Reflecting on the Semester - Social Media Marketing

 

I have had my final Social Media Marketing class. I have presented my final project and have spent today studying for my final test. It’s hard to believe that my class is almost over. Looking back on the semester, I’ve learned a lot. I’m not sure what I expected to learn in this class, but what I did learn was so much better.

I want to share some of the biggest, most important things I learned while taking this class with you.

1.      Social media marketing is about marketing socially, not about marketing on social media. Social media provides you with a unique opportunity to connect with consumers and help them to develop a relationship with your company. Don’t squander the opportunity.

2.      Don’t let your accounts scream “ME ME ME!” No one wants to follow a brand that only talks about themselves. Retweet your followers. Follow other people. Respond to comments on Facebook. Encourage others to share content with you. Do whatever works best for your business, but most importantly be one of many contributors, not the only contributor.

3.      Know your audience. This may sound obvious, but it’s important to know who you’re talking to and how they use social media. Take some time to develop personas, figure out where your audience is, and determine how they use social media. If you’re targeting teenage boys, chances are you won’t find them on Pinterest.

4.      Have a strategy.  Just because your teenager is on Facebook all the time does not mean they know how to maximize it for your business. It’s easy to make big plans and dive into social media by creating lots of different accounts, but you have to have a strategy. Make a plan for connecting with your audience and for creating content. The more organized you are, the easier it will be for you to manage your social media efforts.

5.      Finally, never stop learning. Social media is constantly changing and evolving. Your social media marketing strategy needs to too.  Take the time to keep up with the social media changes and learn what’s new in social marketing. You don’t want to be left behind.

I hope that I’ve been able to share my new knowledge with you and that you have also learned something from this class. I plan to follow #5 and keep expanding my social marketing knowledge even though my class is finished. Who knows how social will change in the next few months?

Happy Marketing!



21 Types of Content We All Crave

 

Recently in class my professor shared with me a great infographic about the 21 types of content we all crave. As a consumer, it’s something I had never really thought about, but as I read through the list, I realized it was true. I wanted to share these content types with you and some examples of this content that I found on Facebook. Not all of the content is brand related, but hopefully it will give you some ideas for content for your business.

21 Types of Content We All Crave

1.      Content that reminds us life is short.

2.      Content that reminds us dreams can come true.

3.      Content that gives us faith to believe for bigger things.

4.      Content that reminds us that we matter.

5.      Content that reminds us of the overlooked or forgotten “basics.”

6.      Content that has unexpected twists.

7.      Content that tells us a story.

8.      Content that takes us along a journey.

9.      Content that inspires us to action.

10.  Content that makes us laugh or smile.

11.  Content that makes us cry (tears of joy or sadness).

12.  Content that reveals secrets.

13.  Content that surprises us.

14.  Content that encourages us to never give up.

15.  Content that reminds us that we are one-of-a-kind and encourages us to live that way.

16.  Content that reminds us that there’s more.

17.  Content that confirms our assumptions.

18.  Content that challenges our assumptions.

19.  Content that educates while entertaining us.

20.  Content where David defeats Goliath.

21.  Content that gives us a fresh point of view, even about common things.

There are so many examples of this type of content to choose from. Some content is more in-depth and complex than others. Some content is as simple as a picture. Here are some pictures of examples that I found from some well-known brands.

 

Here Nike surprises us (#13) by sharing a video about childhood obesity and reminds us that life is short (#1) by showing us what you could do with five years of your life.

 

Here ESPN reminds us of Hank Aaron’s historic homerun that made him the “Home Run King” and reminds us that dreams can come true (#2).
 

This story on Facebook about saving a humpback whale reminds us that we matter (#4) and we can make a difference.

 

Here the Academy of Country Music reminds us of the importance of sharing special moments with your loved ones (forgotten basics #5) with this picture of Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton from the 2013 ACM Awards.

