10 Social Media Tips for Small Business

Small Business Owners, SMB and Entrepreneurs are always juggling their time and resources managing, running and growing their business.  

Social Media Marketing requires extra time, resources and expertise... owners may end up spending 4 to 6 hours a week to manage their social media activities*. The benefits of effective social media are tangible... consistent online exposure, increased website traffic, sharing of knowledge, better lead generation, improved search ranking (SEO), direct customer feedback and service, and engagement with customers. Social media is not a one shot approach though, and it takes patience, persistence and passion to realize some of these benefits. 

oGoing founder & CEO Sanjay Dalal presents 10 Social Media Tips for Small Business:

1. Create a social media plan 

Many owners think social media means creating a new account and sharing couple of updates... Worse yet, they do the same thing on multiple social media channels and expect the same results. "If you build it, they will come!" Not quite. Social media is not a field of dreams on auto-pilot. When owners don't get any traction, they give up quickly thinking that social media doesn't work. The reality is that they did not establish a real plan. What were the reasons they started with social media? How does social media marketing align with the overall company or marketing mission? Social media is not an end all, be all for marketing. It has its place. Owners and executives need to create a strategic plan that includes a mission and vision, objectives and goals, execution, analysis and reporting.

2. Outline specific goals

What are the specific measurable goals after three, six or nine months using social media? For instance, by using social media, would the business create 50 new connections resulting in 20 prospects and 10 leads? Would it allow the organization to offer direct customer service to 50 customers each month wherein representatives will resolve customer problems and answer questions? Can social media help generate 100 new visitors to the company's website? By using social media consistently, would the Search Engine ranking of the company website improve from page 5 to page 3 on Google? When the organization distributes and shares news, white papers, blog posts and articles through their social media channels, would their readership increase by 500 new readers? All these are examples of specific goals marketers and leaders could establish to measure the impact of their social media effort.

3. Identify the stakeholders

Who will be doing social media for the business? This is an important question. Many a times, the owner does social media himself or herself (this can get pretty expensive since owners are now taking time away from their work), or asks a family member to do social media for them (frequently, it's a niece, nephew, son or daughter). Some businesses are hiring interns to do social media. When an owner, family member, or an inexperienced intern does social media marketing, the results may not meet the expectations owing to lack of experience, time and management.  Better yet, few businesses are able to have a marketing lead or service manager help them with social media. When a business hires a part-time employee or dedicated consultant to conduct social media activities, the costs can drive up. Hence, the manager needs to project the ROI on their social media activities. If social media can deliver the results versus the aforementioned goals, the business can make an informed investment in hiring additional resources for social media.

4. Allocate weekly time for social media

Consistency is the name of the game when it comes to social media. Time and Frequency of posting updates is crucial. When is the best time to post that tweet on Twitter? It depends on when your customers are on Twitter. Since most users follow few hundred to few thousand users on Twitter, for a company to make any impact, they must share updates frequently, at least a few times daily. What about Facebook? Evenings is when the prospects are logged in, and you may get the most attention if you post an update in the early evening. Frequently checking what's going on by researching and analyzing matters. Keeping an eye on trends and alerts relevant to your business matters. Seeing what your customers are doing and saying matters. Interacting regularly and having conversations with your customers matters. Social media requires considerable time. And most business owners don't have that extra time! Business owners must find at least two hours weekly if they are going to get serious with social media, and expect any kind of results from their efforts. If owners don't have the time, it's best to have someone manage their social media.Rule of thumb: At least two hours a week per social media channel!

5. Start with one or two social media channels

Why just start with one or two social media channels? There are two key reasons: Each channel takes time to manage. Each channel takes time to fruition. When a business starts with too many channels at once, they are not able to engage effectively with potential customers on any channel. Think of each channel as a target market. When there are too many target markets, a business loses its marketing focus. Marketing requires strategy, focus and execution. What is the most effective social media channel to begin your conversation? If a business is hunting for professionals, LinkedIn is a great bet. When a business is engaging with consumers and establishing a brand, Facebook makes sense. If a business is looking to provide customer service and share articles, Twitter is a good place. When a business wants to connect with technology professionals and improve their search ranking, Google+ is must-have. When a business wants to create a viral presence through video marketing, YouTube, Hulu and Vimeo are great platforms. Pinterest and Instagram are great for sharing visuals and connecting with women. If a company wants to connect with thousands of small business service providers, owners and entrepreneurs, improve search ranking, and generate B2B leads, oGoing is a great small business social network.

