Above Parr Business Services » Twitter

Social Media’s Role in Your Business

Sara — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 15:37:58 +0000

Social Media, Facebook, Twitter and Web 2.0 are all words that you’ll hear around the business community, but how can these work for you?

Firstly, we need look at these two questions;

Why do people buy the things that they buy?
Why do they choose particular places to buy from?

In order give a sensible answer, we need to go back to first principles. Here are our thoughts…

Why do people buy the things that they buy?

People buy things because they either need them, or want them – this is nothing new. Social Media’s part to play is as a tool to spread the word about your product or service. I was watching a TV program a little while ago which mentioned something called “Dunbar’s Number”, which states that the number of people one knows AND keeps in regular contact with is about 150. If those 150 people know another 150 people each (yes there will be some overlap, but you get the idea) then it doesn’t take long to reach a lot of people.

Take our experiment of trying to Sell Our House Using Social Media. We’ve done nothing really apart from create a page and a blog post which we’ve posted links to on Twitter and Facebook a few times. To date we’ve had over 100 page views and it’s been picked up by several “Trending” sites according to Gareth.

Why do they choose particular places to buy from?

This is a bit more involved. Value? Convenience? Price? Location? Quality? Yes, all of them have a part to play. Notice I list Price and Value separately – they are different, but that’s another blog post!

What if all these are equal between two potential suppliers? My experience shows that people buy from people they like and trust. For this to happen they have to get to know each other a little. This is the “Networking” part of “Social Networking” and is overlooked at your peril!

There is a school of thought which suggests keeping your business and personal profiles separate – do business contacts really want to see pictures of your dog or know what you’re having for tea? Personally, I think they are better merged, because it helps to have the transparency and openness and any customer with any sense will ferret in your personal profile anyway! Either way, please remember that whatever you put on your profile, business or otherwise, will be accessible throughout the world…

Someone who does a great job of this is Mike Handley from Graphic Results (one of my clients and a constant source of social media inspiration). He has an informative blog and an open and honest writing style. This, combined with a good balance between business and personal posts provides interesting content that reflects Mike’s personality, drive and motivation for what he does. It’s no accident that he has over 2000 followers on Twitter and people like Theo Paphitis retweeting his comments – quite an achievement for a “Little design studio” in Derbyshire!

You, but more importantly your customers, can have a huge impact on your message (and sales figure) by “word of mouth” referrals to their networks. Treat your Virtual Network in the same way as your physical one by offering advice, help and support where appropriate – and don’t underestimate the power of testimonials and recommendations online.

In summary, Social Media is a platform where you can interact and ask people to listen to what you have to say. Be warned though, if you go in selling hard then you’ll quickly lose friends, followers and credibility. If you’re asking people to listen to you then make sure you have something interesting to say once in a while!

If you would like any specific help then please let us know and we’ll be happy to point you in the right direction!

An hour’s work – Write and post a blog entry

Sara — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:50:28 +0000

Fresh, relevant content on your website can increase your search engine rankings, giving your site greater exposure. Your acceptance by the wider community as an “expert” increases your company’s credibility and can lead to better conversion into sales. With Social Networking becoming more and more important, interacting effectively with your current and potential customers in a way that makes sense to them is vital.

Minky has a Twitter account – though he hasn’t really used it yet and only has a couple of people following him so far…

What he DOESN’T have though is the time (or the imagination) to compose interesting, meaningful content that won’t just be seen as spam. He’s also pretty rubbish at spelling…

We’ve suggested to him that he could set aside some time to decide what sort of thing he wants to blog about, then leave us to draft him some posts. That way he can have a stock ready for if he gets writer’s block, or he can compose something else and leave them for another time. We can also update his twitter page for him, to let his followers know what he’s up to…

It’s how we do our blog – because Sara has flashes of creative inspiration some days, but not every day.

If you would like to know more about how to create a set of stock blog posts then please email Minky (or Sara - if you don’t want to talk to the Monkey…)

I’m a friend of a friend of a friend…

Sara — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:00:56 +0000

As Adam and the Ants once said! (Sorry if anyone under the age of 35 hasn’t even heard of them)

Been having great fun this morning trying to connect people on Facebook, but I think we’re all sorted now…

This particular exercise was social but it has got me wondering just how much use all this social networking is for business???

I have a Twitter page, a Facebook profile, an Ecademy profile and post to umpteen forums on all sorts of topics. I quite enjoy it and find it useful for GETTING information, but just how useful is it for GIVING information??? Is anyone really interested in what I had for lunch??? Or am I just old???

It’s easy to spend hours on social networking (ask any teenager!) but is it a productive use of business hours??? I’m trying it out – partly because I actually have time at the moment while recovering from my op. I’ll let you know how I get on…