At this point it’s a given that SEO and social media are valuable tools for a businesses’ marketing team, but with more and more users signing on, is your company ready to utilize these resources effectively?
I talked with founder Chris Pollara, 28, about Convertiv, a new services boutique that helps Boston businesses get the most out of search, mobile, and social media resources as these technologies reform the business world.
His advice? Stop thinking about SEO and social media as the marketing team’s territory and get everyone involved.
What is Convertiv?
Founded by Pollara and launched in early October, Convertiv is one of the newest services boutiques around. Based in Wakefield, Mass., Convertiv’s focus is on social media, search, and mobile resources.
Convertiv is a local resource for the Boston area and currently employs nine people. They launched search and social strategies with their first client in the middle of November and have already picked up others as a result. They also host a blog that provides some solid insights on related social media topics.
Convertiv vs. Hubspot
Given that he runs a Boston startup focusing on social media and SEO, one of the first questions I asked Chris was how Convertiv differs from Hubspot, the wildly popular Boston-based internet marketing giant. He made it clear that the two can work in conjunction, and that they provide different products. While Hubspot provides tools, Pollara explained that Convertiv is a service “to help people infuse these tools across the enterprise.”
Convertiv isn’t just teaching you how to run a Facebook account, or how to optimize for Google. Hubspot and others already do a good job of that. Instead, Convertiv is about “helping people realize value” in things like social media, and open their minds to the many ways it can be utilized. They’re idea people helping local companies recognize opportunities.
Getting Everyone Involved
One problem Chris believes Convertiv can solve is the compartmentalization of web marketing tools. Right now most businesses that use social media have a couple of experts who represent the company, and that’s it. Pollara sees social media as a resource that can be used by teams across an enterprise. This is where Convertiv comes in. As Chris explains, learning the tools “isn’t technically that hard. The tough part is teaching companies to change their business” to accommodate this new consumer audience.
Pollara’s experiences have shown him that many companies are “setting budgets aside for mobile, social and search marketing.” He noted in an email that “there is a huge opportunity to help [companies] view these three corners of the realtime triangle as one medium to connect with consumers.”
Bringing social media to places like research and development is one way Convertiv plans to evolve the use of web tools. Chris’ take is that social media tools like Facebook and Twitter are, ultimately, “way[s] to interact with the consumer.”
Why not interact by polling your audience and finding out what they want in a product developed for Facebook before you start building it? Convertiv is helping businesses recognize these kind of opportunities and deploy them.
The Social Media Revolution
Pollara brings up a lot of good points about the evolution of business in a social media world. For one, it’s a game-changer for startups who can now “build an audience without tv, magazines,” and other older, more expensive mediums. Chris sees a revolution in how businesses interact with their consumers and Convertiv helps “companies be part of this revolution.” There’s no denying that social media-types are gaining power as businesses realize their value. The landscape is changing, and Convertiv seems to have some great foresight about what that landscape is going to look like.
Have thoughts about Convertiv or the social media industry? Drop us a line in the comments section.
