Social media and business use
After writing my article “What’s the point of Twitter?” earlier this year, I’ve been asked to to some speaking on how social networking sites can be used for business. This blog article builds on that and includes links to the various sites mentioned in the talk. I’ve focused on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter for the simple reason that these are the three I’m most familiar with and the ones that seem (at the moment anyway) to be the most useful to businesses.
A little history
Facebook is a spin-off from Harvard University’s Facemesh and was originally available only to Harvard students. It was rewritten and opened to the public in September 2006. At the time of writing it has more than 300 million active users, half of whom log on every day. The fastest growing demographic is those aged 35 and over. More from Wikipedia
LinkedIn was founded in December 2002 and officially launched in 2003. It reached 1/2 million users April 2004 and celebrated its 5th birthday in January 2009 by hitting 40 million users. It now has more than 50 million registered users. More from Wikipedia and LinkedIn’s Company History page
Twitter was created in 2006. It’s not known exactly how many accounts there are (Twitter won’t release this), but it is ranked as one of the 50 most popular websites and (as of February 2009) the 3rd most used social networking site with 6 million unique visitors and 55 million monthly visits. The same month it was rated as fastest growing social networking site with a monthly growth of 1382% compared to Facebook ‘s 228%. However, only 40% of Twitter users stay. More from Wikipedia
Other popular sites include Bebo, Flickr, Friends Reunited, Last.fm, MySpace, Ning, Plaxo & Xing – for a fuller but still incomplete list see Wikipedia’s “List of social networking websites”
Philosophy
Facebook was originally meant for keeping in touch with friends via status updates. Later they added pages & groups. Pages are similar to profiles – brand or celebrity pages can have friends, add pictures, etc. Groups are a little different from pages, they can be open or closed, anyone can join or they have to be approved by the administrator. Which one to use is complicated because they have so many overlapping features – have a look at Mashable’s Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups: What’s the Difference? for a fuller explanation. There’s the facility to contact all page fans or group members by Facebook email and to add events.
To build a network of contacts you invite someone to be friends with you, they then accept or decline that invitation. You build your network by having people accept your friend request or accepting other peoples friend request.
The LinkedIn philosophy is similar to Facebook’s, you ask for a connection with a person and that person accepts or declines the invitation. LinkedIn is designed for business and has the facility to ask for a referral/connection to someone through one of your connections. It too has groups with similar facilities to Facebook.
Twitter works the other way round. You chose to follow someone, they have the option of following you back. You can see anyone’s “Tweets” (status updates) whether you follow them or not, unless they have chosen to show them to only followers. If someone you are following doesn’t want you to see their Tweets they can block you. You can’t force anyone to follow you.
How they’re being used
Groups
My other company, Network Midlands, has a Facebook group which is open for anyone to join without their membership having to be approved. It uses the group to inform members of events that they are organising. Members start and take part in discussions and post photos and information for other members to see.
I’m also a member of some other groups including Purple Star Design (someone I network with), Rustic Foods (a business owned by a friend of mine) and NFL Live on 5 (I’m a big American Football fan)
Pages
One of my clients, The Greyhound Inn in Lutterworth, has a Facebook page as does Andy Lopata who co-wrote “And Death Came Third”. The Greyhound uses their Facebook page as part of their marketing strategy, whereas Andy uses his page to educate us about business networking.
Network Midlands has a group on LinkedIn. Unlike the Facebook group, applications to join have to be approved by me – mainly to keep Indian spammers out. Again it is used to let members know about forthcoming events and members can post news items or start and contribute to discussions.
LinkedIn has an events section where people can search for or create events. There is also an “Answers” area where people can ask for help and others can post comments or answers. Contributing to this helps to grow your reputation and people can mark you as an expert in a given area.
Twitter has been difficult to classify. It’s been called a micro-blogging site, social text messaging (similar to SMS messaging) and a waste of time 
. Twitter messages (Tweets) are limited to 140 characters and because of this many people have questioned how useful it can be. So what is it being used for?
In the early days people just used to put up a Tweet saying what they were doing (similar to the Facebook status). However, as Twitter’s use has grown, it is now being used for conversations (sort of like instant messaging, but more permanent and public), for short messages instead of sending an email – especially where the message needs to go to several people, publicising events (as Network Midlands does), communicating breaking news, asking questions, technical support, etc.
