B2C Social Media: FohBoh Strategies That Work

Social media is part art, part science and evolving fast. Because Internet marketing and social media communication moves and changes, shifts, wiggles and merges, no one really knows exactly how social media are best used for all business cases. Subscribing to a best practice in social media is a little like creating a budget for a start-up; not enough empirical data is known to create one. Try this, try that and use what works.

FohBoh is creating its own social media best practices for the restaurant/foodservice industry based on its in-house experiences, domain expertise, and honestly, with a fair amount of trial and error. Social media = R+D. 

FohBoh is a social media practitioner with a vertical perspective. We focus our energies and insights exclusively at the foodservice industry. So, while there may be some companies finding success in other industries, it doesn’t always translate to foodservice. Many of the homegrown best practices we have developed for our restaurant clients, we regularly collect good commentary from other social media practitioners. Many of the “laws”, “rules” and “practices” other communities and practitioners use are consistent with our own findings.

The following represent ten that I believe to be true. Note that they suggest integration, just like the social web is, so no silos!

1. CONTENT IS KING

Crowd-sourced or user generated content is amazingly powerful. It's the ultimate manifestation of social neyworking. But, unfortunately, not all of it is good content. Having a voice doesn’t mean it's always useful, or meaningful. It just means that the crowd is in charge and has a megaphone for their collective soap box. This is great and what makes the world a better place. We want crowd commentary and the more the better and, better leads to higher quality. Quality content wins every time, ask anyone in media. So, If you want people to come to your website and promote your brand, share only the content that is most interesting, compelling and click-worthy. If it’s just “stuff” and “fluff” don’t bother. It’s like getting lousy jokes from the same person all the time. After a while you just delete them before even reading them.

2. IT’S NOT all about you
I know it’s hard to resist. But, if you want more social media followers and an increasing number of brand ambassadors, our social media marketing team at FohBoh have found that by providing useful and interesting content and using a consistent messaging theme (see #1 above) is a best practice. We recommend using a ration between 60%/40% and 70%/30%  for pull vs. push media messaging. In some cases all pull is best if you are a well-known brand or celebrity. But for most brands, you will need to find the pull-to-push ratio that best suites your social media objectives. You just earn more trust when you show people that you're not in social media just to promote your brand, products or your site all the time. Try posting to other links and point their content to other sites. Syndicating and sharing is the key here. Trust, honesty and not being terribly blatant in messaging is a key success factor and will inure you to the social web. The results we have found yield more followers and ultimately, more brand influencers.

3. FIND, CATEGORIZE, COVET AND Reward your brand INFLUENCERS
A key social media objective is measurement and understanding what that means for you and your brand. Objectives change from time to time, so your toolkit should be modified from time to time as well. Build trust, know what Return on Influencers (ROI) and Return on Engagement (ROE) mean, relative to your objectives. Strengthening these relationships and building loyalty will ultimately price economic value, if that's your objective. Loyal customers and brand ambassadors are your best evangelists. Because of this. treat your best customers and key influencers with kindness, recognition and respect, and they'll return it to you ten-fold. Reward them with recognition and in some cases gifts and empower them to syndicate a positive message.

4. IT’S NOT THE TECHNOLOGY – it’s the MESSAGE

We hear this all the time and I personally struggle with this concept. But then again, I am not a technologist so what do I know! What I do know is that underlying all this chatter, the metrics and messaging is the technology as platform and delivery mechanism. However, I think the point here is that it's humans (people-to-people) that makes social media work. Having conversations; a dialog that engages and promotes the social agenda on the social web, is what makes social media work. Use the tools but how and in what form you deliver the message is a key.

5. Social Media Metrics

FohBuzz™ is what we recommend you use. Why wouldn’t we? Social media measurement must be adopted and adapted to every social media campaign, or what's the point. You cannot protect your company’s reputation if you don’t know what’s being said about it on social media websites. It’s just too risky to turn down the volume particularly when listening devices are available to alert you to the good, the bad and the ugly! While there is no one way to measure, you must start somewhere. The reality is that once you start listening, you will want more data and want to dig deeper to identify and find your brand influencers, as well as your brand nemesis’. Then, if you’re smart, you’ll want your competitors information too. But, measurement can be tricky. For measurement to be effective it has to align with your social media objectives. And, what are objectives without a social media strategy. Sentiment tools are not perfect but they are getting better, so common sense prevails here like everywhere.

