This document provides an overview of various social media platforms and strategies for business use. It discusses platforms like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, blogs, Foursquare and their business benefits. It advocates starting by crawling and walking on social media, focusing on quality engaging content and interactions to build an online community and drive traffic to a company's website. Metrics and continually measuring effectiveness are also recommended.

1. Social Media Workshop Crawling and Walking

2. Social Media: Revolution or Fad?

3. Knows how to find the right social network

4. Knows how to find the right social network

5. Why social media might be a revolution?

6. Knows how to find the right social network

7. We’re in a new era: the Social Economy In the next 3 years, Forrester projects a $6.9 billion Social Economy

8. Did you know? 90% of all purchase decisions begin on the internet 75% of people shop online before they buy offline 85% are looking for an independent review 80% trust the recommendation of another person 14% of people trust advertising Sources: comScore, Neilsen, Harris Interactive

9. Interest in social media is growing… http://google.com/trends

10. … and so is belief in its effectiveness

11. Our Process Socio-media-logy

12. Socio-media-logy Crawl Look Around and Listen Walk Connect and Activate Run Engage and Involve Thrive Fans Help You Do the Lifting Define business strategy and goals Make your web site desirable to visit Optimize search Establish your social networks Build database Start conversations Quantify and qualify audience Create relationships Increase what works; pull back on what doesn’t Keep delivering relevant content Make it more Interesting Video Podcasts Webinars Updates Live events Rely on your community and their content Nurture them Forums Town halls Bulletin boards New product ideas

13. Hub & Spoke Model Have the following ready before you start: Your “Money Site” Goals Online Sales, Brick & Mortar traffic, newsletter signup E-mail list signup Web Analytics Blog Search Plan Create a customer persona Who – demographics What – will they buy Where – can they be found When –do they buy & how often Why – what are the hot buttons How –will they buy: online or offline

14. Let’s start crawling and walking

15. Free social network and micro-blogging service 23 million people use Twitter; 72% in first six months 1+ million people use it per day 65% of are under 25 5% of all users account for 75% of all Tweets Tuesday is the most popular day 11 am to 3 pm is the most popular period 94% have fewer than 100 followers/following 21% of users have never written a post

16. Why Tweet? Broaden your reach Improve your search ranking Connect with people, some not usually possible Is an incremental sales channel Listen to the pulse of your industry Distribute relevant information, articles and events Link to your website and social networks, particularly your blog

17. Best Practices Find and develop your personal voice Tweet regularly Tweet the quality of information you would want in to get in return…because that’s what you’ll get Respond regularly “ ReTweet (RT)” regularly Ask questions Practice good manners

19. The Largest Social Network with 300+ Million active members Many commercial options for businesses: ads, Fan Pages, Groups, Video, Custom Facebook Apps MySpace is still a popular option for younger generation interesting music, bands, & media, but it has lost its way and is losing ground everyday

20. Why create a presence? Connect with customers through “fan” pages Create compelling promotion content to attract new prospects Use Facebook Ads to create highly targeted advertising campaigns and drive traffic to your website Links to website, blog and Twitter profile

21. Best practices Are your customers on facebook? Determine your goals How much time and effort can you afford? Create a fan page, use existing customers, friends and family to quickly build numbers Get your fan page “vanity” URL Have a content/engagement plan Drive people to your site, measure conversion

23. Largest social network for business professionals 60 million members in 200 countries 21 million in U.S./Over 100,000 are CEO’s Visits are growing +20% per year Average age: 41 Average salary: $139,000 Average number of connection: 60 Average number of groups per member: 3

24. Why become a member? Promote professional and personal identity Join relevant groups and communities Get business help and help others Distribute news about you and your company Display recent presentations Increase search ranking Links to website, blog and Twitter profile

25. Best practices Decide what to promote and in what balance Personal brand: Experience, expertise Professional brand: Capabilities, credentials Take advantage of LinkedIn’s many features Join groups and professional community Build connections wisely Participate

26. Why use it? YouTube is the #2 search engine Interact with customers who can “reply” via video It is a strong element of a content marketing strategy Creating Video Content isn’t as hard as you think YouTube videos can rank highly in Search Results

27. Best practices Keep it short: 60% of viewers don’t watch beyond 60 seconds Great content trumps production quality focus on your message Don’t make it a heavy sell, its not a TV commercial, people want to be entertained or informed Have a call to action at the end Focus on a good keyword rich title Always embed it on your blog and other sites to build search visibility For maximum viewership, post to other video sharing sites as well.

28. Blogs Type of website, maintained by an individual with regular entries and commentaries 133,000,000 blogs 346,000,000 read blogs 900,000 new blogs are created every 24 hours Positive perception of your company website increase by 36% if it has a blog 67% of bloggers are male; 70% have college degrees and 50% are 18-34

29. Why Blog? Elevate search ranking Create positive business perceptions Be a thought leader in your industry and get to know other thought leaders Generate content for your social networks Fix a customer problem personally Return on investment potential is $$$$

30. Blogging Best Practices Building search traffic will take time. There will be ups and downs. Live with them Work out a posting strategy; post continually Focus on your area of expertise Blog posts compound interest with each one Link to other blogs Comment of other people’s blog in your industry

31. Examples

32. How does it work? Consumers “Check-in” at locations, friends are notified directly and you can share your location on social networks Consumers can see what is nearby via GPS location Businesses can use it by creating offers and “tips” to encourage users to visit Apps like Yelp show users what businesses are nearby and provide ratings

33. Best practices Make sure you create a quality listing for your business, you want people nearby to find you Stay on top of listings and ratings such as those on Yelp, resolve issues quickly and publicize the solution Encourage customers to find you on foursquare, create a review on Yelp and share their experience with friends on social media Reinforce your social media presence with tools like foursquare by “friending” your customers who check-in & reward them Build social/mobile into your business

36. Compound Social Interest Produce Content on your site and blog Share it via social media, email and digital PR Content, Video and Blogging drives Search results Interact with customers on Communities and Forums building your online reputation Respond to ratings and reviews Build mobile & social into your business to increase benefit Focus on driving people to your “money site” Measure your effectiveness and adjust

37. Rob Petersen Founding Partner BarnRaisers llc 5 River Road, Suite 205 Wilton, CT 06897 P 203.594.1701 C 203.231.6434 [email_address] www.barnraisersllc.com Twitter: @robpetersen We welcome your questions and input .