 

 

 

Dove inspires us to let someone we know they are beautiful. (#9)

 

Home Depot makes us laugh with this April Fool’s Day joke about a Home Depot fragrance. (#10)

In this video, Publix reminds us of the importance of something as little as blowing out birthday candles and gives us a fresh perspective on this little act (#21).

 

So next time you’re looking to create great content for your business, think about these 21 types of content that we crave. Remember that your customers are human and you’ll benefit from showing them you know that.  Not every type of content will work for you and your business, but figure out what does and roll with it. It’s sure to please your followers.

 

 

 

Just Say No to Spam

 

Spam. We all hate it. It comes into our inbox with great subject lines like “Brittany Spears Weight Loss Program” and one of my personal favorites (and a recent visitor to my inbox) “Open Me.”

Emails like this are what first come to mind when you think of spam. But recently, with the advancement of marketing tools and social media, consumers are thinking of spam as more than just emails for diet pills and virus links. Consumers are starting to think of all of the marketing messages they are receiving as spam too.  

When people are receiving emails from your business every day or in some cases more than one email a day, they start to think of your emails as spam. Spam has spread and isn’t just for email anymore. Businesses are finding other ways to “spam” their followers on social media. Excessive direct messaging, unnecessarily repeated tweets, and begging consumers for likes and shares are annoying to consumers too. While self-promotion like this may seem like a good idea at the time, you don’t want to be that business. Sending out endless promotional emails and messages just makes consumers want to unsubscribe from your email list, un-follow you on Twitter, or un-like you on Facebook, probably the opposite of your goal. Remember that you want to position yourself as an expert to consumers and a business that is beneficial to them, a business they can learn from. Don’t make them think of you as spam.

So before you set up an email promoting your current sale to send to your entire email list for every day next week, think about how your customers will perceive you.  Take a moment to think about your next marketing move not as a marketer or business, but as a consumer. Would you be annoyed if a company sent this much information to you? Of course it’s okay to send out some promotional information, but make sure you don’t cross into spammer territory. In the long run, all it will do is hurt you.

Go Mobile!

 

If you have a smart phone (and there’s a good chance you do), you know that some websites are just easier to navigate on your phone than others. On some websites the text is too small. On others, you need to click on links that are impossibly hard to click correctly when tapping with your fingers. This is frustrating! Consumers are easily annoyed when they need/want to look at your content from a mobile device and they just can’t get what they need.  This isn’t just a momentary problem for a business, but one that can have lasting effects. Almost half of audiences today use a mobile device as their primary tool for content consumption and consumers remember the websites that were difficult. I can think of at least five right now that I never plan to visit from my phone again. I probably won’t visit from my computer either. This means lost sales, all because their website was a nightmare to navigate from a mobile device.

Don’t be one of these businesses! If you already have a mobile plan in place for your website, that’s great. Make sure you maintain it and constantly check it from a mobile device to make sure it’s easy to use. If you don’t have a mobile plan in place for your website, you need to get one ASAP.  Your actual web design is going to require more research, but there are two main directions you can head in. 

First, you can create a mobile website with an m.sitename.com domain name.  The m indicates the mobile site and your website will automatically redirect to this site when accessed from a mobile device. Your mobile website should be set up in a user friendly way, with easy links to what your customers want most. Think about what your users are going to want to do from their phones. For example, Delta’s mobile website gives you easy to click on links for checking into a flight, booking a flight, and checking a flight status. It’s laid out differently than the standard Delta website and is visually appealing and user friendly for a mobile device. Imagine the annoyance customers would feel trying to zoom in and scroll over to press the check-in tab on Delta’s normal website. Having a mobile site makes things easier for consumers and therefore, better for Delta too.

 

 

m.delta.com

 

 

delta.com

Your second option is to create a website with responsive design. Responsive web design means designing a website that adapts to the user’s environment. This includes screen size, platform, and screen orientation.  By creating a website with responsive web design, it doesn’t matter what device your site gets viewed with, the website will adjust and not create excess difficulty for mobile devices.  The good news is that responsive web design is built into HTML5, so if you’re creating a new website, it shouldn’t be too expensive.

