Since September I have been working on a 10 part series asking the question “Can LinkedIn Work for You?” The better questions should be “Can Social Media Work for You?”
In both cases the answer is yes. If you’re willing to put the time and effort required to make it successful. What I’ve often found is that many people start experimenting with the various tools but then abandon their efforts when they don’t immediately see results.
Here are the previous 9 articles:
Can LinkedIn Work for You? (part 1 of 10)
Why Are You On LinkedIn? (Part 2 of 10)
Enhance Your Networking with LinkedIn (part 3 of 10)
Expand Your LinkedIn Reach (part 4 of 10)
Building Credibility on LinkedIn (part 5 of 10)
New Opportunities-New Hires on LinkedIn (part 6 of 10)
Prospecting with LinkedIn (part 7 of 10)
5 Ways to Communicate Your Message on LinkedIn (Part 8 of 10)
Growing Your Business with LinkedIn (part 9 of 10)
Within these posts is much of the information you need to make LinkedIn work for you. Many of the same concepts apply to the other social media tools. What’s missing is how you personally can take this information and make it work specifically for you and what it is that you do.
Back in 1999 I was working in internet marketing, first with Budget Rent A Car and then with MyPoints. I remember all of the talk about how the internet was going to change the world and be the end of traditional marketing. And it did too some extent, but more as a new channel to sell and communicate. More of an addition rather than a replacement.
Today you hear the same type of comments about social media and social networking. Once again the new tools represent an additional way to network and communicate, not a replacement of existing methods. Many of the same rules apply you just need to tweak things some to make it work.
I previously posted a graphic that we use to explain the framework we use to implement a social media strategy – Social Media Process in a Picture. This graphic breaks the Social Web into Social Networking and Social Media… sharing the conversation and sharing the content. We use 6 tools/sites to manage the process.
I saw a recent graphic that showed hundreds of social media/networking sites and you could likely find a use for most of them. At some point, though, you need to think in terms of efficiency. There are only so many hours in a day so you need to focus on those that will provide the most bang for the buck (in this case time).
These are the sites we use. You can use them or figure out which make sense to you. The most important thing you can do is take action and participate.
Blogger note: As I finish this blog, likely the last for the year, we come to the end of the second year of blogging. For two years I’ve written primarily about LinkedIn.
The original blog was GotLinkedIn.com. After LinkedIn took exception to the name it was changed to Linked101.com. I decided I didn’t like that name so it was then changed to the LinkedIntuition.com blog. Once again LinkedIn stepped in and asked me to change the name. So this past summer the blog changed to the Social Media Sonar blog.
Many of the posts have still revolved around LinkedIn but in 2010 I’ll continue to expand the focus. You can expect to see more articles focussing on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and other tools. I also plan to use more late breaking news and stories about social media.
Thank you to everyone that has taken time out of their busy day to read something I have written. I didn’t set out to be a writer and those who have suffered through my consistent misuse of apostrophe’s would likely say that I haven’t reached that status yet. That’s OK. In the end all I hope to be is a business owner who is sharing what I’m learning to help others more effectively use social media/networking.
Have a Happy New Year and make 2010 the year that these great tools go to work for you.
Social Media Sonar provides the following four resources for FREE… 1. The Blog, 2. The Online Marketing/Social Media Blueprint, 3. Conversion Rate Optimization Guide, 4. Resource Center. If these help you implement your own online marketing program, great. We love helping people. If you decide you need some help, great. We love new clients. Contact Us if we can help you.
