- Tune in before you Turn On. If you’re listening to what your community is saying you’ll have better responses. By searching for your customers you can connect with them. Join the conversation. Pay attention to trends. Add value.
- Make the commitment to be a part of social media. Building your community and your brand online takes time. This means regularly checking the social platforms you’ve joined and responding to visitors and fans and adding fresh content.
- Who Are You? Well, only you know who you really are. Don’t put out a false front because eventually people will figure it out. Be authentic. By being yourself to the hilt, you’ll attract those sorts of people that like you and your company. Those that aren’t attracted to you probably wouldn’t purchase much from you anyway.
- When the show is near, focus on it. When you have an upcoming appearance, your online activity should be looking closely at what’s happening at the show. Track show hashtags, make lists of attendees (and booth numbers or other info if relevant), and respond to comments or questions about the show to demonstrate that you’re engaged.
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Be there. Your company’s products and services and brand may appear impersonal to your followers, but the people that work at the company (including you) are not: they’re real people. Be available as a real person and you may be seen as the spirit or soul of the company.
- Make it easy for people to find you. Put links to your social media access points on business cards, flyers, handouts, etc.
- Be flexible. One of the first things you recognize about social media is that it is unpredictable. Learn to go with the flow.
- Follow competitors and complementary businesses. You can learn a lot by watching. By tracking company’s online behaviors you can often uncover strengths and weaknesses that you hadn’t previously seen.
- Share info and views with followers. They like to hear positive things happening in your company. And if there’s something negative, share that as well. Don’t pull punches (but don’t be mean or insensitive or rude). And don’t try to put too much of a positive spin on something that’s inherently negative. Be honest.
- Quality beats quantity. By looking to generate a smaller amount of high quality posts or tweets, you’ll avoid the ‘gotta get something online today because it’s been awhile’ syndrome a lot of us fall for.
- Take it offline. Now you’ve met people on Twitter or Facebook. Look for ways to connect with people elsewhere. Look to build relationships offline. Invite an online friend to coffee or lunch. Pick up the phone to find out what they really sound like. Don’t try to sell them anything – you’re just building relationships at this point. If a sale happens, it’ll be because it’s the obvious thing to happen, not because it was forced in any way
- Combine social media with other marketing. Social media works best when it’s done with other media. Drive traffic to your social media outlets with TV, radio or print ads. Use social media to move people to a tradeshow booth for a prize or to sign up for a mailing list. Find creative ways to meld on and offline marketing to get the best of both mediums.
