The Sociology of Optimizing ROI for Social Marketing Success

If you have any hope of your marketing efforts paying off and bringing you a return on your investment (ROI), you will need to understand the sociology behind it and to truly understand not only what you need to do but also why you need to do it. Taking the appropriate steps and knowing why those steps are critical is essential to your professional success.

Surrounding yourself with the right people

The first thing that you need to do in your effort to get a firm grasp on the sociology of your marketing efforts and how they relate to the knowledge and expertise of your influencers is to start to interact with those influencers. If you don’t have a relationship with those people, it is definitely time for you to establish one (and not just any relationship but a relationship that is solid and mutually beneficial). It may be quite challenging for you to successfully build relationships with your influencers for the simple reason that you are up against an environment where they are used to being surrounded by a large amount of useless information from other people. Before you can make headway with the influencers, you need to prove your credibility and trustworthiness so that they will want to have a relationship with you. It will definitely be worth your while to put in the effort to make that happen.

How do you begin to successfully form relationships?

The absolute first thing that you must do when forming a relationship with an influencer (or anyone else) is to discover exactly what you have in common. You will actually both be working together toward the same perfect end. You are not working separately. You are working as one cohesive unit and your success will not be yours alone. It will be yours and your influencer’s together. If you share common ground and you have the same desires and passions in life, you will do well together in a relationship.

How does the sociology figure into it?

Sociology is the idea that people are not in silos. They have an innate desire to belong to a group. They are attracted to other people based on their passions and desires and what they want to accomplish (in this case, professionally). In any relationship (whether it is personal or professional), people need to connect on a human level. If they can’t do that, they will not be able to connect on any level. The emotional connection needs to be established before anything else. It is not a business transaction that you are going for. It is a relationship where both sides give to each other and what each one gets out of the relationship actually means something valuable. The reason that you want to form relationships with influencers is that your ultimate goal of increasing your professional success will eventually be realized. Everything that you do in business and everything that you are will be influenced by the relationships that you form.

Getting to really know your influencers

As you go through the process of successfully connecting with your influencers and forming meaningful relationships with those people, you must understand that it will require careful planning and a great deal of effort before you actually arrive at the point where you can say that you share a mutually beneficial relationship with that particular influencer. There is a good deal of valuable information about your influencers that you can actually get your hands on and that information is in various places and is yours for the taking. You can look at the influencers’ various social media profiles from which you can glean the following information, which will help you a great deal.

• Twitter: Where the person works, their personal web presence (including their website), areas of interest.
• Facebook: Friends and family members.
• LinkedIn: You will find the influencer’s educational background, work background, and other professional interests here.
• Pinterest: The person’s influencers, likes, and dislikes.

It is very wise on your part if you can tap into all of that rich information. It will greatly strengthen your chances of successfully forming a relationship with the influencer.

What you should do next

Once you have gathered all of the information that you can possibly gather, it is time to peel back that layer and dig a little deeper. Your next step might include using an analytics tool, which will enable you to understand who influences your influencer and the type of information that is being shared. If you can get your hands on the content that your influencers and their influencers are sharing, you can create content that will make them pay attention to you and your business. Another tool that will serve you well is a tool that actually measures influence. There are several that you can use, including Klout and Littlebird.

Conclusion

If you follow the steps that have been suggested here, you will be successful at becoming well acquainted with your targeted influencers. Regarding the order of the steps (logically), it probably makes the most sense to write the content, place it where it will have the most positive effect, and then introduce your influencers to that content. After that, all you need to do is to nurture your relationships and keep proving to your influencers how valuable you and your business are to them. It is critical that you understand the sociological aspect of your relationships with your influencers so that you can really help each other a great deal. Your influencers will help to bring your business to the next level and your interactions will be valuable and productive.

We are pleased to provide you with the insightful comments contained herein. For a complimentary assessment of your online presence, let’s have coffee.