- Facebook page – Make yourself available to clients through the super social network that is now 500,000,000 users worldwide. By developing a page for you business and yourself (to manage the page) you will be able to seek out those you already know through the “people you may know” feature. Be sure to remind your clients that you’re now available in this space. Facebook will enable you to keep your audience informed of the latest happenings at your company – news, new hires, sales etc. Keep in mind that Facebook users have the ability to hide you from their news feed or delete you from their pages altogether so be sure not to oversell. Instead, promote your page in moderation. To make the most of what Facebook has to offer, create new and innovative ways to interact with your network. Offer them information not available elsewhere or exclusive deals to remind them why they like your page!
- Twitter – make sure to grab your Twitter “handle” (user name) before someone else does! Familiarize yourself with the ins and outs of the site. Observe your Tweets as a whole and determine who you do and don’t need to be following. Once you’ve determined who you want to follow, test out some of the third party applications such Tweetdeck, Hootsuite or Seesmic. These will enhance your experience as you become more and more familiar with twitter. These tools will help you navigate your networks, trending topics, business and personal accounts at the same time. To engage yourself even more in the experience, test our one of my favorite Apps- Twitterfeed. It will automatically feed your blog to your twitter updates. Also, TweepSearch will help direct you on who to follow based on their biographic and geographic descriptions.
- Company Blog – minimally – you should reserve a domain name for your blog – again, before someone else does. You can set up a blog for free with Blogger or WordPress. These easy self publishing tools will allow the user to customize their blogs look and feel. If you’re seeking an even more simplified way to publish, you should consider a tool like Posterous, which allows you to post information through email. This option is more suitable if you don’t have the time to invest in managing a successful blog. One must always consider the required time and work to run a blog properly. My best advice for clients looking into this is to map out an editorial plan for your blog. Applicable considerations include: What do you want to talk about? How will this information benefit your reader? Who is your reader? How are you going to engage your reader? All bloggers should also make certain to set up RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to stay current on the topic of the blog. Finally, bloggers should subscribe to relevant news alerts, other bloggers chatting about similar topics, as well as any other bloggers that may inspire them.
- LinkedIn – To get started, first set up a personal account and from there you can establish your business page. This is a must for search purposes. After running your contacts through their search, you can link with your contacts that are already on Linked-In and accept invitations to link-in with people you know who have found you. To get more involved in this professional network, explore groups and the Q&A feature. Groups include anything from alumni pages to networking groups. Group pages and Q&A are two of the most underused functions of Linked-In. They will help you reach out to new contacts, potential hires, new leads, like-minded business folks. Participation in Q&A discussions, as well as in Linked-In as a whole can position you and your company as an expert in your field or industry.
- Social Media Monitoring and Participating in the Conversation – You have to pay attention to what is being said about you, your company and you competition in social media. Finding out how you’re being perceived could hurt you or help you – but ignoring is not an option. If your customer is using social media, then minimally, you need to find out what is being posted and why. Maybe they’ve had a bad experience with a competitor and there posting it all over Yelp– there is an opportunity. Maybe there is someone on Linked-In looking for your services, but they don’t know about your Company – There is an opportunity. Maybe there is a customer of yours on Facebook raving about a great deal they got with you – they’re sharing it with their entire network – there is another opportunity. Whether on a social network in a forum or on a blog, your company should always be partaking in this conversation. With social media, opportunities to introduce your company to a new customer are endless.
Author: George Irish is owner and president of Strategis, a full service marketing and communications agency specializing in social communications. George has more than twenty-seven years invested in the advertising and marketing industry. With Strategis, George has recently carved out a niche for the agency in the arena of social communications by marrying the arts of branding, public relations and social media.
