Welcome to the first of a series of blogs on"How can businesses use Social Media" . We start with an Introductionto the social media in this essay.

 

Social media can be called as a democraticapproach to knowledge generation and content validation. Moving away fromtraditional media in a big way, Social media is two- way traffic between theconsumers and marketers. 

 

Simply put, Social Media ispeople using the internet to have discussions. A fairly simple concept, but itssimplicity does in no way underestimate its power. While generally topics as banalas what one had for breakfast are discussed, they also drown into more insightfultopics, such as politics, religion, world events and even your brand.

 

Social Media therefore is…

A social instrument of communication

A website that asks for your opinion

 

A website where the information is partially by the author andpartially by those who have interacted with it

 

 

As Wendy Schollum says

“The opportunity social mediapresents for your business is the ability to listen, participate and influencethese online conversations”.

Think of it like being able toposition your best sales person at the first worldwide networking event.Instead of being able to influence a room of perspective customers, your salespeople can "work" the nation, or even the world. How useful would itbe for your business to get direct access to your target market and ask them whatthey want? The return and impact on your internal systems, product/servicedevelopment and marketing would be immeasurable.

But, it is important to know howto stimulate this type of conversation. After all, simply setting up a Facebookpage or Twitter account isn't enough to get people chatting about yourbusiness. You need to have a clear social media strategy in place that outlinesyour goals, guidelines, tactics and even a crisis plan.

Keep an eye on the next essay on some of the statistics andstrategies for Social media marketing.

 

 

Tags: Social Media | Social Media Marketing | Power of Social Media | Social Media for Businesses | Social Media for small business | Social Media Greenlemon

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Have you been asking the same question? I often come across the worried subject title in many discussion groups. Problems range from no traffic to getting banned from the site. Just then thought of pointing out some factors that can help in this regard with diverse social media and bookmarking sites.


1. No stale topics. Your matter should trigger interest in the social media beings. It could be debated, controversial, current hot topic or simply anything that the readers might find interest in.

2. Interesting title. The title of your matter is the most important triggering factor. Make it catchy and also "searchable". It should intrigue and prompt the visitors to click right away. Read this: http://www.seobook.com/video-google-seo-friendly-page-titles. I hope this helps concerning few factors.

3. Build your network. Niche network. Because it is only your niche who is going to be interested in reading and reviewing your stuff. Not necessarily your school mates or college mates who may be merely interested in you and not your unrelated stuff.

4. Participate. Read and review others' stuff too. This way you become known and will help you build relationships and expand your network.

5. Be the first. Being the first to bookmark and review will draw a lot of attention to your profile. This  can also help you build network and readers.

6. No self promotion. If you are going to simply put up your own stuff, people will despise you no matter how good your stuffs are. It conveys  the message to the readers that you are out there to help yourself and not for sincere participation. Moreover, you are giving yourself good chances to be banned from the social media site.


That was a quick thought. Remember one thing, building network and drawing attention does take some time. So don't get fed up or discouraged. Keep moving. It's a continuous effort.

Tags: Traffic | Website Traffic | Social Media | Social Networking

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Not every site is setup to be friendly for social media marketing. In order to have a website be social media friendly, it has to be appealing to the "social media beings".



The first thing you may want to do is to have your site instilling the "desire" in people to want to link and keep coming back to it. At the heart of every such website is the WANT to become viral. Being social network friendly means a lot to the success of social media. Sites like Digg, Stumpleupon, Twitter are excellent sources of free website traffic and would be immensely rewarding if your website has an additional quality of being social media friendly.




Okay, so let's get into some ways of accomplishing a social media friendly website.





1. Social Media Friendly Design

A social media friendly design of the website should allow the visitor to read the content easily through ease of navigation of the website and lack of clutter. A good design grabs the attention of a social media user or any visitor for that matter, who may be encouraged to bookmark or subscribe to the website. Also remember to be "modern" in your web design. Your website is the face of your business.; therefore it must project the appeal and professionalism to suit the modern social age. 



2. Social Media Friendly Content

Much heard of, discussed and talked about - Content, yes. Content is king and great content could get you propelled to the extent you never imagined. So what makes the content social media friendly is just the same that one rather not expect to change: lists, tips, how-tos, guides, free resources, photo galleries, videos etc. The idea is to generate and retain visitors through good, interesting and engaging content of the like.





