The Young Professional 1 - Arizona Parks and Recreation Association

are online at different times, so someone should be handlingcustomer communication as often as possible.4. What is your strategy to launch your social mediapresence?Launching social media will not be a one-time event, nor isit an overnight event. It will be important to keep customersinformed about your efforts related to social media on anongoing basis. Putting some information of the officialwebsite of the organization is always a good starting point.5. Define success and your way to measure it!As previously stated, utilizing social media because youare following a trend cannot be the rationale for doing so.Unsuccessful organizations usually decide to add socialmedia, only to quit their efforts a few months later becausethey did not see quantifiable results. The problem lies inthe lack of the definition of their “success.” Like the oldadage says: “If you do not know where you are going, howwill you know when you get there?” Additionally, if yourorganization is unsure of how to measure a successful socialmedia endeavor, any measurable results may not meananything substantial. So, try to quantify the success bychoosing your goals. For example, a successful campaignfor a state park lodge will “result in a 50% increase in webtraffic, 2,000 new newsletter subscribers, and a 50% increasein online booking of sales, within one year.” One of thegreat features of social media tools is that those are easilymeasurable. For example, measuring the web traffic onlyrequires you to check your website’s measurement tools(web analytics), to see if the number has increased by 50%.In contrast to traditional marketing (like radio advertising,print advertising, direct mail, billboards) where outcomesare harder to quantify, measuring social media is the bestway to understand whether your strategy is working andwhether goals are being met. There is, however, a pitfallbehind many statistics, especially if you are one of thesemanagers that love numbers and believe that the morenumbers you know the better. With analytics, for example,you can learn how many people visit your website on adaily basis, or even what time of the day they do so. Nowask yourself, “Is this something you need to know?” It isimportant to not fall into the analytics traps of trying toknow and figured out everything. Attempt to understandand know only the things that are important to you, like thevisitation to your website, or the increase in online booking.Do not lose focus of what is important to you.6. Put customer value into perspective and identify thelifetime value of a customer.If you are the manager of a state park lodge and you have acouple that comes in one time per month, 12 months peryear, and pays an average of $85 per visit. The value ofthis particular couple is $1,020 per year, for as many yearsas they keep visiting your lodge. If the particular coupleis doing so the last 10 years, they have a $10,200 lifetimevalue. Knowing how much money they spent on a yearlybasis, try to think of ways to possibly reward them andincrease their happiness. Maybe you should considergiving them two weekends for free, especially thosemonths that visitation is low. Furthermore, how seriousdo you handle their complaints, if they bring them to you?7. Customers using social media are only a portion ofyour entire customer base.Even as social media tends to become more popular, therewill still be plenty of customers that will never go to yourwebsite, or your social media accounts. While some willwant you to email them, or get alerts for new offers aboutyour products or services, many will not even want toshare an email address with you. Likewise, social mediatools will be used by different target groups. Some of yourcustomers will check into your store via Foursquare andsome will follow your business on Twitter. Others may“like” your brand on Facebook and other customers maynot. The only way social media marketing really differsfrom traditional marketing is that it requires you to listenas well as talk, to participate in conversations, and to buildrelationships.Social media is an additional avenue for marketingyour organization or business. It does require resourceinvestment similarly to traditional marketing, but it maycreate and build relationships with an audience that waspreviously neglected in your current marketing endeavors.As a matter of fact, it has revolutionized business in away that can no longer be ignored by those seeking togain competitive advantage over their competitors. Socialmedia offers several key business opportunities that havebeen capitalized on by many companies, but far too oftenoverlooked or ignored by many others. For others, socialmedia in business is no longer a choice. One thing is forsure; Social media for business is here to stay. So, here isthe question: Are you going to embrace it or not?Tatiana Chalkiidou, Ph.D is a freelanceconsultant for the Municipalities ofNikea and Agios Ioannis Renti (Greece),working on park-management andplayground projects.tatchalk@gmail.comPage 22 | The Young Professional