Social Media for Beginners
Where to start with social media
A great question asked by John of SparesBoyz at the workhsop in Johannesburg on Monday 17th. where do you start exactly.
Research and listen
Personally, if I were in your shoes I would start by doing some research and listening to what customers are saying about products and services in your industry.
- I would firstly do a search on Google for industry related sites,
- Research keywords and look for what search terms are being used by customers
- Assess industry sites and think about what I like and don’t like
- See who my competitors customers are.
- Think of things that I could do better than my competitors
And most importantly I would think about the benefits, it is all about benefits, firstly, what is your customer’s pain and how are you going to fix it.
Strategy
Once I have an idea of what my competitors are doing, who my customers are and how I’m going to fix their pain. I would work on my plan of action and decide which sites I’m going to target and set my goals and objectives.
Keywords
Do a final keyword check, to make sure that you are happy with your chosen keywords and incorporate
Account holder, something you should know.
I was visiting a website yesterday and reading some content disturbed me a little.
Under their services it stated that they can set up Facebook and some other social media accounts on your behalf. Now while this sounds very helpful. If you read the terms and conditions on some, if not all social networking sites it clearly states that only the account holder can open and access the account. You can set up administrators for some social network sites otherwise you may need to get permission from site managers to have someone access your account on your behalf.
Facebook is one of the sites which do not allow any access at all. I made contact with Facebook and their reply was that this option does not exist at this present stage. I know other social sites if you inform site managers, they do allow personal assistants / virtual assistants to have access. Now I know this may in some ways sound rediculous because in most industries personal assistants have access to very confidential information in order to assist the people they work for. In fact many other industries such as accountants, IT also have access to very confidential information, so I find
How to use social media to market your business?
If you are looking for a cost effective way of marketing your business then social media is the way to go. I will warn you that it will take time, patience and effort and a lot of the time you will think that nothing is happening and you are wasting your time. However, it is a great way to establish yourself in the market place. Social media also gives you the opportunity to engage with your target audience and listen to the needs of your customers. What is very clear is that your marketing strategy must be transparent. Listen and engage in conversations.
1. Where to begin
Establish what you want to achieve from social media. What is your objective and why you want to use social media?
2. What do you want to use social media for? Perhaps…
- To get feedback on your products or service
- To offer advice ad information
- To generate new leads
- To form alliances
- To inform your audience of special offers and product information
- To meet people
- To promote events and workshops
- Share stories and experiences
3. Research
Find out which social platforms will be of benefit to you. Find out where your target
Receive our blog by Email
Categories
- Blog Tips
- Building Your Brand
- Customer Service
- Events
- How to Connect with Customers
- How to Social Media Tools
- Ideas for Your Business
- Inspiring Thoughts
- Motivation
- My View Point
- Online Presence
- Profiling
- Reviews
- RSS Feed
- Social Media for Beginners
- Social Media for Business
- Social Media ROI
- Social Media Tools
- Time Management
- Understanding Social Media
Connect with me
