Responses

• Posted by Twitter Trackbacks for SmartBlog On Social Media » Embracing the strategy of no strategy [smartblogs.com] on Topsy.com on December 9th, 2009 at 10:32 am
  

  [...] SmartBlog On Social Media » Embracing the strategy of no strategy smartblogs.com/socialmedia/2009/12/09/embracing-the-strategy-of-no-strategy – view page – cached What does it take to sell nearly $7 million in goods via Twitter? If you’re Dell it apparently requires an interest in engaging your customers — and little else. “No strategy necessary,”… Read moreWhat does it take to sell nearly $7 million in goods via Twitter? If you’re Dell it apparently requires an interest in engaging your customers — and little else. “No strategy necessary,” wrote Manish Mehta, Dell’s vice president of social media and community. View page [...]

• Posted by Luke on December 9th, 2009 at 10:44 am
  

  I guess Manish says this because they had no strategy going into Twitter and were prepared to explore and learn. They were lucky it resulted in something worthwhile. It could have gone a different way.

  Their explorations and learnings can be used by others in strategy. Others can’t afford to hope for luck – they must follow the path already cleared by risktakers and explorers.

• Posted by Ross Simmonds on December 9th, 2009 at 10:47 am
  

  I wouldn’t completely say that Dell went into this with no strategy. They knew that they needed to connect with their consumers and by embracing twitter like a mother and child they were able to build real relationships with consumers all over the world. Yes, I think that Dells size had a lot to do with the amazing results but I think that many organizations can amazing results if they go into social media with the objective of connecting with consumers instead of constantly spamming them. Social Media, specifically twitter allows brands and consumers to interact in a way that hasn’t been seen since the early 1900s and now that it is back brands need to take advantage of it. I think the best strategy when using social media is simple – Just connect.

• Posted by Jay Baer on December 9th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
  

  Their strategy is to listen and to monetize via Twitter. That is a strategy in and of itself. They have the advantage of having a ton of brand chatter that they can use to help determine their course of action. Most brands don’t have as many social media guideposts, thus they have to be more proactive about their social media strategy.

  And without a strategy, what does Dell do when Twitter goes away or changes?

• Posted by Andrew Verescak - Empirical.com on December 9th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
  

  Let’s not forget about one of the most important points that was made in the original article: “because they’re enormous”.

  You’re likely doomed without strategy in any form of dialogue. Would you deploy emails without a strategic baseline of goals and assumed metrics? Would you put your money into a media buy without a plan? – all of these things are achieved with a bit more ease when your brand is recognizable.

  With that said, whether you have the pre-existing following of a Dell, Oprah, or Perez Hilton… or are a small start up looking to engage within Twitter to communicate to potential purchasers – you NEED to plan. You must continually create legitimate dialogue and relationships and it must be logically integrated with existing communications programs.

  I would find it hard to believe that Dell is attributing 100% of the sale being made JUST by using Twitter and the fact that they are as dominant as they are.

• Posted by Kirk Abraham on December 9th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
  

  Absolutely love this post…. Specifically, ‘I’m a fan of letting your goals determine your tactics and emphasizing flexibility above all else.’

  However, I wonder what 7ml looks like in context to their overall revenue? Probably not a lot. Don’t let them fool ya, they’re paying CLOSE attention or they wouldn’t have hired a ‘VICE PRESIDENT of Social Media’

• Posted by Bou Woodland Caribou on December 9th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
  

  I don’t think it’s having no strategy at all . I agree with letting goals drive tactics. Like in life, you need to have a goal and you have to be open to taking new unforeseen paths to reach it. This also means being flexible enough to modify your goal as you pick up new insights while traveling down the different paths. But, isn’t doing this a strategy in itself?

• Posted by Siouxsie on December 9th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
  

  I agree with Jay – they do have a strategy. Listen, identify needs, respond intelligently, propose solutions, sell more product. Additionally, Dell has one of the largest brands worldwide and the infrastructure to support and track a “strategy-less” Twitter Program that resulted in $7M. I think this way oversimplifies what it takes for most companies to be successful in social media, and way understates the amount of work and support it truly takes Dell to be such a success story.

