How Social Media Awareness Can Benefit Your Business Or Charity Cause
Social media is a marketing force that modern businesses can no longer afford to ignore. Twitter is no longer a place to exchange meaningless updates; job seekers and businesses have learned to use it as a powerful tool of information exchange. More and more companies are putting their focus on Facebook and Twitter for one simple reason — that’s where the attention is.
Whether you run a business or a charity, attention is the currency of social media, and if you learn to use it properly, you can use your social media skills to reap big rewards from your customers and fans.
Getting Started With Social Media
So how do you get on the road to using social media properly? Here are a few first steps.
-Have a strategy. What are your social media goals? “Get on Twitter” isn’t enough, it is useful and provides great awareness but is not the only social media method you can use. Decide what your goals are and what social media route best suits your strategy and cause.
-Have a policy on how your company or charity will use social media. A single gaffe can have devastating impact.
-If possible, have someone whose job it is to engage on social media every day. Charities find this very useful as it can network awareness and ensure it is effective through social media tracking.
-Decide where to put the most focus: Twitter, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn… you should have one “primary” platform you engage on.
-Connect with Klout. It’s one of the best ways to gauge and measure your social media performance.
-Create a long-term plan for getting followers and increasing your presence. Building relationships are very important and memorable.
Engage With Customers And People
The two major things to remember when using social media are these:
Use it every day. Some companies or charities get a Twitter account and post something once or twice a month. With that little effort put into it, you might as well not bother at all. A single tweet or Facebook update has a half-life of about three hours — after that, it’s gone. If you’re going to get on social media, you need someone who can post and engage multiple times a day, if possible.
Talk to people. Customers in the age of social media do not want to be sold to. Don’t treat social media like it’s a one-way street to blast out your advertisements. Make it a conversation. Talk to your fans and followers. Find out what interests them. Give back more than you take, and people will respond. Refrain from using auto-tweeting services and scripts. Be human.
Manage Your Reputation
The Internet is full of horror stories about companies that react to something poorly online and create a firestorm of controversy. This is why it’s so important to have a social media policy and make sure you stick to it. Never be rude or insulting to people, never post anything you wouldn’t be comfortable shouting across a crowded room, and respond to criticism with grace and politeness — even when people are anything but polite in return.
A single bad post or comment can have huge repercussions — and the Internet can be quick to spread such things. But if you’re genuine and courteous, you shouldn’t have cause for worry.
Most of all, don’t get discouraged. Many companies and charities give up on social media after a few tries. Remember that you’re one drop in a vast sea of information, and it will take time and effort to get noticed. But keep working at it, and you will find that social media has its benefits.
Featured images:
- License: Creative Commons image source
- License: Creative Commons image source
- License: Creative Commons image source
Many thanks to the CRUK Jobs team for contributing to this social media article.
Social media is a massive part of being a online business these days, this is a fantastic article with good solid information, my only advice is if your are no getting social, you will get left behind
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