If, like me, social networking tends to go to the bottom of the list every day as there are 101 things you’d rather do or have to do, then these tips will at least keep up your presence and give you some ideas as to what you could share on your profiles.

1. Follow/connect with interesting people who share interesting things, then you have information you can share with your followers.

2. Make sure you automatically update your profiles with your latest news or blog posts. This can be automated by using applications such as Twitterfeed, RSS Graffiti for Facebook and ensuring your blog is linked to your LinkedIn profile.

3. Share photos particularly if you have a business where visuals are important, although any business can benefit from sharing images. Apps like Instagram or Twitpic for Twitter make this much easier.

4. Update more than one profile at a time with your latest news. Use some of the tools above, or if you use an application such as Hootsuite or Tweetdeck, make sure your social networking accounts are linked to it so you can update multiple accounts at once.

5. Pre-schedule updates – again if you use Hootsuite or Tweetdeck, you can pre-schedule updates to go out even if you’re away from the office or on holiday.

If it’s ideas that you lack, then the following may help you find interesting things that you could share with your network:

Reading blog posts or articles on what’s happening in your industry sector and sharing them (this is probably what we do the most). If you use Google Reader or Feedly to subscribe to your favourite blogs, it makes life much easier.

Share your thoughts and opinion on something that’s happening in your industry.

Share information about your favourite hobbies or things you like. This means that information you share isn’t just about work, but people get to know you a bit better too.

Participate in discussions that really interest you as you’ll be able to contribute in a meaningful way, rather than just posting because you feel you ought to, or making a comment for the sake of it.

If you want to find out a few more tricks and best practice techniques on social networking, then the following resources are some of the best ones around, certainly the ones we read regularly to make sure we’re as up to date as possible.

Social media examiner  -  always has excellent articles on getting the most out of social media.

Mari Smith  - Although she has positioned herself as an expert on using Facebook she also writes useful posts on other aspects of social networking.

Econsultancy – one of the leading UK resources on internet marketing generally, with plenty of insight on social media marketing.

Social media agency Simply Zesty has a very popular blog and often posts excellent content on social media.

What are your tips for finding the time to network online?

Image: Clock by Dave Stokes, on Flickr

Social Media Marketing is still relatively new and we’re all still learning how best to use it for our businesses.

The Profile Photo Faux Pas

Sam recently wrote a very comprehensive post on the importance of completing your social network profiles. I’d like to add a plea to use a profile photograph (also known as an avatar) that gives the message you really want it to. Cute animals and family groups are fine, but only if you don’t intend to use that profile professionally. And while logo avatars are suitable for company pages, owners of small businesses might be better off using a photo of themselves if they are the recognised ‘face’ of their brand.

I’ve been using the same avatar on all my social media profiles since I set them up back in 2007. While I may not look exactly like that photo any more – people still recognise me from it when I meet them at networking events for the first time. Would they recognise you from your avatar?

The Lack of Consistency Clanger

In order to get good results from social media marketing, stay on message and deliver tweets and updates on topics relevant to your audience. While it’s certainly a good idea to voice your opinion on occasion, try to avoid using your blog as a platform to post too many personal rants. We’ve spoken many times on the need to publish blog posts and email newsletters regularly. This can be made easier if you have a plan and use an editorial calendar, not only for blog posts but for all your social media updates.

Having a plan would result in fewer profiles being hastily set up on the latest networks and promptly abandoned. Or perhaps an initial flurry of activity followed by nothing at all for weeks or even months. If you aren’t ready to use a particular social network, then don’t publicise it on your website or blog. That’s almost worse than not setting up a profile in the first place.

However, it’s important not to become too noisy either. Tweeting or updating every few minutes will annoy your followers. No-one has that much good stuff to share, nor do people have that much time to read it all.

Other Assorted Social Media Clangers

Self promotion and little else becomes a turn-off after a while. For example I find that the links shared by some people always go through to a website home page, sales page, an ‘under-construction’ page, or to an error message. Their links don’t lead to content of value to my followers, so I rarely feel inclined to share them.

Tweets which are too long to retweet won’t be retweeted as often. It takes time to carefully edit them down to be within the required character count. If you want people to be able to retweet you, make it easy for them. Keep the character count down to 110-115 to allow for your RT @name and any link to be included.

Too much automation and not enough conversation. While many social media tools are free, that doesn’t mean everything should be set up to run automatically. You still need to work at social media and chat with people if you want to form any kind of relationships online. Being ‘social’ means sharing, liking and commenting on other people’s stuff too. It’s a two-way street.

