Wow! What a question to start off the new year. The going trend of Marketing is to think of ROI and ‘ME’, the company. While we all agree customers are very important, at the end of the day we mostly focus on how the company feels, what the company has to offer, how much is the company making etc. What we have failed to really take into consideration is the client.With Social Media it’s no longer ROI, it’s ROE = RETURN on ENGAGEMENT!

Social Media opens a world of opportunity when looking to indulge the client. This social networking “tool” has put the power in our hands to cut costs and focus on the client; yet there are still a lot of questions as to how. How Do I Make Money?

Here’s the top 10 ways to turn your Social Connections into Money for your company, however reading this is something you have heard several times by now I’m sure, you have to let go of your old way of thinking and STOP thinking of you, but start a new way of thinking that involves the CLIENT FIRST! REALLY, putting the client first.

1. Build a relationship with your current network – talk to them as if they are human, besides it is a human sitting behind the screen. – LONG TERM = MORE $$$
2. Turn your network into RAVING FANS – Get your network to share your page with their friends, to share your posts with their network/friends, to comment back on what you are saying and provide their opinion, etc – SHORT TERM – INCREASED BRAND EXPOSURE ——– LONG TERM – MORE $$$$
3. # 2 CANNOT go w/o # 3! CONTENT is KING!! Yes we have been saying to you for 2 years through blogs and updates. W/O GREAT content, no one is going to interact with you.
4. Get your network to PARTICIPATE! Ask them questions, run a poll, or a quiz etc. Participation means they like your brand and are 70% more likely to buy from you as well as tell their friends and family about you. = MORE ENGAGEMENT = MORE MONEY
5. Sell your Products directly on Facebook. E-Commerce website? Retail Products? Sell them on your FB page. Now you are only driving people to 1 place where you can stay connected with them. = MORE MONEY
6. Run Contests! People love contests. Run one. Be creative, ask them to upload videos, ask them upload photos, to tell their best story etc.= MORE ENGAGEMENT = MORE MONEY
7. Offer FB/Twitter/Blog Discounts. Give 10% off to someone who refers a FB friend, or 25% off to FB fans, or 15% through a coupon or promo code… = MORE $$$
8. Hold a Digital Focus Group. Why hire secret shoppers? You have a group of people who will gladly answer your questions. – HAPPY CLIENTS = MORE $$$
9. Build Relationships with Influential Bloggers – Have them blog about you, have you blog on their blog, build your blog visibility and optimization = MORE $$$
10. STOP! STOP crying about how much time this takes, STOP making excuses, STOP saying how it’s unproven and it doesn’t work for you. TRY! Try putting as much effort in it as you are in fighting it and you will see the same results large companies are seeing. But you MUST put your old thinking aside and learn how to be social!

Is there a proper way to behave on social media? A better way to present yourself and your business? A right way and a wrong way to approach a topic? Of course there is.

Here are the top 10 best things you can do on social media sites:

1. Love what you do. That means you should really love what you do. It translates into good social media conversation.
2. Be forthcoming with information. Don’t skimp. Either you have all the information you need to address a topic or you don’t. If you don’t, people will begin to regard you as less of an expert – which, of course, you will be … if you skimp on the information.
3. Research and do your homework. That will enable you to become the sought-after expert that people need.
4. Keep politics and religion out of it. Don’t use social media as a podium for your religious and political beliefs. Unless you are a political or religious blogger. A company should stick to offering tips based on what it does best. People don’t want to be preached to – they want to learn from you.
5. Keep it simple and to the point. The writing, that is. Try not to be so superfluous with your written communication so as to assuage the hyperbole for which you are so artly subscribed to impart to your readership . Simple. Sentences. To the point.
6. Time your text. Try to gauge current events and topics so you can release a blog or tidbit of information at the moment at which it is most timely and important.
7. Build on momentum. Business blogging or Facebook posts need to be continuous. Don’t let weeks or months go by without posting.
8. Don’t pretend to be something you’re not. Don’t blog about the best practices of supermarket food handling if you don’t know the first thing about it. Chances are, people who are true experts in this area will be reading your blog and you’ll be called on the carpet – and there goes your credibility.
9. Draw your followers into your conspiracy. Be their best friend. Confide in them the vast secrets of what you do in order to help make their businesses better.
10. Do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. Ten businesses who sell cakes use their social media time to …. sell their cakes. What you should do is educate on the cake-making process, the pitfalls, the best ways to bake a cake. Interest stemming from the expertise and advice you impart will draw people to your website which ultimately will help you … to sell cakes.

What you do for a living is what you’re best at. It’s why you decided to go into business, whether you make widgets, sell insurance or own a restaurant. You’ve had to focus on perfecting what you do in order to stay afloat and increase your profits year after year.

And while you might believe that your talents extend to a range of capabilities where your business is concerned, it could be that social media marketing isn’t something you’ve had the time or the energy to focus on.

Before you launch a social media marketing campaign stop to think how much time you’ve had to devote on studying the social media landscape. Perhaps it’s best to leave your company’s social media reputation to a professional who has been in the business and, most importantly, has a firm grasp on trends in the world of social media and every day changes.

