Compare Twitter to other popular social media programs like Facebook and Linkedin. If you want be a friend on Facebook or a connection on Linkedin, you must ask permission of the other person. It can be days before you receive a reply.
To learn from others on Twitter requires no permission. You can choose to follow another person and you don’t need to get their permission to follow their tweets. No permission needed.
For this reason, some experts have called Twitter the greatest networking tool ever. You can follow and learn without permission.
Now that you have a Twitter account and have made a Tweet, let’s start to reshape your Twitter presence to make it an effective marketing tool for you and your business. In the next several posts, I will look at the various structural pieces of Twitter and give you tips on how each of these can be changed to create an effective small business marketing tool.
The Goal
You are on Twitter with over 20 million people. This number is doubling almost every six months. At this point in time, Facebook has over 200 million participants. Already Twitter has more businesses using its site than Facebook has with its 200 million participants. Clearly businesses are recognizing Twitter as a marketing tool. Bottom line, you have plenty of competition for attention on Twitter.
With this type of competition, you need ways that make your Twitter presence (think of your Twitter account as another website for your business) interesting and attractive. People will be looking at your Twitter website 24/7. How can you make these Twitter structural elements interesting and attractive to get people to follow you?
Your Picture
I already suggested using a head shot picture of you on Twitter. People buy from people not from a logo. Studies have shown that a picture on Twitter out performs a logo or a company name in getting more followers.
The tone of Twitter is causal. This is not the place for a slick corporate marketing document. What type of picture would people expect from someone in your profession? You picture needs to be a balance between professionalism and casualness. Make sure people can see your face on the picture. People relate better to faces than bodies. You will have an opportunity when you customize your Twitter background to have a larger picture of yourself.
I believe the future belongs not to the biggest or the strongest, but to those who are willing to adapt.
Over the past four years, my own efforts to help small business owners with their marketing efforts has become a living example of this belief.
Traditional Marketing Efforts
Initially When I started helping small business owners with their marketing four years ago, I employed the tools I personally used to grow my retail flooring business from $900,000 to $2.300,000. These tools involved:
Building a solid marketing messages
Applying the message consistently across marketing media
Creating good yellow page ads
Customer newsletters
Customer Loyalty programs
Add on selling and Up selling
Joint partnerships with other businesses
Digital Marketing
Two years ago, I realized that we were in the middle of a paradigm shift. Lead by customers using the internet, small business owners needed to use the internet if they were going to be successful with their marketing efforts. While the core ingredients of creating a solid marketing message remained the same, there were new marketing tools.
Websites
Search engines optimizations
Key word analysis
Email Marketing
On-line customer loyalty programs
On-line joint ventures with other businesses
Today’s Social Media Sites
In the last six months, I recognized that small business owners must make even more adaptations. With the advent of social media sites, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs and many other sites, the rules for successful small business marketing have again changed.
Creating a brand presence on social media sites
Learning how to interact with potential customers on line
Using blogs, video, audio and text on line
Learning how to promote with new marketing rules
I developed a free special report, A Small Business Blueprint for Social Media Marketing that you can access by completing the form in the upper right hand corner of this blog page. It’s free and provides a great framework for a small business owner on how they can use social media marketing for their businesses.
My intention six months ago with this Internet Marketing Tools Blog was to use the blog posts to dig deeper into the most popular social media sites. By reading, researching and writing, I hope to help small business with using these sites for their marketing efforts.
I started with Linkedin, a business orientated social media site. With the economic downturn and the record number of lost jobs, I took a small detour. I spent the last three months, exploring how Linkedin can help others find a job. This has been an exciting process. Linkedin has so many tools to aid people in their job search.
Beyond the research and posts I have made with Linkedin and job searching, I compiled those ideas together in a free e-book. (Currently being proof read). I will make that available as a free e-book in the next 2-3 weeks. It’s a small way that I can contribute to help others who are looking for work. (I will notify you how you can get a copy of this free e-book.)
Future Directions
Now I want to return to the original purpose of this blog and start on another social media site. I will start with Twitter since it has been in the news lately with the political developments in places like Iran and China. I will explore in more depth the purposes of Twitter, what it is and how it can be successfully used for small business marketing.
