Charlotte Kemp, Niche Training

Adding social media to your marketing mix should be a natural decision except that the bad press that some of the applications get make people wonder if they are not wasting their time.  Before you throw out this option consider if you would now also throw out your telephone for the private calls that staff make or if you would disable emails for the inevitable personal emails that circulate.

Social media is meant to be social.  But because it is relatively new, we are not always sure how to use it in a business model.  Consider your marketing strategy and deliberately incorporate one or two social media sites into that plan.  Do not let them be optional extras and do not do them when you are finished with traditional marketing or you will never take them seriously or see the value.

My recommendation is normally, but depending on the nature of the business, a Facebook business page and LinkedIn.  The Facebook Business page represents your business on Facebook and allows you to market in that arena, but don’t spam your friends.  You need to nurture a new audience.  I strongly recommend a LinkedIn profile for anyone with a professional career or who markets themselves.  It is one of the most highly regarded social networking sites worldwide for business and for job seeking too.   Get started with those two as a platform for the rest.

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By Charlotte Kemp    

When signing up on Twitter or before starting one’s own blog or Facebook Business page, I always counsel my clients to follow three types of people in order learn something of value that could be reflected in their pages and in their business.  Those people can be categorized under the 3 Cs:  

Colleagues – These are your own local colleagues with whom you work who may be tweeting or posting blogs.  This is very valuable for networking if you know you are going to see someone at an industry function and you can go to their pages beforehand and see what they have been posting and be able to talk to them intelligently about what is going on about their business.  But more specifically you should follow industry leaders, shining examples of people who are performing at the levels that aspire to and you can learn from them.  You can easily follow their blogs with an RSS reader like Google Reader and use what they write as educational material for yourself so that you can be challenged to bring the very best to your clients.  

Competition – You should know what your competition is doing, as well as which of your competition is using social media as a tool.  Also be aware of competition from further afield because with a connected world it is not only the person across the street who could steal your business with a better marketing strategy or price plan, but someone with a good social media strategy from the other side of the country could swoop in and scoop your clients before you know it.  Take nothing for granted and know what they are up to.  Be very aware of your field.  

Clients – Know what your clients are blogging on, tweeting or posting to their pages.  They may fail to tell you important information that you will be able to pick up from these postings. If you are paying attention, you will be able to approach them, even outside of scheduled meetings, and let them know you are aware of issues and respond with appropriate solutions.  Then you add real value in your relationship to them.   Remember that social media is about having that relationship with people, not hunting down leads or always selling your stuff.     And if someone follows you, reciprocate by following them back.  

You can follow me the popular sites using the following addresses.  Please let me know that you came from Women’s Lifestyle World. 

http://twitter.com/charlotte_niche

http://www.linkedin.com/in/charlottekemp

http://tinyurl.com/Niche-FB

http://tinyurl.com/F-Word-Book