Being heard above the noise

The world of social media is noisy. As users and practitioners, we are consistently hit from all platforms with what can only be described as "noise". How does one group of social media marketers, in particular, insure that their message is heard above all others?

Nonprofits are just such a group. They must struggle, on very limited resources, getting their message heard. 

Simply having a presence on social media does not automatically make their voices any louder. One of the biggest mistakes being made by nonprofits is that they make the attempt to start a conversation among their followers but rarely participate fully in that conversation. They will post or tweet an event notice or a link to a relevant article with the hope that it will take on a life of its own. As marketers, we know this is not the case.

However, for profit businesses have the edge on the nonprofits. They have the resources to hire marketing professionals to lead and drive the online conversations. Nonprofits, more often than not, must rely on limited resources; both in terms of manpower and financial capital.

So, how does a nonprofit make itself heard?  How does one differentiate itself from another? How do they promote their prime objectives without coming across as desperate and obtrusive?

1. Make sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to its social media objective. If the nonprofit's board of directors, executive director, paid staff and, even, volunteers are not in agreement on the social media marketing plan; all attempts to be heard will fall on deaf ears.

2. Simply creating a Facebook page, a Google Plus page or a Twitter account for the sake of having one does not create the conversation necessary to promote the nonprofit's objectives. There must be someone, whether a paid staffer or a volunteer, whose primary function is to market on social media.  Many nonprofits, again due to staffing and/or financial restrictions, assign this task to those that are already overwhelmed with their primary job responsibilities. If one person is tasked with both payroll and marketing functions; it is a given that the payroll functions will trump all other tasks.

3. The nonprofit needs to actively partner with community pages in their area. Not only does it promote the nonprofit, it builds the reputation of the entire community. Facebook community pages which promote a town or city are continually on the lookout for events and causes to showcase that shed a positive light on their locale.  Unfortunately, without these partnerships, they usually find themselves scrambling for meaningful content. These partnerships are a win-win situation for all involved.

These three simple steps are a start in enabling nonprofits to raise their voices; to make some noise of their own. Noise worth paying attention to.

Are You Marketing Socially?

As a social media marketer, do you find yourself simply marketing on social media platforms or are you marketing socially? Many may ask, what's the difference? There is a big difference; one that determines whether your social media marketing campaign is a successful one or not.

Social media is all about connections and conversations. This is what sets social media marketing apart from print, radio and television advertising. While they are one-way streets, social media platforms allow us to have two-way conversations. Conversations that enable us to engage with our followers (or customers). 

These conversations; however, are important to develop relationships more so than selling a product or brand. Many social media marketers tend to forget this. Developing a personal rapport with your followers and customers should be a priority in all your social media marketing campaigns.

As a marketer for several different brands, businesses and organizations; I can tell you it takes a lot of trial and error to find the right mix for each one. What works for one organization may not necessarily work for another. However, there are some basic tips that, if followed, will help anyone either just starting out or reevaluating their social media marketing strategies.

1. Keep it simple - When posting about your product, brand, organization or community, keep it simple. Users of social media platforms are not apt to read through paragraphs of product descriptions or reasons why they should like your brand. They will probably lose interest after the first couple of sentences and move on to something else.

2. Personalize it - Posting images of the organization's staff out in the community will draw your followers into the conversation. Of course, the appropriateness of the image must always be considered. An image of your human resources director partying it up at a local bar is probably not as appropriate as an image of them attending a employee benefits workshop. 

3. Keep the conversation going - This is probably the most important tip of all. You have gotten a conversation going whether it is on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus or any of the many other social media platforms. Followers are commenting, sharing or retweeting. Acknowledge this engagement. Reply to their comments; both positive and negative. 

Unlike a 30 second television commercial, social media marketing has an unlimited life span. It is up the the social media marketer to continue to breathe life into it.

Page Manager's Biggest Fear: No One Showing Up to the Party

Your event, sales or fundraising team has come up with the best (in their minds, at least) event concept ever. The date, time and venue are set. Now, it is on your shoulders to promote it via your social media channels and get the people to walk in the door.

You create the event; putting in the extra effort of including an eye catching event image and a captivating event description. You even remember to invite your personal online connections. You are confident that people will be knocking down the doors to attend; you may even have to have the event budget adjusted to include the cost of a bouncer.

A little too optimistic?  Of course it is. Anyone who has set up an event on social media knows that 9 times out of 10; a majority of the people that say they are going to attend an event never show up.  

So, what is a page manager to do? While, no one tip or technique is a surefire cure all; there are a few things you can do (and not do) to increase your chances of success.

1. Utilize the social media platform that is appropriate for your event. Industry or professional specific events are best shared on LinkedIn. A workshop on the bioethics is not going to garner the too much interest on Facebook as it would on a bioethics group on LinkedIn.  Conversely, sale events at a local business would garner more traffic on Facebook than it would on LinkedIn.
2. Encourage traffic to the event page; especially on Facebook, by posting updates and images about the event. It will draw those who have already accepted their invitations to the page; an action which will then show up on their friends' news feeds and tickers.
3. Tag community or business partners in as many ways as you can. Their fans will have their curiosity peaked. However, do not fall into the trap of sharing the event on every single community page as you can. There are clearly certain events that do not belong on certain pages.  Posting the link to a political rally on a business' page will not only not help your cause but also may harm the business by alienating some of their followers.
4. Never wait until the last minute. Creating the event online too close to the date is never a good idea. First, it tends to look like you and your organization waited until the last minute; even though months may have gone into the planning. Second, we all lead very active lives between work, school, family and social activities. Finding the perfect date to hold an event is never easy. The sooner you begin to promote your event, the better.
5. If you are also sending out email or snail mail invitations, include the link to your online event so the invitees can keep up to date on any last minute changes.  
6. Always acknowledge and respond to any and all comments made on the event page. Make your guests feel welcome and appreciated. 
7. Post pictures during and after the event. Nothing says success better than images of people enjoying themselves.

