1. As social media grows, develops and refines itself, so do the many ‘tips’ on how best to use it. It
can get overwhelming. There’s also the question of whether some of them will become obsolete
over the next few years?
While there are plenty of lessons we can learn from 2011, here’s my take on 12 smart tips I think
you can continue to leverage into 2012.
1. Redefine your writing style. Content will always remain king. But as time progresses, we’ll
see a clearer understanding of writing content for your audience first, and only then for SEO
rankings. Forget keyword stuffing – write material that people can understand, appreciate, and
use. In this regard, you have to upload information that people will want to share, recommend,
and bookmark. It should be comprehensive and offer value, guidance, research, or analysis.
Search engines like Google are beginning to take notice of social likes, as seen in Google’s
+1 or Facebook’s Likes. So it’s important to remember that humans who read the content are
just as important as search engines who find them.
2. Be consistent in your use of social media. If you have limited time, select only a few
channels that you can maximize usage from. It’s better to focus your efforts on one or two
networks than to try and work with all of them. There are plenty of tools like HootSuite, which
is a single interface upon which you can manage your Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook
accounts. You can schedule posts and track analytics, which saves you time and effort.
3. Develop key performance indicators (KPI’s) for measuring and analyzing your
content. Remember you cannot measure social media channels apples to apples, but you

2. can select those that deliver the best return on interest. Before you begin, find a baseline you
can use. Also, recognize you can combine several KPI’s into single units. Never used KPI’s
before? Here’s a great article on DreamGrow.com, entitled 48 Social Media KPI’s, which will
help you kick start your plan for 2012.
4. Jump on the tablets and mobile bandwagon. Accessing social media via tablets and
mobiles is not only the current new thing, it’s going to be a replacement to desktop computers,
and perhaps even laptop computers. Apps which can help your business get onto mobiles and
tablets should be embraced. Consider how best you can leverage them for your own
business.
5. Become a key influencer. Becoming visible is important and one of the reasons its works is
because of the influence you assert on your followers and fans and on their extended
following. There are a number of tools like TwitAlayzer, Klout and more recently, Google’s
circles and extended circles. Use them to help you build your influence, to scope your
rankings and grow up your audience interaction.
6. Remember that self promotion will not get you fans; offering useful advice will. Blog
about problems and solutions, or offer advice or answer questions. This allows for a more
interactive setting. Also, the kind of posts you write should be reflective of the kind of blog you
host – a B2B blog for example will offer different content –industry news, statistics, research
etc. –than a B2C blog.
7. Let your personality shine through your tweets and posts. It’s easy to spot automated
posts; yet research shows that self-referenced tweets get less retweets. Don’t let ’you’ be the
main focus of your efforts. Find a balance between showcasing your services and connecting
with your audiences’ needs.
8. Continue to analyze your efforts. All social media channels have inbuilt analytical tools you
can use to keep track of how you’re doing on the social radar. But if you want to get a more in-
depth analysis or if you use multiple social channels, then sites like Google Analytics,
Hootsuite, and Radian6 allow you to measure social media impact quickly and across
channels.
9. Include social sharing buttons on your website and blog. These lets your readers share
posts they find interesting and helps you build traffic to your site. All it takes generally is
adding some code snippet onto your web page. Here are some excellent tools to check out:
Tweet Meme and Twitter Share Button for Twitter, Facebook Like Button, Share Button for
LinkedIn, and ShareThis, AddThis, and SociablePro which add social bookmark icons to
your posts, pages, and RSS feeds.
10. Spontaneous tweeting iswonderful, but take advantage of scheduling options that
allow you to plan and post a schedule in advance. Some applications like
Crowdbooster will also recommend the best time for you to schedule your tweets to
maximize exposure. Other tools worth checking out include CoTweet, Social

3. Oomph,Twaitter, and MediaFunnel. I know I keep mentioning Hootsuite, but it’s such a
versatile tool – you can use it for analytics as well as to schedule posts.
11. Continuously offer something of value, whether it’s a free download or a question/answer
page. If you are going to ask people to ‘like’ you, then you need to give them a valid reason to
do so.
12. Build a single unified brand across social media channels. This could be by using your
name, your product name, a common logo etc. This is particularly important if you have more
than one employee or person in charge of your social media marketing efforts. Too many
executives can result in branding efforts becoming diversified, which in turn hinders the core
message and results in low or poor audience conversion rates.
For those already socially savvy, 2012 promises to be an exciting year with lots of opportunities in
the B2B and B2C sections. For those who haven’t jumped onto the social media bandwagon,
there’s never been a better time to do so than now. I’m personally looking forward to some great
social initiatives next year and in particular, exploring mobile and tablet marketing.
Are there any particular trends you foresee for your business? What will you do to ensure a
successful year ahead on your social networks?
POSTED IN: SOCIAL MARKETING / TAGGED: CONTENT MARKETING, INBOUND MARKETING, SOCIAL
MARKETING, SOCIAL MEDIA
A thought-leader in the technology marketing space, Julie Bevacqua is a leading expert in
business-to-business (B2B) marketing with hands-on executive experience in corporate, industry,
and product marketing; demand management; and social media. She has held executive positions
at global enterprise software companies, heading up integrated marketing strategies from brand
differentiation, demand generation, sales and marketing integration, and digital marketing
strategies to media and analyst relations and corporate social responsibility.
By taking every opportunity to extend the company’s digital footprint, Julie guides her team to
achieve online dominance within the global marketplace. A natural networker, motivator and
mentor, Julie shares her marketing and business savvy through her blog www.JulieBevacqua.com.
Business and corporate marketers and entrepreneurs gain unique insights into the latest
techniques on digital and social marketing that can be applied in any organization.
Julie lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia, a haven for technology and enterprising
upstarts, dubbed ‘Silicon North’.

4. Reach Julie Bevacqua at:
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Google+: Add Julie on Google Plus
Blog: Visit Julie’sBlog