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 Columbus, OH - On Friday, I attended the Black Enterprise Entrepreneurs Conference. One of the sessions was entitled “Blogs, Apps, and Taking it Viral: Growing Revenue in the Age of Social Media”. The panelists were Chris Bennett (Soldsie.com), Spencer Humphrey (Black Tie Catering), Melinda F. Emerson (SmallBizLady), and moderator, Hajj Flemings (Brand Camp University).
During the session, an attendee asked the most frequently asked question about Social Media Marketing, how do I monetize my Social Media efforts? For me, this is the number one most asked question during my conversations with potential clients and at public speaking engagements. Drum roll please!!
How to Monetize your Social Media efforts
- Choice the social media sites by going where your customers hang out. If you don’t know what sites, simply ASK them by sending an email message or survey.
- The panelists did an excellent job of explaining the importance of having a two-way conversation with customers and prospects. That building online relationships and establishing trust happens over time and that often happens before the customer is ready to buy. It’s about being SOCIAL, so yes, on your business fan page allow fans to add comments.
- Business owners must have consistent traffic and built up your brand and credibility through meaningful conversations on the social media sites. Building a fan base takes having a plan, time and commitment.
The goals of the social media plan at a minimum should be:
* drive your fan base to your website, your real estate property on the Internet
* increase database numbers for email marketing.
Your social media goals should be integrated into your business and overall marketing plan. Once you decide your goals, you can choose the metrics to monitor your efforts.
- Your website. Make sure your website has fresh and up-to-date content. Optimize for the search engines, by selecting at least 5 key words so people can find information about you, your products and services. Add social follow button and share widgets to your website.
I recommend when hiring a web page developer, make sure you ask for your website login and hosting information. Also invest money in having the developer provide a few hours of training so you can do minor website updates and uploads on your own.
- Melinda of SmallBizLady, said it best, BLOG, BLOG, BLOG. She likes to blog 4-5 times per week. Whew! Blogging is a social media tool and a great way to raise brand awareness. It allows for two way communication with your audience through the ability for viewers to comment on your blog posts. It provides an opportunity to set your business apart from your competitors by sharing your expertise and other interests. Blogging allows a business to communicate the value of their products and services in a conversational manner.
I recommend if you are new to blogging, start by selecting core topics that reflect the interests or pain points of your target market. If you are not big on writing, (like me) or pressed for time, consider sharing others bloggers or industry expert’s blog posts on your social sites. Make sure to leave a comment on their blog site that adds value to the conversation. Consider doing “how to’s videos or podcasts, blog posts based on interviews and key takeaways from educational sessions. Hey just like this post!!
- It’s happened. The potential customer has clicked on your blog link from the social site, which lands them on your website. Now what? They are now in your sales funnel. Every website should objectives it wants visitors to complete.
Call to actions (CTAs) strategies from the panelists were:
* Great opportunity to build your email list by offering a free eBook, newsletter signup, whitepaper or free gift
* Offer incentives such as coupons or discounts for products and upcoming events
* “Contact us” form
* Advertising campaigns, buy now buttons, PayPal is the standard payment method
* Chris Bennett of Soldsie suggested another payment method, Ecwid (pronounced as “eck-wid”, short for “e-commerce widgets”), is a free shopping cart that seamlessly integrates with your existing website. It can also be added to your page on social media networks, such as Facebook or mySpace
- Website Analytics. Choose metrics to baseline and measure the success of your social media efforts.
* Increase in web traffic from which social networking sites
* Length of visit
* Page view
* Clicks and conversion rates
Most websites have basic traffic tracking, it is important to invest in this if you do not already have it. Look for a program or plugin that can collect and archive data, as well as run reports on campaigns. Possible software programs include Webalizer and WebTrends. Google Analytics provides free campaign tracking with limited functionality.
I’m always eager to learn more about Social Media Marketing by attending educational sessions. In this article, I added my thoughts along with the key takeaways from the panelists at the entrepreneur session. This was another powerful information packed session to help entrepreneurs accelerate their business. Glad I was there!!
What effective ways are you leveraging social media to monetize your business? Let me know.
Shelly Hunt
Website – http://socialmedia-success.com
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SocialMSuccess
Twitter - https://twitter.com/#!/SocialMSuccess
Google+ - https://plus.google.com/114984694466675906276
Pinterest – https://www.pinterest.com/shellyjhunt
 Columbus, Ohio - In establishing a brand for myself, I came up with the title of Social Mediaologist. I had never seen or heard of the title before, but created it because of my love for social media reading, studying, and research. I have a saying, on my social network pages, “did you just blink?” You may ask, why? Glad you asked! Constant change. People are the finger on the pulse, they are the heartbeat of change within the online communities. Trends in the way people use social media are constantly changing. Every time new tools, applications (apps), websites, services or communities are launched, with it comes new ideas, practices and opportunities for marketing your business.
Today, I’m going to give you, in several blinks, the heads up on Twitter. One of the social media network’s that is constantly changing.