A lack of social share buttons on a blog can mean missed opportunities. I can’t tell you how frustrating it is to read a really good article, want to share it with my online followers, only to find no social sharing buttons to click. Fortunately I have Buffer and Hootlet (from Hootsuite) installed on my Chrome browser, but even the free WordPress.com and Blogger platforms both provide sharing options, so there is no excuse!

What are the biggest mistakes you’ve seen small businesses make using social media? 

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bigdrumthump/3214172131/

However, times have moved on and it seems that whether you like social networking or not, if you run a business, you really need to be using these sites. We’ve gone through the benefits of networking in previous posts, and I’m sure you know what they are too.

Despite that, for many of us, social networking doesn’t come easily, even with the daily ‘what shall I talk about?’, ‘will people find me boring?’ worries, finding the time is even harder – and it probably always goes to the bottom of the list if you don’t enjoy it anyway!

I’ve battled with it for several years now, particularly as there are so many internet marketers on the social networks, just sharing the same stuff seems a bit pointless. If I talk about more personal aspects of my life, then I’m sure that’s not going to really interest people either and I never remember jokes, so that’s no good!

I have found that some networks are easier to interact on than others. I confess that I hardly use Facebook and am connected to just a few friends and family. LinkedIn is much easier as you can choose to contribute to ongoing discussions and you’re not limited to a certain number of characters. Google+ is also reasonably easy to use, share and discuss shared information. My main obstacle is Twitter as the conversations move on so quickly and you can’t really have a proper discussion in 140 characters – in fact it’s quite overwhelming. In my opinion, Twitter has become more of a broadcasting platform than a place to interact and network, although I’m sure some of you will disagree.

If you feel a bit like me about social networking, then these are my tips to get the best out of it:

Don’t feel you have to go onto these sites every day. We all have lives offline (well, some of us do anyway) as well as businesses to run, so prioritise your time.

But make time each week. Once you start using these sites and connecting with people, then you do need to commit to it and keep up a presence, so perhaps aim for putting aside some time 3 times per week. Even 15 minutes should be enough to post and interact on the sites you have accounts with.

If, like me, you’re in an industry with a prolific number of social networkers, then perhaps share things you personally like or are interested in rather than just the same industry news, which everyone else is sharing.

Automate some of it. Louise has written a post about automation, specifically using Hootsuite, and it means you can be seen to be there even when you’re not: Using Hootsuite for Business.

Don’t worry too much about it. If other marketing activities are working well for you, then don’t feel pressured into spending too much time on these sites. You need to enjoy the marketing activities you choose, you’ll come across as more sincere, and probably get better results from it!

What tips do you have for the reluctant networker? Please share your thoughts and experiences in the comments! 

Here’s one reason why you might want to - 

In January 2012, Pinterest sent more traffic to websites than LinkedIn, Google Plus, Reddit, AND YouTube put together – according to Shareaholic.

If that startling fact doesn’t get your attention, how about this one? 

Daily Pinterest users have increased by more than 145% since the beginning of 2012 – Mashable

In my opinion, there are two main reasons people are flocking to use Pinterest. First, it is undeniably attractive to look at and browse through. Second, it’s incredibly easy to use. You don’t have to read or write much at all. And at a time when we’re bombarded with so many pages full of words, it’s a refreshing change to be able to simply look at and share lovely images. Videos are popular as always.

Will it work for your business?

I have hesitated to suggest Pinterest before because I know you have enough to do already! However, the continued growth of this new social media darling means you really cannot afford to ignore it.

Although we haven’t opened an account for Savvy Marketers, both Sam and I have set up individual accounts so you can have a look to see what we’re up to, and of course we’d be delighted if you’d follow us.  (Sam is at pinterest.com/vintagetrading and I’m at pinterest.com/louisebj)

From personal experience I warn you now that Pinterest is incredibly addictive and can consume far too much time. You’ll need to be disciplined and keep it under control.

Plenty of articles have been written recently about using Pinterest, so rather than rehash what’s already out there, I recommend you read the following:

1. Apply for an account (it only takes a couple of days to be accepted) and then read this step by step post to get started. Be sure to set up your profile properly (as Sam writes in this post)
2. Watch this excellent webinar for some good ideas and tips [Video]
3. To help you add pins of your own, here’s a list of useful tools.
4. There are 56 Pinterest marketing ideas for your business in this post.
5. If you’re interested in more facts about the meteoric rise of Pinterest, this infographic (from Infographic Labs) has plenty of them:

Are you on Pinterest? Put your url in the comments below so people can find and follow you!

