Social Media 101
Think you're already a social media expert?? Ahh not so fast!! Well if you think you are, you might be - but I hope to at least provide some insight for you that you may not already know. Last week I attended a very informative boot camp on social media presented by a local marketing firm called Splash Media and I wanted to share some highlights with our readers.
Lately I've been feeling the pressure to begin using social media as a marketing platform for our firm but I wasn't sure where to start. So, I went to the boot camp hoping to learn some good "next-step" strategies. I'm not sure where you find yourself as it relates to social media, but today starts a series of blogs on social media that I hope gives you some insight on 3 things: 1) What social media is 2) How you can use it and 3) Why you should/should not use it.
What is Social Media Really?
Good question. At it's basic form, it's an outlet to express something to a potentially wide audience via the internet. I think most people get that (and by most, I mean anyone under 40 - sorry Mom & Dad!), but where things start to get blurry is when you try to choose from the numerous outlets that are available. Here's a brief rundown of the top 4:
1. LinkedIn - Business Networking for business professionals. More of a listing service to post your resume, work history, & workplace updates or achievements
2. Facebook - Social networking for anyone. Most people use this as a "scrapbook" to keep people informed of what's happening in their lives. In that last 12 months, business also have begun to widely use Facebook as another online place to promote their products.
3. Twitter - Not really for networking, but more for staying in touch and keeping "tabs" on people or organizations you are interested in. Can also be a great place to promote products, events, new stories, or even cause social change, i.e. Egypt.
3. Blogs - All the above outlets generally call for short messages - but blogs are more of your online archive. A blog exists for as long as you choose to keep it, where other services (Twitter, Facebook) your messages lasts only for a short time before new posts by others push your message out of relevance.
You obviously want to choose one that your comfortable with and one that meets your needs. For example, if you are not a good writer please don't blog. It will frustrate you and no one will read it (I say that with as much tenderness as possible). Try Twitter instead. If your more of a serious person and work in finance, LinkedIn is for you. See what I mean?
More on that later because some of you shouldn't use social media at all! I'll tell you why later...
Stay tuned as we dive deeper into this how to use it and why you should or shouldn't use social media. But for today I will leave you with this:
Social media is bigger than you think, and more influential than you think, and here to stay.