Here are the five reasons to hire a social media marketing company versus doing the work yourself or hiring in house:

1. Knowledge: A firm dedicated to knowing the social media lay of the land has the experience in this field to know what avenues are best for your company and how to direct and guide your social media campaign. We know where to place your company for optimum results.
2. Optimization – We understand Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, and how to position a topic for the greatest amount of hits online. We know the dynamics of web traffic and understand how a few key word placements can help you grow your business or how a great conversation between you and your prospects can increase your sales.
3. Cost Savings – With an average social media campaign costing between $2,000 and $3,000 a month, the cost savings are substantial in outsourcing to a team of three to five in a social media company versus hiring an in-house team of three to five employees, you do the math. Five employees with the true knowledge to run your social media campaign will cost you at least $12,000.00 a month and that’s basic pay.
4. Relationship Building: Social media professionals live and breathe, well, social media. We have been doing this our whole lives practically, while that’s a joke about how young we usually are, it’s true. We know how to truly build a relationship with people through social sites to influence their buying decisions. It’s how we communicate! It’s what we have been doing well almost since birth.
5. Trends and Changes: Social Media Agencies know what’s a trend and what’s here to stay. We stay on top of all the changes that are going on in the industry. We know where to look for changes and what changes are important to capitalize on … and what changes to stay away from. We communicate with like minded individuals and users to know how best to represent your company ‘socially’.

So when you decide to launch a social media marketing campaign remember that social media outsourcing can be more advantageous to your business than hiring in house. You’d be getting a team that offers flexibility, cost savings and web savvy for your company. The additional perk of having more of an objective view, will help you to zero in on what’s necessary to get your message across. It’s all about the old adage of too many cooks spoil the broth. In this case: too many in-house media experts can spoil a campaign. With everyone assuming the role of expert, not as much can be accomplished and a change may occur while they are trying to fight over who is correct.

The blogosphere is crowded. There’s a lot of content out there competing for a ranking on the search engines. This means your business blog has to grab the interest of your audience in only a few seconds and hold onto it for the entire read. And then hold onto the same viewer the next time around. And the next.

Your subject should be fresh – don’t write about how you’ve just discovered e books when the entire world has not only discovered them but embraced them – your tone professional and entertaining.

Sound hard? Well, for those people who don’t actually write for a living it could be hard. Companies have their own unique set of core capabilities – they manufacture or offer a specific service – writing for social media marketing is shoved under the rug. But communication is incredibly important and likewise can be incredibly difficult when non-writers try to get their company’s message across.

So here are tips to get your business blog off the ground:

1. Focus on what you want to say. Don’t dance around your subject with a bunch of words that sound nice but don’t really get to the point of what you’re offering. “An array of valuable services that will help to optimize your visibility and increase your product’s value in the marketplace” sounds nice but still begs the questions: What services? What does he mean by optimize? How does he know what my visibility is? Or my value? Why doesn’t he just talk about his expertise as a way to help me improve my business?
2. Write to educate your audience: People can find out information about you from your website. In your blog they want to learn what you have learned – they want you to tell them something interesting about what they need to know, want to know or should know about growing their business.
3. Write to engage your audience. Ask your network what they’d like to hear about and then write about it. This will increase your readership and followers.
4. Write for the search engines. Always remember to incorporate keywords you know people are searching for on the internet into your content. Use them three to five times throughout the copy to ensure search engines will pick up the keywords and increase your rankings.

The crux is that writing a business blog is really writing about what you know. And what you know can help your customers achieve their business goals.

Many businesses both small and large are taken away by this “social” phenomenon. Who knew that creating a site where people can unite with each other would be so popular, so powerful that it took the globe by storm? A simple idea, a complex website and a determined young man with the will power to follow through with his goals has created an industry that is changing the way the world does business.

Corporations are scrambling to find the right “Director of Social Media” to represent their brand and help them create their strategy. They are searching for the ‘right’ person with the ‘right’ experience to manage the image they have spent years creating. Did you know that corporations are spending over $100,000 a year for one person to help them learn to ‘socialize’, that doesn’t include the team that person must hire? Did you know that they require a minimum of 8 to 10 years experience in social media and online brand building, because yes it’s been around that long?

While, smaller businesses have yet to believe in this thing called ‘social media’, they are hurting for attention and business, yet many of them aren’t sure that this “new” style of marketing will work for them. Scrambling to figure out which sites they should be on and how to start connecting. More than that they truly believe an automated service at $300.00 a month will get them the business they so desperately need to survive this market.

Millennial’s practically won’t even do business with a company unless they appeal to their ‘social’ need. Gen Y relies solely on what their friends are doing, posting, tweeting and who they ‘recommend’. Their Facebook page is full of suggestions, likes and comments, experiences and references.

Interesting when you think about it isn’t it? It seems that there is such a gap between who believes in it, who is doing business there already, who is left behind and who won’t do business without it. While this industry has exploded over the last year, there still aren’t many out there who really has what it takes to educate the masses, build a solid strategy and represent a culture.

So ask yourself, whether you are a sole business owner or a corporate executive, if in one year an industry has exploded onto the scene, rapidly changing daily; why would you doubt the power this has over you, your business, your brand and your consumer? Why would you not take the time to get to know it, embrace it and spend the money to find someone who is:

• Reputable
• Knowledgeable
• Experienced

Why would you continue to let your teenager consult you, or avoid it because of fear? Do you know this is the most powerful industry to step on the scene in 10 years? It’s bigger than the internet ever thought of being! It’s worth the time and money invested in having an experienced professional represent you and manage your brand or company, socially. This is the way of the future. Stop wasting your money in something that gives no return, turn your efforts into a community where you have direct access to your customers and they have direct access to your company.