Over the past couple of years we have seen an evolution in how companies are using social media websites to promote their business and expand their customer base. Websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube have allowed companies to reach out to their fans in ways that are more creative and interactive than traditional websites or advertisements. Now there is a new social media website that has grabbed the attention of everyday users and is becoming increasingly valuable for companies as well.  It’s called Pinterest and I am absolutely pinned on it.

Pinterest is most popularly known as a site that allows its users to organize and share some of their favorite things. It is a quick and easy way to find new recipes, personal style and decorating ideas, DIY crafts, and suggestions for your dream wedding. Now that the core of Pinterest has been developed and discovered by its users, companies are now jumping on board to this new platform of business marketing.

Companies are constantly looking for new ways to engage current and potential consumers, and Pinterest has allowed them to explore a whole new world. Through my personal use of Pinterest, I have entered a contest by Lands’ End and discovered new products from modcloth.com. What makes Pinterest so valuable to companies is the fact that it is purely visual. Consumers aren’t forced to read a product or service description. What captures the users’ attention is purely the product, for what it is at the most basic level: a picture.

One of the most valuable aspects of Pinterest is that it gives its consumers the option of exploring a picture further. Find a couch that you would love in your living room or that perfect outfit for an upcoming social event? Simply click on the picture and follow the URL that takes you to where the picture was originally found, more often than not, the website where the product can be purchased.  Consumers aren’t left having to search the Internet for a product they saw in an advertisement.

Pinterest has made it easier for users to share their favorite products and ideas on the web, and has made it even easier for businesses to get their products into the eyes of potential customers. And quite often, the original post of a product came from a customer, not the business itself. This has allowed for almost endless possibilities of free marketing for businesses.

Pinterest is still a social media site that is being tested in terms of what it can do for both consumers and companies. I believe that over the next couple of months we will see an evolution in how companies use this platform to market and promote their products.  Will companies go away with traditional print and television advertising and instead post their advertisements and videos directly on Pinterest, where the sharing capabilities are easier and endless? Only time will tell.

Getting started in social media as a small business can seem like a daunting task. Your business may not have any presence in social media and you might not have anyone skilled in social media. Luckily, when getting started you don’t need the reinvent to wheel. Many small businesses have been successful with social media and you can have success too even if you are currently not a user. Starting from the ground up in to the world of Facebook, Twitter, and blogs is not as confusing as it seems. You just need a plan to get started. Here is a good one to follow:

1. Commit to the success of the social media campaign. Just because social media is seen as a low cost way of reaching customers doesn’t mean it won’t demand a time commitment. You will need to create content, interact with followers, and work to grow your fan base on a daily basis. Be prepared to commit at least three hours a week.
2. Don’t overwhelm yourself with too many social media channels to begin with. Choose one social media channel to start, learn how to create buzz online, and then move forward with others.
3. Create Content. You have to give your followers a reason to follow and pay attention to your page. This doesn’t mean you have to constantly be giving out deals to your Facebook fans. If you post content that is relevant to your clients, they will pay attention to you online. This could be content you create or content you share or find pertaining to your industry.
4. Engage your followers. When they post on your wall or retweet you, you need to respond. This lets them know you care about what they are saying and gives them a reason to engage you in the future. Also, they may ask a question about your products or services and your answer could help lead to a sale.
5. Brand your page. This is a step many small businesses ignore. A welcome page branded for your business on Facebook is the number one way to convert someone into “liking” your page. A background on your Twitter or YouTube profile goes a long way to making your profile look professional.
6. Monitor your progress. Most social media sites give you good tools to be able to track your progress, but you may want to get even more in-depth analytics. There are many different social media analytics programs including Hootsuite and Tweetdeck. Remember, like any other marketing effort you want to track results.
7. Be Patient. You are not going to get a thousand followers your first week. It will take time to build your following, but if you are willing to put in the work, you will get great results and a loyal base of followers.

