Questions with Joshua March, CEO and Co-Founder of Conversocial
Conversocial are generously sponsoring Social Media Week.
We spoke with Joshua March, CEO and Co-Founder of Social Media Management System, Conversocial, a Social Media Week Sponsor. Josh will be speaking on ‘Social Telly: from Campaigning to Commentary to Community Building’ next week, and gives us some thoughts on engagement in Social Media.
What is Conversocial? Conversocial is a Social Media Management System, accessible from your web browser, which connects to your Facebook pages and Twitter accounts and pulls in all content. We provide in- depth engagement analytics and comprehensive comment management tools to enable marketing distribution, moderation and customer support from a single interface.
What is the significance of engagement in social media? Almost all engagement with brands happens in the newsfeed – fans rarely go to a Facebook page directly. Facebook’s algorithm is based upon interactions such as comments and likes, and the more engagement updates receive, the longer they will be held in the news feed. In Twitter, @replies and re-tweets directly increase visibility in the feed. Measuring and analysing engagement is key of you want to increase it – failing to address engagement levels can mean brands risk losing out on the value of social channels. If they’ve spent a lot of money to build up their fan base, this value can be huge.
Secondly, communication in social channels is two way and marketing and customer support channels occupy the same space. The more successfully you push a Facebook page or a Twitter account for marketing, the more your customers will use it to ask questions or grieve their complaints. These comments are public, for all to see, and swift responses are expected. Failure to deliver can alienate existing and potential customers.
Why is social media important for broadcasters? Engaging with viewers should be a high priority for broadcasters at a time where excitement about upcoming episodes is dwindling. There is now much more flexibility and choice for viewers, with TV on demand available both online and on television sets directly; the public are becoming less dependent upon what media companies decide to air, when. As programmes are watched on the web, conversations around them follows – broadcasters should be involved. Social media is a great channel to get people talking about your programmes and spreading the word to create the next hit show.
What are you hoping to get from Social Media Week? I am really looking forward to the session on Social Telly. It will be great to speak to some broadcasters to find out what they’re doing with social media and get a better understanding of the obstacles they face. I’m also really looking forward to hearing what the other speakers have to say on the subject, as we have some expert insights on offer here. Not only will I be sharing my thoughts, based upon research we have carried out into television’s relationship with social media, but this event is an invaluable opportunity for me to learn a lot.
Conversocial are sponsoring Social Telly: From Campaigning to Commentary to Community Building on Tuesday 8th Feb, 12pm -2pm.
Social Media and TV have been working together for a while to increase and extend conversation and interaction around programming content, from campaign to commentary to community building. We will look at the best practice in the world of TV and social media and lessons we can learn from this to take to the advent of social TV.
