For this weeks social 7 I’ve chosen a post on a novel use for Pinterest, one about how Social media is effecting the role of the sales man, a great Facebook tutorial and more.
How Pinterest can help you choose seeds
I’d love to be an avid Gardener but in truth I spend way too much time in front of my computer and not enough tending my garden. My Garden is a mess and I haven’t attempted to grow anything for years. Dee Sewell from Greenside Up seems to have gotten the balance right though, she uses social media to enhance her business. This week she posted about how gardeners can use Pinterest as a garden planning tool. Read more here.
Is social media making your sales team obsolete?
In my previous business I had to spend a massive chunk of my time on Sales, sales calls, sales letters, follow up calls were a daily chore. I slowly began to integrate social tools into the sales process and found that they could make it easier. I love that social media can take the cold out of cold calling, you can research your customer and build the initial relationships online making it easier to lift the phone to arrange an appointment. It also means your customers can find out more about you.
That was three years ago now, have we now become even more reliant on online tools for sales? Is this making your sales team obsolete or does it just mean that they need to learn new skills? Great analysis here from Jay Bear’s convince and convert blog.
Using social media for customer research
If you want to put some social media in to your sales process, particularly for customer research, this post from Social Media Examiner is a great read. It takes you through a variety of networks and how they can be used to learn more about your customer, discovering what sorts of questions your customers might be asking and what sort of content they are interested in. I’m sure you must all be subscribed to the Social Media Examiner blog already but if you aren’t it’s definitely one to add to your reading list.
3 low cost Facebook campaigns
It’s always good to look to promotions or campaigns that others are running in order to see what might work for you. These three case studies are great inspiration. However I’d be wary of a campaign that only results in page likes or page views. For this reason I think the conservation group is the best example as the competition resulted in sign ups and volunteers.
How to merge duplicate Facebook pages
Duplicate Facebook pages are becoming a massive problem, whether it’s having two pages set up by accident both with their own number of Likes, or whether someone has checked in at your location resulting in a rogue places page it can happen easily. Luckily there is a solution, you can claim pages and merge them. Here’s a tutorial on how to via the brilliant Impactiv8 blog.
The future of the Internet could help with dating!
Last week I shared an article on the Internet of Things, the week before I wrote about how I saw the future. Continuing on this theme I love this short film on how augmented reality contact lenses could both enhance and destroy dating. Thanks to @stevewatts on Twitter for sharing it with me.
Interactive WordPress for small business Infographic
I’m a big fan of WordPress, I will be building my new, long promised website on it. I love it because it’s simple to customise, you can have a website built in a very short space of time and it’s easy to update once it’s built. If you are thinking of taking a closer look at WordPress for your website, or even as a blogging tool, this infographic is a great resource. Click on any of the boxes on the graphic and you will find links to more in-depth information on the topics.
And from Spiderworking.com this week
Cool tool that makes it easier to understand your Facebook statistics
The insights Dashboard on Facebook has become more and more complex over the years. This is a good thing, the information is valuable and gives you a better measure of what is and is not working for your page. They can take a while to navigate though so if you want a quick snap shot of headline statistics this weeks cool tool Minilytics is here to help. Read my review here.
Twitter Marketing Tip #2 – The Importance of conversation
Probably the most important thing you can do on Twitter and maybe the one thing that is most commonly overlooked. This week I talk about conversation in 15 seconds.
5 reasons why Facebook like and share competitions don’t work
At our monthly bloggers meet-up on Monday we were talking about Facebook and whether users really were turning away from the network. One person said that they were tired of logging in to see their newsfeed full of competitions their friends were sharing. This has been a sore point for me for a while. Not only do these competitions break the rules but I fail to see the value in them. Here’s why.