• Posted by Jack Macholl on December 9th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
  

  This was a terrific post. I agree about objectives driving the tactics. We can’t lose that perspective-flexibility and IMC principles are still relevant.

• Posted by Pat Spenner on December 9th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
  

  I’d recommend not having a strategy as traditionally conceived (i.e., shelf life longer than one year)—that’s a fool’s errand for most companies in this rapidly changing social media landscape.

  Instead, most companies should develop a social media experimentation strategy. What’s the difference? An experimentation strategy is more of a deliberate learning plan. It builds flexibility in as you learn. But I do think organizations can reap results from social media more quickly if they deliberately focus their learning against some areas and not others.

  Notably, they should focus their social media experiments to areas where social media has the potential to change the basis of competition in their sector, or to areas where social media can accentuate a company’s differentiators. Read more here. http://bit.ly/1gkZUu

  Patrick Spenner
  Managing Director, Marketing Leadership Council
  http://mlcwideangle.exbdblogs.com/

• Posted by Andrew Mueller on December 9th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
  

  Dells twitter sales are more akin to direct marketing than social media. They just happen to use a social media channel. This is a tactic that is part of a marketing strategy. Social media is can be looked as a tactic to be used to execute a broader marketing strategy which tell most certainly has and executes effective.y

• Posted by Michelle on December 9th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
  

  They may not have a specific strategy for Twitter, but it is just one component of social media. Social media is about the integration of networks such as facebook, twitter, youtube, flickr, blogs, with other online strategies and traditional advertising. Twitter may be where the most buying behavior take place, but it is the culmination of all marketing channels that ultimately drive and encourage action on Twitter.

• Posted by Niki on December 9th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
  

  It can never hurt to have a strategy as long as you’re okay deviating from the plan from time to time; you can always go right back to the original plan and experiment along the way. On the same note, I also think that if you try too hard, it might not work. I like that Dell didn’t try so hard, but I also think they succeeded because they are, in fact, a large company. I wouldn’t necessarily replicate their non-strategy.It’s always good to have a basic game plan. What is your end-goal, what will you do to reach that end goal, and is it working? Those are the questions you should constantly be asking yourself when venturing into social media.

• Posted by jgraziani on December 9th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
  

  I agree with Ross Simmonds…if Dell has decided to connect with its community and let its social media endeavors evolve based on feedback, then that is a strategy — albeit a simplistic one. Developing goals, strategies, tactics, etc., helps a company focus its resources (human and $$) to meet the goal in the most efficient and direct manner. Having a strategy is not necessarily a bad thing, especially when your bank account may not resemble Dell’s. So Dell made $7 mil. Great! Could they have made more if they had outlined a path? We’ll never know. That being said, I like Mehta’s Mom & Pop store analogy. That’s a good description of the type of connection we all hope to make.

• Posted by pvesey on December 9th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
  

  I just read this quote: by blogtrepreneur.com
  The fact that you are engaging in social media circles is effectively marketing enough for you. In other words, your presence is your marketing tool.

  Just show up? have some trust and authority engage the customer and earn $$$$

• Posted by Twitter Trackbacks for SmartBlog On Social Media [smartblogs.com] on Topsy.com on December 9th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
  

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• Posted by Debbie Weil on December 9th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
  

  I highly suspect that Dell’s “strategy” wading into social media the past several years has been Wash / Rinse / Repeat. Now, is that a strategy? Yes, it is. It’s a repeating process of seeing what works, adjusting, trying again and so on. It’s a very tactical strategy. But it’s a strategy nonetheless.