For the record, it’s not all about fans, followers and subscribers. It’s about reach, engagement and building long-term relationships. It’s about connecting, and inspiring action while building relationships. It’s about building your brands “street team” and empowering them to be your brand message ambassadors. Get your share of the conversation before your competitors tap the network for their strategic benefit. There is no time like the present to discover, in real-time, what your customers are saying about you or your restaurant. Visit FohBuzz for more information on this. It's very cool and created for independent restaurants, restaurant groups and small chains.

6. COURSE CORRECT

Ever been sailing? Ever been on a sailboat when another yacht steals your wind? Dead calm, it is and an early business lesson for me. Get in front and stay in front so a competitor doesn’t steal your wind. The best way to do this is to be smart and strategic while clearly and consistently executing on your social media objectives. Measure, course correct and repeat.

Objectives change and will challenge you because you are no longer in control of your brand; the consumer is; we are. This is possibly the most difficult concept to overcome for many professional marketers. CONTROL IS AN ILLUSION. All we can do is try to influence, which is why social media is so valuable and developing a social media skill so important.

7. THE SOCIAL media LANDSCAPE

Thousands of tools and technologies dot the social media landscape. “New arriving daily”, should be the sign on the infamous "information superhighway". This landscape is made up of four to five categories: sharing, expressing, networking, reviewing even gaming tools. Most of these web 2.0 tools and technologies free. Many are easy to use, and others, more complicated. But, one thing in common is they nearly all have funny sounding names. So, shrink your “universe” down to a solar system, or a social media tool box that works best for your restaurant. 


We do this at FohBoh every day and focus only on those social media tools that have application best suited to the foodservice industry. While many can be purposed for almost any industry, some just tend to work better than others for restaurants. We recommend building your own toolbox to meet your social media objectives and keep a look out for new tools, based on what your strategy and core social media objective look like. FohBoh offers FohMedia social media marketing and strategic planning services to help restaurant operators navigate this.

8. SOCIAL media STRATEGY
We suggest that you being with listening. Listening is perhaps the most important thing we do at FohBoh. But then, one would need to know what to listen for. In the restaurant space, we start with behavior: listen to your employees (peer influencers), your customers (social influencers) and your market (key influencers). What are they saying about your brand in your market? Social science is a big part of social media - we are dealing the people here after all. It just makes sense to respect behavior before going off and launching a facebook fan page and Tweeting to anyone that will listen. Strategy is necessary and the first step in developing a winning social media strategy is first, understanding the behavior of your brand, market and customer. Then, use this to create a strategy using FohMedia methodology. I have a blog about this.

9. EXECUTION AND ENGAGe
It's okay to engage and have a social dialog with people you don’t know. Make friends, connect, communicate, collaborate, share, learn, teach and have a voice. Don't be afraid to put yourself out there and please, have a thick skin. SOmetimes it can be a bit rough. 


Social networking is a big part of social media. With nearly 90% of those online now using some form of social networking site, this is where you need to be. Wasn’t it Willy Sutton that famously said, “It’s where the money is” when asked why he robbed banks? Develop a strategy that works for your restaurant and that meets your objectives. Be like Willy - go where your customers are. Then, execute your tactics consistently and constantly. Embrace the Social Shock™.

10. be smarter

To own a smart restaurant you first must become a smart restaurant operator. New rules apply now. New business models are being created and adopted. New ways to engage and retain customers are being incorporated and new opportunities to optimize your partnerships and retain and engage your workforce are being presented. Social CRM didn’t exit until recently and Software as a Service (SaaS) will teach operators how to compete better and smarter in 2010. Being smart and operating your business smarter using technology is simply the reality of running a business in the 21^st century. Operators must be smart and leverage their time better. Technology is your friend, it’s getting affordable and easier to use.