Check out this very interesting article by Nick Martin, recapping his recent presentation at the International Customer Reference Program Conference in Boston. In the article he breaks down his presentation into the following two categories:

Impacting the Right Conversations Means Influencing the Bottom Line

Business need to understand the different stages of the customer life-cycle. In order for businesses to target their audience correctly during each stage of the customer, they must:

• Research top influencers
• Determine target search terms & phrases customers use
• Calculate a customer’s desired outcome

Four Common Social Media Mistakes to Avoid

• Don’t assume that your target audience is already following you
• Focus on building followers
• Defining social too narrowly
• Optimizing for search AND social

I highly recommend not only checking out his presentation recap but also the full presentation titled Unlocking the Value of Search and Social for Customer Evidence on SlideShare.