We use it for fun, we use it to arrange our social life and we use if for business.

Your Facebook business page wall is the home where your business’ fans, friends, customers and critics can all interact directly with your company. They can post questions, comments, feedback or fan mail. Fellow fans of your business may even interact with each other.  Many individuals will interact with content your business has posted itself.

There are three ways people can interact on your Facebook Business Page that you should be monitoring.

Wall posts: Anyone who ‘likes’ your page can post content to your page’s wall. And that means ‘anyone’! They can say good things, complain, talk about a recent experience they’ve had – whether it was good or bad. These remarks are user generated content about your brand and as such are very powerful.

Comments: These are an opportunity to react to a wall post. Both you and your fans can comment.  Think of it as a mini conversation that started from the original post.

Likes: The classic thumbs up! If someone ‘likes’ a wall post, this means they like the content of that post or they are agreeing with it.

Another important thing to understand about the content that gets posted to your page’s wall is, that the more people interact with a wall post, the more ‘viral’ that post becomes. For example, when a individual posts something to a page’s all, that action is also referenced on the wall of that individual’s personal profile. Same goes with ‘liking’ and ‘commenting’. Also wall posts that receive an exceptional amount of ‘likes’ and ‘comments’ often show up in other Facebook users’ ‘news feeds’.

Your ‘news feed’ consists of the most relevant and important items occurring in your network. Your goal should be to react to the most important items in your business’ news feed and get your wall posts featured in others’ news feeds.

(Taken from – A guide to streamlining your social media process – Hubspot)

Blogging for business blogging, Social media for business, social media strategy

www.twitter.com

What you should be monitoring in Twitter

There’s lots of valuable information available to marketers in Twitter if only you can find it…

Here’s some hints and tips on the type of information and tweets you should be looking out for!

Relevant questions about your company: If someone tweets ‘should I buy X product or a competitor’s product?’ you want to be ready to respond. If not directly by offering helpful content about your business, perhaps you could point that person to a customer of yours if you can’t help directly.

Relevant questions about your sector: Being helpful by answering someone’s question is a great way to develop credibility with that person. In the event they need a product or service related to one your business provides they might end up coming to you!

Requests for support: If a customer tweets a request for help (either directly to you or perhaps via their network) it is very important that you notice that tweet and respond accordingly. Happy customers are key to a successful business.

Complaints and feedback: Critics are always out there, and it’s important to acknowledge and resolve issues when you can. Leaving them unanswered is the worst option.

Competitor mentions: Monitor those conversations for information and data, other people are praising them, complaining and asking questions – it’s free competitor intel.

Praise: It’s a wonderful thing to receive – why not say thank you? Retweet it.  Save it to your favourites. It’s wise to appreciate those who appreciate you!

(Taken from – A guide to streamlining your social media process – Hubspot)

Blogging for business blogging, social media strategy, Twitter

Search engine optimisation is a key service of ours, and in our travels we come across thousands of blogs and social media presences that are being used as just another way of getting up the search engine rankings. All this content is being created for the search engine spiders, with little thought as to how valuable it is to web users. It is true that making frequent posts, promoted through social media channels will attract the search engine spiders to return to your site more regularly. Optimise that content and it’s highly likely you’ll see an upwards shift in your rankings. It might be a good strategy for bringing people in, but is it enough to keep them?

Whilst high search engine rankings are important for the businesses that we deal with, developing a long term brand is much more important.

To maintain a brand, customers and potential customers need to be engaged. So here is the simple RED or Dead rule to remember each time you make a post: Read more…

Blogging for business, Social Media Marketing blogging, Social media for business, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy

The above quote came from Kevin Eyers, MD of LinkedIn Europe, on the opening day of the Social Media World Forum at London’s Olympia.

Eyers also warned of an information overload – 76million emails are sent every day, and a quick search on the term “future of social media” provided him with 150million results in Google. How many people, he asked, would go beyond page one? But, importantly, he posed another question: “Just because it’s on page one, is it the right result for me? Or have they just got great SEO?” Read more…

Marketing General, Social Media Marketing facebook, Google Buzz, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy, Twitter

Next Monday and Tuesday, March 15 and 16, sees the Social Media World Forum Europe event in London. LexisClick will be attending and I can’t wait to spend two days immersed in the social media world.

Social media is a tricky thing for companies, with many not knowing exactly how to use it to best benefit their business. I spend much of my day immersed in social media strategies, but still think I’ll learn a great deal at this event. Read more…

Marketing General, Social Media Marketing Social Media Marketing, social media strategy

Look before you tweet...

