We all know in this day and age social networks are a great form of marketing. Often I find client reticent to use them, I guess theres a great deal of misinformation out there on social networking. Theres also a plethora of pithy advise.. like “just be yourself”.

Simply put if your not using social media your missing out on connecting with your target market -in non marketers speech thats your customers and potential customers. Social networking is free and though it may take a little maintenance and effort its well worth while. But I have a few tips.

 

1) Consistant Branding
While this may seem like a no brainer its vital. your social networks don’t reflect you as a person but your brand. Your logo or a derivation of your logo should be present, your key colours if possible and something that connects to your online and print marketing.
For example:

 

 

 

2) Choose your network for what its good at: I find this one the hardest to explain. 

•  Facebook – everyone is on it its pretty much a must have.
• Twitter – possibly the most misunderstood social network. A must have if your in the geek market , wonderful for instantaneous support on products or services, great for quick questions.  Worth trying just to see how many of your customers use it.
• Linked in – the ugly duckling of social networks (so not where the cool kids hang out) However if your doing business to business marketing or even looking to connect with people in specific industries its worth getting onto – its company marketing is terrible you will have to use your winning personality and business contacts.
• Pinterest & Instagram – personally I’m a pintrest person if your product is visual, pretty and desirable it will go well here. I call it cloud based scrapbooking and who wouldn’t want to be collected and part of that. Instagram on the other hand is good for constant visual updates.
• youtube – if your content is or can be explained in a video its a fine idea. People respond to videos more than plain text or static images.
• Others -there are so many theses days its hard to keep track off however a small social network thats user specific may well be worth investing some time into.

3) Connect and Engage !
Please, please don’t just blast out boring repetitious sales pitches learn to give this is not TV or media advertising. you’ll be judged on your form (the grace in which you do things in the world – so play nice and DONT SHOUT :{ ) and your content. While there’s nothing wrong with reposting stories about kittens it may not be in your best interest unless your business has some connection to kittens and  I strongly advise against stories about exploding kittens (I had to say that to a real client..).

Beyond that a plan is actually a good idea – you can talk to me about formulating a social network marketing plan personally I like to make a study of your competition and see how you can do better