The 7 Cs of building a social media strategy

To ensure success, think about your social media strategy in the context of the seven Cs.

1. Community

Like all good communication, it is best to start by determining your target audience. Where do they spend time online? What social media channels do they use? Before your social media efforts can take shape, you should listen and learn about your community.

For example, one of their top social media communities for a business-to-consumer brand such as Oreo is Facebook. Its recent salute to the Mars landing was a huge hit with their 27 million Facebook fans. Meanwhile, a job seeker will most likely find a community on LinkedIn. According to a recent survey, 93 percent of job recruiters use LinkedIn to find qualified candidates.

Finding out where your community interacts on social media is the first step of a successful social media strategy. It’s important to determine what type of conversations are taking place about your brand and in your industry before engaging in a community or building a community from scratch.

2. Content