  This discussion puts me in mind of the terrific article about healthcare reform in the Dec. 14, 2009 issue of The New Yorker. The title is “Testing, Testing.” Atul Gawande makes a key point: there are two kinds of problems — those which have a technical solution and those which can be “managed” through repeated experiments. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/12/14/091214fa_fact_gawande

• Posted by Steve Parker on December 9th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
  

  I agree with Debbie Weil that “wading in” and trying tactics is a kind of a strategy. Especially if the wading in phase is treated as R&D to discover customer social media preferences that help inform a strategy-to-be-named-later. But to suggest that one doesn’t need a strategy at all implies (incorrectly IMHO) that wading in is the best one. That seems unlikely. The real question is, if Dell could do $7M without, could they have done $14M with one? Mr. Mehta’s bosses are probably too happy with the $7M windfall to ask the question. Can’t say that I blame them–and yet.

  If nothing else, this discussion underscores that big, relatively rich organizations can afford to spend what would be a significant amount of staff (or vendor) time and resources in experimentation, compared to a small businesses. That means they get to play the game by different rules–especially if like Dell, they are a household name. The other thing is Mr. Mehta’s comment “no strategy necessary” may say more about his definition of strategy and his business philosophy than it is instructive for others who don’t work for Dell.

• Posted by Walter Adamson on December 9th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
  

  I agree with most comments and especially @josh @jay @steve and where I disagree is those who say strategy is not necessary or only think of strategy as marketing. I presume that Mr Metha’s post was being positively provocative.

  Dell is a $60 billion corporation and must have definite and clear strategies which run over multi-years with regular say annual review and adjustment. You don’t run $60b firms and change them like you do a corner store – that’s just facile thinking.

  Through Twitter marketing itself, Dell made over $6.5 million. The number of tweets sent out by all of Dell’s Twitter accounts were about 1.5 million and over 100 employees have been sending out tweets for the company.

  Firstly, 0.01% of sales, through what was essentially a direct marketing approach is hardly the basis for throwing out strategy top to bottom for global $61b firm.

  Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for social media and a big fan of Dell and a social media practitioner. I know the benefits, and am learning more each day.

  Do results and circumstances change strategy? Yes of course but they don’t push strategy from pillar to post every day as those who say that “things move to fast to have a strategy” would have you want to believe. Is there such a thing as emergent strategy? Yes of course, and I tire of people saying “Facebook doesn’t have a strategy” and doesn’t know how to earn money etc etc – of course they are smarter than us and they have an emergent strategy in place – give them credit.

  Does Dell as a $60b firm have a strategy will could be called “emergent” – personally I doubt it. Let’s get back to how you casually engage with and coordinate your own 100 people who are sending out 1.5 million tweets – with great respect I don’t think Mom and Pop at the corner store would have any idea of how to PLAN this.

  But wait, what’s the difference between a plan and a strategy? Well actually I don’t know and it doesn’t matter. Dell thought through what they were doing, without knowing how it would work out and shape up. It was PART of their business strategy and “A means to help determine it” not THE means. And they have done a great job and Mr Metha has done a great job of igniting the conversation.

  If more executives dip their toe in the water all the better. It is very hard to teach a person to ride a bike if you have not ridden one yourself, and that’s what it often feels like when I am talking with execs who have an urge to get their people and company involved but are not involved in social media themselves.

  Walter Adamson @g2m
  http://xeesm.com/walter

• Posted by Caroline Melberg on December 9th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
  

  Don’t confuse having a strategy with having it all figured out. You’ll want to approach social media with a plan (if you’re using it for business), but not such a rigid framework that you don’t have room for experimentation and change along the way! Social media is very much about learning and staying flexible to make changes as you go – a plan will help to make sure you are continuing to point in the direction you want to head for.

• Posted by Oliver T. Hellriegel on December 10th, 2009 at 2:19 am
  

  I agree with a lot of comments and think that esp. @jay and @walter made some points.

  Having “no strategy” for a new and emerging communication method (I’d rather like not to talk about it as channel) is the strategy in itself. And for sure the company has a business strategy where they have derived their marketing and also their communication strategy from.

  And BTW: Listening to the customers isn’t all new because of social media – this should be part of any MARKETING strategy. Social media just makes it easier for brands to listen and to learn and having conversations and interactions. And that’s what SOCIAL MEDIA is about…

  I’m coming from the strategy side and I’m a big fan of social media. But I’m still learning each day… And so should brand managers as well as agencies: learn to use social media as a communication platform and not yet another one-way channel to shout out their message. And that is part of a STRATEGY, isn’t it?

