Head Count - Who is using social media with their business?

[jkdbjj]

Let's have it, who here devotes any I mean ANY consistent time maintaining social media outlets for their business?
I am venturing into 5 of them.

Facebook
LinkedIN
YouTube
Twitter
Pinterest

Granted I have barely begun even registering at some of these, and have learned there are programs that centralize the posting and monitoring of these outlets, BUT, I have to say the task is overwhelming, daunting, and quite laughable at times.

Laughable because, I feel like a rat in a race to get the cheese, doing and performing things I have NO business doing, acting like I enjoy this crap.

Furthermore, when I visit the social pages of BIG Ad agencies and similar groups who you'd think would have the mass followings, you find just post after post after post, and here or there someone responds or likes a post, but for the most part it is a graveyard of posts.

I here by declare this model being pushed upon us the small business is not sustainable. Furthermore, it is VERY difficult to make a sign company sexy enough to want to follow??????????!!!!!???????

Rant done...

 

[Letterbox Mike]

YES!!! Social media isn't appropriate for every business, and your target clientele will determine if it's justifiable, but for us it is very much so. We don't manage ours ourselves, we hired a marketing company last year (best thing we ever did) and part of the services they provide us is managing all of our social media platforms.

We saw a 42% increase last year in sales, almost entirely attributable to our marketing firm, and of that growth, much of it can be either directly or indirectly linked to our social media presence. That said social media on it's own isn't very valuable, it has to be strategically planned and implemented in a much larger and very well rounded advertising/marketing program. It's not a magic bullet on it's own, it's just one important piece of a larger puzzle.

 

[James Burke]

Currently, I only use facebook for our business. There are a couple of "dashboards" out there that will let you update all your social media venues at once (http://www.hootsuite.com, etc...). There's no sense spending your whole day reeling in business when you should be tending to the chores.


JB

 

[Craig Sjoquist]

Not sure about those you mentioned about bringing in work, I do know a good website works and if your a good writer Blogs work well if you keep updating work in progress work even better if the projects
take weeks and months.

Your right signs are not the coolest thing to talk about, except when your looking for advertising.

 

[showcase 66]

Facebook, Linkden, and Pinterest here.

Pinterest is more of good designs I see and material for others to find. I have pinned some of the awesome material I have found over the years that others in design or looking into design might like to know about. Example is Dan Antonelli's Logo Design for Small Business 1 and 2.

My Sister in law works for facebook in online marketing. She has only been there for about a month but has told me a lot on how some companies are using there marketing power. I think facebook is better for people who have products that appeal to the masses. But I did see a little ad the other day about coro signs for political campaign. I ment to click on it to see who it might be but got side tracked on something else.

Linkden I think was good at first since it catered to business people and not everyone else. It was a quick way to get connected to other businesses and I did get some good contacts out of it, but now I get more stuff from my friends on facebook wanting to be connected on there. So I have not messed with it as much lately.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Not sure about those you mentioned about bringing in work,

Facebook does pretty well for what it is bringing in work. I tend to update my digitizing works a whole lot more there, so it does attract people seeing all the different types of designs. It's not much compared to other sources, but it sure does surprise me what it does bring in.

I haven't ventured too far into the others, mainly because if I do that, it's going to get to the point I'll need a person to do just that one thing and keep things fresh and vibrant.

 

[JKADesigns]

All of my work so far has come through Facebook. We do have to remember though, the people with the money aren't on Facebook, need to get out there and beat the pavement to get to the people who want/need sign work done. I do notice almost everyone on Facebook is CHEAP!

 

[JoshLoring]

We have lots of social network accounts... But nobody spends BIG money. We actually only really use them for Search engine status. Not that that impacts much anyhow..

Forget Social networking- focus on web traffic.

 

[Jillbeans]

I use Facebook. It hasn't really brought me in any business, but I like it because it gives me a "presence" out among the people.
I can upload HUGE pix (unlike my crappy GoDaddy website) I can update daily with a photo of whatever I'm working on so that I at least look busy.
Evan linked my FB to my website but when I try to see if I have a link on the site, it looks like GoDaddy isn't fond of FB linking because I can't see mine.

Love....Jill

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Evan linked my FB to my website but when I try to see if I have a link on the site, it looks like GoDaddy isn't fond of FB linking because I can't see mine.

It's there. Right below "My Business is making Your Business look good"

 

[Jillbeans]

Yay! Thanks Evan. Wonder why I can't see it? You know me, I am not good with this stuff.

 

[TyrantDesigner]

I don't use any of it, word of mouth advertising (and the occasional goody branded with contact info) go a lot farther in my business. Facebook is decent for bars and restaurants and even retail stores to promote sales and generate interest on events ... twitter is one I would use and have used a lot ... generally because people subscribe with their phone, I can do give aways that I can easily track through retweets and because posts are simple and to the point. linkedin ... meh, 90% of the people and 'businesses' on there are looking for money or work themselves ... pass on that. Really having a blog generated me the most business before ... people could see the up to date on their project, see what the process is before getting started and only required 1-3 photos and a few paragraphs every couple of days ... we probably spend more time on signs 101 than what you could on a shop blog. When I work for myself fully again I will probably have a facebook and twitter devoted to the shop but really only as info sources.

 

[SightLine]

Zero social media here.

 

[CheapVehicleWrap]

I do notice almost everyone on Facebook is CHEAP!

I'm on Facebook.

 

[jkdbjj]

Wow, great replies.
Insignia, I am looking into that exact approach this coming week. I decided to try it on my own, but I just can't do it. My background is in marketing, so I get the strategy, but I also realize and respect the fact, for it to work it needs to be a dedicated approach. Which I can't do right now.

BTW, got your print sample yesterday! Very nice work and I appreciate you sending it out.

 

[James Burke]

I think like any marketing effort, social media is only one piece of the pie. And with that in mind, you need to carefully measure the results to accurately determine your ROI.

Sure, social media is "free" to use, but the time it consumes is not free. You'd be surprised how many business owners don't comprehend the value of their time.


JB

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Sure, social media is "free" to use, but the time it consumes is not free. You'd be surprised how many business owners don't comprehend the value of their time.

Very true. Always why I make the joke that I might have to hire someone specifically for all this social media stuff if I do more then one or two.

 

[signswi]

Use Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+ but only as part of a larger web presence campaign, not as end goals.

 

[SD&F]

I have been doing it for awhile and it is extremely time consuming. I really haven't seen a lot of top$$ coming in from it, but it can't hurt.

 

[2B]

YES!!! Social media isn't appropriate for every business, and your target clientele will determine if it's justifiable, but for us it is very much so. We don't manage ours ourselves, we hired a marketing company last year (best thing we ever did) and part of the services they provide us is managing all of our social media platforms.

We saw a 42% increase last year in sales, almost entirely attributable to our marketing firm, and of that growth, much of it can be either directly or indirectly linked to our social media presence. That said social media on it's own isn't very valuable, it has to be strategically planned and implemented in a much larger and very well rounded advertising/marketing program. It's not a magic bullet on it's own, it's just one important piece of a larger puzzle.

does this 42% increase come before or after you pay the marketing firm? if before what is the ROI ratio to the cost of the marketing firm to the increased sales?