Quickly! Think about how you manage your social media.

I bet what came to mind was some collection of content publishing, listening, or analysis systems. If you're in a regulated industry then perhaps a content compliance or archiving system might have come to mind.

What's the common denominator? Content. That's not a bad thing since sharing content is why we're on social media. However, we're overlooking a fundamental component – Presence!

Dear Big Retail CMO, is Social coming between you and your stores?

Does it feel like employees are reading from a different social play book...working at cross purposes?

As the CMO, you probably see social as something best left to the team at HQ to communicate the big brand messages. You may even consider social media at the store level as something unruly, that "doesn't move the needle," and which brings unwanted brand risk. However, your store managers probably look at it differently. From their point of view they are responsible for driving sales to their stores and who knows your local customers better than the local team? So, your store managers probably see social media as something which can "move the needle" for their store.