Social media has earned its place in the marketing mix across every industry — and the technology sector is no exception. As tech companies look for the latest marketing breakthroughs, many have discovered that social media offers unique advantages. In fact, the smartest technology marketers are beginning to shift their focus and resources to powerful opportunities to build brand awareness, promote thought leadership and generate leads. Spredfast works with dozens of top technology brands, including Rackspace, National Instruments, LifeSize, Intuit, and Jive Software. These customers report that Spredfast has helped them:

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SOCIAL BUSINESS IMPACT IN HIGH TECH
Learn how top tech brands like Rackspace,
Jive Software, National Instruments, LifeSize, and Intuit
deliver business impact through social.

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WHAT SMART TECHNOLOGY MARKETERS ACHIEVE
Social media has earned its place in the marketing mix across every industry — and the technology sector is no
exception. As tech companies look for the latest marketing breakthroughs, many have discovered that social
media offers unique advantages. In fact, the smartest technology marketers are beginning to shift their focus and
resources to powerful opportunities to build brand awareness, promote thought leadership and generate leads.
Spredfast works with dozens of top technology brands, including Rackspace, National Instruments, LifeSize, Intuit,
and Jive Software. These customers report that Spredfast has helped them:
Demonstrate thought leadership — Hardware-and-software providers enlist hundreds of subject
matter experts (SMEs) to contribute content and build brand affinity and sales opportunities via
engagement with SME content.
Achieve Higher Conversion Rates — One software company has found that social media
campaigns convert 43% better than email and 170-190% better than traditional online
advertising.
Deliver shorter sales cycles — A software company found that sales opportunities originating
on social closed 400% faster than other sources, taking their sales cycle from 120 days down
to 30 days.
Build sales pipeline — One Fortune 50 hardware-and-software provider generated $500K in
sales opportunities through social campaigns and redirected less effective ad dollars.
“We spend a lot of time and effort trying to understand the influence
and impact that social media has on Rackspace brand awareness and
our sales funnel, and Spredfast provides metrics and measurements
around our social media campaigns to help us evaluate and optimize
our programs…It’s become higher priority because social media is one
of the top ways our prospects and customers interact with us.”
– Suaad Sait, CMO Rackspace

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5 Social Media Best Practices for High Tech Brands
Proactively participate in conversations.
Anyone will tell you, listening is the first step to a successful social program. But listening alone isn’t
enough. Smart tech brands actively scan conversations taking place about their brand, industry, and
competitors so they can engage with social users that indicate qualified interest. Look for individuals
asking industry–related questions, stating intent to purchase, or expressing dissatisfaction with a
competitor. And then be ready to respond to questions and engage them in conversation.
Use Targeting Options to Reach the Right Audience.
While it is important to cast a wide net when building brand awareness, it is also important to
reach the right people with the right message. Take advantage of targeting options that allow you
to reach individuals based on demographics such as industry, job function, age, seniority, location
and interests.
Demonstrate thought leadership by sharing great content.
Contribute to existing conversations and spark new discussions by generating and sharing valuable
content. Keep your audience’s preferences and values top of mind, and remember that great content
can come from anywhere. This includes high-performing, homegrown material as well as industry
news, content from your business partners, and industry commentary. Don’t forget to enlist your
company’s Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to share expertise and insight. Ask them to moderate and
contribute to your LinkedIn or Google+ groups, post on the company blog, and share relevant insights
from a personal Twitter handle.
Provide Targeted Calls to Action.
The most common form of user engagement is clicks to links. [Spredfast Benchmark Report] Capture leads
by directing social users to your website to download new content (e.g., research or whitepapers) or
register for webinars or live events. Spotlight new products or features, share company news, or link
to content that can educate your prospects and customers about your offering. And don’t forget to
make your campaigns socially sharable to facilitate great word of mouth.
Use Social Insights to Optimize Campaigns.
Take advantage of the wealth of social performance data to understand which types of content are
driving quality engagement and which campaigns perform best. Use these insights to optimize your
owned social content and make informed decisions about paid social promotions.
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Whyit’stimetoexpandyoursocialmarketingefforts
Your audience is there.
High-tech purchasers are present and seeking out information across a variety of social channels. For
example, LinkedIn, the professional social network where users are contextually ready to “talk shop,”
has over 200 million members. Two of the top five represented industries are Information Technology
and Services and Computer Software. [LinkedIn Blog]
They are ready to listen.
66% of tech professionals say that they have used social networking sites to obtain information to
influence a technology purchase. [SM@Work] Twitter users exposed to tweets by B2B tech brands were
150% more likely to search for the same brands online. [Twitter Blog]
They are taking action.
92% of IT professionals have taken actions such as visiting a vendor web site, directly contacting a
vendor for more information, or registering to download content as a result of using social media.
[SM@Work]
You will gain insight.
Social media offers greater visibility into your audience, industry, and campaign performance than any
other channel. On traditional media, insight is limited and successful programs are the result of costly trial
and error. But social networks provide audience insights, targeting capabilities, and real-time engagement
metrics that allow you to identify and iterate upon successful content — quickly and effectively.

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Common Questions from High Tech Brands
While many technology companies are already using social media to drive business impact and results, others
have yet to go “all in” on social and realize its full potential. Here are a few common questions we hear from
technology marketers, and the ways that Spredfast can help.
How do I surface executive-level insights from social-network data so I can
demonstrate impact and obtain budget and buy-in?
WhatifIdon’thavethecollaboration,workflow,planningandorganizational
tools I need, to expand internal participation?
How do I keep my team focused on big-picture objectives and strategy
when they’re buried under day to day tactics and just trying to keep up
with the crazy pace of social?
What if my team is outgrowing first-generation technologies and their
insufficient functionality and insights? How do we evolve beyond our
use of freemium tools and native social network interfaces?
Gain visibility with insights that help you understand your audience,
measure quality engagement, define and track social conversions,
and calculate return on engagement.
Empower contributors and protect brand integrity by assigning
access and permissions, centralizing content calendars, and
promoting best practices.
Remove operational barriers by implementing workflow and
assignment rules, automating approval paths, centralizing content
distribution, and managing conversation moderation.
Achieve insight and organize complex social teams in a way that is
both powerful and flexible enough to meet the needs of your social
business as it matures.

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Let’s get started.
We are helping dozens of technology brands to achieve meaningful business results on social. Top technology brands
are using Spredfast not only because we provide a technology platform that is powerful and flexible enough to suit each
organization’s unique structure and goals. They are choosing Spredfast because we are a trusted partner committed to
providing strategic guidance and sharing best practices that help our customers succeed in social business.
There are many reasons why the time is right to expand your social marketing efforts whether you are looking to
build brand awareness, manage communities, demonstrate thought leadership or generate high quality leads. We are
ready to answer any questions and share how Spredfast can help your technology company expand your social media
programs to deliver meaningful business results.
Ready to find out how?
www.spredfast.com | info@spredfast.com
LET’S TALK