According to Smart Insights, 80 percent of companies are under the impression that their social media customer service experience is exceptional, while only 8% of their customers say they agree. There’s obviously a major disconnect here, but where are companies going wrong?

I actually think the real question here is: In the sea of information that we call the Internet, how can businesses (and even personal brands) distinguish themselves from the other hundred brands that do or call themselves something similarly?

When working with clients, we use a variety of questions to get to the core of their sales goals and dissect their brand narrative.  This allows us to align all marketing efforts so that their messaging is seamless and simple for customers to understand.

Here are a few foundational questions every brand should ask themselves in our #digitalfirst world.

What are you known for now?

If you were to Google yourself, what are the first few links, images or news updates that appear? Like it or not, these lay the basis for your online identity and shape the narrative around you and your brand. This also serves a reminder of the ancillary topics that your service or product might be related to. For example, if you are a phone repair company, mobile trade-in and reseller programs are indirect competitors who might advertise to your same customer. A keen awareness of these digital dynamics is crucial to successfully positioning your business as the customer’s best choice.

How do people who don’t know you (and vice versa), validate you and your expertise?

Today, becoming a thought leader in your respective industry is one of the most effective tactics to establishing yourself as an authoritative voice. How you choose to do this involves a thorough audit of your social media channels, an assessment of the types of content best received by your audience, and an analysis of how that content impacts your sales processes and funnel. Through the development of a channel content strategy for each platform, companies can focus on designing targeted customer acquisition methods and using audience insights to create content that is easy to find and caters to their needs.

When it comes to your individual professional identity, what do you want to be known for? The three areas below are what must be established when it comes to defining your social media persona:

1. Topics: These are your content pillars. What do you do professionally?  Accounting and finance? Great. Then those are the things you should be sharing. Marketing? Awesome. Talk about which aspects you work in and the value it brings. Let’s say you work in product marketing. You’re all about value propositions, positioning against competitors, pricing and new product launches. General rule of thumb: pick 3 professional topics.  
2. Personality: So much goes into this. Are you approachable? Factual? Laid back? Some of this can tie to your industry or profession. For example, if you’re in finance (perhaps a stock broker), you want to appear trustworthy, knowledgeable and helpful.. Personality guides how you write, respond and engage with your audiences. This goes beyond tone and style. People want to connect with people. We call this H2H — human to human. One of the easiest ways to do this is to Add a Content Pillar to reflect this. We recommend a charitable cause you support that you can advocate for. For me, I support She Supply, a North Texas non-profit that supplies feminine hygiene products to women in need.  I became involved in this organization when my friend Kathy reached out to me with the idea of forming this organization 4 years ago. Currently, I serve as an executive advisor.  We are headed into Year 5 and have provided 471,998 products to 32,849 women in the 5 counties surrounding Dallas. (Learn more by visiting www.shesupply.org)
3. Look and Feel: This is about putting it all together. You have your topics.  You are establishing your voice with how you write, how you respond, and how you share. Are you simply hitting share/repost, or are you giving insights into why you are sharing? How can you visually represent your “brand” with consistency? This includes a professional headshot, cover photo, links, documents, images or videos you can attach to your brand’s profiles to enhance its appearance.