We have the ‘social media’ conversation with our clients all the time, and many are skeptical of using Twitter for business. Many business owners ask,’ how can I use Twitter as part of my business strategy when I can only see it damaging my brand’? The brutal fact, however, is social media is here to stay. So, how do you make Twitter work for your brand? Here are our top tips for getting started and maximizing Twitter:

Create an account now even if you don’t use Twitter straight away. There are more than 1 million people registered with Twitter in Australia and it will get harder to find appropriate account names that are related to your business (just like domain names). Setting up a profile is free and very easy. Doing it now ensures you get the best account name that suits your business. If you can’t get your business name, create an account that describes what you do – i.e. if your company is called The Cupcake Factory, you could register a name such as @sweetcakes or @tastycakes, for example, if you can’t get your company name or something close to it.

Be creative with who you follow. Follow you clients, your suppliers, media, journalists, industry associations, your potential market and other people/companies that inspire you. Don’t forget that you can also use Twitter to retrieve useful information for your business as well as to share information and raise your profile.

Engage with your tweets. Remember social media is not about ‘pushing’ your product or service. People see through this very quickly. Twitter, like other social media platforms, is about engagement, sharing and dialogue with your network. Every once and a while announce that you have a 50% off everything sale; however don’t make your Twitter strategy about advertising. Tweet about interesting articles, new content on your site, announce news, call out for help with recruitments, business surveys etc . Engagement through Twitter will drive your brand forward.

Measure the effectiveness of your tweets. Use a tool like ‘bitly’ (http:bitly.com) to not only shorten links but to measure your link activity. This way you have visibility of how many people have clicked on links that you send out.  Take note also of what tweets are re-tweeted to gauge what your network are interested in and then give them more similar content.

Promote and integrate your Twitter presence with other initiatives. Get the word out there that you are on Twitter. Add it to your email signature, to your business cards, to your website. Make sure it is easy for people to share content of your site through a range of social media platforms including Twitter.  Also, don’t forget to monitor referrals to your website through Twitter via your Google analytics report. This is a great way to see your Twitter strategy working.

Forums are a great way for a business to establish thought leadership in their area of expertise. You can use forums in two different ways to support your marketing and thought leadership strategy:

1. Initially select 2 – 3 forums relevant to your business. Actively participate in these forums, sharing your thoughts, insights and expertise on a number of areas.

This is a great way to build new relationships online, while establishing yourself as a thought leader in particular areas. This automatically brings you and your company credibility and trust.

It is important to make sure that the forums you choose are high traffic with lots of new comments, topics and threads daily. Once you join a forum, ensure that you have a completed profile with an effective signature that links back to your website. Then, participate regularly! By commenting and participating in online discussions, you not only generate extra traffic to your site – you can boost your search engine ranking and enhance your personal brand.  

Commenting on articles and discussion boards also boosts your search engine ranking – especially if it is a site/discussion board that already rates highly with a search engine like Google for example.

2. Leverage an online forum in your marketing strategy by creating your own forum and using it as a way to further increase brand awareness and to develop brand credibility and differentiation.

This requires thought and planning and must dove-tail into your broader marketing strategy.  There are lots of different types of forums online today and the key to launching a forum is to do your research: what is out there and what is missing? Where is there a gap, and can you sponsor a forum to fill that gap?

Your forum must champion a cause and have a dedicated purpose.  For this kind of strategy to work, you need to ensure that the forum is not another advertising platform for your business. You will get the business benefits from being the founder of the forum. You will establish a thought leadership position when your forum becomes a success. Your brand will always be associated with the forum and this can do wonders for your personal and company brand credibility.

LinkedIn is a highly powerful tool, when you know how to use it and how it can benefit your brand. LinkedIn is the largest professional social network online and every professional and business owner regardless of industry or type of business should have a professional and company LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn provides an opportunity to build relationships with potential customers, clients, partners and peers. It allows you to tap into a powerful audience that you can engage, interact with and influence. It can be used as part of your sales, marketing and recruitment strategy. Here are our top tips on how to use LinkedIn to establish personal and company brand credibility.

Enhance your connectability through a complete LinkedIn profile.  A complete profile enhances both your personal and company brand credibility. You should fill out your profile  like it’s your CV or executive bio – include past positions and companies, education, affiliates, skills, activities etc. Also reach out to your network and ask for recommendations and join groups relevant to your business as well as groups where your potential customers might be. If you are a business owner and your individual profile stands out, it will encourage people to check out your website or look at your company LinkedIn page also – so your individual profile page is highly important.

Incorporate LinkedIn with other online marketing strategies. For example, promote your blog through LinkedIn using an application called Blog link by Type Pad. This way, visitors to your profile can read your blogs directly and in turn this could drive traffic to your site. You can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature. The added benefit here is people can see your credentials directly. Don’t forget to mention your LinkedIn profile on your website also and provide the option for visitors to share information via LinkedIn directly. 

Commit to regular and relevant status updates. Use the status bar frequently so you can share useful information and engage with your network. Strive to be visible and valuable during business hours when many people are actually on LinkedIn. Your status updates should add value to your target markets and be updated two to three times daily. You might want to attach articles via LinkedIn, announce an interesting conference, recommend a book or website that you find interesting etc.

