Social media is not a strategy.  It is not a goal.  It is a series of tactics.

I’m not one for semantics, when it comes to your social media the difference between these three terms are important.

If you are a small business or a startup trying to venture out into the social media world, you can easily be led to think that you should neglect traditional marketing, customer support, PR, and just replace them with social media.   

“We need to put everything on Facebook and Tweeter, that way we won’t need to send out newsletters!”

If that statement makes sense to you, or is even remotely attractive, HALT. Don’t even think about taking that direction. Go get your marketing plan, and consider where social media tools will support or extend your existing marketing strategy.  (Social media can enhance more than just marketing, but that’s a good place to start)

These are the actual Merriam-Webster definitions:

Strategy : the science and art of employing the political, economic, psychological, and military forces of a nation or group of nations to afford the maximum support to adopted policies in peace or war

Goal : the end toward which effort is directed

Tactic : a device for accomplishing an end

Don’t get so hung up on these terms that you become paralyzed.  All you need to do is have a clear, written plan to help you accomplish your corporate goals.  You’ll use a variety of marketing strategies, one of which is social media.

I’m getting a lot of requests to write a post on social media metrics and measurement.  I’m getting to it, I promise. Here’s an infographic for now. 

Here is a great infographic from queaar.com showing the growth of QR codes. They seem to be a pretty hot topic right now but, until QR code reader apps are added as standard with every mobile, there is still a huge debate around if they accessible enough?

Here are a few highlights from this infographic:

QR code uptake has increased 4589% from early 2010 to early 2011

56% of QR codes appear on product packaging

The majority of users expect to receive a coupon or deal from scanning a QR code

11 out of 50 Fortune companies are incorporating QR codes into their marketing strategy

68% of QR codes are scanned via an iPhone

(higher resolution here)