Social Networking & Business Promotion
If you’re not currently utilizing social networking sites to promote your business, you are most certainly missing out on a powerful medium for promoting your business. Unless you happen to be selling cardboard boxes or nails (anything generic and ‘boring’) chances are the people who buy the kinds of products that you sell are gathering online and having conversations with one another i.e. getting feedback and sharing (often brutally honest) reviews and opinions.
With the top two social networking sites (namely Facebook and Myspace and let’s not forget Twitter) collectively garnering nearly 130 million unique visitors for January of 2009 alone, you could be leaving a free and potentially huge marketing tool completely untouched. There are many reasons why social network marketing is becoming a must for online marketing campaigns, but let’s look at a few of the most compelling.
Your customers are using social networking sites. It may seem a little too obvious, but it is in fact the most compelling reason of all. Regardless of what your target demographic may be, chances are a good percentage of your customers are frequenting social network sites. The simplest rule in marketing is making sure your message is where your customers can see it, and maintaining an active social networking presence is a great way to accomplish this.
Social networks help keep your online presence alive. Even if you think you do a fairly good job of keeping your website updated with fresh content, your customers might not see it that way. If a customer visited your website yesterday, what reason might her have to come back today? Even the best websites are somewhat static, and static quickly becomes stale to your customers. Social networking allows you a quick and easy way to offer fresh, vibrant and kinetic content to your customers.
Your customers have friends. The whole idea behind social networking sites is of course networking. That can work for your business is a big way. When you interact with your customers via social networking sites, much of that interaction will be visible to others in the network. Friends often share interests and every contact your customers maintain within their own networks is a potential customer for you.
Social networking is without a doubt one of the fastest growing segments of the internet at large. For this reason, it is quickly becoming one of the largest mediums for communication. Don’t miss the boat on this emerging opportunity. Establish your presence in the social network now before your competitors do. This is the future of online marketing. Transparent, personal and in real-time.