Social Media – everyone’s talking about it. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube make the headlines on a daily basis – for positive and negative reasons. The vast majority of businesses, organisations and community groups have Twitter feeds, Facebook fan pages, LinkedIn profiles or other forms of social media engagement.

However, social media strategy is still somewhat baffling for many businesses, big and small, and social media campaigns remain complex to analyse – the concept of achieving positive ROI from investment in social media is quite alien to many brand owners. The ‘now’ factor of social media is also something many businesses have yet to master – recently Vodafone were forced to apologise, profusely and repeatedly, after a homophobic tweet was sent on their official account by a member of their team.

As soon as it was spotted, the tweet was deleted, but not before it had been screengrabbed, retweeted and repeated across the internet. With social media, someone, somewhere, is always watching, and it’s impossible to cover something tweeted or blogged by mistake because the chances are, someone will have seen your errant message and, especially if it’s juicy, inappropriate or downright offensive, chances are, they’re going to repeat it.

The most important thing when using social media to interact with clients and potential clients is to take a moment to think. Like sending a drunken text message to an old flame, what seems like a good idea in the heat of the moment may not in fact be as fabulous/funny as you think. So before tweeting, pause a moment. Would you say what you’re about to say if your client was sitting in the office in front of you? Would you stand up and say it to a room full of people? And is it on brand with your company’s profile?

Of course, whoever is looking after your social media campaign is only human, and mistakes will happen. Whether it’s in the form of an innocuous typo or missing link, or tweeting to the wrong account if you manage more than one, or if it’s something a little more serious, such as a disgruntled employee, bad joke or hacked account, there’s only one thing you can do: acknowledge that the mistake has happened.

Trying to cover it up will, in the long run, have a more negative effect on your brand or business. If necessary, apologise. Like Vodafone, if the breach is serious enough, issue a short statement distancing yourself from the offensive message and reassuring your followers that the matter is being dealt with.

Vodafone were also subjects of a – slightly less reported – positive social media story last month, which showed how companies can use social media to interact with customers, investigate and help solve their problems. Popular Conservative blogger Iain Dale went straight to his blog to report his horror when he received a monthly mobile bill of £2,500 from Vodafone. The blog post was instantly tweeted and repeated to friends and followers of Iain on Facebook.

Iain’s tweet was spotted by Vodafone’s web relations team, who undertook a month long investigation and, after concluding that UberTwitter was the most likely culprit, Vodafone waved the charges – totaling £5,400 after the same thing happened for a second month. They even changed his tariff to a better deal, saving him more money. Result? One very satisfied customer, who promptly blogged, tweeted and Facebooked his gratitude.

Social media platforms enable you to interact with your clients like never before. Complaints, queries and praise can be handled in real time, and if the result is a positive outcome for your client, the chances are you’ll get some positive publicity across the social networks in return.

The key things to remember are to reply promptly to queries, offer to contact customers with problems directly to resolve them, to acknowledge any mistakes as soon as they are noticed and apologise if necessary, and above all, think before you tweet – and make sure your employees are doing the same.

Click the following link to read Iain Dale’s positive social media customer service experience.

Social Media Marketing blogging, facebook, Social media for business, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy, Twitter

Tweeting from work... for work, of course.

US troops are being allowed access to social networking sites including Twitter and Facebook, it was reported on Saturday. According to officials in the US Defence Department, the benefits of using social media far outweigh threats to security.

Like many companies and organisations, the US military are using social media for recruitment, public relations and communications between troops. Military personnel also use such sites to communicate with their families back home.

Until now, the military’s approach to using social networking sites had been inconsistent. Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, has a prolific following on Twitter, while the US Southern Command gave updates on relief work in Haiti through the microblogging site. But the US Army and Marine Corps banned access to Twitter, and other social networks.

Now it seems the Defence Department is embracing the positive benefits of social media. But the question faced by the department, like by many organisations across the world, is how to use social media effectively, how to take advantage of the possibilities provided by the technology, and how to avoid being taken advantage of.

Just a day before the BBC reported the US Defence Department’s decision, the Daily Telegraph carried a more negative social media story when it revealed that Greater Manchester Police officers had been accused of spending too much time on Twitter whilst on duty – Tweets on the beat were not entirely the PR friendly exercise it was hoped they would be.

During a crackdown on alcohol-fuelled violence, police officers were permitted to tweet their progress to keep the public up to date with their actions. More than 90 tweets were sent, but instead of being impressed, the police force’s followers thought that the tweets were too frequent, and commented that the officers should be more concerned in doing their job than updating their status.

