Seven Tips to Extend Social Media Marketing Efforts

As a small or medium-sized business, it's important to think about how to extend your social media efforts and to integrate these initiatives into your ongoing marketing plans. (For more information on developing an online marketing strategy, click here.) Here are seven tips to help you:

1. Listen before you participate. While social media can help small and medium-sized businesses appear bigger than they are, it's critical not to promote, promote, promote.

2. Monitor what's being said about your business. This includes a variety of social media offerings including blogs, review sites like Yelp and niche communities, and discussion groups.

3. Integrate social media efforts offline. Provide retail prospects with a similar experience through an old-fashioned bulletin board with photographs or handouts containing how-to information.

4. Promote social media efforts online and offline. Include your Web site, e-mailings, direct mail, local advertising, in-store postings, flyers, business cards, and correspondence.

5. Socialize social media marketing. Ask visitors, prospects, and customers to visit your social media installations and share their experiences. Don't overlook traditional ways to extend your business such as local events like Rotary and local sports teams such as Little League.

6. Create a content strategy. (For additional insights on content strategy, click here.) Develop an editorial calendar for content creation to ensure that you don't get stuck thinking of what to write, especially when using Twitter and blogs where customers expect regular servings of information.

7. Make content search-friendly. Use relevant search keywords and tags and add text to photographs and video to aid findability.

Nick Nicholls
www.InternetMarketingBestPractices.net

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