I’m on a road trip until the end of June. This post by Carol Wilson is part of a call for guest posts
We all know by now that, if you’re not using social media to market your business, you have somehow missed the boat. Most business owners have some sort of social media profile set up to represent their business online, or they are quickly learning to create the right social media presence for marketing purposes. But, because so many business owners are using social media as a marketing tool, it can be difficult to figure out how to make your products stand out. Here are a few things that social media newcomers may not think to try for business marketing, but that can garner great results every time:
1. Use Twitter Trends
Twitter is by far one of the fastest growing social media landscapes today. People use it for personal conversations as well as business promotion. If you have your own business, you will definitely want to get some Twitter accounts established to represent both you and your business. Once you have a Twitter profile set up for your business, one of the best ways to get attention and gain followers is to follow the trending topics on Twitter. When you’re on the Twitter homepage, you should see a list of topics on the left-hand side. These topics are the highest-occurring words or phrases being used on Twitter at that moment. When you click on them, you can immediately see who is commenting on these topics in real time. If you join the conversation every time a topic starts to trend, you have a higher chance of users noticing your tweets and checking out your profile.
2. Do a Facebook Contest
If you have a Facebook account established for your business, your main goal is to get as many Facebook friends as you can and then hope that they will take notice of your products or services and become loyal customers. However, it can be difficult to separate your business from the rest. One of the best ways to get more Facebook friends and then get those people to interact with your business is to do a Facebook contest. Many businesses will run promotions where, if a Facebook user “likes” the company or posts the company on their or someone else’s wall, then they will be entered to win a prize. Figure out what you can offer to potential customers as a giveaway that might get them excited, and offer that prize up for your own special contest.
3. Connect to Bloggers
Running a blog to represent your business is a great way to add a personal touch to your home web site and to get customers talking about your products and communicating with you and one another. But, while it’s great to have current customers following your blog, how do you reach out to consumers who have never heard of your business? One of the best ways to use your blog to connect to new users is to allow other bloggers to write guest posts, or to write a guest author yourself on someone else’s blog. When you cross post the articles, both you and the guest blogger have the opportunity to benefit from higher visibility.
Carol Wilson is a freelance insurance business writer who is in the midst of creating her very own business insurance guide for consumers. In the meantime, she likes to share her knowledge of business insurance and other business related topics such as marketing to small business owners, entrepreneurs, and other corporate moguls. She welcomes your comments at wilson.carol24@gmail.com.