I have been watching a lot of the Food Network lately and being the wordsmith that I am, I had been adding to my epicurean vocabulary.  Here’s a term I found particularly interesting, amuse-bouches.  They’re single bite appetizers (always complimentary) specially created to give guests an idea of a chef’s cooking style and prepare them for the meal ahead. They are in essence tastebud tinglers. The term is French, literally translated to “mouth amuser.”

While I was pondering amuse-bouches (and cracking myself up saying the word out loud: ä-ˌmüz-ˈbüsh) I thought about social media and how it offers a great way introduce your brand.  Social channels give your fans and followers a taste of what it is like to work with or buy from your company. So what follows are great social media amuse-bouches to tingle your customers and get them excited for more to come:

1.     Acknowledge them.

2.     Thank them.

3.     Say you’re sorry if you need to.

4.     Give them inside information.

5.     Hang out with them.

6.     Give them free stuff.

7.     Write a blog that solves their biggest problem.

8.     Retweet them.

9.     #ff them.

10. Introduce them to someone influential.

These social media morsels are just a start. There are many more ways to make your fans and followers feel special. What amuse-bouches do you serve your prospective customers?

During October, I attended the Facebook Success Summit, a series of webinars about the latest and greatest strategies and tactics for Facebook marketing. One of the presenters was Jan Rezab from Socialbakers, a website that offers an abundance of social media statistics. Based on measuring millions of Facebook posts, this is a list of Jan’s Facebook best and worst practices and my own two cents worth added in.

Facebook Do’s

1. “Diversity of content,” Jan says that statistically you will get more engagement if you mix up your content. Think about it. If you are always saying or asking the same thing, your wall gets boring fast.

2. “Engaging content.” Ok this is a gimme. You have to engage to be engaging. What makes up engaging content? Stuff your community wants to know about. Don’t know what that is? Just ask. That’s the beauty of social media.

3. “Actually telling people to engage.” Again this is obvious, but often overlooked.  Social media managers are so concerned with being authentic and not too salesman-like that they forget to ask for people to like, share and comment.

4. “Simple and clear messages.” I saw a statistic (Dan Zarella, social scientist) that said the best Facebook posts are under 80 characters, about the length of a short sentence. Even though Facebook now allows longer posts (1000 characters), it isn’t the place to share your dissertation. Remember, Facebook is the People Magazine of social media, not the New Yorker.

Facebook Don’ts

1. “Posting too many updates a day. Recommendation: 1 – 2 / day for brands.” Ok, how many of you have hidden the posts of friends who share way too much? The same is true from brands. Forty-six percent of people unsubscribe from brand pages for over-posting, a Socialbaker’s study shows.

2. “Not engaging with people in comments.”  Facebook edgerank (the algorithm that determines if your post makes it to your fans newsfeed) weights comments more heavily than likes. What that means is if someone has taken the time to comment, the least you can do is to acknowledge their contribution. If not for the edgerank, comment back because it’s good manners.

3. “Arguing with fans.” Really, does that need any further elaboration?

4. “Running competitions against Facebook rules.” Facebook has 800 million users and thousands of business pages. What’s the chance of getting caught? With lots of low cost and even free ways to run a competition, why take the chance?

5. “Not using apps + tabs.” Using these helps with #1 of Facebook do’s and avoiding #4 of Facebook don’ts. Plus, apps and tabs can help with SEO.  How it helps is a blog for another day.

Have you seen that ad with a big face of the trial attorney on it? I thought to myself, wow, that guy has really nice skin. But I don’t select an attorney based on his complexion.

In the past month, I have seen the following categories use the owner of the company, CEO or employees in their advertising: auto dealerships, jewelry stores, restaurants, florists, mortgage companies, banks, hospitals, eye doctors, construction companies and more.

This morning I see billboard for a winery with the family portrait on it. To all of these I say, what’s the point? In the case of the winery, was it just to tell me this is a family vineyard? Am I supposed to guess that a family vineyard makes better wine? Is the family part of the experience or the brand? And if so, how? Let me answer all my own questions; don’t know; don’t know; don’t know; don’t know; don’t know, which makes for pretty poor advertising.

