Social Media Guide for Small Businesses
Social Media Guide for Small Businesses
Contents
Feed the Social Media Beast ..................................................................................................................... 4
Blogging: The front door to social media ..............................................................................................12
Social search ......................................................................................................................................................18
Social networks ................................................................................................................................................20
Facebook ...............................................................................................................................................20
LinkedIn..................................................................................................................................................28
Twitter .....................................................................................................................................................32
Managing the Social Media Beast ............................................................................................................39
In the end ........................................................................................................................................................... 41
About the Author ............................................................................................................................................42
Small businesses:
Feed the Social Media Beast and youll see it pay dividends
Not long ago, social media seemed so new and different that it was treated as an appendage of
sortsa kind of marketing that should be tried only by experts.
While that view still exists to some degree today, its become clear to many that social media is no
longer marketings new thing. Its now simply part of the way we do marketing today.
I believe that the proper way to view social media from a small-business owners point of view is
as more of an evolution than a revolution.
Traditional marketing tactics such as advertising, referrals, and public relations are still very
important, but social media tactics have now become a part of everyday marketings fabric and
need to be considered at the strategic level of your marketing decision-making process.
So, rather than asking yourself if you should or should not use Facebook or Twitter, the question
is: How can Facebook and Twitter help you achieve your marketing objectives? Its the same as
asking how direct mail or having two more salespeople might fit into the plans.
From this integrated viewpoint, social media participation can start to make more sense for each
individual marketers needs and goals.
Is social media simply todays hot thing?
Think you can sit the social networking craze out? Consider the following statistics.
According to the online competitive intelligence service Compete.com, social media growth
continues to skyrocket.
The top three social networksFacebook, Twitter, and LinkedIncollectively received
more than 2.5 billion visits in the month of September 2009 alone. Twitter grew by more
than 600% in 2009, while Facebook grew by 210% and LinkedIn by 85%.
As of this writing, Google and Yahoo are the only websites that receive more daily traffic
than Facebook. Current trends suggest that may not last much longer.
In fact, if Facebook were a country, it would be the worlds fourth largest.
The most recent count of blogs being indexed by Technorati currently stands at 133 million.
The same report also revealed that, on average, 900,000 blog posts are created within a
single 24-hour period.
Its been reported that YouTube is likely to serve more than 75 billion video streams to
around 375 million unique visitors during 2009.
The online photo sharing site Flickr now hosts more than 3.6 billion user images.
The online bookmarking service Delicious has more than 5 million users and more than
150 million unique bookmarked URLs.
So, you see, perhaps this social media thing is going to catch on after all.
I think the best way to look at social media is to view it as a way to open up new access points.
These points can then be leveraged to create content, context, connection, and community. Do
that well, and they can also add to lead generation, nurturing, and conversion. And thats the
payoff of social media. But get the order wrong, get the interaction wrong, get the participation
wrongand you may never see much return on the time you invest.
Social media conversations are just thatopen, honest, transparent conversations, not sales
pitches or shouting festivals.
The online hub and spoke model
Much of what this document deals with is creating outposts of content and connection on social
media sites. But, there is one element that pulls this strategy together and thats your primary
Web hub. You cant depend on the contacts you make in most social media activity to serve as
the primary trust-building connection that ultimately leads to a sale.
Your primary website or blog is the tool that ties all of your social media activity together. Your
activity on social media sites or spokes functions primarily as a way to lead prospects back to the
much more fully developed content that resides on your website.
Your hub is the place where you can engage your prospect in a total education-based campaign
that helps them understand that you have the solutions they are seeking. In fact, you can think of
a great deal of your social media activity as a way to create awareness and an initial level of trust
substantial enough for someone to want to know more. Social media and social networking may
be the ultimate permission-based marketing tool when viewed in this light.
The hierarchy of social marketing
One of the things that small-business marketers struggle with around the entire topic of social
marketing is trying to jump into the next new thing without enough analysis of what they should
focus on. I happen to think this is an important, evolving, and essential area of marketing for small
businesses, but theres a hierarchy to it. In other words, there is a logical progression of utilization
that comes about much like Maslows Hierarchy of Human Nature.
As Maslow theorized, the ultimate potential of your marketing or human self-actualization
couldnt be achieved until the most basic human psychological needs such as breathing, eating,
sleeping, and sex were first met. In fact, safety, love, and esteem all come before transcendence.
Now, before I edge too close to the deep end here, Im simply comparing what I think is a bit like
progressing up the social-marketing hierarchy.
Most small-business owners should look at the following progression or hierarchy as they move
deeper into social-marketing tactics. So, jump in, but do it in this order and dont move on until
you have the basics of each stage down and working for you.
5) Social Networks: Branching out to take advantage of the numbers of potential prospects
that you might find in sites such as Facebook or MySpace will frustrate, at least as a
business tool, if you dont have many of the above needs met. These networks take time to
understand and thrive on ideas and content. Youve got to have much to share if you wish
to build a business case.
6) Micro: Platforms such as Twitter, Thwirl, Plurk, and FriendFeed have become a very
important part of the social media mix as they allow for quick tracking, joining, and
engagement. However, they still reside at the top of the pyramid because without content,
such as that created on a blog, the engagement on Twitter may not go very deep.
