Once word of mouth was the best advertising. Once only Reuters and the Associated Press controlled and distributed breaking news, photos and video. Welcome to today’s world of web 2.0—which means every can one publish information easily on the Internet. And, every advertiser needs to add these “social marketing” methods to the traditional marketing and media mix. What is the cost to use these services? Only your time!
Here’s the executive summary:
Facebook—355 million worldwide users. It takes minutes to open a fan page for your business and a personal page for yourself with photo galleries and information. You’ll post upcoming event and product news. Customers will comment, share information about your service. These reviews are more believable than any ad you can create and are essential to the growth of your service. To promote your Facebook site, link to your e-mail signature line and website home page, include in all traditional advertising, e-blast customer database, download customer and prospect data base—ask customers to become fans. When an individual becomes “accepted friend”, you gain access to invite their entire list of friends—hence, the remarkable power of this media.
Twitter—22 million users, 80% from mobile phones. Used initially by celebrities and athletes reporting on daily activities. But holds potential for all kinds of business promotion. Will grow to 40 million by end of this year. Establish an account at twitter.com for your company. Post status updates of 160 characters or less. To be successful, you must publish news/activities of interest, and choose to follow groups with similar interests. By following a group, you expose yourself to its members who, if interested, then choose to follow you.
Blogger.com -- Publish a weekly informational or editorial piece. Embed this in your website. Search engines favor current information, so by simply attaching this to your website, it appears higher in rankings.
Ezinearticles.com- Publish information of any kind as a readable story. It can and will be picked up by bloggers, newsletter publishers.
You Tube—You Tube is second only to Google in popular usage. Users search for “How To” information. Don’t post your commercial. If you want to be successful, create a “how to” demonstration related to your product. Include your website to the title to give viewers a link they can click on to your web site.
One of the best aspects of “Social Media” is that the media is completely democratic. Small budget advertisers can make the same impact as multi-million dollar budget advertisers. The creativity of the message determines who is viewed! If you’d like to discuss a creative marketing campaign, we can help. Call Bob Gibson at 561-741-1441 x108.
Gibson/Roscoe/Owens Advertising
