Internet Marketing - Matt Bailey [226]
Small Businesses
If you are a small-business owner, chances are you don’t have hours to put into an extended and far-reaching social media campaign. In fact, I’m sure that given the choice, you would more likely just do your business rather than talk on Facebook or Twitter. Honestly, I don’t blame you. This is why you absolutely have to assess your available resources and establish a plan, rather than attempt to do everything at once.
After developing your message and determining the right channels to reach your audience, then it is necessary to evaluate the number of hours you can put into a campaign. If three to five hours a week is all you can dedicate, then focusing on a single medium may be the best use of your time. By focusing on a single medium and doing it well, you can save yourself the frustration of attempting to do everything. Stop burdening yourself with the pressure to do everything everyone tells you, and decide upon the best course of action. If time is very strict, then one of the easiest, least expensive, and most user-friendly thing you can do as a small business is to develop a Facebook business page and ensure that you are in the local business listings in the search engines. You can use Facebook to reach your customers and fans and also use it to offer discounts, specials, or offers to grow your community and customers. Do something simple and easy to build your confidence and see some results; then grow into the larger game.
Midsize Businesses
Even if you don’t have much in time or personnel resources available, you can still take advantage of social media. The ideal midsize business media option is a blog, which is very inexpensive in comparison with building a website. The blog allows you to be flexible in developing content, sharing your business’s story, and showcasing your products or content. Establishing a blog is contingent on the ability to write well. The ability of someone being able to communicate important business-case information as well as provide entertaining and informative information is an important resource for establishing a successful blog presence.
There are many small to medium-sized businesses that have been able to make a large impact in their local area or industry by gaining the visibility that a blog can bring. One important factor that a blog can bring is the added search engine visibility and rankings, because the blog posts help the business be found for many key phrases and related topics. The more content is written on the blog, the more content is available for searchers to find and search engines to rank.
With building the blog, using Twitter and Facebook to link to new posts or announcements can aid in the visibility of both the blog and the entrance of your company in the social-media space. Using additional social-media outlets can aid in building links to the blog posts and assisting in the development of a readership and customer retention.
Of course, your business may be able to take advantage of additional social media, such as YouTube or the immediacy of Twitter. It is up to you and your company to decide which media will be most effective for your focus and your market. Although Twitter gets a lot of attention and buzz in the media, it is always wise to understand where your customers and prospects get their news and find their information. If your target audience is not on the bleeding edge of technology (and most are not), then Twitter may be a good way to communicate to peers in your industry but not to reach new customers.
Large Businesses
Large businesses have the capability of employing web managers, analysts, and marketing managers, and when it comes to developing a plan for the large business, the social-media manager must work in concert with the marketing team, the web team, and the web analysts. Too many businesses allow the social-media specialists to run on their own, without the broader teamwork of the online marketing team. The entire team must understand the message and the purpose of