Creative resources can be scarcer at small businesses without big social media budgets, and Facebook does have a somewhat static format to work with. Yet it needn’t be costly to come up with some great landing page manipulation, and here are some tips that should offer some inspiration:

1. Use a large call-to action

The most obvious and relevant call to action is to invite visitors to click on the ‘Like’ button of your Facebook page. BMW has consistently used this tactic on its landing page, always updating the look and feel of the graphics in line with its current messaging. ..see BMW Facebook page

2. Create an interactive, user-oriented page

Depending on who your target audience is, encourage interactivity with suitable competitions, games and interactive video. Disney Pixar has done just this, framing activity on its landing page around its latest Disneyland project, John of the Jungle. Also observe Disney’s use of joined-up activity on YouTube, where visitors can upload photos to a competition…see Disney Pixar Facebook page

3. Keep it clean and simple

It may be tempting to equate creativity with flashiness, but the results can end up being overcomplicated. A clean and simple design that presents users with only a handful of options like Harley Davidson’s can still be visually impressive…see Harley Davidson Facebook page

4. Promote a cause

Facebook is an ideal setting to promote any charitable tie-ups, as Heinz Ketchup is currently doing with its Wounded Warror Project partnership. Its landing page uses clear, striking calls to action, which perfectly fit Heinz’s distinctive branding. Conducted correctly, philanthropic tie-ups can have remarkably positive effects on engagement, but be aware of the risk of coming across as self-serving…see Heinz Facebook page

5. Encourage a user journey

Visitors landing on Oxfam GB’s page are presented with a clear and colourful series of options that direct them to relevant areas of specific interest. A useful tactic for organisations with lots of content and resources to share, this is an enticing invitation to journey on with a brand. Notice also Oxfam’s prominent placement of a call to action to sign up to its email list…see Oxfam Facebook page

Bonus Tip: Note that each example within this crop employs unique tabs, created within the company pages, that act as fixed landing points for the user. The results are instantly more engaging and sticky than arriving at a standard Facebook Wall.

Facebook marketing may be a no-brainer for global brands like Coca-Cola and Nike, but for a law firm specialising in divorce, nobody is likely to publicise their personal situation by ‘liking’ your company page. It may be more useful to create expert video advice on how to prevent divorce, or steps to finding the correct lawyer if separation is unavoidable. This video could then be posted to your own website, and adapted into a company blog post to be shared on Twitter.

These steps will help anyone from a reiki healer to a bookkeeper establish which platforms to make part of their social media activity:

1. Discover and investigate your target market by searching Google, Facebook, Twitter Search, YouTube, LinkedIn (especially the Groups and Q&A sections) and niche specific forums.

2. Look at competitor websites and social networks to see what is working and what isn’t.

3. Contact your target market directly, perhaps using your existing email marketing list, to ask them where they engage online.

4. Once you have established which platforms to use, create a strategy to create regular content and cross-post that content for maximum exposure. For example, if you post a video to Vimeo, remember to repurpose the content as a blog of tips, for example, and post related pictures and enticing screenshots to Flickr, linking back to the full video.

Every business ultimately wants to attract loyal customers and drive sales, but each has a unique offer and specific target audience. It is perhaps time to look beyond a ‘one-size-fits-all’ social media fix, and with each platform comes a new way to share your unique content with the right people.

One word of advice: avoid setting up presences on multiple platforms if you won’t be able to maintain them with great content. It is preferable to have one or two lively, regularly updated social presences over six empty ones.

Some 70% of marketers cited social as their top priority for 2012, followed closely by content marketing, cited by 59%, according to the State of Social Media Marketing: Top Areas for Social Marketing Investment and Biggest Social Marketing Challenges in 2012 report by Awareness.

Most encouraging is the approach that marketers plan to take in the coming year. Having already established and grown their social presences on the major channels (Facebook and Twitter), they now plan to extend their social media strategy to include previously overlooked sites such as YouTube, foursquare and Tumblr.

Content is playing a major role in the growth of social. Pairing both channels has enabled businesses to boost interactivity on their sites with social sharing buttons, with shared content proving ready-made fuel for social marketing efforts.

Along with this enhanced approach from companies comes a fresh focus on active social media management to improve lead generation and sales from social media.

