Posts Tagged ‘social media’

Integrating Social Media Into Your Small Businesses?

Author: Skye King

Growing link between social media and small businesses

A new study by Smith School of Business at The University of Maryland on the relationship between small business and social media has concluded that Social Media rates in the U.S. have reached 24%, primarily through Facebook and LinkedIn, an increase of 8% from 2008.

The December 2009 report surveyed 500 small business owners and found that one in five small businesses are have integrated social media into their marketing mix. In fact, 45% of surveyed respondents even believe their social media initiatives will pay off financially in 12 months or less.

As the graphic below details, the small business owners who are using social media are primarily engaging in social media through company pages (75%) and status updates (69%) on Facebook or LinkedIn. However only 16% of the business owners surveyed admitted to using Twitter as a customer service channel.

The report also shows that small business owners now believe social media can help them generate leads. While half of surveyed respondents found the time it takes to use social media sites more daunting than expected, 61% are still putting in the hours and making active efforts to identify new customers.

Despite there still being a need for traditional advertising and press releases, social sites such as Twitter and Facebook allow a whole new type of communication to take place that has previously been unknown to most businesses. Because of this it is even more important for business to not only get a large number of fans or followers, but also follow through on the opportunity to make more genuine and direct connections with customers.

We are now in the age of open communication, engaged dialogue, and transparency and business success may now have less to do with the size of ad budgets, but on the quality of interactions with customers – especially before these customers forge relationships with your competitors.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/social-marketing-articles/integrating-social-media-into-your-small-businesses-1931586.html

About the Author

Skye King is an Internet Marketing Adviser, the founder of Grow Success Today, a Lifestyle Marketing Company that spans 160 countries in 40 different languages. She specialized in Social Media, Branding & SEO Strategies. King is the Editor of Home Based Business at BusinessTM.com.

Business Transparency & Social Media

Author: Skye King

With so many businesses of all sizes being aware of the benefits of social media optimization and implanting strategies to become more connected, social media is helping to forge a new era in business transparency and engagement, creating both new challenges and opportunities.

The days when companies could rely on carefully crafted press releases or flashy ad campaigns to communicate with their customers are long gone. Especially futile is an attempt to convince people that your products are the best in the field. In the age of social media, the rules have changed drastically, and people today demand a more honest and direct relationship with the companies with which they do business.

Companies now face a clear choice: wall themselves in and become increasingly controlled and hidden, or use social media and other means to reveal their human side, welcome transparency, and forge new relationships with their customers.

Below are the top four shifts that businesses are making due to social media optimization (SMO).

1. From “Trying to Sell” to “Making Connections”

The goal with SMO in most cases is not to sell more but to engage and connect with customers on a deeper level — and, as a result, through such engagement people feel more comfortable doing business with those companies.

The most popular brands in social media tend to post less about their products or services and more about things that help their customers get to know the people and personality of a company. Jeff Swartz, who is the President and CEO of the Timberland Company, is a great example of this. Swartz uses his Twitter account to show his personality by tweeting about his life and the social issues he is passionate about, rather than the shoes his company makes. He also links from his Twitter bio to Timberland’s Earthkeeper project that supports environmental awareness, rather than to the company homepage, in an effort to make a connection with people around something that goes beyond just the products Timberland sells.

Lesson: Rely less on PR tactics and grab at the opportunity to interact with your customers sincerely.

2. From “Large Campaigns” to “Small Acts”

Being able to communicate on such a wide-spanning platform also allows for small acts that express gratitude and a commitment to customer satisfaction. Sites like Facebook and Twitter provide businesses and their followers a broadcasting network, and businesses are beginning to see that rather than spending millions of dollars on traditional ad campaigns, small acts can be more valuable because people will inevitably share such experiences through the social web.

In the past, if we had a very bad or very good experience with a company, it could take days or weeks to tell all of our friends and relatives about it. Today, in a matter of minutes, we can let all our friends on Facebook or followers on Twitter know about what happened. When every customer experience can be easily and widely broadcast, small issues become extremely important.

Since bad experiences are broadcast just as fast and just as easily as the good, it pays for companies to pay attention to the one-on-one customer relationships forged via social media.

Lesson: Instead of only relying on big campaigns, make authentic, helpful relationships and communication the new campaign.

3. From “Controlling Our Image” to “Being Ourselves”

For generations businesses have stressed over the concept of image and maintaining a carefully crafted public persona. Of course companies need to have employee policies, and there is such a thing as bad press, but look at the most popular companies in the era of social media, and you’ll generally find the ones that give their employees freedom to be themselves in online spaces. The goal should no longer be to create a very controlled and polished image that everyone in a company tries to reinforce, but rather to give employees the means necessary to be human beings that can put a friendly face on the corporation.

Also important is being aware of what online perceptions of your business are. How people connect with your business dictates to a great extent the longevity and reliability of their association with your brand and service. Therefore, it’s not just about what you tell them about the business, it’s also about what political stances you take and what information you share and

Lesson: Leave the dated concept of company image behind and embrace your business’s differences and human qualities.

