by, Lesa Seibert, President, Xstreme Media
Social media and social networking sites are the Web's hottest trends. What is changing, is how social networks are being used by businesses and how social media is affecting branding and consumer interaction. The web has opened up a pipeline to consumers and any size business can take advantage of this opportunity. May businesses have seed wild success utilizing social media and others have failed miserably. Now is the time to get involved, if you're not already. If you are already involved, now is the time to build a social media strategy.
Over the next several weeks, we are going to look at how to build, refine and launch a social media campaign. Do's and Don'ts and how to prepare.
First we will start with the basics of social media strategy. Think of social media like a real-life cocktail party - don't interrupt and otherwise pleasant conversation and stray off-topic when nobody else is ready to move on.
There are some general truths to know - MySpace caters to a much younger crowd and can be called the seedy dive bar of social media. Great for bands and bars. Facebook is like the back-yard bar-b-que and trends a little older. LinkedIn is like the business meeting and is more formal and mostly for business to business marketing. Finding where your consumers are between all of the platforms will be your most important first task. If you are marketing on a platform that your customers don't frequent you are wasting valuable time and money.
Search the networks for groups and organizations using keywords pertinent to your business and industry. The higher the volume of results and involved participants, the better. Also look for your competition on these networks and check their level of activity. Do they update often? Do consumers leave comments or retweet posts? If so, you are getting warm. Social media networking can be a tremendous time involvement. You must make sure you use your time wisely and in the right place.
In the next installment, we will look at how to interact on social platforms.
Social media and social networking sites are the Web's hottest trends. What is changing, is how social networks are being used by businesses and how social media is affecting branding and consumer interaction. The web has opened up a pipeline to consumers and any size business can take advantage of this opportunity. May businesses have seed wild success utilizing social media and others have failed miserably. Now is the time to get involved, if you're not already. If you are already involved, now is the time to build a social media strategy.
Over the next several weeks, we are going to look at how to build, refine and launch a social media campaign. Do's and Don'ts and how to prepare.
First we will start with the basics of social media strategy. Think of social media like a real-life cocktail party - don't interrupt and otherwise pleasant conversation and stray off-topic when nobody else is ready to move on.
Choosing your weapon(s).
There are plenty of social media networks to choose from and some are very specialized. For business, it is critical to spend your valuable time or money on those networks that present the greatest opportunity, which is where your target audience spends their time online.There are some general truths to know - MySpace caters to a much younger crowd and can be called the seedy dive bar of social media. Great for bands and bars. Facebook is like the back-yard bar-b-que and trends a little older. LinkedIn is like the business meeting and is more formal and mostly for business to business marketing. Finding where your consumers are between all of the platforms will be your most important first task. If you are marketing on a platform that your customers don't frequent you are wasting valuable time and money.
Search the networks for groups and organizations using keywords pertinent to your business and industry. The higher the volume of results and involved participants, the better. Also look for your competition on these networks and check their level of activity. Do they update often? Do consumers leave comments or retweet posts? If so, you are getting warm. Social media networking can be a tremendous time involvement. You must make sure you use your time wisely and in the right place.
In the next installment, we will look at how to interact on social platforms.
