Building Bridges With Social Media

As I have previously discussed, online social media tools drives business. 
How you use them is up to you.  Brand awareness now more than ever in this
digital age can make or break your company.  You may be Joe's handyman shop in
rural America or a fortune 500 company in New York City.  Either way, social
media is being implemented and our society is deeply entrenched in using it. 
Here are a few more tips I would like to offer as I continue my blogs on social
media and it's deployment in your business.

Networking
Make sure you are out and about meeting people. Networking with
people who are in your industry or potential clients is a key factor.  They see
your face.  If you don't have the time, send one of your key employees who knows
your business.  If you have a marketing  person, he or she needs to be at
chamber events, leads groups or other social business events handing out
business cards, promoting your company, or scheduling presentations to talk
about products or services that are relevent to your business.  You might be
asking yourself  "What does this have to do with social media?" Networking is
social contact my friend!

Create Contact Participation
If you do blogs or offer  some kind of newsletter within your web site or
online community, make sure you do something that allows interaction. 
Do a contest for a chance to win a prize, solicit nominations for a free service,
offer to do a business spotlight, anything that creates interaction.  This
creates a tighter client-business relationship and makes them feel like you care
about them not only as a customer but as a friend.

Be Current & Up To Date
Keep your  social media interaction up and current.
  Don't post something and forget about it.  Nothing is more annoying than having
a customer check your website or Twitter feed to find "Happy 4th of July" and
it's September.  If you do not have time to post, don't post at all.
 (Find someone who can for you)

Link, Link, Link
Make sure you link to everything and everywhere.
From your website, link to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, whatever you using. 
Make sure those same sites have links back to everything else you do. 
It creates more impressions, increases your position on search engines, and allows
more "hits".

Don't Be Cruel (With Apologies To Elvis)
Keep in mind that many of your clients have no clue about landing pages, what
a "tweet" is or what those funny boxes called Quick Response Codes are. Help
them find you. Help them understand and use social media.  It creates word of
mouth referrals to your business.

I hope this helps you and your business deploy
social media to its best potential.  If you have questions, visit my website and
contact me via my portal. Get Social!