Twitter – None, low and medium
What’s the value of your tweets? Starting Wednesday, Feb 20th, Twitter has announced it will start assigning value ratings to users’ tweets using: none, low and medium. A “high” value option will be rolled out later. Implementing this rating system is to benefit the Twitter developers. It will allow them to better sort through the millions of tweets to find the data that is useful to them. In other words, they would like to cut through the noise, the meaningless tweets. How the tweets will be rated, has not been disclosed. There is speculation, that large companies and people with a high number of followers and retweets, will get the higher value ratings. And those with a smaller following, may end up with “none” or “low” ratings.
It will be interesting to see how many people and small businesses will take the “none” or “low” ratings personally. It may cause a “dominoes effect”. It may drive away Twitter users’, from the social network itself. Those who are potential clients, customers and prospects (none and low ratings Twitter users’) of the “medium and high” value rated larger companies. What do you think? Let’s see how this value rating strategy plays out for the developers. To read more about this, click here.
Vine Effect – The next big thing
Late last year, Twitter, launched the Vine app for the iPhone and iPod Touch. This video sharing app is like Instagram (mobile photo sharing) hooking up with YouTube, and the icing on the cake is being able to share the videos on your blog, your social networks like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and the Vine app itself. You can video in six-second clips, which loops along with 140 characters. Users can follow, like and comment on the video clips.
Six ways your business can use Vine? 
- Introduce or promote your company, products and promotions
- Educate your target audience with “How To” Vines then upload it to Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or Vine app
- Go behind the scenes of your business, highlight an employee
- Campaign or contest teaser introductions with URL for more information
- Pose interesting questions about your products or services
- Show some gratitude, thank your customers
Vine is a free app, available on the iPhone and iPad. You can download it from the App Store.
In several blinks of the eye, I have shared Twitter news tip and marketing strategy. What do you think will happen with the Twitter rating system? Vine is a quick easy way to market your business. What do you think of Vine? When you try Vine, share the link with me.
- See more at: http://grapevinecolumbus.com/index.php?id=3383#sthash.tGtftmD3.dpuf
Columbus, Ohio - In establishing a brand for myself, I came up with the title of Social Mediaologist. I had never seen or heard of the title before, but created it because of my love for social media reading, studying, and research. I have a saying, on my social network pages, “did you just blink?” You may ask, why? Glad you asked! Constant change. People are the finger on the pulse, they are the heartbeat of change within the online communities. Trends in the way people use social media are constantly changing. Every time new tools, applications (apps), websites, services or communities are launched, with it comes new ideas, practices and opportunities for marketing your business.
Today, I’m going to give you, in several blinks, the heads up on Twitter. One of the social media network’s that is constantly changing.
Twitter – None, low and medium
What’s the value of your tweets? Starting Wednesday, Feb 20th, Twitter has announced it will start assigning value ratings to users’ tweets using: none, low and medium. A “high” value option will be rolled out later. Implementing this rating system is to benefit the Twitter developers. It will allow them to better sort through the millions of tweets to find the data that is useful to them. In other words, they would like to cut through the noise, the meaningless tweets. How the tweets will be rated, has not been disclosed. There is speculation, that large companies and people with a high number of followers and retweets, will get the higher value ratings. And those with a smaller following, may end up with “none” or “low” ratings.
It will be interesting to see how many people and small businesses will take the “none” or “low” ratings personally. It may cause a “dominoes effect”. It may drive away Twitter users’, from the social network itself. Those who are potential clients, customers and prospects (none and low ratings Twitter users’) of the “medium and high” value rated larger companies. What do you think? Let’s see how this value rating strategy plays out for the developers. To read more about this, click here.
Vine Effect – The next big thing
Late last year, Twitter, launched the Vine app for the iPhone and iPod Touch. This video sharing app is like Instagram (mobile photo sharing) hooking up with YouTube, and the icing on the cake is being able to share the videos on your blog, your social networks like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and the Vine app itself. You can video in six-second clips, which loops along with 140 characters. Users can follow, like and comment on the video clips.
Six ways your business can use Vine?
- Introduce or promote your company, products and promotions
- Educate your target audience with “How To” Vines then upload it to Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or Vine app
- Go behind the scenes of your business, highlight an employee
- Campaign or contest teaser introductions with URL for more information
- Pose interesting questions about your products or services
- Show some gratitude, thank your customers
Vine is a free app, available on the iPhone and iPad. You can download it from the App Store.
In several blinks of the eye, I have shared Twitter news tip and marketing strategy. What do you think will happen with the Twitter rating system? Vine is a quick easy way to market your business. What do you think of Vine? When you try Vine, share the link with me.
- See more at: http://grapevinecolumbus.com/index.php?id=3383#sthash.tGtftmD3.dpuf
To read all of Shelly's articles CLICK HERE!
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
Shelly Hunt (614) 328-9991 Shelly@SocialMedia-Success.com
http://socialmedia-success.com/
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