Written
by Marc Parham, Small Business Expert, CAPBuilder Network, wwww.marcparham.com
Research has shown your customers and potential customers are
using social media, you should too. You can transform your business’s social
media presence from non-existent to expert status in just a few minutes every
day. It is simpler to set up than you think and the rewards are limitless for
your business.
Social media is quickly
becoming one of the most important aspects of digital marketing, which provides
incredible benefits that help reach millions of customers worldwide. If you
are not applying this profitable strategy, you will fall way behind your
competition.
Social media marketing has to
yield positive results versus set goals.
Many online users and shoppers
rely on social media to make a purchasing decision, or purchase a product or
service through a recommendation on social media. Majority of social media
users are more likely to buy a product or pay a service from a business
connected with them.
Here are some key stats:* Most
businesses are spending more than one hour a day on social media marketing.
Businesses generate more than 100 percent of web traffic if they have 51 to 100
followers on Twitter than those with 25 or less. Businesses nearly doubled
their online traffic after they passed 1,000 Facebook likes. LinkedIn business
pages have the most number of generated customers, followed by Twitter and
Facebook. Google is effectively used by marketers to grow their SEO ranking
and increase online visibility. oGoing integrates with Facebook, Google ,
LinkedIn and Twitter.
Online marketing is always more
effective as it can reach huge audiences spread over a huge distance. Social
media platforms have created tremendous business for companies that have the
acumen to handle the virtual medium efficiently. SEO based marketing is one
step ahead of social media marketing in its reach and its greater probability
of approach.
Reputation management, the not
so good about social media.
One aspect of social media that makes it so appealing is that news
can travel quickly. Nevertheless, this can be a disadvantage when it is bad
news traveling quickly. For example, a nasty rumor about an individual or
business can reach many people in a short amount of time. Even if the
information is not true, it is out there in the social media sphere and can do
its damage. News traveling quickly and widely can make reigning in the bad
press difficult and hinder any crisis communication efforts.
Social media causes a disadvantage to businesses when someone
lodges a complaint via a social networking site. That negative press travels to
that person’s network and beyond, potentially creating a public relations
nightmare, making it vital for a business involved in social media to stay
abreast of what people are saying about it and answer any negative comments as
quickly as possible. Getting too involved in social media can mean taking time
away from other marketing efforts and even from customers. Trying to reach a
company’s target audience on every social networking site takes a lot of time
and effort.
It is important to get help if you need it.
Just because you can post to
social media right from your phone doesn’t mean you should do it. Most
businesses had to hire professional marketing companies to help them create
a strategy to grow their business before social media. Nothing has
changed. If marketing is not your thing, find someone that understands
marketing and how social media can be used as a strategy to market your
business.
As the man says, first
impressions are lasting impressions.
Don’t make the big mistake of
just putting something out there to see what happens. It may be your only
opportunity to reach the customers that will help you grow your business.
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