How To Take Advantage Of The Rise Of Social Media

Social media is an important part of today's digital landscape and plays a major role in both our personal and working lives. You are more than likely familiar with Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and LinkedIn and probably wonder how you ever managed before these arrived on the scene.

Rise of Social Media

There has been a rapid increase in personal use of social media but business too is getting in on the act. Many companies are making full use of social media technologies in order to contact potential customers with the aim of building long term relationships. They have recognised the importance of harnessing this technology to deliver their goods or services to their target audience.

Social media is about communication and collaboration. Now, bear in mind that many people expect a business to not only have its own website but to have some form of social media as well. It doesn't matter whether it's Facebook, Twitter or StumbleUpon, all that matters is that you have a presence and are open to dialogue with others.

Develop a social media plan

If you are looking to implement social media as part of your overall marketing strategy then think about how you will do this. There is no point doing it half heartedly or even worse, just hitting and hoping. You need to have a plan.

There are two issues to consider: - How you will engage with customers - How you will measure this engagement

So, you need to think about what social media tool works best for your business and how you will measure the success (or failure) of that tool. For instance, you may find that microblogging, e.g. Twitter feeds gives the best results in terms of increased visitors to your website.

Alternately, a business page on a social networking site such as Facebook may be your best option. What about a blog such as WordPress? Or consider having video clips on YouTube which demonstrate how your products or services work. These are all options to consider.

Monitor a social media plan

Once you have your strategy in place it is important that you monitor it on a regular basis to see what works and what doesn't. This is very much an ongoing process in which you will have to make changes or discard tools which are not giving you the results you need.

This means identifying who your target audience is; find out what they want from forums; creating content which is aimed at them and their needs; ensuring that they comment and share this with others via bookmarking and develop a reputation for being a top quality resource.

The aim is for you to increase the number of incoming links from other sites as well as converting interested visitors into customers. If you get this right then expect to see an upsurge in visitors to your website which will hopefully translate into happy customers.

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