Everyone wants more business and more and more people are looking to social media to help them generate leads. But the question is how do we use social to get leads. We first must look at what social media is good at, conversations.
Getting involved in conversations is a great way to begin building your social media presence. It isn’t that far from real life. If you’re the person at the party that sits in the corner and waits for people to come talk to you, you might have 1 conversation all night. However, if you are active, approaching others, LISTENING to what they have to say and responding intelligently and authentically, you are talking all night. You are engaging. You are memorable.
The same is true in social media. Listen to what is being said and participate, authentically. This is not the time to “sell”. This is simply a conversation.
Know Your Audience
Understand how the people you’re conversing with work. What are their likes and dislikes. Where do they spend their time online. What sites do they use. While your audience may not be on facebook a lot, they might be on linkedIn. They might comment on popular blogs, forums, etc.
Develop Your Social Media Strategy
Dale recently wrote a blog about why you need a strategy for digital marketing. You must have a plan and then execute that plan. We don’t want to roaming around the digital landscape and not know where we are going. Spending all our time on one platform when another is the fertile ground.
Consistency Is Key
Some say absence makes the heart grow fonder but in business it makes the mind wonder. Wonder what happened. Ever find your self thinking I wonder what happened to them…. When people stop hearing from you, they assume the worse. They don’t assume you are so busy you can’t talk. They assume you are so dead you don’t want to talk. Make sure you are talking, consistently. This is hard, I know. We struggle with it too, but it is something we are constantly working on.
Be Authentic
In the day and age of 24/7 information, anything is a simple google search away. You must be true to who you are and don’t try to fake the details. Just be you.
In the end, social media is a relationship building tool. You aren’t going to gain a new customer from social right when they like you. You are just getting started. You then use that platform to let them know what you are about, what you stand for, and how you think. You grow that relationship over time. More importantly you learn about them. Who are they, what do they like, etc.
So, I encourage you to start the conversation below. Let’s get the party started!
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For the first time, online ad spend has increased over print ad spend. This is the true measurement that it is time that marketing activities must become integrated. The trouble that most marketers are having with the integration of online and offline is that these two industries view what their roles are as completely separate, and that separation can be quite large at times. For the sake of the client, this gap has to narrow and it has to do so quickly. There is no one channel that fits for everything that is needed to mount successful campaigns.
