How to Better Use Social Media For Business
Each of these networks has its own special strengths and purposes. Choose the ones that are right for you and fit how much time you have.
As in life, it is better to be positive than negative. Be full of generosity when you see things that you like.
Still the gorilla of social media, Facebook has a considerable user base globally. That may be the understatement of the century. According to an Evan Osnos article in The New Yorker, the user base is not only unprecedented in the history of American enterprise, but the 2.2 billion people who log in at least once a month is equivalent in size to Christianity. The article also claims that its precision advertising model, “earns Facebook for ad revenue in a year than all American newspapers combined.”
In Australia, a whopping proportion of us are active users. When you cut out the very young and the very old, you can appreciate the numbers. If there is one place you are going to be, it should be Facebook, no matter what kind of business you are in.
Facebook TIPS:
- The more interactions your post gets, the more people will see it
- Use Facebook Insights to see who is engaging and what posts are popular (or not)
- If you have images online to share, link to the URL (except for video)
- Interact with other pages
- Upload video here natively. Facebook competes with Google, which owns YouTube
Anti-Facebook?
If you dislike Facebook, for whatever reason, you might be interested in Minds.
Minds is a social network that currently has 200,000 monthly users and is growing fast. It boasts an easy-to-use interface and regular engagement tools. It allows users to earn ‘tokens’ for their time on site and engagement.
Twitter is used by journalists everywhere, bloggers, opinion leaders, politicians, et al. It is perfect for making quick connections and finding people with specific interests. Permissions, opt-outs, and the SPAM and CANSPAM and various national email legislation don’t apply, which makes it very easy and fast to form new contacts. Also effective as a customer service tool or to announce important breaking events such as service interruptions that will affect people.
Twitter Tips:
- Twitter is excellent as a Search tool (you don’t even need to post). You can find events and popular #hashtags for your industry
- By all means, piggyback off national and State event/awareness days. They have well-publicised event #hashtags for relevant conversations you can segue into
- Try to get noticed/retweeted by the key influencers in your area
- Repeat your tweets 2 or 3 times, spreading them a few hours apart
- Add a few images for each tweet
Google+ No More
Well, Google Plus would have been my next recommendation. But Google killed it off this September 2018 after a large data breach with its API.
These are more personal and visual accounts and about sharing slices of life. For a business, it’s best to have a personal angle by enlisting someone to make the updates based on their experiences at work (staff/CEO/whoever). Lufthansa, for example, uses pilot photos of places through the cockpit window.
Instagram Tips:
- Remember, companies don’t Instagram, people Instagram.
- Use 5 to 10-word captions for images
- Use hashtags
- Look at what’s popular
This is the network for the highest quality content. Allows you to position yourself for competence and expertise.
LinkedIn Tips:
- Posts can be 500 to 1,000 words
- Integrate Slideshare for your presentations
- Integrate issuu for your reports and booklets
- Customise the ‘connection’ request
- Get staff to share them on their profiles so they show up to a proper audience size.
- Participate in Groups (if you can find a relevant group to you).
This is a very aesthetic network.
Pinterest Tips:
- Pin professional photos.
- No hashtags
Integrate Blogging and Social Media
Almost everyone seems to be doing this now, but this is the recipe I think works best.
- After writing your post, get a quality image from a stock site like https://www.pexels.com/pexels that is royalty free.
- Have social share buttons (to everything) on every blog post.
- Send multiple Tweets (at least 3) linking to your article.
- Add a photo and link to your Facebook Page.
- If it is super newsworthy, submit a version to a media release distribution agency like MediaNet.
- Publish on Medium through ‘Import Story’.
- Create a 500 words synopsis and publish on LinkedIn and Google+.
- Turn your bullet point articles into slideshows with Slideshare.
- Turn your SlideShare presentations into videos for YouTube.
- Email your list a heads-up with the link.
- If you still have time, do some Guest Blogging for other sites.
Summary
I hope that gives you a great toolkit. Remember, you have limited time and resources, so pick what you can achieve and schedule in some time each week for your social media.
Photo by picjumbo.com from Pexels
