Social Networking and Marketing – Are you up for the virtual challenge? - ReachForce Book Club
This week’s focus on The B2B Lead seems to be social networking, not sure if we planned that or if it’s sheer coincidence. Laura, Leigh Anne and I have been busy these past weeks building out our LinkedIn Profiles and making sure we are answering any of the LinkedIn Answers questions out there that apply to what we do on a daily basis. So this chapter (19) is right on time for us. Here’s a few new things we’re planning on doing or checking out in the coming weeks…
- Squidoo – Do you squidoo? We don’t currently but we will be looking into it very soon. If anyone is currently using Squidoo, we’d love to hear what you think? Does it drive the right kinds of traffic?
- Max Pipeline – like Helga in the Volkswagen example – will be out there exploring the B2B Lead Generation world and will be sharing his findings right here on The B2B Lead. Check him out on FaceBook and be sure to check back here for his updates.
- LinkedIn Groups – oh the possibilities here…
As you can see, we’re jumping in the social networking world with both feet. If you’re just getting started or considering a social plan, here’s a few other tips David recommends to get the most out of your social networking sites:
- Target a specific audience – think niche market/long tail here
- Be a thought leader – provide valuable and useful information, remember this is not where you do company promotions
- Be authentic and transparent – just be yourself please
- Create lots of links – links “makes the web what it is”
- Encourage people to interact with you
- Participate – you can’t just put it out there and hope they’ll come, you have to engage with others in your space.
- Experiment – if what you’re doing isn’t working, try something new – there’s definitely enough choices out there.
What are you doing? What have you learned? Please share as this is a new world for most of us. Making the leap can be scary but the benefits are there if you’re willing to work for them, right?
2 Responses to “Social Networking and Marketing – Are you up for the virtual challenge? - ReachForce Book Club”
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October 10th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
My compliments on your blog, great source of B2B marketing info. I agree with your tips, especially not having the “build it and they will come” mentality, must engage the community. I’m an independent B2B marketing communications consultant and copywriter and have jumped into social networking with both feet during the past 3 months or so. Twitter, StumbleUpon, Squidoo, delicious, Technorati, Sphinn, and starting my biz blog have all been part of my efforts. I’ve been using LinkedIn for years but have been answering questions and joining groups more often the past few months.
My blog has been the greatest driver of quality traffic (SEO benefits definitely pay off), but Twitter has been terrific for connecting with people interested in B2B marketing, copywriting, SEO, etc, and quite a few people have clicked through to my website from the link in my profile. I’ve had a couple of Twitter followers inquire re: my services but no actual clients yet. StumbleUpon drives high volume traffic, but it’s not necessarily the best quality. Squidoo hasn’t driven much traffic, but I need to work on the page and make it more useful and that may change. LinkedIn doesn’t drive a lot of traffic to my site but what traffic it does bring is good quality, 3 clients have found me through LI and I found a creative agency I now work with. I’ve only used Technorati, delicious and Sphinn for a few weeks so not long enough to judge yet.
Hope this helps those who are considering making the social networking leap
October 13th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Hi Kim,
Thanks for your comment. We too (at ReachForce) have jumped in with both feet. In fact, I recently switched out my traditional PR firm for a new media specialist (Laura). This new world we are playing in so exciting and there is so much new stuff out there to be explored! Be sure to check back to The B2B Lead in the coming months. We are going to be experimenting with a lot of new social tools and will definitely be sharing our findings here.
In the meantime, how can I find you on Twitter?