Do you think people should do it themselves?

Good Morning, Social Rabbit here with your guide to the world of social media.

I’m back!  From holidays that is.

My question to you today is should people do their own social media in house or is it ok to outsource it?  I mean do you think that people would still want to interact with your business if the posts and comments weren’t actually made by the business?

Here’s why you might outsource instead of keeping it inhouse….

1. Not enough time – you are too busy running the business to manage the social media as well and don’t have anyone in the team with spare time
2. No idea – where to start, someone has told you it is important and needs to be done, but your team just doesn’t have the skills
3. No passion – for social, which lets face it you and/or your team need, otherwise you just won’t last long….
4. Not interested – you just don’t get why people would want to interact online, I mean what happened to the phone?  But you do realise the importance, but feel that to do it inhouse will distract the team from what else they need to do
5. Not creative – you and your team just can’t imagine what you’d write day in and day out, plus what do people want to talk to you about?
6. No ideas – not in how to get started, but more on what you put online, I mean you have a page now what?
7. Don’t get it – you just don’t see the point of social media, and would never choose to use it personally

Now don’t get me wrong I’m not saying you shouldn’t outsource, or that it is a bad thing, but genuinely social media might not be your bag, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Here’s reasons why you keep it inhouse

1. More likely to integrate social with other marketing - if you and your team know what is going on elsewhere in the business it means that you can combine this knowledge in the interaction on social media
2. Keep on message – you know what you want to say and when, whereas with outsourcing the message might vary depending on what controls you have in place with the outsourced company doing the implementation.
3. Easier to control – ideally when outsourcing you should get the signoff on all content before it goes up, however this may not happen.  If it is done in house and your brand team completely understands the brand and your audience then potentially the content will be more relevant.
4. Respond more quickly – when things go pear shaped, in theory if it is outsourced it should be responded to quickly, but it depends on how often the outsourced company are monitoring it
5. Vested interest – it’s part of promoting the business, therefore your team are more likely to be motivated to get it firing rather than being one of many clients with an outsourced company.
6. Cheaper – if you have people in house with the right skills it is going to be cheaper than outsourcing….
7. Know the customers – if your team already interact with customers, you can extend the relationship online

Do you think it makes a difference who posts up content?

I don’t, if it is on message, fits with the brand, the purpose of the social media, it is responded to quickly and is good content then you should get the same results, however often passion, openness, honesty and friendliness can make up a lot for other failings…..

But, what do you think?  Can you tell the difference?  Would you be annoyed if you found out that a company wasn’t doing it’s own social media?  Or would it not matter if the content was good?  Tell me in the comments below…