Each month, IdeaMarketers.com is hosting panel discussions with our team of experts on various
topics. Last night's discussion was "How to Use
Social Media to Build Your Business." Visibility, online marketing and
article marketing experts joined the call to discuss ways they have used
LinkedIn, MySpace, Facebook and Ning to build their businesses. The call was
recorded and is available for you to listen to at http://www.ideamarketers.com/experts/calls/socialmedia.cfm
The experts defined social media and explained why it's so popular. For
example, our exclusive visibility
expert, Nancy Marmolejo says, "When you have a social networking page it's
like this wonderful at-a-glance view of who you are and what you're doing as
opposed to somebody going to your web site where they have to click around, look
at your blog, and other information. You can go to somebody's MySpace, LinkedIn,
or Facebook page and get this at-a-glance idea of who they are, who they
associate with, who they consider important, and what they think about x, y and
z. I think for our attention deficit society, it's like shopping at Target. You
can walk in and get underwear, a hammer, a greeting card and a couch. Social
networking pages are very similar to that. It's everything under one roof, and I
think that's because it came from the younger generation and that's how they
operate. They don't really want to sit around and click to all these various
pages. They want it all right there. That's one of its most attractive points.
It's easy to 'get it.' The minute you see it you say, 'ok, I get who this person
is. I understand what this company is about.'"
Also discussed on the call were examples of how social media has increased
the experts' revenues. Michele PW, the official online
marketing and advertising, gave this example, "Just after starting I was
contacted by three different people to do teleclasses which resulted in sales.
Not only have I connected with new people, but also I've reconnected with two
people that I met several years ago. One of them bought one of my products and
the other one became a client. It's about more than meeting new people. It's
being able to reconnect with people you haven't seen in years."
Topics such as proper etiquette were also discussed, Jeff Herring, the
official article
marketing expert, gave this advice, "One of the things you see often is
someone joins a social media site and then immediately begins to sell and
market. At the very least this is going to turn everybody off, and on some sites
it will get you booted out right away. So go slow. Network, connect with people,
have discussions, join in the party before you begin to sell. Think long term.
You're going to be a presence on these sites for a long time. So you don't have
to jump in right away. Spend a month getting known, answering questions, and
developing a following and a connection before you begin to market
yourself."
In summary, Jeff Herring suggests, "Step 1: Get started. Step 2: Pick one
site to get involved with and build it out. Get it to where it's basically
managing itself. Step 3: Pick another one and do the same thing again."
To listen to the recorded call, go to here . On this page you may also enroll to receive updates on other informative calls with official IdeaMarketers.com experts.
Comments