Social Media Resolutions for 2012

With 2011 behind us, now is the time to think about marketing strategies for the new year. By now, you likely have your Twitter account and Facebook page for your business set up, connected to each other, and updating followers regularly with news of your business and products/services. Perhaps you don't have as many followers as you would like, but a new year brings the promise for increased interest. It's also a good time to take into consideration a number of social media resolutions.

What should you plan for 2012? This largely depends on what you have intended for your business. Your marketing strategy will differ from those of other companies, but if you are looking for ideas here are some to adapt.

1) Cut away the dead weight. Do you have social profiles set up that you do not use anymore? Maybe in a fit to cover all the bases you set up a Flickr or MySpace page and let it fall to the wayside. You might want to consider deleting profiles that haven't been updated in several months - it looks rather unprofessional for a social profile to lie stagnant. Either that, or find a way to revive it by feeding an active RSS into it.

2) Re-Evaluate design. This could be a good time to change your Twitter background or your Facebook page profile photo. As social networks have changed interfaces over the last year, your current designs may no longer suit. Take the time for a few makeovers.

3) Check Facebook tabs. Are you still using FBML for custom tabs on your Facebook page? Better fix that quick, for FBML support will eventually go away. You need to make sure you are familiar with Facebook's development site for making tabs, and that you have a server with https support to host the pages.

4) Engage more in social media with people. Once a day, commit yourself to the following:

• Re-tweet one update on Twitter
• Respond to another person's Twitter status
• Use Facebook as your page's persona and comment on another Facebook page (without spamming your business)
• Share one status update from another person on your Google Plus page
• Comment on a relevant YouTube video
• Comment on a relevant blog post

Social media entails more than shot-gunning information. Put the social back in your social campaigns.

5) Lastly, don't be afraid to show your sense of humor. One doesn't always plan to go viral with a tweet, video, or blog post, but when it happens it's because the item is worth sharing. You don't have to be the clown prince of social media, but if you let your hair down once in a while you can show people a new side to your business that they will want to know.

Good luck with your social marketing in 2012

Social Media Vs Social Networking: What's the Difference?

In our growing culture, technology is thriving, giving way to amazing advancements. Internet technologies have improved communication one hundred fold, allowing people from all over the world and all walks of life to engage in discourse.

Social media and social networking have had some profound effects on the way businesses are run and how people interact with one another. Although most use the terms "social media" and "social networking" interchangeably, there are some distinct, subtle differences. Let's take a look at these differences.

Defining the Terms

Simply put, social media is a means of transmitting or sharing information with a general audience. As long as you have a computer connected to the Internet you can partake in social media. Everyone has the opportunity to create and distribute information. Consider the concept of media in the past as dominated by TV, newspapers, magazines, and so on. Social media broke away from those static forms to create a real sense of interactivity.

Social networking is an act of engagement and connection. Groups of like-minded people with common interests as well as people with totally different world views come together through various social networking sites to build relationships through that online community.

Communication

Both social media and social networking encourage communication, but the style of communication is a bit different. In the world of social networking, communication is a two-way street. People may congregate around a central topic of interest to share in their similar experiences, but it is all much more akin to a simple conversation. Through those conversations, users develop relationships.

Social media is more of a communication channel, like TV or radio. It's a format meant to convey messages and information. Social media isn't a place you visit but simply a means of distributing information.

Responses and Effort

Between the two, social media is hard work. Unless your business is already well-established, you can't create an overnight following nor can you automate conversations. Getting into social media is a continuous task.

Social networking is direct communication between parties, often leading to much richer, personal conversations. Even better, your network grows the more you interact. Creating a "social network" does not take nearly as much time, though you still have to invest a great deal of time with that network.

Blurring the Lines

Twitter and Facebook-probably the most popular social platforms out there today-have made discerning between social media and social networking a bit difficult because they essentially make use of both. They perfectly straddle the line between the two, allowing users to have unique, personal conversations while also sharing interactive information.

Tarik Sansal is an internet entrepreneur. He is currently the founder and CEO of Romio, which is social site that leverages neighborhood networks.

Tarik started his careers in investments. He was the first investment analyst at Moon Capital, the emerging markets hedge fund. He is passionate about leveraging socially conscious internet ventures to make a positive social impact. He also has ideas around new alternative investment models which leverage a socially conscious approach to deliver superior returns to investors.

Using Social Media to Market in the 21st Century

As George talked about his company's approach to Social Media it became clear that he was laboring under a fundamental misconception about what Social Media is all about. The result for George is that his company has invested hundreds of man-hours and thousands of dollars with very little to show for their considerable, and growing, investment. Unfortunately, George is not alone - there are many whose investment of time and money in Social Media has produced disappointing results due to a common, and fundamental, misunderstanding of Social Media. What about you? Do you share this common misunderstanding?

It's about connecting

A good understanding of what Social Media is about and how you can put it to work in your business is less about the technology and more about your message and connecting with others through this exciting new medium. Think of it as 21st Century networking. Successful networking is not about pushing yourself on others - it is about building relationships. It's not about "selling" people, it's about engaging folks in conversation.

Networking the right way is about forming connections and building those connections into relationships. It is about adding value to others. Successful networking comes as a result of the universal law of reciprocity, where the more you give, the more you receive. The path to Social Media success is governed by this same universal law.

It's not rocket science

Don't be intimidated and distracted by all the geek-speak surrounding Social Media. Instead of thinking about it as a collection of tools and technologies, think about the underlying purpose - connecting with others. Recognize that what people are responding to through Social Media is not the platform, but the individual/ company/brand and its message. In other words you're not attracting people and interest because you have a Facebook page, you are attracting people to your Facebook page because of what you are doing with it.

How can you use your Facebook page in a way that your target audience finds interesting and helpful? What can you provide to your audience on Facebook that they aren't already receiving somewhere else? How can you add value to your target audience through the social technologies that they are already using?

In order to harness the power of Social Media for you and your business, you don't need huge advertising budgets, scores of interns, and a guru on staff, but you do need to know the fundamentals. Done wrong, this strategy can become a distraction that will consume time and money with no benefit for your business. Done right, Social media can add tremendous value to you and your business in just minutes a day. Find out how you too can achieve great results for your business with 5 Ways to Grow Your Business Using Social Media.

My Internet Marketing Partner (MIMP) develops a specific plan for your website to consistently attract attention and ideal clients. In order to grow online and present the right image, your website needs to show up well in the appropriate search engines for the services and/or products you provide. MIMP's Road Map System designs a clear route to achieving measurable results, based on comprehensive analysis of your current marketing and website as well as competitors online and relative search engine rankings.