  Oliver T. Hellriegel
  http://xeesm.com/Hellriegel/

• Posted by Jay Deragon on December 10th, 2009 at 5:02 am
  

  As more and more businesses migrate to use of social media it quickly becomes evident that they lack a strategy

  Since social technology is new there is a lack of knowledge relative to its impact on strategic thinking and the related disciplines. Traditionally strategic thinking has encompassed organizational alignment of key elements present in most organizations. These elements included: organizational design, culture, leadership, management, communications, marketing, technology, human relations, finance and market research. There are a host of subset elements for each of the primary elements but in essence strategy was about development and deployment of a road map that maximized the efficiency and effectiveness of the entire organization.

  A social strategy defines how the organization can better “relate and communicate” with all its constituents. Constituencies includes people (markets, suppliers, customers, investors, society and employees) who interact with the organization, internally and externally.

  Because the reach and richness of social technology is new it has never been considered of strategic importance until now. The ability to relate and communicate impacts everything, everyone and at speeds never before experienced. The knowledge domain of these issues simply does not exist but is evolving day by day and the related changes impact everything and everyone.

  Strategy is about having a road map to reach strategic objectives. Social strategies is about how to ensure your organization is ready to follow the map effectively and what new knowledge is required. Knowledge about the technology but more importantly knowledge of the inter-related dynamics it creates and the impact those dynamics have on results.

  Stay tuned as everyone learns the disciplines and knowledge required to develop and execute a social strategy. Doing so requires a new mind map that is in opposition to business as usual and defines a new road map for business thinking and processes that are unusual. Not having a social strategy means your organization will likely fail in the emerging markets which is quickly replacing all markets.

• Posted by Erin on December 10th, 2009 at 10:25 am
  

  Dell is such a popular, huge company that they were had a luxury here. They had the opportunity to jump in, head first, and figure out what would work best for them. In my experiences, it is ALWAYS best to have a strategy. You wouldn’t run a traditional PR or marketing campaign without one, would you?

• Posted by Jordan Willms on December 10th, 2009 at 11:20 am
  

  Great article, but I’m a little confused by the closing paragraph.

  Manish says “No strategy necessary”, although one sentence before he clearly states that facilitating the conversation should be the strategy companies should use.

  I think this boils down to the fact that for Dell, customer service is in the fabric of the organization, where for many other businesses, this is an actual strategic direction they need to pursue.

  Jordan
  http://jordanwillms.posterous.com/manish-mehta-isnt-the-value-of-social-media-w

• Posted by R. Trent Thompson on December 10th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
  

  Make no mistake, they have a strategy. Sustained success is not possible without one.

• Posted by Web Marketing Therapy » Blog Archive » Use SmartBrief To Get the Latest Marketing & Social Media News on December 15th, 2009 at 10:26 am
  

  [...] Your turn: How important is it to have a social-media strategy? [...]

• Posted by Will Dell Ever Be Number 1 Again | THE Tech Scoop on January 5th, 2010 at 2:58 am
  

  [...] Embracing the strategy of no strategy (smartblogs.com) [...]

• Posted by Andrew Verescak - Empirical.co on February 5th, 2010 at 2:39 am
  

  Let's not forget about one of the most important points that was made in the original article: “because they’re enormous”.

  You're likely doomed without strategy in any form of dialogue. Would you deploy emails without a strategic baseline of goals and assumed metrics? Would you put your money into a media buy without a plan? – all of these things are achieved with a bit more ease when your brand is recognizable.

  With that said, whether you have the pre-existing following of a Dell, Oprah, or Perez Hilton… or are a small start up looking to engage within Twitter to communicate to potential purchasers – you NEED to plan. You must continually create legitimate dialogue and relationships and it must be logically integrated with existing communications programs.

  I would find it hard to believe that Dell is attributing 100% of the sale being made JUST by using Twitter and the fact that they are as dominant as they are.

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