I originally posted this video about twelve days ago, but never got around to actually writing a post about it. So I’ve watched it again and am, again, blown away by these numbers. This video is super fast-paced, so it can be a little too quick to see everything, but you can still pick up the point that social media is BIG. And by big, I mean GI-NORMOUS!!
Social media is quickly becoming, if it isn’t already, as essential to your business as your website is (or should be!). As a small business, one of the most difficult issues has always been marketing. There’s just never enough money to do it right. And even if you have enough money to do the marketing you want, you wish you could see a better return on that investment. With social media, those issues are resolved.
As you can see in the video, Gary Vaynerchuk’s business increased more through Twitter, than anything else he’d ever tried. (As an aside, with that kind of success in your business, imagine the new dreams you can have; dreams even greater than you ever thought you could dare to hope for.) Twitter it is a free tool and, while Twitter cannot save your business, there are ways to use it effectively to drive success. There are, in fact, many free online tools for you to take advantage of. There are also TONS of free tools you can take advantage of. The key is, you have to be smart and choose the ones most beneficial to your business (yes, I did say ‘oneS’). Those may or may not be the ones you hear about all the time; there could be others you’ve never heard of that are perfect for your business. That’s where your investment comes in.
The first investment is time. How much time do you want to spend finding the right tools, learning those tools, then using those tools every day? Or just about every day. How much is your time worth? Now you will need to spend more time online, but it will be time that is most effective to marketing your business.
That’s where the second investment comes in, actual dollars.
There is some investment required to set up a successful social media campaign, but that initial investment vs. the increase in sales or sales leads, is difficult to determine. One of my favorite quotes from the video is, “how do you measure the ROI of your phone?” Have you thought about that recently? What is the dollar value of your cell phone to your business? Kinda hard to figure, huh? We all know they’re invaluable, just not quantifiable. It’s the same with social networking. You can’t always place a dollar value on how it’s affecting your bottom line, you just know sales are up, and you’re busier than ever. So the lesson here is, just because you can’t quantify it, doesn’t mean it’s not valuable or you don’t need to do it.
That being said, however, just pouring money into social networking doesn’t necessarily mean that’s how much more profit you’ll make; it’s not a vending machine. However, there are levels of investment that can be made. The most important factor in any social media campaign is participation. The point of all this is relationship, so you must participate.
That is the REAL investment to social media. YOU. As a consultant, I can set up accounts for you; I can help craft a plan for you; I can even do some posting for you. But I can’t BE you. One of the deepest tenets of social networking is authenticity. It needs to really be you that engages. It’s your business and your passion that people respond to. That’s what I can’t duplicate.
So to recap, marketing can be expensive for small business, but social networking can level that marketing playing field. There is still an investment to be made, in both time and money, but now that money can be spent on training to learn how to use these tools effectively, which will determine how that money should be spent to reach a better qualified demographic.
CTA: “What is the cost of doing nothing? Do you really want to take that risk?” Think about these two questions from the video and let me know your answers. Comment below.
