Where do you start with a social media strategy? The answer to this question might appear obvious: you’d probably say that you begin by creating your profile on Facebook, on Google+, on Twitter, and other channels; but the truth is that before you even enter the first line of your bio or upload the first profile photo, you have to spend some time contemplating your identity. You shouldn’t even go near the profile-building pages of those social media channels until you’ve developed a vision of who you are and found your online “voice”. We’ve developed a great tool to help our clients do this: Seven Archetypes for Social Media Engagement. These seven brand personalities make use of different strengths to engage audiences, and as you read through you’ll probably begin to feel some familiarity with one or more of them.

1. 7 Archetypes
for Social
Media
Engagement
idmlo.co
By Bryan Merica

2. Introduction | 2
Where do you start with a social media strategy? The answer to this question
might appear obvious: you’d probably say that you begin by creating your profile
on Facebook, on Google+, on Twitter, and other channels; but the truth is that
before you even enter the first line of your bio or upload the first profile photo,
you have to spend some time contemplating your organization’s identity.
Because social media platforms make it so easy to fill in their profile templates,
you can get the mistaken impression that creating your online persona is as
simple as answering a questionnaire. The truth is, however, that creating and
maintaining your social media persona is far more like starting each day with a
blank white canvas in front of you and a paintbrush in your hand. Even if you
were magically granted extraordinary artistic skills, how would you begin to
portray your identity?
You shouldn’t even go near the profile-building pages of those social media
channels until you’ve developed a vision of who you are and found your
online “voice”. We’ve developed a great tool to help our clients do this: Seven
Archetypes for Social Media Engagement.
These seven brand personalities make use of different strengths to engage
audiences, and as you read through you’ll feel some familiarity with one or more
of them:

3. The Analyst

4. The Analyst | 4
The Analyst generates new
information, sometimes
using very technical
methods, and in so doing
becomes a change agent.
Nate Silver’s unique
ability to take poll analysis
to a new science has
permanently changed
election forecasting. If your
organization, personal
profile, or company is all about bringing new information to the table, the
Analyst is your archetype. You’ll want to establish yourself as an expert in
your field and post interesting new links on social media channels that lead
back to your own web content.
Furthermore, you’ll want to join circles and groups in your field, establish
Google Authorship, and make sure your publications or presentations are
well integrated into your social media identity.
“You’ll want to
establish yourself
as an expert in
your field and post
interesting new links
on social media
channels that lead
back to your own
web content.”

5. The Reporter

6. The Reporter | 6
Similar to the Analyst, the
Reporter creates new content,
but that content is not the
result of extensive analysis or
testing. Instead, the Reporter
is a communicator, someone
who physically goes out and
experiences events in the
larger world and writes about
them. Christiane Amanpour is
one of journalism’s titans, moving across the global political stages as a
correspondent, and at the same time making abundant use of Facebook
and Twitter. With over 750,000 Twitter followers and 193,000 Facebook
Likes, she’s able to step beyond her role as ABC’s Global Affairs Anchor and
provide personal insight to her social media followers.
Her skilled use of social media, even while she has a prominent role in
classical broadcast journalism, indicates the way in which individuals now
move beyond their employer when they create their personal brand. The
“...the reporter is
a communicator,
someone who
physically goes out
and experiences
events in the larger
world and writes
about them.”

7. The Reporter | 7
connections that Amanpour makes via social networks will only add to her
viewership and to ABC’s prominence. Her independent establishment of an
identity is a net plus for her employer.

8. The Curator

9. The Curator | 9
In the ever-growing tidal
flood of information,
curators fill a crucial role.
Maria Popova, who curates
a site and newsletter of
“interestingness” called
Brain Pickings, has made a
case for curation as a new
form of authorship. This
premise is controversial, but
the fact remains that her site sees more visitors than The New York Review
of Books and she now has bylines for WiredUK and The Atlantic (not to
mention 365,000 Twitter followers).
Curation may well be part of what you and your organization offer online,
and (like Brain Pickings) you may be able to provide a truly fresh window
by sifting out the jewels from the gigantic rock pile of the online world. The
process of curation naturally gathers users, as you will be offering links
across the net to a wide range of activities, thoughts, and locations.
“The process of
curation naturally
gathers users, as
you will be offering
links across the net
to a wide range of
activities, thoughts,
and locations.”

10. The
Advertiser

11. The Advertiser | 11
This archetype is all about the
pure science of getting your
brand in front of practically
everyone. It’s about your logo
being recognizable worldwide
and (the ultimate mark of
super-success) your product
name becoming part of the
English language. NBC made
a major advertising push on
Facebook to drive engagement around their coverage of the 2012 Olympic
Games. Intuit targets its business customers aggressively on the social
network where they spend a good portion of their time: LinkedIn.
The interesting thing about these brands, though, is the fact that we aren’t
aware of being constantly subjected to their advertising. What we focus on
are the services they offer, and their brand names are linked in our minds
to our own daily activities. If you see yourself as embracing the Advertiser
archetype, keep in mind the first step is tying your name to a service that
people find valuable.
“It’s about your logo
being recognizable
worldwide and
(the ultimate mark
of super-success)
your product name
becoming part of the
English language.”

