How does my online ‘content’ integrate with being social?

Grant Leboff: We talked earlier about this idea of being social and maybe some companies, are just not going to be social in the way that others are. So we say Coca Cola can be very social because it’s a fun brand, it’s a lifestyle brand, people get involved with it and then get involved with sports and other things that people will engage with and talk about. But if you’re making ball bearings, that’s not quite the same thing. But I wanted to introduce this idea of content and where that fits in, because it seems to me that Coca-Cola can produce fantastic content and they do, but actually there is a place for the ball bearing manufacturer to be able to produce some very relevant and interesting content, obviously for the people that need those bearings or use those barriers. Where do you sit with content and where that integrates with social?

David Taylor: One of the, obviously very important aspects of social is this content pipeline. It’s important to have this content and it’s also; what are you going to be using social for? Now you may be using social, not for the generation, you might not be using it for corporate social responsibility, you might not be using it for brand awareness. Maybe you just want to use it as thought leadership. So maybe, the ball bearing manufacturer, the MD is a thought leader within the industry and what he does is, he might use social himself to talk about the industry and what’s going on… what’s happening with ball bearings. Equally, the ball bearing manufacturer might have a great website with a regularly updated blog, talking about what’s going on in the industry, the talks of ball bearings being used, where they’re being used, how they’re being used, what sort of applications they are being used within. And so what it’s doing is growing their authority. This is a brand that really understands it, that’s at the top of their game. It may well be that they make videos which are educational, which they’re helping the people they supply, to use those ball bearings. So it’s even a customer service as well. So I think the sort of content you can create… I mean, there is this fallacy that somehow, maybe social is just consumer facing, but it’s equally used in a B2B aspect. But networking, about growing brand, growing authority, building relationships, etc. So there’s, there’s, there’s no harm and in fact, it’s very useful to create that content. And of course, by creating that content and they put it on their website, of course Google is going to be very pleased because they’re posting fresh content, which has got some great keywords about ball bearings and metal and applications, which means they’ll actually appear higher in search engines. So if someone’s looking for that company, they’re more likely to find them.