Matt McGee has put together a great list of options for small businesses that are looking to market their businesses via social media in his Small is Beautiful column over at Search Engine Land. I"ve long been a fan of Matt"s common sense approach to all things online marketing related and this post offers up yet another collection of easy to understand (and put into action) tips.
He also brings up the very valid point that it"s not just about DOING social media, it"s about understanding the investment and the return. After all, if it takes you five weeks of brainstorming to get your site on Digg and you don"t make a single sale...was it really worth it?
No one debates that there are legitimate returns from social media marketing. These returns often come in the form of a short burst of traffic and/or an increase in links. That can improve your search engine visibility, but small businesses, in particular, still have to ask: Is the return greater than the investment of time and money?
For what it"s worth, I agree that nearly every business, big or small, unsexy or not, can come up with something that"s unique and linkworthy—something that will play well on Digg, YouTube, or whichever social media site offers the best audience fit. I also think it"s imperative that small businesses use social media marketing in order to decrease their reliance on traffic from one or two search engines; you have to diversify to survive.
You"ll need to read his post to get all seven tips, but here are my two favorite.
1b. Comment on other blogs. You can"t blog into a vacuum. Blogging is about creating and joining conversations, and that includes reading what others in your industry are saying and joining the discussion on other blogs. It"s free, and again, the time investment is up to you. You"ll be able to supply your name and URL when leaving a comment, and there"s no debate that intelligent comments on other blogs helps build traffic to yours.
I"ve found blog commenting to be an excellent way for a company to get in front of their target audience. This especially holds true if you"ve launched your own blog and are looking to attract new readers.
4. Take and share photos. I"m a longtime believer in using Flickr as a marketing tool. The time and cost investment is minimal. And thanks to Flickr"s incredibly active photo groups, you can share photos of your products with people who are interested. A pet store owner could share photos with the 2,000+ members of the pet parade group, which is one of dozens of animal-related groups. A company that makes iPod accessories could post nice product photos in the Apple group, with its ~2400 members. And a construction company that makes custom homes could post photos in the appropriate city group, like San Francisco or Chicago. For more on this, I invite you to read How to Market on Flickr on my blog.
Matt was one of the first people I heard talk about the marketing potential of Flickr. In fact, if you ever run into Matt in person, you need to tackle him and make him share some insight with you, especially if your business sells products or services that are heavily visual. In fact, it was after Matt speak about this very idea that I started digging my way through cake photos on Flickr and started hunting down some bakeries that I need to visit on my trip to New York for next month"s Search Engine Strategies conference.
Social media isn"t easy, but it doesn"t have to be hard either. As always, creativity can level the playing field and help put small businesses back in the game with the big guys.
>>Source Link
>>Blog: Search Engine Guide : Small Business Search Marketing
>>Publish Date: 3/30/2007 8:01:43 AM
>>Keywords: social media
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