How to Make Your Social Media Sites Stand Out From the Competition

Do you sit down and look at your company’s Facebook page everyday thinking, what can I do differently? Do you find that you are posting the same kind of material daily or that when you try to engage your audience with a thought-provoking question, there’s no response? It’s time to step your social media game up. Let’s see how we create a buzz around your Facebook, Twitter and blog sites…

Our Top Ten Social Media Tips

Here at Progressive Media Concepts, not only do we like to explain to our readers why social media is important and why businesses should be using it in their marketing plan, but we like to give advice on HOW to use it. Every Tuesday and Thursday we are posting new social media tips and tricks for our fans. Today, I am selecting our top ten tips and tricks, and sharing them with you. These are shortcuts and strategies we have learned along our own social media journey. Enjoy!

Social Media Spotlight: Olejo Stores

For today’s edition of Social Media Spotlight, we are highlighting an e-commerce business that has used to social media to build brand awareness, create relationships with customers, and promote products. Olejo Stores was started in 2008 as a way to cater to specialty shopping categories online. Olejo Stores operates specialty home and house ware websites include LatexMattress.com, USBeds.com, MemoryFoammMattress.com, and AirBeds.com. Each site caters to a specialty “boutique” product that can be purchased on the site. Olejo Stores currently has 25 stores under its umbrella, and is expanding rapidly into new product categories, which will debut in the coming months. Let’s find out what has worked for Olejo Stores in terms of social media, and what hasn’t. The Marketing Director at Olejo Stores gives us an inside look at their strategy…

Social Media Spotlight: Send the Trend

The Social Media Spotlight is pleased to introduce a company that should be recognized by all fashionable consumers: Send the Trend. Send the Trend is a monthly membership accessories service created by Christian Siriano, Mariah Chase and Divya Gugnani. Once you have become a member, you will receive a customized accessory gallery based on a personal style survey. Once a month, you have the option to purchase new accessories for your collection. Send the Trend is in on trend whether you’re in need of some new sunglasses, an amazing scarf, earrings, bracelets, a statement necklace, rings, bangles or all the above. Kaitlin, the Social Media Manager, gave us some useful insight on how Send the Trend uses social sites to build and promote this e-commerce business.

How Social Media Marketing Works for E-Commerce Business

It is a no-brainer that social media sites are excellent marketing tools for all types of businesses, but e-commerce sites have an advantage when it comes to using the different networks. For one, consider the e-commerce target market: online shoppers. People who spend their time on the Internet searching for products to buy are more than likely spending time on social media sites as well. This is just one reason why social media cannot be overlooked as a marketing tool within the e-commerce industry.

Promoting products and services on sites such as Facebook, Twitter and blogs are a great way to drive consumers to your site and make sales. Social media outlets are good tools for link building; therefore by posting URLs that link back to your site, you are more likely to see an increase in traffic. Social media gives businesses the means to direct traffic to whichever site they want, whether it be a product giveaway on a blog site or a link to a coupon. E-commerce sites have an advantage over brick-and-mortar businesses because their consumers are just a click away from their products and do not have to travel into a store.

Creative Social Media Contests That Generate Viral Buzz

Creating a way to stir up buzz about your company and/or product these days seems to be a relatively easy task. Whether it’s to start controversy during major sporting events, like a Sleepy’s mattress commercial did, or to create consumer interaction to make one of the funniest Doritos commercials of the year, each and every idea is different. So what have companies been doing to increase their viral presence within their consumer base?

Skittles, for starters, has long since surpassed expectations on a well thought out viral campaign. MOB The Rainbow, their social media campaign, has engaged millions of Skittles fans worldwide. This campaign alone nearly quadrupled their Facebook fan base to over 15 million people. These campaigns are primarily a collaboration of all Skittles fans to achieve a common goal. The video below is an actual MOB event that created some serious viral buzz for the Skittles’ brand back in early 2010.

Driving Sales vs. Building Brand Loyalty Through Social Media

What does your company use social media outlets for? Are you trying to obtain a larger fan base than your competitors in the social sphere, jumping on the band-wagon to keep up, or simply trying to increase your sales? If any of these options are your company’s driving factor to having a social media presence, you are going to have to reevaluate your goals. At the end of the day, we all know the main objective is to produce more money for your business. However, social media should be used in a way that will engage your consumers to a point where they will become loyal to your brand. Brand loyalty is more valuable than any one-time sale you made through a tweet or a promotional blog post.

How could a Facebook page produce this thing called brand loyalty? It all comes down to the content you create for your social media sites. By constantly posting discount information, links to your company sites, or blogs about your product, you are overlooking the most important substance: engagement.