How Systems Thinking can help brands more meaningfully connect on social media

It’s ironic that, despite our name, social media specialists have long worked in isolation.

For too many years, social media departments have been relegated to weaving the mysterious dark arts of social in shady corners, while the ‘real’ marketers get a seat at the brand table. Sure, we might get a sneak peek of a marketing plan or be on the receiving end of new brand assets that refuse to squeeze into a thumbnail but, for the most part, we’ve operated in a social vacuum that stands apart from the wider brand ecosystem.

This approach flies in the face of Systems Thinking. Rather than look at a brand world as an interconnected whole, the reductionist view of many social media practitioners focuses on social media in silo, reducing it to its most basic parts – likes, impressions, posts, and channels. This approach may have worked for a while but given social’s increasingly important role in brand discovery and consideration, it’s time for the boundaries between ‘brand’ and ‘social’ to be removed. Instead, we need to explore how social media can become an extension of the wider brand world.

To find out more download 1HQ’s Cue magazine, All Systems Go, here.

Credit: Tom Wrigley, Digital & Social Communications, Strategy Director, 1HQ UK