3) Repurpose: Taking content that appears in one form and twisting it in ways that make it
more available in another, or to another audience, is one of the secrets to success in the
hyper info-driven marketing world in which we find ourselves. When you hold an event to
present information, you can promote the event in various social media networks and then
capture that event and post the audio to your podcast, slides to SlideShare, and transcript
(I use CastingWords for this) as a free report for download. You can string five blog posts
together and make them available as a workshop handout or a bonus for your LinkedIn
group. Never look at any content as a single use, single medium, single act.
4) Generate leads: So many people want to generate leads in the wide world of social
media, but cant seem to understand how or have met with downright hostile reactions
when trying. Effectively generating leads from social media marketing is really no different
than effectively generating leads anywhereits just that the care you must take to do
it right is amplified by the no selling allowed culture. No one likes to be sold to in any
environmentthe trick is to let them buyand this is even more important in social
media marketing. So what this means is that your activity, much of what Ive mentioned
above, needs to focus on creating awareness of your valuable, education-based content,
housed on your main hub site. You can gain permission to market to your social media
network and contacts when you can build a level of trust through content sharing and
engagement. Its really the ultimate two-step advertising, only perhaps now its threestepmeet and engage in social media, lead to content elsewhere, content elsewhere
presents the opportunity to buy. To generate leads through social media marketing, you
need to view your activity on social sites like an effective headline for an adthe purpose
of the headline is not to sell, but to engage and build, know, like, and trust. Its the ultimate
permission-based play when done correctly.
One glaring exception to this softer approach for some folks is Twitter search. I believe
you can use Twitter search to locate people in your area who are asking for solutions and
complaining about problems you can solve and reach out to them directly with a bit of a
solution pitch. People who are talking publicly about needing something are offering a
form of permission and can be approached as more of a warmed lead. The same can also be
said for LinkedIn Answers. If someone asks if anyone knows a good WordPress designer, I
think you can move to convincing them that you are indeed a great WordPress designer.
5) Learn: One of the hangups I frequently encounter from people just trying to get started
in social media marketing is the paralysis formed when they stare blankly at Twitter,
wondering what in the world to say. The pressure to fill the silence can be so overwhelming
that they eventually succumb and tweet what they had for lunch. If you find yourself in this
camp, Im going to let you off the hookyou dont have to say anything to get tremendous
benefit from social media participation. If I did nothing more than listen and occasionally
respond when directly engaged, I would derive tremendous benefit from that level of
participation. In fact, if you are just getting started, this is what you should do before you
ever open your 140-character mouth. Set up an RSS reader and subscribe to blogs, visit
social bookmarking sites such as BizSugar, and Delicious and read whats popular. Create
custom Twitter searches for your brand, your competitors, and your industry, and closely
follow people on Twitter who have a reputation for putting out great content. And then
just listen and learn. If you do only this, you will be much smarter about your business and
industry than most and you may eventually gain the knowledge and confidence to tap the
full range of whats possible in the wild and wacky world of social media marketing.
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C ASe STudy
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Blogging software
As mentioned previously, blogs are run by software, so one of your first chores is to determine
what software you want to use and get it set up.
A quick search for blog software will turn up dozens of options. But for the sake of this publication,
we are going to focus on just a few of the leading choices:
WordPress.org: WordPress.org offers a free, open-source blogging tool that has many things going
for it. This is the tool I use on my blog and its hard to imagine going wrong with this tool. This is
software that you download, configure, and upload to your Web host. Because it is open source
there are also many beneficial add-ons and plug-ins that can add even more power to the software.
The downside, if there is one, is that you must be able to get through a bit of technical tinkering
to make it work, but its very straightforward.
WordPress.com: This is a hosted version of the WordPress software that allows you to easily create
a blog that is hosted by WordPress. The benefit of this approach is that there is no real setup, you
simply sign up (its free), choose a theme, and start blogging.
The downside with hosted blogging platforms is that they are not as flexible and might not deliver
as much search engine benefit because the content does not reside on your website domain.
TypePad.com: TypePad is another great hosted service with many features and a simple
startup process.
Compendium Blogware: Business-targeted blog system that works around targeting keywords
and phrases.
Windows Live Spaces: Based on simplicity and familiarity, Windows Live Spaces offers users a free,
quick, and easy way to get started blogging.
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4) Show some humanness. No matter what your blog topic is, readers like to know that the
author is a human being. Its OK to let that show and to add personal thoughts. Only you
can determine how far to go with this, but I know that your readers will connect the more
they know your story
5) Stir the pot from time to time. You dont have to be a celebrity gossip blogger to stir up
a little controversy. Often some of my best interactions come from topics that people are
decidedly passionate about.
6) Make comment participation a game. Keep score and reward your most active
commentators. I have installed the WP Top Commentators plug-in that keeps track of how
many comments a particular reader makes and rewards them with a link. You can see it in
the left sidebar.
7) Make sure commenting is easy. Publish your comment feed and consider adding a
Subscribe to Comments plug-in so that people get a notice when someone else comments
on a post they are active on.