Use applications and other tools to get the most out LinkedIn. Our favorite applications are: BlogLink, Company Buzz, WordPress and the LinkedIn Today function. A combination of these tools works brilliantly, for not only profiling, but also keeping on top of the latest news and industry trends.

Improve your Google ranking and enhance your search engine results. LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. Since LinkedIn profiles receive a high PageRank in Google, this is a good way to influence what people see when they search for you or your company. To do this, when you create a public profile select “Full View.” Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profile’s URL to be your actual name. In addition to your name, you can also promote your blog or website to search engines like Google.

In summary, LinkedIn can significantly raise your personal and brand credibility resulting in new business. LinkedIn is becoming a key reference tool to check the credentials of individuals and companies and therefore it must be high on your marketing agenda along with your website and other online initiatives.  Like any initiative, you need to invest time and effort into it for you to see the benefits. Once you do this, you will see significant business results.  We are testimony to this as we have won new business through our own participation on LinkedIn!

The age old question in today’s digital world is ”to tweet or not to tweet”?

Social media is definitely all the rage. You might be a sceptic of it and really hope that it goes away, however the reality is,  it isn’t going anywhere; it is here to stay. If you are not doing social media, it is only a matter of time before you will need to get your head around it and start embracing it for your business. It won’t be long before your competitors are using social media, if they aren’t already, and then you will really be left behind.

We have the ‘social media’ conversation all the time with our clients. To be honest, Manning & Co., for a marketing company,  were late adopters of some social media platforms such as Twitter. I personally, was a sceptic of Twitter, until I was forced to sign-up when I presented a webinar on Strategic Marketing through the Australian Business Women’s Network.  Since, then I have never looked back.   When I started using Twitter, I realised how you can interact with Twitter in a number of different ways to get the most out of it personally and professionally.

Despite what Social Media scpetics like to believe, social media is not just about letting people know that you are going down the road for a coffee or about to go to dinner with friends! Social media is primarily about engaging – giving something to your networks such as useful tips, information, useful websites etc. Genuine engagement through social media is what will drive your business forward.

You really need to get active with some key social media platforms to see the value that it can deliver  your business. Social media platofrms have a multitude of different applications. For example, Twitter, can be used for not just following your favourite celebrity, but you can follow various news sites, industry associations and councils, companies that may be your clients etc. During last year’s Federal Election, I received more up-to-date information via Twitter on the poll results rather than any other news site.  Following you client organisations, is another practical way to use twitter – find out what they are doing, what research reports they have released, what services they promote etc.

So where do I start? Here are our top tips for introducing a social media strategy for your business:

• Start with  the key social media platforms – Twitter, Linked In, Face Book and You Tube. Master these and then, you can expand on this. There are 466 social media platforms out there!
• Sign-up and make your profiles for your business now, even if you don’t use them straight away. As more businesses and people get involved with social media, it will be harder to find appropriate account names that are related to your business name (just is the case now with domain names). There is no harm in setting up a profile on any of these platforms that we have mentioned; it is free and very easy to do.
• Before you start actively using various social media platforms for your business, explore and see where you can get value from these applications for your business.
• Remember social media is not about ‘pushing’ your product or service. People see through this very quickly. Social media is about engagement, sharing and dialogue with your networks. Sure every once and a while announce that you have a 50% off everything sale starting tomorrow; however don’t make social media just about advertising for your business.

Getting back to the age old question, “to tweet or to not to tweet”, there is still a strong perception that twitter is for celebrities and individuals rather than for businesses. Why would I want to use Twitter for my business? We tell our clients, to get on Twitter and become familiar with it so you can see how you can apply its use for your business. You really need to start ‘tweeting’ to see the value it can bring your business.

I challenge you – start tweeting; join the social media band wagon and see results in your business in the future.

Innovative design plays an influential role in creating brand experiences that are compelling, memorable and authentic. Good design can help a brand stand out in the market place. In a digital era, design is becoming increasingly  intertwined with brand strategy and brand communications.  Design can enhance a strategy and ensure the right outcomes of a re-brand are achieved.

Design is a subjective area of marketing and brand stategy and good design means different things to different people.

Embracing modern design – design that intersects online and offline environments to create brand experiences that stand out for customers – is something that cutting edge, innovative and marketing leading brands are actively doing.

One example is PWC – aka PriceWaterhouse Coopers (www.pwc.com.au). Recently the company launched a new brand identity that featured shortening their name to PWC and a logo that was designed predominately for the online environment. Their logo is dynamic and comes to life online. It is multi-dimensional with many layers. Online, the logo is interactive and used to support a number of key messages. It further supports the companies brand values. PWC have lead the way in this area compared to their competitors.

Other great examples of brands who have used design to stand-out and achieve their brand communication objectives include:

• Sucrogen – www.sucrogen.com.au
• Taubmans – www.taubmans.com.au

Not many companies are there yet in terms of seeing the potential of design that caters for both the online and offline environment. The companies that have taken the leap are  market leaders in their fields, innovative and not afraid to embrace the digital era.

Gemma