GUIDE TO SOCIAL MEDIA Overview Like it or not, social media is no longer a choice for most businesses. Social networks have combined search, email, instant messaging, blogging, gaming, video sharing, and online shopping into one comprehensive user experience. Your marketing strategy should include a social media presence to win the hearts and minds of this space. The ROI of social media is that your business will still exist in 5 years. - Erik Qualman The social web is an incredible platform for finding, connecting with, and engaging your target audience, often at a fraction of the cost of traditional media. • 98% of people in the U.S that are online • 1 in 5 minutes online is spent on social use social networks. (comScore Media networks. (comScore Media Matrix, Octo- Matrix, October 2011) ber 2011) • It’s not just young people using social me- • Among customers who talk about brands dia. Users 55 and older represent the fast- on social networks, the overwhelming ma- est growing segment in social networking. jority say that the brand mentions are posi- (comScore Media Matrix, October 2011) tive. (AYTM) toll-free: 888-600-1030 / www.blazonco.com Facebook www.facebook.com Twitter www.twitter.com Facebook is the king of all social networks. Twitter is a microblogging site that enables It is one of the most popular ways for indi- users to send short posts called “tweets” viduals to share content, create online per- to a network of other users who have sub- sonalities, connect with friends, and interact scribed as followers. Users can re-post with brands online. Consumers can “like” a content they like and directly interact with company’s page and subscribe to receive individuals or brands through replies and updates from that company, while also com- direct messages. Twitter is one of the easi- menting on your brand’s posts, posting their est ways for a brand to communicate with own content on your page, and sharing any a large target audience and build a loyal questions or comments they have about following online. your company. A strong brand presence on Facebook shows consumers that you are • 39% of Twitter users have tweeted about serious about your company and about con- a brand. (AYTM) necting with your customers. • 29% of Twitter users have retweeted a • 3 out of every 4 minutes spent across all brand message. (AYTM) social media channels are spent on Face- book. (comScore Media Matrix, October • Twitter’s unique visitor count has grown 2011) 59% in the past year. (comScore) • The number of marketers who say Face- • More than ½ of active Twitter users follow book is “critical” or “important” to their busi- companies, brands or products on social ness has increased by 83% in just two years. networks. (Edison Research) (HubSpot state of Inbound Marketing 2011) • 42% of Twitter users use it to learn about • 58% of Facebook users have liked a brand. products or services. (Edison Research) (AYTM) • 41% of Twitter users use it to provide • 42% of Facebook users have mentioned a opinions about products and services. (Ed- brand in a status update. (AYTM) ison Research) • 41% of Facebook users have shared a link, • 79% of U.S. Twitter users are likely to rec- video, or story about a brand. (AYTM) ommend brands they follow, while 67% are likely to buy from brands they follow. (Edi- • 67% of consumer companies have ac- son Research) quired customers through Facebook. (HubSpot State of Inbound Marketing Re- port, 2011) toll-free: 888-600-1030 / www.blazonco.com LinkedIn www.linkedin.com Google+ plus.google.com LinkedIn is a business-focused social net- Google+ is Google’s own social network working platform. It allows individual users and content sharing platform. Many of the to share their professional backgrounds functions and features are similar to those and connect with business contacts online. offered by Facebook, but it does have LinkedIn also lets users create pages for some unique functionality such as Circles, their businesses. These business pages a feature that allows users to group their contain information about employees, connections and regulate who they share products, and services, and even offer content with. Google+ has not yet gained business owners the option to advertise the same massive user base that Face- job openings. LinkedIn is one of the most book has, but it is becoming more and valuable professional networking options more important due to Google’s ongoing available today. integration of social media signals into their Google Search algorithm. • LinkedIn has over 100 million members, more than 5 times the population of the • Google+ gained 25 million visitors in less state of New York. (Mashable) than a month, faster than any other social network. (comScore) • 49% of LinkedIn users have household incomes over $100K. (Social