>So, you’re just starting up your business and you’ve heard about social media marketing. No matter your target market, the size or age of your business or your marketing goals, SMM is a highly-targeted and customized way to marketing your products or services. The important thing to remember: consistent interaction is the baseline for your success.
Even if you have a Facebook FAN page or a Twitter profile in place, how do you make sure you’re keeping your followers aware of what’s going on in your business? How do you know if they’re even checking in often for updates? It’s so easy to lose readers in the overloaded world that we live in—there are too many blogs, Facebook pages, and Twitter pages to keep up with. The key is to make your sites worth your readers’ time.
There are two types of marketing—Broadcast Marketing and Engagement Marketing. Before social media came to the forefront of the media industry, broadcast marketing was the heavy hitter. Blasting out information about your company or product through print ads, flyers, and, even when the internet became popular, banner ads. Think of broadcast marketing like telemarketing – it’s a shove-in-your-face approach. The general public has become snow blind to the plethora of ads and commercial pushing products and services around every corner.
With engagement marketing, you’re not broadcasting your brand to those around you but are rather building a community and relationship with your customers. You’re using social media outlets to not only let others learn about you, but to allow you to learn about your customer.
Diane Gilleland from Etsy, makes some great points in a recent blog post and suggests that you need to earn attention in social media space “…Consider this: how much do you trust marketers? After decades of being hammered with broadcast marketing, most of us don’t trust marketers at all. But we do trust people and, especially, people we like.”
However, as we’ve all grown up exposed to broadcast marketing, it’s important to be aware that you’re not falling into the pitfalls of news blasting on social media outlets. A few of the common mistakes are that businesses will use their Twitter or Facebook page to only post that they have a new product or service. In essence, you’re telling your customer that you’re not interested in them on a personal level but that you just want their business. Instead, find ways to share something a little more personal.
If you have a new product you’d like to push, share the inspiration behind it. Or if it was created in a unique way, share that. If it reminds you of something you grew up seeing in your grandmother’s house, share that! People love to hear stories. And stories about your products or services allow your customers to know why what you do and what you sell is personal to you, which will resonate more in the long run.
“With every post, give people a reason to see you as a trustworthy person, not a marketer.”
What your Brand SAYS is What your Brand IS. 