The hardest part of anything ambitious and worthwhile is getting started. The second hardest part is sticking with it. The best way to do both is to have a plan, strategy, roadmap… whatever you want to call it.

Here, I’ve outlined the 10 key categories that should be in there. Just lay this out in a PowerPoint, KeyNote, or Word and start filling in the blanks. If you need help with any of it, give us a shout!

1. GOALS

1. What do you want to accomplish with social media?
2. Sell more products and services?
3. Get more overall awareness?
4. Make new connections? Get more funding?
5. Customer service?
6. Stay connected with customers in between buying cycles?
7. Encourage word of mouth, referrals and sharing?

2. RESOURCES

1. What resources do you have to use?
2. Marketing budget percentage?
3. Internal marketing team social media, PR or creative agency
4. How much time do you have to spend on social media?  Social media requires lots of time See “Key to Social Media Success is Hard Work and Hustle”
5. Who will do the required research?

3. RESEARCH / TARGET YOUR DEMOGRAPHIC

1. Who are you targeting with social media?
2. Who are your customers?
3. What social media channels do they use most?
4. What kinds of content do they like most? Videos, blogs, photos, live interaction?
5. Who are your customers’ influencers?
6. When are they on social media?
7. Are they mostly on mobile? Desktop?

4. BUDGET

1. What budget do you have to work with?
2. Staff hours spent
3. Content creation budget
4. Advertising budget
5. Agency fees if working with an agency

5. CONTENT

1. What can you create that is of interest and adds value to your customers’ lives beyond the product or service you sell?
2. Blog posts on topics of interest to your customers, entertaining, informative, educational
3. Videos on topics of interest to your customers on YouTube, Vimeo and other video channels
4. Web video series
5. Vine and Instagram videos
6. Facebook updates
7. Twitter updates
8. LinkedIn updates and company page updates
9. Google+ updates
10. Pinterest updates
11. Instagram photos

6. CALL TO ACTION / GOAL INTEGRATION

1. How do these updates and content lead to achieving your goals?
2. Include “call to action” points into your content that clearly let people know the action you’d like them to take
3. Do you want people to go to your website, subscribe to something, share, sign up, download, order, buy now, like?

7. ADVERTISING AND PAID ENDORSEMENTS

Do you want to include social media ads? Each major social media platform has some type of ad buy that you can take advantage of to jump start your social media efforts or keep them moving

1. Facebook ads
2. Twitter ads
3. YouTube ads
4. LinkedIn ads
5. Google ads
6. Instagram ads
7. Paid celebrities
8. Paid social media influencers
9. Paid bloggers

8. CONTENT CALENDAR

1. How will you organize the content you’ll be sharing?
2. Start a calendar and outline all the content you’ll be sharing over a 14-30 day period
3. Who is responsible for having content ready by which dates?
4. Who is responsible for posting which content, and when?
5. Who is responsible for writing social media ads?
6. Who is responsible for placing and monitoring social media ads?

9. SHARING STRATEGY AND ANALYTICS

1. Who is responsible for sharing your content?
2. How often will content be shared?
3. When?
4. Who is responsible for daily updates?
5. Who is responsible for blog and publication outreach to get posts and videos shared with their audiences?
6. Post to multiple social media channels, which ones?
7. Cross posting
8. Checking analytics to see what’s working and what’s not working

10. REAL TIME ENGAGEMENT / INTERACTION STRATEGY

1. How will you interact with your customers and their influencers in the social media environment?
2. Who is responsible for daily interaction?
3. When and how will you check for social media activity?
4. Use search for finding conversation opportunities
5. Set up alerts
6. Follow on Twitter, retweet, @ reply, like
7. Like on Facebook, comment, share
8. Connect on LinkedIn, like, share, comment, join groups
9. Subscribe on YouTube, comment, like, reply
10. +1 on Google+, like, comment, share
11. Follow on Pinterest,
12. Follow on instagram
13. Comment on blog posts