Last week I went to Boston for the New England Business XPO where I got to meet and speak with a few people who I’ve been following and reading about.
My greatest moment of the day was being able to meet Chris Brogan, author of Social Media 101 and Trust Agents (see my post about Trust Agents here). He’s a very personable and approachable guy, happy to meet his avid fans, and gives off the feeling that you’ve already met.
The majority of his speech was about how small businesses need a web presence to promote themselves and increase awareness to people. According to Chris, 6 out of 10 small businesses have no web presence.
What can your small business do?
The 4 Things SM does best and why you should consider doing it (brought to you by the acronym CRAP)
- Connections: Getting a connection is a hand in a door, not, please give me crap i didn’t ask for. Use a connection to start a relationship instead. Begin by talking to them about what they are into, and progress into making your consumer the hero. People don’t buy things because of specs, warranties and fluff, but because things make them feel good, save time to do other things, or provide an actual concrete benefit.
- Referrals: Here, Chris suggested reading The Referral Engine. He explained that the social web is built for referrals and likes and that when people search for goods/services they need, they are still most likely to talk to other people. Now, instead of talking to someone in person or over the phone, referrals are done through social media. Here, also, was my famous moment of the day, where Chris mentioned that I had chatted with him on Twitter before and made the effort to speak to him in person today. I had established a connection with him previously, so future conversations are less unwarranted.
- Awareness: this means building awareness through great content- blogposts, youtube videos, newsletters, ebooks, etc, but also being aware of what customers are talking about. Be sure here though to use content and keywords your customer would be searching for, and not the technical terms someone in your profession would search for.
- Presence: Your small business should be where the buyer is with a working website, some social media connectivity, and hopefully a mobile compatible website as well. Where exactly do you find time for this? In between other tasks, when you’re on hold, or schedule in some time to use it and give attention where you can.
Overall, CRAP defines a few of the basics for small businesses to begin involvement with social media where they can.
Want to watch the whole presentation? Head on over to ChrisBrogan.com