and that companies who provide that information are seeing their businesses grow.

Instead of using the word "blog," use the word "website." A blog is a website, after all -- but "website" doesn't carry the same baggage.  If you see value in using Twitter as a tool to communicate industry headlines to an important audience, sell the concept, and leave Twitter out of it.  You can use Twitter's RSS feeds to move informaiton without anyone ever seeing the Twitter logo, if that's what you want to do.

How do I keep up with all these social networks?
This is a big one. I can barely keep track of passwords, let alone follow everything.  We had three suggestions for following what's going on -- whether it's your own content, or what people are saying about your company.  Kyle suggests using Google Reader to pull in the RSS feeds from various places (your blog, your Twitter feed, a blog search and a Twitter search for keywords involving your industry, etc.)  Almost every source of information in the social network space includes an RSS feed now, and it's easy to import those feeds into Google reader and scan them every morning.

I suggested using Friendfeed for the same purpose.  And Dave C. pointed out that Radian 6 has some good tools for helping you track what people are saying about you or your brand.

Are farmers using social networking?
Someone questioned whether farmers are actually using social networks.  The consensus of the panelist is "yes." I thought Chuck summed it up best when he pointed out that farmers are not that different from other groups of people.  The broadband gap is closing quickly, allowing farmers and others in rural areas to be online.

One of us also pointed out that Facebook has 200-million users now.  If it were a country, it would be the 6th-most populous country in the world.  That's a lot of people, and it's not just techies or college kids.  A couple of stats from memory show that this is not just about young people:

• The fastest-growing Facebook demo is women in their 30s and 40s.
• Twitter users are much older than you may think, averaging in their 30s and 40s.

I think it was Kyle who made another valid point here.  Even if your audience isn't online in huge numbers now, there's no reason to believe that will continue.  They will be online in the relatively near future.  And that means you have an opportunity to be there waiting for them, with an established presence, when they arrive.

Conclusion
To sum up, social networks are about engaging people with valuable content.  And that's true whether you're having a conversation with a friend, or discussing different brands of fertilizer.  If you try to use a social network as just another avenue to get a commercial in front of people, you'll fail.

But if you engage them with interesting, relevant content; if you think first about who you want to engage most deeply; if you make sure every piece of content addresses one of their needs, you're on the way to integrating social media successfully.

A reminder, if you have more specifics you want to discuss, leave me a comment or email me. I though it was pretty clear we could've gone all day on this topic, and not run out of stuff to talk about.  And finally, thanks for your participation!  I enjoyed meeting a lot of you at NAMA, and I'm looking forward to continuing our conversation about social media and agriculture.