Social Media Optimization (SMO) refers to using social media outlets to increase awareness about your brand/product and increase web traffic. But, SMO is no longer limited to marketing and brand building for organizations, but has grown to encompass many different departments within the organization such as Human Resources, Client/Customer Satisfaction, product development, Business Development and Sales. As these other departments start to realize how to effectively utilize social media channels, SMO is taking a bigger focus within organizations.
So what can you do to make sure your website and social media strategies are having the best impact on your business? Below are a few things to consider that I have noticed when discussing SMO.
Optimize your share buttons- The worst thing you can do is place a social share button at the top/bottom of your piece of content and not change the automated messaging. You are already asking your visitors to share your content; the least you could do is make it easy for them to do so. Including the title (or message) of the content you want shared and your company’s twitter handle (for tweet buttons) is a great way to maximize this sharing opportunity. If your visitor has to look up your handle to manually add the “via @AGSalesworks” your chances of getting the share decrease tremendously as well as your visibility. If your visitor has to manually add the title of the content to the tweet/share, your chances of getting the share dropped to just above zero. Lay the ground work for your visitors so that all they need to do is click the share button and move on.
Allow employees to share job openings on their Social Sites- Recruiting on social sites has become very main stream. Most HR suite of services have realized this notion and optimized their own offerings to include social media in the recruiting strategy. Jobvite and Bullhorn are two of the bigger ones that I seem to run across routinely on Linkedin, Twitter, and Facebook. Organizations should be utilizing their employee’s as a resource to increase the number of applications and qualified candidates.
Include Social Icons with employee email signatures- Increase your company’s visibility and traffic by driving potential prospects to the appropriate social media channels. Most email recipients will click the icon they are the most active on so include all of the icons where your company has a presence. If your company has multiple accounts active, I would cap the icons at 5 and choose the ones that are most active or have the highest following and most success.
Add your social sites to your marketing collateral- Most people are on social media in some form. Facebook seems to be a staple, but Pinterest and Twitter are gaining in popularity quickly. Let your prospects know what sites your business can be found on and where they can best interact with you. This is your opportunity to start building more relationships through your social media outlets and gaining new visitors.
Target at least one Social Tool/Application to utilize- The market has become over saturated with social media tools or applications to assist with your social strategy. That said, there’s a reason why there are so many; in most cases you will save a lot of time and energy when monitoring or engaging on your social sites. Tools such as Hootsuite, TweetDeck, and SproutSocial are a few of the bigger names that come to mind. SocialBro is another good one that works great with Hootsuite. Find a tool that you like and make the investment; in most cases the monthly dollar amounts are very minimal and reasonable.
Link your social accounts? - Be wary of using the same message on all social media accounts. It is best if you adjust your messaging depending on what social account you are using. Each social media account should be developed with a specific focus. Example: Facebook may be used for showing company culture while Twitter is used for sharing company content. Linkedin is developed to show the company’s solutions or services while Tumblr may be used to share different aspects of your company persona. Why would someone follow all of your accounts if they can see the same message by only following one account? Know what message works best with each social account to maximize its benefits. Your follower’s on different accounts are doing so for different reasons, don’t confuse the message.
Include social share buttons on your landing pages- You accomplished one task of driving traffic to your landing page, now give your web visitor the opportunity to share your content should they find it compelling enough. Again, make sure you have adjusted the message so that it projects the message you want shared and make it easy for visitor to share your content with their audience.
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