Guest Blog Post by Hareesh Tibrewala, Joint CEO, Social Wavelength.

Once upon a time, not so long ago, brand managers sat in ivory towers and commanded ad agencies at their disposal to go forth and conquer the market. Armed with massive buying power, agencies would unleash a communication wave on the consumer. Totally brainwashed by this “awesome” power, the consumer would meekly submit and faithfully pick up the brand from the store shelves. Average products backed by money power had a better chance of success than good products with limited budgets. Marketing was not about creating good products but about brainwashing the consumer into submission.

Not so any more. Social Media is going to democratise the market place with the power shifting from the brand owner to the consumer of the brand. After all, in classical marketing parlance, a brand is what “the consumer makes it out to be”! Here are some of the significant shifts that I foresee, both within the organisation and in the market place:

The walls that separate customer service, sales, marketing and branding will disappear. Once upon a time “a customer-service” problem was exactly that, the problem of “a customer”. Today, one dissatisfied customer can group other dissatisfied customers on a social networking site and cause considerable damage to a brands reputation. Imagine the plight of a store manager if all his dissatisfied customers were to show up together. That is a real threat that Social Networking Sites pose to brands. A customer service problem is no longer a case to be dealt with in isolation; it can snowball into a brand reputation issue.

• In the era of mass communication, the brand manager decided the brands positioning. In a world powered by Social Media, consumers will decide the brands positioning. Brand managers will need to be attentive to consumer chatter and use that information to ascertain how the consumer is thinking of his brand. He will have the choice of accepting that positioning, or going back and modifying the product, to try to establish another positioning. Sheer money power will not be enough to establish a brands positioning.
•  One of the most used cliché by a CMO is “We make products that our customers want”. Fact of life is that a company actually makes products that it knows how to make and hopes that customers will want it. Social Media will bring consumers closer to the product creation cycle and products will actually be made (either by choice or perforce) which are closer to consumer expectations.
• The role of brand manager will become more like that of an air traffic controller. He will no longer be a “commander”. He will be more like a “navigator”. With his eyes firmly glued to the brand radar he will be closely watching the currents created on account of brand activities (ATL, BTL, Digital marketing, Social Media Marketing) as well customer service issues, PR crises etc, happening across the geographical spread of the brand. And it will be his job to guide the brand carefully through these currents, trying to avoid turbulence and air-pockets but at the same time enhancing the impact of favourable currents. This role will require 24×7 vigilance and ability to take very sharp calls.

 Hareesh Tibrewala is a social media evangelist and a thought-leader in the social media space. His company, Social Wavelength based out of India, manages and monitors social media communication for numerous international brands. Hareesh received his master of science from University of Southern California and is a serial entrepreneur. Having created a management consultancy business and an e-commerce venture, Social Wavelength is now is his 3^rd entrepreneurial venture.

This is a guest post by Steven Killeen. Steve is an Alterian Account Manager in the UK with a passion for assisting government in utilizing technology to better meet their constituent’s needs.

New marketing is all about communicating with your audience in a totally personalized way, fully understanding their requirements and delivering relevant content that they want to consume, when they are ready to consume it. It’s also about protecting and enhancing your brand, so that customers, citizens and prospects respect what you do, what you say and who you are. As consumers and citizens, we are bombarded with digital information, which can be a definite turn off rather than a turn on. Getting the balance right requires a well thought out strategy and the right software to make it happen.

Central Government is no different: departments, executive agencies and NDPB’s need to protect their ‘brand’, name, or reputation even. The way Government interacts with its audience and partners now needs to be transparent, or else the consequences are dire. The Internet is changing everything; it is increasing the number of communication channels and the ability to send numerous messages cheaply and quickly. Too much is overkill and too little shows a distinct lack of ideas, caring or competence.

For Government, the need to have a digital engagement strategy started with the adoption of the Internet, but there have been specific reports like the Power of Information Taskforce report and Lord Carter’s interim report on Digital Britain 2009, which have brought digital focus to the fore. Much more recently is the appointment of Martha Lane Fox’s role as Digital Champion, which is going to significantly impact the speed at which Government adopts technology to communicate. That and the gaping hole in funds at HM Treasury means cutting costs but not at the expense of services (pun not intended!).

What do citizens need Government for – information, content, compliance, advice? Do they know where to go? Is data.gov.uk and Directgov working? Why not have systems that forward information to people rather than wait for them to try and find it?

Martha Lane Fox’s great campaign to get people online by 2010 will go a long way to achieving cost savings and will make Government policy ubiquitous. It cannot be achieved without a digital engagement strategy.

Everyone has a voice and is more inclined to use it online. It’s massively exciting times for Government and society in general. People are interacting and engaging on a massive scale, and the opportunities to change the way Government communicates are great.