Experts urge small business owners to “brand” their businesses with a logo and a set of consistent marketing materials. However, they rarely explain the reasons behind this advice. Below are some of some of the benefits of a professionally designed logo and identity system:
1. To look “bigger” and “established.” Home-printed business cards or cards printed with Microsoft clipart scream “small-time vendor” to your potential clients — and that is how they will want to compensate you.
2. To attract more clients. Some clients look for a well-defined company, and “look and feel” may be one of their criteria for making a purchasing decision.
3. To brand yourself. If you are a consultant, you need a logo in order to build an image and a brand that is greater than your individual identity.
4. To convey that you are reputable. A logo and professionally-printed materials show that you are committed to both your business and to your clients.
5. To give clients a sense of stability. You may not have been in business “since 1908,” but if you have invested in your identity, you are more likely to remain firm and relevant in the eyes of your customers. It goes a long way toward building that all-important “trust.”
6. To be more memorable. Forty percent of people better remember what they see than what they hear or read. So to have graphics associated with your business, and to keep those graphics consistent, makes you more likely to be at the forefront of potential clients’ minds when they need your goods or services.
7. To explain an unusual line of business. If your business is nontraditional or in a hard-to-explain industry, a logo can help to clarify exactly what it is that you do.
8. To differentiate you from your competition. A well-designed logo can have many subtle meanings and can begin to tell the story of how you do business, including the special practices that make you stand apart from the competition.
9. To comply with expectations. In some industries, a logo is just expected. In the creative services industry especially, having a logo is an industry standard.
10. To show your commitment. Do it for the sense of personal pride that it will add to your practice.
Originally Posted by Erin Ryan on April 26, 2010
(http://soshable.com/social-networking-for-business-8-tips-on-how-to-relate-and-communicate/)
Blast
Since the evolution of communicating online and the formations of social networks, many businesses have shut down the access from their locations. Some might say it is due to the prevention of wasting time and improving time management. Others might be weary of hackers or phishing scams that could possibly be associated with the social networks. Regardless of the reason, blocking access to social sites is hurting your business.
Why It is Important to Establish your Business Online
You need to begin branding your name. Branding is a way to reach various audiences and demographics that may be interested in what you have to sell. Firstly, you must remember that they are people, not customers. Establishing your name on social networks will already alert your fans of who you are and since the various social sites provide places such as info tabs, bios, hours of operation and more, there is no urgency to then turn your social networks into a constant feed of what it is you do. Just make sure that you have filled out all the information areas that each social network provides and those keywords will help people find you online. More importantly, in order for them to find you, you must exist and you must be active.
Why it is Important to Maintain your Social Networks
Many businesses think that if they have the links out there then people will come. This is not only wrong but can hurt your business. Yes, having Social links with your business’s name on them will have your name stretched across the internet and of course people will be able to find you. However, once they do and all they see are empty shells of what they thought would be a community, they will be disappointed and move on. People aren’t impressed with ghost accounts; they want interaction, knowledgeable information, and life breathing from these sites.
That does not mean that pushing links that are related to your business 100% of the time is going to be anymore effective than the empty accounts. Many businesses lose the fact that social networking is to relate and communicate, not to advertise like a pest, and than hope for the best. If you truly want your business to be valued you have to provide value.
Create a welcome video, find article’s online that pertain to your industry and not just your products (even write articles yourself), create a dialogue by asking questions, questions at the end of everything you share is one of the best things you can do. This way people have a choice to engage the page or not, and more so than not, they will.
Opinion’s Matter
The people that you are interacting with are those that could potentially be your current or future customers. They can even possibly be an advocate for your business if they like what they see. You must remember to listen to what they have to say and take the time to respond. The only time you should ever delete a post by a fan is if something is posted to your social sites that have nothing to do with your business. Other than that, whether it is positive or negative feedback you must respond to that customer whether you believe that they are right or wrong. Do not continue the problem by making excuses, choose your post response wisely and always with a solution in hand. Do not just post and not respond. As a fan of whatever social sites you are on, they will want to be heard and the only way they can verify this is by you responding. Remember, their opinion is of great value to you, so you need to be invaluable to them by always putting them first which will validate that you are in fact paying attention.
Let go of the ego, diminish the sell, stop thinking in numbers, and start talking with people, sharing with them and listening to what they are saying to you. The page can be fun and creative and certainly not always about the business. Find a balance between social and professional interactions and success will ensue.
