| Top 5 Social Media Best Practices for Generating Business Leads |
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Just about everyone with a business is either dabbling or strategically attacking one or many social media platforms intending to convert business. Now, I wasn’t the earliest of adopters but I planned from the start to use a few key platforms regularly. I experimented, charted my time, tracked my results and can honestly say that these are my top 5 Lead Generating Best Practices that either I or my assistant perform every week that have paid off. 1) Auto-Tweets: This may sound impersonal, but if you use a ratio of 70-80% education and information sharing you may as well repeat and rotate in your regular information. I’ve tested the repetition myself. At first I thought I couldn’t keep topics rotating, but then with followers all over the globe in different time zones it seemed silly to not sleep-tweet. I found excellent stats when I tested my sleep-tweets. I change the titles each month to potentially interest someone from another perspective. They are still the same articles, though and most importantly – they have the same trackable link. Play with this feature if you are global. If you only service a certain geographic area be sure to tweet all day and evening. 2) Article Posting: My assistant posts my blogs on selected sharing sites every week. Since we just began catching up, she posts that week’s content and usually one or two others. Two of the sites in particular have been driving consistent inbound traffic: EzineArticles and Business Exchange. 3) LinkedIn Groups: Making connections within the LinkedIn Groups is an excellent place to hunt for prospects and potential joint ventures. My assistant posts links to my content in all my groups and it drives most of my website traffic. I have taken time to determine the groups where my target audience reads. I have heard of others doing very well by answering questions on LinkedIn Answers, but my field is cluttered with “experts” so I’d rather use my time more wisely. Often, people read my posts and ask to connect. I have a direct link to these people now. Whenever I have an event, press release or product special I send them a direct note. It takes time – 50 per message, but it’s worth it. 4) Commenting & Sharing: I subscribe to about 30 industry blogs via my Google Reader. I try my best to skim the headlines every day and anything that is really good I will share with all three of my social sites: Twitter, Facebook Page and LinkedIn status. I do this right through HootSuite automatically using their Hootlet browser app. Whatever page I’m reading I just click and send to everyone. It adds a trackable link and I can see which items my friends clicked on. Additionally, I will comment intelligently on good posts. I find many of these people reciprocate by commenting and sharing my posts. It’s just good ju-ju to be a friendly competitor. 5) Facebook: I created a tremendous amount of controversy by announcing my de-friending campaign to take back personal control of my account. While I originally planned to cut-bait quickly, I’ve found just the message telling people I’m trying to clean up my account has created some of the best networking and conversions ever! Sure, some people got mad. Others warmly shared their organization techniques and urged me not to banish everyone to my Facebook Page. Actually, I’m doing both. The task has proved to be an interesting way to find out who is really paying attention or just spamming promos. Not to mention, my message has a list of ALL the networks they can connect with me on and many are choosing their preferred platform. Bingo – reaching prospects where they want to be reached! These tasks are my top social media to-dos in any week. Yes, there are press releases and video uploads too, but these five get done come rain or shine. In between all the automation, I make sure to chat up people and comment on posts. Ten percent of your time needs to be networking online by having real conversations with real people. I use the last 10% to promote offers and workshops automatically. Keeping that ratio low demonstrates value. I prefer to gather prospects rather than take them hostage.
Want to use this article on your website? That’s great, but please include the next section beneath it. Paula Pollock is CEO of the Pollock Marketing Group, further assisting good companies in becoming great through outsourced marketing services with her team of professionals. PMG supports business marketing at all levels from DIY, short-term projects and campaign corrections. You can sign up to receive her Marketing Tips newsletter at www.paulapollock.com
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Just about everyone with a business is either dabbling or strategically attacking one or many social media platforms intending to convert business. Now, I wasn’t the earliest of adopters but I planned from the start to use a few key platforms regularly. I experimented, charted my time,
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