Expert Tips for Your 2013 Social Marketing

There are many calling themselves social media experts these days and I have to say that’s their opinion. I however am happy to give you some top tips from some top social marketing experts I do respect.

First things first:

Randi Zuckerburg – “Customise your page. This should be the first thing a company does after having created their Page. Tab differentiation and a clear brand message represents good Page customisation. Make your users get to your Page and go, “Ah ha! I know exactly what this brand is.”

Jason Falls – “Every Bit of me networking as been targeted and purposeful.”

Mari Smith – “I have never been aggressive in pursuing followers, but I am proactive. I share all manner of photos from my various travels and engage people in the activities of my life.”

Pam Moore – “I don’t like to focus on one network over another. Instead I like to focus on an integrated strategy that leverages content to connect with audiences with a goal of meeting both life and business objectives.”

Annie Infinite – “Start with the end in mind and work forward from there. Know why you are setting up a social marketing strategy and what you want to achieve and then plan the look, feel and engagement from that place.”

Social Engagement:

Randi Zuckerburg – “Great ideas for engagement are seen on many of the best Pages and they include using your Facebook (any social media) to get immediate feedback, feature your fans, use video and images, use what you have to create interest,”

Mari Smith – “Experiment with posting outside of business hours. So experiment with posting during early morning periods (4 am-7 am ET), late evenings (10 pm-12 am ET) and on weekends. Thentrack what type of response you get. Don’t just try it one time and stop; mix it up each week. For example, let’s say you currently post on your fan page twice a day—make one post during business hours and the other post either early morning or late evening.”

PJ Jonas – “Involve your fans in your product launches. As close to the product launch as possible, ask your fans for their input.  Create a sense of urgency by sharing that you are making a final decision shortly and need their input now.  If appropriate, include photos of the possible choices. When you launch the product, thank them for their input and share what you decided on.”

Chris Brogan – “Share information that benefits your reads, but builds your brand, too.  Add media such as ebooks, videos, images and reports to add interest and provide value for your fans. Aim for an on-topic/off-topic ratio of 80/20 to keep your content mix interesting. ”

Mari Smith – ““To provide additional value and fresh ways for your fans to interact with you, periodically conduct live chat sessions or live webinars or teleseminars.

Erik Qualman - “Don’t try to build your personal brand or company brand alone. Go out of your way to look for opportunities to help others and give others credit. This may seem like a lot of work in the short term, but it pays off in the long run. Plus, it’s the right thing to do.”

Holly Thomasas - “All too often, businesses overlook the ‘social’ part of the phrase social media marketing and jump straight into the ‘marketing’ part… to their detriment. They forget that social media is dominated by a community of people who have expectations of the various social networks to which they belong. Very often, these expectations do not include having marketing messages jammed down their throats.”

Brian Solis - “Every business case is different. Your customers’ needs are different. Use a tool such as Research.ly to learn more about what your customers and prospects are saying, looking for and sharing. It’s here where you will find the insights necessary to inspire a campaign that’s relevant and meaningful.”

Mike Selztner – “Write in simple, consumable language, just as you’d speak—not like you’re writing a high school essay. ”

Annie Infinite - “I find authenticity and informality and real and interesting conversations on my page create loads of feedback and interaction. I ask real questions or pose real scenarios, thank my fans for their input and engagement after all it’s just like chatting over coffee with friends isn’t it?”

Monetising your Social Marketing:

Gary Vaynerchuk - when asked, “How do you monetize social media?” His answer: the same way you monetize any other media. Vaynerchuk says that from newspapers to magazines, to blogs and commercials, advertising has been the backbone of social media monetization. However, he points out that you shouldn’t even be thinking about monetization until you’ve built up traffic and brand awareness.

Amy Jo Martin – “Social media branding must be focused on people. Humanize your brandis the golden rule of social media, because humans connect with humans, not logos. Traditional marketing has always approached branding as a way to control the message. Certainly the executives who are asked to share themselves and their personalities through social media struggle becoming comfortable with this (except maybe Shaq). But it’s crucial for a brand to provide access to its personalities in some capacity because logos have zero ability to socialize. Controlled messages are distrusted in a world where social media can expose them so quickly. Revealing the people behind your brand builds trust. Trust is the first step to building loyalty.”

Annie Infinite – I have included this segment merely because this is a question that is asked over and over again, however any marketer will tell you that you cannot and should not try to ‘monetise your social media’, social media is only a part of your social marketing campaign which should be an ongoing, evolving, growing and open ended conversation about and around your brand, products, services and vision. All marketing these days is social, or at least should be!

Mari Smith – Mari never talks about monetising social media and in this I tend to agree, we monetise our brand see this slideshow presentation for more…