Permission Marketing In The Social World

Like, follow and subscribe: three words that have redefined the permission marketing in the recent times. Permission marketing is where people give explicit permission to marketers to contact them. There’s a big shift in how people perceive marketers courtesy of the social world. A few years back getting yourself on the do not call list was a cool thing to do, today liking a page on Facebook and following a brand on Twitter is so neat.

Sounds great! Now you got permission to communicate with your customers. That’s amazing! But something is missing. What’s the problem? The biggest problem in social media is overcrowding. Stats suggest that an average active Facebook user likes two new pages every month.
So how can a marketer best leverage the permission provided by consumers in social media? The first thing marketers need to accept is that just having a large number of followers and friends on social network is not the real definition of success in this space. In fact this is just a small part of your social media campaign. That’s because of a couple of reasons. First, the probability of your consumers staying in regular touch with you is slim. The reason being out of hundreds of friends and dozens of brand that compete for attention every minute, the probability that your brand will get the attention is as close to zero as it can be. Second, 8 out of 10 conversations about your brand are happening outside of your turf. If a consumer had a good experience with your product, they write it on their wall. If they liked a movie, they tweet it normally without linking it to the movie’s Twitter account.

It is awesome that you got permission to talk to your consumers. The important thing is to make full use of it. There are a couple of ways you can do this. One is by focusing on an issue that the consumers want to learn more about. The probability that the consumer will pay attention to the issue you, the experts and others talk about is much more likely than anything else. Second, learn about your consumers. Gain insights around who they are. What they want. What’s missing. Why they are forming a certain perception. Why they like you and why they dislike you. Then use these insights to take actions that will make you reach closer to the consumers and gain the real permission to stay on top of their mind in the social world.