Top tips for small businesses using social media

We’re all on Facebook these days, and probably Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and others too! I probably generate as much business now via social networking as I do through submitting proposals, and I have a number of good friends who also operate small businesses very successfully via social networks. However, breaking into the social networking world can be a little daunting at first.

Getting into the networking flow is about more than just setting up a jazzy page and waiting for the ‘likes’ to arrive. It’s more about getting into a ‘like ladder’ or some other way of boosting your page’s like count. What you need is real, honest ‘likers’, followers or connections who are interested in you and what you do. Here are a few things I have learnt over time about social networking that might just help you if you want to take advantage of social media for your small businesses.

Have high quality content

Whether it’s a sentence on Twitter, an article on Google+ or a shared news story on Facebook, you need to keep working hard at putting high quality content on your social media channels. If you are writing something, make sure your words are well formed, grammatically correct and spell checked, and if you aren’t too hot on the written word, get a good content writer to produce some social media pieces for you.

Different words for different audiences

Most social media channels can be linked together so that whatever you write on one gets copied across all networks. In some cases this can be a great time saving exercise , but you also need to make sure you are producing different content for different audiences. Your tone, length of pieces and focus should alter slightly depending on where you are posting:

•           Facebook: A ‘fun’ social media site, where content should be kept short, informal and is ideally accompanied by pictures.

•           Google+: Because you can create ‘circles’ of contacts, you will be able to target your posts specifically at potential customers, previous customers, peers or friends, so you can pick your content based upon who will see it.

•           LinkedIn: A professional network where longer posts and a more formal tone works better.

• Twitter: A great place to make industry contacts and to promote sales, promotions, new blog posts or special offers. Posts are only a sentence long, so practice keeping it short and getting everything you need to say into a few words. 

Schedule posts for maximum impact 

You might find you are most available to write posts or blog entries in the evening, but if none of your target audience are on line to see your update, you could be wasting your time. Facebook has a simple scheduling function built in for fan pages, or you can use apps like HootSuite to schedule updates and posts for many days into the future and at times that you know the most people will be online.

Be prepared!

Once you have got your all singing, all dancing social networking pages set up, you need to be prepared to manage these accounts effectively. There is nothing worse than commenting on someone’s post, asking a question on their wall or directly messaging them, only to get no response for several hours, days or possibly even not at all.

If you don’t have the time yourself to manage these accounts and posts, then employ a content writer or social media manager to do this for you.

So, off you go, and reach out to the world on social media for yourself! It takes a little practice and tenacity to get your accounts the exposure you desire, but it is, without doubt, the cheapest and most effective way to market your products and services to a huge online audience.