6. Find and know your customers, influencers and partners

Now that a business has created its social media presence on one or more social networks, the next step is to find what's going on! What are some great ways to do this? Set up custom alerts for specific terms pertaining to the company's customers, industry, influencers, and trends. Create custom searches on the social networks by keywords, customers, and also the competition. Save these custom searches. Check the results of these search daily so that the company can stay abreast of the trends and is proactive in dealing with them. Search for customers by their names and see what they are sharing and doing on the social networks. The more a business listens and learns about their customers, prospects and partners, the more knowledgeable and able it becomes in serving them and growing their social media presence. Many companies are not aware of the role of influencers in social media - these are well-known industry experts, speakers, leaders who have a huge following. Connecting with these influencers, promoting their updates, responding to their questions, and occasionally asking them to share your updates would go a long way toward establishing credibility and strong brand.

7. Connect, engage and promote your customers

Once a business finds and knows who their customers are on the key social networks, it should begin connecting with them, albeit slowly. Resist the temptation to connect with a lot of customers quickly. Many marketers will make you believe that when a business connects with many customers, few of these customers will follow back, and this helps grow the number of followers or fans. The idea is to repeat this process over and over again, and keep on gaining new followers (and dropping the connections who don't follow back). Although this approach may work in the beginning, very soon the business would realize that they end up following thousands to tens of thousands of contacts (and in some cases hundreds of thousands), and now, it becomes almost impossible to keep up with what's going on. Some social networks may restrict the business from making new connections, and even add the business to the spam list. Finally, those customers who the business may stop following (because they did not follow back) wouldn't be thrilled by the experience. Following a company is not the only form of engagement. A business can engage with customers and prospects without even following them... by promoting their updates, by sharing what they are saying, by mentioning them frequently, by replying to their questions, by asking them questions, by inviting them to events, by asking them for feedback or by sending them a direct message. Frequently engaging with customers and frequently promoting what they share ultimately leads to better customer satisfaction and higher sales down the road.

8. Ask questions, share insights, tips and best practices

When it comes to sharing content, many small businesses grapple with a few questions: "What to share on social networks? What not to share on social networks? Who will create the content? When to share the content? How to track how many folks are reading?" Numerous studies have shown that when a business asks questions in their updates, the percentage of responses go up. Even when a business wants to share a tip or best practice, the engagement is higher when the update is posted as a question. The more questions posted by a business, the higher the customer interactions. The company must always be mindful that whatever is being shared on social media channels becomes public information. Everyone is reading the posts... customers, prospects, partners, competitors, employees, et al. Many businesses have paid the price of sharing something hurriedly only to realize later on that they shouldn't have said this at all. What a business says or doesn't say matters a lot in public. The key to social media success is to keep the posts real, conversations authentic, content fresh, and the tone enthusiastic and funny. This drives more people to connect with the company in the long term. Many companies post the same offers, and promotional messages about their products and services again and again. This is equivalent to social media spamming and is a quick way to detract followers, and not attract them. Customers are always yearning for more information that increases their knowledge, make better decisions and do better business. Can the company provide that information frequently?

9. Become The subject matter expert, i.e. The authority

This the holy grail of social media. Can the company become The subject matter expert, i.e. The authority for a particular domain of knowledge. For instance, a business providing human resources or workforce management solutions for a particular industry becomes the sought-after social media expert for resources, best practices, tips and more. Customers seek out this company's updates, favorite them, add the profile to lists or groups, and share, respond and mention them. Very few companies and very few professionals achieve this ultimate expert status in the world of business. These experts have tens of thousands of followers, in most cases even more. These experts share many common traits - they are real, successful, inspiring, edgy, passionate and love sharing their knowledge. They are also known as influencers. How can a small business become an authority? By first connecting with the target market, following through the above tips, growing their social media brand, and then staying the course.

10. Analyze, repeat and modify the plan as needed

Did the company realize the aforementioned social media goals? If the company followed through on the nine success tips above, it should achieve most of the said objectives. How does one achieve all the goals? It's quite simple: Do more of what's working. Correct what's not. Be nimble! Social media is a fast-changing paradigm. There are many tools available in the market place for social media analytics, reporting and management. Companies should leverage these tools to make their tasks efficient and measure the success of various programs. It pays to be creative, and if a business has to start all over again, that's fine! The best barometer for success: Is the company attracting more customers, and are the customers engaged?

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Many small business owners, entrepreneurs and SMB need help managing their social media. The experts at oGoing have created a highly affordable social media marketing program for small business for only $39 monthly (including a free 30 day trial). Learn more about the oGoing Social Media Marketing Pro Service and sign up today!

Contact oGoing team if you have any questions.

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