Manage All of Your Social Media Networks at Once? We Do…and So Can You!

In order to run a successful business, you must be organizes, inside and out. With all of the social media networks and constant updates, mentions and followers, it is no wonder that our social media strategy can fall under the radar.

As the social media guru at GenNext, I can attest to the sweat, pain and tears (maybe a little exaggerated…) we have gone through looking for a social media platform that can fulfill all of our needs.

The key to finding this, we have learned, is simply through trial and error. But first you must establish the features your business needs to run an organized and manageable social media marketing strategy.

So ask yourself, what is your ideal social media platform? Here are the things that were essential to us:

• Scheduled Updates. Based on analytics, we schedule our tweets/updates to go out at particular times of the day, when they will have the best conversion rate. Therefore, if I want my blog post to go out at 3:00 p.m. sharp, I can schedule this in the morning and know that it is complete.

• Combined URL Shortner and Analytics. A URL shortener is a must for Twitter updates, but they mean nothing if you cannot track who is clicking on them. We use analytics to monitor our target audience to shape our marketing strategy to what our customers are looking for.

• Monitoring Twitter Mentions. In order to stay up-to-date on people mentioning your business throughout the distributed web, it is important to have an automatic system that informs you of when you are retweeted, direct messaged or commented on. We like to engage our audience and let them know that we are there for the social marketing needs.

Can you find all these things in one site? We did. HootSuite is a great organizational platform that fits all of our social media needs. But it might not work for your business. So, ask yourself, what are your social media marketing needs? Let us know…we can lead you toward a platform that will fit your business.

Business Marketing: Where Content is King and Collaboration is Key

Business marketing using social media networking places companies at a distinct advantage over competition. How’s that? Well, this marketing approach wastes no time and money in getting right to the heart of what customers want. Answers to questions they have in places like blogs, forums, search engines and product review sites.

Yes, you read right. Free marketing by answering the questions your target customers have in the places they like to hang out in online. They are discussing and commenting on their problems and possible solutions in niche communities all over the web. You have an incredible opportunity to be the company or person that is there when they need you most.

Where Content is King …

The win-win marketing connection is—real-life focus group activity on a massive global scale that reveals highly targeted information consumers are looking for. The goal is to become the trusted source of information. This is much more powerful than advertising.

The key is to determine what SEO keywords and phrases to use for your blog posts, articles, videos and other media you distribute in these social community sites.

Next, determine how to write your articles so they answer issues people are looking to solve and also satisfy shopping needs they’re trying to fill.

… and Collaboration is Key

Here’s how you hang out, Internet-style:

• Join social-site sub-groups that reflect your interests

• Chime in with good ideas, comment with your opinion, provide a sound analysis of the problem situation or simply organize disparate info so it becomes coherent by providing a context for further discussion by group members.

• Or, ask outright, “Who’s doing social marketing? I am, and I’m looking to interview anyone who’s interested for my blog.”

I tried out my strategy. Lo and behold, Michael Licamele, VP Marketing for TotalMortgage.com responded. We got to chatting. The upshot? We’re going to team up and write a book on how social media is a great business marketing tool for real estate!

My partnering with Michael underscores an important cog in online marketing—collaboration is key. Collaboration makes it all work out in a highly targeted and interconnected global arena. Why? Because generating business leads is all about building good relationships.

There’s lots more business marketing tools for starting an online marketing company. You never know what you’ll discover, until you start trying different tactics.

Chris Marentis is a serial entrepreneur and recognized Internet Marketing expert having served as SVP at AOL and CEO of Clearspring Technologies. For more information on Online Marketing and Advertising, go to http://www.gennextmedia.com today.