1. Know why? – Why are
you in business? When you first started what was your passion, what made you
decide to set up the business you have – what difference did you want to make
to those who use your services? – Starting here is a great way of re-assessing
every aspect of your sales & marketing strategy, this will be important
when it comes to communicating, via social media, who you are and what you do.
2. What outcomes
do you deliver? – Many
businesses make the mistake of only listing on their websites what they do and
how they do it. Clients are much less interested in these factors; rather they
want to know if you can solve their problems or help them achieve their
business objectives. Does your LinkedIn profile communicate this well?
3. Who is your
audience? - Is it time to reassess who your clients are? Are there some who are
more profitable for your business, who are easier to deal with and should you
be searching for more of these types of clients? Social media sites, such as
LinkedIn and Twitter provide free tools to enable you to locate and engage with
thousands of potential new clients – you just need to learn how to make best
use of these tools.
4. What is your
story? – Marketing has changed – the focus now is on building relationships,
not driving transactions. Potential clients want to know more about you, your
beliefs, attitudes, values, how you’ve helped others similar to them to achieve
success – they want to like you and above all trust you. Your job is to share
content via social media that has heart, real stories about real people – your
clients, your employees maybe? – social media content needs to engage at a
human level, it’s not simply about sharing corporate sales messages, no one
believes these any more. Establish a connection first and clients will buy, you
will rarely have to sell to them.
5. It’s not just
about posting – There is a misconception that if you post
sufficient information via LinkedIn status updates, in groups, on Twitter,
Google+ and Facebook that eventually you’ll attract plenty of new business and
yes, you will attract some. However, if you’re not prepared to engage in
dialogue with those who view your profile or respond to your posts – if you’re
not prepared to engage in discussion forums and Twitter conversations then
you’re not being ‘social‘. Engagement is
the key to building relationships.
6. Create
content that engages – Content is definitely
king – when it comes to social media and websites Google takes specific notice
of those sites that share great content and that are linked to other sites that
share great content. Your job is to create or curate great content (sounds
simple doesn’t it?). What is great content? It’s content that your clients want
to read, not what you think they should read. Consider sharing industry trends
and updates that are relevant to your clients, be an indispensable resource to
them. Share positive stories where you have had an influence in helping other
similar businesses – be cautious of being too overtly sales biased though.
7. Don’t forget
the sales element - In the end though, there
is no point making all these connections and attracting many followers and
likes -sharing wonderfully useful content with them, if they are not going to
visit your website or enquire about your services further – you must put your
sales hat on. For example, use Google Analytics to assess which of
your website pages visitors land on most frequently and make sure that your
social media content includes a link, every time, to these pages. When they
land on your page, do you have a capture mechanism, clearly identified, where
the visitor can sign up to your newsletter or special offer, so you capture
their data? You must consider and include an end-game as far as your social
media plans are concerned.
