Theme 7: Ask for Help
Your seventh theme for social media marketing (and the last in this series) is to let people help you.
When you ask people for small favors – that they can easily do – you are helping them feel good about themselves. And then they also feel good about you.
I know, it sounds odd – ask for a favor and people will like you better – but that works.
So ask for favors!
Just make them extremely simple and painless to do.
It’s even better if you can ask a favor where helping you makes them look good too – where they can both help you and show their own knowledge and experience.
For example, if you ask for a suggestion for a restaurant in Boston, people get to show that they know Boston and have knowledge of the good restaurants there. That’s pretty cool!
If you ask for suggestions about whether to get an iPad or one of the newer tablets, people get to show that they have a lot of knowledge about the products.
So ask for advice.
You can look for business help:
- Vendors
- Tools
- Services
- Consultants
- Equipment
- Methodologies
- Techniques
- Coaches
- Seminars
- Training
You can also ask for personal recommendations and advice:
- Restaurants
- Shows
- Hotels
- Gadgets
- Tours
- Gyms
- Camps
If there are only a couple of choices, it can be fun to set up a poll and let people vote.
A couple tips… Only ask for one favor at a time, and keep it simple to do. Ideally it should be something they can do in a couple seconds – it shouldn’t require a lot of thought. You also don’t want to ask them to put themselves on the line in any way. It shouldn’t be risky.
But do ask regularly. People love to help, and if you make it easy you will find that you can grow your circle substantially. What are some ways you’ve asked people to help?
Theme 6: Show a Bandwagon
Everyone wants to be part of a success. So use social media to let people see that what you do is working – that others are excited about what you offer and are jumping on it.
You don’t have to wait for big wins to do this – share the small triumphs too.
Talk about what a great response you are getting to your marketing or advertising.
Be excited about milestones as you achieve them. If you just landed your 40th customer or exceeded your revenue target for the month or hired your first employee – yay!
Share quotes and testimonials. You don’t need to have formal quotes – simply forward nice things people say about you in social media.
Tell anecdotes about your customers’ successes. You don’t have to name the customer – you can say “a big hotel chain” or “a mom of two” or “a high-school track star.”
Talk about new partners, new deals, new customers, new hires. Introduce them if you (and they) are comfortable with that. If not, just say you hired someone or got 2 new customers.
Tell stories about how your business is expanding and growing. If you need more space, are joining a coworking group, need a bigger garage to store your merchandise, talk about it.
Thank people for referrals – always! Public thank-you’s are wonderful. They show your appreciation and validate for everyone else that you have people referring business to you.
How can you show that more and more people are buying your products and services, getting involved with you, and supporting you?
Theme 5: Show That You’re Connected
Your fifth theme for your social media marketing is to show who is connected with you. This is the whole point of social media!
If you can show that other people – particularly people your prospects respect – have checked you out and decided to get involved with you, then it’s easier for them to make the same decision.
So find ways to let people see that you have important people in your network, great customers, talented people working with you, respected people who refer business to you.
On Facebook, make your featured likes people your prospects will recognize and respect.
Retweet what influential people say.
Comment on blog posts of influencers.
Interact with customers or partners (especially those who are well-known and respected).
Talk about employees and subcontractors – if they have impressive degrees, I’m sure you can find a way to work that into the conversation from time to time.
Mention your board, advisors or investors.
Talk about really good sessions at conferences or webinars you attended.
Quote people your prospects respect.
Be grateful for any honors or awards you receive (or are nominated for).
Think about who your prospects and customers respect, and look for ways you can show connections with those people.
How do you build credibility by showing that you are connected to people your prospects recognize and respect?
Theme 4: Share Who You Are
People do business with people they know, like and trust.
So let people get to know you better. Let them see that you are a nice person – the kind of person they would be comfortable doing business with.
Show some of your personality – you don’t have to share everything with the whole world, but you can pick and choose a few things to let people feel like they know who you are:
• Like your favorite sports teams
• List your favorite singers or bands
• Quote from your favorite books
• Mention a TV show you are addicted to
• Do you do yoga, pilates, rock climbing or zumba? Share that
• Talk about visiting your favorite restaurants
• Show photos of cute things your pet did
This helps people connect with you – it gives them topics of conversation, ways to interact with you online and in person.
You can also use social media to show your character and your ethics:
• Share links to causes that you support
• Ask for donations to charitable events
• Apologize when you mess up
• Stand up for people who have been wronged
• Be helpful and give advice where you can
• Show that you support your friends
Let people identify with you. Even if you’re the CEO of a huge company and wealthy beyond most people’s dreams, you probably have issues. Right? (Please say yes.) Talk about your efforts to lose weight, quit smoking, exercise more, get healthier, find cute shoes.
And just be nice.
• Send holiday greetings.
• Thank people at every opportunity.
What are some of the ways you let people get to know you? Share them here…
Theme 1: Demonstrate Expertise
One of the first questions people will always have about your company is “Do they know what they are doing?”
They need to have ways to confirm that you will do a good job for them.
Social media gives you a lot of opportunities to show off your knowledge in your field.
- On Facebook, you could give a series of short tips relating to your area of expertise.
- One virtual assistant has been doing 2-minute videos with office organization tips and shortcuts.
- I’ve seen SEO consultants give tips about choosing keywords and using alt tags.
- Graphic designers give tips about page layout and optimizing your site.
- Social media consultants give advice about getting better results with Facebook or tips on how to use Google+.
In your blog, you can tell stories about projects you have worked on for clients. You can do mini case studies – with brief outlines of what the client’s problem was, how you solved it, and what results they achieved.
You can upload short videos that answer questions prospects commonly ask.
You can tweet when you close a new deal.
You can forward news from industry sources and explain why it matters.
You can quote a statistic from a recent report and say why you think it’s wrong.
You can quote two statistics from different reports that seem to contradict each other and explain why they are really two different ways of looking at the same thing.
You can blog about trends you’re seeing in the market.
You can forward news from others who are respected in your field.
You can share useful websites.
You can do reviews of tools you find useful.
You can compare methodologies and talk about the strengths and disadvantages of each.
This is usually one of the easiest ways to find content for social media. There are dozens of ways to show off your knowledge – if you have some that aren’t included here, add them as comments. I’d love to hear how you do this.
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