It’s up to you to decide what is right for you and your business. The important thing is that you have a mobile site so you can help your audience to help you!

 

Sharing is Caring

 

One of the great things about social media marketing is the ability to share content with your audience.  Not just your content, but content from other sources as well.  “Doesn’t this just help my competitors?” you may ask.  No.  You’re not sharing content from your competitors, but content that your audience would enjoy reading from sources that help to support what you’re telling them.  You want to establish yourself as an expert and a trusted source for information.  This doesn’t mean that you only promote things you write and create.  Being an expert means gathering content from lots of sources and keeping up with what others are saying. 

In the spirit of content sharing, I want to share with you a great infographic I found on Pinterest (talk about ultimate content sharing) that was created by Social Metrics. Social Metrics provides a social media analytics plugin to help you analyze and measure your social media success.  They also have a blog with lots of great information like the content I’m going to share with you.  (Check out http://socialmetricspro.com/blog/ to see more.) It sums up a lot of great points in an easy to read infographic. These are great tips to remember when you’re creating your social media marketing strategy.

 So go ahead and press retweet or share the next time you see great content on someone’s page.  It can be beneficial for you and your audience to share the content of others.  Just remember to always credit where the content came from.

 Here’s my shared Social Metrics content for you. Enjoy!

 

 

 

Content is key

 

 

You’ve started using your social media accounts and you’ve hit a wall. What are kind of information are you supposed to put out there? What kind of stuff is going to make people want to buy your products? Asking people to like your pictures and participate in your polls just doesn’t seem to be working. What are you missing? Content marketing.

In the flurry that is social media marketing these days, people can often forget that the most important aspect of this is your content. If you don’t give your followers anything of value, they are going to lose interest in you. You can’t create content by asking “What can I create that will get shared?” You need to be asking yourself “What makes my brand special and will make people want to talk about it and share it?”

Your content shouldn’t be shameless promoting, but rather something that adds value to the life of consumers. If they perceive you as an expert or someone that helps to resolve problems in their lives, consumers will begin to trust you and look to your brand. Look at your target market’s interests, pain points, needs, preferences, etc. to find what content will be most appealing to them. Remember: Most of your content should educate consumers and help to solve one of their most important problems.

One of the best ways the motivation behind content marketing was explained to me was by asking me to pretend that I was paid by the potential customer and not by an employer. How would this change the content I created? How would this change its style and timeliness? It makes a difference. So try the exercise and see what you come up with. Does your idea of good content change?

Content marketing market is a big subject to tackle and it can’t be done in just one blog post or just one planning session. You’re going to need a strategy and all of the building that goes with it. So while you’re waiting on more information to come, my advice is to start small. Focus on one target market segment. Understand what kind of content they seek from you and then give it to them. You can work your way up from there. Just remember that content marketing isn’t all about you. That’s the best place to start.



Be prepared for PR problems!

If the PR disaster that plagued Applebee’s just a few short weeks ago did anything for other companies, it reminded them that social media is not all likes and messages of praise. (In case you missed it, check out http://rlstollar.wordpress.com/2013/02/02/applebees-overnight-social-media-meltdown-a-photo-essay/ for a pretty comprehensive summary of the events and how everything unfolded.) It was a very real reminder that social media can exacerbate PR problems and sometimes social media actually helps to create the problem.

Obviously, social media risks are real. Social media is putting your company out there for consumers and customers to interact with and you cannot control what they do or say. However, you can control how you handle it.

You don’t want to risk a fire destroying your entire inventory and severely hurting your business, so you install smoke detectors and sprinklers to try and prevent this and buy insurance in case this unfortunate event takes place. Do the same thing with your social media.

