Applying the concept of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to the needs of people who communicate in social communities, we can see a similar paradigm emerge.

Social media is an organism. A conversation about a brand either flourishes and grows, or stagnates … or even worse, begins to undermine the long-term viability of the brand online. As we look at how this dynamic manifests in the social conversation between brands and consumers, there are certain basic needs that must be met in order for a brand to initiate, engage and grow its relationship with consumers.

Building on the Social Hierarchy

Level One – The Foundation: A Cohesive, Consistent and Sustainable Presence
Just as food and shelter are basic needs in Maslow’s Hierarchy, starting with a foundation that builds a cohesive, consistent and stable presence in social media is paramount to a brand’s success there. Characteristics of this level include:

• A presence that ties in every potential consumer touchpoint online; from a Facebook presence that carries the same branding as a Twitter background to similar, but community-appropriate, content.  A disconnected social media presence is easy to spot.  It’s most often the brand that has little to no coordination between community manager teams and fractured content strategies.
• Having a coordinated and consistent content approach among these teams with a clear understanding of roles and responsibilities is a start for creating cohesion across the brand’s social presence. This coordination will also help ensure consistency of content and posts, creating a more sustainable presence for the brand.
• And, most important to setting this foundation is an understanding of how to address customer service issues. It’s generally in this phase of building a social presence that the customer service and brand reputation functions are working together to establish the channels and dialing in the right content mix and tone.

Level Two – Honest, Authentic and Open Conversation
One of the most difficult things for a brand to reconcile is the ability to sound human. You can tell the brands that have mastered this – their Facebook responses have a comfortable, authentic tone, and they sound like a real person is communicating, rather than the logo. However, this is more of an art than most realize. For most brands, it involves investing significant time to educate employees on the nuances of social media. It’s not simply writing or re-purposing ad copy or a legal brief; it’s having a discussion with a single person in full view of anyone who wants to see the conversation. And beyond finding the right voice, internal hurdles such as legal push-back, inertia, or the fear that the counter-intuitive nature may undermine the brand’s status in some way can be challenges.

While it’s not always easy, done right, engaging a brand in social conversation can be a great opportunity for those brands that are often seen as stuffy, staunch and impersonal to add some life to the brand and communicate with people like people communicate.

Level Three – An Interactive and Engaging Presence
With a consistent and cohesive foundation established, and the authentic voice of the brand dialed in, engaging with consumers in social media becomes easier. Now you can focus on interacting on the terms of your customers, and perhaps identify some sort of collective point of view.

With an integrated customer team, the typical work of addressing basic customer needs and resolving issues can now be done in a way that builds increased trust with every interaction.  Consumers can see that you’re not just there to market to them, but you’re there to use the channels to help meet the totality of their brand-related interests and needs.  And, you can bring more to the conversation – in the form of promotions, special offers, etc.

Level Four – A Trusted and Effective Presence (Social Commerce)
Because you’ve set the foundation, you’re no longer leading with an ask, but rather leading with an answer to the constant questions consumers are asking in these channels – “What can you do for me?” And, you’re now able to bring a sales aspect to your social presence, if desired. In this final level, the brand can now engage in the marketing and sales conversation with more credibility. Few brands have been able to master this final step – some because they try to start the conversation here, others because they try to take more liberty here than they deserve. It’s a delicate balance between being helpful and just being another company trying to sell you something.

The Payoff
Social channels aren’t sales and marketing channels – although that activity can take place.  They are trust channels, and you must establish that trust upfront, in order to move on to engaging in brand-centric activities. I often tell clients that the first step in assessing their social presence is to determine if they’re looking at the discussion from the inside-out, or the outside-in.  To keep things honest and authentic, brands should look at the conversation through the eyes of their customers, rather than looking at it through the eyes of the brand. Building from a strong foundation, a brand can progress through the levels to achieve what it wants to accomplish: creating a sustainable social presence and building a closer connection with consumers in the process.