The Fine Line in B2B Social Media

Social media, and more specifically social network connections with real friends and family is a much more interesting and comfortable place to be than it is for business. How I envy even the business-to-consumer businesses where they can cozy up with entertaining and light games, gimmicks, and discussion. Yet, while we all dress business casual these days to go about our daily work routines, we still have to put on that respectable suit in client and customer facing activities. Thus, is the case with social media marketing.

If the intent of social media marketing is to provide greater transparency, where do you draw the line? And, does that line move depending on how engaged and connected your customer is?

Several years back I had a conference call with an executive at a large media company. The call was on a day that I was working at home and happened to be in the kitchen with the back slider open letting in the beautiful day. As we were discussing the finer details of a project, a turkey chick happened to wonder up on my deck and right into my kitchen. Wide eye’d and shocked, I ran through the kitchen to grab a broom and shoo it out. As I did this, who happened to follow looking for the chick, you got it, mamma turkey. Half in the conversation, and half out of my mind, I began to swing carefully at the birds to get them back out on my deck. Mamma turkey was all too ready to defend her chick and the gobbling began, the wings flapped, and clawed feet came up. I squealed half under my breath but of course my client was on to me. First I had to explain that I was working from home, then I had to explain the noise and squeal. I was mortified. As it turned out, my client found the situation hilarious and since we had a fairly good relationship, it all worked out fine. Yet, I was not prepared for such an unprofessional event to intrude on my business at hand.

Had this been a sales call or first meeting, I don’t know that this incident would have come across as well. Such is the issue with social media engagement. Since conversations are typically out there for all to see, there are going to be times when long time connections and newly created ones will interact with you and each other at the same time. With newly engaged connections you may want to err on the side of safety and maintain the business suit, but with long time customers, jeans and a button down may be just fine. You don’t have control over what is said, only how you respond. Will you shoo away newly engaged customers if they intrude on conversations you are having with existing customers or those that are ready to enter your sales cycle? Or, will you shoo away long time customers when you are developing a new relationship?  In social media, you don’t really have the option to ignore or push off if you want to hold and nurture your community.

The more I ponder the nature of relationship building in social media, the more I conclude that engagement and transparency may take on a more homogenous aspect and that the line moves as engaged connections move into the sales cycle, solution cycles, and support cycles. Social media is good as a communication stream with a broad ability to form direct connections, but it won’t necessarily build deep connections where the line of transparency and relationship begins to dissipate toward arm chair discussion.

If the goal is a customer relationship that is a partnership, social media is a piece of this and can facilitate communication. However, will it really be the primary mechanism of the relationship?