Did you Tweet today?

Social media is one of those things that small to medium business’ are falling short on, according to BRW.

The e-Business Report from Sensis, looking at the online habits of small and medium enterprises, shows only 18 per cent of businesses use social media. Report author Christena Singh says that many businesses are wary of tapping in. “Social media is one of those areas we’ve seen consumers jump onto much faster than businesses,” Singh says. (BRW)

So if consumers are on the bandwagon- why aren’t you?

Social media is a cost effective, low effort form of dialogue straight to your customers. And all it takes is a little bit of time and some very basic tech-know-how.

Lets look at the main forms of social media you should consider for your business.

Why have a Blog?

Blog software is easy to use. Simply write your thoughts, link to resources, and publish to your blog, all at the push of a few buttons. Blog software companies such as: Movable Type, Blogger.com and Typepad all offer easy blogging tools to get started.

Blogging is a low-cost alternative to having a web presence. For small business owners without the time to learn web html or the money to hire a designer/developer, blogging offers an inexpensive method to get your company's name out on the Internet.

Updating the weblog is a much quicker process than contacting a web designer with changes or doing the coding and uploading yourself.

Business blogs provide your small business with a chance to share your expertise and knowledge with a larger audience. A powerful benefit for consultants and knowledge workers.

How should my business use twitter?

1. Be more interested in helping than making money

Twitter followers are people. They don’t have dollar signs plastered on their foreheads. Help these people out and they will help you back. They may not always have the money to purchase your products but they will happily retweet a product for you.

2. Create relationships first

Before you go into blasting business messages through Tweetlater, it would be advisable to create relationships first. Twitter is a huge community. No one will care about your tweets if they don’t know who the hell you are. Talk to people first. Interact.

3. Introduce your company at the right time and place

I remembered encountering a Twitter follower and we had a nice chat. The only problem is he loves his company and product too much. Of course that is not really the problem. The problem is that he introduced it to me almost right after I said “hi” to him. I tried to change the conversation but then he would steer the conversation back to his company and his product.

You know what I thought during that time? Hey! This person is more interested in my money than me. He didn’t want to have a relationship with me. He just wants my money right away. And as you can expect, I lost the interest to buy. Furthermore, I didn’t think about promoting him to my friends.

The lesson here is to promote your product at the right time and place. Your Twitter profile is there for a reason. Use it. And learn to warm up conversations. Ever heard of an icebreaker? Don’t steer conversations to your product immediately.

4. Don’t repeat the same message

One of the most popular problems of Twitter users today is spam. There are idiots that think that if they repeat a particular message a gazillion times, they will get sales. Well let me tell you something. Your message will quickly get trashed into the bin with a fast unfollow from the person you spammed. Even if you are promoting, there is a right way of doing it. Post your message once and ask people to retweet your message for you. Repeat only after 2-6 hours if necessary.

5. Reach out a helping hand

Help other people in your niche. Retweet their tweets as well as help them in other social networks such as Digg and StumbleUpon. Don’t concentrate on you and your products. Promote the products of others without asking anything in return. Concentrate on building a network of people who help each other, a community.

Business Benefits of Using Facebook Applications

1. Branding - Facebook can be a great resource for generating brand awareness. Facebook is becoming popular amongst various age demographics and can be a create interception point for building your relationship with you consumers and prospects.
2. Customer Engagement - Using Facebook applications can be a great way for communicating promotions, contest and events. Again it is another interception point that can be leveraged to entice consumer engagement with your brand, your products or your service.
3. Drive Web Traffic - Facebook can act as a portal point for driving traffic to your site and other online properties.
4. Reputation Management - can be a useful tool for seeing what users are saying about you and your brand. In addition your Facebook profile can now be indexed in the search results and as a result can provide another favorable listing in the organic search results of the engines.
5. New Customer Acquisition - Facebook provides an opportunity to find consumers you may have not otherwise discovered.
6. Lead Generation - Similar to the previous point is that Facebook can act as another potential lead gen tool that can be used to qualify leads. Reviewing potential prospects' profiles may help you build a relationship with your prospects and aid in the lead generation qualifying process.
7. Client Retention - provides another potential interception point to build the relationship with your consumer.
8. Access to the social world and it’s inherent value - aka the cool factor. You never know who is using Facebook. Consider the following scenario: a potential prospect could be doing research on your brand or organization and may use Facebook to see if you have a presence there. Then they see that you have a Facebook profile and see a number of positive posts about your brand. This in turn can shape their sphere of influence and could end up being one of many deciding factors as to why the prospect selects you over another vendor. The perception that Facebook is "IN" and the fact that you are using Facebook could help influence their perception of your brand. Having said that, there are still may who are anti-Facebook so it could also affect the perception about your brand. The fact remains is that Facebook continues to gain popularity and it is not going away anytime soon.
9. The Viral Effect - Take word Of mouth to a whole new level. Nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd... Facebook is attracting quite a crowd.
10. Feedback Mechanism - Using Facebook and the various applications available can help you understand consumer behavior based on the sharing of content and commentary on the social networking site.
11. Build Business Use Cases - Facebook can provide you with an opportunity to build successful business cases as you target specific vertical markets with specific business objectives.