Be Genuine.
Don’t fake it to make it. Share your personality, devote time and effort into the content that you share and find out what it is that your fan base wants. Businesses often lose site of being authentic while utilizing their social networks to push onto people what they think their fans want. Instead ask them. Don’t be afraid to take some risks or to follow through with some suggestions from your fans. Be fearless with ideas and prepare for their failure if that is the case, as the cliché goes “it is better to have tried than not at all”. Your sincerity will be seen and your ability to try again will be appreciated. The only time you can fail is by not giving it a try at all.
It is vital to spend more time on the fans you have (especially the loyal ones) than spending time on luring new fans. If you have a special offer, allow the loyal fans to know first. You can even create a fan of the month to show them how special they are. New fans will find you, maintaining the ones who have stuck by you should always be a priority. Be genuine and honest with your fans and you will earn their respect and build credibility within a long lasting community for your business.
Commit, Don’t Quit
As you can see, a responsibility comes with setting up, maintaining, and monitoring your social networks. It is imperative that you make the choice to commit and to set a plan in motion that you are able to update your pages at a minimum of 1-3 hours a week. Devotion is important and taking the time will work in your favor, as long as you work it into your day. No matter what products you sell people will most likely look for it online prior to approaching your business offline, so it is not only important to create social sites for your business but even more critical to remain as active as you can and to never quit. If you get busy and distracted by other things, remember to always go back and continue the relationship with your fans, even explain where you have been, or have another employee take the control of the sites if you are not available.
Take Control, by Losing Control
Fearing social networking at work is bad for business. You need to lose control. Trust that the same employees that you hired to help run and maintain your business can do so online too. Allow access for your business’s location to social networking sites so you can implement a strategic plan with your employees on how to brand your business online. You can’t do it alone, you need their help, and it will look inviting to your potential fans to see that you have a strong community within your business already. Allow your employees to post, comment, and share opinions. Incorporate them onto your social networks as you do everyday at your company. Make the process and transition between offline branding and online branding easier with allowing access and by encouraging your employees to take part and share the sites with people they know.
Adapt or get lost in the Shuffle
The change has happened. The way we communicate is no longer the same and this goes for businesses as well. You can not stand by and not take part in the new medium of Social Media; it will impair your business. You need to adapt and perform accordingly to be an effective part of this communication shift. You must take time to research, incorporate your employees, maintain your pages, and be genuine. If not, you will get lost within the shuffle.
Take Action
Social Media is an outstanding opportunity to connect and build relationships with your fans. It is of significant importance for you to establish yourself on the variety of social networks that are available to you. Resistance is never helpful when change has occurred and can ultimately damage your hard earned reputation. By not taking action, you run the risk of being over shadowed by your competition, so don’t be idle, get out their and get social. Embrace the change that can now allow you to embark on the new form of relationships between business owners and their customers, not to mention exposing your business’s name to the world, but also a chance to demonstrate just how great your business truly is.
1. Spark initial growth numbers within the network quickly
If you’re looking to reach a wide audience, (this brand has mass appeal) reaching enough active users in the network to reach a tipping point is the first, crucial step. There are just more potential people to share/like/comment on your content you’re adding into the channel (which in Facebook helps grow a fan page due to the fact this activity shows up in user feeds).
An easy way to start is get multiple influential users to invite all of their friends to become fans of the page. If you can get 20 people each to invite 100 users, and encourage those users to invite their own friends, you’ll start to see growth. Use incentives if necessary – contests, rewards for joining, etc. Facebook has specific rules now (which weren’t in place when I made this page) that make some of this more difficult, but there are still plenty of creative ways to do this.
2. Leverage external traffic streams/subscriber bases
Take stock of all your communities, email lists, websites and any other place you have a digital presence. Start to call them to action to join your fan page. Add links to your blog sidebar, put a CTA on the homepage of the website you’re already marketing, add a link in employee emails, put links in your email marketing, etc. Put it bold and up front to start – the key is to funnel enough subscribers to the page where a natural cycle of growth begins by virtue of more people becoming fans. The strategy here is simple: leverage what you have to spark growth in a new community until it’s growing organically.
But remember: the long-term play is to consistently siphon people out of Facebook to a community where SEO/social media value can really ramp up and you’re not limited by the rules of playing in a network you don’t control. In other words: once your fan page is growing organically, flip the funnel: start to move people out of Facebook to your own, self-hosted platform like a blog.
