By: Graham Perry

Graham Perry — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 11:36:53 +0000

I think social networking is one component in a marketing strategy – it doesn’t work in isolation.

By: Kate Lennon

Kate Lennon — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:36:49 +0000

This article is well-written, but it doesn’t really tell me anything new or useful. Join social networks. Tell your friends about your product/service and hopefully they’ll pass it on. Etc. The reality is that promotion of any kind – however subtle – on Facebook, MySpace etc., is very much frowned upon and discouraged. At best, people ignore it. At worst, they block you, or post a message on the “wall” asking you not to use the site for promotional purposes. And I’m not talking about blatant promotions; I’m talking about anything that looks even remotely like it might be a promo for something. Nor do “friends” tend to share things, apart from video clips of the latest Britney song, or whatever.
It is possible to create groups, fan pages etc., on most social networks; but, again, people tend to ignore these. Very few groups attract more than a handful of members (unless, again, the group has something to do with celebrities, movie stars etc.).
At this stage I think I must have read a thousand articles – on websites, in newsletters and so on – supposedly advising website owners on how to use social networking to promote their business; and yet I still have no idea how this can be done. The advice is always the same. Sensible, as far as it goes; but basically of no practical value.
To give just one example of what I mean: I have around 30 facebook friends (six or seven are real friends whom I’ve known for years; the rest are casual aquaintances and people I’ve only ever “met” online). If I posted a message on the fb “wall” right now letting these friends know that, eg, I’d just had a book published, a handful of them – maybe eight or nine at best – would post congratulatory messages such as “Well done!” or “Way to go!” Maybe – if I was very lucky – one or two of them would click the “share” link. But the people they shared with would almost certainly not hit their share link (because they don’t know me from Eve). And that would be that. Within a few hours, my post would have descended to the bottom of the wall (where hardly anyone reads); and by the following day it would have disappeared altogether.
Some big promotion!
So, as I say, while I keep hearing about companies who have used social networking to promote themselves successfully, I can’t see how that is possible, given the built-in limitations of Facebook, MySpace etc. The simple fact is, nothing goes further than your immediate friends unless they hit the “share” button. In fact it would probably be more effective just to email each of them individually and ask them to share my email with other people in their address book.
Maybe somebody here can post a link to a website which actually explains how to use social networking to promote one’s business (and which doesn’t merely give the kind of obvious and sensible but essentially useless advice given in this article. advice

Comments on: Social Networking for Business Guide

By: Graham Perry

By: Kate Lennon