As an entrepreneur, you likely have more titles than you know what to do with. Not only are you managing your clients and the delivery of your products and services, but you may also be the HR manager, the chief marketing officer and the rainmaker. With all that on your plate, it may seem like networking and building your brand through social media marketing is just too much to handle.
So how can you work blogs and other social media platforms, which are quickly becoming the most common and effective means of expanding client capital, into your already-hectic schedule? The key is to “start small and stay focused,” as BtoB magazine says.
- Did you recently learn something at a conference that you think would be valuable to your current and prospective clients? Write a blog post about it.
- Do you often read interesting articles in the news that existing or prospective clients might enjoy? Send out a weekly email with links and a brief summary of the articles.
- Do you already write business articles for a local newspaper? Start sharing those links on your website or on the firm’s social media profile.
It’s also better to focus on one platform that will appeal to your ideal client and master that before building up a suite of blog posts, tweets, white papers and other social assets. Facebook may be an ideal channel for some businesses to promote their products, but it’s probably less fitting for others.
As Sunil Senan of Infosys writes on the Forbes blog, there’s an ever-expanding list of social media websites to choose from, so make a list of your marketing goals – greater visibility, increased client engagement, thought leadership – and pick a platform that fulfills those targets. “Pick a platform that addresses your objectives and also offers greater flexibility in drawing relevance to your brand,” he recommends. Seek out the sites that offer more functions (analytics, multimedia and sharing features, for example) and that can “integrate seamlessly with your organization’s IT ecosystem” and represent the various aspects of your firm. Seek out platforms that come with pre-implemented applications that are suitable for your industry, Senan adds, and choose a platform service partner that can create adoption and traffic-building strategies, as well as analytics and other insight that can increase social ROI.
It is important to monitor if you are engaging people with your content. Analytics can help you understand what your market is looking for and where their interests lie. By drafting a digital leadership strategy at the start of the initiative – assessing the content you already have, drafting a plan for what you hope to achieve, picking a platform that is best suited to your needs, and considering how it will integrate with other marketing initiatives – it will be easier for you to manage the time commitment required for social.
