Quality Innovation: Social Media Marketing Plan

A plan for social media marketing is a summary of all the things that a companys management plans to carry out and hopes to attain for the company using social media networks. A social media marketing plan should include an audit of the current state of the companys accounts, objectives for where the accounts are needed to be in the future, as well as all the tools that needs to be used to get there. The more specific a marketing plan is, the more it will be implemented effectively. The plan should be succinct, for it to be attainable. However, the objective of the plan is to guide the actions, although it also provides a measure whether the company is succeeding or falling (Castells, 2009). This report will provide a social media marketing plan for Quality Innovation Inc.

Companys Vision and Mission

Quality Innovation (Qi2) is a consultant firm that specializes in offering necessary healthcare, information technology and consulting solution for business entities as well as government clients. Qi2 is a joint team of specialists who endeavor to support the need of the government and military veterans. The company is multidimensional, with several solutions based services. The mission of the firm is to ensure client satisfaction through faultless acquiescence to contract terms while struggling incessantly to improve their business processes. The company also tries to assist their clients create a strong foundation and business practices so they can be prosperous. Quality Innovation will always work to enhance all aspects of their processes, including performance excellence, teamwork culture, as well as productivity ("About Us", 2017).

The decision of moving from traditional media to social media has an impact in the accomplishment of the mission and vision of Qi2. The company will be able to ensure customer satisfaction through a two-way communication system. The Company will be able to reach out to the needs of individual clients in meeting the mission statement. The needs of clients requiring quality innovative system in healthcare, consultancy as well as information technology will end up met because the mission and vision of the Company will be open through social media. The organization will ensure that all services to the client meets the set goals and objectives as envisaged in the mission and vision for a strong relationship with customers. Additionally, the Company will ensure delivery of everything promised to the customer because of a two-way communication and openness through social media unlike in the traditional media.

Situation Analysis

The strategic change of QI2 Company to shift from traditional to social medial will have an impact in the situational analysis of the organization. By adoption of social media, there will be an understanding in the external and internal factors affecting the organization. The customers will be able to identify its customers, capabilities, business environment as well as potential clients by the use of social media. By following the comments and views of customers about the products offered by QI2, the company will get an understanding of its situational analysis. Also, the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities as we well as the threats of QI2 will get clear on the inception of social media. The manager will get a clue on what is going in the business for a chance in the determination of the most appropriate steps for the success of business.

Transparency in social media will help QI to understand its business environment for appropriate techniques in winning the customers. Transparency in getting information from the clients and some competitors will aid in the understanding of the present and future competitive situation (Mangold & Faulds (2009). The Organization will have an opportunity to get information to do an analysis of the main competitors for the establishment of competitive advantages. The social media step by the Companys leadership will understand the distribution situation by a two-way communication with clients. The services like provision of information technology, consultancy as well as healthcare by Q12 will occur through equitable distribution of services in accordance with number of clients at a time within a particular locality. For instance, by checking on the likes and followers on face book and LinkedIn, the company will be able to understand ways on how to distribute the services to clients by focusing on demand versus supply (Mangold & Faulds (2009).

Website Strategy

The decision by Q12 management to move from the traditional media to social media will use the website strategy in the development of a social media strategic plan. The Company will develop a strong website as a platform for the communication with the clients. Clients will log into the company website to orders for services as well as to deliver their comment. Since social media applies bottom-top technique, the Company will view the comments of customers through their websites accounts to help in coming up with decisions that gears towards meeting the needs of clients. Also, the company will use social media to inform their clients about their website (Mangold & Faulds (2009). By sharing the website in social media groups like of Whatsaap and Google+, customers will become aware of the Companys website. As a result, the website strategy will occur through social media networking system. Information will flow fast at a time from one person to another about the services offered by Q12.

There will be as well the direct use of website in communication to the clients. QI2 will post on its website information about its services of healthcare, consultancy and management as well as information technology to its clients. Clients will get interested by looking at the pictures and attractive images posted at the companys website. The website will have social media links where customers can share on social media platforms like Whatsaap and Youtube. For instance, linking the video having information about the services provided by the Company through Youtube from the Companys website will lead to many people accessing the information at a time. The strategy of the website is therefore a way of ensuring that the clients are able to share the information about the company in a convenient manner (Mangold & Faulds (2009).

