It’s official: social media has moved beyond the “early adopter” phase and into the mainstream business world. According to a 2010 Mashable report, “technology adoption rates in the U.S. have doubled in the past year from 12% to 24%.” This is not a coincidence. Once thought of as mere entertainment portals, social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have become serious revenue generators for small business owners who know how to use them.
Company Pages On Popular Networks
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According to the above mentioned survey, one in five small business owners now integrate social media into their business processes, with Facebook and LinkedIn being the social sites of choice. An astounding 75% of those business owners have official company pages on one or both of these websites.
Additionally, 69% of that same group actively sends out status updates on these networks. Both of these statistics suggest what many experts have long preached: that social media requires constant engagement. Businesses that follow a “set it and forget it” model are often disappointed when their social profiles bring them no sales, but they have only their own approach to blame. The companies who are succeeding on the social web treat it like interactive platform that it is.
Cheap Lead Generation
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Another effective use of social media on the business side is cheap, targeted lead generation. Using blog posts and sites like Facebook, companies are able to cast a wider net, attracting interested prospects with free content and trapping their contact information for future promotions.
It’s an excellent strategy for companies whose existing lead generation efforts are stalled or stagnant. The key, though, is not making your social presence too commercial. It’s fine to promote your sales and offers (after all, that’s what you’re ultimately online for anyway) but social media is about interaction first and transactions second. Focus more on providing content that your readers will enjoy and want to share – then trap the lead or sale.
Direct Communication With Influencers
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As a business owner, you may be familiar with the concept of “influencer marketing.” Basically, this approach states that some of your customer are much more vocal and persuasive than others. These “influencers”, simply by spreading the word about products they love, sway dozens of their friends or relatives to do what they do and buy what they buy. Target the influencers in your customer base and you can inspire them to reach the rest of the market for you.
Social media offers an unprecedented opportunity to do this. By paying attention to the most active participants on your Facebook page or Twitter feed, you can interact with these influencers directly, in real-time. Any new messages or angles you want conveyed to the public can be systematically fed through your influencers and spread further than you ever thought possible.
Casual Follow-Up
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Social media also helps small business owners stay connected with their customers via casual online follow-up. Responding to customer tweets, participating in discussions on your Facebook wall, updating your status to reflect customer concerns – all of these are simple yet effective ways of showing customers that you’re there and paying attention to them.
Though follow-up does not always yield immediate sales benefits, it does solidify your involvement and generate good will between you and your customers. In a July 2010 USA Today article, one entrepreneur said “the value of Facebook is that it gives you efficient ways to retain current customers and reach out to and find new customers. It’s happening on a scalable, digital way among you and your friends.”
Online-Only Promos & Deals
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Once your business has a lively following on your social site(s) of choice, you can run unique deals and offers whenever you wish. “Facebook-only” promos and limited-time specials are all common in today’s social media environment because they foster a sense of exclusivity within your customer base. It gives your social followers a reason to keep following you and paying attention to what you put out.
Again: don’t overdo this. None of your followers want to be pummeled with sales pitch after sales pitch on a daily basis. For best results, follow a 70% content/30% pitch formula, where 70% of your posts and social interactions give something to the community (entertaining statuses, informative articles, video, etc.) and 30% request something from the community in the form of a sale or lead trap.
Guerrilla Market Research
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While Inc.com concurs that the biggest small business use of social media is for lead generation, it’s not the only use. Smart entrepreneurs are also using the social web to do guerrilla market research. Using their Facebook and Twitter pages, it’s possible to do all of the following at virtually no cost:
- Polls
- Q&A sessions about new or current products
- Quick testing of proposed new ideas, products and initiatives
- Surveys about customer concerns, likes and dislikes
Prior to social media, companies who wanted this sort of information paid huge fees to market research firms, and many small businesses simply didn’t collect this data at all. Now, it’s easier than ever, instantaneous and costs nothing.
More of my clients ask me about doing social media for them also when they ask for seo services. I have seen most companies really trying to push their brand with social media a lot this year.
“Black Seo Guy “Signing Off”
Hi Antonio,
I have been experiencing the same thing with clients and prospects for some time now. It’s amazing how many site owners are starting to really realize that SEO is only a part of the puzzle and that social media is continuing to be a huge driving force to market their businesses.
Thanks for stopping by!
I think social media site marketing is really powerful to get client. the way is like email marketing, but I think nowadays, social media marketing using social modia site like facebook or tweeter is better than email marketing.
Thank for sharing
Regards
Ery
Hey Michele,
Social Media is growing rapidly, and the thing is that it only continues to develop faster! Every day, more and more people use social media. Back a couple years ago I felt like an outcast to the older people in my family, because I was interested in social media(Mainly social networking). My parents just looked at it as a waste of time(even though many times I was wasting time).
Little did they know that in a couple years even they would be using social media! My mom never knew how to work her phone a couple years ago when she had a simple phone. Now her phone is loaded with social media and different things she can do, and she uses it as much as I use mines. She even made a Facebook, and I never thought that day would come! ( :
Social media is really stepping things up. I just wish I saw the true potential in social media earlier.
Just my 2 cents!