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Social search
One of my favorite small-business search topics is something called social search. A social search
engine is one that lists small businesses and allows people to rate and review them.
I guess we can call these types of sites directories, but what is clear from the discussion is that
people arent really looking for directories; they are looking for answers, recommendations, and
user experiences. Social sites ask members and visitors to rate their experience, good and bad,
with a business and post that information for others to view. Depending upon who you listen
to, actual purchases made over the Web only make up about 3% of all commerce, but buying
decisions are made every day through research on the Web.
Prospects are turning to sites such as Insider Pages to find sources for everything from plumbers
to piano tuners in almost every community in America. Highly rated small businesses appearing
on social sites are starting to get noticed! This is a great new medium. There is no cost involved
and the benefits far outweigh the little bit of work you may put in to start building your online
reputation. Smart small businesses are starting to encourage online reviews. (Merely point out to
your happy customers that they might want to share the love.) Other businesses are printing and
using their online reviews offline. Businesses with the most ratings and reviews seem to do the
best. Coupons and offers are a great way to get noticed too!
You need to start exploring this avenue now, if for no other reason than to manage your online
reputation. Some businesses fear the impact of a negative review. I mean, you cant make every
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customer happy, right? Most of the social directories have processes in place to fight spam and
competitive revenge type reviews, but nothing works like a good offense. Make sure you are
building reviews from happy clients. Send offline customers online and teach them how to use a
site such as Judys Book.
Some of the more popular social/local directories include:
Craigslist
Judys Book
Insider Pages
Smalltown.com
Yelp
My advice: Get proactive with social search
1) Make sure you are listed on the major social media sites and that your profile and business
information is up to date and as accurate as possible.
2) Make note of the URL for your listings and start promoting these sites and stimulating
positive reviews from some of your most loyal customers to get the ball rolling in your
favor. (Some of the review sites appear to list businesses with more reviews above others
when people do local searches.)
3) Start publishing your positive reviews in other forms of communication (maybe a T-shirt!).
These testimonials can add to your marketing message and act as subtle reminders to
other happy customers that they might want to post reviews as well.
4) Add a few reviews of your favorite local businesses, particularly those you may have
strategic relationships with.
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Social networks
Facebook
Facebook for business
Facebook has become the most widely recognized name in social networks. Social networks
allow people to join, and friend members or invite others to join and then share and exchange
information.
The tools that run social networks have some tremendous business applications when you
understand whats behind them.
Networking has always been an important marketing skill and online networking bares some
similarities with a set of power tools. A lot has been publicized about social networks used by
teens and dating services, but its the application of the tools that you need to focus on to
understand the business value of participating in a network such as Facebook.
3 ways for businesses to get a return from Facebook
Facebook continues to grow in popularity with small businesses to the point where its no longer
a matter of if you should be utilizing this platform as how. Its really no surprise to me that
Facebook is generally deemed more useful for the small business than other social media tools,
such as Twitter. The Facebook platform and applications are such that a business could feasibly
build its entire Web presence thereparticularly now that Fan pages can be viewed publicly by
non-Facebook users.
So, the question I want to dive into today is this: Whats the best way to approach Facebook for
your business?
Of course, Im not entirely sure theres one correct answer, so Ill outline three approaches that
might make sense.
1) Facebook business account only
Business accounts are designed for individuals who only want to use the site to administer
pages and their ad campaigns. A Facebook business account allows you to build a simple
business presence by creating public business pages, but you have limited access to the
profiles of people who interact with or fan your page, as well as little access to other
features on the site. (Note: If you already have a personal profile account, this option is not
available.)
Heres the Help Center FAQs on business accounts. This can be a decent option for people
who dont want to do anything more than create a presence on Facebook. If you do not
already have a Facebook personal profile you simply create a page or ad here. Once you
create a Facebook page via business account you will always have the opportunity to
convert it and create a personal profile.
2) Personal profile for personal use, and business fan page for business use
Some people created a personal profile because they realized what a great tool Facebook
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is for keeping up with college and high school friends or sharing details about life with
family and friends. When these same folks started realizing what a nice tool Facebook is
for business, they faced the issue of mixing too much personal with business and vice versa.
For these folks, the addition of a Facebook Fan Page is the most obvious solution. The
fan page allows you to create a business only page with a great deal of functionality
and settings that allow you to open your page up to the world far beyond your current
Facebook friends. In addition, your updates and posts on your fan page spread to the wall
of all those who become a fan on your page making your business presence even greater.
Of course, the way Facebook is set up there is still a very close relationship between your
personal profile and the fan pages you administer. In this case, privacy settings on your
personal profile probably become very important. You can visit your Facebook Profile
Privacy Settings to make updates.
