• 95% of new media users believe companies or brands should have a social media presence.
• 89% believe that they should interact with their consumers in this space.

If you have to ask whether or not you or your company should be engaged in social media, go back and read the two statistics above.

Your customers and prospects are telling you that they want you or your brand to have a LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other types of social accounts. They are also telling you that they want you to engage in conversations with them.

One of the questions I get asked by business owners often is “why would someone want to connect, follow, or friend ‘my company’, ‘my brand’, ‘my product’, etc.? People using your product or service already have some level of attachment to it. Social media just allows them to have a deeper attachment. If they have a question, a comment, or a concern they like that they can reach out and communicate that message directly.

One of our client’s is Copeland’s New Orleans Style restaurants. Here are some comments from people that follow Copeland’s on Twitter:

“Going to enjoy some bow-tie pasta spinach artichoke dip @CopelandsATL with the in-laws. Oh yeah!”

“Chillin’ at @CopelandsATL with @MissTikiBaby for drinks and desserts White Russian and White Chocolate Bread Pudding #dying”

“Hands downs @CopelandsATL has the best brunch!!!”

“@CopelandsATL I’ve had the fried crawfish its great. Goes great w/ a cheesecake Napoleon w/ the rum sauce/ pralines”

Some from Facebook

“We LOVE Copeland’s. And we love our Saints!! Come on North Cobb County. Let’s get a great crowd to show up for Superbowl Sunday for the Saint’s WIN! ?I want to be with a huge group of fans at the Kennesaw Copeland’s, watching on the big screen, eating some great food like shrimp and grits!”

There are more comments, tweets, retweets, photos posted …all from people who want to share their experience with a restaurant. I’ve seen similar results with Political Candidates, Business Coaches, Insurance Brokers, Chiropractors, and a number of other businesses.

People want to be heard and if you make the effort to engage them in the social networks where they interact, they’ll talk. Often what they say will be positive thoughts and opinions about your business.

I’ll end this with two more statistics that I think are relevant.

• 51% of respondents saying that social media has influenced their online transactions.
• 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations

These two statistics reinforce the value of others posting positive messages about your company and how that can impact the purchase decisions of others.

If you’re still wondering if you and your company can benefit from social media, then I’m not sure what I can say that says it better than the statistics above. Its not so much a question of can it work but more a question of how are your going to make it work.

You need to become your own VP of Getting It Done!

And now a special announcement: Social Media does not produce miracles and will not work for you if you do not know what it is that you do (very well I hope) and what messages you want to communicate to deliver your compelling offer or interesting (people actually want to consume it) content.

Having 5,00 Twitter followers will not make it happen automatically. Those 1,000 Facebook friends you have, most do not personally know you. The same if you have over 500 connections on LinkedIn. Doesn’t mean that they can’t become customers, it just means you won’t sell them based on your winning personality.

So let’s set the stage.

Marketing: Management process through which the goods and services you offer move from concept to the customer. Its doing business in terms of customer needs and their satisfaction.

As a practice, it consists in coordination of four elements called 4P’s:

• Identification, selection, and development of a product
• Determination of its price
• Selection of a distribution channel to reach the customer’s place
• Development and implementation of a promotional strategy

Advertising: A form of communication intended to persuade its viewers, readers or listeners to take some action. It usually includes the name of a product or service and how that product or service could benefit the consumer, to persuade potential customers to purchase or to consume that particular brand. (more…)

Social Media is everywhere. They talk about it on the news and radio, there are articles in newspapers and magazines, and searching “Social Media” on Google returns 194 million results.

If you want to learn more about it there are hundreds of thousands of blogs, podcasts, and videos available to review. There is no excuse why you cannot figure out how to put social media to work for you. Well maybe one excuse.

That excuse is the missing ingredient in most people’s social media strategy and its “Time”. You can’t learn time and its a limited resource. You either have it or you don’t. Or you need to find or create it.

You really have three choices if you want to get serious about making social media a part of your marketing efforts.

• You can learn it from scratch by simply diving in and figuring things out.
• You can tap into the knowledge of others through classes, books, workshops, blogs, audio, and podcasts.
• You can outsource your efforts.

Regardless of which you choose you will still have to invest some time, but In the end its more a matter of time and money. (more…)

Back in 1998 I started building my first website for an Insurance company. The CEO had heard that in one of my graduate school classes I had had to submit a class project using html. He decided that I was just the person he was looking for to build the companies first website.

It was true that I had used html in that project, but all I really did was sit next to a project member while he copied snippets of code from a book to create our first web page. At the time I started creating the companies website it was cool and cutting edge to have a website but it wasn’t necessarily viewed as a business requirement. That would change over the next year.

In 2010 I think we’re at a similar point. Social Media/Networking is still viewed by some as not a business requirement but I expect that will change over the next year. Some will do so because they get it, others because they fear getting left behind. Even if they’re not sure what it is they might be left behind by.

To start off the new year I’m going to discuss what I call the 4 C’s of social media. These are the four concepts we focus on with our clients. (more…)

I recently was asked to speak at a workshop on LinkedIn by a connection of mine.  A week or so prior to the event I received an email from her to use to promote the event.  The description headline stopped me in my tracks…”Sean Nelson the King of LinkedIn”

It took me about two seconds to fire off an email telling her to ditch the royal reference ASAP.  A lot of people would call me an expert on LinkedIn, its their opinion so they can think or say what they like.  I have a different different way of describing what I am.  “I’m simply a small business owner that learned how to use LinkedIn and Social networking / media in order to network more efficiently and to drive new business.”

The word “expert” is thrown around way too often these days with little to back up the claim.  What does a LinkedIn expert look like?  How do you determine that they are an expert?  The same goes for “social networking/media expert”.