I hope this gives you insights into the adaptations I have made and the course I will be taking rmy blog for the immediate future.
Taking a moment on the 4th of July to wish everyone who celebrates our independence day, a wonderful holiday. May it be filled with hotdogs, apple pie, flag waving and some good old fashion fireworks or whatever way you celebrate!
This is from a series of posts from our users as part of Grad Guides seek week. Henric
Haldeborg is a JD and MPA student at Cleveland State University in Cleveland, Ohio. By
years end, he’ll leave the comforts of academic abstraction for the harsh realities of
gainful employment to somewhere warm, if he has anything to say about it]
So, I’ve been asked to write a few lines about how I use LinkedIn to search for jobs and internships. I’ll start with an example straight out of reality:
Back in the beginning of the year, I took an interim class in mediation, where the professor mentioned that he had a LinkedIn group devoted to mediation and arbitration that he would be happy to let any interested students join. Of course, I bit immediately. We got to talking in class and before I knew it I had landed a clerkship (legalese for internship) with the idea that it will turn into a full time, permanent position once I’m done with school in December.
Of course, I’m not saying that by you joining groups on LinkedIn employers will magically come out of the woodwork to offer you fancy positions at their firms. What I am saying is that in your quest for that elusive foot in the door you want to be where the right people are. Pick your groups and join in on the fun (or start some of your own). Show interest, initiative, and a willingness to learn. Before you know it, the right people (or people who know the right people) will notice. http://tinyurl.com/cztx2x
The following is an email I received from Jorge Olson and his suggestions on how to use Linkedin in your job search. Enjoy.
Hello Al
LinkedIn has a new feature on the Group section, it is a job board. This is a great idea as many people are using the Group Discussion as a job board and many group administrators don’t like it. Many administrators even posted a dedicated discussion thread for jobs, many times entitled “Post Your Jobs Here”.
As of today, you can’t see the job board inside groups by simply looking at a list of groups; this is probably a bug. You actually have to click something within the groups such as news, discussion, or any other link. After you click any link you will see Jobs as part of the main menu within the post.
This new feature will complement the general Job feature that you see at the top of LinkedIn as one of their main menu items together with People, Answers, and Companies. The difference is that the Group Jobs are free to post, so you’ll see many more jobs there than in the general job posting.
What to do if you are looking for a job? Join all the groups that you can, LinkedIn allows you to join 50. Join the groups that relate to your industry or job expertise and also join any groups of HR or Recruiting professional so you can network with them. Finally, join groups in your city or area. For example, I live in San Diego, California and there are more than 10 groups dedicated to San Diegans.
Once you join all the groups go to the job posting part of the groups and start scanning for jobs. Contact the person that posted the job directly and strike a conversation or relationship. Don’t just send resumes to everyone, otherwise you are missing the point of networking. Remember, the power of LinkedIn lies in the people, the relationships you can establish and how you use these relationships.
If you have not already, make sure you profile is complete with photo, job history, education, skills, etc. This way the recruiters of HR managers can check you out before giving you a call.
Want to learn how to use LinkedIn for sales, marketing and self promotion? Attract thousands of visitors to your website, get hundreds of leads and increase your leads and sales dramatically. Visit www.Linked-Marketing.com for details.
Here’s the second part of C.G. Lynch’s article. Enjoy.
3. Filling out your bio
One of the finer things about LinkedIn, at least from a recruiting standpoint, is that it not only encourages honesty in your resume, it essentially requires it, since your profile is viewed by your bosses, colleagues and customers.
Dixson says the normal resume rules apply — accentuate your strengths and highlights, while providing context around your job responsibilities.
But the one main difference between a regular resume and a LinkedIn profile is that you’ll have a wider range of people viewing the latter. As such, you will have to be slightly more pragmatic in hitting points that you think might satisfy a few different sectors of your industry that interest you.
A couple other quick tips for your profile and bio:
• Get the LinkedIn URL you want. Most LinkedIn profiles URLs will have be a slash and then your name (/your name) at the end of them. Names can be common, so try to get yours first.
