Why Facebook restrict your post reach

Monday 27 August 2012

Introduction to Twitter for Business


Hello, and welcome to our third Social Media Blog where we will be introducing you to Twitter for Business.

Last time we talked about the excellent Professional Networking site LinkedIn.  While LinkedIn is an important Social Networking tool, on its own it is not enough.  Just as Social Networking should be one aspect of your Marketing Mix, so LinkedIn is just one aspect of your Social Networking Mix.
So here we will look at another excellent Social Networking tool – Twitter, and how twitter can help us raise awareness for ourselves, our businesses, products and services.

Why bother with twitter ?  March 2016 it was estimated that there were over 320M Twitter users, 79% outside the USA, over 16M in the UK.  So there is considerable scope for reaching prospective UK clients, associates or suppliers.

One common criticism of Twitter is the amount or trivial, ‘nonsense’, that gets tweeted.   My consistent response is not to worry about what others are tweeting – it’s what you say (tweet) that matters.   While a twitter account is free, you do need to invest your time in getting noticed.  However, twitter allows you and your business to raise your profile and brand yourselves in a very cost effective way.  And you do this by sending  tweets - that reinforce your message - basically tweeting what you believe your target audience, or community, wants to hear. 

You only have 140 characters – so word your tweets carefully, in fact statistics show that there's a sweet spot at around 120 characters.  And remember you can attache multimedia content and web addresses (URL’s) to encourage visitors to engage with your tweets, like, retweet and click through to pages in your web site, Blog, LinkedIn profile etc.  

So what should you tweet ?   

A few simple Dont's...
Avoid too many promotions and sales, we want to encourage people to follow us – don’t push them away with constant promotion and sales talk.
Don’t only talk business.  It’s called Social Media for a reason, so be social..

And some Do’s...
Do tweet about what you are doing, and make it interesting... don’t be boring.
Do tweet about your business challenges you have today, this week/quarter. Your followers will learn and understand more about you and your business.
Do tweet about what you are reading/studying/writing.  More insights into you the person.
Do tweet, announcements, press releases, product launches, blogs...
Do Educate, share knowledge an insight to your business or sector

AND - ask questions, endorse your followers by inviting input from your community (crowd sourcing)

Next... we continue broadening our Social Networking horizon and look at where Google+ fits in our Social Networking and Marketing Mix. 

Mick Holloway,
24-7 Business Networking,
twitter      - @mick_holloway

Monday 20 August 2012

Introduction to LinkedIn


Hello, and welcome to our second Social Media Blog introducing you to LinkedIn. 
 
In our first blog we talked about Social media being all about Online Conversations and the importance of getting found on line... Now we start looking at how we do this and begin looking at the various Social Media platforms we can use for Business purposes. 

Starting with LinkedIn. 




Linkedin is now a mature growing Social Media platform, now part of the MicroSoft empire.  Although its members numbers (over 460 Million) are a fraction of those of Facebook – LinkedIn’s focus on Professionals, Education and Business makes it uniquely interesting to us.  So what can it do for us ? 

Raise and, build awareness, of you and your business - via Professional Profiles, hosting Recommendations, hosting Rich Multimedia Marketing collateral, Company Information and Company Pages.

Encouraging professional / business orientated Social Networking and building relationship between people you have worked with, people you have done business with AND ... people you would like to do business with.

Establish you as an authority on your subject, you can publish your thoughts, idea’s, products and services and create a targeted following using LinkedIn Company Pages and LinkedIn Groups.

Generate Leads – Consistently.  LinkedIn is a valuable research tool – so you and your Company can be found and put in front of millions of UK based subscribers 24/7.

Find Experts.  LinkedIn has excellent search facilities, and profiling algorithms, for matching people with your search criteria, making research on people, companies, sectors or technologies very effective. 

Continual Learning.  Via LinkedIn Learning Subscribers get access to a superb library of training courses (rebadged Lynda.com who LinkedIn own)

Your LinkedIn Profile is the most complete, content rich, multimedia profile of all the Social Media Platforms, I suggest for professionals, as well as your Google ranking’s, your ranking on LinkedIn is increasingly important.
   

And, it gets better – a basic LinkedIn account is FREE.  

So let's get you started, once you have your LinkedIn account, connect to me here's a link to my profile http://uk.linkedin.com/in/mickholloway, mention this blog so I know where you met me, and join our group Social Media for Business & Lead Generation (UK).


24-7 run a number of Social Media Training and Networking Groups in the UK, to find out more about 24-7 and our groups click HERE
 
My next Blog will introduce Twitter for Business.  Until then...


Mick Holloway,
24-7 Business Networking,


Monday 13 August 2012

Introduction to Social Media


Hello, and welcome to my first BLOG... 

I thought I would go all Julie Andrews and “start at the very beginning...”  :  With an introduction to Social Media and Social Networking.  To start things off, some definitions, since I like keeping things nice and simple so let’s go with these -

Social Media is – Websites, or platforms like Facebook or LinkedIn, that help people having a presence on line, have conversations On Line
Social Networking is – Using these websites

So if you have heard of Facebook, YouTube or Twitter then you have already heard of Social Networking.  We will be learning about these as we go, I would add LinkedIn and Google+ to this list, and I will be keeping an eye out and reporting on emerging technologies  ( if you like reading ahead – check out Pinterest.com ).

Let’s nail the Elephant in the room.  I am often asked – “How is Social Networking going to help me with my Business ?“.  Here’s the picture - Social Media, Social Networking, Google, Wikipedia... the web - have enabled our clients to “buy smarter” MUCH smarter.  No one wants to be sold too anymore – they can do their own research and make their own well informed decisions.  A few years ago if we needed a supplier we would reach for Yellow Pages, or Kelly’s Directories, these days we can Google for the product or service we require then compare price, delivery, take up references - or read reviews... In minutes. 

So Marketing and Sales have changed.  We’re in the era of relationship marketing ( see Seth Godin’s work on “Permission Marketing” ) where we have to "earn the attention and interest of our clients”.   So how can Social Networking Help you? ... By getting you found by your customers, when they are looking, when they are in the buying cycle for your products or services... so when the phone ring’s  the due diligence has been done – In Bound Marketing ... RULES.

At 24-7 we have a range of Social Media training courses available through our networking meetings, class room based courses, webinars and google+ hangouts. 

Would you like to know how to set up a Simple Social Networking Campaign in less than an hour, which then takes ONLY 10 minutes a day to run ...  find out more - HERE

My next Blog will introduce LinkedIn, a Social Media web site for Business and Professionals.  Until then...

Mick Holloway,
24-7 Business Networking,