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Smart Social Media Skills Can Improve Sales Efforts

April 29, 2011

tlfheadshot_web — Thomas Fox is president of Tech Experts, southeast Michigan’s leading small business computer support company.

The old saying goes, “Information is power.” In sales, that’s more true than ever. Fortunately, the Internet has made researching prospective clients and preparing for your next sales appointment quick and easy.

When preparing for a sales call, you can browse to a prospect’s website to research their business, search for other key decision makers, and review recent company news.

Search engines can help you find additional information, such as recent hires, number of employees, and general information about the prospect’s industry. But, Internet searches only go so far. As more companies take advantage of social media, researching prospects on social media sites is a great way to learn more about your prospect.

Facebook
FaceBook (www.fb.com) is the undisputed king of social media. More than a half-billion people have FaceBook accounts, and fifty percent of FaceBook’s active users log in every day.

If you’re selling, there’s a good chance your prospect’s company (and potential buyer) have FaceBook pages where you’ll find a wealth of information about their business.

People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on FaceBook – if you’re not actively using FaceBook to prospect (and market your company), you’re definitely missing some sales.

Twitter
Awareness of Twitter (www.twitter.com) has exploded from 5% of Americans in 2008 to 87% in 2010, and business use has never been higher.

Twitter’s search function allows you to find mentions of your potential client’s company and key decision makers, and the site’s people search feature helps you find users who list your prospect in their bio.

Following these Twitter accounts can help you stay abreast of the latest company news and help you gather deeper insights into what your prospect is working on and what it important to them.

Social networks
LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) remains the number one business to business social network, where professionals sign up to connect with other business people and industry veterans.

Reviewing a company’s LinkedIn profile can tell you about other employees that work for your prospect, and how you might be connected to them.

You’ll also find information that will help you relate to your prospect – where they went to school, other positions they’ve held, and even hobbies they enjoy.

News alerts
You’re already searching a prospects company name, buyers’ names, and industry information before you go on your first sales appointment, so staying on top of updated prospect information will give you the leg up on winning business long term.

All of the popular search engines offer a free news alert service (www.google.com/alerts, www.bing.com/news, alerts.yahoo.com) that will send updated web and news content to your Inbox.

It’s also a good idea to set up alerts on your prospect’s competitors, executives and key decision makers.

These updates can give you additional reasons to contact prospects and clients, and give you additional insight into what is happening behind the scenes.

Bringing it all together
Web based CRM sites such as SalesForce (www.salesforce.com) will help you keep track of multiple prospects, deadlines and milestones.

SalesForce includes direct links to both FaceBook and Twitter to help you monitor clients and prospects in real time.

Be sure to build out your database to track both business and personal data about your prospects and decision makers. The wealth of information available on the Internet makes it easy for a sales professional (or company owner) to go into a call well prepared.

The best things? Since not all salespeople take the time to leverage web research and social media tools, doing your homework can help you set yourself apart from the competition and improve your sales performance.

Using Twitter To Strategically Market Your Business

February 25, 2010

Seth Godin is one of the most widely read bloggers in the world. The success of his blog, which covers marketing and business development, fuels his book sales and keeps his day planner filled with high-paying speaking engagements.

But Godin does not use Twitter. Or Flickr. Or even Facebook. Here he explains why: “My reasoning is simple … I don’t want to use a tool unless I’m going to use it really well. Doing any of these things halfway is worse than not at all. People don’t want a mediocre interaction.”

Secondly, Godin had to face time and money constraints, because “if you want to be in multiple social media and also have a day job, you’re going to need a staff.”

As you consider whether to use Twitter, Facebook or other social media as part of your marketing strategy, think about Godin’s reluctance as well as his high standards. People don’t want a mediocre interaction.

Social Media Requires A Commitment
Should your business commit to social media marketing (you must commit if it’s to work at all), I suggest that you invest time upfront, before your first tweet or status update, to get to know the medium, outline your objectives and define what success looks like.

In 2009, amid the hype surrounding Twitter and Facebook, many businesses took a scattershot approach to social media.

To the extent that there has been a slight backlash against social media in business circles, much of it is attributable to poor planning and execution on the part of businesses themselves.

All of this is to say that social media can be a terrific waste of time and money if there isn’t a solid strategy behind it.

A crucial part of that strategy is understanding your potential audience. One of the first Twitter stars from the business world was Randy Crochet of Naked Pizza, a boutique pizzeria in New Orleans.

Crochet saw Twitter as an opportunity to maintain a presence among fans of his healthy pizza. It helped tremendously that Crochet had a passion that others could buy into – pizza made with fresh ingredients.

Most importantly, Crochet’s personality had that certain x-factor that helped him retain and grow readers. (He’s now partnered with the Kraft Group and has plans to go national with Naked Pizza.)

The majority of Twitter success stories come from businesses that have passionate customers.

Companies that produce less glamorous products have learned the hard way that tweeting their way to fame and fortune is a heavy lift.

That doesn’t mean that social media can’t work for less exciting industries, but a change in approach and expectations is required.

Blue Cross Blue Shield provides a good example. BCBS started using Twitter as a customer service channel, and they defined success less in terms of revenue-per-tweet formula (the model the accountants understand) and more in terms of customer service-per-tweet formula.

And this gets to the heart of social media marketing: it can’t just be about dollars and cents. Sure, every business owner needs to keep an eye on the bottom line, but with social media, the key is to add as much value as you hope to take away. The less you give, the less you’ll get.

