Social Media Consulting and Services

What is Social Media?

Social Media is People+Technology=conversation.
Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Blogs are the big names to start with.  There are Millions of users of the two main services, with Facebook getting over 700,000 new members over the age of 35 every single day.  Twitter has millions of "Tweets" every single day with people talking about where they are having lunch, how they feel to what cleaning service they are using in their homes.  

What is Social Media Marketing?

This is "Word of Mouth" on Steroids. We cannot think of another way of saying it.  When someone watches your video and learns from it, they favorite it.  This tells all of their friends that you liked it and that they should watch it also.  (Word of Mouth)  But they just told like 200 people about it.  When they LIKE your facebook page, it means that they want to keep up to date on your interesting information that you have to offer, and it tells all of their friends about it. (Word of Mouth).  And Twitter is how they share links, interests and either complain or shout out about their latest consumer transaction like "Great lunch at Vino's. Will definately come back." and along with this it can post the address and map of the location at the same time.

What is Listening 2.0?

• Listening 1.0 is when you would search on Yahoo or google for your company name to see if anyone posted a comment on a forum about you.
• Listening 2.0 is when a free piece of software on your desktop automatically notifies you of your company name being mentioned on the most used services in the world. Then you jump in and interact with that person about what they are talking about.  

How can Listening 2.0 benefit my company?

• Bob Jones Tweets: "Anybody know of a good painter in Cedar Rapids?"
• The tools that we provide notifies our Painting Company client that someone is looking for a painter in their area within seconds after the post has been made and Painter Company secretary or sales rep reply's to the post to setup up an appointment and provides a link to the company website.  Now Painter Company has first contact with a potential customer that is looking for their service before they seek out the competitor.
• Susan McFee Tweets: "Cleaning Company X just left. Still cleaning up their mess."
• Response from Cleaning Company X: "Susan, I'll send a different crew over to do that cleanup work plus we'll knock off $50 from our bill"

Now that is some real customer service.  You headed off a problem before it got out of hand and the person posted 10 more times about how the service sucked.  Susan McFee even re-tweeted to post so that her 300 followers all got the message that you sent to her.  Showing that you are on the ball with your customers and making sure to provide top knotch service.

Is Youtube really Social Media and how can it help me?

Youtube is the unique side of social media that incorporates into all other forms.  Consumers want to see your product or service in action. Show them a short 3 minute video that shows everything they want to know and leave a call to action at the end.  This gives them a more personable attraction to be able to walk into your brick and morter location and see someone that they feel like they know.  It's almost as good as the HANDS ON approach. You know, HANDS ON, CHECK SIGNED.
Incorporate that video into your website on the main page.  You spend a ton of money getting a commercial made, then you pay for it to be aired on television hopeing that someone that needs your product or service is watching.  Now take that video, expand the content with more information and let the people see it that are already looking at you as their next product or service provider. Hook, Line and Sinker - Time to Reel them in.

 CALL 3CHIP MEDIA to get things started.  Your competitor is already listening to what your customers are saying, and having conversations with them and getting them to come to their door.  They could be coming to your door.

318-361-7777

Cedar Rapids Home Builders Show

By 3Chip Media - www.3chipmedia.com 

Sunday Feb. 20th I had the chance to visit with some of the vendors at the Cedar Rapids Home Show at the US Cellular Center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.  

I think we were able to pick up some new clients and established some new relationships.  But what has stuck with me the most is what people were saying.  I would ask how the show was going or how much new construction they were seeing in Cedar Rapids, Marion and Hiawatha and the response was this.  There has been a huge rise in people just maintaining or updating the home that they are in now instead of searching out new features for a New Home.  This was said by just about everyone from the guys with the Overhead Doors, Patio Block and especially the insulation vendors.

So I did some searching around and found out some interesting conversations on Twitter and Facebook.

It seems that people are more and more asking their friends what they would reccomend for tips and tricks or who to call when they are looking for a service to do the job.  This is a great place for you, the business owner to start grabbing those potential customers immediately instead of them trying to Google-It and finding your competitor first.

I too am a homeowner and I am beginning to put more money into my own home rather than feeling like I am going to buy something down the road.  The economy is still shaky and will be for awhile, so most people are doing the same thing.  Taking care of the ol' place ourselves.  When we cannot do it ourselves, we ask our friends and family who does the work for them or what is a good furnace to get.  We all have some sort of experience with one place or brand, so we offer out what we experienced.  If the comments are negative, this is a good time for the Brand or business to step in and offer some sort of customer service, whether it is a facebook post or Twitter Tweet about it.

