Source: Core Impact Consulting

1. What is Social Media Marketing for Businesses?

Social Media Marketing for Businesses is the application and use of Social Media tools such as Blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook etc. to market ones business. It is connecting with clients, customers and users on a personal, yet professional level and allowing them to have direct access to your “voice”. Social Media Marketing business application is to make “Connections” and not just “Transactions!”

2. What is the business application for Facebook, Twitter, and/or Linked In?

There are over 400 Million users of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. It is safe to say that a portion of your target market are on one or all of these tools right now. Facebook has the largest following and is entrenched as the number one social media tool in the market place. Your business needs a Facebook page because that is where you customers are going and trust to gain and share information. Twitter is the newest tool utilizing micro-blogging. Twitter is the fastest growing social media marketing tool and is the quickest way to gain access to what your customers are talking about right now. LinkedIn is the professional’s social media marketing tool, with bios looking more like resumes and the purpose is to connect with companies and peers within the same industries. It has become common practice for law firms, banks, etc. to have business LinkedIn pages, linking to their officers and employees.

3. What is the number one challenge faced with a business website?

The number one challenge that business owners with a traditional website face is that the content is static. Meaning it’s not easily updated or changeable. You must contact your web developer to make any changes and those changes will not only take time, but they will inevitably cost money. Thus, this creates rather large barriers in order for you to have consistently updated content.

4. What is the number one challenge faced with a Business Blog?

There are two very difficult challenges to overcome with a business blog. The first is overcoming the impulse to market, market, market as you would on your website or with a advertisement in a newspaper. People do not want to see that on a blog, whether it is for a business or not. They are their to connect, get answers, and leave comments. For a business blog, it is difficult to grasp this new concept, “the purpose of your business blog is to have conversations with your target market about your business, your interest and theirs just as if you were sitting down and having a cup of coffee with them”. The second challenge with a business blog is sticking with it and posting new articles each week. The posts themselves are very easy once you realize that throughout each work day, you could write over a dozen blog posts about the daily occurrences, questions that you are asked or experiences that happen. But you have to stick with it. People will constantly revisit your blog if you have new posts. If the site remains stagnate, you will loose your readership. This has always been the number one flaw of standard static websites, and can easily become the flaw of your blog if you simply let it stay idle.

5. Why do I need Twitter?

There are several reasons why you need twitter, here are a few 1.) It’s free and its use is unlimited. 2.) The updates are real time and thus people receive information immediately 3.) You are the voice of the messages so the information is reliable and trustworthy.

6. Blogs have been around for years, what makes them so necessary now?

Blogs are becoming more and more necessary because the internet has shifted from being a “content consumer” driven world to a “content produced” driven world. Anyone has the opportunity to have a blog up in a manner of minutes and produce content for the whole world to see. This is also where the content shifts from being static to being dynamic and you are able to change all of your content in a manner of minutes without having a web developer do it for you and with no costs.

7. If I start using social media will my privacy be compromised?

Yes and no. You are in control of what you put out there. If you don’t use discretion in what personal information you post then yes your privacy can be compromised. However, if you use discretion and you block your private information from the public there is virtually no risk involved.

8. I am just getting started with my business, do I need to integrate social media into my marketing plan or should I wait?

You should start integrating it now! It doesn’t matter if your business is 10 years old or 10 days old, getting started with this new form of marketing will only position your business for better growth. In fact, Social Media Marketing allows most new businesses the ability to grow with very little costs in comparison to traditional marketing which has high fees and often little results.

9. What’s the purpose of having a blog if I already have a successful website?

There are many reasons for creating a blog, even if you already have a successful website. The first would be to voice your “expertise” in the field that your business is in. Managing a business blog allows people to read about your knowledge and opinion, thus validating your experience and having better trust in the business as a whole. Another reason is it inadvertently increases your search engine optimization. There really isn’t a reason to not have a business blog.

10. I don’t want to participate in social media marketing. If I don’t will it eventually hurt my business?

It’s hard to say right now, but as each month passes Social Media Marketing continues to grow and remains a strong part of the internet and business world. However, we can say that the internet has been forever changed and if you don’t eventually adapt to having dynamic, easily update-able information on the internet then over time you will lose business.