Said Brian Zanghi, CEO of Awareness: “We expect less-experienced marketers to follow their visionary peers, adopting established practices as they move along the maturity continuum.”

Staffing remains one of the key challenges, according to the report. Most of the 320 businesses surveyed employ between one and three people to monitor their social media marketing campaigns, and nearly half (45%) claim to struggle to find qualified talent to manage most of their new media activity.

We’d love to hear if these findings fit with your own experiences and plans for social media activity. Is your business planning to ramp up its strategy this year? Will you be making any additions to your social media team, or are the company purse strings still restrictively tight? Please post your comments below.

Click here to download the free report white paper

A strong and effective blog

Fans and followers need to be offered the chance to get to know a company before they will buy its product or service. Only once the solid foundations of a relationship are in place will they become clients. This means sharing valuable content (see below) in the less salesy environment of a blog, and being sincere in your efforts to help people; the more value you can offer, the more your online connections will appreciate your company and what it has to offer.

Offer high quality content

Without your content, you have nothing. Your company is relating to people through content and what you write will make them decide whether they want to build a working relationship with you. It has to be as perfect as possible, so consider outsourcing your content strategy if resources are scarce.

Compel them to return to you time and again

Loyal fans and followers have the potential to become loyal customers. It is likely to take people at least eight or even more interactions before they decide to buy something from you. The most effective way to create a comfortable and compelling social media environment is to draw people into discussions and make them feel like valued members of the conversation and community.

Be persistent and consistent

Persistency and consistency are two essential ingredients in the conversion mix. Interact often and ensure that you post content at consistent times ie. on specific days. Continue to communicate with other people as often as they communicate with you. As well as making your fans and followers feel valuable, the idea is to convey also how important your contributions are to them professionally.

Take the relationship offline

Once you have established an online relationship and had a certain number of interactions via social channels, there will come a time to meet your potential new client or customer face-to-face. Consider adding a ‘meet-up’ widget to your social pages and website, inviting fans and followers to meet up for an informal chat. Both online and offline interactions are necessary for successful and ultimately profitable relationships.

FPR’s Final Thought:

Turning fans and followers into loyal clients can seem like a daunting task, but take it one step at a time and the mission is instantly more manageable. Social media marketing is proven to help businesses build relationships with their target audiences, create trust and credibility and ultimately gain new leads and clients. Ultimately, you need to ensure that when people need what you are offering, you are the first in mind.

For an informal chat about how an enhanced social media strategy could win you more business, get in touch 0845 053 6855

According to a poll of 3,300 social media marketers in the 2011 Social Media Marketing Industry Report, 58% of marketers spend six or more hours per week on social media marketing activities.

Whatever your answer, the likelihood is that you need that time to be as efficient and cost-effective as possible. In marketing, as with every other business function, efficiency is everything. In these budget-crushing times, saving time equals saving money. As marketing departments across the country plan for 2012, it pays to break down social media efforts to examine how to create the most efficient, well-oiled machine possible.

However many hours you are pumping into social activity per week, the time can probably be divided into three main categories:

Listening: Every business needs a social media monitoring solution that gathers data from across the web for continual analysis. Whether you are using social channels for brand research, promotion or lead generation, you need to select the appropriate tool and customise it to your specific needs for maximum efficiency.

Communicating: Building strong relationships on networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn is vital to carrying out communication strategies. To ensure efficiency, establish exactly where conversations about your brand are happening before dedicating precious resources to joining the discussion.

Creating content: While the other two steps can be undertaken as needed, creating content – whether writing your businesss blog or building an application that allows people to interact with your brand – usually requires more strategic planning.

Consider implementing a system for aggregating useful links and spreading your content resources across multiple formats and channels ways as two ways to streamline your content strategy.

Will you be dedicating more or less time to social media in 2012? If you’re feeling frazzled and in need of a New Year’s efficiency overhaul – call our hotline on 0845 053 6855

1. Extra creative control
First up, the all-new brand pages have a striking new design element; they can be customised with large header images allowing advertisers to display their logo and tagline far more clearly and prominently. Previously, branded elements of the page design were often obscured by the tweet timeline.

2. Top tweet tool
The next major change is that brands can now keep a chosen tweet at the top of their timeline, which auto-expands to reveal photo or video content from Flickr, YouTube or other sources. It’s a deceivingly simple function which we love; integration of cross-platform content.

