Consider Social Media as Word Of Mouth Marketing

"I love the companies that have created a position called “Head of Social Media” or similar"
Antonio Batanero, Sr Director Distribution & Digital Marketing, Sol Meliá - The Americas.

In this interview with Ritesh Gupta, Batareno states that the establishment of a corporate social media committee might be the best way to release its full potential.

If as he suggests we view social media as a mix between "word of mouth, customer satisfaction, email marketing, CRM, and loyalty" then it is really no surprise that the responsibility for this important marketing tool is often poorly defined within an enterprise.

This is precisely why building, maintaining and monitoring online reputation are such important strategies and the corporate structure for managing this needs to be clearly thought through.

Friends telling friends reveals the good, the bad and the downright ugly about an enterprise.

BP who are currently battling with a growing ecological disaster are using social media as a key part of its PR strategy.

In this way they can counteract some of the negative and satirical PR that is being generated on the Net.  They are using the hashtag #oilspill on Twitter and judging from current trend mapping they seem to be maintaining the highest profile in the area most affected.

I suspect that there is a 'corporate committee' handling this and all of the emergency PR associated with the oil spill.

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