Here’s what I do know. Buying products or services is about me, my lifestyle, my status, my experience, my choice, my wants and needs. Marketing products or services is about giving me an emotional reason to believe by connecting the product or service with my lifestyle. Example: Steve Jobs is Apple Computer, but we never see his face on any of the marketing or advertising. What we do see is an ad that demonstrates how cool this technology is and how amazingly awesome my life will be with this Apple product.

Since the 1990’s and the emergence of account planning, the general understanding was that advertising should be all about the consumer, their experience, and what the brand offers them. Today, with the saturation of social media, this is more important than ever before.

Every social media player and blogger has their own special way of doing things. While creating content and spending all that time in front of a computer screen, most of them can agree that playing music plays a large part in that process–whether its playing in the background or pumping through a set of headphones. I personally have the embarrassing trait of mouthing the words and bobbing my head to the beat, which accounts for all the weird looks I get in coffee shops in the greater Chicagoland area because I look like an unemployed DJ.

But where does all this music come from? The answer will either be your own personal iTunes collection or a free Internet radio website. I want to talk about the latter. For years Pandora.com has controlled the reigns of the Internet radio industry by creating music stations based on artists and songs that you submitted. In the recent weeks it seems there’s been a surge of new competitors such as:

Spotify is the newest kid on the block and what makes it so appealing is the same reason why everyone jumped on the Google+ train, early exclusivity. You currently need an invitation to join the Internet radio website and right now as you’re reading this, you don’t know why, but you really want one.

Turntable.fm is another contender that’s not quite as popular as Spotify but you still need an invitation to join nonetheless. The difference between Turntable and other sites is that once you’re a member you can start building “DJ rooms” where members take turns playing songs and acting as the “DJ.” Other members will get to rate your sets which earns you DJ points which you can use to build your online persona on the site. Its been reported that Kanye West and Lady Gaga have contributed $7.5 million to finance Turntable.fm.

Whether its Internet radio or social media networks, keeping them relatively exclusive is what’s generating its buzz and demand in world of private soirees, the man with the invites is king. If you happen to use any of the above mentioned sites let me know which one you like the best because hunting down all these invites is exhausting.

So if you haven’t heard by now, I’m about to tell you: Google+ is going to be the next big thing in social media.  They have already launched a limited beta trial warning the users that they “may find some rough edges.” In order to gain entry into Google+ at the moment you’ll need an invitation, and a limited number of users were given 15 invitations a piece to bring others on board. Google+ reached its user limit within 48 hours of sending those invitations, impressive right?

So what is going to be so special about this new social media network? Google is claiming that their goal with Google+ is to fix what they call the “awkward” state of online sharing.

Here is where you sign up:

https://services.google.com/fb/forms/googleplus/

You aren’t guaranteed an immediate invitation but what Google promises to do is send you an e-mail the minute its live and running for everyone to use. The following is a list of known features Google+ is set to have:

-       Ultra customizable privacy settings

-       Google “friend circles” (create groups)

-       Import mass photos (even from your phone)

-       Google Sparks: Will provide stories, videos and photos you might like according to your interests

-       Google+ Stream: It’ll work just like a Facebook newsfeed but inter spliced with Google Sparks, which was previously mentioned.

-       Google Hangouts: Live video chatting with all of your friends.

-       Google Huddle: Allow you to start group chats via text messaging quickly and easily.

Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

by Jose Molina, Creative Technician

I’ve been meaning to ask you this for a while but do you want to be in my Facebook mafia gang? No? OK. What about my Facebook vampire crew? No? OK. Could you add Farmville and give me a Facebook carrot because I really need one of those? No? OK. Remember when I asked you to be in my mafia gang and you said no? Well what about NOW? Ignored? ALRIGHT.

This has happened to me.

