Social media: an introduction pack
Andrew Field
Social Media Social (or sharing) media provides numerous exciting channels for businesses to distribute content to customers, clients, purchasers and opinions formers. Clever use of social media platforms builds inbound links, greater traffic and boosts sales. This information pack contains various social media reports covering everything from step-by-step guides to the internet to generating sales with LinkedIn to blogging. Produced by leading authorities, I am sharing them with you so you can understand how best to exploit social media and the internet for your business needs. There’s a lot to read - but it is worth the effort. Alternatively, pick through the sections that apply to your business. And if you want any help with your social media communications strategy or content creation and sharing, simply get in touch.
Andrew Field
M: 07850 933350 T: 0161 798 8810 E: afcuk@btinternet.com skype: afcuk61 www.afc-uk.org
Social Media guides The following guides appear in this information pack with kind permission of their authors/publishers. • The essential step-by-step guide to internet marketing (Hubspot) • An introductory guide to building landing pages (Hubspot) • An introduction to Search Engine Optimisation (Hubspot) • How to generate leads using LinkedIn (Hubspot) • How to master Facebook in 10 days (Hubspot) • How to monitor your social media presence in 10 minutes a day (Hubspot) • Dirty dozen: email newsletter mistakes nearly everyone makes (Hubspot) • How to use Google+ for business (Magdalena Georgieva) • How to create effective calls-to-action (Magdalena Georgieva) • How to increase awareness and generate leads with local SEO (Hubspot) • 2011 social media marketing industry report (Michael A Stelzner) • 13 business blogging mistakes & their easy fixes (Hubspot) • Strategic copywriting: what’s it all about (Andrew Field)
Food for thought... “If your reputation sucks, none of it matters. People with lousy products, crummy business practices, and shady backgrounds get found out. And word spreads with frightening speed.” Sonia Simone “Human beings are far more likely to communicate ideas and information with others when they are emotionally engaged. Find the key issues that concern your audience and then inculcate them within your marketing plan to get an emotional response.” Maki, doshdosh.com “You as a brand have to be completely confident about your position, because you will get criticism. You will have a negative reaction. If you didn’t get a negative reaction, that means you’re standing neutral and you have no point of view. Who wants to participate in that?” Frank Cooper “A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is – it is what consumers tell each other it is.” Scott Cook “If there’s a firestorm erupting via blogs, your customers will expect you to respond via those same blogs, not via a carefully-worded press release four days later.” Mack Collier “Don’t say anything online that you wouldn’t want plastered on a billboard with your face on it.” Erin Bury “You can’t buy attention anymore. Having a huge budget doesn’t mean anything in social media… The old paradigm was pay to play. Now you get back what you authentically put in. You’ve got to be willing to play to play.” Alex Bogusky “There’s no need to re-create everything from scratch … Look at some of the early adopters, see what they’ve done and see if it makes sense for your organisation. And then think about what you need to do to custome it.” Dave Fletcher “It has never been easier to be as influential as you can be today. Information is cheap. Information is easier to produce. And if you have a quality message, it’s never been cheaper to get out.” Jordan Raynor “Social media can be an enabler and an accelerator of existing core capabilities, values, attributes and plans. It can even be a catalyst for change. But it can’t magically create what doesn’t exist.” Denise Zimmerman “Think like a publisher, not a marketer.” David Meerman Scott “The most successful marketer becomes part of the lives of their followers. They follow back. They wish happy birthday. They handle problems their customers have with products or service. They grow their businesses and brands by involving themselves in their own communities.” Marsha Collier “The hardest thing for marketers is to turn over the brand experience to the community and let them define it.” Eric Erwin “The minute news hits the wires, it becomes a conversation. It’s just a question of how high [the] volume [of] that conversation will become.” Doug Frisbie