The advent of the Internet 15 years ago, as a communications platform, turned the marketing and communications field upside down and twisted it sideways. The evolution of Social Media continues to present unprecedented opportunity to directly communicate one-to-one with your target audiences.
Nothing new. Organizations and agencies alike are realigning staffs and budgets to leverage Social Media as part of their marketing communications, promotional and public relations efforts.
In fact, social media and blogs are the most rapidly expanding portions of marketing budgets. Social media is a growing marketing powerhouse from both a brand awareness and lead generation perspective.
Amidst the rush to build a social media presence, many organizations are simply using social media as one more distribution point for their news and events items. While important, that does not truly harness the real power behind social media.
More than anything, social media is a platform for candid third party endorsements. Simply speaking, referrals…word of mouth marketing…a salesperson’s best friend.
To do it properly, you must have both a workable strategic and tactical execution plan to insure success.
- —what you post is vital. Writing appropriately for your social media platform is essential. Don’t just post your releases. Your content must be social-friendly.
- —Many organizations with social media presences are nothing more than “Social Wall Flowers”. They are there, but they are not engaged. They do not consistently add relevant content that resonates with their followers. Social media success is contingent on your timely commitment.
- —As previously noted under commitment, consistency is paramount. That’s why we note it twice.
- —Know your audience. The number of social media sites on the web would shock you. Right now, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube are the mainstays. Foursquare and GoogleBuzz are growing. Facebook especially, is the rave, but it is primarily a business to consumer medium. If you are a B-to-C company, then Facebook is your forum. If you are a business-to-business entity, your social web is LinkedIn. If you service both, develop presences for both, but steer your content and postings according.
- —Build your following and fans through your integrated marketing communications tactics. Utilize your social media site as part of your call to actions in your traditional marketing endeavors, i.e., ads, collateral. Make your company web pages easy to share. Ask people to follow you in the signature of your email. Also cross promote among your social media platforms. Post a new video on YouTube, share it via FaceBook, Twitter and/or LinkedIn.
Social media is challenging marketing professionals. Don’t be daunted by it. Embrace it. Opportunities abound.
To contact a representative from The Marathon Group to learn more about Social Media programs for your business, call 856.914.0240 or email dwilson@themarathongroup.com.
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Whew.
You survived the recession. Or at least it looks like you will. But if you’re like many small and mid-sized business owners, you’ve focused all your energy for the past two years on just that – surviving. But now things are starting to turn a corner. Maybe the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t a train after all.
Now is the time to prepare your business for the coming recovery. Do you want to limp out into the light? Or do you want to blast out better than you ever were before?
It’s likely that you didn’t think too much about your brand and marketing while you were busy plugging holes in the dike. And if you don’t pay a little attention to how you’re presenting yourself to the world, you’ll miss out on a huge opportunity. And potentially become one of the ones who didn’t survive “The Great Recession”.
At this point, you might be thinking, “Sure, I’d love to spend more on branding and marketing, but the money just isn’t there.” Believe me, we understand. But the good news is that, with the right approach, you can accomplish a great deal even on a limited budget. The trick is to make your investment work extremely hard. Here’s how:
- Know your audience – Do you really know what they’re thinking? What they want and need? Do your products and services deliver above and beyond their expectations? What do they think of you and your organization? Do you need to win them back? Do they even know you exist? Do a little research, question your employees, question your customers, investigate the competition. Your marketing will work harder when it’s informed by rich intelligence.
- Develop a plan – many small and mid-sized businesses use the shotgun method of marketing. A sales rep comes by and convinces you that radio is the way to go. Then someone else sells you on church bulletins. Someone else, on inserts in the local paper. Next thing you know, you don’t really know where all your marketing money has going – much less if it did any good. If you want your money to work harder, put it against a well-conceived marketing plan. Know what you want to say and to whom you want to say it. When you follow a plan, it helps focus your efforts on the tactics and vehicles that will best reach your intended audience.
- Get creative with your tactics – Sometimes traditional media like newspapers, outdoor or radio are exactly what you need. Sometimes an all-interactive approach might make sense. But when you have a small budget, sometimes you have to get creative with your approach. Put your ads on flyers and hand them out. Post them on the bulletin board at the local supermarket. Get out in the community and share your passion and expertise, and then hand out cards or something creative connected to your talk that people can take away as a reminder. Just get out there.
- Get creative with the work – it’s been said that one well-produced, creative ad can do the work of ten bad ones. It makes sense. If your ads are well-designed, creative, engaging, compelling and on-strategy, many more people will actually notice it, and many more of them will be moved. If it’s cluttered with every message you want to communicate and it looks and sounds like everyone else, you’re wasting your money because no one will notice.
There’s not a business owner out there who doesn’t want to succeed. And most of you know that you can’t succeed if no one knows you exist. But that doesn’t mean you need to spend a fortune. You just need to spend smart.
- Ken Gleason
Creative Director
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