12. The
Mobilizer

13. The Mobilizer | 13
While individuals can
initially get the social
activism ball rolling
all by themselves, it is
organizational sites such as
Change.org and Causes.com
which are carrying activism
to a whole new level of
effectiveness. These mission-driven “action platforms” enable individuals
to join forces for creating change. Other types of activism are exemplified
by Kickstarter and Indie-Go-Go, which leverage individual contributions to
allow non-mainstream projects to sidestep institutional roadblocks.
If your business or online archetype is that of the Mobilizer, you may
consider setting up an official campaign through one of these established
action sites. They have special provisions for sponsoring non-profit
organizations in partnership roles, an example of how the internet can be
used as a social change channel.
“These mission-
driven ‘action
platforms’ enable
individuals to join
forces for creating
change.”

14. The
Entertainer
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15. The Entertainer | 15
Jon Stewart is a great example
of today’s entertainer: he uses
humor to convey important
facts and commentary on real
events. While he makes no
claims to being anything other
than an entertainer – indeed,
he embraces that role – he has
ended up being America’s most
trusted newscaster (according
to a Time Magazine poll.) As he
states, “Jokes don’t work when
they’re lies,” and so the drive to
be a good entertainer is unified
with his intent to say something true. His Daily Show Twitter account has
1,695,000 followers, and his Facebook page has 3.8 million Likes. His
tweets range from the deadly serious to the sheerly goofy, and the vast
audience consumes them all hungrily.
“By making it
fun to engage
with you, and by
offering material
that provides pure
enjoyment, you’ll
stimulate users to
share your links
and want to keep
on coming back for
more.“

16. The Entertainer | 16
You are on the web for a serious reason, whether that reason is promoting
your candidacy, your vision, or your services and products. By making it fun
to engage with you, and by offering material that provides pure enjoyment,
you’ll stimulate users to share your links and want to keep coming back for
more.

17. The
Engager

18. The Engager | 18
While all forms of social
media communication are
a type of engagement, the
Engager archetype is unique.
He or she makes a fulltime
career out of engaging with
their audience. Nobody
personifies this archetype
more vividly than Dan
Savage. He began his career
answering reader questions
as a sex-advice columnist
for a print publication, and
has continued his countless
conversations through
online blogging, podcasting, his own MTV show, personal appearances at
colleges, and writing several books. His “It Gets Better” YouTube campaign,
created to give hope to gay and lesbian teens who felt isolated, spread so
virally that within months President Obama had added his own video to the
“To be an engager,
you have to come
into the social arena
with a powerful
agenda, and then
deliver it with a
persuasive tone that
catches people’s
sense of outrage, or
need, or hope.You
have to emotionally
connect with them.”

19. The Engager | 19
burgeoning thousands in the campaign. Dan Savage has his own distinctive
voice, using his signature blend of dark humor, satire, outrage and loving
kindness to make legions of followers fall in love with him.
If you resonate with the archetype of the Engager, think in terms of
expanding through all media channels with your own strong expression of
what you believe. To be an engager, you have to come into the social arena
with a powerful agenda, and then deliver it with a persuasive tone that
catches people’s sense of outrage, need, or hope. You have to emotionally
connect with them.

20. Putting it All
Together

21. Putting it all together | 21
So, which is the right archetype for your organization?
We’ve developed a few planning tools that allow our clients to select the
best archetype (or in some cases multiple archetypes) that will work for
them. For example, the following framework casts the archetypes into two
key dimensions: Content Originality and Audience Engagement. Depending
on your organization’s comfort and ability to create new content and engage
directly with audiences, one or more of these archetypes may be the right
one for you.
ContentOriginality
Audience EngagementLow High
High
• Entertainer
• Analyst
• Advertiser
• Reporter
• Mobilizer
• Engager
• Curator

22. Put it all together | 22
Selecting the archetype is just the first step. Once you’ve set your initial
online identity in place, each post, tweet, and conversation you publish
needs to convey your chosen persona in a consistent tone. But don’t worry;
our team of digital strategists have great tools to help you with that as well.

23. | 23
IDMLOCO brings together some of California’s most strategic and creative
thinkers to serve a diverse client list spanning professional and collegiate
athletics, healthcare organizations, brands and businesses, and government
agencies. The team’s capabilities include custom web development,
digital advertising, social media monitoring and engagement, mobile app
development and content creation. IDMLOCO’s real value, though, lies
in its decade of experience tying these components together to achieve
measurable sales, fundraising and communications goals.

24. | 24
Bryan Merica
Co-Founder & Partner, IDMLOCO
Before starting IDMLOCO, Merica was a Senior Strategist at the enterprise
software firm, PeopleSoft. He also founded and worked with several
startups in the early days of the dot-com era. Merica started his career
in management consulting, working with international consulting firms
Deloitte and Price Waterhouse.

25. | 25
Merica graduated Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science in
Business Administration from the University of the Pacific.
Merica is extensively quoted and published on matters related to digital
public relations and public affairs, including: Wall Street Journal, Los
Angeles Times, Campaigns & Elections Magazine, Silicon Valley Business
Journal and Sacramento Bee.
Merica is an active board member with WEAVE, a non-profit provider of
crisis intervention services for survivors of domestic violence and sexual
assault. Merica also serves on the board of CapitolWeekly.com, a stalwart
California news organization covering political and state government
matters across the state and beyond.

26. Digital
Strategy and
Execution
idmlo.co