It can be difficult to explain the  benefits of Social Marketing on networks like Facebook, Twitter, or Google+ to upper management. Not only are you using unfamiliar terms like “Retweets”, “Hashtags”, and “social reach”, you’re talking about websites they typically use to share pictures with out-of-town family. One effective way I’ve found is the caveman analogy.

So easy a caveman could Tweet it!

Think of each social network as a giant collection of cavemen. Each caveman has a loose collection of other cavemen that belong to his “clan”. These clans have labels like “Friends”, “Followers”, and “Circles”. Like most cavemen, they gather and hunt for resources and share their spoils with their clan. However, instead of gathering berries and hunting for bison, the prized resources they share are memes, videos, news stories, and product reviews. Primitive cave paintings have been replaced by Facebook walls, Twitter tweets, and Google+ streams becoming the tapestry of their exploits and interests.

Even if they are not aware of it, the caveman increases his standing in the clan by the volume and quality of the resources that he shares.

Who wouldn’t “Like” a sharpened stick?

Lets say you manufacture Sharpened sticks, here are some easy ways you can help cavemen share your brand with their tribe:

• Create “like” buttons on your Sharpened stick homepage.
• Take funny pictures of cats holding sharpened sticks and post them to your Facebook Page, Flickr or Twitter for easy distribution.
• Write articles about a caveman who used one of your Sharpened sticks to bring down 3 wooly mammoths in one night.
• Create contests where several lucky cavemen will get the next generation in Sharpened stick technology, the bronze spear.

You don’t have to beg or bribe cavemen with monetary gain to get them to “share” this kind of content. Just subtly remind them with the presences of “share” and “like” buttons.

By creating content that would be seen as valuable and creating the proper reminders to share it, you can tap into the caveman’s subconscious desire to bring back valuable resources to their clan.