On March 27, I released Social Media Marketing: The Movie. If you haven’t seen the 45-minute flick yet, you should check it out here.
Why did I make that movie? Because I wanted to learn from key experts about the best ways to use social media for business.
I interviewed well-known influencers such as Jay Baer, Michael Stelzner, Brenda Ster, Joel Comm, Mari Smith, Sue Zimmerman, Leslie Samuel, Sunny Lenarduzzi, Viveka von Rosen and Amy Landino. They shared some insights that a lot of marketers might not have heard before.
Here are just a few of the things that the pros had to say in Social Media Marketing: The Movie.
Get Your Priorities Right
“It’s social first, media second, and marketing last.”
That’s what content marketing expert Leslie Samuel told me when I interviewed him.
Samuel says that the biggest problem he sees is that people leave the “social” out of social media marketing. Instead of trying to build relationships, they just try to sell.
That won’t work.
He points out that people go on social media to connect with others and the things they care about. Marketers need to be aware of that when they’re approaching a social strategy.
Samuel tells them to start by asking the following questions: “How can I connect with people? What kinds of stories should I share?”
Then, create a content strategy that’s in line with the answers to those questions.
Samuel also advises strategists to create videos on social media. That’s a great way to stand apart from the competition.
Get Your Priorities Right, Part Deux
I also interviewed Internet entrepreneur Joel Comm. He said that marketers should approach their social media strategy in 4 stages:
- Know me
- Like me
- Trust me
- Pay me
Important: they have to go through the stages in that order.
Marketers should start off by using social media as a way to get the word out about their brands. Social media, by and large, is a point of entry at the very top of the sales funnel.
Next, strategists should get people to like them by posting content that others will love and share.
Then, marketers should get people to trust them. How they do that depends on their business models, but social proof and case studies are two great ways to develop trust.
Finally, they should go for the close.
Comm says that once marketers have developed trust, it’s a “very short hop” to land a sale.
Forget About Virality
Comm also had an interesting thing to say about virality.
Whenever people ask him how to produce viral content, Comm said that he shakes his head and tells them that they’re thinking about it the wrong way.
Instead of asking “How can I produce content that will go viral?” people should be asking “What kind of a story can I tell that’s so compelling that people will want to retell it?”
Remember: social media sites are designed for sharing. Most sites have a little button or a link that users can press to share something they enjoy.
So it’s not difficult for people to share content that they want to share.
It’s up to marketers to produce shareable content. Then and only then does that content have the potential to go viral.
Develop a Social Media Content Strategy
“We must stop random acts of Facebook.”
That’s what digital marketing expert Jay Baer told me. He’s spent 25 years in online marketing, wrote 5 books, and now runs a consulting company that helps the biggest companies in the world develop a social strategy.
And what does he mean by “random acts of Facebook”?
He means that marketers need to stop the haphazard practice of just sharing something on social media because they like it.
Instead, he says, they should develop a specific, target-rich social media strategy.
“If you’re trying to succeed,with Facebook for your business, the worst possible way to do that is to add stuff to Facebook when you feel like it about a crazy, random collection of topics,” Baer says. “It simply will not work. You absolutely have to have a set strategy about what you’re putting on Facebook, when, why, and for whom.”
He thinks of social networks as TV shows. By that he means that TV shows come on at the same time every week, they show predetermined content, and they appeal to a specific audience.
Marketers should produce one or more Facebook “shows.” They should share video, customer profiles, and other types of content on schedule. Each of those shares should appeal to a specific market segment.
Wrapping It Up
Of course, the experts had a lot more to say about social media marketing than what I’ve mentioned here. If you’d like to learn more, feel free to check out Social Media Marketing: The Movie.