I’m not a Facebook game hater nor a hater in any sense of the word but sometimes the invites get a little crazy, right guys? RIGHT GUYS? Same goes with event invitations. An overwhelming amount of event invitations all from the sent from the same person (sometimes to things you’re not in the same city for) clutter your home page.  There are ways to fight and guard you from these social media villains, (yes that makes me a social media hero) just follow these steps:

1.     Click “Account” on your top right corner of your Facebook page.

2.     Click “Privacy Settings” once the account options have scrolled down.

3.     Go to the bottom on the page, find Block Lists & click “Edit your lists.”

4.     It is at this wonderful page where Facebook will allow you to block app or event invites from any individual. Awesome.

Pretty soon your home page is going to be as clean as a whistle and you can happily go back to reading your newsfeed when you should be doing work. Use this information wisely…oh and never use it against me because I seriously need those Facebook carrots.

I am going to bet you five schillings that you have more than six event invitations or page suggestions just collecting dust on your Facebook page right now.  I’ll also double down on the fact that you read no more than 35% of the messages you get that aren’t personally written for you; spam messages with titles like, “>CONCERT<<DRINK | SPECIAL>>CONCERT<” in your inbox.

So how do you differentiate yourself from Chad who wants you to Like “Kappa Party Beta” and to attend the “Wearing Visors Backwards is Still Super Cool Party” on Facebook? Simple, you make it personal.

Firing out short personal messages to key Facebook influencers has now become the most effective way of building a following without using ads or promotions.  Writing a person’s name in a message, along with a short, “How have you been?” goes a very long way. The same theory applies to a Facebook event. After you post the event and shoot your invitations out, follow up with a personalized message about how you would really appreciate to see them at your event. Kill them with kindness and attention to detail.

Now before you say anything, I know what you’re thinking, “What are schillings and where can I get some?” But more importantly, you’re thinking that “sending everyone I know personalized messages would take forever!” Not really:

1.     Don’t send a message out to EVERYONE, just to EVERYONE that matters.

2.     You can copy and paste the same basic message, just change it slightly.

3.     Keep it simple and it will go a lot faster than you think.

So in conclusion, a schilling is a form of Austrian currency, which stopped circulating in 2002. You owe me ten of them.

I don’t know about the rest of you but it seems like a wave of people that were resisting having Twitter accounts all just got one this week. Whether it’s all the news about crazy celebrity tweets or just getting bored with Facebook, more and more people are joining Twitter everyday.

So listen up Twitter newbs, I have taken it upon myself to give you cheat sheet you can use to gain the maximum amount of followers, as well as have an overall awesome Twitter page. Here you go:

1. Quality Posts Are Key

When posting articles or videos, it’s important that you’ve actually read and gone through the material as opposed to finding a title you like and posting away. The chances of someone retweeting one of your links again after reading a fluff post from you are very unlikely.

2. Reply, Reply, Reply

When Twitter users tweet and mention you, make sure to send the love right back and retweet or mention them back – even if it’s a simple “Thanks”. No one likes the friend who never calls you back.

3. Post During Peak Times

Analytics show that people are on Twitter and Facebook mostly during standard work hours, peaking at noon and slowly decreasing from there.  So statistically speaking, you are more likely to have someone see you posting during these hours. I apologize to the vampire social media community. Daytime is prime time.

4. Acknowledge New Followers

Give a simple tweet shout out to new followers on a weekly basis to let them know you appreciate them following you.  Chances are they will retweet it to thank you and at the same time expose your profile to a new series of people. A simple tweet can go a long way.

5. All Work And No Play Makes Your Twitter Page Boring

Remember that social media is supposed to be fun! So overwhelming your page with business related tweets is not the best idea. Throw in a couple of posts about yourself from time to time with a humorous hashtag to give your followers a sense of your personality. Sometimes I think there are more automated machines with twitter accounts than actual people. #scaredoftweetingmachines

If you have any questions or want more intermediate Twitter tips shoot us a tweet @Whizbangideas or @BroseMolina