Do you have any tricks on increasing attendance at your events? If so, please feel free in sharing them. 

Facebook Page Likes: More than just a number

You have a great product, service, blog or an idea to engage a certain segment of your online community. Whatever the case, your next order of business is to create a Facebook page.  

Five minutes later, the page is active and open for business. Simple enough.  Next on the agenda is to build a fan base. Facebook makes it easy; allowing the page administrator to send page invites to their personal Facebook friends.  

The hard part is getting the invitees to click on the LIKE button and getting them to engage with the page.  

With the possible exception of George Takei, page fan/follower engagement is the number one hurdle to overcome. This may well be an area where time honored marketing strategies need to be thrown to the wayside. 

To transform your product, service, blog or idea into a Facebook "brand", one must think outside of the box. Yes, that is cliche and, while I do regret using the term; it is appropriate in this instance.  

A few of the strategies, I have found that work are:

• When possible, tag your friends, coworkers, fellow organization members when posting photos of events. A simple way to direct traffic to your page and elicit engagement;
• Engage with other pages as your page persona either by liking, commenting on and/or sharing their posts. To create engagement, you must also be engaging.  
• Always acknowledge those that are engaging with the page. Do not ignore the comments or posts made by your followers. Whether it be just liking their comment or responding with a full blown reply, it shows that you are interested in them as individuals and not just for their contribution to the page's number of likes. 
• Never ignore the page insights that are available to all administrators.  The data is invaluable to determining what it working and what isn't.
• An important thing to remember is to know who your target audience is. If you are running a page about cupcakes, posting pictures about cheeseburgers is not quite going to work; that is, unless you can somehow creatively tie the two together. 

That brings me to my final point; be creative.  Simply creating a page will not bring on fans or sales.  It takes a lot of trial and error to find the right mix along with the realization that a successful page will not happen overnight.  Also, you need to realize that success is fleeting if you do not continue to work at it.

Amazing Grace of the Page Administrator

Inspiration for article topics come from the oddest places. While using a new shower gel this morning, I read the following inscription on the bottle:

Philosophy: Life is a classroom, and each day we receive a passing or failing grade in one particular subject: grace. Being the smartest, the prettiest, the most talented, the richest or even the poorest can’t help. Being a humble person can, and being a helpful person can guide you through your days with grace and gratitude.

Excellent words to live by, for sure; but how well do they translate to the world of social media? Should we even expect them to?

Social media has become the modern day Christmas Card letter. You know, that treatise you receive every year from Aunt Millie bragging about every great thing her family has done since the previous Christmas. However, this modern day version is now a daily occurrence. As well it should be for the individual users of social media. I take exception to the community and business pages that cross the line from brand promotion to individual promotion.

Page administrators are there to promote the brand that the page represents (whether it be an organization, a business or community); not themselves. Please leave those self serving posts where they belong and will be better appreciated; on your personal time lines. The only exception would be when the page in question is that of a celebrity or political candidate; and even then self promotion posts should be made with a certain sense of decorum and yes, grace.

When Community Pages Lose Their Focus

Community pages are created to provide a public forum for like minded followers to engage, share and broaden the message of a particular cause, place, organization or idea. For the most part, these pages are successful in achieving their initial goals and mission.  However, recently I have come across pages which I have followed for some time that have lost their focus. 

The blame for this loss of vision seems to fall on the page administrators, themselves.  Whether it is a lack of understanding of how to best administer the page; miscommunication as to the intended focus of the page; or simple self-promotion on the part of the administrator, many of these pages are falling to the wayside in terms of effective engagement with their remaining followers.

For the argument's sake, let's look at an example of one such page:

XYZ page was created to promote local businesses in a particular area.  It's main objective was to showcase the business through liking and sharing their Facebook statuses.  However, more and more the updates being shared have nothing to do with either the business, the area or both.  A majority of what this page administrator is sharing are:

1. Third-party links that businesses share on their fan page: The original link shows up on XYZ's page without any reference to the local business. This is a clear case of not taking the time to type a reference to the local business' page prior to hitting share. It now appears to XYZ's followers that they are promoting the company affiliated with the shared link and not the local business.  XYZ's followers are probably not interested in an obscure company located 3,000 miles away.  They are following XYZ to keep abreast of the businesses in their immediate area.
2. Outright Self Promotion:  XYZ is there to promote local businesses. Sharing pictures of yourself or your family under the guise of promoting a local business is just that self promotion. Those images should be left to your personal timeline and have no place on a community page.  The same can be said for your personal beliefs. Religious, political and socio-economic rants should clearly be left off any community page unless they have a clear relevance to the page's mission statement.  And even then, it is the administrator's role to maintain a sense of neutrality when it comes to hot button issues.  Yes, you are there to engage your followers; but definitely not to enrage them.
3. Blatant competition with similar community pages: I touched on this subject briefly in my post "When Community Pages Collide" (6/12/13). The Internet and its social media platforms are clearly large enough for multiple community pages promoting the same thing.  When an administrator of a page either blatantly or underhandedly denigrates a fellow administrator or their page; all sense of professionalism is thrown out the window.

Again, the above examples are just that examples and are not isolated to XYZ's community page.  Have you seen a shift by the community pages you follow away from their primary focus?  Have you stop following pages because of this?