A great question asked by John of SparesBoyz at the workhsop in Johannesburg on Monday 17th.  where do you start exactly.

Research and listen

Personally, if I were in your shoes I would start by doing some research and listening to what customers are saying about products and services in your industry.

• I would firstly do a search on Google for industry related sites,
• Research keywords and look for what search terms are being used by customers
• Assess industry sites and think about what I like and don’t like
• See who my competitors customers are.
• Think of things that I could do better than my competitors

And most importantly I would think about  the benefits, it is all about benefits, firstly, what is your customer’s pain and how are you going to fix it.

Strategy

Once I have an idea of what my competitors are doing, who my customers are and how I’m going to fix their pain.  I would work on my plan of action and decide which sites I’m going to target and set my goals and objectives.

Keywords

Do a final keyword check, to make sure that you are happy with your chosen keywords and incorporate them into your bio, profile, website content and your blogs.

Profile and Bio

Then comes the profile.  I would right a short and clear tag line which tells my audience exactly what it is I do and who my best customers are  and work on a short bio which will make me stand out from the crowd.

Branding

Work out your branding if you haven’t done so already.

Content

Content is king.  Start writing some content.  If you feel you are not good at writing, then hire a copywriter but sometimes we have the tendency to under estimate our own abilities.  Just be natural and be yourself.  If you need some copywriting done, we have a service which can assist in this area.  Sometimes having a good combination of using a copywriter and writing your own content for blogs and articles reduces the workload of having to do it all yourself.

Set up a blog

You must have a starting point, your blog is like having a shop window where you get to display everything you have to offer and where you get to display your expertise and this is where you content and keywords come in.

Network

Network, network, network, follow, connect and participate.  Social media is all about networking.  We have all done it offline and done it all our lives.

The basic starting poings I would recommend is Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook from there I would then decide whether I would like to join another site which may be of benefit to me.  Generally I would choose a local community site.

Don’t give up

Lastly, don’t give up, keep at it, be consistant and the results will come.

If you need social media assistance and would like to know more about our services you can contact me via Twitter: @romanythresher or Skype: directassist.  We cater to both UK and South Africa.

Useful Blog
Scaling Social Media by Chris Brogan