3. Bookmarking & Sharing Made Easy

Great content is perfectly fine. But you should also ensure that your social media friendly content is made easy to be shared by your users. Give your visitors a button to push. Get the social site buttons installed at the bottom of every article, blog, product page or any content that is deemed to be liked for sharing. AddThis and ShareThis offer small widgets that can be installed into a standard web page. Social media is all about interaction, therefore one should make sure that the regular readers have an opportunity of say, or vote for the content.





4. Catchy Headlines.

A catchy or intriguing headline could instill enthusiasm amongst the visitors to get reading even a mediocre article. Therefore the significance of a great headline in articles, blog posts, or any other content is not to be underestimated. Here is where you got to get yourself a little detached from the spiders. Remember not to just stuff keywords in the headlines in your zeal to entice the spiders, only to lose the charm of your great content. It's the real humans who are ultimately going to read them on whom is left the choice in entirety whether to read on or not. Strike a balance between the spiders and humans. Social media users aren't known to be patient; a bad headline will easily turn them away even if you are in possession of an outstanding content. Here goes an interesting article: How a Good Title and Description Can Make or Break Your Social Media Submission.





5. Eye-Grabbing Photos

Just like a great headline, a striking image in your write-up can also help grab attention. Images are best given prominence in the beginning of your article. This is because social media users often make the decision of bookmarking or voting up in the initial few seconds of seeing the content. This may not be appropriate all the time; however, an article is best complimented with a compelling image in a suitable place than left black and white.





6. Downplay Ads and Be Hospitable

Social media users don't like to see ads on the content they're reading. And if you still had to use, position them in a way that will not intrude a potential voter with the ease and comfort of reading the content. Don't force the readers to view more than one page in order to finish your article and avoid any sort of pop-ups or distractions. Be hospitable with your readers. Digg is a social media site known to be less favourable towards ads; and therefore the strategy adopted by many social media marketers is to submit the ad-free content to digg, and then put them back on the page either right after the content hits the home page or a week or two later after the demise of traffic and links.





7. Social Community Elements on Display

Having widgets like Facebook Connect, MySpace, MyBlogLog displayed on your site is a way of telling the people that you're active and involved in social communities which is a part of having a social media friendly website. It may not be as important as the other elements, but being a part of a community can actually fetch you social media success.




8. Prompt in Serving Visitors

Social media users are on the round to reading hundreds of articles each day, who cannot afford to spare time for a website so lousy. Therefore it is important that the web page loads the content as quickly as possible not to distract a possible vote or link. The speed by which your web page downloads becomes even more of an issue once your social media campaign becomes successful. Internet surfers are quite impatient, and if your web page takes more of their time than can be beared with, you are at the risk of directing your visitors to different destinations. Make sure your page is not loaded with too much of ads, images, javascripts etc so that the loading time is minimal.



9. A blog

Social media thrives on two way communications. It is all about interactions and conversations, and there's probably no better way to get them on your site than a blog. People are encouraged to participate and comment, especially if you prove to be a gem in your niche. Make sure to answer any questions that come up in your blog comment. A strong blog will become the hub of your social media efforts and can make your site social media friendly.




10. Don't Resemble a Spam

You may want to use the word "free" (especially in the keywords) to grab the visitors and their attention. But hang on. In social media, the word "free" has the likelihood of being associated with "spam". Avoid excessive usage of such terms, especially in the titles or headers (where keywords are most preferred) which gives you the mask of a spammer or advertisement. It may be a harmful idea in your way towards the accomplishment of a social media friendly website, so do away with it.





Above all, take time to identify and keep up with people who are actively contributing content to your website. Participate and engage in conversation wherever your users are. Make a mention of the people who send you ideas and information to post. Have a nice RSS button displayed for easy visibility and subscription. These are all essential factors of your website being considered a social media friendly one. The overall essence of having a social media friendly website is ultimately to leverage traffic and get maximum returns in the form of loyal visitors.





In the world of social media, one must listen, learn and contribute. Please feel free to share if you got any more ideas on the subject.

Tags: Social Media Friendly Website | Social Networking | Social Media Marketing | Social Media

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