Fundamentally, there are two main ways to get traffic:
- Via Search Engine – SEO/SEM
- Via Page Links/Referrals
The first is pretty obvious. Everyone wants to rank highly on Google to get free traffic. To do it right is another matter. The alternative to organic search engine ranking is to buy your traffic – SEM (search engine marketing). Google Adword is the biggest out there. Unfortunately, for the uninitiated, buying Google Adword can be an expensive and potentially dangerous game.
As a business – if playing the Search Engine game is a daunting exercise, then what’s the alternative?
The reason why Social Marketing is Hot is because it IS the alternative to Search Engine marketing.
Social Media/Social Networking/Social Marketing
There are volumes of tomes written on this topic. Fundamentally, social marketing is another fancy term for good ole fashion “word of mouth” advertising. If you offer something worth talking about, worth sharing AND you make it easy for people to share the news about your product or service – you’ve got social marketing.
The key here is:
- Be Extraordinary – Offer Something Worth Talking about
- Use Social Media – Make it easy for people to share it to their friends
Be Extraordinary
Ever saw something funny, cute, or inspiring you just can’t help but share it with your friends? We all do it. It’s human nature. We see something really funny and we say to ourselves “I got to share this, my friend would get a kick out ot this.”
In social marketing, we have a phrase. Content is King.
Create original, authoritative high quality content. Provide something of value to your readers. For example, I am helping my wife put together a site called GreenTeaLady.com. She’s an avid expert on all things related to tea. My advise to her is to put together an authoritative treatise on green tea. This way, when someone reads her blog, and likes it, they will be more likely to refer to her site via link back on the subject of green tea.
The best way to create authoritative content is to create a blog. If you have a website say: www.socialsam.com. The best way to do this is to simply install the Wordpress application onto a sub-directory like this: www.socialsam.com/blog
For more information about installing a Wordpress blog, go to www.wordpress.org.
Then, from your main site, create a new menu/link for Blog which will point to your new blog. This ensures that users and Google will be able to access your blog.
In my book “The Social Marketing Manifesto“, I talked about Blendtec’s “Will it blend” campaign. They blended wood blocks, ipods, and all sorts of crazy things that would make you and I cringe. But, it was extraordinary. It was outrageous. It was worth talking about.
What can you create that is authoritative, funny, cute, informative or weird that is worth talking about? Worth sharing?
Making it Easy to Share
Here’s where the power of social media/social marketing kicks your extraordinary content into hyperdrive. Places like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube makes it easy for you to grow your sphere of influence and direct that sphere to content you recommend – such as your blog. No one wants to be sold (some do), but people want to be:
- Engaged
- Informed
- Entertained
Especially if your content is worth sharing…then that’s when the magic happens……
your visitors will naturally want to share it with their friends through their social media networks
And if your content is worth sharing…
then their friends will want to share it with their friends.
And that, boiled down to its bear essence is social marketing.
In my book, “The Social Marketing Manifesto” – I outline these strategies, how to understand the framework, and how to monetize your influence.
Sincerely
George Tran
Author of “The Social Marketing Manifesto”
Success Strategies for Small Businesses using Social Media
www.socialmarketingman.com
www.twitter.com/georgetran
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