We believe that social media has changed the world.  It has changed society and it has changed the world of business.  Here is a great example about how the world of sales and marketing can be transformed with social.

But how as an organisation do you take advantage of these changes?

One of our clients recently posted on LinkedIn.

"Yesterday we hosted the first ClubCISO Advisory Board meeting of the new year looking back on a record 2019 for our community. Over 170 applications were received from all over the world. This fresh injection of new members has created a huge pooling of real world, peer to peer advice available almost 24/7 (eek) and with, quite frankly ridiculously fast response times.  Forgive the website as it's still reeling from the shock of it all and definitely needs an update, but new members always welcome https://www.clubciso.org/"

This is a very rah, rah, rah comment, so I thought I would drill down on that by asking a question, which was :-

"What a great marketing success story for once! - In a world where buyers won't answer cold callers, where we have to be manipulative to get people to open emails and where there is a 70% take up of ad-blockers, here's a marketing team that is getting success.  I wonder what the secret is?"

The response I got was a lot more enlightening.

"Hi Tim, do you remember the presentation Alexander Low did at your conference last year around Trust (not Technology) being the biggest issue of our decade. With communities like ClubCISO, we’re finding that they offer members support from their peers under Chatham house rule away from internal politics and vendor pressures. The trust amongst peers is implicit. People have been attracted to our other communities like Data Journeys for this same reason, and they’re using the pooled wisdom to move themselves forward faster. We did a quick straw poll of people that joined the community over Christmas to ask them how they’d heard of ClubCISO. 47% said word of mouth, 27% said LinkedIn - these were the top two sources. The growth comes from the power of the network - and the more personal the better. But you know this as I’m talking to a master in this field! "

This is a great example of where community through social is being used in marketing.  Not with an objective to "sell" but with an objective to provide a supporting environment.  Now "obviously" they company will sell by association, which is a lot subtler.

The supplier can also "lock out" competitors, recruiters and spammers, which will always be an issue if you use groups on social media. 

The post can be found here.

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/catherinecoale_clubciso-ciso-cybersecurity-activity-6626075917905080320-IbxG

Social is changing and you need to change with it.  My advice, but I do admit I'm biased, is to get a partner that can help you.  This won't come from a marketing agency, or a PR agency, this will come from a social media specialist company.  DLA Ignite dlaignite.com would be an example of this .... anyway back to the blog on comminutes and their use for you to gain competitive advantage.