This post is part of the Top Ten Tips series put on by SCORE. SCORE is a great organization dedicated to setting small business owners up for success. I’m so honored to be part of their board and kicking off the Top Ten Tips series. This is the second post of ten so please start from the beginning otherwise you may get lost.
A quick recap: For something that has only been in existence in the last ten years; social media has gotten a lot of press. It has also grown in complexity as it has gone from a place for friends to get together to something companies develop entire strategies around. This can be quite daunting. When I put these three facts together: young, complex, daunting; it reminds me of a particular time in my life. It’s called high school. So we’re going to have some fun with this by connecting social media with high school.
Since we are talking about high school; I want to start off by talking about Homecoming King and Queen. This is the quintessential sign of popularity isn’t it? You get this and you know you’ve made it. You’ve worked hard to get this popular and now you’ve done it. Kudos.
I think many of us approach social media like this. In the same way that becoming Homecoming King is a measurable and tangible (that sweet sash), the number of likes or followers we have is measurable. Unfortunately we stop there. We repeat “like me, like me, like me”. Your posts may look like this:
1
Getting liked is important. There’s no doubt about that. However there are more reasonable and effective ways to do it than the example above. The first step is is to think. Don’t just spit something out. Think about it. If you write something you don’t care about; most likely no one else cares about it either. In order to get likes, you have to provide something of value to your reader.
Being on homecoming court is rarely luck. There is a reason why they were nominated. Their friends felt that this person added some value to their lives (perhaps only as premo gossip fodder). While I don’t recommend creating scandal as a marketing tool (follow us on Twitter to hear the latest scoop on Beth in accounting’s roller-coaster of a relationship with Mark in sales); you get my point. How do you fit into your customer’s life? What would your customer consider worth sharing?
Your second tip is this:
Getting Liked is the Beginning not the End
Check back tomorrow for the next tip in the Top Ten Tip Series.
1http://theoatmeal.com/comics/facebook_likes