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As we tell our Savvy Marketer workshop delegates, using the internet to market your small business doesn’t mean you can stop marketing the ‘traditional’ or offline way. The best results will be achieved with a mix of both sets of tools.
And there are many valuable lessons to be learned from traditional marketing. Like the need to be constant and consistent.
Consistent in your presence. Social Media marketing is like an overloaded buffet table with so many tempting dishes. Newcomers are understandably overwhelmed by all the choices available and think they need to be involved in everything. Not only is this an impossible mission, it’s also a mistake.
To join a group or network, connect with people like crazy for a few days and then not visit again for weeks (or even months) is a completely wasted effort. This approach wouldn’t work with offline Networking groups either.
If you start a blog or email newsletter, keep posting and publishing regularly; if you join Twitter, LinkedIn, or any other networks, contribute often.
Constant in your message. The business possibilities available to those who embrace social media are exciting and many! It can be very easy to get carried away and sign up to lots of affiliate schemes, buy dozens of domain names (because they’re available) and slap up squeeze pages by the score …. and then find it difficult to market any of them effectively.
Traditional Marketing 101 tells us to select our area of specialism and define its target market. Make sure you become known as a specialist in whatever area you choose and only consider adding products and services that fit with your specialism. Your marketing message will be much easier to craft and to communicate as it will be laser focused.
Get one business up and running – and profitable! – before embarking on the next. Don’t be distracted by all the bright shiny possiblities!
About Louise
Louise Barnes-Johnston has been working in social media marketing since 2007 after realising that it was a powerful marketing tool which would enable her clients to raise the profile of their businesses on the internet, even when working to a limited budget. Her specialism is in researching social media practices; trying out the most effective online tools and then sharing the best of them with her clients.
