At one point in time, many businesses viewed the world of social media as a playing ground for kids. Those days are long gone. In today’s society, social media sites provide a valuable tool for marketing and branding any business. With such a level of importance placed on these sites, it is equally important to make your social media marketing plan an effective one. In this article we will give you a few tips for starting out right.
Social Media
Marketing companies specialized in social media are not always a good solution. Many of these businesses are preying on inexperienced owners of Internet marketing businesses with scams. Some of these operations will use tricky methods of creating fake social media accounts through automation and proxy servers. They can show you impressive viewership counts for your advertising, when in fact you’ve sunk serious money into having your ad watched repeatedly by a software program.
Figure out what it means to have a conversation. Many business owners don’t always take advantage of consumer feedback as an opportunity for conversation and a chance to encourage the growth of the company in a positive manner. Engage fully with the customers that contact you and build a mutually-rewarding dialogue with them. You can serve them better, and improve your business’s performance, by cultivating a genuine interest in what your customers want and need.
Use links to tie together your various social media sites. Be sure your blog has easy to see links to your Facebook page, your YouTube videos and Twitter. Be sure your Twitter profile contains a URL for your Facebook profile and your blog. If you link each type of social media you use, your customer audience will grow exponentially.
Keep your attitude humble. If you sound like you’re arrogant, you’ll end up with a bad reputation and your offensive posts repeated all over the Internet. Your strength is maintained only by the customers who give it to you in the first place. They will ultimately determine and sustain your success.
Keeping finding new ways to get in touch with your customers. Put comments on your Facebook and on your blogs if you feel it is a good thing. It is important that you do not participate in personal conversations; you should limit your posts to topics related to your business.
Social Media Profiles
Consider posting contests for freebies in your various social media profiles. Everyone loves getting something for nothing, and running a contest is an excellent strategy for drawing new followers on social media sites. Simply decide on the freebie, then go to some of the popular freebie social media profiles and post a link to where customers can get the freebie.
Don’t stick with only one social media website. Most of them are free, so it’s easy to use quite a few of them. Although Facebook is used by many people, you should also “diversify” your social media marketing to include other social media networks such as MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn, and others. Your chances of enjoying marketing success increase with the amount of exposure you have.
Generate publicity for your company by hosting contests that offer attractive awards. Because of the way social media works, news of your contest will spread very quickly. The rewards you use should be creative, and a fun way to promote your business. Perhaps you could have contestants come up with a logo for your next item.
One way to offer valuable information in your social media marketing project is to do video interviews with experts in your niche. Post your videos on YouTube and your own web site. Now only will you create content which your targeted audience will be interested in, but you’ll also be connecting your brand with field leaders, building your reputation as an authority. This name-recognition will help you greatly in promoting your business.
Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is the new and upcoming thing that your business should use. It can be used to effectively market and brand your unique product or service, and provide you with exposure to millions of potential customers. In the preceding paragraphs, a number of fundamentals about social media marketing were covered.