• Make sure your LinkedIn profile is public (go to account settings to check). If you want to tap all the capabilities of LinkedIn, and be able to have people search for you and examine your career experience, you need a public profile.
• Remember that you don’t matter on the Web if Googledoesn’t see you. Try to include keywords in your profile that you think people might search for regarding your field.
4. Your LinkedIn Connection List
There are two main factions who argue the merits of how one chooses connections on LinkedIn. One is LinkedIn itself. As CIO highlighted in a past article, LinkedIn firmly believes you should know your contacts before deciding to add them as a connection. They say they have designed the service with that philosophy in mind. Connections, they argue, are a reflection of you professionally. If you don’t know who they are, it can reflect poorly on you when people peruse your connection list.
On the other end of the spectrum are the LinkedIn Open Networkers, known as LIONs. A LION generally will add most people as a connection (whether they know them or not). Many LIONs build huge connection lists (thousands), and see value from doing this. According to the LION entry on wikipedia, they also adamantly discourage the use of the “I don’t know” button. “I don’t know” was designed by LinkedIn to discourage random, unknown connections. If it’s hit five times, a person can be blocked from LinkedIn or face consequences that prohibit their use of the service.
Dixson recommends taking somewhat of a middle ground between the two camps and work up a strategy you think makes sense for you and your profession. The key, she says, is having a consistent set of guidelines for adding connections.
But it will always be a murky issue, Dixson says. Perhaps, for instance, your criteria for adding a connection is that you know someone or have at least conducted business with them in the past. Well, what if, after you give a talk at a trade show or conference, a member of the audience writes and asks to connect with you on LinkedIn?
Dixson says it is fine to decline a connection, but that if such a case arises, it’s good form to explain why. For example, you might respond this way: “Thank you for reaching out. I’m glad you enjoyed my talk at the trade show. While I’m happy you contacted me, I don’t add connections until I’ve done business with a person directly. As such, feel free to e-mail me in the future and we can see what opportunities might come up in the future.”
If you are the one sending a connection, be sure to not use the canned invitation of “I’d like to add you as a connection” when sending the invite, especially if you feel you don’t know the person incredibly well or that their memory might need some prodding. At the very least, even if they decline it, they’ll be less likely to hit the dreaded “I don’t know” button.
Finally, make your connection list public, Dixson says. If you don’t, you are essentially defeating the purpose of LinkedIn. It’s a social network, and there isn’t anything more inherently unsocial than not allowing your contacts to connect with one another. The only exception would be is if you feel showing your connections would undermine your company’s competitive advantage.
5. Recommend and Getting Recommended
The recommendations feature on LinkedIn can be a powerful way to show that your work has been endorsed by influential people. With this in mind, Dixson recommends a “360 degree strategy” that shows the various ways in which you do your job and the people you serve.
“You want managers, peers and clients to recommend you,” Dixson says. “These should be people who know you well and who can really speak to your competencies as they’re relevant to what you’re positioning yourself for.”
Though it’s nice to be recommended, Dixson says it’s vital to build up your own social capital by recommending others, a key to good LinkedIn Etiquette (and social networks in general): what goes around comes around. If you go and write a good recommendation for a colleague, odds are someone will do the same for you in the future.
Taking the time to answer other Linkedin participant’s questions not only allows you to contribute, it also builds credibility and expertise within your network. Years ago, when I left my carpeting business, I volunteered for one of those “Ask an Expert” websites as an expert regarding carpet. I answered 50-60 questions per year. It’s been several years, since I left that program. I still get emails from people I have helped with my knowledge.
Click on Answer a question and you will get a drop down box that also indicates what recommended Categories are most likely for your expertise. These are based on the groups you belong to and the information in your Profile. You will also see a heading, New Questions from Your Network. In addition, you can click on any of the Categories listed on the right side of the page and answer questions from these Categories.
Your Options
Use one ofthe above options to see a list of current questions. Click on an appropriate question. You will have two options.
