Susan Gunelius is president and CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a full-service marketing communications company, and is the author of more than half a dozen books. For more information, including ways to connect with Susan on the social Web, go to www.SusanGunelius.com.

30-MINUTE SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Step-by-Step Techniques to Spread the Word About Your Business FAST AND FREE

By Susan Gunelius

The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 Susan Gunelius
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-07-174381-5

Contents

Foreword by Dan SchawbelPrefaceAcknowledgmentsPART I Get Started: The Who, What, and Why of Social Media MarketingChapter 1 What Is Social Media Marketing?Chapter 2 Why Are Businesses Using Social Media Marketing?Chapter 3 Who Is Doing It Right and Wrong?Chapter 4 Warning: One Size Does Not Fit AllChapter 5 Before You Begin: Perceptions, Honesty, and Giving Up ControlPART II Test the Water: The Where of Social Media MarketingChapter 6 Analyzing Social Media Marketing ToolsChapter 7 BloggingChapter 8 MicrobloggingChapter 9 Social NetworkingChapter 10 Social Bookmarking and Content SharingChapter 11 Audio and VideoChapter 12 E-Books, Reviews, Webinars, and Other Social Media Marketing
OpportunitiesPART III Dive In for 30 Minutes a Day: The How of Social Media MarketingChapter 13 Indirect MarketingChapter 14 Brand BuildingChapter 15 Building Relationships and CommunitiesChapter 16 Word-of-Mouth MarketingChapter 17 Expanding Reach and Establishing PositionChapter 18 Direct Marketing and PromotionsPART IV Maintaining Social Media Marketing Momentum over the Long TermChapter 19 Integrating with Traditional MarketingChapter 20 Following the Rules of Social Media MarketingChapter 21 Measuring Results, Testing, Tweaking, and Trying AgainChapter 22 Bringing It All TogetherAppendix A Twitter Cofounder Biz Stone Reflects on Twitter in 2009Appendix B Resources and HelpAppendix C Social Media Marketing Plan WorksheetGlossaryReferencesIndex

Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

What Is Social Media Marketing?

There was a time, not so long ago, when the world of online marketing was onethat small businesses didn’t even consider joining. I remember my first job outof college in 1993, when I joined the marketing department within a division ofAT&T (when AT&T was one of the biggest companies in the world). The division Iworked for didn’t even have a website at the time, and words like blogs,Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube didn’t exist. Online marketing simplywasn’t a strategic priority. Suffice it to say, a lot changed in less than twodecades.

No longer is having a website a low-priority investment for large or smallbusinesses. Today it’s a necessity for survival. The biggest catalyst to gettingbusinesses online came with the dawn of the 21st century, when a little thingcalled the social Web grew into the biggest marketing opportunity sincetelevision commercials made their debut. Soon businesses realized that beingpart of the social Web wasn’t a fad that would fade away as fast as it hademerged. Instead, the businesses that weren’t yet on the social Webscurried to claim their spaces and join the online conversation. Suddenly,building relationships took precedence over direct selling, with consumers,rather than companies, leading the way.

The social Web represents an amazing opportunity for pull marketing(defined in the sidebar “Pull vs. Push Marketing”) that business leaders couldnever have dreamed of even 10 years ago. What business executive wouldn’tsalivate at the chance to have at his or her fingertips an engaged audience ofpeople who actively want to hear from that executive’s company? The social Webmakes that dream a reality. The trick for a small business owner is learning howto use the tools of the social Web to effectively build the business while stillbalancing all the other responsibilities of owning a small business. Believe itor not, it can be done—and quite successfully, as you’ll learn from themany real-world success stories scattered throughout this book.

But before you can dive into the world of the social Web, you need to understandsome of the terminology and jargon that go along with it. Before you continuereading, take some time to familiarize yourself with the definitions in thesidebar “Lessons in Social Web Lingo,” so you can speak the language of thesocial Web and fully understand the concepts discussed in this book. Next, youneed to understand exactly why all the fuss about the social Web is soimportant.

History of the World Wide Web

It took a long time for the World Wide Web to grow into an essential part ofpeople’s everyday lives. The Internet didn’t truly become a household word untilthe 1990s, when dial-up modems and America Online were the go-to tools forbusinesses and individuals who wanted to check out the latest technology craze.At first, the World Wide Web was a navigational tool. Users could findinformation in a one-way communication stream. Most Web pages were text heavyand used rudimentary programming to display information in formats not muchdifferent from how information would be displayed on a printed page. In itsinfancy, the World Wide Web was interesting to many people but used by few.

Usage started to change when the Web moved from a strictly navigational tool toa transactional tool. Suddenly, people could make purchases, ask questions, getresponses, and more all through the Internet. Websites were still primarily one-way communication tools, but visitors to those sites could perform actions thatmade their lives easier, thereby upping the interest level in the Web immensely.Sites like Amazon.com became popular quickly, and the Internet startedto grow and evolve into a tool that more and more people embraced.

