The 10 Commandments Of Using Social Media For Business

Without a doubt, maintaining a social media presence can boost your company’s profile and help you reach more customers. When using social networking platforms your business can control a lot of information that reaches your consumers, while also letting you easily communicate with them.

Social media marketing is therefore an easy (and in most cases free) way to promote your products and services, build awareness for your brand and market your business.

1 – Use Facebook Reviews

Have you thought about including a Facebook review link on your website or Facebook profile? This will allow your readers to write reviews about your company, products and services and share their opinions. It’s a great way to engage users and get them commenting.

Just don’t be too quick to edit or delete any unfavorable reviews. You will enhance your reputation far more if you are seen to be responding to complaints proactively and politely.

2 – Comment On Other blogs

If you want to really make social media work for you, then you should get into the habit of commenting on other people’s blogs and sites. The word “social” in “social media” means that you need to put yourself out there if you want to get any results.

This strategy can increase your visibility and build your reputation in your niche and is fairly easy to do. Don’t spam. Leave meaningful comments on other blogs that show you have read the article and if you have an opinion on the topic, voice it. This will engage the blog owner and open up opportunities for networking and guest blogging.

Commenting on high ranking, popular blogs will also give you some vital “link juice” i.e. backlinks to your site thereby increasing your site’s visibility and sending more traffic your way.

3 – Let People Know

Let all of your existing customers, subscribers and friends know that you are going to start being active on social media sites. This will give your social media profiles some initial contacts, which always looks good. No one likes to follow a blank profile.

Once people like your fan page or start following you in the case of Twitter, their friends and followers will see your updates too. Your content can go viral this way and send hordes of traffic to your site.

Remember to include your website URL on your bio in all your social media accounts as this is one free method of advertising that you should not ignore.

4 – Share Valuable Content

When you offer advice, tips and assistance on online and social media channels, you can quickly gain a reputation in your industry as an expert. This strategy pays dividends for any new business.

Look around online for locations where people are asking questions regarding your industry, and help them by providing quality answers. Forums relating to your niche are a good place to start. Eventually, people will find you and you may attract customers you could not have found any other way. Forum posting is another link building strategy with considerable SEO benefits.

5 – Tell Them About It

Keep your followers updated about your business’ progress on your social media pages. For example, you could write a post or an update that celebrates your company reaching 1,000 Twitter followers, or have a contest or promotion where the 100^th contributor wins a prize.

Posting about the results of your social media marketing will be popular and could go viral. Again, be courteous. Thank your fans for showing an interest in your social media account and you will build a loyal community.

6 – Get Connected

If your business has a website, you should always link it to your social media pages. This is easily accomplished by adding “share” buttons to individual posts or pages. For WordPress sites, install a free plugin like WP Socializer or Sociable to make it easy for visitors to share content and increase your customer base.

7 – Keep An Eye On Your Competition

Keep checking on what your competitors and authority figures in your niche are doing. Look at their profiles and keep track of what they share. If something seems to be working for them, try a similar strategy. Or, use the knowledge you gather to come up with a totally new idea or angle that they have not tried.

8 – Update Often

Make sure that you update consistently so that your page stays as fresh as possible. Develop a posting schedule and/or blog editorial calendar to organize your writing. This will encourage your readers to visit your site frequently to find updates. Blog entries are a great way to keep fresh content available to your followers.

9 – Get An Opt-In Box

Make it easy for your visitors to subscribe to your newsletters by setting up an email autoresponder service and installing an opt-in box prominently on your site. Aweber, Mailchimp and Getresponse all offer free or low-cost trials.

Email your list of contacts on a regular basis in order to remind your readers of new content on your social marketing sites.

10 – Start An Online Contest

People who use social media networks love free stuff! They will follow you if you give away freebies such as reports, mp3 recordings, coupons and the like. Now that you know this, use it to help grow your business.

Create surveys or contests where people can win something or get something for free. Be sure to announce who won, as it provides credibility and is a way of getting further advertising.

Finally, make sure you track your activities and make modifications to your marketing plans as you go along or whenever you feel something needs tweaking. By doing this, you will know what does or does not work.

Have I missed out any key social media strategies that you find useful? What has worked well for you? Has anything been a complete disaster? Please share your experiences below.