If the specifics of fans, following, and friending are all a mystery to you, CrowdTamers is your go-to resource. Different businesses need different presences, and should be active on different sites. Whether you want someone to come in and speak briefly to your sales team on how social media can create revenue or you need a person to create a complete social media plan and presence, we can help you out. All of that said, here are a few quick tips for you, based upon business type:

• Just about everyone:
  • Get a Twitter account or a Facebook fan page at a minimum. In general, CrowdTamers advises that B2C organizations get Twitter pages, and B2B businesses get a Facebook page.  Look at this brief “Social Media Workout” for an idea how you can use Twitter or Facebook without putting hours of effort every day into it.
  • Move your site into a CMS like WordPress or Joomla. Websites shouldn’t be static things any more, so you need to pick tools that make it easy for you to manage the content you post online. I’m a fan of WordPress, but you can pick whatever suits you.
  • Get a blog. I know, everyone says that. But if you get a blog and write an article every week, at the end of a year you will have 52 pages of content on your site with keywords, information, and links galore! It’s the best way to keep your site fresh and relevant.
  • Reach out to local bloggers. They want to hear from you. Find something fun, different, or outrageous that your business does, and then search for bloggers in the area who might be inclined to write about it and let them know, via a comment or an email, what you’re up to.
• Retail / Consumer Oriented Business
  • Get on the local review sites in your area. Yelp.com, Foursquare, or whatever specialist review site your industry uses, make sure that you not only have a presence there, but also that you keep up to date the reviews / comments / customer social media that is posted to your profile. You want to know what people online are saying about you, because that can make a tremendous difference in your foot traffic.
  • Use your social media channels to publicize deals. CrowdTamers always emphasizes to our clients that marketing through social media is really a lot more like PR in traditional media. You can’t compel attention like you can via interruption-based marketing (such as TV, radio, and print ads); you have to court it instead. Make offers through social media that interest your followers so that they keep looking for your messages.
• Professional Businesses
  • Show your knowledge. Groups such as lawyers, doctors, accountants, and so forth have limits on what they can say via social media.  Blogs and social channels such as LinkedIn are still remarkable opportunities for these organizations to demonstrate thought leadership and develop links, SEO, and reputation. While carefully respecting the requirements of your profession, CrowdTamers encourages you to use longer forms of social media discussions, such as LinkedIn Answers, blog posts, and podcasts to explore issues that will interest your potential audience.
  • Post videos or podcasts. Many professional businesses aren’t making full use of rich media yet. Posting a regular video series or podcast that is filled with information is an easy way to “punch above your weight” and take on organizations that have much larger advertising and SEO budgets.
• B2B Organizations
  • Tell your story. Use your social media to establish expertise in your field and what it is that you do that makes you better or different than anyone else.  If you make widgets, document how the process happens. Confidently showing your process to potential customers will impress them with your openness, and likely help answer questions that they didn’t even know that they had.
  • Participate. There’s discussion happening online–right now!–where someone’s talking about a need that you could fulfill. Get a service like Google Alerts and Seesmic Desktop and use them to track the ebb and flow of online conversations that you need to hear. Then, participate in the conversations and get your name and brand out there!

This is the barest sketch of a primer. There’s only so much one can do in 800 words. If you have any more questions, call us at 407.374.9079 or email us at tlongino@crowdtamers.com

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