If you’ve only recently started exploring social media marketing tools to promote your business online, the terms ‘Content Marketing’ and ‘Copywriting’ may not mean a lot. They could just be terms you’ve heard of or read about. The aim of today’s post is to define what they are and suggest how to use them both to get better results from your online marketing.

And if you’ve been blogging and networking online for a while, there may be still be tweaks you can apply and benefit from.

Sam and I recently gave a short talk to the Chichester Chamber Breakfast Group where we shared an overview of the importance of Content Marketing, what it is and suggested quite a few different ways to create it.

Our definition of Content Marketing is this: it means moving way beyond having a brochure or other way of offering information about your products & services. It means delivering best practices, case studies, success stories, thought leadership – anything that will help you become a trusted resource for your customers and prospective customers. 

Content marketing will help you build credibility – as someone who knows what they’re talking about; build trust – as you share tips and successes; build your brand reputation – as you’re seen to be a part of the online networks and communicating with other respected persons.

Content marketing will help you generate leads for your business and nurture them until the point of conversion. But only if the content you provide is of high quality and useful to your prospective clients.

So where does Copywriting come in?

My definition of Copywriting is that it’s the way you put together your content in order to encourage the consumer to take the action you want them to. This means that online Copywriting can apply not only to webpages and blog posts, but also to podcasts and videos. After all, you still need to put together the words to record.

Professional Copywriters command very high fees because their copy is so effective. They’re the people who write the sales pages you read on websites – the ones that have you reaching for your credit card – and taking exactly the action they want!

But most content should not be a blatant sales pitch! If it is you will quickly feel the cold draught of people leaving your blog, unsubscribing from your newsletter, unfollowing and defriending you. That’s yet another skill of a great copywriter – their copy is very subtle indeed.

However most of us can’t afford to hire a professional copywriter. So we need to learn how to write (create) the content ourselves, in such a way that we get good results too. Copywriting areas to pay particular attention to include:

Headlines – these are possibly the most important part of copywriting to learn to do well, and we’ll be devoting a new post to this topic very soon.

Structure and readability – you want to guide your reader and present content in a way that is easy for them to understand. Doing this will encourage blog visitors to stay on your site for longer.

Relevant Content – Give your newsletter readers and blog visitors the kind of good quality content they’re looking for and keep them happy!

Rapport Building – Your online articles and updates may be the only way you connect with some prospective clients, so the tone of your copy is an important part of forming a relationship with them.

Call to Action – This is the part of copywriting so many people either forget or get wrong. What do you want your reader or visitor to do next?

If you found this post interesting, don’t forget to register for next week’s free webinar : “How to Write so Your Web Visitors Do What You Want Them To!” 

 Further Reading:

What’s the Difference Between Content Marketing and Copywriting?

Copywriting vs. Content Writing: What’s the Difference?

It’s almost 4 years since I started blogging, using social media and other “technology” apps and tools to further my business. I’ve been thinking about it as Sam asked me to write a blog about my experiences with social media and I pondered about a variety of things.

It’s not just at New Year that one should revise their strategy, update their thoughts and perhaps even change their game plan – business wise. I do it on a regular basis – and with the help of social media and all the applications I have come to use, rather quickly. I guess that’s the beauty of all of this – as a small business I can change my marketing, change my strategy or update my website in the blink of an eye! Or can I?

Well yes, it means I am more in charge than ever before, instead of relying on people to do something for me, pay them and hope to god they do it right, I can now just get on with it myself. But of course this all takes time – nothing ever gets done with NO effort – people seem to forget that! And I have had to spend time learning about the technological ins and outs – and as time goes on brain cells do struggle! But I do enjoy it and I feel very good that at the ripe old age of 45 I was an “early adopter”!

I do think that people do think this takes no effort – and when they find out this does work they still think it’s a waste of time.

On one side you have the “twitter scorners” as I call them. They know nothing about it or might have just tried it for a few weeks and just don’t get it. On the other side you have the “new evangelists” – the ones that have tried it, stuck with it and now feel it’s their confessor and best friend rolled into one.

I went through both those stages – I think we all do. I thought I was way too old to mess with the kids on Twitter until someone explained the business strategy behind it and gave me a case study. The same with Facebook and LinkedIn – didn’t know how to really use them although had been on them for years and years, but I was sceptical and thought them a waste of time. But I have always prided myself on being open minded, so the case studies gave me a light bulb moment. That’s how I function, I need examples. Many people aren’t shown examples, so they become “Twitter scorners” forever. Some people of course use social media purely for fun and that’s ok.

