Selling B2B social media: don't mention the S word

Sadly, in the world of B2B marketing, as in most areas of human society, prejudice is rife.

What I mean is that people tend to judge quickly and once they have formed their opinion, it is pretty hard to shake it. As a result, many worthy ideas are quickly branded as either "good" or "bad" - and opportunities may go to waste because those ideas initially classified as "bad" are dismissed out of hand every time they come up, even though they may have merit in a different situation.

The power of words
One of the main reasons for this is the way we use language - especially in business. Words are wonderful things because we can wrap up a whole idea in a simple combination of letters. But while we gain a benefit of conciseness by giving complex things simple labels, we also constrain ourselves by attaching emotions to those labels at the same time. This means that every time the word comes up, we cannot help ourselves thinking of the emotions we had first time that we heard it.

As brand-savvy people, we know how this works. The emotional associations of brand words - like "Virgin" or "Ford" - often outweigh the original meaning of the word. In this way the very term we use becomes a hurdle we must overcome if we are to assess objectively the merits of a given course of action.

The example I am talking about is of course "social media". Look at the word: social media. Think about it. Social. Media. Now let me tell you what it means - rationally and emotionally.

Rational definition
Social media: a category of websites and online communities that are designed to facilitate discussion and sharing of information between users, whether in the form of text, images or video.

Emotional definition.
Twitter, Facebook and all that kind of thing. Lots of people I've never heard of telling each other what they're doing when no one really cares. Strange acronyms that I don't understand: LOL, FLMAO, BTW, IMHO. Superficial and faddish. Not for real business.

Now both these are accurate definitions of the word. By which I don't mean that the second definition is a sensible description of what social media is. I mean that the two words "social" and "media", when put together, bring those associations to many people's minds.

Fine - everyone is entitled to their opinion. But prejudices get in the way of sensible debate, and if there is a business benefit to be gained by social media, marketers like us need to find a way to remove those obstacles.

And the easiest way is to change the term you use. It won't mean you're talking about something else. But it will give you a level-playing field: a chance to discuss the issues without running every point through the prejudice filter.

In my experience, the following are good ways to avoid the S word.

Online communities
Community is not yet an over-used word. It's maybe getting that way, but you can describe the people in that community and it becomes characterised by the people in it, rather than by the fact that it is part of social media. Talk about "extending the presence of the brand into online communities used by business buyers" and even the hardest sceptic will still be listening.

Online engagement
"Engagement" is great because it is not yet exclusively linked to social media. To engage customers is a wonderful thing. It means customers are listening. So if you can talk to companies about how they can "engage" online, it sounds attractive. Of course, it all falls down if you say that you are suggesting they "engage them on social media"...

Online word of mouth
This is a great alternative because it highlights the really interesting, non-technical aspect of social media - ie that it is really about people talking. I think there may be a sub-conscious advantage in using a term that is physical rather than virtual.

Peer group recommendation
Similar to the above, but perhaps sounds more sophisticated.

Information-sharing networks
This is a slightly dry alternative, but can be perhaps most appropriately used when talking about the underlying technology. So instead of saying "tweeting", you might want to talk about "publishing content across the information-sharing networks". I know it's inelegant, but the word "tweet" plays havoc with the decision-making powers of many CxOs.

Of course, these synonyms - or rather euphemisms - are only necessary if you feel that the prejudices are there in the first place. But having presented to an awful lot of companies over the past couple of years, I have got become accustomed to the sense of antagonism that frequently appears at the first mention of the S word - and I've found it's often better to avoid it. I'm not avoiding the issue of course - I'm simply sidestepping the bear-trap of negative associations that threatens to stop any potentially effective customer engagement initiative in its tracks.

Have you used similar tactics? I'd be fascinated to know...



PS: A note of thanks to @AndrewJDavison for the conversation that inspired this blog last week!

Photo credit: Creative Commons/Flickr/Sarah G