God bless,
William Veasley
I think companies are starting to realize they need to get their headsets plugin into social media as thats were their prospective clients are! Plus SM serves as a good social proof if properly used by these companies.
Good tips on here Michele!
Martinsays: Thanks
I have seen so many businesses setting up on facebook now it has become more of a business market place than a social network site! It’s a very good use of the forum and a great to promote and keep in touch with your clients.
Enjoy the journey.
Mandy
A good discussion about social media. One thing I can say it is main stream and it is extremely popular and you can not do without it.
But when it comes to conversion, I am not sure if social media is helping an average Internet marketer. If it does, which I did not get a proof on the Internet, I will be glad to say it is the best thing of my time.
This post is a good read
Fran A
Hi Fran,
I think the problem arises in that it’s difficult to truly measure whether or not those prospects arriving to your site via social media is converting. You do have tools such as Google Analytics that allow you to track where your traffic is coming from, bounce rates and such, but in terms of conversions directly related to social media, a difficult task for sure. Unless you’ve directly surveyed your customer/prospect, it’s will be difficult to measure it’s effectiveness.
I think the key is to think of social media not in necessarily in terms of conversion, but in building relationships and creating trust. This I feel has more impact on a business overall, because the loyalty of a true fan can have a substantial impact on your business. Not just in buying your products and services, but being a voice (foot soldiers if you will), for your business.
Anyway, just my two cents.
Lovely hearing from you.
Hi Michelle
I read your reply and felt as if your reason, to take social media as a tool to socialize, is very intriguing. Whenever I am bored on the Internet, I do come to tweet, read some write some and it feels like I am socializing and it gives me a change of pace.
I do check my Analytics and I see how many subscribers came from twitter or facebook.
Thanks for taking the time to reply my comment.
Fran A
Hi Fran,
One other note about using social media as an effective mean for drawing more business. As I said prior it’s about building relationships and trust.
You’ve been great at communicating with others via Twitter and in turn have established yourself as a trustworthy and reliable resource.
In turn if I were to hear of someone who was looking to hire a writing expert, who do you think would come to mind? You of course!
See how that works. You’ve just created a foot soldier with very little effort, other than just connecting to someone and you didn’t even know it.
That’s your ROI!
You couldn’t have done a better job summing this up. It is imperative that businesses of all sizes utilize social media. Anymore, it’s as though you don’t exist if you don’t have an ‘F’ or a ‘T’ in the forefront! Thank you for this informative post and I think we’ll all benefit from your words!
Hi Bryan,
It is a very nice and informative post.Thanks for sharing your knowledge on how small businesses are using soical media effectively.This post is really helpful for me.
Hi Michelle,
Now-a-days social media becomes as essential part of every businesses, whether it is an online or offline company. I have been working on the SEO field for three years and these days all the clients are asking me to do SMO for them along with SEO. I think these days everyone is aware of the impact of social media.
Sathish
Hi Sathish,
Interesting as I too have been faced with the same with clients. I start them off with their sites and their next conversation always turns to how to implement social media. Great…more work for people like you and I!
Thanks for your input!
Social Media is must for any small business but it is very important to have a solid business plan for social media marketing to have the maximum success.
I like the way you broke up this post, Michele. I think many people overlook the point about having direct access to influencers. This can be a powerful strategy with social media when used properly. Winning over these people can send waves of new customers to a small business. Thanks for sharing the results and your thoughts with us.
Speaking of social media Michele, I was really surprised not to see a +1 button in your sharing sidebar? Do you use digg digg?
You better get on that…. j/k =]
You know Chris, I have used Digg before but didn’t find it to be very useful for my site. Site such as that, you may get spikes in your traffic but then after that initial spike it levels back. But if you really think it’s worth it, I will have a another look.
Thanks for the recommendation!
Michele,
Oh no too funny, I was talking about you using Google’s +1 button…lol
Digg Digg is the name of the WordPress plugin that I use for all of my sharing buttons and it was recently updated to include Google’s new +1 button.
Have a great weekend! =]
LOL, ok have not heard of that plugin. I was wondering why you mentioned the word Digg twice…lol. Thought it was a typo.
Oh my that gave quite a giggle! Thanks for time. Perfect timing.
Will definitely have a look into that one… thanks again!
In my country, most of the small biz owners don’t have a clue about what social media is and how they can boost their business with it. They think that Facebook is just a way of killing time for teenagers.
I guess this is good for me because I can teach them and help them learn how to integrate social media, blogging etc. into their business.
Nail
Popular search engines and social networking sites are considered to be the main sources of targeted traffic to websites. So, if an online entrepreneur selects the right social media advertising strategy he can gain a lot of targeted users and therefore potential clients in the end.
Thanks for the post Bryan. Social media as a means of highly targeted marketing is certainly very real but we find that our clients benefit most from the relationships that are built.
Many small businesses operate locally where relationships matter most and most small business owners wisely protect their reputation. What not enough of them realize yet is the power of social media to help them scale their relationship building, and ultimately influence for their target market.
Bryan, thank you for sharing this with us. It is quite beneficial to us. I think everyone that want to have a business using social media can use this tips of your. Thank you and hope to hear more from you.