USING SOCIAL MEDIA

FOR BUSINESS

By Joanne Munro

Why Bother With Social Media?

• It’s free marketing

• You can share ideas, collaborate, ask questions and get advice

• You can demonstrate your expertise and be seen as a knowledgeable expert in

your field

• You can see what people think about your product or service (search and

monitor your name/brand)

• It’s a great way to build relationships: people do business with people - and

people they like!

• It gives you and your company a personality

• It makes you more easily accessible to customers

• It drive traffic to your website/blogs

• It’s great for SEO – Google LOVES Social Media

• It’s Social Proof

1) Twitter – What it’s About

• You write ‘Tweets’ of 140 characters or less and can ‘retweet’ (share with your

followers) content from other users. You can also send private messages, reply

directly to someone, or have your tweet out in the public domain

• It can be likened to a dinner party. There are all sorts of people on it and you

decide who you’d like to interact with. Some of those people are of course idiots

• It’s used to share information, promote events and services, link to other sites,

ask questions, get feedback, provide customer service, run polls upload and

share photos and videos

• Twitter is very mainstream now with conferences or TV programmes giving you

a hashtag to use to discuss the event (#HIGNFY, #BBCQT)

• There are lots of associated tools (schedulers, directories, monitors, cleaners)

• You have to use it well or it can damage your reputation – know how it works!

Twitter – Benefits and Pitfalls• It’s a quick way to interact with people

• It’s a great way to build relationships with people you don’t see very often

• You get to find out what’s happening before it’s on the news or on websites

• You can schedule posts then just pop on and chat when you have time (to reach

audiences in different time zones or to free up your time)

• It’s really easy to use on the go

• You can reach a very large audience very quickly

• Twitter can be addictive – you could be on there all day and not do any work

• Mistakes can make you look really unprofessional and will be seen by a lot of people

• It’s ‘noisy’ and you can be overwhelmed with information

• Don’t talk about what you had for dinner unless you’re a food writer!

• Some people don’t tweet for a while or abandon their accounts as they’re not sure

how best to use it

• There can be a lot of spammers

• It’s essential to do it well

Twitter – Best Practice• Think before you tweet!

• Filter out noise by using lists and culling followers

• Keep an eye on what people are saying about you and reply

• Build up a following slowly – be discerning with your followers

• Don’t have your Twitter feed on your website or blog as it looks unprofessional

• Use the search facility for better targeting

• Don’t write tweets so long they can’t be shared and don’t choose a long username

• Use an RSS Reader like Feedly to collate news feeds for Twitter fodder then

schedule with Buffer

• Use Twitter tools like Tweetdeck, Twitcleaner, Tweriod, and Twylah

• Read up as much as you can on using hashtags and lists – Twitter is a big area

• It’s vital to add value

• Never just broadcast - you have to engage or there’s no point

• Good examples of Twitter use

2) LinkedIn – What it’s About

• It’s seen as the most professional of the Social Media platforms

• Like having an online CV – your LI profile always comes top of search results

• You have a personal profile that outlines your career history and people can link up

with you

• It has a LinkedIn Today section with interesting articles

• You have to prove how you know a person before you can link with them

• You use it to collaborate and exchange knowledge and ideas with other professionals

• You can create or join groups, create company pages and post jobs

• You can search for people, companies, professions, locations, or job titles

• People can leave testimonials for you as well as endorsements

LinkedIn – Benefits and Pitfalls

• It doesn’t require too much time to maintain and use

• It’s a great way to find out who to contact in an organisation

• The groups are an incredible resource – create your own private or open group

• It gives you an SEO-optimised professional online profile

• You can schedule updates with Buffer

• You can receive a tonne of updates if you don’t check your settings

• You can get requests from people you don’t know

• It can be a bit dry

LinkedIn – Best Practice• Personalise your connect requests

• If someone asks to connect with you then suggest a face-to-face meeting

• Using Rapportive for Gmail means you can bypass the ‘how you know them’ bit

• Import LinkedIn contacts into your email contacts lists

• Use groups to collaborate with and learn from

• Answer questions

• Add your company page

• Use LinkedIn Today as blog or Tweet fodder

• Optimise your profile and photo with keywords

• Edit your settings to control the amount of correspondence you receive

• Don’t connect your Twitter feed but do connect your blog

• Freely give testimonials and endorsements

• Get a custom URL (for SEO)

• Good examples of LinkedIn use

3) FACEBOOK – What it’s About

• You create a business page and use it to share news, photos, run

competitions and polls, interact with potential and existing customers, add

links, and develop trusting relationships

• You can run paid ads and promote posts

• Facebook Places can be used to run location-based offers

• The timeline is a good way to show company history and benchmarks

Facebook – Benefits and Pitfalls

• Lots of people are already on Facebook so it’s easier to get them to interact with

you – they will also share what they like

• Likes are an easy way to gain ‘Social Proof’ which search engines love

• It’s a good way to maintain customer service

• Businesses that have a Facebook page are automatically included in the

Facebook places directory so you can target offers that way

• Facebook has a terrible track record with privacy and using your data

• It’s not applicable to some businesses

Facebook – Best Practice

• Make the most of your profile image – it’s the first thing people see

• Get likes. Ask people to like your page when sending newsletters and when

asking for testimonials etc

• Use the Insights tool to see how people are interacting with your page

• Try out targeted advertising and Facebook places offers

• Be creative with the Timeline feature

• Check your privacy settings!

