subject: Social Networking: Overcoming Intimidation To Get Results [print this page] A few years ago I received a panicked call from my grandmother. She had recently acquired her first computer and was attempting to navigate the web. She was having no luck despite the fact that as per my mis-heard instructions she"d been "Goggling and Goggling for hours." The point? Technology can be intimidating but eventually everyone and his grandmother needs to become familiar with the basics to get ahead.
The most recent technological trend to envelope our culture is social networking. In case you have been living under a rock as part of some sort of social experiment, social networking is the introduction of sites such as Twitter, Facebook and MySpace where you post a profile complete with photos, updates on your every movement throughout the day, and details so intimate even your doctor and sorority sisters don"t know them all. Or they didn"t until you blasted them online for the entire world to see.
Now why should you care about such things? Well because Facebook alone has over 200 million active users. Twitter users have increased eight times in the past year alone. This means that when properly applied to your marketing strategy, social networking sites can lead to great things for your business and brand equity.
When you first hear such words bandied about such as Tweets, fan pages, and tagging it"s confusing. Immediately there is the panic of "What is this exactly?" "How does this work?" "What do I have to do here?" The first step is to take a deep breath and relax. Just keep your eyes on the prize and let me walk you through the steps of successfully using social networking.
With some sites you can buy advertising space. With Facebook averaging 100 million hits a day you could do worse with your advertising dollar! Sites such as Twitter have you create your profile for free and then it"s up to you to get followers. Easy enough, you follow me, I"ll follow you applies in the Twitter world and pretty soon you"ve got fans from all over the place you never thought would find you. The concept on all of these sites is simple. Just as with any type of marketing you want to concisely make your business sound interesting and enticing using fun buzz words to grab attention of "followers" and "fans" of your profile or page. Then just sit back and let the sales, hits, clicks, and fan mail roll in as the users of the network see your product or service and follow along. See? Painless!