Twitter has also been frowned upon by a number of local councils. Swansea Council banned tweeting during council meetings, followed closely by Salford Council, whose ban extended to journalists covering the events. Iain Lindley, a Conservative councillor for Salford, told ConservativeHome that he disagreed with the ban because Twitter “allowed residents to see democracy in action.” Further, he argued, the tweets brought “more transparency and openness” to local government.

The forthcoming General Election is going to be the first of the Social Media age. Barack Obama proved just how beneficial social networks could be to an election campaign during his run for president, and the battle lines have already been drawn by UK parties, who are embracing the likes of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in their campaigns – with varying degrees of success. (Remember Gordon Brown’s creepy smile when discussing MPs’ expenses, which got him all the wrong kind of publicity?)

Social media is something that must be used wisely and well to get the results you want for your business or organisation. I think David Wennergren, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence for Information Technology in the US, sums it up perfectly.

“We need to take advantage of the capabilities that are out there…” he told the BBC. “The idea is to be responsible and use [social media] to help get the job done.”

This is sound advice for any business, large or small. To find out how LexisClick can help with your social media strategy, contact us today.

Read the full BBC story.

The Daily Telegraph’s story about Greater Manchester Police.

And Iain Lindley’s comments on ConservativeHome here.

Social Media Marketing facebook, Social media for business, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy, Twitter

A couple of days ago I told you about the socialmediaworldforum Europe event, Shaping the future of Social Media.

This is Europe’s premier social media event and not one to be missed. Here’s our preview of what you can expect to get from the event.

First, you’ll have access to more than 120 top speakers from a huge range of companies, all of them experts in social media. You’ll be able to learn from real examples from worldwide brands and find out how to adapt a similar social media strategy for your own brand.

You’ll also be able to learn how advertisers are making the best use of social networking to set up and develop revenue streams.

Spokespeople from leading social networks will be discussing their strategy and how they approach the future, and there’ll also be an in-depth examination of the current market as well as predictions of what the future holds.

If you are attending, you can make use of socialmediaworldforum Europe’s pre-show online meeting planner to arrange meetings in advance, helping you improve your connections.

As I say, this is an event not to be missed. We’ll have an in-depth preview next week.

Social Media Marketing Shaping the future of Social Media, social media strategy

A little something interesting dropped into my inbox today; information about the Shaping the Future of Social Media event held by Social Media World Forum Europe.

The social media event of the year, at least in Europe, takes place at London’s Olympia on 15 and 16 March and is something anyone serious about social media for business can’t afford to miss.

This two-day event features four dedicated conference streams, workshops and an exhibition. Key speakers from a number of global brands, organisations and developers, plus leaders in the field of social media, content producers and agencies will be taking part, alongside many others.

Topics of discussion will include developments in brand engagement via social media, social media monitoring tools and building social media apps; there’ll also be a look at the impact of social media on politics, which will be fascinating with the general election in the offing.

Social media marketing is a hot topic in many industries right now, but is something many smaller businesses (and some large ones!) have failed to grasp. This conference will no doubt provide a great deal of enlightenment.

A free to attend exhibition only pass is available here.

Find out more at socialmedia-forum.com

Social Media Marketing facebook, Google Buzz, Social media for business, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy

Google have unveiled their latest attempt to crack the social networking market, which they’ve called Buzz.

It integrates with the Gmail and enables users to post status updates, as well as sharing content from the likes of Twitter and Flickr. Buzz launches directly into competition with Facebook, but as well as being a social networking tool for private users, Google hope that Buzz will be taken onboard as a business tool (a business model is to follow shortly).

The key selling point for businesses will be real-time collaboration, which will enable feedback from customers and the incorporation of social information at an earlier stage of product or campaign development. This has, obviously, massive potential benefits to businesses of all sizes, although the similarity of this function to that of Google Wave has led some to speculate that Buzz for business is really an improved version of Wave.

Wave’s reception thusfar has been less than blistering, and, as Tony Bradley points out in an article for PC World’s Business Center, there are some serious limitations for Buzz as a business tool, as users of Google Apps Premier Edition are unable to access many of the consumer applications such as Picasa, which takes much of the fun out of the whole Buzz experience.

Businesses are still working out how to fit social media into their marketing and sales strategies. Let’s hope that soon Google will successfully integrate Buzz’s business and consumer services into a truly valuable tool.

LexisClick specialise in social media marketing for businesses. Contact us today to see how we can help your business grow its online presence.

Read the excellent article by Tony Bradley at PC World’s Business Center blog here.

Social Media Marketing Google Buzz, Social media for business, Social Media Marketing, social media strategy