7 Reasons Your Company Should Be Using Social Media

Reposted from my entry on Mediacurrent's blog

Social media. Everyone has it, but not everyone is using it correctly. Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube exist not only to entertain and connect people to one another, but also to connect people with businesses. With advertising dollars getting smaller, the need for effective, low cost marketing tactics is more important than ever. And if your business isn't using social media, then you're missing out on a huge opportunity to develop your brand and garner new revenue.

Here are the top 7 reasons why your business should be on social media:

1. Build your brand – You have the opportunity to determine how people feel about your company based on how you present yourself online. Your social media presence allows you to create your brand persona and perpetuate that sentiment in everything you do - from posts to pictures to general customer service.
2. Spread the news – Many people find out about what's going on around them from their feeds. If you don't have the means to send out press releases via the wire, then take advantage of social media as your announcement platform. If you have a new product or service offering, or an event coming up, share your good news (or any news, really) on your social media account.
3. Manage your reputation – Part of building your brand includes being aware of how your messaging is being received. Also, it is imperative to handle any negative sentiments with grace. If there's a problem with your online reputation, social media is a great tool to use to fix it.
4. Build trust in your company – Customers today need to trust a company before making a purchase. They check reviews on Yelp and Google before selecting a vendor or even a doctor. Social media does several things to help your target audience trust you and your services. First off, people trust their friends and family more than anyone. So if people are talking about your organization positively on social media, chances are you will get referrals from those posts. Also, social media allows you to be accessible by customers. Customers can get questions answered immediately via social media.
5. Establish long lasting relationships – Along with building trust, you can build lasting relationships and brand loyalty through social media by simply being personal. Make your strategy more about making your customers happy than making profit. The profit will come from repeat business if you take the time to be relatable through your social media interactions. Ultimately, happy customers are profitable customers.
6. More affordable than traditional marketing – Setting up a profile is free. Creating content will cost time, but, when done effectively, will be worth the return on investment.
7. Find out what your customers really want – Who needs focus groups when you have a the opportunity to poll your customers in real time? Have you recently launched a new product? Ask your customers for feedback. You will save time, money, and valuable resources by getting feedback from your target audience through social media.

Stretching your advertising taking full advantage of social media and integrating it into your existing inbound marketing strategy. By doing so, you’ll get a solid feel on what you’re doing right and what you need to improve on to make the relationship with your customers last.

4 Tips for Optimizing YouTube

Reposted from my entry on Mediacurrent's blog

Eight seconds. That’s not a whole lot of time at all. But that’s the average attention span of the typical internet user (fun fact - it’s one second less than a goldfish’s). What does that mean for us marketers? We now have even less time to engage our target audience before they scroll down their timelines and forget the messages we’ve invested countless hours on crafting. Now is the time to spend time grabbing your prospective client’s attention both visually AND audibly through your YouTube channel.

YouTube has become the second largest search engine (Google being the first), so it’s vital to spend time optimizing your videos to reach as many of your buyer personas as possible. If you do, the likelyhood of your video reaching the first page of search results pages (SERPs) increases by 53 times. Try it: type in “how to do long division” in Google. Does your search result page look anything like this? If so, you now see why making your videos search engine friendly is key. Here are a few tips to help you get found quicker and increase traffic to your website through your videos.

1. ENTERTAIN, DON’T SELL

Think about it - Would YOU watch a video that started off with “Hey, buy my product”? Probably not. Your customers don’t want to sit through a sales presentation either. So, just as you would with your content strategy, seek to inform and entertain your audience first, provide solutions to their pain points, build the trust with them, and open up lines of communication for them to come to you.

2. COMPLETE THE DESCRIPTION BOX

Because YouTube is second only to Google for online searches, it’s super important to create a video description that is keyword relevant, using terms and phrases that your buyer personas are looking for. Adding these keywords will improve the likelihood that a prospective client will find your videos at the top of their results when doing a Google search.

3. GIVE THEM SOMEWHERE TO GO!

You’ve spent all this time creating amazing content. Now it’s time to direct your viewer to your website! It’s a best practice to always include your company’s website in your video descriptions along with a call to action, like “For more information, click here” or “Want to learn more? Contact us.” This will get your viewer started on the path to becoming a client.

4. HELP LOCAL USERS FIND YOU

Always include your company’s contact information. Why? Because if you’re a local business, adding your address, city, state and phone number, coupled with your description will help your ideal local customer, who is Googling for your services in their city, pick up the phone and call you or walk through your doors.

I go back to those eight seconds. The average YouTube video is 4 minutes and 20 seconds long. That’s 32.5 times longer than a person’s average attention span. So when a person is watching your video, they’re hooked, already engaged with you and your brand. Take these extra steps to make sure that engaged viewer becomes an enthused client.

My (Social) Life, Your Entertainment

I have no interest in the entertainment industry. But I do have an interest in what entertains people, which is why I am so interested in the business of social media. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest have become a part of our daily routines. We wake up to check our newsfeeds. We learn about news via with RSS feeds, blog rolls, and microblogs. A newspaper? What’s that? Do they even make those anymore? Fifty years from now, probably not.

Our world of communications has been forever changed. We text people across the room from us. My fiancé and I love going to new restaurants, but not before reading reviews on Urbanspoon and Yelp, entrusting complete strangers to point us in the right direction. Not only is social media a key part of our lives, but the ability to access those mediums on the go has become increasingly important.

As the Social Media intern of a local marketing and advertising agency, I study trends daily. My morning begins with a giant cup of coffee and Mashable. I take the time to learn what’s new in my industry. Not only is understanding the return on investment, analytics, reach and acceptance of messages important, but knowing what mediums my target audience is using to access these messages is equally essential. We are becoming more connected with the pulse of the world every day through technology. Recently, on Mashable, an infographic produced by OnlineColleges.com showed how  heavily college students rely on their smartphones in their daily lives.

College students are using their phones for more than just voice calls. In fact, 75% of students often use them during idle time throughout the day, 52% use their phones before even getting out of bed after their alarm clocks go off. It is their form of entertainment, which would then make it my kind of business.

Resources: http://mashable.com/2012/06/30/smartphones-college-students-infographic/