The Rising Influence of Social Media [INFOGRAPHIC]

Social media is not a flash in the pan. It is a big deal and has become so integral to modern life. Many prospects may not even take a company seriously, if it does not have a presence on Facebook and Twitter. Organizations that ignore social media marketing do so

 at their own peril. Most major corporations have a presence on some, if not all, of the major social networks—Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. Doing social media marketing right requires genuine engagement, smart content curation and the sharing of your own original, highly shareable content. Excellent content creation is critical. Without it, social media success does not have real value. Attracting a larger captive audience on social media is great. However, what good does it bring, if you are not achieving increased website traffic, lead generation and ultimately more new business as a result of your social media efforts?

Best Practices for Content and Social Media Success

The original content that you share on social media should include blog posts, ebooks, whitepapers, webinars, SlideShare presentations and infographics. To capture a large audience, you need to take advantage of many content media. Your content must be highly relevant, answer questions, solve problems and present data to back up your assertions. It also needs to be well written; style matters. Ensure that it can be easily found. You want prospects to find your content, as they are conducting searches, actively researching and ready to buy your product or services. Here are a number of ways to increase reach and visibility:

• SEO: Keyword research and the development of buyer personas can help you attract prospects. Use the same language as prospects to frame a problem—drawing them to your website content.
• Social Advertising: Advertising on social networks, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ allows you to target ads based on information that prospects provide in their user profiles. Target your ads for increased relevance.
• Content Syndication: Sharing your content on syndication sites like Business 2 Community and Social Media Today can help you reach a much wider captive audience.
• Newsjacking: Relating your content to a hot topic in popular culture or news can help generate increased attention for your content. Follow social trends; know what is trending on Twitter and what people are buzzing about on Facebook. Newsjacking truly can help you amplify your social media presence and online influence.
• Genuine Social Engagement: Marketing on social networks needs to be social. Do not only talk about your business or only share your own content. Share the spotlight. Ask questions, and provide valuable insight and feedback, which can help you be recognized as an industry thought leader.

Social Media Growth

Social media marketing is powerful and influential. However, real social media success is the result of many factors that need to come first, including a solid marketing platform, excellent content creation, visually appealing website design, strategic CTAs and landing pages, and engaging email marketing. A lot goes into a complete inbound marketing strategy, and one is required in order to fully capitalize on winning in social media.  If you are still on the fence about the importance of social media, this infographic from Brafton should help convince you.

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