What is social media and what does it have to do with your business?

Jonnie Jenson wrote this artical on Social Media using SurreyLets as a case study and has been reproduced in my blog with his kind permission. Jonnie Jensen is an internet marketing advisor. He works with businesses to help them match their internet marketing with their business objectives

In case you hadn’t noticed the internet has changed. It is no longer just searching for something and then reading it or buying it. Now we connect with people and companies. We share our pictures on Facebook and our interests on blogs. We comment on other people’s articles and shout about poor customer service. You have probably heard of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. In actual fact there are many more and today they are defined as social media. But these are just for DJ’s and kids right? You are probably asking “what do they have to do with my business?”

The answer is they are the future of your business success. Nearly 19 million UK residents are on Facebook, 4 million are on Twitter. It has overtaken porn as the No 1 internet activity. Your customers and prospects are using these services. In this article we are going to look at how you can get started using social media and provide insights for your success.

You’ve already got a website – so what?
It is no longer enough to just have a website. Social media platforms build awareness, boost business and serve as low cost/no cost marketing tools. The search engines pull in results from them and are more likely to find content about you there than they are your website. If you want to influence the purchasing decisions of people then you need to be part of the conversation. It is all about establishing trust.

People base their decisions on your reputation and recommendations. When they search your name they will see what you have said and most importantly what others are saying about you. This recession and the backlash against corporations is the chance for start ups and small business to create relationships with customers, provide better more relevant services and beat the big name companies.

That may well explain what it is but why is it important for my business?
There are two main reasons why social media is important for your business. The first is that it supports the promotion of your website on search engines. Google loves social media sites because the content is conversational and therefore rich in everyday words that people use when they search for you. Having your own blog is the best place you can start.Your great content will then be linked to by other people in their blogs and Twitter messages and on bookmarking sites like Digg and Delicious. In basic terms this is how Google works; it finds relevant content and then rates it by how many other sites link to it. The more content you have on the internet, the more you will be found. Better still, your marketing efforts on the internet never die. It all references back to you and will provide a fistful of reasons for someone to choose you over your competitors. This is known as ‘long tail marketing’.

The second is reach. Your network of contacts is no doubt useful to you but it is nothing compared to what your online connections can do for you. Simply explained; if you tell 200 contacts something and they then share it with 200 contacts who then do the same, your message will have reached 800,000 people. That is why it is important for your business.

Case Study - Sally Asling of SurreyLetsSally Asling of SurreyLets came from a corporate background and was sceptical about social media.

Q: What services do you use?
I have my own blog plus I use Twitter Facebook, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, Ecademey and PropertyTribes.

Q: How did you get started?
Started connecting my adverts on GumTree to my Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter accounts. Then I put out strategic messages on Twitter like “I need a one bed flat in Guildford” and the conversations I had with various people led to other referrals.

Q: What kind of business have you generated?
It’s not always first hand. I had a person contact me from Sydney who had been retweeted a message. After checking me out on Google they let a flat from me without even seeing it. It can be very random. Since I started in April I have made about £7,000 directly from Twitter.

Q: What piece of advice would you give anyone just starting out?
Write a personal profile of who you want to be. Think of words to create a catch phrase and then link that into everything you do.
www.surreyletsonline.co.uk
twitter.com/SurreyLets

Let’s Get Started
The single most important thing to remember is that your success will be based on the trust you develop with your community. Share your knowledge and your contacts freely - don't just sell.

1. Define your objectives
Establish what you want to achieve and what you want to become known for. This will help you focus on your audience, content and results

2. Start listening
Go out and look for the people who are talking about your products and services. Just search on Google blogsearch, Socialmention.com and Twitter. Start a spreadsheet to note where these conversations are happening and to record info on who is out there. I suggest you add the RSS feed of the search results to a Google Reader account so you can easily revisit all the content.
3. Choose your tools

You don’t need to use every service to start with. Pick a couple and make sure you complete your profile with a good quality picture, honest information, a link to your site and keywords about your service. Chris Brogan (chrisbrogan.com) describes the process as having a Homebase and Outposts. You can find further information at my blog http://tmandi.co.uk/raw

Start with your own blog – home base. This is where you drive people back to. Make sure you update it regularly. I recommend you use Wordpress.org to add a blog to an existing site. If you want an easy web based option go for Wordpress.com or Typepad.
You then use other services – outposts – to interact with people and direct them back to your homebase. There are many to choose from including:
• twitter.com
• facebook.com
• youtube.com
• linkedin.com

4. Make some content
Use your Listening results to see what people are talking about. The articles and discussions with the most amount of comments are popular topics. If a subject is unrepresented then this could help you stand out.
5. Promote your content

Use your Outposts to link to your Homebase content. Update your status and find other blog’s, forums and groups where you could talk about the subject as part of an existing conversation. If you are starting a topic open a discussion that encourages people to debate the subject.

6. Measure results
Social media is measurable. Use all the available metrics and refer back to your original objectives. You can measure:
• Number of followers
• Number of links to your website/blog
• Number of times a message is re-Tweeted
• Views of your video
• Total comments
• Total clicks
• Revenue growth

Any result measured over time will give you an idea of success. If you aren't measuring traffic to your site then set up Google Analytics – it’s free!
Just get started
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start. Be yourself, add value to others and don’t say anything you might regret in the future.
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Jonnie Jensen is an internet marketing advisor. He works with businesses to help them match their internet marketing with their business objectives. To kick start your internet marketing email jonniejensen@tmandi.co.uk or call 02032862306
www.tmandi.co.uk