SOCIAL MEDIA…THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING ACTIVE

Social media

The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.
Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900)

Today, there are infinitely more ways for a company to reach customers. Our current marketing team includes an evangelist, Rowan. His job is to be active and spread our message in the communities — both real and virtual. He tweets regularly with service updates and news. 
He maintains a dialogue with users on forums and community sites. He hits all the local technology and design events and mingles with customers at parties and conferences. 
To many people, Rowan is a better reflection of the personality of On Que than our website. 
To the people he reaches, our company is young, fun, and energetic.

More organisations are allowing its social media strategy to drive the corporate marketing site and it is paying off. With nearly 400 million members on Facebook your organisation can tap into fans willing to spread the word. Consumers are talking and sharing experiences about product and services. Organisations are relaxing their hold on their brand and enabling conversations to occur in a natural, unobtrusive way all over the web, not just on their own site.

Facebook has 400 million members! YouTube is the #3 site on the Internet! Twitter grew 1043%! Social media is here and isn’t going anywhere soon.

Widgets

Using widgets, microsites, and social media applications, brands are realising the power of distributing their content outside of their own domain. Widgets have been helping brands connect with consumers away from corporate domains. Widgets allow consumers to express their affinity for their favorite brands, and they allow organisations to increase their exposure by housing their content in a format that is easily sharable across social networks.

Blogs

Most people think Blogs as being totally different to Social Media Networks such as Twitter, Facebook or MySpace. Don’t be fooled, blogs are Social Media vehicles and the most important Social Media tool you can have.

Content

Your Social Media credibility is tied to the amount of content you provide. To have a significant Social Media presence you must have a certain amount of content. Blogs are a fantastic tool for creating lots of relevant content. Each time you add a post you increase your Blogs content creating a smorgasboard of relevant content that Google and other search engines love. Generally the more posts you have the higher  your Blog will rank and the more Social Media traffic you will get.

Desperately Seeking Answers

Searching for answers is one of the top 3 reasons people use the Internet. People use search engines to find the answers to their most pressing questions. This gives you, the blog owner a fantastic opportunity. By making sure that your blog contains the answers to the most searched questions in your content, you will attract traffic. Blogs that have content designed to answer the most pressing questions that people have in a particular niche can generate massive amounts of traffic for your business.

Searching for answers is one of the 
top 3 reasons people use the Internet. People use search engines to find the answers to their most pressing questions.

Blogs are universal

It’s a fact, anybody who uses the internet can access your blog. Social Media networks such as Twitter,  Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn are accessible only when you join. A blog allows you to achieve a potentially infinite number of customers for your business.

All Roads Should Lead To Your Blog

The cornerstone of your Social Media strategy is your blog. All of your social media activities should be organised to link back to your blog. Your profiles on Social Media sites such as Facebook and Twitter should include a link back to your blog. Articles, YouTube videos, Podcasts should all include a link to your Blog.

The Three Golden Rules (Three E’s)

Educate

Show your customers how to do things. Answer their questions. Be helpful. This can only build brand credibility, trust and build links to the posts which will improve search engine results!

Engage

Engage customers in a 2 way dialogue. Ask them questions. Run polls. Offer special contests and delight them with surprises for visiting your blog or website such as chances to win or links to free stuff.

Entertain

A blog and all social media and your website should entertain. Put a smile on your customers face. Shoot a funny video prior to the holidays. Shoot a video of your senior executive team doing karaoke. Post outtakes from your TVC and post on your site.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 19th, 2010 at 9:00 am and is filed under Social Media, Social Networking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.