I did not quite get into being an evangelist – I always thought telling the world your troubles and being negative was never a good thing for anyone, least of all me. But I did wax lyrical about social media because I did have some rather early wins with it – I was introduced to famous people in my industry, I even blog for one now. And I got £37,350 (T/O) worth of business in my first 6 months. Rather exact right? That’s because even though these are “newish” technologies, applications and business tools, it doesn’t mean you should not apply old world style business processes – like measuring ROI.

So almost four years into it and I have made some strategic changes to how I put myself out there.

For me, social media is part of my business toolbox – it’s marketing, PR and strategy rolled into a bundle that gives me direction to develop my business. It takes time, it takes effort and it takes dedication. But then if you want your business to succeed – doesn’t everything? I still don’t know it all, no-one ever does. The best part though and the one thing that makes me chuckle, is that I get approached by “Twitter Gurus”, “Social Media Supremos” and people that I met 6 months ago who knew nothing about it then and all of a sudden are giving social media workshops for £500/day and would I like to come along?! These people want to help me develop my social media – but first things first – check me out and see what work I do and how active I am before you start promising a myriad of wonders for me. And can I just say that most of these people did not even start out as marketing professionals. You can tell I have a bit of a bee in my bonnet about this!

Well I do, because it’s a learning process that takes time, and to begin with you really need to understand business and business development, marketing and brand development. Old fashioned business adages, but they do apply – they are the foundation to your business. It’s not about just sending out a few tweets and a few blogs out into the ether. I come from a business background and so feel very comfortable with all that stuff and having nearly 4 years of active non-stop social media work behind me, I feel rather confident about the things I have learnt. The good and the bad.

So a few tips and they’re FREE by the way!

Do not broadcast non-stop about what you do. It’s boring, it’s arrogant. Who wants to listen to anyone drone on about how good they are or about their products and services.

You want to be seen as THE voice of honest good reputation on your speciality – so share industry information you have found with others, showcase other people’s work. This makes you look like an authority – people start to trust you.

Meet the people (for real!) you have formed a good relationship with – collaboration is exponential, it feels good, it brings money in and gets your name out there.

Do show off your work or share your blog, but not every 5 minutes. For every one of your own work share 5 others. It’s a good balance.

Do create a strategy – what do you want to achieve in social media? Brand recognition? Get more clients? Meet other industry professionals? Whatever the goal is – develop it as you would offline.

Never ever comment on a client’s work – as sure as night follows day, they will read it and they may not like it! So keep negative comments to yourself.

Enjoy yourself – stay focused – stay positive – because oddly, online chats give people a very good idea of what you are like!

Lastly, remember – think twice about what you put out there – if you hesitate, don’t post it. A thoughtless or nasty comment will get out there and stay there!

Françoise Murat is a degree qualified Architectural Interior Designer and Garden Designer. Eco but not Loco! She specialises in: Architectural interior design for domestic clients, bars and restaurants and a garden design service for the domestic market, property developments and urban landscapes. Visit Françoise’s blog, Rendez-Vous Deco & Jardin. 

It’s no wonder many small business owners hesitate to get started with social media marketing

Social Media Marketing is not a replacement for traditional ‘offline’ marketing – but it is an excellent addition. Here’s why:

Connect

Social Media helps you to reach out to and connect with many more interesting & influential people than if you don’t take part. At a time when the majority of phone calls end up in the voicemail zone, using the social networks can be a more successful way to make that initial contact.

It’s surprising to find that quite senior decision makers and buyers are personally involved. You will find big business thought leaders, early adopters and big brands on Twitter or with Facebook Pages. OK, so they probably don’t send out every tweet themselves, but they will be kept informed of trending topics and notice people of interest.

Communicate

An important factor to remember with Social Media marketing is that it replaces the one-way message of the old, static, brochure-type website and enables you to communicate two-way and even multi-ways with your clients and prospective clients. You can find out what they really want, instead of merely guessing. Many large brands are discovering a whole new box of customer service tools in the social networks (those who get it are anyway).

You can send out your message to reach hundreds or thousands of people in an instant at a fraction of the cost of traditional advertising or direct mail, and receive a response just as quickly. Your customers and prospective customers are getting used to having their say.

