Tag Branding for Small Business

Social Media for Business: If You Can’t Do It Right

Social media can be a great tool for small business.  That is, if it’s used correctly.

There is so much information available on how to do this and that, it’s no wonder so many are doing it wrong.

It’s not to say that there is only one way to manage social media for business effectively, but if you’re going to do it halfway, you may as well not do it at all.

There are several schools of thought when it comes to using social media to market a small business you can also do with other services like this one you find if you click here.

Content Crowd

They believe that it’s all about content creation.  The more content the better.  It doesn’t matter what it is, as long as you’re creating it.

Engagement Crowd

It’s about the conversation.  Make sure you engage people on various social networks and business will magically appear.

Feed Them Crowd

Share as much content as possible based on news found throughout the interwebs.  Set up an RSS feed to your Twitter and Facebook account, because hey, who has time to curate all day?

Forum Crowd

Hit up as many forums as you can, adding links to every discussion.  Doesn’t matter the forum, build as many back links as you can.  Since it’s a discussion forum, certainly your being social right?

Reciprocal Crowd

The more likes and followers you have the better.  It shows that your business is legit.  Email your friends and family to get them to like your page.  Follow as many people as possible, if they don’t follow back, then unfollow.  Remind anyone of Multi-Level-Marketing? If you feel like trying new ways, check out https://scaffoldingwrapadvertising.co.uk/.

So Now What?

The reality is that alone none of these make a ton of sense.  Managing social media for small business requires balance along with a sound strategy.  If you really want to meet new people/prospects here are a few ideas:

  • Find a way to engage locally
  • Find relevant forums.  Answer questions while sharing links back to your content
  • Stop the RSS feed.
  • Connect with locals on Twitter.
  • Focus on taking online connections offline
  • Use social media as a way to network
  • Create your own original content
  • Answer FAQ in blog posts
  • Follow back interesting people. Don’t feel obligated to follow everyone back
  • Share your followers content as well as your own
  • Answer questions on Twitter
  • Have a conversation on Twitter. Don’t just post links all day, your wasting your time.

If you find yourself Tweeting RSS feeds due to lack of time, what is it really doing for your business?  You’re sharing content created by someone else.  You’re not available to take part in any conversation.  Sure you’re getting clicks, but clicks alone will not help you grow your business.  Try finding a chat that’s relevant to your business.  Even better find local events you can attend.  You’ll be surprised what showing up will do for your social media campaign.

There is nothing wrong with tweeting information all day.  It depends on what you’re trying to accomplish.  For example if you’re a City Department, you could share upcoming events, changes in schedules, local news.

Getting the most out of your campaign requires effort.  Mailing it in won’t bring you success.  It’s more than just sending out tweets and Facebook updates.

Remember it’s about being social.

Customer Service and Business: You’re Out of Touch

Sometimes the power of social media makes you go “wow”.   It can be an amazing asset or your worst nightmare as realized recently by Netflix announcing their price increase.

In a nutshell, Netflix adjusted their price structure and raised prices by 60%.  They took something that consumers perceived as value and just like that gave them reason to question the expenditure.

Looking at the Netflix Facebook Page there are over 78,000 comments related to the announcement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many of the comments share the same sentiment.  Customers simply aren’t pleased with the increase.  Part of it could be the way the announcement was presented on Facebook.  The status update doesn’t offer much in the way of explanation, but links to a blog post on Netflix explaining the price increase.   The blog post alone has 12,000 comments with over 4,000 shares on Twitter.

Talk about social media working on all cylinders.  Unfortunately in this case it’s not the right kind of buzz.  They didn’t do themselves any favors either as Netflix was deleting customer complaints from Facebook.

What are the glaring issues here?

In this situation it’s clear that Netflix wasn’t in touch with customer expectations and over valued their product/service.  The customers have stated as much:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fix:  Do your homework.  Understand why your customers appreciate your product/service.  Spend time answering the “what if” by surveying some of your best customers before making changes.

