Is Your Small Business a Social Biz?
A Social Biz is a small business that makes relationships the most important part of their business and marketing.
Are You a Social Biz?
Your small business is a Social Biz if you:
- Make it easy for people to find you and connect with you.
- Create easy (and enjoyable) ways for people to communicate with you (and your people).
- Actively and consistently stay in touch with people who are customers, other business owners, prospective customers, and members of your social networks.
- Set up systems that serve your customers and troubleshoot and change systems that might be more convenient for you but get in your customers’ way.
- Go out of your way to help people and offer solutions to their problems.
- Think about new and better ways to grow a community of loyal, repeat customers who recommend your business to others.
- Make engaging with your networks a daily marketing practice. Take charge and step over any technology barriers (or phobias J ) getting in the way of using the Internet and social media daily to be more visible, find-able and engaging with your networks — because you need to go where THEY are; not just where you are comfortable.
Make It Easy and Enjoyable to Connect with Your Small Business
You and your business will be easy to find and connect with if your contact information is consistent and posted on every page of your website and every listing and social media site that your prospective customers use to search for and interact with local businesses.
If your customers need to call you, is your phone number visible as soon as they go to your website? When they use Google and see your Google My Business listing? If they need to show up at your place of business, will they see your hours and whether there is parking available?
Your business will be enjoyable to connect with if your business listings and social media accounts (e.g. Google My Business, Facebook and Instagram pages) are personal and tell your story as well as provide valuable information for your customers. Even better, your online presence can help customers connect with each other, for example, through contests and comments, testimonials and reviews.
Stay In Touch with Customers and Your Business and Customer Networks
How do you actively stay in touch with people who are customers, other business owners, prospective customers and members of your social networks? Reach out and touch your tribe consistently and frequently:
- A daily post on your Facebook business page and a weekly boost of popular posts with engagement.
- A daily post at Instagram using hashtags that help people find you.
- Postcards with messages and images that delight. Funny, thoughtful, cute or beautiful. Promote your products and services.
- A regular coffee date with a local business owner to share marketing ideas, what’s working and what’s not.
- Dropping in on your neighbor businesses for a quick hello.
- A monthly email newsletter with specials and coupons and news just for people who signed up to be on your list.
- A phone call to a customer who is someone you know and like but haven’t seen in a while.
Solve Problems for People
It is a service to your customers to notice and change any part of your systems that get in the way of your customer’s experience of your business. Make your systems work for them and change steps and things that get in the way of their convenience and ease of doing business with you and your business.
- Too many steps or clicks to find what they want and purchase?
- Easy to navigate in your store, or your website?
- Follow up or information needed to use or consume your product or service?
How will you know when there’s a problem for which you have a solution to offer? You have to look, notice and ask.
- Use your social media and web pages to ask with a quick survey.
- Get a friend or colleague to test drive your web pages and your store to get feedback about what works from their perspective.
- Go online to Quora or LinkedIn or your groups in Facebook and notice what questions people ask.
Is Your Small Business Marketing Plan a Social Biz Plan?
Marketing Has Changed
Have you changed the way you market?
If you have a small business, you are a marketer. With each of us bombarded by advertising in every media, it is now more important than ever that you:
- Create relationships with your prospects, customers and colleagues/competitors both offline (in person) and online.
- Establish an online presence and use social networking to reach out and increase your visibility.
- Grow your email and stay in touch.
- Provide valuable information, including rich content on your website.
- Join with others in your location and/or industry to power up your marketing efforts and results.
What are three ways you could change your small business marketing to become a Social Biz?
Share with us in the Comments section below.
What are three ways we could help you? (We are looking, noticing and asking.)
Leave your suggestions in the Comments section below.