Consider these privacy tips for business use:
a) use the Friend List feature. This feature allows you to make lists to group people
based on how or why you know themfamily in one group, business contacts in
another, cooking club in another, etc. The main reason this is so important is that you
can issue different privacy settings per list and therefore be very selective about, for
instance, what your business-related contact might see.
b) Turn off photo tagging. An often-used feature on Facebook is to tag photos with the
people in them. If you dont want all your business contacts to see you kicking back
with a few beers, than make sure photo tagging is limited in your privacy settings.
c) Protect your photos. Change the settings on your photo privacy (a separate page) so
that your darling two-year-olds birthday pics are kept in the familyunless of course
you want to share them with business contacts.
d) dont share who your friends are. Even before someone becomes a friend they can,
by default, see who you are friends with, just without any details. You dont have to make
this information public and there might be some good reasons in this case not to. You
can change your profile setting called Friends to show select groups of none at all.
e) Choose who can see contact info. Many people put personal contact details in their
personal profile, and as your business use increases and your start approving people
you dont know, you may not want them to have your personal email address and
mobile number.
f) Control your wall settings. Its a good idea to control who can view posts to your
personal wall. If you allow your good friends to add comments, photos, and updates,
you may not want the business contacts to view thischange who can see wall posts
from friends using the lists you build by visiting your profile settings page. You can
also control who can post to your wall page, but this shouldnt be a big issue if you
control who can see posts. Of course, you can also ban individuals from posting.
3) Personal profile for business and Fan Page for business
When I started using Facebook, my intent was strictly for business. (To my knowledge
there are no pictures of me in hula skirts on my personal profile.) When fan pages came
along it became clear that this was also a great business tool, so I added that as well.
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I think this approach of all business is a fine way to take advantage of all that Facebook
offers to those who choose to use this platform.
My personal profile is open and public and I welcome friend requests from people who
see this as a business page. I dont reach out to family members and dont have friend
requests sitting in my daughters inboxes. I business-stream content into my personal page,
including my Twitter, FriendFeed, and blog posts. These streams create a fair amount of
interaction with friends, which I try to participate in.
I use the fan page to create additional awareness, answer questions, post video, and
publish events, including audio and video archives from those events.
Heres the link to my Personal Profile and heres the link to the Duct Tape Marketing Fan
Page (consider becoming a fan!).
The interaction and crossover of friends versus fans is likely pretty high, although Ive never
tried to gauge it. This all-business approach allows me to continue to participate and build
a stronger Facebook foundation as this platform continues to evolve.
Intro to the personal profile
Your profile is the starting point for Facebook. Think of it as your front door. Its very important
that your front door on Facebook be in sync with the front door of your brand. Just because you
can put all kinds of cute things on your Facebook profile, you still must ask yourself what makes
sense in terms of your business and your business objectives. Its common sense really, but its
easy to take your eye off the ball with all the toys and applications available once you learn how
to navigate Facebook.
Create a profile that helps tell your business story and then enhance it with tools and applications
that allow you to branch out and connect with like-minded individuals.
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Friends
Friends in the world of Facebook are simply people who are also members who grant you
permission to view their profile and contact them directly. This is really at the heart of the
networking aspect of Facebook. Without any friends, your Facebook efforts wont be as useful.
The first step is to connect with people who already know you and then you can start to connect
with friends of friends and other recognized thought leaders in your industry.
Dont forget to send friend requests to journalists in your industry as well.
Once someone accepts a friend request you can begin to share information with them and view
the information they make available. A word of warning here: The Facebook culture, as is the case
in many social network environments, frowns on direct promotion. The connections you make
should be much more about networking and building trust.
Creating your Facebook Fan Page
Anyone with a Facebook profile has the ability to add something called a Fan Page to extend
some content beyond the profile page. Creating a Facebook Fan Page has become a very smart
practice for business owners as it allows you to create a flexible business outpost on Facebook.
Fans and non-fans alike can view and join the conversation by commenting on activity and
creating activity on your pages wall. I believe this level of engagement gives pages much more
dynamic community-building functionality and helps your fan page behave much like the rest of
Facebook.
Facebook, in general, has taken on a Twitter-like feel to the status update. But, the new status
update being added to fan pages gives businesses the ability to put updated content out and on
to the profile pages of fans. This alone should get your attention. If used properly this should give
businesses the ability to more effectively, yet still gently, promote within Facebook.
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Testimonials: Use Testimonials to gather your personal and professional references in one
place. Encouraging customers and contacts to post testimonials about your work and
expertise adds great marketing content to your profile.
Introductions: Introduce your friends to each other and make new ones. Ask for an
introduction to a Web programmer or good lawyer. Then make introductions for your
friends. This application speeds the process of effective networking by helping focus on
giving and receiving introductions in a systematic way.
Business Cards: Business Cards helps you network better on Facebook. Personalize your
card and attach it to your Facebook messages! View postings and network with others!
This application is much like the signature common in email messages. Its just one more
way to say business when using Facebook.
My LinkedIn Profile: Makes it easy to promote your LinkedIn account with a badge on your
Facebook profile. Cross-promoting social network activity is a great way to extend your reach.
What I Do: Allows you to promote your services/products to your Facebook network.
Display your skills/wares on your profile box and list yourself in a business directory.
