How to find your voice on social media
I often speak with small business owners who want to jump on the social media train and establish their presence on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, or some combination of these. After all, everyone is doing it and who wants to be left behind? Many people adopt the “just try it” mentality and create an account, start posting, build followers … and then wonder where to go from there (the classic Fire, Aim, Ready approach). That’s fine if your goal for social media is just to be social. But if you intend to market your business through social media, you need to take a more deliberate approach. I call it finding your voice. Here are some practical tips on how to get there.
Set your goals. Are you looking to attract visitors to your website? Do you address customer concerns and comments? Establish Thought Leadership Online? Build a brand? While all of these are valid goals, your answer should NOT be “all of the above”. Decide on one or two main goals and put your full weight behind them. You will be more effective if you are focused.
Identify your target audienceand make a clear mental picture of who they are. If your audience is your customers, for example (that’s the case with my blog), consider a single person and define them more broadly than just their interest in your product or service. What are they like, what interests do they have? What is important to them? My favorite example is the Fiskateers blog, which targets scrapbookers. Sure, they use Fiskar scissors, but the blog’s voice understands that a scrapbooker is much more than just a user of scissors. By defining a clear person as his target reader, Fiskar has built a successful following by catering to the specific needs of the scrapbook maker.
Define what you represent and write it down. It could be a catchphrase (if you have a good one), or a 2 sentence statement of what you want your blog or Facebook page to represent to readers, or what kind of information source you want your Twitter followers to see you. You can call it your Mission or your Soap Box or your Position; the important thing is to write it down and look at it often as you decide how to represent yourself and shape what you write for “social” consumption.
Post only topics that are valuable to your audience. If you want to build a loyal fan base, you need to provide them with information that they value. Do it consistently and your followers will grow. Better yet, your reputation will expand, your website traffic will increase, and your business will benefit. Whether it is to pass links to your Twitter followers, share information with Facebook page ‘likes’, participate in a LinkedIn discussion or Q&A, post on your blog or comment on other blogs, place each comment or Post through your ‘value’ filter before you send it and don’t waste your followers’ time.
Have a consistent style and tone. People follow you for a reason and they will come back for more than they initially liked. Don’t let them down. It doesn’t mean that you should be repetitive or boring, just that you should give your followers what they expect from you.
Find your community. No matter how good or unique you are, you won’t be the only one talking about the topics you choose. Social media is about sharing, so be generous with your give and take. Self-promotion is a turn off for fans of social media, so read what others write, share links when you like something, and give credit where appropriate. Others will do the same for you.
Measure your progress. One way to do this, of course, is to count your followers or “Likers” and watch them grow over time. But more importantly, check your goals and make sure you are tracking progress towards them. Looking to improve your online reputation? Then find out how often you are quoted, mentioned, retweeted, and shared (see Social Media Metrics 101 for a list of tracking tools). Looking to drive traffic to your website? Then use Google Analytics to see how many people are sent through social media links. Do you just want to please? Well then, okay, count your likes.