Seven Golden Rules For Winning At Social Media

Seven Golden Rules For Winning At Social Media:from Business 2 Community by John W Hayes
Social media can be a complete waste of time if you are not disciplined in your approach. It can literally eat hours out of your working day, leaving you working late or just plain unproductive. It’s a little bit like digital quicksand; it can suck you right in. One minute you can be scanning a network for valuable nuggets of business-related information and the next you’re discussing Manchester United’s chances in Europe or reliving a co-worker’s drunken Saturday night antics.
Social media can be habit forming, wasteful and downright dangerous. But that is also why it is so useful. It’s time to harness social media and show it, and your followers, just who the boss is by following some very simple rules.
Rule 1 – Separate your work life from your family and social life: Only use social media for work purposes during office hours. Leave any ‘social’ social media activity for home or during your lunch breaks. It may be possible to socialise both work and social content on Facebook and Twitter, but I believe in keeping any fun and games off professional networks like LinkedIn. If you do use a personal Facebook or Twitter profile for business purposes as well as personal details, be careful what you share and never post when under the influence of drink.
Rule 2 – Maintain a standard profile across any professional social networks: Use the same photograph or image across all your social networking profiles. This will help people quickly and easily identify you on a busy wall of information.
Rule 3 – Be selective in what you share: Don’t be one of the many thousands of people whose only social media activity is to re-post the same story, often published by a major news network or well-read blog, which is perhaps loosely connected to your business. It’s highly unlikely that you are breaking any news here or will be inciting people to click on your links. You want to make sure that anything you share is both highly relevant and of interest to your followers. If at all possible, the shared content should be taken from your own Thought Leadership programme or a nugget of information from an individual you admire or respect (and preferably not a competitor).
Rule 4 – Learn to Listen: Schedule time to listen to feedback relating to your company or brand via the social networks. Sophisticated software such as the Vocus Marketing Suite can help you keep track of social media mentions and conversations, as well as recommending great people to follow and engage with. Smaller companies, who are perhaps just starting out with social media, can start monitoring social media activity by using the search facility on Twitter, monitoring their Facebook pages and setting up Google Alerts to catch mentions on blogs and forums, etc. It’s also a good idea to monitor your competitors’ brand terms and compare sentiment towards them with your brand.
Rule 5 – Be social: It’s called social media for a good reason. Instead of just broadcasting, try and interact with your audience. This is a vital if you hope to build community around your Thought Leadership. Thank people for kind words or recommendations, try to assist people who might have problems and never ignore an angry comment. In the fast-paced world of social media a tiny spark of discontent can quickly turn into a wildfire – keep a check on this.
Rule 6 – Automate: social media operates across international borders and multiple time zones: No matter how much of a hardcore marketer you might think you are or how much strong coffee you drink, there is no way you’ll be able to maximise your social media presence without a little help. There are a number of software tools available (including iContact) designed to help you schedule and track your social media output. This means you can post messages to the likes of Facebook or Twitter at times when your customers are online, freeing you to dedicate your time to more important things (see Rule 1) or perhaps even sleeping, if your customers are on the other side of the world.
Rule 7 – Maintain momentum: Once you have started, don’t stop. An ill-tended or redundant social network gives the impression of a slack organisation, or may even suggest you have gone out of business. It might take a number of months to see any real return on your investment (in terms of followers and revenue) so stick at it and be prepared to build slowly.