Social Media demystified

1. Business | Social media
Untangling
the web Warren Knight, social media and Linking in
digital commerce expert, provides reid hoffman’s linkedIn is a social networking site for
professionals, boasting 100 million users. Ideal for business
an introduction to social media to business (B2B) marketing, it is also an invaluable business
profile, similar to a CV, to link to your website and other
for the therapist social network pages. the linkedIn website allows
professionals, companies and the public to connect on a
B y using social networks in the
most resourceful way, a therapist
can harness social media to build
gap between the impersonal online
experience and personal interaction.
In this article, I will look at some
working level within their industry, for business purposes
and job opportunities.
Make sure that your profile is complete, connected and
connections, promote their therapy of the main social networking sites consistent with your business, with information including
services, target marketing to a captive therapists can use, offer advice on education and career history, achievements, what your
audience with an active interest, and appropriate and effective social media business can offer contacts and any relevant website links.
instil trust in clients. usage, and some tips on driving the more industry-specific keywords used, the higher you’ll
Social media acts as a channel visitors to your website through be in search results. seek recommendations from existing
of communication that bridges the social media. clients and business contacts to boost your brand image.
therapists could use linkedIn to connect with people in
their industry, gain new clients, create events and groups,
build brand awareness, and also find new employees.
linkedIn allows people to post questions, so provide high-
quality answers to establish yourself as an expert in your
field. Integrate your linkedIn profile with twitter updates and
blogs, and experiment with other relevant applications such
as polls for market research, and Company Buzz to track what
is being said about your company.
l To register your profile on LinkedIn, visit
http://uk.linkedin.com
Tweeting
With more than 200 million users, make tweets original and brand
twitter can make it easy for businesses specific, such as new products and
to connect with potential clients and treatments, time-specific special offers
to share their brand with people and promotions, industry trends,
in the industry. having registered developments and news, interesting
your account with details such as and relevant links, blog updates
name, email, profile picture, business and so on.
description and web address, it is then at the heart of every tweet should
possible to ‘follow’ business contacts, be the customer – ask yourself what
industry figures and clients, so that this tweet will give your customer;
their tweets will appear on your how can they use it; how will it help
newsfeed – and vice versa. them? an appropriate photo and Facebook
avoid the risk of isolating contacts commenting on your followers’ tweets Facebook is the most well-known social networking site with
and customers through uninteresting, will help increase brand awareness 800 million subscribers – 62 million in the UK use Facebook
uninspiring and useless tweets; with and create a positive image. Measure for an average of 60 minutes a day. Facilitating personal
only 140 characters for each tweet, the effectiveness of the content by engagement and interaction, Facebook can help propel your
make it worth the read. Consider monitoring followers who ‘retweet’ brand to the forefront of your customers’ – and their
only tweeting three times a day so your tweets and replies to your tweets. friends’ – minds, as they share their experiences with their
that followers don’t have an overload l To sign up for Twitter, visit online social community.
of your tweets on their timeline and http://twitter.com Both personal and business profiles are available on Facebook
22 Issue 99 January 2012 InternatIonal therapIst www.fht.org.uk

2. Social media | Business
Any shared content on social
Spread the word media sites should be engaging,
therapists may wish to blog about their relevant and encourage people to
therapy business, and one free and easy to share it; remember to KISS – Keep
use website for this is Wordpress. Content It Significant and Shareable. Create
should be relevant to your business, such as content that fans can recommend
information on products and services, recent or pass on to other people. A Twitter
industry news, latest developments in your follower may link your blog on their
field, and events and seminars attended. account, or a Facebook fan may ‘like’
Make sure that you maintain brand image a product or treatment, or recommend
consistency and, to establish yourself as an an offer to others, thus potentially
expert in your field, ensure information is encouraging their friends to become fans –
high-quality, topical and useful. and all are potential customers.