The show was amazing, I couldn't beleive the number of visitors walking around and talking to the vendors about their products and seeing people walk away saying, Let's talk more about this later in the week.  This is a great event if you want to put together a remodel, looking for ideas and to see everyone that you need to in one location, and if they are a member of the Cedar Rapids Home Builders Association, they are probably a reputable company that offers great service and products.  I learned that just from the caliber of individuals that I met there and the fact that I have worked with many of them over the years one way or another.  

I had the opportunity to run into a few of my old clients from other places that I have worked also, I remember building their first website for them and how skeptical they were at the time.  Now, they all have a website, put even more money into it and are looking now at how to compete with the other guy to get to the top of the list.  This can be pretty hard to do if you are the little guy or the new guy in the game.  These are established companies, they have a long standing reputation and they have had time to tweak their websites to come up first in Google, Bing or Yahoo and that is tough to beat.  Unless you know some tricks and how the search engines really work.

To end off this story, I have to say that I cannot wait until this summer when a few of the projects that I went to see about get started.  I'm getting some new Spray Foam insulation from one of the vendors, a little concrete work done by another one and I'm even going to get the wife that new kitchen floor from another vendor from the show.  All in all, it was a great event to attend. I would highly reccomend it for you to consider visiting the Cedar Rapids Home Builders Association Home Show next year.

Written by Shannon Appleby - 3Chip Media - Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
Recommended Link - http://www.crhba.org

How to convince your boss to use Social Media

Whether you are the boss or someone that is attempting to convince your boss to build business relationships with your customers or to just offer better customer service and see what your potential customers are saying about you. Social media can do these things.  But they cannot just be automated, it is going to take some resources to handle a job like this and the boss knows that the number thing to look at is the bottom line.

An educated and knowledgeable agency can help you setup your Inbound Marketing accounts such as Facebook and Twitter, they can setup some great comments for you to post and set you up with all kinds of tools but are they going to educate you on how to continue your Inbound Marketing strategies?  Are they going to show you how to use the tools?  Are they going to continue to monitor your efforts to make sure they are working for you?

You need to have someone in place to continue the work to be done on this new and broadening landscape. When trying to convince the boss to support either your new efforts to expand the company into the social media landscape and tap into the massive resources that are out there, you need to make sure that they understand that this is what is good for the company.  You cannot just say, this is the Coolest, New thing that everyone is doing. You have to compel them with the truth about social media.  Another thing is going to be that they will try to defend the traditional media efforts that have supported them for many years. Doing this is going to be hard to do.

Here are some points to use when confronting the boss about Why Social Media should be a focus point.

• Marketing - Get in front of new customers that have never been attracted before. Organically, not with the hard sell.
• Customer Service - Now you can see what your customers are saying about you and interact with them.
• Sales - Direct promotion of Brand and Product with links to the products are easily distributed.
• Support - Easily interact with customers that have a unique issue with your product. Eleiminate them saying bad things about you with instant satisfaction with your service.

Additionally, you can also point out to your boss, that based on the research and thousands of case studies, the cost comparison between

Inbound Marketing and Direct Sales conversion shows that Inbound Marketing can save about 50-60% in cost over outbound sales.  When I say this, I mean that by having your website, twitter and facebook working for you, that an individual can maintain a dozen customers to one comparitively to the outbound sales force.  Outbound sales require a person to make the phone call, navigate through the gatekeeper and then work to make the sale, set the appointment etc.

In the end, if everything you say doesn't work, find your nearest competitor and show the boss how they are using social media, videos and Search Engine optimization along with a well designed and user friendly website to take away the market share and the money that could be coming into the company instead of going out to the other guy.

To end off this article I would like to remind you also that 3Chip Media can assist you in your efforts to begin your endeavor into the social media world of marketing with Education, training, setup services and follow through. Contact us athttp://www.3chipmedia.com or follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Youtube.  Remember, you found this article, we can help customers find you too.

Why Blogging is Soooo Important

Blogging for your brand or product is crucial in your online Digital Marketing Strategies. 

The reason for blogging is simple, Keep your customers up to date on what you are doing.  Something as small as telling about the new printer that you just got in is something to Blog about.  When talking about it though, tell why you got it, why it will save the company time and money and how that will help the customer in the end.

Telling all about a new product release or a new service you offer is fantastic and something they want to know about, but more importantly, this also keeps your website fresh and new with continually updated information so that it isn't always the same thing when they show up.  Somebody may have been to your site just last week and found exactly what they wanted to know, but then new article about the update to a different product or a special you have going on could be the key to them making the actual purchase this week as opposed to waiting 2 weeks like they had intended.  This gets their money before they research your competitors in the end.

There are many more reason to have a blog but I cannot go into great detail about it here.  If you would like more information, please contact us and we can talk about how 3Chip Media can help you set up your blog and work with you based on your needs to build a comprehensive, results driven blogging schedule and how to do it right.

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