1) See Who is Tweeting About You
Many people I talk with have heard about Twitter, but don’t want to set up a Twitter account until they know what they’ll do with it. Twazzup.com is an easy way to see how your competitors and customers are using Twitter. It searches Twitter and shows you the most popular stories on your topic and displays the Twitter users who Tweet the most on your subject.
Next, go ahead and set up a Twitter account or two. You’ll want to set up an account with your company name so someone else doesn’t use it to damage your reputation. And, set up one with your own real name. Use these for business-related activity. For these accounts, only follow other Twitter users that talk on Twitter about your business or industry. You may also wish to set up an account under a nickname with a corresponding Yahoo or Gmail email account so you can practice following people and Tweet anonymously until you get the hang of it.
2) Setup a Facebook Fan Page for Your Company
Do a search on Facebook for company or product names you’re familiar with and see how they’re using it to market to their customers.
Bowen Furniture is a retailer in North Carolina with 348 Facebook fans. They continually update their page to include videos, photos, promotions and they link to their WordPress blog for more in-depth articles. Each time they post an update to Facebook, their 348 fans are alerted — for FREE.
A regional restaurant chain, Yat’s, uses Facebook to get feedback from its customers and drive traffic to their restaurants on slow days.
Every time one of your satisfied customers becomes your Facebook fan, their friends view it as a testimonial.
3) Don’t Mix Business with Pleasure
Exposing parts of your personal life with your customers, colleagues or clients helps give you a bond outside of your normal business relationship. But, you probably don’t want them seeing all of your photos and they certainly don’t care what you had for breakfast this morning.
In Facebook, you can add your business associates in a Professional friends list and then use Facebook’s privacy settings to set permissions for what content your professional friends can see. That way, when your old college friends tag you in frat party photos, your professional friends won’t see them.
4) Setup a YouTube Channel
Get a Flip Video Camera and start making your own videos and upload them to YouTube. Post your TV commercials, too. Then, link to them from your Twitter, Facebook and Linked In Accounts. And, embed them in your blog. Do a search on YouTube for furniture and you’ll see how The Red House in North Carolina has become an Internet sensation with their latest TV commercial.
5) Become a SMUG Member
Social Media University, Global is a free, online institution of higher learning focusing on Social Media. With its continually updated curriculum, you’ll quickly become comfortable using social media in your marketing mix. This makes it sound very official, but it’s actually a learn-as-you-have-time group with many quick-read “how-to” primers.