Kinetic Marketing and Design - Grimsby Graphic Design, Advertising and Marketing

If you make and keep one New Year’s Resolution for your business it should be to make 2012 the year you really get stuck into social media. I have waxed lyrical in previous blogs about the benefits to small businesses - it is low cost although does require the time resource. Unfortunately time is a scarce commodity for most small business owners and directors, so despite its potential I know it can be a struggle to find the time to fit it in.

So I thought I would put together some tips and strategies to help you fit social media into your day. I cannot add an extra couple of hours to your day, but I may give you a couple of ideas that can help.

As someone involved in marketing no one can ever accuse me of being shy of using the odd buzzword and it can be very difficult to avoid certain terms and words that are just so commonly used. Think of how many companies profess to offer ‘bespoke solutions’ or ‘quality that counts’. I call these ‘weasel words’. Words that are not untrue, but are either so overused that people stop listening to them, or are bland and generic.

Well it seems this phenomenon is spreading to how we present ourselves online, specifically with our LinkedIn profile. This week, LinkedIn released its list of 10 most overused professional buzzwords .

With Halloween fast approaching and all sense deserting us as we decide that severed fingers and dodgy fancy dress outfits are appropriate purchases, it got me thinking about what is the most scary social media platform.

The answer definitely has to be Twitter. It is one of the most talked about yet least understood social media platforms I come across when talking to businesses. And, because of that, it can seems to be an alien place full of its own language and connected to crazy things such as the disgrace of football players or the incitement of civil unrest. For many it feels like a dangerous place and not one that is appropriate for them, especially in the B2B market.

So I thought it best to address these fears with tips about how to use Twitter for your business and, like all good ghost stories, with the lights on it is never so spine tingling as first appears.

One of the biggest impacts social media has had on how businesses market themselves is not about low cost routes to market or the ability to ‘engage’ (I hate that word) with your audience, I believe it is the shift is emphasis from pushing out controlled sales messages to sharing knowledge and expertise.

But for many business owners this does not sit comfortably.

I have had conversations with business owners who do not want to publish case studies in case there competitors see them (not that most of us don’t have a very good idea of who our competitors are working with anyway). I also come across the argument about the giving away of knowledge for free, especially for service companies where their knowledge is usually attached with a fee or charge.

So what is the happy medium? What are the arguments for being more open with the sharing of your knowledge be it through blogs, forums or free guides or white papers?

Recession, credit crunch, economic downturn - call it what you will there are few small businesses that have not been affected in some way or another.

In tight times the need to cut costs can often result in reduced marketing spend, especially in light of cash flow concerns but when times are tough it is even more important to keep promoting your business.

Now you may be thinking ‘well of course she would say that, marketing is what she sells’ but if you consider what is actually happening in a recession, you see why it is so important to keep up the momentum of your promotions.

1. 1)  Your customers (people or businesses) have less money to spend
2. 2)  They are looking to make more careful purchasing decisions
3. 3)  You will need to demonstrate how your product or service provides real value and is a better choice than your competitors.
4. 4)  You need to stay ‘front of mind’ so that when customers are looking to purchase, they come to your business.

Sounds like a job for marketing.

So if we accept that marketing is something all businesses need to do to survive, then what can be done when cash is in short supply?

Blog is word we have all heard but many people don’t really know what it actually involves. When creating a website for a client I will often recommend a blog but are often faced with either a blank or disdainful face. Often I will be asked ‘What actually is a blog’ and it is then that you realise that this word BLOG can actually be quite alien and off putting even though the concept has been around for many years.

But if we forgot the word blog and used a different more comfortable word such as ‘opinion’ or ‘diary’ maybe a blog wouldn’t seem so scary. Anyway if you still need convincing here are some thoughts on why your business should be blogging –

Most businesses, whatever their size are realising just how important a company blog is. It provides a hub for your other social media activity, allows you to establish yourself as an expert and provide some added value resources to your customers and prospects.

Yet a common complaint I get is that it isn’t suitable for them. We’re too small. We’re only a small business. We’re too specialist. People think they have nothing to write about or that no one will be interested in what they have to say. Some of this is good old British modesty. But if we were honest with ourselves, we shouldn’t be in business if we don’t have some insights, opinions or knowledge about the sector or industry we work in.

So to give everyone who finds themselves with one of the above excuses tripping off their lips, here are 10 ideas to get you started ... no more excuses.

How Vodafone's social media campaign turned into a media disaster.

The big brands have long recognised social media as a fantastic way of building quick and personal relationships with their customers. Relationships that traditional media just cannot make.

For Vodafone this Christmas, one such PR stunt went horribly wrong!

In a clever pre-Christmas social media campaign to make Vodafone seem like a fun, generous and warm company – it was giving away free handsets to lucky Twitter users who used the hash tag #mademesmile to tell the company what things gave them a warm, fuzzy feeling . Launched on 11^th December the company invited people to “use Twitter to share something that made you smile today”.

Sounds great. What could possibly go wrong?

I know we haven’t had Christmas yet, but as I was thinking about what New Year Marketing Resolutions I can think of and my first one, “Start Planning Early” prompted me to not wait until January to send this out but strike whilst the iron is hot!

Resolution #1 – Start Planning Early

It is a fact of life (and marketing) that things always take longer than you think. Yes, in this world of email, digital print and social media it is possible to turn some marketing communications very quickly, but there are still things that deserve, and need, to be taken a bit more time over.

There can be no doubt that the recent and sudden freeze has caused massive disruption to the lives and work of people across the UK, and especially in Scotland, the North and East of England. I am reminded of my ill fated comment of a couple of weeks ago that ‘we don’t get snow on the coast in Lincolnshire, last year was just a fluke’ when the next day about 15 inches fell and we have been snowed in for about a week!

So what about the impact on businesses, more specifically on marketing your business?

You’ve got yourself a website. You’ve had a dabble on Facebook and an ex colleagues keeps asking you to join their LinkedIn network and every celebrity seems obsessed with tweeting. As a business owner social media, as it is collectively known, may be on your radar but for many what to do with it is still a mystery.

On the positive side it is cheap. Compared to traditional media such as press, radio, and direct mail it is as cheap as chips. In fact it’s free so that should bring it to the top of the marketing agenda. But on the other hand, it seems to be full of people with too much spare time on their hands and not enough going on in their lives. Does the world really need to know that it is ‘three more sleeps till the weekend’ or that they are just about to eat a bacon sarnie?

The problem with Social Media is that it has grown exceptionally fast, yet unlike traditional media which had a clear purpose – to promote brands or get a response and sell stuff, the role of social media is fuzzy and mixed in with non commercial uses. In fact its very label, social media, seems to devalue it for businesses.