Social Media Network Plans and Strategy

The use of social media plans and strategy by the management of Qi2 will facilitate the move from the traditional to social media strategic planning. The use of social platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, You Yube, instagram as well as twitter will help in the implementation of the social media strategic plan by Qi2. The company will use social media networks for the purpose of marketing its services of providing necessary healthcare, information technology and consulting solution for business entities as well as government clients. The most commonly used social media network platforms in the marketing of businesses are Facebook and Twitter. For instance, Facebook having the highest number of people will help in the reaching out to a wider market. The posts on Facebook by Qi2 will lead to receiving information about its services by following the conversations.

The organization will use twitter for the establishment of a solid brand because the conversations on Twitter are precise and specific. Twitter as a social media platform is about how the Company wants, then client to view it s brand. The other way to effectively use Twitter in the social media plan by Qi2 is through making announcements for timely responses from clients. Youtube is also another social media platform that the Qi2 will through sharing videos about its services to client. Youtube has almost 160 million users and sharing of videos will lead to reality of the business to clients. Linkedin is as well a social media platform for the Company to use in connecting with over 450 professionals Worldwide. Also, Qi2 will use instagram in the process of driving sales by posting contents that are attractive to followers as a way of encouraging the formation of strong business relationships.

Campaign

Campaign is important in the adoption of a social media in the company as it leads to persuading clients to follow conversations. The management together with the department of marketing ought to post information on social media platforms that persuades the clients to follow, share or even comment positively. The marketing department of Qi2 will come up with a series of posts that have a single message in form of images, cartoons, diagrams, videos or animations to promote the services offered by the company. For instance, social media campaign can occur by the use of posts that are tied together for the purpose of offering a visual aesthetic or hash-tag with consistency in messaging or slogan. Campaign has the aim of attracting the attention of followers, friends or contacts through the impression of attractiveness seen in the posts (Effing & Spil, 2016).

For a successful social media campaign, the managers of Qi2 require to apply proper planning. The first step in the campaign will begin by the selection of a social media platform. The choice of a social media channel depends with the intention of the post. For instance, a campaign post with the intention of capturing active comments from people will use Facebook, the post for driving sales will use instagram while the intention of strengthening brand name will work well on Twitter. Moreover, campaigns on Google will focus on strong and immediate relationships with a particular interest on information technology, consultancy or health services offered by Qi2. Posts that include short videos and static images will appear well through instagram while sharing of professional information and articles about Qi2 will be suitable at LinkedIn. Lastly, the campaign planning team will use Pinterest in the posting of project reports for high visual performance because Pinterest offers a strong imagery outlook (Heymann-Reder, 2016).

Integrated Marketing Communications

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) is another important technique for the leadership Qi2 to apply when developing a social media strategic plan. The use of IMC will help in the coherent delivery of information by linking the messages before posting them on social medial networks. For the purpose of harmony in marketing posts, Qi2 marketing department will ensure that the messages in the communication get linked together. To strengthen IMC of the messages communicated to the clients, the organization ought to appreciate the importance of total sum instead of isolation of posts. The incorporation of the various types of integration will yield to harmony of messages across networks. For example, the consideration of horizontal integration across to happen in the existing marketing mix to involve all the sections of Qi2 will lead to delivery of a common message. Secondly, internal integration will help in arriving at internal marketing by updating the staff on new advertisements and promotions (Andrews & Shimp, 2017).

Apart from the application of horizontal and internal integration on social media channels, Qi2 can apply departmental as well as external integration. Departmental ICM can occur by the formation of a Whatsaap group where members of a particular section of the organization can communicate with each other in harmony. Additionally, the company will use external integration to harmonize a commonality in the messages delivered to clients. External IMC is key as it mainly concerns the delivery of marketing information to external partners. There is need for a cohesive and solution with a single, seamless message for the achiev...