Make a plan for putting out small fires. Did someone tweet about their negative experience? Did someone complain to you on Facebook? Establish a way to handle those complaints. Customers do this because they want to feel heard. By establishing a way for you to respond to these customers, you won’t freak out the first time you see a negative comment.

For problems like these and bigger problems like the one Applebee’s faced, you need to determine the tone you want to respond with (This is a big one to consider, because you don’t want customers to think you’re not taking them seriously.), who you want to be responsible for responding, the content you want to respond with, and how quickly you want someone to respond. Go ahead and brainstorm all the possible crises your company can face and determine what you would do in each situation. You might not want to, but it will help you in the long run if you already have a plan in place. Test out your plan internally and make sure that it works for you. If you notice that you’re not getting the response you want, go back to the drawing board and adjust your plan.

Social media PR problems are not a reason to stay away from social media. They are just another risk to include in your crisis management plan. So go ahead and create your plan. If a crisis ever hits, you’ll be glad you did.

Tips from a Textbook: The 8 C's of Strategy Development

 

 

Normally I’m not one for textbooks, but I recently came across some information in a social media textbook that I thought would be good to share. I’ve mentioned that getting your business started on social media means creating a strategy for your social media marketing. There are an endless number of things to consider when creating your social media strategy, but today I’m going to share with you The 8 C’s of Strategy Development.

Categorize

 

Categorize social media platforms by target market relevancy. Consider who your audience is and where they are on the social web. This may mean that different segments of your target audience are in different places and that you may need to alter your content for each group and location.

Comprehend

Comprehend the rules and behavior standards for each platform. “Listen” and learn how to behave and obey the social norms for the platform. Don’t become a spammer. By understanding the rules of the platform, you can better engage and connect with your audience.

Converse

Followers and fans don’t want to be bombarded with your marketing message 24/7. Remember to engage in actual conversations with them and help them to feel a connection to the company and the brand. Understand that it is your job to be a contributor to the platform, not a shameless promoter.

Collaborate

Establish a mutually beneficial relationship with your online community and collaborate with them. Listen to their feedback and provide them with content that is beneficial to them. This will help to build stronger brand loyalty and perceived value for the consumer.

Connect

Influencers can help shape opinions on your product or service and connecting with them is a big way to help you further connect with your audience. It can help to increase your word of mouth and positive brand image, so make connections with your audience and influencers.

Contribute

Contribute valuable content to the online community. Don’t just promote your product and send out your marketing message. Become a valued member of the forum and offer content your fans and followers care about. It will help build your reputation and drive engagement.

Community

Get the community to participate in discussions and in the creation of content for your brand. This can benefit you and the consumer. Consumers like to feel involved and heard and by allowing them to participate, they feel a greater connection to your brand. This can also help you by creating more loyal consumers and give you some great feedback on improving your product or service or some altogether new ideas.

Convert

Convert your strategy into desired outcomes. Make sure you know what you are working towards with your social media strategy and accounts and make sure your content and interactions support these goals. If you’re doing it right, you should be able to turn brand awareness into consideration, then conversion, loyalty, and advocacy.

There are so many different components to developing a good social strategy that it takes time and patience to make sure you get it done right. With all of the different questions and planning tools you’re considering, don’t forget the 8 C’s. They’ll help to keep you on track and remind you of some of your most important goals and actions.



Don't hide your social profiles. Make yourself seen!

 

Now that you’re on social networking sites, you might be wondering how to help people find you and get the word out there that you’re “socially connected.” While developing a presence and social following are going to take some work, try some of these easy to implement tips to make it easier for people to find you on social media.

Put links and icons on your website.

It is surprising how many businesses that have social media accounts don’t include links to their profiles on their main business website. This is one of the easiest ways for potential customers to find your social pages. By including icons linked to your social media profiles on your website, it gives website viewers easy access to your social channels. Put them on your homepage and near your contact information so it’s easy for users to find. But don’t just rely on icons…

Create distinct URLs for each social network.