Recommend your colleagues services and products too.
using Facebooks Twitter-like tagging feature
Tagging or bookmarking websites, images, and people is a tactic that is somewhat synonymous
with social media. When you send an @reply through Twitter you are effectively tagging
that person and linking to them in your tweet. Its an effective tool on Twitter and allows the
Twitterverse to see your link to that person as well. An effective way to draw some attention to
your Facebook activity is to tag people in your images. The act of tagging puts it on their wall,
your wall, and sends a notice to the person being tagged. Some folks use this very effectively as
an awareness activity. Hint: take pictures with well-known folks you meet at conferences and then
upload and tag them and you might draw some attention from the wall of your taggee.
Facebook has added tagging in a way that I believe will be very useful for business purposes.
When you update your status on your personal page, business page, or on any business page
where you share information, you can tag any of your followers in your update and it will
automatically create a link to your followers page, publish the status update to that persons wall,
and send them a notice that they were tagged. Do you see how that might be useful?
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A couple rules: The folks you tag must be following you and a tagged person has the option to
delete the tag. Try this out, but dont overdo it!
The way you invoke the tag is where the Twitter-like comparisons really come into play. You start
typing your status update and then add the @ and the Facebook system will drop down a list of
possible people to tag as you start typing that persons name. The @ sign does not appear in the
update like on Twitter but it signals Facebook that you are trying to use the tagging feature.
using Facebook ads for content awareness
Ads on Facebook have been around for a while now and based on reviews coming out from
some users, results using Facebook ads are mixed. I personally find them to be an effective and
intriguing option for many small businesses.
Heres why
You have a very large universe on Facebook, but you can target your ad to
be shown based on the location, sex, age, education, and keyword interests
of the Facebook user, making this a potentially narrow ad buy, particularly
for the local business. If you want to show your ad to business type folks
only in Denver, Colorado, so be it.
Some detractors claim that Facebook ads dont convert to sales, but I would suggest that is the
wrong way to think about it and to use this tool. Think of your Facebook ads, or ads in any social
media space, as content that is intended to create further awareness about more content. See,
Facebook ads dont have to link out to your sales page, they can be associated with content right
there on Facebook. For instance, if you use the events application to promote an event you are
hosting, such as a webinar, you can associate ads with that event and drive targeted people to
find out about or even directly RSVP to your event on Facebook. The same is true for the video
application. Use Facebook ads to drive people to a video on Facebook that gives great content
and invites them to learn more at your primary Web hub.
You can also tightly integrate your ad campaigns with the largely revamped fan or business pages
options to create outposts for your fan pages and invite narrowly defined target audiences to
become a fan on Facebook.
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When you use these internal ad plays, your ads, complete with social features, become more like
tiny bites of content instead of sales pitches and help prospective customers get to know, like, and
trust you a bit more before you ever ask for business.
Facebook allows you to buy your ads on a cost-per-click or cost-per-thousand impressions basis
and provides decent real-time reporting so you can adjust your ads as needed.
If you already have a Facebook profile and/or fan page you can start running ads today from the
Facebook Ads page.
5 tips for getting more from Facebook
1) Fan page. Facebook had personal profiles and groups from the start, but a few months
ago they added to the function called fan pages and made them more business friendly.
Any business on Facebook should create a fan page for their business and start optimizing
additional content there. The cool thing about fan pages is that its now a lot like having
another website. You can add applications, newsletter sign-up pages, and events, and
promote them to your friends on Facebook. When someone becomes a fan of your page,
your updates on the page show up on their wall giving additional exposure.
2) Custom HTML. This ones a little more technical but when you create a fan page you will
see that your page comes with tabs for various categories of content you create (each
tab has its own URL so you can promote each section on your fan page around the Web).
Using the Facebook Mark-up Language (FBML), you can create custom boxes of HTML
content, like newsletter sign-up pages, blog RSS feeds, and white paper downloads just
like you might on your website. FBML is a Facebook application you can get here. Ive also
done a quick little video showing you how to add FBML custom HTML here.
3) Special content. Give your Facebook fans a little something extra they might not find on
your blog or website. Upload images from your PowerPoint presentations, articles from the
local publication you contribute to, or on-the-fly videos created using the Facebook video
application. Youre bound to find some crossover from other social networks like Twitter, so
give the Facebook users something unique. I know some people caution about reposting
Twitter here, but I think its perfectly fine. I get lots of comments from people who just
happen to like to use Facebook more than Twitter and this way they still get updates.
4) events, videos, and apps. Use the heck out of all of the Facebook applications. Promote
events, upload or record video, hold contests and polls. All of this extra engagement is so easy
to do using pre-built tools. And dont forget to integrate your Facebook activity back to your
website and blog using a Facebook Fan BoxI wrote about the Facebook FanBox tool here.
5) Ads for awareness. I think that Facebook has built one of the better ad targeting tools
going. You can target ads to Facebook members on all kinds of criteria and run pretty low
cost campaigns. The trick though is to run campaigns that are compelling and promote
your Facebook Fan Page instead of trying to sell something. Promote your white paper,
events, and educational contentcreate awareness about your great content and you
will get the chance to earn the trust it takes to actually sell something to someone. Heres
where you go to find more info about Facebook ads.