You can answer the question Answer Yourself
You can Suggest an Expert and provide the person with a connection or a resource that can help
While Answering the question yourself bring some immediate attention to your own expertise, connecting other people resources is also a powerful way of building relationships. Do you remember the last time someone hooked you up to the right person? You felt good that you had a solution to your problem. The expert felt good that they were recognized for their expertise and could now establish a new relationship with you. And the connector felt good because they were helpful even though they did not have the immediate answer.
This Week’s Expert Status
You will also see a list of This Week’s Experts with a Star logo behind their name. The person asking a Linkedin questions gets to select the best answer to their question. When you are choose as the best answer you get a “Point” from Linkedin. After several “points” you are given Expert status of the week—just a little extra bonus of recognition. Here are the Linkedin rules for getting Expert status.
Earning expertise is easy:
1. Find questions in the areas you know–Browse questions to find categories familiar to you
2. Answer those questions–Remember, private answers won’t help you earn expertise
3. Every time the questioner picks your answer the best, you gain a point of expertise–The more points of expertise, the higher you appear on lists of experts.
To be continued, your comments are always welcomed…
An equally cool tool for quickly expanding your network is the Linkedin Browser Tool. Like the Outlook took, the Browser tool interconnects your web browser, either Firefox or Internet Explorer with the Linkedin program. When you down load the Browser toolbar, a small Linkedin Icon appears on the menu bar of your browser. By clicking on the Icon, you can do the following:
Go directly to your Linkedin home page
Directly use Linkedin to find people
Find Services
Change your profile
Find your connections
Add connections
Find Jobs
Use Linkedin Job Insider
In short, instead of having to log into your Linkedin program, you can do it from your browser bar. This makes it very convenient for you to the Linkedin tool always there to be put to use whenever you need it.
Downloading the Linkedin Outlook Toolbar and Browser Toolbar
Go the bottom of any Linkedin page on your Linkedin program and look for the category Tools. You will see the Outlook Toolbar and the Browser Toolbar. There are easy to follow download instructions. Put these tools to work for you.
The goal for expanding your network is to find the best people possible to help with your job search. Best people can mean a number of different things:
Best people who direct you to a job
Best people who are looking for candidates like you
Best people who invite you to contact others who can help you
Best people who help and support your job search
Best people who provide you with information about jobs or companies
Best people who put you in contact with the right people
Before I show you the many wonderful ways Linkedin helps you expand your network, let me share with you an article I wrote recently about the real benefits of the Linkedin network. It will give you new insights about networking.
What is the real Power of Networking?
Some might say the power of networking is in its low cost. True, its one of the cheapest forms of marketing. Others would say that word of mouth advertising is networking’s greatest power. True, word of mouth advertising is your most effective form of advertising. Others would suggest that the exposure your business gets from networking is the real power. True, business exposure is good.
The real power of networking is not who you know but who they know. Let’s look at this power.
Your 250 Contacts
Experts tell us that each of us knows about 250 people. What happens once we contact these 250 people? Where to we go from there?
Each of these people we know also knows 250 people. If each of these people we know introduced us to 5 of their contacts and each of those contacts introduced us to just five of their friends or contacts? Well, you can do the math. Your network has increased exponentially.
Space and time limit our networking abilities. Now, let’s look at how digital networking eliminates these limitations.
Linkedin
I will use Linkedin as an example of second and third degree networking. (Face Book and Twitter have specific applications that will allow you to do the same thing). When you go to your Linkedin page, you see your first level of contacts. These are the people you are directly connected with through Linkedin. Then you can click on any one of their profiles and see who they are connected with. Then you can click on any one of their connections to see a third level of connections.
Linkedin tells me that with my 70 connections I have potential contact with 1.4 million connections. They also tell me on my page that the new connections I added last month has increased my overall connections by 3,000.
Digital networking overcomes the time and space limitations of physical networking and now allows us to see well beyond our immediate contact list. Do you see how this can opens up new possibilities for your small business?
Conclusion
It’s not who you know but who they know that is the secret of digital networking. To fully utilize social networking programs, go beyond your first level of contacts and explore the second and third degrees of contacts that are just waiting for you to tap into them. The Small Business Tool Box May 2009
