I hate to even talk about this subject since it has reached buzz word status. Everyone wants to get it, use it, do it and they’re not quite sure what it is. So if you wanna get ya some social media then read on further.
Everyone has become a social media expert. Every company has at least stuck their foot in the water. Many quickly found the water was too cold. The new media is here to stay though. You can embrace it and adapt to it or you can ignore it and eventually fail. It seems harsh but I believe it’s true. I prefer to look at the positive side though. What if your business conquers this space first? It doesn’t mean you’ll win but I like your chances a lot better. Seth Godin says we’re in a race to build tribes.
Buckle up and go for it.
The Places
Let’s do it this way. Ning, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube, Vimeo, Viddler, Tumblr, Digg, Stumbleupon, Technorati, Flickr, Friend Feed, People Browser, Delicious, Meetup, Eventful, Google, Yahoo Buzz, Squidoo, Forums, Wiki’s and lots more.
We’ll discuss your business or market and see where your fans are talking. If they’re not on the grid yet, we’ll pick a place and help organize them there.
Listening
We’ll also teach you how to listen to what your fans are saying about your brand. If you’re a small business, a busy professional, a non profit or a ministry you still have a brand. Brands are not limited to large corporations. We’ll show you how to listen using tools like Google Alerts, Twitter search and Technorati. We’ll organize this for you and make it easy. This is not my idea by the way. Smart people like Chris Brogan, Seth Godin and many others came up with it.
Building Relationships
We’ll show you which tools will help you build relationships online. Genuine relationships- like the ones where you help people and they help you back. We’ll also show you how to make friends and gain followers. Not for the sake of numbers or ego but to build your brand or cause or idea. I tell people that conversations still end up at a coffee shop, in a meeting room or at a hotel seminar. It just happens that they start online now. They start on Twitter and Facebook, LinkedIn and Ning.
Sharing
We’ll show you how tools like Tweetdeck, Hootsuite, Echofon and Google Reader can help you share with others. Of course I’m assuming you’ve picked a few places, listened and built relationships first. If you’ve done this; then sharing your business, product, services, idea, cause or vision is natural. It doesn’t seem like a shameless plug or spam when you have permission.
Now we can’t do this for you. We can share your story by blogging, creating email newsletters and managing your content. We can’t run a Twitter account for you. We don’t have the time or scale to manage your Twitter account or Facebook page. We can’t listen in at your Google Reader account. We can teach you and coach you and hold you accountable to do this yourself. Plus If someone outside your company handles this, it seems fake and phony. It can be done and we’ve done it; however, we wouldn’t recommend it.
Let’s work together so we can get ya some of that there social media.
