small-business-marketing

Social media marketing can feel like a treadmill where your small business never quite finds its footing. Keep running long enough, and it's easy to lose sight of your true small business marketing goal: consistent, cost-effective lead generation.

Social Media Marketing and Lead Generation Done Right

Here's the good news: Social media, used correctly, is one of the most cost-effective lead generation tools your business can deploy. There's simply nothing else that can deliver this much ROI on a B2B marketing investment.

So what does it mean to use social media the "correct" way? Here are five specific examples:

1. Never quit experimenting. Some social media sites are gaining ground as B2B marketing platforms (YouTube, LinkedIn) while others are in decline (MySpace, StumbleUpon). Behind those broad trends, however, almost every small business marketer discovers a unique mix of social media platforms and content that delivers the best results.

Don't be afraid to try new things, and don't be afraid to fail - there's simply too much to gain here from experimenting and fine-tuning your online lead generation efforts. Tweak your business blog topics, and fine-tune your writing voice. Work with podcasts, video, and other types of social content. Even efforts that fail to generate leads can provide valuable feedback about what works and what doesn't.

2. Don't forget to deliver a call to action. The conventional wisdom holds that a call to action over social media will damage your credibility and hurt your relationship marketing activities. Yet there are limits to this attitude - after all, many of your prospects want to buy and are looking for information about your business.

A well-crafted call to action gives prospects the opportunity to get the information they need while still showing respect - and delivering value - for everybody else. Whether your call to action involves a website, e-book, whitepaper, registration/landing page, newsletter signup form, or some other response, you need to integrate it into every aspect of your social media marketing strategy.

3. Give prospects somewhere to go! It sounds simple, but you'd be amazed how many businesses overlook this step. If your individual social media marketing efforts are the spokes in a wheel, then think of your landing page or website as the hub. All roads lead here - so be sure you provide a compelling destination!

4. Robust social media analytics are a must! By "robust" I definitely don't mean analytics that deal only with a single social media tool. Those are useful, but they never give you a coherent view of your marketing strategy.

Instead, I'm talking about the growing crop of social CRM and social media management tools, as well as increasingly sophisticated marketing automation solutions with built-in social media analytics. These products, including those from major vendors like Salesforce.com, Sugar CRM, and Eloqua, provide the hard data you need to drive your social media marketing and lead generation efforts.