Social Is Local

Some will tell you that social media is all about making consumers and brands more global and creating virtual communities made up of people across the world. This may be true for entities that sell products only online, but it’s not true for small businesses or franchisees.

Customers typically don’t buy a large coffee, a slice of pizza, or a new SUV online. You can influence, engage with, and make an offer to consumers via social channels, BUT they need to come in to become an actual customer.

So many brands are selling at that local level, yet not marketing to or engaging with potential customers at the local level. Why are they missing these potential customers?

One reason is a misunderstanding about consistency. This is typical when the top person responsible for social marketing is not accountable for real business results (read: dollars!)

I recently spoke with a marketing and communications team at a large US-based oil company with several hundred franchised convenience stores in communities across the country. These mid-level managers couldn’t get past the idea of a local franchisee potentially saying something inconsistent in social media. They decided it would be safer to just have one corporate page and no local or regional activity in social.

This is exactly why franchisors need to lead, not just limit, social media communications. If that’s not possible, then they should remove their franchisees’ phones too. And, if inconsistency in social media scares you this much, then stop franchising. Close up shop!

The fact is, social media is the EASIEST place to manage your brand. Put some listening and publishing tools in place, commit an hour or two per week, and you’re good to go for your whole franchise system.

All that other stuff you’re already doing is the hard part of managing a brand!

The Future of Social Media is Mobile and What Else?

I’ve participated in, spoken at, and attended several social media and public relations conferences and roundtables in the past year and the same question comes up to each speaker at every session: What’s the future of social media?

The answer lately has always been MOBILE. I think we can all agree on this.

I continue to add, though, that the second question should be: what else? And the answer is LOCAL.

What do I mean by local? Well, you are always local. And if I’m near you, I’m local too, right? To quote Buckaroo Banzai: “No matter where you go, there you are.”

The mobile users of social media are growing daily. They are not sitting at home or in the office thinking about your brand anymore. Those users are at your locations and want to connect, shout, check in, and tell stories about your brand. Even more, they want to tell stories about your brand specifically at the 123 Main Street location in Anytown USA.

PR Pro’s have a short window of opportunity to take advantage of mobile meeting local. Without proper promotion of what’s happening at your (or your client’s) local outlets, stores, offices, franchisees, or dealers, you are missing the intersection of Social, Mobile, and Local.

So, you’ve already set up Facebook fan page, a Twitter account, and a blog for your brand. Now you must do three things:

1. Set up individual fan pages, Twitter accounts, and blogs for each location.

2. Engage customers (or potential customers) at the local level via any platforms on which they are conversing.

3. Share their content with the rest of your community! A bit of content from a customer regarding the 123 Main Street location of your brand is much more powerful than anything else you can create!

The true power of local PR is delivering results and achieving business goals not by just Tweeting about the brand on a global or national level, but also by keeping friends, fans, and customers informed about events happening at each outlet, store, location, or community.

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