Social media is important to firms

Most businesses that invest heavily in
social media tend to forget one key
component to maximizing their
success in developing direct
relationships with their audience:
They forget to be social.
Much effort and attention is given to
creating valuable content, publishing
at just the right time to maximize
impressions, determining what
triggers to use to incite sharing,
figuring out how to encourage
comments and “likes,” and more.
All of this is great, but there isn’t
anything social about publishing
content and hoping for virality metrics
to shoot through the roof. Even
replying to comments left on blog
content, Facebook updates, tweets,
and Google+ posts isn’t truly being
social.
Think about it in the context of your
life. You don’t go to a party, see
some guy standing in the corner all by
his lonesome, and think, "Man, that
guy is really putting himself out
there!" He’d probably answer a
question if you asked him, but he’s
not doing anything to garner
attention, attract people to him, or
develop connections or relationships.
Except for rare circumstances,
businesses and brands simply cannot
develop meaningful relationships with
consumers on social media without
behaving socially.
The beautiful thing about social media
is that it gives businesses the
opportunity to speak with their
audience, including current and
prospective consumers. That’s
powerful stuff.
Initiate a dialogue.
If you are hoping to develop real
relationships with your consumers,
attract them to participate in the
discussions that are occurring on your
social media properties, and encourage
them to be social, I strongly
encourage you to initiate a dialogue
with them on their preferred online
turf.
By initiating an exchange, you are
greatly enhancing the probability that
you will not only receive a reply, but
also generate a dialogue. When you
create a dialogue with your
consumers, you’re going to
understand them better, learn what
they want, fully comprehend their
needs, and figure out how to provide
tremendous value with your products,
services, and content.
Develop direct relationships with your
consumers.
You are also going to greatly increase
the value of the interactions you have
with your consumers if there is some
give and take. Nobody wants to be
involved in a relationship in which they
are simply broadcast to. That’s not a
relationship at all. People want to
influence the course of a discussion.
This can be unnerving to reps at
businesses and brands accustomed to
retaining control of their
communications, but it is also
extremely exciting if you can adapt,
learn, and be nimble enough to take
advantage of the tremendous value
that direct relationships with
consumers can yield.
If there is one thing to take away
from this post, it is to find ways for
your business to be more proactively
social on social media. You don’t sit on
your hands waiting for consumers to
learn about your business or brand in
the offline world. You market,
advertise, write press releases, work
to generate word of mouth, and
develop and build relationships. All of
this is proactive and action oriented.
[RELATED: Learn the art of the
visual story at this November
video summit.
]
On social media you should really be
doing the same. Try to avoid turning
social media into a broadcast channel
for your content, and get involved
with your consumers where they are
interacting and engaging on the social
Web.
How do you engage socially with your
consumers online?
Matthew Peneycad blogs , tweets, and
posts as RGB Social with the aim of
sharing his advertising agency
experience in social media and digital
marketing with businesses and brands
of all sizes. A version of this story
also appeared on Social Media Today.

posted from Bloggeroid