Times) • Google+ has 90 million registered users. (Social Beat) YouTube www.youtube.com YouTube is the most popular way to share Yelp www.yelp.com videos online. Easy to use and complete- Yelp is an incredibly popular website ly free, YouTube lets brands upload and where users write reviews of businesses. share original videos, which are often the The concept is straightforward enough, but best form of promotional or informative Yelp’s rapid innovation and user growth content. has made it a major hub for consumer- generated business information despite • 48 hours of video are uploaded every the fact that it is not technically a social minute, resulting in nearly 8 years of con- network. Businesses on Yelp have the op- tent uploaded every day. (YouTube) portunity to post information about their services and respond to reviews. • Over 3 billion videos are viewed every day. (YouTube) • Yelp has a monthly average of 61 million unique visitors. (Yelp) • Yelp users have written more than 22 mil- lion reviews. (Yelp) toll-free: 888-600-1030 / www.blazonco.com foursquare www.foursquare.com Pinterest www.pinterest.com Though not technically a social network, four- Pinterest is a virtual bulletin board that allows square is nevertheless an incredibly signifi- users to organize, share, and comment on cant part of the social web that allows users content. Though fairly new, Pinterest is rap- to “check in” via mobile phone at various loca- idly growing. Users can “pin” content to vir- tions around the world. The foursquare plat- tual pinboards, categorizing their interests, form turns a visit to your local grocery store or and can also “repin,” “like,” or comment on coffee shop into a social game, where users content that they like. The more popular the compete to earn badges based on the num- “pin,” the more likely it is to be featured in a ber of times they check in at particular loca- place of prominence on the site, such as the tions. It’s important for brick-and-mortar busi- homepage. Companies can create pinboards nesses to be aware of this platform and the to share their own content as well as content more than 10 million people who use it, as they feel is of interest to their target market. foursquare provides businesses with promo- tional tools to retain these socially connected • Pinterest has more than 3.2 million unique visitors. Incidentally, the name “foursquare” is monthly visitors. (TechCrunch) never capitalized. • Pinterest has sustained a 45% monthly • 4 million check-ins per day. (foursquare) growth. (TechCrunch) • 30 million venues listed. (foursquare) StumbleUpon www.stumbleupon.com StumbleUpon is a discovery engine that finds • 600,000 merchants utilize foursquare’s and recommends web pages, videos, photos business tools and provide special offers. and other content from across the web ac- (foursquare) cording to the specified interests of the user. When shown a website, video, article, or oth- Reddit www.reddit.com er piece of content, users have the option of Reddit is a social news website where users “liking” it or not, and the more often a content can share content and “upvote” or “down- piece is “liked,” the more likely it is to be rec- vote” the content they find interesting or un- ommended to other users. Brands can utilize interesting, respectively. The more favorable StumbleUpon’s Paid Discovery platform to votes a piece of content receives, the more promote their websites and content, and can prominently it will be featured on the Reddit also create their own channels to share con- homepage. Brands can also share content, tent for free. which users can vote on. • StumbleUpon’s “Stumble” button has been • Reddit has more than 35 million unique visi- clicked more than 25 billion times. (Mashable) tors each month. (Site Trail) • StumbleUpon sends more traffic to U.S. • Reddit has close to 2 billion page views websites than Facebook. (GigaOm) each month. (Daily Dot) toll-free: 888-600-1030 / www.blazonco.com Setting Up Your Social Presence The setup process is different for each social media platform. Most of them are very easy and intuitive to use, and some allow a greater level of customization than others. When setting up all of them, keep the following points in mind. 1. Make sure the information you provide is complete and accurate. If a customer is seeking information about your company on a social network, the last thing you want is to provide incorrect or inaccurate information. 2. Make your contact information easy to find. Your goal is to market your services, which means your customers need to be able to get in touch with you. Provide your phone number, a link to your website or your blog, and, if appropriate, Google Maps directions to your place of business. 3. Provide links to your other social networking sites. 4.