Social Media–do you need it?

What is it?
Social media is a communication channel that creates conversations, builds relationships and syndicates information about your business. In many ways, social media is a natural extension of normal business communication methods.

So creating a Social Media Strategy for your company can be relatively straightforward and not as scary as you might think!
You should start by thinking about your website – what is it for and what can it do for your company.

Most businesses will have nominated one or more people in their team to update their website with text, photos and videos, upload presentations and information about special offers, company news and events. So how can this be incorporated in an effective Social Media Strategy?

Blogging
If you are updating your corporate website or blog on a regular basis, ideally at least once a day, it makes sense to simultaneously update a blog or microblog such as Twitter with the same information. Users of Twitter and similar services are likely to follow your brand if its provides material of genuine interest

Research
Research can be posted onto blogs and websites, syndicated via RSS and tagged on social bookmarking websites. If there is something you are researching, you can be sure that other people on the web will find it interesting.

Video and photography
Photos and videos (providing they are going to be of interest and entertaining to other people) can be uploaded onto media hosting sites such as Flickr and YouTube. These website platforms allow media assets to be distributed and viewed by people who would not directly access a corporate website or otherwise interact with a brand.

Slide sharing
A growing platform, think of YouTube for presentations, gives your business the opportunity to place useful presentations on a slide sharing platform where other people can use them and comment on them.

All these activities will help to facilitate conversations, build relationships and generate genuine brand engagement.

As companies embrace social media they will start to connect with audiences through content and conversation, which will progressively show results. These can be measured in sales and website traffic. But remember that this is a gradual and organic process and patience is required!

Go and have a look at Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, YouTube and Flickr and look at how companies are making use of these new channels of communication.
Don’t put it off – it’s important for every company, whatever size to get started with a Social Media Strategy.