Mark Merenda provided me with this great guest post about social media and what it means to your business. Mark is the brains behind Smart Marketing Now where he and his wonderful staff provide marketing services to attorneys, law firms and financial professionals.
Guest post by Mark Merenda:
Susan Boyle proves that your firm needs Twitter
Recently on one of the marketing listservs where I hang out, there was a lively discussion about the usefulness, or lack thereof, of “social media” — discussion kicked off by Jenni Buchanan of BlogProfs.com, who cited this article in U.S. News & World Report: Susan Boyle and Small Business
According to the article, one of the lessons small business owners can learn from the Susan Boyle phenomenon (in case you have been living under a rock, click here: Susan Boyle – Britains Got Talent 2009
Writer Steve King says, “Simply put, small businesses can no longer ignore social media. YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs are now mainstream information channels. In addition to entertainment, this is where customers are increasingly going to find out about products and services.”
I agree, although I would add some other thoughts. In my view, the real reason that small businesses cannot ignore social media, or any other Internet marketing strategy, has to do with cost/benefit ratio. Most small businesses cannot afford to use traditional marketing methods (advertising, direct mail, public relations) in traditional media (TV, radio, newspapers, magazines), and must find another way to promote their businesses.
In classical marketing theory, a business uses guerilla marketing techniques to become a market leader. Once there, those market leaders use traditional media to keep upstarts out of the game. By advertising all over the place, for example, they set the bar of entry to the marketplace very high. For a new business seeking to enter the market, the expense of competing is simply too much.
Now, however, print is dying and the Internet rules. I would advise any small business that had a small-to-non-existent marketing budget to devote all their time and energy to Internet marketing.
There is a giant conversation going on in cyberspace. It’s kind of like a big networking party without the cocktails. (Or with. What the hell, nobody’s going to know.) Can you afford to miss the party? Don’t you want to participate in the conversation?
