Social Media Beginners Guide – The first services I set up for small businesses
This post is a very brief and beginner-focused summary of the first social media services I set up for small businesses; by the end of this post, you will know which are the primary services to set up as a small business with some tips on how to best do this.
Why use social media?
Social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) are tools that should be used by the majority of small businesses.
From personal experience, I know that one of the primary challenges for a small business is marketing, or the ability to tell lots of people about what you do, usually because funds are limited.
Social media is a free avenue for building the audience to whom you wish to communicate with.
I am not going into the ‘in and outs’ here on how to build up your audience in a way that it will translate into additional customers, just the Social Media platforms that I would recommend registering with and just posting on.
It could be said that Hootsuite have a vested interest in pushing Social Media platform but they still make a compelling case with their 23 benefits of Social Media for business.
- Particularly good for businesses that are aimed at the consumer market
- If you have the commitment to regularly post interesting things and make comments and engage in conversations
- If you the commitment to separately market your Facebook page through other marketing methods, such as email marketing etc
- Great for building potential relationships with both businesses and consumers
- If you have the commitment to find and follow related people and businesses which will eventually translate into people following you
- If you have the commitment to regularly post interesting things and engage in conversations
- If you have the commitment to find out people on businesses on Twitter to try and create links with
Linked In
- Great for building online CV’s and profiles of individuals
- Great for building business contacts, finding and connecting with actual people
- Great for online networking with other businesses
Blog
- Great for adding content to your website and showcasing the stuff you know
- If you have the commitment to write at least one decent blog post per week.
- If you have the commitment to comment on other similar blogs to yours and engage in conversation with other bloggers
YouTube
- Videos are great for engaging the visitors to your site
- Great if you have video’s you are looking to post
Tips for setting things up:
As a small business owner, another commodity which we are all very short of is time! I would, therefore, recommend in addition to setting up the following services that you also set up and account with Hootsuite. This is a very easy to use service that enables to you post to Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all at once, plus spreads out the posts during the day so you are not posting loads of stuff all at once.
- Facebook
- Profile image can be a logo, though try and get some pictures of your company and people on there too
- Try to get pictures in your posts with people to give personality to your company
- Remember, to get a following you need to invite people, they will not just come looking for you.
- Twitter
- Picture to be of a person seems to work better than a generic Co profile
- Make your Twitter name relate to a person and their business – e.g. @jonsearchmonkey
- Set up an account with bitly so you can shorten links in your posts
- LinkedIn
- Worth putting a bit of effort into this profile as it’s a bit like an online CV
- Put in a picture of you
- Blog
- Ensure you set up a tool so when you publish a blog post it automatically posts to Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
- Get a tool to block comments spam such as Akismet
There are lots more you can add, but initially, I’d start here.
Only set up what you can maintain
My main message (especially with Facebook, Twitter, and Blogs), would be to only set up what you do actually have the commitment and time to maintain. I’ve seen so many people set things up and be keen on posting for the first few weeks, then this all pretty much stops.
Still a little worried about how to keep your Social Media accounts active. Find out more here.
Hope that helps, much more to come.