3. Tell a richer brand story
The new pages separate out a brand’s replies and mentions, a useful tool for customer-service oriented customers who want to keep responding to users without diluting their messaging.

4. Enhanced content sharing
‘New’ Twitter is intelligently set up to help users discover brands’ content more easily via its ‘Discover’ function. In addition, Twitter has introduced new buttons such a hashtag button, which should encourage Twitter users to tweet and share content on behalf of their favourite brands.

It remains to be seen how brands will embrace Twitter’s new offering. We envisage entertainment brands like Disney and HBO using the top tweet to promote upcoming shows with embedded trailers. Live tweeting, product launches and breaking news are other possibilities.

Forward-thinking marketers will harness ‘new’ Twitter’s creative elements to deliver their most compelling and timely content, which can only lead to deeper engagement with Twitter’s ever-growing and very active user base.

1. Integrate social and content with all aspects of the business, from customer service to sales.

Don’t create a separate social department. PR and customer service are the first three areas that need to be integrated with social – train and empower customer service teams to interact with customers over social channels.

2. Tailor your social media presence to fans’ passion points

Ford has created multiple Facebook Pages for each of its key marque brands, such as Ford Focus, Ford Mustang and Ford Racing, each with their own thriving fan communities.

3. Use video and humour for truly creative campaigns

Check out Cisco’s 100th episode Cisco Unified Computing Celebration. Chapman believes Cisco has social “down pat” because it knows its target market and exactly how to engage with it.

4. Set specific goals from the get-go

Start with the final objective in mind, whether that be more views, more email sign-ups, sales or donations…then work back from there. And be very specific: think increasing number of page views by 10% rather than just generally increasing the number of views.

As always, we welcome the opportunity to hear about your experiences. Has integrating social marketing across the business or setting clear objectives for a social media strategy benefited your company?

As well as airing on television, the ad was also posted to YouTube and the John Lewis Facebook page prompting a significant amount of online buzz. While responses have been varied, it is worth noting that opinion has been noticeably different on the two networks. A glance through the official John Lewis Facebook wall reveals a remarkably positive response to the advert, while comments on YouTube and news sites appear more sceptical and critical.

Clearly observable, the marked difference in responses has been confirmed by detailed research from social media monitoring agency Wave Metrix. The results aren’t altogether surprising. YouTube is a well-known home of cynicism, sarcasm and debate. Facebook Pages, meanwhile, generally attracts a loyal fan base and establishes communities likely to show support and feel comfortable praising their chosen brand.

Reactions to the John Lewis Christmas advert have implications for any brand considering a social media marketing strategy to back up ATL marketing. Facebook fans are likely to support content with emotive and positive discussion. YouTube, on the other hand, is often the platform of choice for users wanting to debate content. It can be a potentially hostile environment for brands seeking to promote themselves or use viral video, so a well-managed strategy is especially vital.
 

So said Adam Lavelle, chief strategic officer, iCrossing US, speaking at a meeting of America’s chief PR associations, including The Public Relations Society of America, for the industry has decided to devise a fresh definition for itself.

Social media, including blogs, Facebook and Twitter have unquestionably and radically transformed the relationship between the public and the organisations communicating with them.

Traditional PR involved a one-way monologue that usually went in one direction – from the top down. Now, we are seeing a new-fashioned PR that embraces two-way conversations. The industry has been shaken up and introduced to new terms such as earned media, word of mouth marketing and buzz marketing.

A search for a new definition of public relations seems long overdue. An updated level of standardisation might help both PR practitioners and the public to get to grips with PR in the age of social media, and may have helped to prevent some of PR’s most memorable recent blunders. Anyone remember BP’s mishandling of online reputation following the Gulf of Mexico oil spill? Or ChapStick repeatedly deleting negative comments about its ads from its Facebook page, a move which backfired to the extent that complaints actually soared?

One of the most radical shifts offered by social media is that today, everybody is a content creator. Brands have to rethink their PR and online reputation strategies, bearing in mind that they cannot simply push their own content out to a passive public.

To stay up to date with the redefinition of PR in the US, keep checking in to the Public Relations Society of America website at prsa.org. A new section is set to go live on Monday at prdefinition.prsa.org – and in the true spirit of social, the new industry definition is being crowdsourced with visitors invited to submit suggestions.