The
crux of social media marketing lies in creating great content. A post
that is liked and shared is the need of the hour. So, expend a lot of
time, effort and expense in creating the right content. Your content
should be attractive, likeable and more importantly, it should serve
the marketing purpose. I can share the picture of a pretty girl and
that would garner a lot of interest but I am not marketing my product
or service with that, am I? So, create the perfect content. That is
step one!
If
your content is good enough, people will find you. But do help them
find you. Share it zealously. Talk about it in the right forums.
Network with others who you think would be interested in the content.
Aim to build relationships with these people you painstakingly find
out.
The
next important factor that makes or breaks your online marketing
activity is whether your content is easily sharable or not. Even if
it is very interesting and people do want to share it, any hassle in
sharing the content is going to cost you. While on this topic, it is
perhaps noteworthy to understand why people want to share something
on their walls. People love anything that is funny. People love to
share content that makes them look intelligent and intellectual to
others. So, work on creating content that cater to these needs. And
such content finds its own hosts and markets itself.
Use
social media to listen to what your customers say. A lot of
successful business ventures today have their social media platforms
to collect information from customers- what they like, what they
dislike, what they want and do not want etc. A lot of custoemr
grievances are sorted out with social media.
Finally,
give it a lot of thought before posting anything online. While great
content can fetch you a lot of accolades and business, poor content
can ruin you!
A
few years back, Waitrose, the UK grocer that caters to the the
British upper class launched a Twitter campaign. PR at Waitrose
invited Twitterati to participate in their tweet campaign by
tweeting
their reasons to shop at Waitrose. And boy, it backfired and ended in
negative campaigning. The campaign fetched only a minority of serious
tweets from people who gave positive reasons as to why they shop at
Waitrose. Most other tweets received tarnished the brand for their
stiff upper lip, upper class image!
Read
more about the backlash here.
So,
whatever you post, think twice before you hit ‘Publish’!
Image: Internet