What Do You Want From Social Media?
Posted on Thu, Jul 01, 2010 @ 10:58 AM
As most companies know social media has become a necessity for conducting business. What most companies are having trouble identifying, is what social media can do for your business. There will always be naysayers out there that say, "There are too many social media outlets out there to know what is really going on, I'd rather just pick up a phone." Well for those people in that situation I can understand where you are coming from. But before you start to disengage yourself away from social media, ask yourself, "What do I want social media to do for my business?" Once you are able to assess your needs for social media, then you will you be able to start utilizing social media effectively for your business.
Increase Your Brand Awareness Through Feedback
Creating a buzz around your product on social networks is one of the quickest ways to create brand awareness, but this can attract both positive and negative response. The solution to effectively marketing your brand is by monitoring what is being said about your product. Negative comments aren't necessarily a bad thing for your business; it only creates an opportunity to resolve the issue. By closely monitoring your brand, you will be able to quickly pick up on what is being said and engage your customers better. Negative feedback can become one of the best ways to increase brand awareness, because you have now filled the void of customer satisfaction with a quick response.
Create a Loyal Following
Now that you have engaged conversation with your customers, they now feel bonded to your product. This can be done in a variety of ways...internal blogs, online events, twitter, and just communicating with your audience have shown to be effective. A loyal following goes a long way and will enhance your product for other users that are not yet engaged in your community. Not everything that is conducted online has to be a big sales pitch; users like to see the more personal side. If you are not willing to engage with other users, they will never know who you are.
Driver Traffic To Your Website
Social Media makes this very attainable and it's a fun engaging way to go about it. A few ideas on how to drive traffic to your website are:
• Submitting articles to the correct social bookmarking sites (Top 10 social bookmarking sites)
• Make your headlines enticing; Top 10 articles, Why you need to..., How this product is changing lives. These are engaging headlines that draw attention to your article
• Avoid Pop-ups and banners - they're annoying
• Use images that are fun and relevant to your content
Now that you have a better idea of what your companies intentions are for social media, you must realize that social media is all about communication. Communicating with users is the fastest way to create a buzz around your product. If no one is talking about your product, how will anyone know about it? If you can take anything away from this article it is that communication is the greatest means of interaction and with social media can be used effectively for a business.
By Cameron Moulton, Internet Marketing Associate
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