Drive visitors to your blog and build an Keep your target market on their toes experiment into action – by providing
audience by promoting it via Facebook, – choose content, pictures and links that customers with a compelling reason to use
twitter and linkedIn and pull in feeds from stimulate your audience’s curiosity. Consider social media, you are expanding your brand.
these websites. set up an rss feed by clicking their specific needs and interests when Share the success of the mother and daughter
on the rss button, which allows readers to developing your content, for example, day with all your followers/fans on all your
subscribe to your blog. rss (or really simple special offers on treatments, news updates social networking sites. A free social media
syndication) allows people to subscribe to relevant to your industry, events attended and marketing dashboard to bring all of
receive updated posts as soon as they are and awards won. Sponsored stories can be your social media platforms into one place is
published. I would advise blogging between successful, as can linking with other relevant MarketMeSuite (www.marketmesuite.com).
one and two entries a week to improve your sites that are current and topical; common DEVELOP: As social media is constantly
search engine ranking, without isolating ground will encourage people to talk more. changing, you need to make sure your
subscribers through information overload. Make sure it’s easy for people to leave brand is up to date with all the new tools
l To find out more about WordPress, a recommendation or post an opinion – and technology.
visit http://wordpress.org word of mouth is one of the most valuable
marketing tools. Don’t be afraid of negative
opinions – it may be the voice of that one
customer that changes your approach to
future consumers.
Another great way to promote your
therapy services is to find experts. Cut
through the barriers surrounding very
well known people and just Tweet them,
respond to their blog or post a question.
Make yourself interesting and maintain
regular contact and you are more likely to Monitoring social media results
get noticed and receive a response. If you can When monitoring your social media results,
offer them a product or treatment for free, do not just assume everything is working –
they are more likely to publish a comment continually watch, test and assess.
on your service. Monitor your Facebook fans (visit
www.facebook.com/insights to view
– the former tend to connect friends and LEAD strategy data including total, and new, fans, plus
family; the latter connect industry contacts. The best way to develop the most appropriate demographic breakdown by age, gender
the two can be connected by starting a fan and effective social media usage is to and geographical location, mentions and
page or a group. a fan page allows fans to implement the LEAD strategy: interactions), Twitter followers, LinkedIn
‘like’ the page and receive updates on your LISTEN: Listen to your customers to find connections, and comments on blogs.
business, helping to promote brand presence out what interests and engages them, and Check your search engine optimisation
and share news/events with their community. take your competitors into consideration. (SEO) rankings (a good website is http://
Unlike a fan page, members have to be invited For example, if a client is talking about a googlerankings.com) and consider possible
to join a group. When creating a business certain procedure from another salon that ways of driving more traffic to your website.
account, fan page or group you can include you haven’t invested in, create an online The social media world and your target
information including name, address, phone poll for your clients to answer regarding new audience will be in constant change and
number, email, web address and a logo or treatments or equipment to discover if it is what works Tuesday morning might not
image. It is then possible to select applications something they would be interested in. work on Sunday afternoon.
to create an event; integrate a blog; create a EXPERIMENT: The best way to find out Use some of the available social media
poll; allow customers to review your products what works for your business is trial and tools to monitor your channel performance,
and services; integrate your tweets; or display error, but try not to invest too much time such as Google Analytics (www.google.
Youtube videos. and money in a small project that may com/analytics), making sure you turn on
Build your business profile around your not work out. Take advantage of existing the social media and e-commerce options,
brand image – displaying photos suggesting proven solutions, many of which are free, which can specify the number of visitors to
drunkenness or a wild character may not build for example, ratings and reviews when your website and the sources of traffic. Run
confidence in the potential customer, so be advertising a mother and daughter day at regular reports into what your clients are
mindful of what photos you choose. your salon for a discounted price in order reading; where they are coming from; how
l For more information, visit http:// to see if you are successful in building they found you; what they chose to share;
www.facebook.com brand awareness. what generated the most comments, and use
APPLY: Put the results from your the information to amend your content.
www.fht.org.uk InternatIonal therapIst Issue 99 January 2012 23

3. Business | Social media
Driving traffic to your website 6 Set up links via your social media sites,
When using social media, one of the in particular Twitter, Facebook
biggest questions is ‘how can I drive more and LinkedIn.
traffic to my website?’ A few tips on how a Online customers are three times more
business owner could drive traffic towards likely to trust recommendations from fellow
their website include: social network users than from online
1 If you’re launching a new site, or adverts. Facebook has had 22 million
publishing new content, write an people make a purchase based solely on
introduction and submit it to share sites their recommendations. The social customer
like Digg (http://digg.com), Reddit (www. is 35 per cent more likely to buy a ‘liked’
reddit.com) and Now Public (www. 4 Bookmark your site on Del.icio.us (http:// item purely because they trust their fellow
nowpublic.com). A share site allows you to delicious.com) and consider adding a Del. users, with 25 per cent of customers
submit content to be judged by other users icio.us button to your homepage. connecting with brands on Facebook to
and increases business exposure. Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking web receive discounts and 23 per cent of Twitter
2 Place a free ad for your company on ads’ere service for storing, sharing and discovering users following businesses to find special
(www.adsere.com), which is an online web bookmarks. promotions or sales.