3. Continually update the page with new content
More content on the page is going to be more content for users to interact with. And, due to how Facebook has setup their system, users consistently engaging with content is a key component to growth. By reaching into the streams of individual users your brand can start to grow fast if your content is worth reacting to.
Other ideas:
- Buy targeted advertising on Facebook’s platform
- Leverage your offline networks (TV/newspaper/magazine ads, etc.)
- Run a contest/promotion offline of Facebook, yet encourage users to become a fan during the promotion process (since there is quite a bit of red tape to actually run promotions on Facebook fan pages themselves)
- Create some unmissable content published exclusively on your Facebook fan page
- Frequently make special offer announcements and even new product announcements through the page first
- Hire a community manager to implement ongoing growth opportunities across all your social channels
- Buy Google ads to drive traffic directly to your Facebook fan page
- End your press releases with your Facebook fan page link
- Provide talking points to publicized team members to say become a fan in Facebook during interviews
Of course, there are plenty of additional methods for growing Facebook fan pages/platform specific pages. But any additional recommendations or ideas are going to be more specific based on the brand or product involved (the above are all quite general).
The bigger thing to remember is know how you’re going to make your Facebook presence work for your larger digital strategy prior to doing anything. Without this, sure – you can grow something popular, but it should still feed a larger objective.
Facebook has just introduced a ‘Like’ button for fan pages. This new ‘Like’ button is replacing the ‘Become a Fan’ button that we all know and have become used to.
Facebook says that, “Starting today people will be able to connect with (Fan) Page(s) by clicking “Like” rather than “Become a Fan.” We hope this action will feel much more lightweight, and that it will increase the number of connections made across the site.”
Many Facebook users have become so used to clicking the ‘Like’ button on people’s photos, videos, and statuses that they may not even notice that they are actually becoming a fan by clicking the like button. Facebook has also changed the wording on each fan page, however, to now say that 773 people like the page, for example, rather than 773 people are fans of the page. This is a smart move on Facebook’s part, because it seems like a lot of users are hesitant about becoming a fan or joining groups, but everyone clicks the like button! And Facebook knows this.
This new, non-threatening like button is going to help businesses, although once people realize that everything that they have previously ‘Liked’ is showing up on their own profile under their pages section, they may learn to start being cautious about clicking even the ever so popular ‘Like’ button.
Do you think the Like button will be more effective than the Become a Fan button? Leave your thoughts and comments below!
Facebook’s not just for keeping tabs on friends and filling out quizzes — it can also be used as a highly effective business tool. It’s great for marketing your products, landing gigs and connecting with your customers. Here are great ways to use Facebook in your business:
- Fill out your profile completely to earn trust.
- Establish a Corporate Page if you don’t already have one.
- Stay out of trouble by reading the Facebook rules regarding Corporate Pages.
- Keep any personal parts of your profile private through Settings.
- Post a professional or business casual photos of yourself to reinforce your brand.
- Limit business contacts’ access to personal photos.
- Post your newsletter subscription information and archives somewhere in your profile.
- Obtain a Facebook vanity URL so that people can find you easily.
- Add your Facebok URL to your email signature and any marketing collateral (business cards, etc.) so prospects can learn more about you.
- Post business updates on your wall. Focus on business activities, such as “Working with ABC Company on web site redesign.”
- Share useful articles and links to presentation and valuable resources that interest customers and prospects on your wall, to establish credibility.
- Combine Facebook with other social media tools like Twitter. For example, when someone asks question on Twitter, you can respond in detail in a blog post and link to it from Facebook.
- Research prospects before meeting or contacting them.
- Upload your contacts from your email client to find more connections.
- Use Find Friends for suggestions of other people you may know to expand your network even further.
- Look for mutual contacts on your contacts’ friends lists.
- Find experts in your field and invite them as a guest blogger on your blog or speaker at your event.
- Market your products by posting discounts and package deals.
- Share survey or research data to gain credibility.
- Use Facebook Connect to add social networking features to your web site.
- Suggest Friends to clients and colleagues — by helping them, you establish trust.
- Buy Facebook ads to target your exact audience.
- Post upcoming events including webinars, conferences and other programs where you or someone from your company will be present.
- Update your group or fan page on a regular basis with helpful information and answers to questions.
- Join network, industry and alumni groups related to your business.
- 32. Use search to find groups and fan pages related to your business by industry, location and career.
How do you use Facebook for business?
