Social media strategy and tools go hand-in-hand

After spending three days at the Ragan Communications Social Media Summit hosted by Cisco in San Jose, California June 9-11, 2010, I left with a renewed realization that discussing social media strategy and tools are co-dependent.

And just so you know, I was fortunate enough to work on the conference programming with Ragan and Cisco. I couldn’t be happier with how it turned out.

Strategy versus tools

Let me explain why I believe social media strategy and tools go hand-in-hand.

There’s great value in understanding the myriad of social media tools. My pre-conference workshop, 17 social media tools to help communicators save time and money, was focused on highlighting more than 30 different tools.

Communicators need a personal familiarity with the tools before they can apply them to business.

However, existence of the tools alone will not guarantee success in implementation.

There must be an objective — a specific, measurable outcome — in order to know if social media tools are useful.

Building furniture

For example, I’m a woodworker. I have built a handful of bedroom sets for family and friends. Possessing woodworking tools and purchasing supplies does not mean I’ll automatically end up with a bedroom set.

Having the tools and a knowledge of how to use them is only an indication that I could create bedroom furniture if I wanted.

Using plans and diagrams I can apply my woodworking tools and skill set to the project of creating a bedroom set.

Using social media is like using woodworking tools

Social media works similarly. You must have the tools and an understanding of how to employ them. You must also use the tools within an established framework, according to an existing plan, to produce the desired outcome.

I heard some presenters and Social Media Summit attendees suggest there’s no such thing as a social media strategy, that all social media entails is a set of tools.

I heard others harp on setting clear communication objectives before focusing on social media tools.

I believe in our day of integrated marketing communications both a strategy and solid social media toolkit are necessary. They work together to create successful communication campaigns.

What do you think?