No matter your opinion regarding social media, it appears to be here to stay and it definitely is an essential piece of your company’s branding efforts. Why is this?
If done correctly, social media can be the preeminent means to grow your professional relationships. Through these relationships, you can foster contacts and disseminate your company’s message. These long-term relationships translate into repeat customers, clients or partners.
But, it is very important to enter into these business relationships on a human level, with the proper approach – one with an attitude of giving, not getting. This will help you build the trust and credibility necessary in any relationship.
To that end, it is important to carefully think this through before putting your hand to your social network profiles construction. This is because you want to be ranked highly in search engine results so you can be found when people look for you.
Not only do you want people to find you, but you want them to be impressed when they do. You know the adage: you only have one chance to make a good first impression.
Each social media profile you build should be thought of as a landing page. That makes sense. What does a landing page do?
- A landing page promotes your business by quickly giving potential clients or customers details they seek.
- It gives them a method to navigate to your website or to other social networks.
- Once visitors become familiar with your business, it’s more likely that they will further promote your products/services.
Keeping in mind that when someone lands on your page, you have 10 seconds or less to impress them enough to stay there to learn more about you and your company, what would you want to include? Though there is much you could include, I’ve whittled the list down to eight components:
- The name under which you want to be found.
- A username in your URL that you think people would use to search.
- A consistent, default photo, logo or avatar that you will use across all networks. (Be sure to name the photo before upload for SEO purposes.).
- A link to your website (or a special landing page) on the main page.
- A confident and well thought out bio (About Us), showcasing your expertise and using your main key words.
- Your interests – even if you’re a business. It’s all about relationship building.
- A customized background, for those networks who allow it.
- Publicly viewable privacy settings, whenever possible or appropriate.
After your profile is created, it is crucial to maintain an ongoing activity of involvement, which includes participating, sharing and engaging. The 80/20 rule of communication is always a good standard: 80% relationship-building and 20% promoting. Don’t ever, ever be that fellow we all know who only talks about himself. No one likes to be around him.
Finally, promote yourself with your social profiles across all your social networks and marketing avenues. Why not utilize the fruits of your labor, growing it synergistically?
