There's a rather big, intimidating world of social media out there. With so many competing services all trying to draw in users and advertisers, it can be hard to tell which ones are really worth your time and attention. After all, one of the main benefits of social media marketing is that you can do it quickly and cheaply. It defeats the purpose if it turns into a hassle or a time-sink.
So, to help you sort out your options, we wanted to make a quick list of the Top Five social media sites, in descending order of importance. If you're looking to expand your social media coverage, these are the bases you need to have covered first.
The Top Five Social Media Sites for Marketing
1)Facebook. Is there any doubt that if you can only do social marketing on one site, Facebook should be that site? With over 850 million members, it's got the most eyeballs looking at it, as well as having by far the highest minutes-per-day rates of any site on the Internet. Plus, it's a great place to have discussions with your fans and get feedback from them. However you use it, your Facebook page is likely going to be the hub of your social media efforts.
2)Twitter. Following behind Facebook a bit in numbers, but making up for it with growth, is Twitter. With 500 million users, it's the second-biggest social site on the Internet. Its format of micro-messages is challenging to utilize in your social media marketing, but on the other hand, being a daily trend can get you a lot of attention. Use it mostly for more casual interaction. A few major announcements here and there are OK, but for the most part, Twitter is pretty informal.
3)LinkedIn. LinkedIn is the Facebook of the business world, and with 150 million users, it's doing pretty well for itself. It is pretty much exclusively used for promotion your products and looking for contracts, and profiles and pages are expected to be glorified sales shows. One unique feature of it is that while you can ask anyone to have a “Connection” with you, if they refuse, it hurts a ranking of your reliability. Since you want your reliability rank as high as possible, you need to be careful about hitting strangers with requests.
4)YouTube. YouTube is, of course, all about video, and it's common for businesses to have an official YouTube account for their promotional materials. You can use it as cloud storage for videos on your website, or focus on developing your YouTube profile as its own landing page. There's one bonus to YouTube, however, puts it above most other sites: it can help your SEO directly. Google searches which popular YouTube searches will put the top ranking YouTube videos at the top of the list. So, even if your normal search screen results rankings are low, a single popular YouTube video can send you straight to the top of page one.
5)Pinterest. I'm going out on a limb here, since technically Pinterest doesn't even have open signups yet, but I think it's justified. Pinterest is a sort of virtual corkboard where you “pin” pictures of your own, or that you simply find online. You can create themed montages covering any subject, and connect with other users. The reason I'm including it is that, despite not even being out of beta, it's already attracted a huge range of commercial users. Small shops are using it as virtual storefront, and apparently having success.
Got a different opinion? I know many people thing Google+ should have made it onto this list. There are good reasons to argue this position. Let us hear your thoughts in the comments!
DeepSky Marketing is a company that provides business owners and managers with profitable marketing systems and verifiable return on investment (ROI). To schedule a brief no-cost consultation call 707 823-3888.