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LinkedIn
LinkedIn for connecting
LinkedIn is often billed as the largest network of business professionals. It certainly has a much
more focused business participation than many social networks and is a great place to network
and do research on specific organizations and opportunities.
Probably the biggest difference between Facebook and LinkedIn is the focus on introductions.
Ingrained in the LinkedIn culture is the ability to see who knows whom and who can make an
introduction.
As is the case with any social network, its important that you take a little time and get to know
the culture and the accepted norms. This is often done by lurking a bit. Use the time to build
your profile and your network of current friends so you can see firsthand some examples of how
people connect and reach out on your chosen network. From there you can begin to contribute
and seek out connections with demonstrated leaders within the network.
For the business professional there are some pretty good reasons to make LinkedIn a part of your
overall social media outreach:
1) Find clients, help, and deals. For some industries LinkedIn is a great place to locate
prospects and network partners. Many individuals openly promote relationships and deals
that they are in the market for.
2) Build up buzz. Once youve established a following within LinkedIn you can begin to
promote specific happenings around your organization.
3) Hire professionals. Often people think of social networking only in terms of making
marketing connections. LinkedIn has become a great place to network and find great
associates, partners, and vendors.
4) Get feedback and research. One of the most effective ways to tap your newly built social
networks is to use them as a resource for research and feedback. Simply putting questions
out to your group is a great way to get a feel for areas where you want input.
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The image above shows the links on my profile with carefully selected anchor text that
links to pages on my site. LinkedIn is one of the few social profiles sites that allows this.
2) Give to get
When people view profiles one of the top features is something called recommendations.
While these may feel a little fluffy when you read them, lack of them can be a competitive
issue. You should acquire some recommendations and I find the best way to get them is
to give them. Choose people in your network that youve worked with and write an honest
statement of recommendation. Dont be surprised if you receive some in return.
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them last. I think this feature makes the paid version worth a look. Of course, theyve also made it
free for 30 days. You activate the free trial by simply using the save profile feature.
Search on the term marketinghover over a profile and save it to your marketing folder
(click image to enlarge).
In profile organizer you can make notes on any saved profile (click image to enlarge).
The Profile Organizer shows up as a workspace under the contact tab and once active youll see
save profile as an option any time you are looking at an individual or group of profiles.
The thing I like most is that this allows you to work in LinkedIn any time you have 10 minutes and
makes that 10 minutes much more efficient. For me, researching and contacting are two very
different activities and take different frames of mind when doing them. I like that fact that I can
organize all the profiles as I feel like it and then come back and do laser-focused reaching out
when Im in that mood. The note-taking field is what makes this CRM like to me. (Note: You dont
have to be connected to someone to save and note their profile either.)
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Twitter
using Twitter for business
Maybe youre sick of hearing about Twitter. But theres no denying its become a hot business tool
and with some pretty good reasonsas long as you think about how it will help you achieve your
objectives!
What is it?
In simplest terms, Twitter is a free service that allows anyone to say anything to anybody in 140
characters or lessits the what are you doing right now kind of micro-blogging that permeates
online social communication.
So, now the question isis that all? Well, no, not exactly. While people are using it to tell no
one in particular what they had for lunch, millions are leaning on Twitter pretty hard as a way to
network and communicate with contacts new and old. Twitter is outfitted, like most social media
tools with the ability to subscribe, share, friend, or follow as many Twitter feeds as you like. In
addition, developers are swiftly creating tools that allow users to bend and twist the feeds in
creative ways. More on that shortly.
How do I use it?
First thing, sign up for an account. Its very painless. See http://Twitter.com/account/create.
Once you create an account you will be given a home page and a profile pagei.e., my profile is
http://Twitter.com/ducttape. So my Twitter handle is @ducttape. From these pages you can find
other Twitter streams to follow, post your own messages, and even watch the entire public stream
of comments flow by. (I dont recommend that unless you are really, really bored.)
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Its a good idea if you are going to jump into social media sites that allow you to
build profiles to create a 100 x 100 px image, or avatar as they are called, to use
on your profile and often with your activity.
Why would I use it?
Now that is the real question isnt it? Many people look at Twitter on the surface and conclude
that its just one big waste of time. I cant say I disagree completely, but like all social media and
marketing tactics, before you can determine if something makes sense you need to analyze your
objectives. So, instead of asking why you would use it, ask how it might help you achieve some
other already stated objectives.
1) Would you like a way to connect and network with others in your industry or others who
share you views? Its a good a tool for that.
2) Would you like a way to get instant access to whats being said, this minute, about your
organization, people, products, or brand? Its a good tool for that.
3) Would you like a steady stream of ideas, content, links, resources, and tips focused on your
area of expertise or interest? Its a good tool for that.
4) Would you like to monitor whats being said about your customers to help them protect
their brands? Its a good tool for that.
5) Would you like to extend the reach of your thought leadershipblog posts and other
content? It can be a good tool for that.
6) Would you like to promote your products and services directly to a target audience? Not
such a good tool for that.
Before you really jump into a service like Twitter, its important that you identify at least, and
initially only, one objective from the list above and focus your efforts on learning how to use the
tool to that end.