I was looking at my home page the other day and noticed an updated profile for a connection of mine and someone I’ve known for the last couple of years.  Curious about what changed I took a look at his profile and immediately noticed that after years in another field he was now a social media expert.

Now anyone can learn a lot about social media and be seen as an expert or extremely knowledgeable even if they’re not in the marketing or advertising field.  I’m a prime example of that.  I learned LinkedIn and social networking/media through trial and error trying to drive business for my insurance agency.

In this case the person had attended a couple of my LinkedIn workshops, a few other social media workshops, and was partnering with a company jumping from Google Adwords to social media.  It takes more than attending a couple of workshops and working in the industry to be an expert.

So what is an expert and how do you determine if you’re one?  Is it valid to claim that you are an expert or does that title have to be conferred upon you by another person?  I’m not certain what the official definition is but here are some thoughts about what I think it takes to potentially be considered an expert: (more…)

September was a busy and productive month with 7 posts, including the first three parts of my 10 part LinkedIn series “Can LinkedIn Work for You?”.  This month also included a primer on Twitter speak and a graphic detailing the social media/networking process.

Here’s a review and links to each article.

3 Steps to LinkedIn Success

Even if you’re not at the head of the list, only 24% of LinkedIn users are deemed “Active Users”. So once again the opportunity is out there. You simply need to focus on these three areas starting out to find success with LinkedIn.

Enhance Your Networking with LinkedIn (part 3 of 10)

The core of LinkedIn revolves around connecting to other business professionals. Networking exclusively on LinkedIn, though, ignores the human element of face to face interaction. How do you use it to enhance your other networking?

Do You Speak Twittinese?

Social networking and social media are introducing new languages in order to communicate. For those of you still working on speaking the native language of Twittinese, I offer this basic primer course.

Why Are You On LinkedIn? (Part 2 of 10)

In Part 2 of the 10 Part Series “Can LinkedIn Work for You?” we start with a question…“Why are you on LinkedIn?” LinkedIn takes time and effort to produce results. Without this answer “How do you know what actions you should be taking?”

LinkedIn User Guide

Why do only 25% of LinkedIn members use the site on a regular basis? Because most don’t know what to do after signing up. If you haven’t figured out how to use LinkedIn these resources will help.

Can LinkedIn Work for You? (part 1 of 10)

The first article in this 10 Part series asks “Can LinkedIn work for you?”. There are over 45 million people now on LinkedIn but only about 25% are active users. These articles will provide tips and strategies to more effectively use LinkedIn.

Social Media Process in a Picture

Yesterday I wrote about 6 tools that we use at SONARconnects to create and implement social media/networking strategies for ourselves and our client’s. This got me to thinking about how to simplify things by laying out the process in a graphic.

Yesterday I wrote about 6 tools that we use at SONARconnects to create and implement social media/networking strategies for ourselves and our client’s.  This got me to thinking about how to simplify things by laying out the process in a graphic.  Below is the result of that exercise.  I hope it helps you see the overall picture.

Does this help you see things more clearly?
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Many people use the term “Social Media” to represent the vast array of social networking sites, social media sites, and tools available.  What we’re really talking about is the Social Web.  The Social Web is made up of Social Networking and Social Media.

Social Networking is about sharing the conversation.  Social Media is about sharing content.  Combined they form an effective toolbox to grow you business.

Sharing the Conversation
There are hundreds social networking sites available and you could spend unlimited time trying to determine how to use each.  I’m looking to use social networking in as efficient manner as possible so I focus on two networking sites and one hybrid.

The two sites that I use are LinkedIn and Facebook.  Both allow me to build communities of people, engage and interact with them, and communicate to on an ongoing basis.  The results may include branding but the end goal is always monetization.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a natural fit from a membership perspective.  The average household income per member is $109,000, close to 80% have attended college, and 49% are decision makers.  The average LinkedIn member is a great prospect.

LinkedIn is a somewhat closed environment and it takes time and effort to build the right communities and typically most of our communications are indirect in nature.  I want those in my networks to see the messages I deliver over time and to get to know, like, and trust me so that when they have a need for the services I provide, I’m top of mind.

It also doesn’t hurt that you have the ability to prospect and then see how you connect into each opportunity. (more…)

A lot gets written up in press releases, blog posts, Tweets, and other communications about the number of members on the various sites.   There’s a huge difference though between the number of users each site has and the number of users who are consistently interacting with others.

I recently came across some statistics that I’m going to share.   These statistics were revealed in a study by Anderson Analytics and you can view the report by clicking on the company name.   The study estimates that there are 110 million people who regularly use Social Networking Sites (SNS).

On average, users of SNS sites login to the sites 5 days a week, 4 times a day and spend about 1 hour on SNS each day.   While not explicitly stated this is what I would assume that they consider a regular user. So here are the top sites with the number of users and the number of regular users in parentheses.

• Facebook: 250 million (78 million) 31.2% regular users
• MySpace: 150 million (67 million) 44.6% regular users
• Twitter: 28 million (17 million) *estimated membership 60.7% regular users
• LinkedIn: 45 million (11 million) 24.4% regular users (more…)

This past week Erik Wolf and Stephanie Frost, hosts of the Gravity Free Radio show were desperate for a guest so they turned to Scott Dunn and myself.  I’m always happy to be filler for Erik and Stephanie.

In addition to the show Erik and Stephanie run Zero-G Creative, a killer web design, graphic design, and web tools company that I would highly recommend to anyone looking for a unique website and online presence.

The show covers LinkedIn bouncing from building your network, optimizing your profile, and leveraging LinkedIn.  There’s a better explanation on the show at the Gravity Free Radio show

To listen to the show go to  http://gravityfreeradio.com/archives/187