That can become VERY expensive.. but that is another topic. The real concern for me here is, are they are using these tools effectively, or are their efforts really turning their potential clients off because they are unsure of what makes social media marketing successful?

Using social media for business growth is a growing industry and there are several heavy hitters competing for market share. What determines a good candidate to handle social media marketing? How do you know if who you are hiring, really has the skill sets to expand your business through this style of marketing?

Here are a few tips:

1. Do they ask you what your goals are to determine where you want to be in the market, who is your target market, what is your message, is your message really reaching your target market, etc.
2. Do they have the ability to develop a clear strategy for you to achieve your goals?
3. Is there main focus on making money, or helping you to market your company?
4. Are they willing to provide you with the information they know?
5. Do they have success with other companies and referral sources to give you?
6. Are they measuring the ROI of their efforts?

These are all important because some people are using social media completely wrong and are hiring people who may not really know how to utilize social media marketing for business growth. It is important to make sure the person or company you are partnering with to help you with your social media campaign understands how to use social media sites to help your business grow.

So many people feel that the buzz related with social media and social media marketing is a fad. People are feeling overwhelmed and yet are compelled to get on these sites for personal and business related purposes. I agree it can be overwhelming, but it is something fun all in the same time, or should be.

This video that I found about social media compares this new trend to be the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution! That’s pretty big! but I believe that is a Great comparison. The fastest growing segment for Facebook is the age group between 55 and 65.

Five years ago I can remember when Facebook was “the thing” for college kids. Only college students could create a profile and network with each other. I used to spend hours and hours a day searching friends, adding friends and keeping up to date on all my micro blogs on there. Now to think the paradigm has taken a shift and the fastest growing group is people between the age of 55 and 65!?!  What!?!?

That is crazy!! but oh so true. My dad loves Facebook and within two months of being on there he already has over 200 friends.. shoot dad thats quite a few people in two months!

 Businesses can capitalize on the social media fever if they just use it correctly! It’s not an outlet that is meant to sell and persuade people, it is a way to interact with real live people all over the world!

Check out this video with some true statistics on social media and let me know your thoughts!

Is Social Media a Fad?

The best thing to keep in mind with social media marketing is to think of it as a regular marketing campaign. When you participate in a Print campaign you don’t choose only one avenue to go through right? Typically a good marketing campaign involves print, TV, Internet and Radio. Combining all of these avenues to get your message across to consumers, usually means gaining more leads from your campaign.

Internet Marketing and Social Media Marketing should be viewed in the same way. All aspects should be involved into your campaign to make it the most successful for your business, no matter what industry. Facebook and Twitter are avenues that help you brand your name and product or products. LinkedIn is great for networking with other business professionals, who are actually looking for business professionals to meet. The best kept secret so far, however is Business Blogging.

Business blogging is the best way to engage consumers while simultaneously branding your name and product/products. Engaging consumers is so much better in this millenium, as opposed to pushing your products on them and begging them to make a decision. Communicating through a blog, helps companies reach a larger number of their target market, they also allow consumers to communicate back through leaving comments, questions and reactions, as opposed to a static web page that only allows consumers to view and read.

A blog page also encourages internet users to stay up to date on the blog page, coming back to the page on a weekly or daily basis to be informed through your writings. When consumers start returning to your blog page to read the information, they become more and more comfortable with your company. This trust that builds up through the writing in a business blog is what allows consumers to make up their mind to purchase from your company as opposed to your competitor.

 Over the past year I have heard from businesses of almost every industry; what is this blogging and I don’t have the time for that! And that is just one of the problems associated with blogging, what business owner has the time to write, edit and upload content on a weekly basis to their blog site? Taking it even further than that, who has the time to learn how to blog effectively for business and where to post it. That can take months to learn, especially if you are working only in your free time to learn.

 The fact of the matter is though; business blogging is essential in this day and time to a company’s success. Blogging helps to bring awareness to your business to millions of internet users who are researching products and services on the internet. It is informational, and indirect which is what people are looking for. Too many companies hire pushy sales people  to push their product, and not that that doesn’t work, but consumers are getting tired of having people calling them all the time trying to ‘convince’ them to buy a product. Most consumers know what they want and go to the internet first to find it. For that reason alone, it is vital your business is seen in the right area on the internet.

 What is even more important is that you do not make the mistake of overloading the internet with your business information, but that you help to educate the market of individuals searching for your product in a way that helps them to realize and decide that your company is right for them. The days of pushy selling tactics are seeing their end; consumers are looking elsewhere to fulfill their needs and wants. They are looking to the internet to be their guide and a business blog is the perfect way to let them know who you are and what you do, while still allowing them to make the decision as to what company they want to do business with.

This tool is part of the new Web 2.0 phenomena that has recently become talk of the town in the Marketing world. A professional blog is an open forum from the company that allows their website visitors to do more than just view their website; the blog allows them to interact with the company by reading and staying up to date with the information the company posts and allows the reader to leave questions or comments when they want to. Blogging in general, really just began a couple of years ago, and in the past year has become very popular.

A professional blog ties in concepts from journal blogging, in a more professional manner. Targeted key words are used through out the blog post to help attract search engines like Google, who send out what are called spiders to search for new and updated content on a weekly basis. What do they look for? A number of different things through-out each post, that will help them identify if the material being posted is useful or not, this is one of the ways they determine who climbs the social rankings (like who is on page 20 and who is on page 1).

As the owner of Business bragger, I have seen the need for companies to offer blogs as a part of their marketing strategy. Blogging is the newspaper of the future. Because it is so important for companies to be able to communicate with their clients through a blog, I have set my whole business model around taking the time requirements of hiring someone to learn how to effectively write a blog, which can take months and they still may not know the ends and outs, from business owners and placed it in my hands. As the owner of Business bragger, I have made available to every company a cost effective way to hire a professional blogger or as we call it here, bragger to step onto your team, and learn about your company. After learning about your company, we take care of writing the desired and necessary search engine friendly content for your company. We will also manage your entire blog page for you, so that you can focus on where your business needs you the most.

Visit our website http://www.businessbragger.com/ or call us today to find out how we can better help you increase your awareness on the Internet. 1-877-424-9272