What should small business talk about on Social Media?

When any small business decides to go 'online' and start promoting their business, the same fear is felt by most owners.
Lee Kenny, Managing Director at Snowflake MediaLee Kenny, Managing Director at Snowflake Media
Lee Kenny, Managing Director at Snowflake Media

“What am I going to talk about?”: Yes, as a business owner you know your product knowledge inside out, know what your customers need to know. Very soon though you get a sense of confusion over how many different ways you can say essentially the same thing.

Be the Ball: I love this quote from the film Caddyshack, it has some validity in that you need to “Be the customer”

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What interests do they have besides buying your absolutely perfect services?

I was fortunately enough to head up The Golf Channel TV network for 4 years and if our programmes and adverts would have been solely Golf related products, it would not have been very successful. In fact pick up any golf magazine from the newsagents and see how many of the articles and adverts are for Cars, Fashion, Jewellery or Travel. They vastly outnumber Golf.

More business: MOT changes are coming – is your car ready?How can you apply this to social media for your business?

Well if you consider what interests your customers. They may include the following:Fashion and Style; Travel; The weather (Yes, everyone talks about the weather); Industry knowledge; Discounts and sales; Local news; National News; Trends in a particular sector; New launches; Technology; Staff profiles and news; Case Studies.

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The list is an endless one, but you should be able to narrowly define 5 or 6 things that your business is known for on social media. Of course relevance is the key. If you are an electronics retailer, talking about Travel doesn’t always fit.

If you look at Social Snowflakes non-sales communications, they broadly fall in to five areas: Online Marketing; Technology; Productivity (We work with a lot of small businesses); Creativity and design; Motivation and Inspiration stories.

Our Digital Renovators company, which creates websites for businesses, has a slightly different audience therefore needs to produce different content. The team here choose to focus on:

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Local stories, even though 75% of the customers are still National or International, we aim to be number 1 in this area for helping businesses succeed online

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Search Engine Optimisation and how to attract more people to your site

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How to use social media effectively to generate customers

More business: Halifax restaurant Inn Cognito to close after 35 yearsYou may have heard the phrase “Be interested rather than Interesting”. With social media you should aim to be both interested in the needs of your reader and prospective customer but also provide materials and insight that they will find interesting.

What works in your business? What do you see and hear your existing customers talking about. Social Media should be Sociable, not just business.

Have a great weekend!