It didn’t take long for people to demand faster access to the Web, and with theintroduction of cable modems and high-speed Internet connections, the user baseexploded. However, it wasn’t until users found a way to join the world of onlinepublishing that the Internet evolved from a transactional to a social tool. Withthe introduction of blogs, people found a way to publish online diaries andcommunicate with others in a two-way conversation. The Web evolved into a socialmedium, and user-generated content was born. The new generation of the Internetbecame known as Web 2.0 or the social Web.

When blogging applications like Blogger and WordPress, which require very littletechnical knowledge to use, hit the online scene, publishing user-generatedcontent became easier than ever, and more and more people joined the onlineconversation for myriad reasons. Thanks to these free tools and the growingavailability of high-speed Internet access at affordable prices (no longer didpeople have to pay per hour of use, as flat monthly fees became the norm), thebarriers to entry to the social Web were shattered. Anyone was welcome to theparty, and the party grew and grew.

Blogs became far more than personal diaries. They were transformed into animportant source of information from authoritative influencers, and businessesstarted to take notice. As sites like MySpace and Facebook made it even easierand more entertaining to connect with people via the social Web, the onlineconversation grew louder and reached even further. By the time Twitter made itsvalue known in 2008, the world had already gotten much smaller. Suddenly, morepeople around the world had access to more information in a timelier manner, andlife would never be the same.

The Social Web Delivers Information Across Borders Anytime

One of the first global stories that proved the reach and influence of thesocial Web came out of Iran and was delivered to the world not by experts but byeveryday people via Twitter. In June 2009, citizens of Iran protested followinga questionable presidential election process. News out of the country washalted, and the rest of the world waited with bated breath to hear what happenedin the fallout from the criticized election. The world didn’t have to wait longas individual Iranian citizens found their way to their computers and begansending 140-character updates through their Twitter profiles to share the storyhappening on the streets as Iranians protested against the powers that be.

What made the story of the 2009 Iranian presidential election more poignant isthe fact that Twitter became not just a communications tool during the aftermathbut rather the communications tool. Its influence was so important thatthe U.S. State Department contacted the Twitter team shortly after the electionprotests began and requested that a scheduled Twitter maintenance that wouldtake the site offline temporarily be postponed so communications could continueto flow out of Iran. You can read more about the social Web’s role in the Iranelection protest in the sidebar “Social Media and the 2009 Iranian PresidentialElection Protests.”

The global reach and influence of Twitter and blogs was demonstrated again inJune 2009 with the news of performer Michael Jackson’s death. That news brokenot through a traditional news source but on an entertainment blog, TMZ(www.tmz.com). It took hours for traditional news sources to report whathad already been announced on the TMZ blog. Immediately after TMZ broke thenews, people around the world began talking about it on Twitter, ultimatelycausing the microblogging site to crash due to a massive amount of traffic. Infact, this would become a common occurrence in 2009 and 2010 when people aroundthe world turned to Twitter again and again to discuss and learn about high-profile current events.

If anyone thought Twitter or the tools of the social Web were meaningless, theiropinions likely changed in June 2009. The social Web was here to stay, and ithad become an integral part of society, politics, business, culture,entertainment, and more. In other words, the social Web permeated all areas oflife around the globe, and in 2009, the world recognized its power. Businessesthat hadn’t been active on the social Web before would need to get active soon,or they would be left behind.

By 2010, the social Web became mainstream. Hundreds of millions of people hadFacebook profiles, and Twitter delivered a billion tweets per hour. When amassive earthquake struck Haiti on January 12, 2010, Twitter and the tools ofthe social Web became more than just methods for sharing information. Suddenly,they became lifelines.

Twitter profiles and Facebook groups were created allowing people to publishinformation about loved ones they couldn’t contact, and millions of dollars indonations were collected through people joining together in support of Haitiancitizens, using Twitter hashtags to ensure people around the world knew what washappening in the ravaged country. Again, the sheer volume of traffic to Twittercaused the site to go down temporarily. Images of the aftermath taken bysurvivors were uploaded and shared on sites like Twitter, Flickr, and Facebook,and videos of the destruction, rescues, and relief operations showed the worldhow people could come together to help a nation in need. Once again, the powerof the social Web crossed borders and influenced the world. The social Web washere to stay, and no one wanted to be left out of the global conversation.

Business Embraces Social Media Marketing

The first decade of the 21st century can be remembered as a time when businesseswere wary of and confused by the social Web, but the second decade of the 21stcentury marks a time when businesses need to embrace the social Web and make itan integral part of their strategic marketing plans. That means large and smallbusinesses should not only be present on the social Web, but also have a definedsocial media marketing strategy. Let’s take a step backward and define socialmedia and social media marketing:

Social media are the online publishing and communications tools, sites, anddestinations of Web 2.0 that are rooted in conversations, engagement, andparticipation.

Social media marketing is any form of direct or indirect marketing that isused to build awareness, recognition, recall, and action for a brand, business,product, person, or other entity and is carried out using the tools of thesocial Web, such as blogging, microblogging, social networking, socialbookmarking, and content sharing.