They didn’t ease into the transaction and had to quickly backtrack by offering a discount to customers, further devaluing their product.   It was already too late.  Certainly they lost customers who will never come back.

Fix:  Give your customers time to adjust to the changes.  Making the switch quickly can backfire.

Price and value must go hand in hand. By not understanding the price point at which customers perceived the most value they again misunderstood the marketplace.

Fix:  This is an important aspect of any business.  Make sure that you know when and where price and value are in alignment.  If it’s not easy to find, figure out a way to create it.  That’s where marketing comes in handy.

Social media hasn’t helped, but it could have.  Netflix could have easily utilized social to address many of the issues above well before announcing the price increase.  They have 1.9 million fans on Facebook certainly they could have found a large enough sample size to survey.

Besides social media they could have reached out to customers via email by way of surveys.

From a business strategy standpoint it makes perfect sense.  Changes needed to be made, but when a strategic change backfires you’ve got major issues.

Part of what we do here at Talan is help small business navigate these sort of minefields.  We help business develop a strong strategy whether it be marketing, PR, exit strategies, or social media.

Understanding the risk associated with your decisions is an important part of being an entrepreneur.  Not doing so comes with enormous consequences.

If you found your company in this position how would you react?

 

Facebook for Small Business

Facebook has grown at a break neck pace and there is no doubt that it’s weaved it’s way into our daily lives.  We’ve all watched as business both large and small have utilized Facebook for business.

Chances are you already have a Facebook page for small business.  We thought we’d share how are we use Facebook for business to give you some ideas on how to make it work for you.

1.  Post consistently

Give your audience a reason to come back.  We try to post in the morning each and every day to catch those who check Facebook fist thing in the morning.

2.  Post Interesting Content

The content we share is relevant to our customer base.  We try to seek out content that can generate discussion and ask a question to spark discussion.  Even if we don’t get feedback we are trying to stay fresh in their minds.

3.  Ask questions

As per number 2, we try to ask open ended questions to hopefully get our fans to engage with our content.

4.  Share our Page

A link to our Facebook page is everywhere we find ourselves on the web.  It’s on our homepage.  We add it to other social media profiles.  We also try to add it to all of our traditional marketing materials such as our 48 sheet billboard.  If our customers don’t know we’re there how can they become fans?

5.  Create a default landing Page

A landing page has been a great way to welcome new Facebook visitors to our page.  We’ve used it to highlight upcoming events, asked for subscriptions to our email list,  and encouraged sign ups to our newsletter.

6.  Creating Events

Anytime we have an event going on at TalanSBS we create a Facebook Event.  Even though we’ve sent an email it’s another way to stay engaged with our audience.

7.   Utilizing Notes

Notes have been perfect for adding our blog to Facebook.  Not only does it allow for fans to read our content within Facebook and easily share it, the content provides back links to our website.

8.  Adding Pictures

Adding pictures of events or random acts that happen day in and out, helps us to connect on a personal level with our fans.

9.  Tagging

Anytime we can tag customers or friends we do.  It always drives traffic to our Facebook page.

10.  Adding Keyword Links

We utilize social media management software that allows for a keyword link for each an every post we add to Facebook.   Each time we do this it’s another vote for our website in the eyes of search engines.

That’s it in a nutshell.  An abbreviated list of how we are currently using Facebook for small business.  How are you finding the reception to your business on Facebook?

Protecting Your Products From Copycats

A friend sent us the attached article which was posted in USA Today on Monday September 20th. The main concept of the article is focused on protecting your products from copycats. While this topic is directly relevant to those of you who develop, invent and create new products, the article has some very good “take-aways” for every type of business leader. At its core, the article identifies that the awareness of our competitors’ position in the market, as well as always staying connected to the wants and needs of our customers, is critically important to maintaining successful growth. We hope you enjoy the article and look forward to hearing your feedback.

Click Here for Article- http://tinyurl.com/26zr3oe