Social Media - Who Knows Best? A thought piece by Louise Bucknall

5th April 2011

At Cogent Elliott we believe that social media is more than simply providing the technical know-how when communicating and engaging with people online. It is also about building credible relationships through exciting, targeted and interesting conversations, i.e. delivering the right message at the right time to the right people.

Equally, although social media is still a young channel, we believe that to make a social media campaign really work it has to have PR and Digital and a variety of other marketing disciplines (ecrm, store, advertising) all working together.

We know that PR professionals understand the power of the written word, and should, on occasions be the people who write the social content. Equally, getting the social content 'out there' to the right people is a must. In a crowded market in can be difficult to get your voice heard and having the right 'push' to get people talking about your brand and/or product is where a Digital expert becomes essential. All of this, backed up with strategic marketing insight, should deliver a truly engaging online conversation.

As a result social media shouldn't sit solely within either Digital or PR - instead it should be a collaborative partnership between a variety of marketing disciplines. A sharing of minds and expertise which delivers compelling content which is joined up. This is where integrated marketing agencies can, and do, add real value.

At Cogent, we set out on a journey of delivering a distinctive, integrated agency that can help clients build their businesses through applying insight and understanding fused with great creative. We apply this approach into everything we do, be that on or offline marketing solutions. This is possibly one of the reasons why we were recently voted the number one UK integrated agency by senior marketers in a YouGov survey.

We're in a great position to offer clients extraordinary social media expertise which is backed up with our broad strategic and integrated understanding of our clients business. And at our finger tips we've dedicated social media and PR specialists providing strategy, content and support to a variety of clients including Triumph Motorcycles, Calor and Subway.

So, who knows best?

Social media shouldn't be a battle of ownership and should be more a sharing of minds, expertise and insight - bound together through commercial understanding. This is where integrated agencies can play a massive role in helping clients to define social media success.

By Louise Bucknall, PR Specialist