See this great article from Chris Brogan for more ideas: 50 Ways to Use Twitter for Business. Also,
see 8 Tips for Using Twitter for Your Business, by Office Live Small Business Monte Enbysk.
Before you really jump into a service like Twitter, its important that you identify at least, and
initially only, one objective from the list above and focus your efforts on learning how to use the
tool to that end.
Some basic Twitter terminology
Tweet: When you post or write your 140 characters on Twitter and
hit send its called a tweet or tweeting.
Handle: Thats your Twitter name @ducttapebalance short with
descriptive and no matter what your business handle is get
your personal name if you can even if you dont plan to use it
right now. Its like your URL and will have value someday.
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Follow: This is simply the act of adding someone to your list of people you are following
this makes their tweets show up on your home page.
Replies: This is what it is called when someone writes a tweet directly at your handle
@ducttape cool post today blah blahthis is often an invite to engage with a follower.
Retweet: This is a tactic of republishing someone elses tweetthe original tweet along with
author stays intact, but you are basically showing someones tweet to your followers
many people find this a great way to add content and acknowledge good stuff from the
folks they follow.
dM: This is a message that is sent directly to another user. They must be following you for
you to DM them, but this is a very useful tool for private messages and generally a good
choice when you start going back and forth with someone on something your entire base
of followers might not find interesting.
Hashtag: This is a way people categorize tweets so that others might use the same tag and
effectively create a way for people to view related tweetsit will look something like
#marketingmore on this in search.
Who do I follow?
In Twitter terms, following someone simply means that their posts, or tweets as they are called,
show up on your home page (or text messages via mobile phone option).
To make Twitter more useful for many of the objectives above
you need to follow others and begin to have others follow
you. Some people take very aggressive and, often, timeconsuming leaps into to this and try to follow and be followed
by everyone on Twitter. Again, back to the objectives, most often quality over quantity is best.
While you can upload your current contacts (a good place to start) and search for people you
know on Twitter, I would suggest that you take a look at two sites that will help you locate people
with focused interest.
Twellow is like a Twitter phone
directory that sorts people by industry.
This can be a great way to find people
in your industry.
The profiles also tell you a little about
each person, including how many
followers they have. Sometimes
following people with large followings
can lead to people following you, but
if your goal is networking, be realistic
and find people who may also just be
getting started. If your goal is to keep
tabs of what industry leaders are saying, then focus on industry leaders. The Twellow site has a
link to each profile on Twitter so you can click on the link and go to a Twitter page to follow the
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person you have chosen and then jump back to Twellow to keep looking. If you want to get listed
on Twellow, use this link: http://www.twellow.com/user_add.php.
Tweepsearch is an option as well and focuses on searching through Twitter bios and profiles to
help you locate folks that might be of interest to follow.
Another directory can be found here: http://Twitterpacks.pbwiki.com/. The nice thing about this
directory is that you can also add your Twitter links if you arent afraid to edit a wiki.
What do I say?
Another tough question. Whatever your answer, it needs to be 140 characters or less. So, lets go
back to the objectives, shall we?
If, for instance, you want some immediate feedback on things, you may choose to pose some
questions. This often stimulates conversation but it can also do a great deal in terms of helping
your make a decisiona bit like a poll. I have received some great ideas for blog content and
often cross-post a response or two from Twitter in a blog post.
If you want to promote an event or post or idea dont simply link to it, add a twist, ask if people
have any thoughts, pose an interesting thought.
Filtering Twitter to make it make sense
One of the most important and frequently underutilized objectives for Twitter is as a way to
monitor your brand and reputation. Anytime anything is being said about your company,
products, people, or services you can track it and respond instantly. You can also use a set of
readily available tools to track whats being said about any search term you like. This is another
way to find people with shared interests.
Twitter Search: This little tool allows you
to monitor anything you can search. I
use it to see whats being said back to
me @ducttape and then do searches
like duct tape marketing or john
jantschnow for some this may feel a
little vain, but this is a great way to stay
in touch and even network with folks
who have an interest in your products
and services.
Some large organizations such as
Dell use Twitter very effectively to
communicate with customershappy
and sad alike. This has become a major
customer communication tool for them
because they can respond immediately.
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Lastly, Twitter search allows you to create RSS feeds from your searches so you can have them
sent directly to your RSS reader or you can republish a stream of content on your website or blog
and add the collective Twitterverse to your content creation.
Mining Twitter for leads
Getting leads and business by participating on sites like Twitter is a very intriguing notion. Now
Im not talking about barging in and hocking your wares to anyone with an @you wouldnt
do that in an offline setting, say at a cocktail party, would you? But, think of that same cocktail
party, youre having a chat with someone who is going on about how they cant get good help to
staff their business, and you just happen to have the answer for them. You might suggest a great
solution and voila, land a nice piece of business.
Well, that virtual cocktail party is going on all day long on Twitter. The problem is, its a bit like a
party held in the Rose Bowl, if somebody in section 101 needs what you do, but youre in section
334, youll never meet each other.
This is where some powerful Twitter and third-party tools can come to help you make sense of it all.
