10 Tips for Social Media Marketing

Business Stepping into Social Media Marketing?

10 Tips to Boost bottom line, and Build Brand Buzz

A quick guide for business based on “10 Rules for Social Media Marketing” by Susan Gunelius

Social media marketing can help build your audience and customer base in a dramatically.  However,  starting without a roadmap can make it a daunting task.
Using these 10 tips will help you better serve your clients,brand and more importantly your bottom line.  These 10 tips can help you make the best use of your social media time, rather than flailing around in the dark.

1. Listen Up!  We have two ears and one mouth -use the same proportion in social media discourses. Listen to find out what is important to  your target audience by reading what they have to say, and joining discussions. When you know what people need, then can you create content that adds value instead of clutter. Then keep listening to guage how your work is received.
2. Focus Makes more Committed Followers
Specializing rather than being a jack-of-all-trades help build a strong brand. In the fast-paced Internet A  persona focused on one thing, helps people to categorize  and organize their connections. This is one reason some people will develop separate identities for different purposes.
3. Follower Quality vs Quantity .While it is possible to purchase followers, having quality online connections who interact with you about your content is better than people who pop in, then disappear.
4. Be Patient Content Marketing and Social Media usually require long haul commitments. Rarely does success happen overnight, so stay the course.

5. Quality Content Increases Spread. When people find content they love, word can spread like wildfire. You will find it referenced by people on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, their own blogs and more. This creates more points of entry for search engines like Google which in turn can grow to hundreds and thousands of potential new clients.
6. Know your Influencers Who are the influencers in your market? Find out who has an audience that would be interested in your product or service. Connect with targeted influencers  and build relationships with them. Get on their radar with authoritative, interesting ,useful information, so they have something to share with their own followers, putting your business in front of a huge new audience.
7. Bring Something of Value.  Spend more time on creating amazing content and developing relationships with online influencers than  promoting your products and services.  Constant promotion causes people to tune out. Gradually, online influencers will spread the word about what you have helped them achieve.
8. Use Your Manners Just as you wouldn’t snub someone who greeted you on the street, acknowledge everyone who reaches out to you online. Build relationships to bring social media marketing success.
9. Don’t Disappear Be consistent in publishing content and sharing conversations. Online Followers can be fickle and will drop you like a hot potato if you disappear for weeks or months. If you will be off grid for a while try to leave a note to let people know what’s happening.
10. Golden Rule Want people to say something nice about your business or share your content? Budget some time to focus on sharing and talking about content others publish.The Golden Rule applies strongly in Social Media.
By and large, successful Social Media Marketing is found by being less self-centered, and more focussed on the needs of clients. When you think of it- isn’t that what truly successful marketing is all about?
Read the original article by Susan Gunelius CEO of KeySplash Creative Inc., on Entrepreneur. (Accessed Mar.1,2011).