When you run a small business, your days can seem a little overwhelming at times. If you run the operation by yourself, you’re likely inundated with tasks ranging from customer service to advertising. In the event you have help, you’re then responsible for making sure your workers are paid on time, interact well with customers, and handle the variety of tasks that can come up on a daily basis.
Oftentimes lost in all this madness is the importance of promoting your small company, especially through social media. Whether you are regularly active on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Google+ or you just show up from time to time, your ability to maneuver and do social media correctly should never be taken for granted.
Related Article: 7 Ways Your Small Business Can Improve Its Social Media Marketing
Social Presence is Essential
As more small business owners are discovering social media has myriad of ways to promote one’s brand. Among the ways to properly use social media:
- Mission – Before you do anything else, create a social media mission plan. What do you hope to accomplish in using social media? How much time and resources are you able to devote to SM? Will you be doing the social media posting or outsourcing it? Trying to do social media on the fly will likely end up causing you more problems than it is worth;
- Message – What will your message be when it comes to social media? Are you on there just because the competition is or do you truly want to interact with customers? If it is the latter, then you’re headed in the right direction. Positive customer interaction via social media is a great way to show yourself as a small business that cares, a small business that is relevant, and a small business that is up to speed with today’s social trends;
- Manners – When using social media as a business owner, the biggest gaffe you can undertake is getting involved in negative comments with one or more customers. Face it; just about every business owner has a run-in with a customer from time to time. If that problem takes on life on social media, it can be damaging to both your reputation and your small business. In the event someone takes to Facebook, Twitter or another social site to take issue with a product or service of yours, take the conversation private as soon as possible;
- Motivation – Finally, how motivated are you to be on social media? If you’re going to put forth a full-time effort to properly use social media, thumbs up. If you’re going to do it here and there, thumbs down. While you do not have to be on social media 24/7, you can do random visits to your Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and other social pages. Over time, the public will lose interest and you will see your follower rate take a drop. Put your game plan in motion and stick to it from day one.
If you have been lackadaisical or even non-existent on social media in the past, take the New Year and enhance your social presence.
Author: Miguel Salcido has been a professional search marketing consultant for over 11 years. He is the founder and CEO of Organic Media Group, a content driven SEO agency. He also likes to blog at OrganicSEOConsultant.com and share insights into advanced SEO.
Published: January 8, 2015
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