Social media strategy: follow the 6 P's for successful outreach.

• Author: Johnston, Ross
• Position: SPECIAL SECTION: TELECOMMUNICATIONS & TECHNOLOGY

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Creating a social media campaign is more than setting up a Facebook page. Social media outreach takes time and effort. The first step involves planning. While some companies are hesitant to embark on a social media campaign, there are many organizations in Alaska that have embraced it wholeheartedly. The 6 P's of social media are steps that guide organizations in creating a successful outreach in a clearly defined framework.

* Perceive

* Purpose

* People

* Platform

* Policy & Procedure

* Participation

PERCEIVE

Perceiving is the first step in the social media process. Perceiving involves looking at what people are saying about your company, industry, suppliers, customers and community. There are a lot of free tools out there like Social Mention, Google Reader and Tweet Deck that allow you to see how your company is perceived in the social media world and where these conversations are happening.

From these conversations, there also may be an opportunity to act. For instance, the Lower 48 experienced a heat wave this last summer. A lot of people jokingly tweeted, "It is so hot I'm moving to Alaska." Even though this is a half-joke, Gary Scott of Thompson & Co. Public Relations sees this as an opportunity for the Alaska Travel Industry Association to reach out to potential visitors and respond on how easy it is to get to Alaska.

Perceiving also is seeing what other organizations are doing and identifying what works and what doesn't work. When Providence Alaska Medical Center set up their Facebook page two years ago, they looked to see what other hospitals were doing in the United States. The Mayo Clinic in Minnesota has a robust social media presence and had a very responsive Facebook page. Providence took note of how and in what way the Mayo Clinic was responding.

Research is integral to finding out what conversations are occurring online and finding out what others are doing well.

PURPOSE

It isn't enough to have a presence, but a destination. Social media outreach should bring results whether it is thought leadership, customer service, advocacy, branding, etc.

Making Strides Against Breast Cancer--Anchorage effectively used social media to drive donations for their inaugural event raising more than $130,000. Ryan Makinster, the social media chair for the event, says "Facebook posts as well as direct donation requests were an integral part of fundraising for many teams. By effectively leveraging social media the...