Consistent

With traditional marketing activities, you wouldn’t expect to do something only once or twice for it to bring you good results, would you? That would be like going to one networking meeting or mailing out one letter, and then sitting back waiting for the phone to ring. Instead you’d plan out a campaign of activities to take place over a few months or more. You would visit the networking groups regularly and send out a series of mailings – and follow them up too.

With Social Media marketing you need to commit to doing it consistently & correctly for it to work for your business. If you’re going to be on Twitter or any of the other online networks, you have to show up often to see any return. And if you have a blog, you need to post something at least once a week, every week.

Whether your prospective clients are parents, students, young mums, the retired or redundant or they are sole-traders or business tycoons, there is a way to connect and communicate with them using social media marketing.

What would you add? Please share in the comments below.

We’re definitely in favour of making life easier by using some of the great automation tools available online

Twitterfeed is great for automatically tweeting the RSS feeds of your and other peoples’ blogs and articles and it isn’t hard to do. Once you’ve set up your account you type in the blog feed URL including the http://www.blogname.com/feed (you can find the feed URL by hovering over the orange RSS button on the site). Each time a new post is published by that blogger, Twitterfeed sends out a tweet from your Twitter account. You can personalise tweets by prefacing with, for example: ‘Latest post: …’.

Social Oomph (formerly Tweet Later) has many useful features. We use it to ‘vet’ or check out latest followers on Twitter, decide if we want to follow them back (or sometimes block any undesirables!), and then assign them to a list. Another great use for this tool is to write & store draft tweets and preschedule them to go out at specified times and dates in the future.

Unlike many people we think an automated welcome message to new followers can be OK, provided it is just a welcome – and doesn’t include a pitch, or even a link to a free report (that’s just tacky!).

Twitter clients TweetDeck and Hootsuite both allow you to manage your twitter accounts, lists and followers as well as to connect with other social networks. This means you can update your Facebook and LinkedIn status with just a single tweet. One of the main differences between the two clients is that TweetDeck requires you to download software onto your computer (this can slow things down a bit for older PCs), whereas Hootsuite has a web-based option so just needs an internet connection to run.

Setting up and personalising an iGoogle page with some of the many available ‘gadgets’ lets you each of your social media networks, preview your Google Mail, Google Calendar and Google Docs – all on the same page . This makes it easy to quickly glance and catch up with what’s going on in your online world whenever you have a few moments, without the need to log into each individual account.

It’s tempting to get carried away with all this available automation, but if you set up every tweet to also automatically update your status on LinkedIn and Facebook, it will get very irritating for your connections on those sites. Do you really want everyone to see every tweet you send? Twitter is the best place to contain the chatter, so we recommend you use the appropriate tools and be selective.

As a final thought for today, while these automated tools are great at saving time it’s a good idea to occasionally check they’re still doing what you intended when you set them up. If you plan to use social media marketing regularly to help promote your business, it’s well worth automating some broadcasts to save time and effort. But people will notice if you try to automate too much, so make sure you stop and ‘chat’ with your connections, even if only for a few minutes a day – and be ‘sociable’!

What’s your favourite social media marketing automation tool? We’d love you to share it here!

We hear a lot of people say

This question assumes that social media is something you can do once and not have to return to. Sorry to disappoint but Social Media marketing is a bit like a huge jigsaw puzzle and, because social media keeps on changing and growing, the jigsaw is never completely finished.

As an eternal ‘tweaker’ I can honestly say that there are so many little pieces, it takes forever to put them all in the right place on the picture that is social media.

What we find is that it’s often the little pieces of the puzzle that can make the biggest difference and have the most impact on business.

Here are just 15 little pieces that you may want to use for your own social media marketing puzzle:

Twitter

• Check that you have included a up to date live link back to your website in your bio.
• If you’re using automation tools, make sure the scheduled tweets are still relevant.
• Have you cleared out inactive or spammy followers lately?

Facebook

• On your Personal Profile, check you have included links to your Facebook Business Page, Twitter account and website(s) in the Contact Information section of the Info tab.
• Engage with friends and family on your Personal profile, but gradually move business acquaintances over to the Business Page.
• On your Facebook Business Page, set up a routine to add interesting content every day (auto-linking Twitter doesn’t count ).

LinkedIn

• Check that your profile is up to date – current employer & summary
• Have you selected your specialist areas yet?
• Create a Company page for your business and start promoting your products & services.

Blog

• Is your Sign-up box to collect visitor details and build your list prominently displayed?
• Check that the RSS feed link works (clicking on it should open a selection of readers, not a page of code)
• Give readers plenty of opportunities to share your articles around the internet.

