Social Media for Small Business - Marketing and design ...

Sometimes it?s easy to fall prey to the upstate inferiority complex and forget that the Capital Region is home to countless world-class experts in all kinds of industries.? Overit Media is one of those expert businesses.

For almost 20 years, the digital agency?s marketing and PR pros have helped build brands for clients all over the country, from Tech Valley to Silicon Valley. Over time, it has built a nationally recognized motion graphics, animation, video and illustration practice. Overit works for huge brands including well-known names like Marvel, Nickelodeon, Trump, Catseye, and the Chicago Bulls.

I asked Lisa Barone, Overit Vice President for Strategy (official title) and social media queen extraordinaire (title I made up to describe her) about small business and social media:

1. I?m a small business. I don?t have the money to hire someone to handle social media, but I really need to have a presence. What are the top two things I should be doing that will make the most impact.

• Add a blog to your business website. [If you don?t have a website, stop reading this and build one. You can?t exist on the Web without one.] Creating a blog is such a powerful thing for a small business owner. It opens up a constant stream to talk to your customers, demonstrate subject-matter expertise, gives you content to share via other social channels, and it makes you a friend of the search engines.? Small business owners are already so in tune with their customers, but this takes that relationship to an even more personal level, while opening up a new lead generation channel.
• Have a plan. You?re right; social media can be super time consuming. But it?s even more time consuming when you start wandering around aimlessly, tweeting or updating at random and with no real purpose behind it. Before you spend time in social media, take a step back and identify:
  • Why are you there? What are your business reasons for getting involved?
  • Where are your customers already hanging out? If you?re not sure, most social media services will give you the option to search your contacts to see who is already on the site. If your email is tied to your business, you can see which of your customers are there so you know where it makes sense for you to create an account.
  • What types of content/updates will they respond to? What?s worked before? What have they asked for? Create a plan for the types of content you?ll share and how often you?ll share it.

It may seem like a lot of work upfront, but the stronger your plan going in, the more likely it is you?ll stick to it.

2. All this social media stuff is so time consuming. Isn?t there a way to make it easier/more efficient?

Creating a plan of attack for how you?ll use social media will help to make it more manageable. Two others things I?d recommend:

Schedule time for social media: Maybe it?s 10 minutes in the morning, again right before lunch, and then before you walk out the door. Or maybe it?s 30 minutes right when you wake up. ?Whatever works for you, but schedule social media into your day so it becomes part of your process.

Use tools to help the process: You can get work done and be present in social media at the same time. The trick is to find the right tools to help you. For example, for Twitter I rely on BufferApp to help me find and schedule content. I can find a few articles during my lunch break and then schedule them to go out during the rest of the day. It helps me maintain a constant presence, without taking over my whole day.

3. How do I know if I?m doing a good job with my social media accounts?

Are conversions increasing? Are you attracting more people to your business who want to buy something or invest in your services?

Increasing conversation around your brand is great. Building awareness and authority are great. But in the end, if it?s not leading back to a sale, social media isn?t doing all it can for you.

This is where a company like Overit can step it, offer guidance, and send you back on your way. ?Most often we?re able to offer a Social Media Audit to clients, which becomes their training manual for how to leverage social media. Armed with that, social media becomes a lot less intimidating and far more profitable. It?s really about getting that strategy in place to lead all action.

Web site -?LinkedIN -?Facebook -?Twitter

Source: http://blog.timesunion.com/marketing/social-media-for-small-business/3237/

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