trading platform that allows you to upload 5 Advertise your site on Craigslist How you act online is your virtual CV.
unlimited ads free of charge. (http://london.craigslist.co.uk). It’s a footprint of behaviour that never goes
3 Offer something for free or at a discount or Free, relevant and localised, Craigslist away, so make sure you represent your brand
special offer. People often tell their friends is an online community featuring appropriately to ensure you maintain and
about good deals. classified advertisements. grow your online following.
Define your online voice according to your
Case study – Mary Atkinson, MFHT business image and make sure the message
that is on your business website matches
I wanted to drive more visitors to my the message you are putting across on the
website and, although social media seemed various social networking sites.
overwhelming at first, I started by changing
my website to Wordpress so that I could have
a blog (www.maryatkinson.com) and update An incredible journey
my own website information easily. the world wide web (WWW) was invented
I publish two new posts a week on my blog in 1989 by tim Berners-lee, and although
to encourage search engines to pick up the seemingly alike, the WWW and the internet
updates, which helps improve my Google are not the same thing. the WWW is a way
ranking. My blog entries usually contain useful of accessing information over the internet;
information, my aspirations, events, interviews the internet is a network created to bring
with other therapists to promote their work, computers together globally.
course details and available treatments. I may Web 1.0 theDot.com was invented,
also blog about any current, topical and four years later the first web browser
news that I would like to comment was running successfully on the Windows
on or raise awareness. operating system. Microsoft hotmail was
a good tip is to set up Google launched in 1996 and Google two years
alerts; I receive alerts and links daily camexpo outstanding achievement later. Web 2.0 was key to the development of
for up to date information on the award 2011. I also signed up for web-based communities, web applications
web about Indian head massage linkedIn (http://uk.linkedin.com/ and hosting services, and saw the onset
and massage for children, which I in/maryatkinson) and have since of social networking and video-sharing
can then utilise in my own blog. joined several groups and forums websites. Currently at Web 2.5, the WWW
My website is much more for therapists. I get updates about has been combined with the internet to offer
interactive now, with visitors who blogs from other people and it is the most impressive technology yet, with
are looking at training courses then being interesting reading different perspectives the past few years seeing social media and
directed to a relevant blog entry. It offers and connecting with their Facebook pages. sharing information taken to the next level
more information and encourages people to although I have not noticed any increase in by platforms like Wordpress for blogging and
stay a bit longer and discover other areas of clients or students booking from linkedIn yet, twitter for micro-blogging.
my work. recently I was asked to provide a these things can take time.
seminar on aDhD and also write an article I recently joined twitter
for Bamboo, a Canadian magazine, about my (@MaryatkinsonChi) and was excited when Warren Knight is a
book healing touch for Children, when the people were sending complimentary tweets social media and digital
editor followed a Google link to my website about my keynote speech at camexpo 2011. commerce expert with
through one of my blog features. I can then personally thank them and also 20 years of experience in
I then set up a Facebook page follow up with more information. I think it’s helping small to medium
(https://www.facebook.com/ a good idea to include links on your website size companies sell
MaryatkinsonholistictherapyCourses) to keep to your social media profiles and on email products and services
people up to date with courses, special offers, signatures, newsletters, and business cards. globally. he is a speaker,
talks and so on. It can sometimes be quite lonely as a sole consultant and author, who specialises in
pICtUres: IstoCKphoto
I try to avoid bombarding people with trader/therapist/trainer but I feel part of a social media marketing, and is co-founder
selling and provide general information too, wider social media community now and of Gloople, the UK’s first ‘social sharing’
such as a link to a newspaper article about less isolated. It’s a great way of supporting e-commerce platform designed for sMes.
massage in schools or a link to nominating the each other. www.warrenknight.co.uk www.gloople.co.uk
24 Issue 99 January 2012 InternatIonal therapIst www.fht.org.uk