October 15, 2009
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Affordably Build Your Brand
FedEx Global Brand Management Director Monica Skipper shares a cost-effective way to build a bigger brand for your small business.
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Is social media right for my business? It’s a question that has crossed the minds of many entrepreneurs I’ve talked to, so for this article I sought out the opinions of three business owners and marketing consultants who use and view social media differently.
Joanne Miller, Founder and CEO of Third Stone Media (in Newport, Calif.), says she has been a fan of social media since early on. Her agency’s business, which used to be 100% web design and development, is now 50% social media consulting. She recommends it to her clients because “You have to take control of your brand, or someone else will. If for no other reason, use social media to boost your search engine rankings so the first thing someone sees when searching for your company is not a Web site by dissatisfied customers.”
Recently, she became convinced by the power of Twitter. For one client, Orange County Drum, she started tweeting and connecting with their customers, including one famous musician who agreed to show his support by doing promotions with them. It’s resulted in sales of 10 drum kits over 6 months – via Twitter alone. “I was amazed at the power of 140 characters could have – from raising money for charities, to connecting with fans, to marketing brands. I attribute it to the way we entertain ourselves. Social media is the new TV.”
Another enthusiast Cindy King, an international sales specialist, has had much success developing her own business through social media, mainly through Twitter. She’s used it to observe what people are talking about in countries where she wants to do business, as well as to learn how to approach people. “Whereas a corporation will hire a consulting group to help them research international markets, small companies can do it themselves through social media.”
She says she uses Twitter to target companies that want to go international, as well as people who can connect her to those companies. To start, she created a “tweet plan”: writing five tweets a day across 7 categories that she defined, such as one self-serving tweet, one tweet on third-party content, and so on. Approximately 90% of her tweets were useful information and resources; the remaining were surveys and questions. “Within 10 days, I was getting many more emails from potential clients.”
Offering a more cautious view on social media is Alyssa Dver, marketing consultant, trainer, and author of No Time Marketing: Small Business-Sized Steps in 30 Minutes or Less. She told me her one of her “pet peeves” is the current obsession with social media as a way to create real business leads. “You should think of social media as you would any marketing tactic: Is it being used by your target audience and what additional value can you provide to them through this method? Social media isn’t right for every business. The target audience may not use it or may not use it for business reasons.” She advises her clients to ask themselves, “Given your limited time and resources and the amount needed to commit to a successful social media initiative, is any one social media method really the best place to reach my audience?”
She also said that clients often ask about social media because they think it’s free. “But what is your time worth? Can you give enough time to make an impact? Social media can work very well for the right people in the right circumstances. Just be sure you also consider other available marketing channels, as well as different ways to use social media.”
For one client, she noticed that the marketing vice president was clipping industry news on a weekly basis to share with her fellow executives. Dver suggested turning that curated news into their own ‘sponsored’ blog that would attract customers and prospects in the industry because of the time savings value the indexed news provides. “You don’t necessarily need to build your own platform either. For example, you can write and submit an article to another blog that already reaches your audience,” she said. “It’s really about finding how and where you can provide valuable information to your target audience.”
If you have a story about how you’ve used social media, please e-mail me at marcy@openforum.com. I’d like to share your story with other OPEN Forum readers. I also invite you to follow me on Twitter @marcyshinder and OPEN Forum via @openforum.
You can find Joanne Miller on her blog or on Twitter @everythingIdo; Cindy King and @cindyking; and Alyssa Dver or @NoTimeMarketing.
Check your balance, review recent transactions and pay your bill on the go.
Courtney Colwell 1 year 2 months and 25 days ago
Great article! For those who want to learn more about using social media, also check out www.openforum.com/socialmedia