Social Media – Does it really work?

By Eliza Beattie, 45 Millbank

Social media (SM) has become an essential entity of marketing campaigns over the past two years, including MySpace, YouTube, eBay, Twitter, Ning’s, LinkedIn and Facebook. A visible shift has been from using SM as a personal hobby of youngsters to the use of it for business promotion and information. But does ‘social media’ actually work for businesses, especially event’s businesses?

The effectiveness of SM, like all marketing, depends on your target audience. Even if your business is based offline every company should have a web presence and online marketing plan – and the use of social media should be at the top of this list, along with blogging, videos and press releases. However, is SM appropriate for your clientele or complimentary of your companies brand story? Let us look at the main social media applications currently available to your business:

Facebook

Currently one of the most visited websites on the internet with over 500 million active users; over half of which log on daily and 200 million of them use their mobiles, the dominance of Facebook as a medium of SM is apparent. Often cited as the initiator of SM (sorry MySpace!), no longer is the usage about university students sharing their lives with family and friends. It has become a global promotional hub for individuals and businesses alike, allowing companies to promote their profile and service. As a free and accessible medium (business profiles do not require an individual to be logged on to Facebook, or even ‘a friend’), business Facebook pages allow consumers to search for key information through search engines. Potential clients and suppliers can also join particular groups or forums that you are associated with within your industry or service, which will lead to your profile page.

You can also advertise your business via Facebook’s pay per click scheme; this allows you to target certain users or suppliers.

Twitter

Twitter as ‘a micro blogging website’ is the ‘new kid on the block’ allowing users to create short messages of 140 characters with links to direct the reader towards the content you might be mentioning, such as DDR packages. Created in 2005, Twitter has more then 175 millions registered users writing 95 million tweets a day. Twitter may not be suitable for many businesses but it is great for industry networking allowing companies to increase their brand exposure to suppliers and existing/potential clientele.

You Tube and Video Blogs

Any medium of marketing that allows a company to communicate with potential clients in a refreshing and efficient manner is beneficial, and this is what YouTube and video blogging allows with over 200 million videos being viewed daily on smartphones and other internet-linked mediums. On YouTube, for example, you can upload virtual tours of your venue but also create a group of industry/supplier/client contacts and invite people who interest you to view your new videos. You can also subscribe to channels that interest you and send direct messages.

It was recently pointed out to me that videos now rank within search engine results pages so it is important that you get involved and upload your video blogs to YouTube, including films of past events, client testimonies and interesting industry interviews.

So does Social Media Work?

“Social media is changing the way we do business and the way in which we can communicate with customers both existing and new”. This change is reactive to technological advancements, such as the development of iPad friendly websites and smartphone screen specific apps. In 2010 alone, social networking sites experienced rapid mobile growth, with Twitter growing by 1,800 percent over 2010. Facebook grew by 1,000 percent.

You do need to be pro-active and reactive when using SM. Listen and read other’s blogs or profile pages and respond to suppliers tweets etc., show an interest in what potential clients are looking for. Comments are essential, for the more comments on a blog, Facebook page or event piece, the more it will be spread around the web.

Remember to keep your customary branding consistent, so brand your SM like you would your documents and website. The majority of SM mediums allow you to upload your logo and colour scheme to customise your profile.

Do not forget to take advantage of your accessibility and contact with the consumer, and ask your audience what they want, or what they are looking for. This not only helps companies react to the wants and needs of clients, but also develop innovative services and potential new business. Also, “keeping your clients continually involved allows you to create better working relationships which are better for both sides”.

Good luck and have fun – it’s meant to be refreshing and creative.

Using Twitter to Promote your Event

Twitter can be a useful tool for promoting your business or service; however with almost 100 million tweets pouring out of Twitter every day, it is difficult to know how use Twitter to get you and your event noticed. Here are some tips to get your tweets seen.

