Getting Your Boss’s Buy-in
It may be a challenge to convince the powers-that-be in your organization to allow you to engage with your social media network during business hours, even if it is to establish yourself as a thought leader in your company’s industry.
Company leaders have different approaches towards social media interaction depending on the leader. Case in point: there are leaders who believe social media is only for entertainment and do not take their activity on it seriously. If this is your boss’s perspective then when you propose a social media presence to your boss, stay goal-oriented, explaining the benefits of engagement with potential clients.
Agree on a trial period where you measure results of your social media campaigns, which can take the form of how many new people you added to your network as a result of engagement, or how many people engaged in your topics over a specific period of time. An initial baseline kept in a simple excel spreadsheet will help you track followers and friends, clicks and views of online media you are promoting.
Best case scenario: your company’s leaders are already onboard with social media, recognizing its tremendous potential to generate leads, build customer rapport, and establish credibility in their industry.
These leaders recognize the need to be organized and strategic in its use. This leader will see the broader strategic value of social media and mass collaboration, and tie it to a succinct set of business metrics.
On an enterprise level, having a cohesive plan based on a set of social media guidelines that all employees can follow could increase the chance of success to develop many thought leaders in an industry, from within an organization.
This does not mean that only one department (like the marketing department for example) should be the only ones in the company engaging in social media.
Thought leadership through social media is best implemented by individuals throughout the entire business, from the top down.
Over time, social media interaction as a tool to create thought leadership positions will become an integral and accepted part of every successful organization.
The businesses that adopt this integration as standard business practice will treat community collaboration as a necessary part of the organization’s work, ingrained in how people think and behave, and then create their business strategies accordingly.
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Becoming a Thought Leader in Your Industry Through Social Media.
