As social media continues to grow and gain even more momentum, organizations need to find ways to empower their best brand ambassadors with the right tools and to create more impact. From creating guidelines, to setting as examples, to training others, there are many ways organizations can enable their employees.
In a recent blog post “Creating a Social Media Training Program that Works”, we outlined a social media training program we’ve implemented at Cisco. Now that it’s in place, we want to hear from you, share more insights, and exchange new ideas.
Join @petra1400, @elhoust, and @christyjpark for a special @CiscoSocial Twitter chat on Thursday, August 2 from 9-10a.m. PDT, following the #smtraining hashtag directly on Twitter or another Twitter application. We will dive into the following areas and encourage everyone to participate in the lively discussion!
Setting the social media training strategy
What goes into it?
How does it work?
Who’s involved?
Creating the appropriate content
What’s the framework?
What’s in it for the participant?
How does the content come together?
Sustaining the program
How is it maintained?
What are key tips to keep in mind?
What does it take to implement the program?
Let’s get the conversation started before the @CiscoSocial #smtraining Twitter chat. Share your ideas (through the comment section below or on Twitter using #smtraining) regarding ways your organization is including social media training or pose questions you would like to ask the panelists. We look forward to your participation and lively discussion!
The Web Marketing Association recently announced the Cisco Support Community’s technical support iPhone/iPad application as the winner of their 2012 Best Advocacy Mobile Application Award. The app was recognized for its ease of use, breadth of features and intuitive design. What was so eye-catching about this app? Before I go into further detail about the entry, here are some customer testimonials that speak for themselves:
”Just downloaded the app and it is swanky!! It’s already helping me in an outage tonight… It beats running across the data-center to where my laptop has to charge!” --Brett Lykins, Network Administrator, Rockingham Memorial Hospital
“It’s a great app. I like the functionality and the fact that I can post and reply on the go. Thanks to all who made this possible.” --Rajiv Dasmohapatra, Customer Support Engineer, Wipro
Not too long ago, we featured Greg Smith (@gregsmit68), a Cisco Service Provider Marketing Manager, in a “Meet Our SMEs” series blog post (“Meet Greg Smith: Mastermind Behind 2 Award-Winning Social Programs”). Greg was noted for his blogging best practices and for leveraging innovative social media programs to effictvely connect with fans. When we got the opportunity to interact with him face-to-face at the recent Ragan Social Media Conference, we managed to pull him aside to ask for some social words of advice to share with our Cisco Social Media Blog readers.
Hear some of Greg’s social media tips in this short 2-minute video: Read More »
Over the past year we’ve been (quietly) working on a video documentary that has nothing to do with Cisco products, solutions, launches or events. Our goal was to use storytelling and video imagery to showcase the amazing impact that the telecom network is having on the socio-economic status of communities around the world. Through the work of local service providers, community leaders, and dedicated volunteers the changes are phenomenal to witness.
We enlisted the help of Dr. Steven Shepard of USC’s Institute for Communications Technology Management program to narrate the videos. Dr. Shepard shared some wisdom from his 25 years of experience as a veteran of the telecommunications industry, networking and education. He traveled with us and interviewed telecom executives from various businesses, as well as many interesting characters he happened upon during the journey. Six videos were created for the series.
Network Effect
Pioneers of the Network
A Network Built for Mom
Reaching the Unreachable
Phone Company In a Box
Looking Forward
We invite you to watch this documentary during its television broadcast debut exclusively on ShortsTV. (This channel is currently only available to subscribers of AT&T U-verse and DirectTV.) Once the promotion is completed (at the end of July), the documentary will be available on YouTube. As a sneak peak, here is one of the episodes.
A Catalyst for Social Change
The stories told are great examples of an aspect of social media that is often missing – social impact, changing lives, empowering people to be their best. These stories go beyond individual products, or solutions but dive into the power of being connected. A stone mason whose neighbors skip meals one day a week to pay for a satellite dish to promote his business. Delivering reading lessons via SMS to teach young women to read thereby enabling them to get better jobs. Thousands of micro-businesses increased sales over 30 percent while reducing costs because of access to telephony services housed in shipping containers. Hearing the impact and creativeness of those who use the telecom network is what drove our mission.
As these videos evolved we used our Connected Life Exchange (CLE) blog to promote the series. We started CLE for the purpose of experimenting with the then new transmedia multi-platform storytelling approach to communication. In March, CLE was selected as the runner-up finalist for Best Corporate Blog by B2B magazine.
Clearly this type of multimedia storytelling, editorial essays, and the ability to make human connections, without a self-promotional agenda, is the best example of authentic social marketing in action. BtoB Magazine remarked:
“The whole package is refreshingly non-promotional and often fascinating. Cisco continues to innovate in the suddenly red-hot field of content marketing with an approach to thought leadership that emphasizes actual thinking”
What examples of inspirational story telling have you seen? Do you think a more subtle approach is better at reaching your target audience? When is it best used, and why?
They may seem simple changes, but we think some recent updates to the Products & Services page on Cisco.com will make this page easier and quicker for you to use.
Here are some of the main things we’ve improved:
Links are more obvious. Previously, some links were hidden behind drawers. Examining the metrics — plus testing with you — convinced us to make all the links visible, which will definitely help for findability.
Scanning the list of products is easier.
Scanning the list of services is easier and the lists are more obvious.
There’s a new “Key Topics” module which allows a clear navigation path to these important areas.
Borderless Networks; Collaboration; and Data Center & Virtualization are highlighted.
We’ve updated the “Let us Help” content to reflect all of our main contact methods so you can connect with us more easily.
It’s easier find key links to areas like Visio stencils and EOL products. And, we’ve added a few new links places like the Developer Network Marketplace and Developer Network (Resources).
A lesson is this update is that sometimes, simpler is better. The previous design was an improvement over its earlier version, but also had some interactive elements such as switchable tabs and popup drawers; these may have been “cool” to play with, but didn’t do much to help usability or speed of navigating on the page. We’ll let you know how this new, more simple version performs.
The new page:
For comparison, the previous version:
The older one is shorter, but in the end, we find that people don’t mind scrolling or swiping a bit to get to the information they need. It’s much better to have the information visible.
