Face Your Social Media Fears

by Excerpted from The Tasti D-Lite Way, James Amos and BJ Emerson

A new book, co-authored by Tasti D-Lite's chairman and CEO and VP of technology, takes a close look at the franchise's social media strategy and what other companies can learn from it. In this excerpt, the authors take on your "brand fears" and why you need to overcome them.

Brand Fears

Organizations of all types are feeling the impact of social media. Many are responding with a mix of fear, confusion, and uncertainty, while others are jumping in head first with reckless abandon. Handling criticism, maintaining control, and learning how to respond to the real needs of customers are just a few of the issues businesses have to address. These things are happening regardless of businesses’ participation. As a result, the thing they fear the most will happen if they do nothing.

Whenever something new comes along, there’s an inherent resistance because what you don’t know, you fear. In case you are having a hard time identifying these fears, we’ll outline just a few here along with a little dose of reality. More detail is provided in other chapters:

1. My competitors will get too much information. Yes, they will. They will have access to the same valuable information that is provided to your customers.

2. My competition will steal my fans/followers. As some have said, social media is rapidly becoming the great equalizer. So what are you doing about it? If your product or service is inferior, then you have a problem. At the end of the day, the best offering and greatest experience will come out ahead.

3. It will be an open forum for customer complaints and criticism and our service and support channels aren’t set up for this. The reality is that consumers are already creating their own forums for complaints and criticism. The question is whether you are going to be part of the conversation.

4. It takes too much time and resources to manage it all. Yes, it does. Do it right, and the rewards will be there. Do it wrong, and you will waste time and resources.

5. We will lose all control. That’s already happened if you are allowing others to write the narrative for you. See item 3.

6. There is no way to measure ROI. There are more points of measurement within social media than traditional media. Engineer your campaigns right, and you’ll have more data on which to base better marketing decisions.

7. We don’t understand the etiquette or protocols and can’t keep up with the latest applications and social networks. That’s because you are not listening and investing in the communities where your customers are interacting. Incidentally, digital citizens have little toler-ance when businesses are lazy in this area.

8. Social media is a productivity killer. You can either stifle the social activity of your employees or empower the social activity of your employees. We explore this in the next chapter.

9. This kind of communication has to be run through PR or legal. Perhaps when PR or legal see what the competition is doing in these areas, you might find some ways to streamline your processes. Putting the cultural and communications framework in place to sup-port these initiatives is not an option. Customers are already communicating your brand to others, and they are not asking permission.

10. Our industry is highly regulated. If your customers are online, figure out the rules. They will embrace you, and you’ll be a leader in your industry.

11. Most of our customers are not using social media. Then this is the time to get in. Even if a small segment is online, is it possible that the valuable insights they offer could be shared by others?

12. My competitors are already so far ahead that we’ll never catch up. With new social networks emerging on a regular basis, the early bird has several advantages. Missing the boat with one opportunity isn’t the end of the world, but you should start preparing your organization for the next one. This is not a fad. It’s time to get in.

Excerpted from "The tasti D-lite Way: Social Media Marketing Lessons for Building Loyalty and a Brand Customers Crave" By James Amos, Chairman and CEO, Tasti D-Lite, and BJ Emerson, VP Technology, Tasti D-Lite. The McGraw-Hill Companies, 2013

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