Her approach in developing the marketing strategy, company and product brands showed her depth of understanding of the consumer and their needs… — Greg Hakonson, PneuVation Medical Inc.
The world is abuzz about social media. Many people are hesitant to get on board because of the learning curve and time commitment. And for those who’ve jumped on the bandwagon it can become a distraction from more tangible day-to-day business activities.
I have a couple of different Twitter accounts, for different aspects of my business. If I use Twitter straight up, I have to login to each account separately which quickly becomes overwhelming. With HootSuite, I can login to all accounts with a single username and password. Not only does it save me time, I can watch what is going on with all accounts at the same time, see where there is cross-over happening AND cross-pollinate my accounts as appropriate.
HootSuite also has the ability to automate posts between Twitter, FaceBook, and Linked In, and you can track your Follows, Friends, and Links all at once. This alone is worth the trouble of setting up, as you can post to all three at once.
My favourite feature by far, however, is the ability to schedule posts. I like to post quotes, thought-provoking links, and event notices, but don’t have time to go into Twitter 20 times a day to do so. HootSuite allows me to schedule posts for later in the day or later in the week, as my schedule requires. I can still post in-the-moment comments, while ensuring that I don’t miss any deadlines.
Here’s another great TED Talk video, this one keeps social media simple — like it should be.
Alexis Ohanian of Reddit confirms social media as a new way to communicate not just a bunch of new tools to master. Be careful how you engage, you cannot control it the way you can advertising!
If you’re one of those people still hoping social media is just a fad that’s going to go away if you just keep your head buried under a rock, consider this your reality check…
Social media is all the buzz these days. In fact, we see a lot of questions coming up about it at our Ask the Experts events. You’d think it was the ONLY marketing option out there right now, but while many companies are focusing on it solely, it still works best as part of a more comprehensive marketing strategy.
Part of the challenge is there are so many social media technologies and so few hours in the day. You could just be wasting your time, and not know it until too late. There are a couple of things you need to do that will make all the difference in whether your move toward social media as a marketing tool is going to be a success:
Set realistic goals on results you want to achieve. Not all goals are realistic, so it’s important to know what’s possible and what’s wishful thinking. Some to consider: increased website traffic, increased client numbers, response rate to ads, etc.
Determine which social media tools are best suited to reaching those goals. With all the changes and new technology always turning up, your best bet is to ask someone who is current on the latest trends, like Mhairi at Out-Smarts Marketing. She keeps on top of things so you don’t have to.
Define specific, time-limited marketing campaigns and build in metrics to track success. “We’ll do X, for X long and aim for X results.” Marketing needs to be done on a regular basis to work – this you will catch onto quickly if you start to Twitter, believe me.
Evaluate your results on a regular basis. How close did you get to your goal? Once you have a target, not only can you track progress (something we often forget to do), you can figure out how to do better next time.
There are no guarantees, but you can increase your odds. To ensure you’re getting it right, set the bar, keep an eye on progress, and tweak as necessary.