Breaking news
- US Airways flight 1549 crash on the Hudson River: Because Tweets can be sent as text messages from mobile phones, many people Tweeted about this as it happened. I’ve been told that the BBC found out about it from watching the Twitter feeds. Pictures were also posted to the twitpic website, again from mobile phones
- The Iran elections generated a frenzy of messages from Twitter users
Getting answers
One of the people I follow on Twitter, Nikki Pilkington, was having problems getting something to work on her website. She asked people to have a look and see if it was really doing what she thought it was doing, and the answer was yes. I offered to have a look at the code. I couldn’t see why it wasn’t working, but I did find another way of getting the desired result. A few hours later Nikki posted a tweet sating “A MASSIVE thank you to @trevorwood for sorting out my alignment problem! What a star! x http://ow.ly/uudN” – the problem was fixed.
In my previous post, What’s the point of Twitter? I listed a number of case studies where companies have used twitter, either by design or (in the case of the CoffeeGroundz Cafe in Houston) by accident. I really like the CoffeeGroundz case – it’s worth spending a few minutes to read the article.
Some Dos and Don’ts
Some of these only apply to Twitter, but most work for all social networking sites
Manners
- Dress nicely – get a good photo for your profile. If it’s a company account, then it’s OK to use your company logo, but otherwise please show a photo of yourself, not your cat or dog or teddy bear.
- Introduce yourself – Fill in your profile page and link to a page about you or your company (I’m still writing mine!)
- Be a good conversationalist – there’s no point setting up an account and then never going back to it
Before you start
- Reserve your account name, use something simple that people can remember – use your real name or company name if you can, nicknames can be so unprofessional
- Learn the culture & language – it’s like being in a foreign country, but friendlier. Take your time getting to know how people interact.
- If you can, find a tour guide – someone who knows how to use the site, especially good if they are in your industry area
- Identify key players – people who have lots of contacts and can influence others to take you seriously – just like real-world networking.
- Monitor your industry and watch for mentions of you and/or your company. There are tools for doing this (tweetbeep, socialoomph and Google Alerts are good places to start).
Finding followers
- Import your address book and see who’s already on twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn
- Provide value, solve problems, fulfil needs
- Leverage other profiles & networks, e.g., company website, blog, email signature, business card – put your Twitter/Facebook/LinkedIn URL on them
- Ask & answer questions
- Be conversational, be active especially at peak times for your target audience
- Offer incentives, but be careful as this could be construed as spam
- Build your network before you need it
Writing tips
- Be personal
- Repeat tweets at intervals, the chances of tweet being seen drops off after 30 mins. Repeat at different times of the day
- Tweet links to interesting websites or web pages
- Take time to craft your tweets
- Reframe and retweet other peoples questions
- Use direct messages for private conversations
Get under 140 chars
- Use URL shorteners
- Use TXT speak in moderation
- Leave room for your tweet to be re-tweeted
- Link to blog posts, pics, etc. if over 140 chars
Common mistakes
- Lack of transparency – don’t trick people
- Forgetting your tweets will be on the web forever
- Not filling out your bio – could be seen as a spammer
- Not branding consistently
- Not updating tweets
- Rants, fights, baiting, etc. – all the things we saw in the early days of bulletin boards and forums
- Tweeting everything – too much is one of the main reasons people unfollow
- Following loads more people than follow you
Finally (for now anyway) remember social networking should be an integral part of your overall marketing plan, not an add on or stand alone.
Resources
Useful websites – in no particular order (mostly Twitter related)
- 181 Free Twitter Buttons, Badges, Widget and Counters to Help You Find Followers
- 62 Ways to Use Twitter for Business
- 7 Habits of Highly Effective Twitterers
- 8 Twitter Networking Tips: From Online to In-the-Flesh
- tweetbeep – Free Twitter Alerts by Email
- Twibes Twitter Groups
- Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups: What’s the Difference?
- Socialoomph – Tools to boost your social media productivity
- twitpic – share pictures via Twitter
- Twitter my site – get customised buttons for Twitter
- TwitterTroll.com – real-time Twitter search engine
- TwiTip blog – Twitter Tips
- Twitter Tips for Beginners [VIDEO]
- TwitterFeed – feed your blog to twitter
- Twittermail – email to your twitter feed
- Starting a Blog? Here are 10 Things to Keep in Mind
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Ann Holman in her blog has pointed me in the direction of an eBook written by John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing called "Social Media for Small Businesses". You can download it from here. Enjoy
[...] various chambers of commerce. From time to time he is asked to give short talks on topics such as social media and business continuity planning. Trevor is now Vice Chairman of the South Leicestershire branch of [...]