Meet Twitter Advanced Searchthe basic Twitter search function is a great time-saving filter and
allows you to set up searches on your name, company name, brands, competitors, all the basic
stuff, so you can monitor your business and reputation and even know when people are replying
to your tweets.
Advanced search, however, is where the real data mining comes to life.
Advanced search allows you to filter everything thats being said for your keyword phases in
your town, for example. Think that might be useful? Lets say you are a network server specialist
in Tucson, Arizona. If you set up an advanced search for people in Tucson, Arizona, complaining
about their server, and you got those complaints in real time, could you develop some hot leads?
Heres the search for that.
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Creating advanced searches around topics that would identify someone as a hot lead is really
pretty easy using the form on the advanced search page. Or, you can use a host of operators in
the basic search page to create some interesting searches. For example, want to know if anyone
in Detroit is asking about marketingyour search would look like this: near:Detroit within:50mi
marketing? Note the question mark after the word marketing.
People are asking questions, complaining, and searching for stuff in every corner of the world on
Twitter and these people are often more than happy to hear from someone who can provide an
answer locally. With a little practice you can set up a series of tweets that might turn up leads for
your business every single day.
Again, this is not an invitation to spam people, but with a little care and the fact that you can
identify people through the flood of tweets, people expressing needs and wants, you can
proceed to target and educate these folks by starting a conversation and answering their
questions thoughtfully.
Managing your Twitter activity
Once you start using Twitter, youll want to explore ways to make it easier to follow whats going
on and respond to @replies and searches youve set up.
There are a number of third-party desktop and mobile applications that make this a snap.
TweetDeck: This is a piece of software
that you run on your desktop. You can
post tweets from it, respond to replies
from others and, this is what I really like,
set up various searches and get updates
in real time when someone tweets on a
subject or phrase you
are following.
This is a great way to
monitor your brand or jump on opportunities connected to your specific topics
of choice without having to hang out on Twitter all day.
Tweetie 2: This mobile application allows you to do much of what you might on
a desktop but from your iPhone.
TwitterBerry: This is the mobile app of choice for BlackBerry users.
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Hashtag use
There is a pretty useful trick that Twitter insiders use all the time called a hashtag. The roots of
the #tag are buried somewhere in IM coding, but its what you can do with it using Twitter that
matters. (More on hashtags, if you want some techie stuff on this.)
The hashtag or #tag added to a tweet acts as way to create categories, groups, or topics for
tweets that others can use as well. This way, tweets can easily be grouped together using the
search.Twitter.com feature.
Let me give you a very commonly used tactic for this. Lets say a group of folks are attending a
workshop and tweeting their notes in real time. If everyone at that workshop were asked to add
something like #mkt101 to their tweets, everyone present or not can see and share all the notes
in one place.
During earthquakes and fires hashtags are a great way for people to get news.
Promoting events and product launches via a hashtag helps keep the word in context.
Companies often use hashtags as a way for remote employees to use Twitter as a communication
tool for all the stuff people should stay on top of.
I use a hashtag for each of my live webinars and then people tweet and ask questions via Twitter
and I have a back channel of conversation and notes and another source of relevant content to
support the webinar.
You can also find hot trends via hashtag at search.Twitter.com. The homepage lists the trending
tags. More than one Twitter user has found that jumping into a hot trend conversation is a great
way to connect with folks on something of shared interest.
Anyone can create a hashtag by putting # in front of anything. Keep it short so you dont use up
your 140 and try for something unique. If you use a tag that others are using you will mingle your
results with others.
Popular third-party Twitter tools
TweetDeck: desktop Twitter client
Seesmic Desktop: another desktop Twitter client
Tweetie 2: iPhone app
TwitPic: share images in tweets
TweetStats: analyze your Twitter activity
Hootsuite: business oriented
CoTweet: multiple accounts
Objective Marketer: advanced analytics
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Weekly (end)
Scan LinkedIn Questions from my network and respond when appropriate
Scan delicious, digg, and mixx popular and select bookmarks for content ideas and
trending topics
Consciously add comments to conversations I want to joinhot topic focused
Join one Twitter hot trend conversation if appropriatesearch.Twitter.com shows these
in real time
Set your system up and work it, day in and day outwhatever that means for you. You will then
start to understand the vital role that social media can play in your overall marketing strategy.
Good luck managing the beast!
Lets get social
If you would like to connect with me on one of the following social networks, here are my profiles.
Plurk: http://www.plurk.com/user/ducttape
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/ducttapemarketing
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ducttapemarketing
Stumbleupon: http://jjantsch.stumbleupon.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ducttapemarketing
Twitter: http://www.Twitter.com/ducttape
youTube: http://youtube.com/jantsch
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/ducttape
digg: http://digg.com/users/jantsch
FriendFeed: http://friendfeed.com/ducttape
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In the end
As you can see, when technology is leveraged to facilitate and enhance social interaction, a
great deal of value can be created. But tread carefully. This savvy audience can be turned off if
approached in the wrong way. Use these new tools properly and theyll prove to be invaluable
in your effort to strengthen existing customer relationships and capture the hearts and minds of
new consumers.
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