According to Edison Research, more then half of America’s population 12 and older now have a Facebook page and those numbers keep on growing daily. With statistics like that how can your business not afford to have a Facebook page?
Creating a Facebook or Twitter page for a business is easy, a ten-year old can do it now a-days but it's how you use it to improve your business and keep your customers attracted to your business, which is a completely different story.
If used correctly, you can improve your customer following dramatically with social media. One such success story is a young, multi-million dollar entrepreneur John Earl, also known as Johnny Cupcakes. Johnny Cupcakes is a clothing line based out of Boston with a very successful online store and four (4) retail outlets in Boston, Los Angeles and London. John Earl founded the brand in 2001 as a joke. “I make shirts with cupcakes on them”, as Earl would say is the simplest way to explain his multi million dollar business. Johnny Cupcakes offers an interactive website and entertaining stores (Johnny Cupcakes Finds Sweet Success in T-Shirts, 2006). But Johnny didn’t do all of this without the help of social media. Johnny mainly uses two (2) of the most popular social media channels out there to engage and entertain his customers; namely Facebook and Twitter.
Depending on your business, post a sneak peek of an upcoming product. This way you can get feedback from your customer base even before the product is officially launched. Johnny always posts a sneak peek from his new line before it comes out. By doing this; Johnny excites his customer base and gets them talking about the product online which will then spread to their friends who might not have been a Johnny Cupcakes fan till now.
It’s important not to bore your customers with your content. Of course some posts will include what’s happening with your company but it could get old really fast and that might lead to the loss of a follower. Your posts should also include interesting or funny articles/videos you’ve discovered. This will lead to people also finding your social media page entertaining and informative. Johnny makes a point of it to post at least one ‘random’ post on both his Facebook page and Twitter.
Engage your customers with random give-a-ways and competitions via social media. Depending on your business, ask your customers to take a picture of your product in the most random place they can think of. The picture with the most ‘likes’ will win a prize. Contestants will ask their friends to vote for their picture. This way, you the business owner will win too because to vote you have to ‘like’ the page in the first place so not only will you engage your customers in a fun and entertaining way but your page will also get more likes. Johnny is a prime example of this. If Johnny is struggling to sell a certain product he will post a competition similar to the example explained to help improve sales.
For more ways on how to use social media effectively for your business, read the article by Inc. Magazine and take a look at Johnny Cupcakes Facebook page to see a master at work.
Reference
Smith, T. (2006). Johnny Cupcakes finds sweet success in t-shirts. Retrieved June 29th, 2011, from Weekend Edition. Website: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5618417
Inc. Magazine: http://www.inc.com/articles/2010/01/30-tips-for-using-social-media.html
Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/25/facebook-user-statistics-america_n_840524.html
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