How to Make Social Media Useful
Lisa Barone reports that a Citibank and Gfk Roper study found that 76 percent of small business owners don't find social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn helpful in generating leads and business (Can SMB Owners Make Social Media Useful?, Small Business Trends).
Lisa's take on this is that it's not that social media isn't or can't be useful; it's just that it takes so much time. The solution? Time management. You need to know why you're using social media and plan in advance where and how you're going to engage.
Lisa's post is full of tips for focusing your time and energy. Planning and scheduling are key, she says, and there are many tools that can help you avoid overload and stay organized such as "Tweetdeck, HootSuite or Seesmic to help you manage conversation and schedule tweets ahead of time" and "Google Alerts via either email or RSS to keep track of social media mentions."
What I found really useful is her point about establishing a "strong listening station" to combat what I've found to be the biggest problem using social media: immediacy. How do you keep up with real-time conversations when you're a person who isn't glued to the Web all day and can't handle constant interruptions? Lisa Barone explains how she does it in How To Find Conversations By Tracking Brand Mentions (Outspoken Media), an article I found really useful.
Now it's your turn. What's your biggest problem using social media? Vote in the poll at right. (And if you don't have any problems using social media to generate business for your business, you can let us know that too in the comments below.)
More on Using Social Media for Business
- 5 Specific Business Goals for Using Social Media
- How to Promote Your Business on Twitter
- How to Twitter: A Get Started Guide
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Hi Susan,
I chose “Other,” so let me explain.
My biggest problem using social media is with the interfaces. Twitter isn’t too bad, by I do not find the Facebook interface, for example, to be very user-friendly. And that’s just for basic navigation; forget trying to do anything fancy, such as tweaking applications.
Also, being still relatively new, these sites haven’t worked out all the techie kinks yet. And since they are evolving organisms, it is sometimes difficult to find up-to-date answers online to specific questions one may have regarding them.
I chose “It takes too much time” and would add, “if you let it.” I try not to let it take too much time, but I did at first. Now I don’t try to read all the messages and I don’t try to play all the games on Facebook. I just use it and Twitter to keep up with friends and also to promote my website – but not too much. I try to keep a balance.
I selected too much time. However, I’m learning how to manage my time by setting up a schedule and know what I want to tweet.
I have had pretty good success attracting clients through a couple of the social networks, and as in traditional networking, they relationships developed in large part due to having a good reputation within the communities I participate in. Having said that, the biggest issue I have with social networks is connecting with folks who have a need for my services. I’ve had great success through facebook, but not with Linked In or twitter. Myspace has also been a good source for me.
Why did I vote “just hype?” Simple really, as a longtime stagehand- who lived in San Francisco back in the Silicon Valley days- did many, many shows for computers- computer geeks are truly socially inept; I have witnessed another aspect to our species.
I am constantly amazed at just how truly lazy most folks are, I guess it is a lot easier to sit and stare at a screen for hours than actually get up and do something. We are a social species, we survive because we help each other… like put a cave over our heads, grow, hunt, or fish for food, etc. But most folks just want to be entertained in their own universe, the rest of us could be invisible for all they care.
There is a good (and funny) reason why my writing is for satire… all I have to do is just sit back and watch, then shake my head wondering.
I imagine that the people reading this are more in this POV (note: I didn’t invent this way of seeing things) so I hope it puts a smile on your face. See ya!