You have a distinct, company specific URL for your business website, why should your social media sites be any different? This makes it easier for users to remember your profile and/or search for you. For example, facebook.com/SayItAintSocial is a lot more branded and easier to remember than facebook.com/890945378725234. Vanity URLs like these make for much nicer looking lines on your business cards and website as well. On that note…

Include your social network info in your print material.

This just makes it easier for potential customers and fans to find you later. Consumers don’t always have access to a handy social media icon and if they don’t, it will be easier for them to just type the URL into their browser. Just another reason to be glad you have a unique URL.

Add social plug-ins to your website.

Another great way for consumers to find you and interact with you is if you include some social plug-ins on your website. If they can see your Twitter feed or your latest Facebook post, they might become interested in some of your content and be more apt to visit your actual page. It doesn’t hurt that this makes it even easier to “Like” or “Follow” you.

Link yourself!

Finally, include links to your other social networking sites on your social profiles. You don’t connect with just Facebook and neither do consumers. Put links to your other social profiles in your About or Contact Information sections of your Facebook profile and make it easy for people to find you in other places. Do the same for your other social networks. And those personalized URLs will look great when they’re all listed there together.

While this won’t do all the work for you or get you the engagement that you’re looking for, these tips are a pretty simple way to get your social network information out there without a lot of effort from you. Hey, you never know, these links may help you to gain more fans, more social interaction, and more customers.

Don't forget to strategize!

“We’re a small business with a small marketing budget. Why don’t we just sign up for different social media accounts and market that way. We can figure it out as we go along.”

This sort of phrase became all too familiar to me while I worked as an intern trying to help small businesses build their online presence and connect with consumers. One of the most unrecognized aspects of social media marketing for small businesses is the social media strategy. Signing up for a Facebook account, checking it once a week, and hoping that that will bring new business is not enough. Businesses need to come up with a strategy for their social media marketing if they want to have success. Through my past internship experience I’ve learned that by doing these things, small businesses give themselves a great start to developing their social media strategies.

First, do a little research on the different social media networks you’ve heard about. Just because you’ve heard of StumbleUpon doesn’t mean it’s the right platform for your business. Learn about what each site does and how it presents information. It’s not a bad idea to take the time to look up other businesses on the platform and see how they interact with consumers. By doing this, you can get a better feel for what each site does and how it can benefit you.

Next, consider are what type of business you are and who you are trying to reach. These will help you decide what social media platforms are for you. For example, if you are a local plumber and you make the house calls, Foursquare is not for you. Customers won’t be around to check in. If you’re a hardware store looking to show off your stock of power tools, Pinterest is not where your target market is hanging out online.

Once you’ve narrowed down what sites you think will work best for your business, think about what will realistically work for you. While interning I found that many businesses thought that they had to do it all right away and consequently spread themselves too thin. If you can’t give your social media network the time it needs, it doesn’t matter that you have accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. You’re not really interacting or marketing to consumers effectively.

Consider the content you want to present to your followers. You don’t want to post the same things every day and you don’t always want to ask them to like a picture. Think about what you want your followers to do with the information and what types of content are most appropriate for the site. For example, Instagram is not the most appropriate platform for a  long wordy paragraph. Don’t feel overwhelmed by this planning – you don’t have to figure out everything you ever plan to post right away. But do think about what you want to share. It will help you feel less flustered later.

Come up with a guideline for posting. It’s not realistic for every business to post things every hour. (Don’t forget that you actually have a business to run!) Figure out what will work best for you. If you feel that you have the time and content for two Facebook posts a day, that’s great. But if you don’t, create a timeline that works for you. Again, you don’t want to spread yourself too thin.

While these things are certainly not a comprehensive list for creating a social media strategy for your business, they will get you thinking on the right track. The starting point is often the hardest part for small businesses looking to utilize social media. So when you decide that social media is right for your business, don’t forget the important first step – strategizing!