• Good examples of Facebook Page use

4) Pinterest – What it’s About

• Pinterest is basically a place for people to stash images

• You get a pin bookmarklet so you can pin images from sites on to your boards

• You can also repin other people’s images as well as add admin users so other people

can add images

• You can create private boards, collaborate on other people’s, like and comment on

other pins

• When you click an image it takes you through to the original source

• It’s all about creativity and inspiration

• It’s quite a new platform so people are still working out how best to use it for their

business

• It can drive a colossal amount of traffic to your site. It’s the third most popular site

after Twitter and Facebook

Pinterest – Benefits and Pitfalls

• It’s brilliant for anyone who creates something – designers, flower companies,

hairdressers, make-up artists, wedding companies, fitness instructors, cooks or

food companies, clothes and design companies, printers – anything visible

• It doesn’t require much time and interaction as some of the others platforms

• It links really well to other platforms (hairdressing tutorials on YouTube etc)

• People love images (it’s a very female-heavy site)

• Tutorials go down particularly well

• It’s really, really fun

• It’s addictive and a massive time-sucker!

Pinterest – Best Practices

• Don’t use it just as a sales platform

• Be creative – it’s new and pretty untapped but popular as hell

• Get people involved – comment and like

• Verify your website and link to it in your profile

• Add prices if applicable

• Run competitions

• Brand your images

• Design infographics on how to do something but make them come to your

website for more

• Try not to spend all day on there!

5) Google Plus – How it Works

• It’s like Facebook for Grownups - more professional

• You create a page and add people to different circles so you decide what to

share with whom. G+ makes it very hard to accidentally share info with the

wrong people

• You can edit an update or comment after you post it (Facebook followed)

• You can also use ‘Hangouts’ which is like Skype. You can record them and

they’re great for conference calls

• It’s similar to Facebook but much less noise and clutter – they copied each other

and took the best bits from each other’s sites

• Your Google Places page is now linked with Google+

Google Plus – Benefits and Pitfalls

• It’s kind of a one-stop Google shop where you can link all your online profiles

• It integrates seamlessly with other Google products and adds itself to your Google

toolbar

• It’s owned by Google so fantastic for SEO. Google prioritises this content in searches

• You decide what you share with whom

• You can edit your posts after you’ve published them

• It has a much cleaner interface

• Not as many people use it as other Social Media sites

Google Plus – Best Practice• Create a company page then claim authorship on your blog and link to your other

Social Media profiles so Google knows they’re you. This bit is really important

• Make the most of your company profile image

• Use hangouts

• Put people in various circles – they can be in more than one

• Share valuable content with the appropriate circles

• Interact and engage with other users

• Great Examples of Use – http://mashable.com/2012/06/28/google-plus-brands/

6) YouTube – Benefits and Pitfalls

• It’s a great way to demonstrate your expertise and know-how

• You can set up Adwords

• Because it’s owned by Google, they show videos first in search results.

• When someone clicks on your profile It links to your Google+ account

• People love tutorials

• It can drive a lot of traffic to your site

• It comes with video analytics

• A great fantastic tool if you do something practical that helps people

• You have to make sure you have good images and sound

YouTube – Best Practice

• Add links to your website and other Social Media sites in your profile page

• Use relevent keywords for your videos in the titles and descriptions – that’s

how they’re found!

• Post videos of you demonstrating your products or services

• Make sure you check out the analytics section on your videos to see how

they’re doing and at what point people click away

• Put your company branding at the beginning and the end of your video with

links to your website or blog

• Good examples of YouTube use

Overall Tips For Using Social Media

• It’s not for everyone. If you don’t have the time to do it properly then don’t do it at all

• Each platform has own traits – learn about each one before you start

• It’s a slow burner – don’t expect results straight away

• It’s better to do one or two well rather than all of them badly

• Decide on your strategy: What are you going to say, to whom, and for what

purpose? What platforms are you going to use? Who is going to update? When are

they going to update?

• Decide what you’re going to call yourself – your own name, your company name, or

other?

• Study your metrics and measure your success by checking your Google and Buffer

analytics, asking people how they found you, and seeing what they clicked through or

responded to – then give them more of it

Cont…

• Use Social Media to connect with people but always try to set up face-to-face

meetings as well. People do business with people

• Cross-platform. Put links in your email signature, on business cards, when

commenting on posts, and on your website and blog. Also add Social Media

follow and share buttons to your website and blog

• Optimise everything using key words - profiles, images, and content

• Immediately take it offline if you have issues

• See if people you met networking are on SM as soon as you get back and

connect straight away

• Find your voice – be honest and real above all else

• Don’t just bowl in there and try to sell stuff. Watch and listen to what’s going on

before you join in

Cont…

• Don’t make it all about you – share info and promote others

• Get your social media updates sent to another email address rather than your

business one

• Don’t just abandon your account if you’re not keeping it up. Delete it

• Use compelling headlines and tweets to get people to read your article or click

on links.

• Offer compelling content – link to some good articles and things your audience

might want. Give them a reason to follow you

• Make the most of your profile. Read up on how to best optimise it

• Choose professional images for your profile photo that can be seen on mobile

devices

• It’s vital you engage and ADD VALUE

Useful Social Media Resources• Mashable

• Social Media Examiner

• Simply Zesty

• Social Triggers

• Quicksprout

• Inc

• Munro PA – My Virtual Assistant website for Social Media training and

assistance

• Me on Twitter: @jojomunroro

• Me on LinkedIn: jojomunroro

• Me on Pinterest: JoMunro

• VA Website: www.munro-pa.co.uk