The importance of managing your brand in social media

In the age of social media there is still much debate over the value of a Facebook fan or "like" for companies. Monetizing and quantifying Facebook and social media fan bases in a direct way has proven to be very difficult. That said, there is virtually no questioning the importance of managing your brand in social media, or of the ability to strengthen (or significantly damage) your brand without the appropriate social media strategy.

Companies with strong brands in social media have been able to increase customer captivity and loyalty, distribute coupons and promotions to their most loyal followers, engage consumers in conversations about their brands and products, and use "free" channels to enhance their profitability, albeit primarily in indirect ways.

Alternatively, above and beyond the multitude of companies who are either not using social media at all or using it in a poor and ineffective way, there are those companies who have actually damaged their brands by poor social media management, some of them rather famously.

The latest example of that is Bank of America: http://www.businessinsider.com/bank-of-america-google-plus-page-2011-11 and http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/11/bank-of-americas-google-plus-page-appears-brandjacked.php. Apparently, amidst their 30,000+ employee layoffs they seem to have lost their social media team or they were caught asleep at the wheel. Either way, there is no doubt that with active monitoring of their social media presence this "brandjacking" would have been caught immediately, certainly within a day if not within hours of posting, and the Bank could have avoided all the bad press it received. A quick search on Google News reveals 76 articles that featured this social media gaffe on the part of B of A.