Content creation is used by businesses to showcase their expertise, know-how and provide useful information to their potential target. Many businesses have had to play catch up and in order to “get into social media” have hired an in-house content marketing specialist… and let them go at it…with a huge sigh of relief. Finally, their business is on the platform that so many are talking about, and more importantly, engaging with. But is that really the solution or only part of the solution?
This reactive strategy, I believe, stems from a lack of understanding about social media on a conceptual level.How can you actively participate and showcase your entire service offerings with just one head count allocation? Afterall, social media isn’t only part of the marketing equation, today it’s a big part of the sales equation too. Integrating social media in overall marketing initiatives is now pretty common practice…well, more so than just a year ago. Whether you run a small business, medium business, big business… today, you just can’t ignore the call of social media, especially for sales.
By now we all understand that the thrust to many social media initiatives is mostly about content creation. We’ve all been hearing about content marketing or what many refer to as blogging. Well, it is true and it does work.
Social media and content creation go hand in hand.
In truth, many businesses who have been slightly ahead of the curve also create content for SEO, but that’s a topic for another post. The need for generating compelling content with a wide scope is key to establishing your parameters within the social media environment. This should include as many facets of your business as possible. Customer service, sales, marketing, product development, design, etc…. This allows viewers to see the total perspective of your business. That is why content generation must be part of company culture. So how does one go about promoting and integrating social media in their business culture. Here’s a few tips:
- Define your goal of success in the social media context and develop a plan.
- Identify the qualities of your personnel and make sure to take advantage of their strengths. Not everyone has to write. Content creation largely includes visual content link videos (youtubes, webinars) and photos (Pinterest, Instagrams, info graphics). Embrace the differences.
- Build a team within your organization that will be the social media ambassadors… and be sure to integrate as many of your staff members as possible to provide a depth of content creation.
- Establish a measurement criteria that shows progress and aligns all the efforts. Social media isn’t about hoping for the best. Make sure key strategic players are at the table participating and contributing, if only directionally, to the content that will appear in social media.
- Celebrate the milestones… big and small. The first comment from a post, the number of subscribers on a business blog, the first contact from a potential customer coming from your social media initiatives. Yes it does happen!
It doesn’t matter if your business is b2b or consumer based…whether your business is local, regional, national or international…content creation is playing an increasingly important role in the sales context of any business. If your business hasn’t ventured in social media yet and want to get started, click here to access our ebook. At the speed of business, it’s best to start now. 😉