P&G Social Media Panel

I was invited by Stan Joosten at P&G to participate on a Interactive Marketing and Social Media panel with Lisa Bradner from Forrester Research and Bob Pearson from Dell today. The discussion was lively and timely and the P&G attendees had some very insightful questions. I think the one that has been sticking in my head since the panel came from Stan. What is the one skill a Marketing person needs to be successful in Interactive Marketing. This is a very tough question because I do not think there is just one skill. Also, I feel a good Interactive Marketer is a good Marketer. We have been separating these roles for far too long and it is time to integrate them. So, here is what I think a good Interactive Marketer should know:

• Positioning - Be able to position your brand and your products and services.
• Customer Segmentation - Know who you are targeting for your product or service.
• Brand & Product Strategy - What is it? How will you win? How will you go to market?
• Groundswell - Learn the Groundswell Framework that relies on you knowing Positioning, Customer Segmentation & Targeting, and Brand & Product Strategy. Knowing these and using the framework will allow you to assess your customers and strategize on how to best interact with them on the internet.
• Experiment - Once you have the above well understood, try some low cost experiments and engage with your customers. Listen to your customers and find out how they would like to engage with you. It might be a blog, it might just be through your branded website, it might be through social networking sites like myspace and facebook or it might be through innovative services like Twitter. Let them guide you to the right technologies and services.

So, did I come up with one skill, not even close. Just as it takes a combination of many skills to become a great marketer it requires a combination of many skills to become a great interactive marketer. But I do think they require the same foundation of marketing skills that then evolve as experience is gained.

Someday, this will not even be a discussion point as interactive marketing will just be another, and possibly major, part of integrated marketing.