SOCIAL MEDIA ORCHESTRATION MANIFESTO

1. Strategy development:

At the heart of social media orchestration is the development of a robust strategy. This involves defining the overarching goals that social media efforts should achieve, such as increasing brand awareness, driving customer engagement, or supporting product launches. Strategy development also includes identifying target audiences, analyzing market trends, and determining key messages that will resonate with these audiences. We believe it is fundamental in any social media strategy that organizations ensure that their activities are purposeful and effective. 

2. Campaign planning:

Campaign planning translates strategic goals into actionable plans. This involves creating campaigns that are directly linked to key business requirements and organizational objectives. Each campaign is meticulously planned, with specific tasks assigned to team members, timelines established, and content editorials and creative personnel aligned with the campaign’s goals. Every piece of content produced must contribute to the success of the campaign and supports the overall strategy. 

3. Content planning and publishing:

Content planning is the tactical execution of the strategy, focusing on the creation, scheduling, and distribution of content. This involves organizing content into categories that align with strategic themes, linking content to specific campaigns, and ensuring that it is distributed across the right channels at the right times. Effective content planning also includes the use of properly assigned and curated metadata to guide content creation, making it easier to manage large volumes of content and ensure consistency across all channels throughout the organization. 

Companies engaging in social media orchestration must manage content and media assets effectively to maintain consistency and efficiency in their publishing process. Asset management involves proper archiving and organizing content and media files, linking them to specific campaigns and topics, and making them easily accessible for future use. With multiple teams involved in the publishing of content, personnel must be able to quickly find and reuse assets, reducing duplication of effort and maintaining a consistent brand voice across all channels. This requires a robust knowledge management and communication pipeline within the organization. 

4. Amplifying voices 

Social media orchestration is about leveraging the entirety of your organization to meet social media objectives. This means taking advantage of a large and vocal asset that already exists on social media to help magnify and engage with your brand. The power of employee voices cannot be overstated, and bringing all of these voices together into a unified chorus is at the heart of social media orchestration done right.

5. Topic architecture: 

Topic architecture involves organizing communication activities under key strategic themes to ensure consistency and alignment with business objectives. If an organization focuses on product innovation, customer success, and sustainability, all related content—such as blog posts, social media updates, and email campaigns—would be categorized accordingly. This structure helps streamline content creation, making every communication effort supports the organization's overarching goals. 

6. User and task management:  

Effective orchestration includes a wide range of users, and therefore requires clear roles and responsibilities. User and task management involves assigning roles within the organization, defining permissions, and managing tasks to ensure that all team members know their responsibilities and have the tools they need to succeed. This component also includes workflow management, so that tasks are completed on time and that the entire process is transparent. It also requires user role and permission assignments to keep the scope of responsibilities manageable by content creators and community managers. 

A dedicated oversight role for social media orchestration within an organization may be advisable depending on the complexity of organizational structuring and depth of social media needs. This person or small team is generally comprised of communications experts, team leads, senior social media managers, or similar.  

7. Channel integration and cross-posting:

To maximize reach and impact, orchestration involves integrated communication channels. Channel integration allows organizations to manage both external platforms (like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn) and internal communication tools (like company intranets or messaging apps) from one place. Cross-posting functionality ensures that content can be simultaneously published across multiple channels, ensuring a consistent message reaches all relevant audiences. It also includes integration with third-party tools such as social listening, analytics tools, content design tools, and more. 

8. Community management and moderation:

Within social media orchestration, community management is strategically integrated to align with broader business objectives, and the communication and tone that is projected by it is also part of that strategy. It's not just about handling interactions—it's about using every engagement to reinforce brand messaging. Community management in SMO maintains consistent and meaningful interactions. It also means having a single workspace for personnel engaged in community management, and the capacity to handle responses, comments, and other sorts of interaction at scale across many different platforms. 

9. Analytics and reporting:

Data-driven decision-making is essential for refining social media strategies. Analytics and reporting tools provide real-time insights into the performance of communication activities. By tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) and comparing them to strategic objectives, organizations can assess the effectiveness of their social media efforts and make informed adjustments to improve outcomes. Customizable reports allow teams to focus on the metrics that matter most to their specific goals, providing a clear understanding of what is working and where improvements are needed.