Posts Tagged ‘Business’

 

Four Steps to Crafting a Connection Strategy on Social Media

Monday, January 28th, 2013

The amount of information and the speed at which content is currently produced may seem overwhelming. If you have a message, product or service to deliver to the masses you may wish to use social media to connect with customers, friends or potential buyers.

But you first have to be heard.

How among all the social platforms will your voice be heard above the throng of tweets, posts and status updates?

connect

Katherine Pangaro via Compfight

Step 1: Craft a Plan

The first step to standing out from the crowd on social media is to plan. We know of a jewelry company who thought it was a ‘good idea to get on Facebook.’ After opening a Facebook page and uploading a few pictures of jewelry  they were disheartened to see very few people connecting with their business. They didn’t have a plan.

We’ll get into a few specifics below, but the old saying “if you fail to plan you plan to fail” certainly rings true.

Step 2: Set Your Goals

While crafting your plan, be specific. Use the acronym S.M.A.R.T. (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, time-based) as a guide. Ensure each of your tasks includes each and every S.M.A.R.T. item.

Step 3: Solicit for Feedback

Once a plan is crafted, consider that draft one. Perhaps you want to connect with customers on a social network like Facebook. Once you’ve crafted a plan using S.M.A.R.T. goals to do that, ask someone (and we’d be happy to help) what they think of your plan. It could be that Facebook may be the wrong platform and Pinterest or Google+ may better serve your demographic. Get a second opinion.

Step 4: Remain Consistent and Flexible

Consisten and flexible may seem dichotomous, but they’re not. A good parent is both consistent as well as flexible. The sam remains true for social media. As social media continues to expand, consistently learning new trends and methods of connection enables us not to get in a rut, rigidly refusing to adjust to changes in technological advances.

 

 

Five Social Media Mistakes You Can’t Afford To Make

Sunday, July 1st, 2012

Everyone makes mistakes.

+Spilling milk.

+Auto-correct errors.

+Falling asleep in the sun with a tennis racquet on your face, creating a checkerboard face.

While those mistakes are temporary, social media mistakes last a lifetime.

By Alex E. Proimos

Sure, you could delete that tweet, amend that Facebook post (you can edit them now!), or delete your blog, but all that content may still be floating around cyberspace. Someone may have snapped a screenshot or reposted your blog post and now it exists forever.

Since most of us don’t want our mistakes to last forever, here’s five social media mistakes you can’t afford to make.

1. Tweeting and Driving

Need convincing that it’s bound to catch up with you? Watch AT&T’s “Where r” commercial. I also posted about tweeting during the Daytona 500 here.

2. Way too Personal

I’ve seen business owner’s social media following rapidly dwindle simply because the content they posted on their business account was way too personal. Updates such as “ugh, hangover again. Happy Monday to me” are not only negative, they’re simply unprofessional.

3. Disappear

 Growing silent on social media is certain death. The name of the game is conversation, and if there is none, no engagement exists and the platform slowly dies.

4. Running Faucet

Salespeople are notorious for being talkers. And (generally speaking) customers don’t like salespeople. But if a salesperson pauses or asks a question, the customer is engaged and is more likely to become comfortable with the salesperson. With social media, make sure the conversation is a two way street by asking questions. Which leads us to…

5. Update o’ Rama

Space out your updates, just like a good athlete would space out meals and snacks throughout the day. A smattering of tweets and updates is annoying to your followers. Use tools such as Timely, Buffer, or Hootsuite to help you space out your update.

Question: What social media mistakes have you made? What tips can you offer?