With that, here are six best practices to keep in mind when getting into social media marketing:

1. Grow your readership by gaining the trust of your audience;
2. Produce content that plays to your readers’ interests, not your own;
3. Provide transparency into your business;
4. Become a trusted resource to your readers;
5. Maintain the conversation – don’t try to control it;
6. Retain valuable followers.

Social Networking Boosts Your Business!

September 15, 2009

You can’t turn on the television, read a newspaper, or even browse online without hearing about the business benefi ts of “social networking.” What is social networking, and how can it help build your business?

Loosely defined, social networking is nothing more than a group of people who share a common interest getting together online. It gives you the opportunity to create a virtual meeting place where your clients, prospects, vendors and even employees can talk about things going on in your company, ask questions, promote products or sales, and announce special events.

Social networking eliminates time zone differences, a huge factor for many. People from all over the state, country, and even world can connect and communicate easily in real time, opening many doors that geographical boundaries once closed. In a nutshell: Social networking helps you stay in touch!

There are a myriad of social networking sites on the Internet, and each is geared toward a slightly different demographic or type of user. More than likely, you’ll want to participate in a couple different sites to stay in touch with the most number of people.

The most used sites for business networking include Facebook, LinkedIn.com, and Twitter. Don’t discount the value of participating in online forums and writing your own blog.

Facebook
Facebook (www.facebook.com) has become one of the most popular online relationship building sites. It’s a central point for a lot of different things, like posting status updates (what are you up to right now?), photo albums, and even videos. You can also keep up with what everyone else that you’re “friends” with on the site is doing – and in this case, friends can mean true friends, or business acquaintances.

When you log into Facebook, you’ll see all of your friend’s latest updates about what they’re up to – and when they log in, they’ll see yours, mixed in with other friends they have. Some people post every small detail of what’s going on in their lives, and others post infrequently or only when they have something truly important to say. Neither approach is right or wrong – what you decide to post is more of a personal preference.

LinkedIn.com
LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) is probably the largest online business networking site. You can post your resume, join special interest groups, search for people you want to meet, and request introductions from your friends to other people you want to meet. That may be the most interesting thing about LinkedIn – think of it as an online “six degrees of separation.” Your LinkedIn network extends from your friends, out to friends they know, out several levels.

Twitter
Twitter (www.twitter.com) is a very popular new online meeting place. Twitter is what’s known as a “microblogging” site, because posts or updates you make are limited to 140 characters at a time. These entries are known as “tweets.”

Ping (www.ping.fm) lets you tie it all together. Ping is a service that will take your update and post it to all of your social networking accounts at one time.

Forums and blogs
Online forums are a great way to meet people who are interested in similar topics, and there are literally thousands of active forums online. It’s easy to participate, and you’ll fi nd a lot of forums are incredibly active. To boost your online exposure, which boosts your company’s profi le, look for forums that focus on topics your clients care about. Then, post answers to other people’s questions. You’ll quickly demonstrate your expertise.

It is easy to say that everyone (and every company) should have a blog, but the reality is, in order to be successful, you’ll need to blog regularly. You have to enjoy writing and be willing to commit to posting on a very regular schedule, or risk losing readers.

By becoming part of a social networking site, you’re not only opening your business to all World Wide Web users, you’re actually making your business more accessible to the public to be available to purchase your products and services. Connecting with other businesses also gives us the ability to share common ideas and practices in groups who share common ideas and business goals.

What You Need To Know About Social Networking

December 22, 2008

Social and business networking sites are changing the way people talk online. Sites like Facebook, MySpace and Bebo help friends stay in touch while LinkedIn and Plaxo mainly connect business users.

They are very popular but present challenges to small business owners. You can visit our website, www.MySpaceDisorder.com for our warnings about MySpace.

These sites seem to have come out of nowhere. For example, Facebook was founded in May, 2007, and currently has 70 million users. The rapid growth of such sites is part of the problem – you risk being caught off guard. Here are some of the top risks social networking sites pose to your business, and ways to manage that risk.

Indiscretion
Inadvertent disclosure of confidential information is a large risk. You wouldn’t publish your organization chart and phone directory on the internet; but a head-hunter or identity thief can use information on social networking sites to reconstruct this kind of information.

Reputation risk
There is also a risk to your company’s reputation. Social networking is more public and less formal than company email. It is also easier to use than blog software. It’s easy to imagine employees posting pictures or text that would embarrass their employer.

Cyber-slacking
Social networking sites can be addictive and timeconsuming. Cyber-slacking is a genuine concern, and difficult to control and monitor without security enhancements to your network.

Viruses and spyware
Social networking sites often display advertisements. At Tech Experts, we’ve observed that some of these advertisements have caused virus and spyware infections.

Broken privacy and identity theft
Some sites also allow third parties to run applications that have access to user profiles. This is a potential privacy risk. People publish a wealth of personal information in their profiles. This makes social networking sites a happy hunting ground for identity thieves and conmen.

We recommend that companies give serious thought to social networking and how they want to manage the risk.

Make sure your network is protected against web-borne viruses. At a minimum, every computer on your network should have current and automatically updated anti-virus software. For an enhanced layer of protection, install a firewall device that provides multi-layered protection against existing and emerging malware.

Have a clear and comprehensive Acceptable Use Policy in place. Ensure that employees are aware of what they can and cannot do on your company’s network. Review and update it often.

Set Rules for Personal Use. Use your company policy manual to spell out exactly how much personal web surfing is allowed, when, with whom, and under what circumstances. Of course, we recommend none.

Enforce your policies with an appropriate technology. This mean installing web monitoring and blocking software on each computer, or installing a network-wide security appliance.

No matter which option you choose, make sure you actively monitor usage, publish a usage policy, and keep that policy updated as new sites and threats emerge.

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