Does Social Media Marketing Really Work?

There it is.  The question that every business that is trying to stay ahead of the game is asking.  What can I do to promote my business and get the best bang for my buck?  Do I pour money into my website?  Do I jump on the Twitter and Facebook bandwagons?  Will my customers really care that I am sitting down to eat pizza with @co-worker at @PizzaHut?  What's with all the @'s anyway?  How about blogging?  I can sit here and write paragraphs and spend hours tweaking the wording to make it sound good, but how do I get people to read the blog?  It sits there on my website and I don't even know if anyone looks at it.  

My advice to you is to stop looking at Social Media from your perspective and start looking at it from the perspective of your client.  Social Media meets your clients where they are comfortable.  They are not receiving phone calls from you while they are sitting to eat at the dinner table.  Their mailbox is not filled with junk mail, so they can not complain about all the tree's that you are killing. You are not knocking on their door, or interrupting their favorite television show.

You meet your clients when they take a break from life.  You meet your clients when they are sitting with their feet up in a robe.  Your clients come to you.  With Facebook bragging over 350,000,000 users and over half of those users logging in on a daily basis, you have a great chance to meet your clients frequently.  While they are looking for some new gossip to share at work tomorrow, or viewing pictures from Josh and Kalee's Wedding, or laughing hysterical at a video that Jimbo sent them.  Not only when they are comfortable, but you are being recommended by your customers friends.  

Here is how it works... Let's say you make an incredible apple pie.  That is your product.  I happen to LOVE your apple pie.  I love your pie so much that I become a fan of your fan page on facebook.  I become a fan because I want to know when that pie is going to be on sale.  When I become a fan, immediately a message is sent to every one of my friends telling them that I am a fan of your apple pie.  Of course I am a fan of your apple pie.  First of all, it is american to love apple pie, secondly it's a darn good apple pie.  Let's say of my 1,020 friends on Facebook 10% of those friends like apple pie too!  I just told them about the best pie anywhere!  It came from me!  Not a company trying to sell them something.  They know I have good taste!  Boom, You just gained 100 fans, who will in turn without any effort on their part pass the info onto all of their friends.

 All of this is dependent on your product being the best apple pie in america, but you already know that your product is the best.  Social Media allows the other people who love your product to tell all their friends about it!

Facebook is one example of social media.  Other mediums may work better for your company.  I am telling you this though... Apple Pie has 10,737 fans on facebook.  That should say something!