I’m really pleased to introduce you to a good friend of mine. Nicholas Fearn is 16 and an accomplished blogger in his own right. He owns the GagdetXpert blog that’s well worth a look, and was kind enough to write this post for me.
I think this post is important for to reasons. One, Nicholas is a digital native. He doesn’t have much experience of a non connected world. He speaks ‘Tech’ as a first language and is about as switched on you’ll find any teenager to be.
Two, Nicholas has Aspergers syndrome, and while you wont get that from his excellent writing, I am more than happy to support kids (and anyone else) with autism and autism spectrum disorders as much as I can.
Here we go…
The art of promotion via social media – the socially abrupt version.
A brief introduction…
If someone was to mention the words “social media” to you then you would probably automatically think of networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, although I personally see social media as a form of science in its own right – there’s so much that you can achieve by using social media for marketing and PR – but it can often confuse ordinary people who have no clue of its significance or value in today’s modern world.
Social media in everyday life.. what it is to everyday society.
Nearly everybody I know is signed up to some form of social networking site – be it Twitter or Facebook, they’re used by millions in the United Kingdom alone – and their meaning to modern society is mega. First of all, you can do so much on these types of sites; from connecting with your family and friends to playing games such as Farmville on Facebook, the art of social networking is a fundamental part of 21st century living – and that’s why it’s so important for companies to connect with customers via these types of sites.
Connecting with the user – and DON’T harass them!
I know as a user of sites such as Facebook and Twitter, that it can be very annoying when a company/person is constantly spamming you with stupid invitations to games that you’ve never heard of and products that you’re never likely to use… so that’s why it’s so important to be able to connect with the customer/reader in a manner that won’t p*** them off.
Upon trying to get a user or community interested in your product, you need to do a little bit of research into why they would use it – in terms of getting someone reading your articles for you journalists out there, I would highly suggest that you do the same thing – just do a little bit of research into the people you’re trying to sell your product/article to, and think about how you could engage with them!
Now personally I like to start a debate or argument – I mean if I was covering an article about the British monarchy and its values to the country – then I would most probably look into getting the opinions of my readers… I’d do this my simply posting a question on my Facebook page like: “Do we need the monarchy?” And I can 100% promise that you’ll get a ton of people commenting!
Some other ideas that you could be trying to connect with your customers/readers…
Why not think about starting a campaign – look at what other companies and publications are doing and try creating something that would create more interest in your product/service/article.. but don’t be too precious about it! I hate people who appear to be trying too hard.. be yourself, because your personal values and opinions are important! If you’re la-di-da about it, then you can forget about getting people interested…
If you can be bothered to do a bit more work and digging, then you could even find some problems with competing companies that are offering up similar products/services/articles to you – and when you find something wrong, you totally need to fix it by offering up your audience/customers/readers something better.
… Whilst my hands are starting to hurt from writing this whole piece of awesome literature, I shall continue to share my words of wisdom with you amazing people out there…
Getting your customers/readers to side with you…
Something that I’ve learned from the past is that it’s good to have people who can vouch for you in the times of conflict with other companies/publications – a great example is if ‘Barry’ has just commented on your status with something kind and influential then you should try and make conversation with him… try getting him interested with some of your other stuff, and soon he’ll have made friends with you and he’ll be advocating your product with the best of them.
Be comical… serious people always lose..
Personally, I always find myself responding to products/services/articles that come across as pretty funny and not-so-serious.. it just comes across to me as if the company/publication responsible is not taking things so seriously, which really appeals to me.. people who try too hard are usually the people that lose – and whilst this may not be backed up because David Cameron is currently prime minister of this fine country – it’s true… serious people are SO boring and normally preach a load of crap…………………………… long ellipsis because I don’t really care………………….. see my point? I care, but don’t care? See why? Agree?
Set a good example – but not always…
Normally its a good piece of advice for a company to set a good example to its peers. Although from past experience I think it’s sometimes best to go pretty much against this… be controversial at times and it might get you a bit of good PR and exposure – and you can see what I mean because you’re still reading this article about social media and I’ve totally abused the PM, and asked whether there should be a monarchy in Britain – if we were still in the 16th century, then the chances are that I would’ve been executed for treason… I damn hope these laws aren’t still in place… obviously they aren’t…
Take the bad reviews, because I can guarantee that they’ll help you improve a whole lot… trust moi on that…
We all like positive feedback now and again, but really you don’t get anything from this type of feedback, because you’re already a “perfect” company/publication and there’s obviously nothing that you can do to expand on your products/articles – But you can actually improve on things from bad reviews.. so you’ll end up getting better results in the end! OK – maybe you don’t need to actually annoy your audience, but you can easily improve everything on a whole by listening to the customer/reader – as they say, the customer is always right!
And remember, please have fun with promoting via social networking sites…
Now, I’ve already preached to you that I prefer people that are being themselves and not too serious, but I’d also recommend that you try to have fun whilst in the process of promoting your product/service/article: if you’re not enjoying promoting a product, then the customer/reader won’t enjoy using/reading it… AND learn from your MISTAKES!
Follow Nicholas @NicholasFearnuk