Firstly you need to identify your goals and whether Twitter is a suitable medium to promote your event. To do this, you need to consider what you want to do, who you want to reach and if Twitter can facilitate this. Be cautious not to disregard Twitter just because your attendee genre are not likely to be on there as there may be other influential users that you may want to reach, such as trade press.

If Twitter is a platform that you think will work then you will need to build a plan to get good quality and influential followers. On Twitter it is more important to have quality rather than quantity of followers. The more high quality followers you have the more credible your Twitter looks and people will follow you because they will see the worth of your other followers. Searching and following influential people talking about the same industry your event is in is instant way to get some attention from the right people. Don’t be shy at following people or asking people to tweet about your event – it is all relationship building. It is a good target to aim to have more followers then people you follow, all of this adds up to your Twitter looking like it’s worth following and that your content is good.

When you create your Twitter account it may also be beneficial to create a communications plan of what is going to be tweeted before, during and after your event. Key dates can be included in this, for example, when the online registration opens. It is important that you supply your followers with all of the information that they may need, and include URLs to further information where appropriate. Before your event you can use Twitter to generate interest and awareness around your event, during your event you can use Twitter to keep interest running and make non-attendees feeling like they are missing out. After the event you should ensure that you keep in touch with your followers to keep them interested, you can tweet about the success of the event and thank the attendees for coming; if any sessions were recorded then video links can be tweeted, as can visitor stats etc. After the follow up you should aim to tweet content that will interest your followers, especially if you plan to repeat the event again.

Hash-tagging will help promote your event and enable people to find you on Twitter. It is something that you should endeavour to do in every tweet where it is appropriate. Putting a ‘#’ in front of a particular word in your tweet will mean that your tweet can be more easily searched for, driving new readers to your profile. You should also hash-tag the name of your event so it is easier for people to follow any announcements. You need to bear in mind that the hash-tag needs to be one word, and you must check that it is not already being used for something else by searching for it. Once the hash-tag is set up, it will help create a buzz about your event, you can also use it during the event, giving followers real-time updates. Your hash-tag can be tracked using desktop applications such as TweetDeck or Seesmic, both of which are free to use.

Another Twitter application that you should explore is tweetmyevents.com, this application allows you to tweet a link to a detailed explanation of your events. You can also use this platform to publicise your event on Facebook and LinkedIn. One of the most beneficial parts of this tool is that it collates page view data, so you can check on page views in real-time.

As with all marketing activity, you will want to know some statistics on your efforts and there are many ways to get other statistics on your tweets. One of the most helpful websites is tweetburner.com, this will monitor your click though rate on URLs in your tweets. Using this will help you analyse what the most popular topics are that you tweet, and also the most successful time of day that you tweet. You should also examine your website statistics through google analytics or your regular web trend software.

Re-tweeting is another good way of getting noticed, and is an easy way of sending good content to your followers and showing that you’re aware of what people are talking about. If you do re-tweet, aim to add value to them. Instead of simply re-tweeting content, add a comment or opinion to the tweet. For example, instead of re-tweeting a newspaper article, re-tweet the article but also write what that could mean to your industry or how similar content will be covered at your event. This shows that your tweets are well thought out and will raise the profile of your event.

It is good etiquette to thank people that re-tweet your content. When you write your tweets you are limited to 140 characters; however you may want to take into consideration that long tweets can be lost if they are re-tweeted. If people re-tweet you then a “RT @yourtwittername” will come at the beginning of your tweet, and if you have already used all 140 characters then some of your tweet may be lost to make room for this.

Finally, you should avoid spamming your followers with your tweets. Sending out a high number of irrelevant tweets will cause followers to ignore your tweets or un-follow you. Instead, if you tweet high quality content then your tweets will become something that your followers specifically look out for.

With Twitter getting over 300,000 new users every day and 180 unique visits every month, Twitter is a powerful medium for getting your message out. Following these simple guidelines should help your tweets not only be seen, but be seen as credible, good quality content that your followers respect.