Social media marketing can include specific tactics such as sharing a coupon orannouncing a sale on Facebook or Twitter, or it could include broader brand-buildinginitiatives like communicating with people on LinkedIn or creatinginteresting content on a blog, in a video uploaded to YouTube, or in apresentation shared on SlideShare. Since social media marketing is stillevolving, there is no written set of guidelines you can follow, but that’s alsowhat makes it so open, interesting, and fun.

The key word in “social Web” and “social media marketing” is social. Aslong as you’re contributing to the conversation that’s happening on the socialWeb, you’re doing it right. It may seem overwhelming and intimidating, but aswith any form of communication and networking, once you try it, you might learnthat you really like it. Remember when using e-mail involved a huge learningcurve? Today, using e-mail is not just second nature, but also something mostpeople couldn’t live without. Once you join the conversation on the social Web,you’ll learn that it can become second nature, just as e-mail is to you today.

The Disruption of Interruption Marketing

Critical to your business’s success on the social Web is your understanding ofsocial media marketing as being very different from traditional marketing. Whilesome people refer to social media marketing as “interruption marketing,” I arguethat social media marketing is exactly the opposite of interruption marketing.Rather than causing consumers to stop what they’re doing, effectivesocial media marketing enhances what they’re already doing. While atelevision commercial interrupts the program a person is watching,effective social media marketing should make a person’s activities moreinteresting or better.

For example, when you share amazing, relevant content in a conversation takingplace among your social Web connections, you add value to that conversationrather than interrupting it. Traditional marketing is intended to stop consumersin their tracks, but effective social media marketing should encourage thoseconsumers to continue on their original paths armed with more knowledge,support, or confidence than they had before.

With that in mind, social media marketing has disrupted marketers’ long-heldtheories related to selling products and building businesses. Instead of justcatching the attention of consumers in order to deliver a message and provoke aresponse, effective social media marketing requires listening, understanding,and participation to add value and build relationships without interrupting. Inshort, social media marketing has disrupted traditional marketing, causing afundamental shift in strategic marketing planning and tactical execution, and ithas helped to level the business playing field as both small and largebusinesses (and every business in between) can join the conversation with fewbarriers to entry. Even if you have just a little bit of time, the social Webaudience can be yours.

CHAPTER 2

Why Are Businesses Using Social Media Marketing?

Now that you have an understanding of what the social Web is and some of thecommonly used tools of the social Web, it’s time to learn why businesses areusing them. The most important thing you can learn from reading this book is thepotential of using social media:

Social media marketing offers the single largest opportunity forentrepreneurs, small businesses, midsize companies, and large corporations tobuild their brands and their businesses.

Don’t believe it? There are countless examples of companies of all sizesleveraging the tools of the social Web to grow their businesses. One suchexample comes from a woman named Cindy Gordon, who led the marketing effort forUniversal Orlando Resort in 2008 to announce and create excitement around thenew Wizarding World of Harry Potter theme park destination.

In 2007, the executives at Universal told Gordon that her objective was to raiseawareness of the new theme park attraction, and she was given a sizable budgetto make it happen. However, instead of investing millions of dollars in SuperBowl commercials, Gordon turned to the social Web to spread the word about theWizarding World of Harry Potter. She invited the top seven Harry Potter bloggersto a midnight webcast (an online broadcast of multimedia content such as audioor video) held on May 31, 2007, when they were told they’d be the first to hearsome exciting news. During the webcast, Gordon announced that the WizardingWorld of Harry Potter was coming. Those seven people blogged about the new themepark, with posts going live on fan blogs as early as 12:02 A.M., just twominutes after the webcast began. Within 24 hours, by Universal’s estimates, 350million people around the world heard the news about the Wizarding World ofHarry Potter theme park—all from Gordon telling just seven people.

You could argue that Gordon’s story doesn’t apply to small business owners wholack the global brand recognition that the Harry Potter series of books andmovies already enjoyed at the time Universal announced the Wizarding World ofHarry Potter, but the fundamental reasons that social media marketing workstruly do apply to businesses of all sizes. In short, it’s about getting accessto people. Businesses don’t hesitate to invest money in commercials and directmail in an attempt to drive a few people into their brick-and-mortar locations,where they can stand in front of those consumers for a few minutes and conveythe benefits of buying from them. However, the idea of investing almost no moneyand directly communicating with a huge audience of engaged individuals acrossthe social Web still doesn’t make sense to many business owners. If that’s not amissed opportunity, then I don’t know what is.

Think of it this way: when you need to find information about a product,service, brand, or business, where do you look for that information? The vastmajority of consumers turn to Google (or their preferred search engine). Yourbusiness had better be represented in the search results related to yourproducts and services, or you’re likely to lose a lot of potential customers.But how do you boost your business’s search engine rankings? Of course, usingsearch engine optimization (SEO) techniques to increase your search rankings foryour targeted keywords is important, but there is more that you can do thanfocusing on keywords. The social Web offers a multitude of opportunities for youto increase your business’s search rankings.

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