Facebook:
- Financial Investment Firms need an organizational or “Business Page”. This is the official Facebook site for the business and should be ‘friended’ by all employees of the firm with their profile.
- The goal here should be to acquire as many “Fans” as possible.
- This is the site where official updates of the business are posted, updating your “fans”… to include:
- Upcoming events; open houses; social hour; conference…
- Blog postings, related articles, podcasts and videos…
- Pics of the most recent media training, company outing, or birthday celebration…
- Links are important. Links to sources of information, links to bloggers, links that are of value to current and prospective clients.
- Financial Investment Firms will then need to move onto the creation of a “Group Page”. This is specifically targeted to the audience we want.
- This is the water cooler where topics related, but not necessarily directly related to the business can be discussed.
- This is a great site to eavesdrop on your fans discussing different topics and get an idea of what your potential and/or current customers are thinking and discussing. Pay particular attention to gripes, moans, and complaints… These types of comments should be looked upon as a gift from your customer. It provides insight into a potential future loss, which you are now able to thwart and keep as a customer by addressing those needs before culminating to a point of frustration.
- It’s important to facilitate in a group environment and not attempt to drive the conversation. Allow it to travel its own course. This is the only way you’ll be able to acquire accurate data.
LinkedIn:
- This is a professional site for business professionals to network and “link-in” with each other for opportunities, answers to questions, jobs, and for staying abreast of the business “buzz” of the day.
- Instead of fans, you have links, which in turn provide you even more secondary, then tertiary links to potential clients or business partners.
- The most interesting part of this fascinating Web site is where you can see who’s been looking at your profile. For the most part, it indicates the line of work this person is in, and in some rare occurrences, it indicates the searcher by name.
- On occasion, it’s exciting to see who’s been looking at your profile.
- Credibility is the name of the game when it comes to the social media landscape and a great way to garner this is through LinkedIn’s Answers/Questions.
- You can ask a question, then post it for the next week or two to see what kind of responses you get.
- Or, you can answer already posted questions. If your answer is deemed one of the better responses, the person asking the question may stamp you with “the best answer” label, thus marking you as an expert in this particular field.
Twitter:
- This is the most egregiously misused tool in the social media toolbox. What began as a 140-character update (a tweet) on the most important and pertinent issues of the day, has turned into a social update tool to inform the masses that you are in line at the hot dog stand and it is taking too long.
- “Tweets” should be focused on your area of expertise or a specific target-topic for your audience.
- Every tweet should set you apart as an expert and thus a resource for your audience.
- Remember not to sell. This only turns off your potential clients. As long as you provide information deemed pertinent to their needs, they will eventually come around.
- Step 1. Set up a profile and pay particular attention to “Bio”. This will often determine whether someone wants to follow you or not. A quick, but interesting sound bite, but once again, don’t sell yourself here or anywhere else on Twitter.
- Step 2. Set up a company profile and have every (this is important that EVERY single employee “follow” the company site, otherwise, potential clients will be wondering why…) employee follow it.
- Step 3. Begin wandering the hinterlands of Twitterville. I.e., look up some prominent companies in similar lines of business and see who’s following them. Then, follow them!
- Step 4. Monitor what’s being said by those you’re following. What are the topics? The buzz? The latest news? What stories are they linking and retweeting? All this will direct you in the right direction, not to mention as soon as you begin tweeting your own expert opinion in the matter, tweeters will begin following you.
Networking, whether in the real world or in the social media realm takes time and effort. The bad news is, it’s tough to get started. Just as if you were visiting a foreign country for the first time, you will not understand the language, the culture, nor be in the right time zone. The same can be said of the social media realm. The language is often confusing, the mannerisms are difficult to understand, and your head is spinning with the traffic going back and forth.
Virgin, Jet Blue, Mattel, Milk, and Tiger have all fallen victim to today’s onslaught of social media. Many so called “experts” seem to feel compelled to post questions like “What could Tiger have done better?” And though we can all armchair quarterback these issues to no end, shouldn’t we really be looking at what these companies should have done years before?
Personally, I don’t really care to know what 
By relying on lawyers, you may stay out of jail, however, life can continue to be miserable…, profits can continue to tank…, and worst of all, your reputation or your company’s reputation can be ruined for life.
A communications expert with a passion for building strategic communication plans through the use of identifying focused key messages for specifically-targeted audiences through the leveraging of both social and traditional media.
His passion is building awareness and inspiring communities and businesses to do the right thing by fostering community goodwill, fueling employee engagement, and driving efficiencies.
