Do you ever wonder why your Facebook page sits at 37 fans and never gets any interaction? Or why your blog posts never get any comments? After all, you are reaching out like you were told to do.
Why isn’t anyone else reaching back?
One of the common problems we see is a “push” mentality when it comes to social media. We continue the “look at me!” approach that has been used in conventional advertising for so long and just apply it to the Internet. It doesn’t work that way.
People have short attention spans, and if you can’t engage them quickly they will choose one of the other millions of people online vying for their attention.
Would you be interested in someone who stuck a business card or product at your face the minute you met them? Probably not. But you would probably spend time with someone who asked you a question, wanted to know your opinion, or showed you how to do something really useful or entertaining.
The Internet really is like one big cocktail party. You can be that annoying person with the handful of business cards who cruises the room looking for targets, or you can be the woman at the center of attention, telling interesting stories as everyone crowds around to listen. Which one do you think people will remember most when it comes time to buy?
Basic strategies for creatively engaging your customers online
- Ask a question
- Share interesting or funny news or information related to your business
- Email a friendly “hello” to each new follower/commenter to start cementing a back-and-forth relationship right away
Lately we’ve seen some really outstanding examples of creatively engaging with potential customers online.
- Indie singer/songwriter Juliana Finch is making a huge splash with fans all over the world by writing and recording a new song for every 100 new Facebook fans (and selling them on her site, of course). She also hosts “virtual concerts” on Sunday nights for fans to log in and hear her play for just $2. Everything she does on Facebook is just so creative and engaging. Her fans love her for thinking of them first and crafting her performances around what they want. Brilliant.
- The movie Life in a Day was created with user content. Fans were asked to submit a video of what they were doing on a particular date in time, and the director melded it into a movie about life on planet earth. Someone as famous as Ridley Scott doesn’t need to do this for content, so it is pretty cool that he did. And you can bet amateur YouTubers and video fans from around the world will be buying tickets to see this movie.
- If you were a Twitter user last summer you would have heard about the Old Spice video response campaign. The Old Spice guy from those funny commercials spent the day filming responses to a variety of tweets, even passing on a proposal. This was a great way to engage an older product with a younger audience in a fresh, creative way, and it earned Old Spice ink all over the web for days afterward.
Let us help you creatively engage with your customers online
You may not be ready for something that big, but you can see how powerfully each person was able to connect with their audience and bring about recognition (and sales) to their projects.
Does this inspire you to do something a little different? Contact us for a little brainstorming session and we’ll map out a strategy that put you at the center of attention in your market.
Category : Social Media
