ACtion Magazine - May 2016 - (Page 16)

Letting your social media and website work together as one Angie Kilbourne Have you optimized your website for social media marketing? W ith all the advances in technology, shouldn't your job be getting easier instead of more difficult? Unfortunately, too many of the tools today's small business owners need to use for marketing and day-to-day operations don't really work together, much less talk to each other. Like many of the vehicles coming into your shop for repairs, today's social media networks and websites need special tools that unlock the potential for them to work in concert. Evolve to social commerce Come together "Too many small businesses treat their company's website and social media accounts as two separate parts of their digital marketing strategy," explains Lucas Miller, founder of Echelon Copy, a social media marketing content firm. "Instead, your digital marketing strategy should integrate the two and work in unison. This will enable your digital marketing results to grow exponentially." Miller shared three ways shops can optimize their websites for social media success. 1. Ensure you provide links between your shop website and social media accounts. "While most businesses include their website URL in social media bios, far fewer companies use their website to directly link to their social media accounts," says Miller. "It may seem obvious, but it's a major oversight many make. Adding a bit of extra coding or the installation of extra apps to accomplish this for your site is well worth the effort." Look into social-sharing tools that work with your site's platform, such as buttons from AddThis.com or ShareThis.com, that make it easy for site visitors to share a piece of content on their own social media profiles. Share counter tools, which show visitors the number of times a page or specific piece of content has been shared, give visitors a sense of credibility regarding your website and, ultimately, your professionalism. 2. Commit to providing original, engaging content on your website and in your social media posts. "Buzzsumo's analysis of the most viral content of 2015 found that posts that included practical tips, quizzes or a unique spin on trending topics tended to be among the most shared," says Miller. "thus vary the type of unique and interesting content between written blog posts, infographics, videos and other forms of content that are more engaging, spark emotional response and spur your followers to share your posts on their own social media accounts." Create multipurpose content for your website that can be used 16 ACTION * May 2016 in crafting social media posts. For example, let's say you just published a website blog post titled Six Essential A/C Maintenance Tips for New Car Owners. Pushing those tips out individually, via social media channels, with corresponding graphics is a natural match. And don't forget to include the link to your original post. 3. Make your website and social platforms conveniently interactive. There is nothing more frustrating than wanting to accomplish a task online or read a blog post, only to be required to register or input a great deal of personal information. "Individuals - your customers - may visit websites like yours for business purposes, but they flock to social media platforms to interact," Miller emphasizes. "Rather than forcing site visitors to undergo a convoluted registration process to participate, make it easy and convenient for them to comment, interact or generate their own content." " ...Too many businesses fail to optimize their company's website for social media marketing." - Lucas Miller, founder of Echelon Copy http://www.echeloncopy.com/ If your website allows commenting on pages or posts, don't require a lot of information from visitors who want to leave a review or comment. Even better, use a social media commenting system, such as Livefyre or Disqus, which allows visitors to register with their existing social media accounts. Those comments, reviews and other interaction help increase the visibility of your shop's posts by creating more social media connections - which are then seen by friends and other users who otherwise might have missed your original post, adds Miller. The more integrated your website and social media marketing efforts become, the more likely you are to gain a robust, engaged social media following while simultaneously increasing visitors and sales on your site. Focusing on social media optimization, (SEO) a shop can improve every other element of its digital marketing strategy. Those hard-to-measure byproducts, such as awareness, credibility and a more-engaged following, will improve. So will increases in tangible measurables, including the number of website visitors, conversions from visits to appointments, sales and other desirables. ❆ http://www.echeloncopy.com/ http://www.AddThis.com http://www.ShareThis.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of ACtion Magazine - May 2016

ACtion Magazine - May 2016
Tooling up for the A/C season
Outlook
Service Port
Leonard's law
Virtual View
Last Watch
Member Profile
Cooling Corner
Industry News
Association News
New Products and Services

ACtion Magazine - May 2016