4. From “Hard to Reach” to “Available Everywhere”

To engage with customers, it is no longer enough to have an email address and customer service number on one’s website. Today, people want to interact with and engage businesses via their chosen means of communication, whether that is Twitter, Facebook, discussion forums, or a feedback site like Get Satisfaction.

However, this omnipresence also presents an added challenge: listening to what your customers want and implementing suggestions. Any expansive platform also adds extra responsibility to use the information gathered in a way that is both purposeful and helpful. This means that just as it is extremely important to reach this audience, it is also important to make the changes they are asking for. Keeping lines of communication open during this process is also helpful since feedback is available with every step.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/smo-articles/business-transparency-amp-social-media-1932110.html

About the Author

Skye King is an Internet Marketing Adviser, the founder of Grow Success Today, a Lifestyle Marketing Company that spans 160 countries in 40 different languages. She is the Editor for Home Based Business at BusinessTM.com. King specializes in Social Media Marketing, SEO and Personal Branding.

How to Use Twitter for Marketing

By: Darren Olander

Twitter is a relatively new web 2.0 site that is starting to gain a lot of popularity. That means that a lot of people have heard of it but it is also quite common to run into people who haven’t heard of it.. yet. Twitter.com is this social site that encourages users to post often about what they are currently doing.

A lot of people are using it to improve their marketing reach, by being an active twitterer they gain followers who are interested in what they got going on. This means people being exposed to their updates on a regular basis. For example, if you have hundreds of followers in Twitter and you decide to post an affiliate link, that means that hundreds of people have instantly been exposed to your offer. In this article I will discuss ways to maximize Twitter for your marketing, and also a big mistake to be aware of.

In order to have a fan base per say of followers in Twitter you must be able to keep their interest in you and what you are doing now. “What are you doing?” is the whole foundation of what Twitter is about in the first place. Make sure to post daily if not several times throughout the day updates about what you are doing. The magical thing behind this is that many of your contacts will be able to feel like they know you so much better, will trust you more, and feel much more comfortable about working with you. On the other hand, when you follow others you can learn about them and their possible needs.

The big mistake to watch out for is only posting affiliate links or offers on your Twitter page. This looks like Spam and many people will see you as just abusing Twitter for your own personal gain. Think of it this way, if you would not want to invite your friends or family to keep up with you via Twitter then you are going about it all wrong. As with anything you send out or provide, ninety percent should be content and ten percent (at most) advertising. So this concept is quite simple… constantly post throughout the day what you are doing.. it is usually very simple and only takes a few seconds to post! Secondly, if you write articles or provide content online, provide a link for those in your Twitter posts. You may post many things within one day, but the last thing you post for the day is usually the most important because it will be there the longest. This means that your last post for the day should very well contain a link that you want your followers to see before your start Twittering again the next day!

Another part of Twitter is contributing. As with any social site it should be a give and take relationship. Notice that give comes first… the more you give the more people will want to work with you and the more attention you will receive. Make sure to read and follow other users in Twitter. If you read something interesting or helpful then make sure to reply and say so, or even put a link for it on your Twitter so that you are directing others to more quality content. This can also be as simple as connecting with other users, if they know you are reading their Twitter page they will be much more likely to check out what you have going on too.

To get started in Twitter you should first invite contacts who aren’t using Twitter and also find contacts who are already using Twitter so that you can start following them and also start getting people to follow you. Twitter has a nice invite and find feature that makes this incredibly easy. To grow your reach even more you can start following people who follow or are followed by the people who follow you.. or that you follow. You might need to read that sentence again.. but basically you can find other users to connect with that are already connected to other users.

Now for a big tip. If you really want to maximize the potential with Twitter, you should make sure to take advantage of any plug-ins or sites that support Twitter. Here are three, but I’m sure there will be many more in the future if not already. Squidoo allows you to input your Twitter account info into your Squidoo account and then it can automatically post updates to your Twitter account when you create or update Squidoo lenses. Facebook has an application called Twitter, it automatically updates your Facebook status when you make a Twitter post. The other tool is a free WordPress plug-in called TweetMyBlog that allows you to create a two-way connection from your blogs to Twitter. TweetMyBlog allows you to use a widget on your Wordpress blogs that will display your current Twitter feed.. that way all visitors to your blog can look at the widget and see a running feed of your latest Twitter posts. If they click on that they will be brought to your Twitter page. In addition, when you make a new post to your blog, TweetMyBlog will automatically make a post to your Twitter page with a link to your latest blog post. Imagine the extra exposure you can receive by using these tools that help people see more of what you are doing.

Lastly, have fun! Twitter is a social site… so interact and enjoy!

About the Author

Darren Olander is dedicated to teaching others how to create a success online through internet network marketing strategies. He is a site owner, article writer, coach & marketing consultant enjoying the benefits of working full time from home. Learn more about him at http://www.darrenolander.com

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Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/ – How to Use Twitter for Marketing