Name: Mitesh Kothari
Designation: Social Media Consultant
Questions:
Q. Since when have you been in the digital/social media field?
A. I have been professionally practising in the industry for 3 years now. Even before I took it up as vocation I was helping my family and friends understand and leverage the emerging media.
Q. What entails a successful social media campaign?
A. Social media campaign – like mainline campaigns are executed to achieve a particular goal. Goals can be anything from brand awareness, increasing sales, promoting an offer to launching the brand. So on the micro level, social media activity that achieved the before set goals is successful. On the macro level a successful social media campaign is one which breaks the clutter through creative use of the medium, viral content and ability to engage audience with the brand on one-to-one level.
Q. How does one acquire the skills required to be a successful social media manager?
A. Social media managers are a different breed in themselves unlike run of the mill advertising. Since social media is not a short term activity a SM is most likely to be a Brand Manager on social media. So to be a successful SM one needs to have a knack of understanding the brand, objectives of the brand, target audience, consumption habits and psychology of the audience, innate client servicing skills and a knack for understanding numbers and creative work. Such skills can be acquired during the BMM coursework through various projects, working with people and most of all be up-to-date with ever changing social media world through industry leading blogs.
Q. How can a fresher land a job in the digital field?
A. Industry itself is in a very nascent stage and has a huge potential for growth. It is a tectonic shift in way how brands will market their goods and services to customers. So if you think that the field is for you, walk into a digital agency with your reason for joining them along with projects you have done during your coursework and sighting your current social and digital presence.
Q. Is it important for an individual to be active on social media if she/he wishes to be a social media manager? Why?
A. It is very important. We don’t expect someone to create a path breaking viral campaign or even run of the mill ones if they themselves don’t understand the nitty-gritty of the medium. For example one will never understand their target audience’s YouTube consumption pattern if they themselves are not on YouTube almost every day. Insightful knowledge of the medium comes from heavy usage of the medium itself, so if you don’t see yourself attracted by Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram or Pinterest then surely you can’t use them to successfully market your client’s products.
Q. What are the trends for 2013 in the digital media space in India?
A. 2013 is a very exciting year for digital space, it’s a year when 1/4th of the marketer are awaking to the possibility that it won’t be Digital Marketing anymore it will be just Marketing; in short Digital will be the centre space of almost every marketing activity, be it through use of the medium or use of the technology. Some of the emerging trends are –
Moving beyond likes – It will no more be the number of people I have on my fanpage, it will be more about the number of people interacting with me, giving me input about my products and evangelising my brand.
Mobile – Future of digital space, social space and marketing space is mobile. People cannot live without their mobiles and if marketers reap it intelligently they will have first mover’s advantage.
Analytics – Analytics tools will become more and more essential for marketers to understand and leverage. These tools will aid understand consumers activities and consumption and will drive the future campaigns.
Your Mother Is On Facebook – No more can it be argued that social and digital space can cater to a limited audience. We help brands to reach audience up to age of 40 with through Fcaebook. Marketers will have to wake-up and break the traditional mind-set.
Experiential Marketing – Everything will be virtual and it will be quite essential for marketers to mix digital and real world marketing coupes to impact their audience. May it be Coke Australia’s Coke fairy vending machine or closer to home Foodhall’s Christmas campaign to merge digital and real world. It’s the future and its inevitable, come on terms and create.
General Gyaan
5 Must-Do tips/activities that future social media managers can follow:
- Learn what the core identity of your client’s brand. Understand what it stands for and translate it to digital and social.
- Read articles and reports, learn what your target audience wants, what are their touch points and use the knowledge wisely.
- Use social media extensively, if you don’t know what the medium is all about you can hardly make it profitable for your client.
- Think out of the box, there is huge clutter on digital due to lack of entry barriers. So be creative think as absurd as you can and then go back and link it with the brand you have to work on.
- Never let anyone tell you that digital and social are just fad and they will go away. Like TV, Newspaper and Internet, Digital and Social are tectonic shift and they will remain and grow exponentially for decades to come.
Some top blogs to follow are –
- www.mashable.com
- www.techcrunch.com
- www.lighthouseinsights.com
- www.socialmediaexaminer.com
- www.digitalbuzzblog.com
Top 3 digital media companies (in India), according to you are:
Hunagama
WebChutney
iContract
PS: Never forget to read Marketing White book for the current year
