Website Design and SEO Blog by Malcom Chakery

By now, you have likely realized that one of the best ways to give exposure to your company, without investing huge amounts of money in advertising, is social media. So, if you have taken the plunge and had a custom Facebook or Twitter design created, you now want to utilize it to the fullest potential. Recently, Mashable.com offered some tips for marketing your business through social media sites. Here is a recap of some  their ideas:

1. Show your human side. Be sure that comments and tweets sound like they come from a real person, not just some computer generated info. Have someone (perhaps a team of people) whose job is to keep post fresh an interesting. In addition, don’t stress out if there is a typo or misspelled name on the page. Simply post a note saying “Oops” and correct the error. This lets others know you are human. J

2. Have goal or focus group that you want to reach with your social media site. Thinking about this before you begin interacting online will save time in the long run and help build your brand as well.

3. Interact-Listen and respond to what your fans and followers are saying. Be sure to respond to questions and comments. This is a great way to let people know they are important to you. Also, it will allow you to deal with any negative situations before they result in a lack of business.

Have good content.  Don’t just focus on interacting with your fan base, provide them with something interesting to look at, read, listen to, etc. Consider using polls to find out what your followers are thinking about or are looking for.

Be sure you understand the differences in platforms. Twitter is best for basic customer inquiries, saying thanks, brand updates and basic conversational dialogue. Facebook is more like a community and is great for announcements. For many businesses, Twitter allows for more conversation than Facebook, which is why you see so many businesses, television programs and celebrities using it.

So, be social and build your business online. Whether you do all the communication yourself or have a team do the social media for you, you will be amazed at how something so relatively simple can make such a big difference in promoting your company.

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