Google+

• Create and complete your profile (with photograph) and include relevant links to your other online homes
• Create a Google+ Business Page and add your information to the About Page.
• Add a Google+ Profile Badge to your website and blog. (If you’re on WordPress here’s a plugin: http://plusdevs.com/google-wordpress-plugin/)

As with all marketing activities you will need to try, test and monitor to find out which social media pieces work best for your business.

Over to you – what jigsaw pieces would you include?

Inspired by yet another great post from Debra Collins at Pennsylvania based B2B and professional services marketing specialists, Marketri, I am encouraged to give my own view on the plethora of social media that now competes for our attention every day of the week. What works and what doesn’t work? What should we invest our time in and what should we leave alone? What is social and what is for business?….And where do we stand on the greatest challenge of all for marketers, ROI?

In her post (and I really do encourage you to read it for yourself), Debra classifies each of the main platforms as either a necessity or a luxury. In summary, Debra concludes:

• LinkedIn: Necessity
• Twitter: Luxury
• Google+: Necessity
• Facebook: Luxury

My experience and perspective from this side of the pond is slightly different.

LinkedIn: Necessity

A LinkedIn profile is, I agree, essential. Finding and maintaining contact with former colleagues is LinkedIn’s most useful purpose, swiftly followed by the ability to find a contact in a target organisation and identify any common connections.

One should also not fail to note that a potential client is likely to look at one’s profile in advance of a meeting or first contact. A profile that does not adequately communicate one’s skills and experience could be the difference between success and failure.

To date, however, I have found little benefit in contributing to LinkedIn discussions, or updating my status (other than via an autofeed from Twitter) or having a company profile or group. People’s time to contribute and engage in these discussions seems to be too limited. My personal view is that time dedicated to these activities should be allocated sparingly.

Twitter: Necessity

I find Twitter essential as a source of information. Many times I’ve used it for insight on industry news that I’ve then shared with clients and prospects to impress them with how ‘in touch’ I am! My colleagues have spotted PR opportunities for clients by following journalists and The Marketing Eye has clients who have created leads for themselves by spotting buying signals in the tweets of prospects who they strategically follow.

Can one be a user of Twitter and not a contributor? Possibly, at the conscious expense of forsaking brand profile with a like-minded audience. The indiscriminate pursuit of followers for the sake of status is, however, clearly misplaced. There is little more mindless than users who are following, and being followed by, thousands.

Facebook: Necessity

I am a late, but now enthusiastic, adopter of Facebook for business- it is the 3rd most important source of leads to our website and generates 7 times more visitors than LinkedIn.

I don’t believe any marketer can afford to ignore a platform that has 600m users and rising. There are some who say that businesses won’t bother with traditional websites in five year’s time, instead they will rely entirely on Facebook. I am not sure if I subscribe to this view entirely, but I can see their point.

Facebook is very searchable, allows for quick and informal updates and allows marketers to communicate with a target audience when it is at its most relaxed and therefore most amenable to suggestion. The demographic targeting capabilities of Facebook advertising are another significant advantage for the savvy operator.

Google+: Luxury (for now)

I will no doubt be as late an adopter of Google+ as I was of Facebook. I have taken a look at Google+ out of professional interest and created a personal profile (Google is discouraging the creation of business profiles at the time of writing (edit: Google has now introduced business pages on Google+)), but in common with many, I am daunted by thought of monitoring and maintaining yet another presence. Google’s dominance in search will, no doubt, make it compulsory at some point.

The great ROI debate

So, when push comes to shove, is it all worth it? Is social media a critical part of any business’s marketing activity or is it the greatest confidence trick since the King’s New Clothes?

The whole premise of the debate is flawed in my view. To view social media in ROI terms is misplaced. Social media platforms are tools and not campaigns – they should be learned and used for the benefits they bring, be they as marketing communications or as sources of information. To paraphrase another favourite commentator of mine, Ian Brodie: “In the social media age, it is no more necessary to measure the ROI of social media than it is to measure the ROI of the computer or telephone”.

What do you think?

Neil is a Chartered Marketer and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing with many years’ experience in marketing, brand and communications. His experience includes being a Director of Marketing in The Royal Bank of Scotland Group where he was responsible for brands in the UK, Ireland and US. Those brands include: Lombard, Jamjarcars.com, Angel Trains and Dixon Motors. Entrepreneurial, creative and energetic, Neil’s success has come from a pragmatic and intelligent approach to combining marketing with business needs. You can find out more about Neil on The Marketing Eye’s website.