I presume that everyone is aware of and agrees with the importance of social media for B2B marketing. The question at hand isn't "why we should use social media?" but rather "what are the key components of a successful social media strategy?" 

The good news is that your social media marketing approach will be quite similar to how you plan for all of your other marketing platforms. Strategize, Listen, Execute, Measure, and Refine are the basic steps. The real secret to success, however, lies in three areas.  

1. Determine your destination before measuring your progress. 

A common thing that everyone says is the primary goal of social media is to increase website traffic. But if we end the discussion there, then we should all just give up and find something else to do. That statement lacks substance, is uninteresting, and most importantly, cannot demonstrate any actual benefit. 

Here are some worthwhile objectives to pursue: 

• Generate sales through social media: Your marketing automation software and CRM must be completely integrated. 
• Value of pipeline: The same integration is required. Although it is not mandatory, getting the information you require without it will require collecting data through manual labor and processing it. 
• Completion of goals: For instance, CTAs like "call our sales team" or "request a demo," "request a free trial," "download your whitepaper today," and so forth.  
• Social media traffic's quality: For instance, visitors through Twitter are more likely than others to finish a task on our website. Additionally, almost 25% of all visitors to our website originate from social media; these visitors browse more pages and stay on the site longer than visitors from referral traffic or organic search, but not as long as visitors via email marketing. This demonstrates that users who arrive from social media are intrigued and remain to browse through our content. 
• Relationship development and influencer participation: It takes time and skill to establish relationships with influencers in your particular field, but once they start sharing your material with their audience or, better yet, working with you to create content together, it will be well worth the effort. 

Make sure you have a reliable, repeatable method in place for tracking performance once you've determined the objectives you need to measure. 

2. It's crucial to use the appropriate language and tone 

When you have everything set up for goals and tracking, it's time to consider messaging.  

Tone: How will you sound in a B2B context? To ensure that your organization is represented in a way that satisfies your team's expectations, plan this ahead of time, get it in writing, and receive your senior team's approval. 

What should we be discussing in order to bring value? Here's a hint: it's not just about you and how well your company is doing. What are the main discussion points for the industry? How can we be of more use here? 

3. Match your objectives and reporting to the board's objectives. 

Aligning your objectives with those of the board is the single most crucial step you can take to ensure the success of your B2B social media strategy. That right there is CMO material. Your desired promotion and honor.    

Without doubt, this holds true for every part of your marketing endeavors, and it's also the biggest difficulty you'll encounter. But if the board agrees, you'll discover that social media quickly takes center stage in both your B2B marketing strategy and the overall business plan. 

Need some help sorting out your B2B social media strategy? We are happy help. Get in touch with us, and let's get your project started.