It used to be the case that a company had to have its own website to be on the cutting edge of promoting their business online. You not only had to have a website you had to promote the site through paying for expensive SEO fees or participate in the many pay per click advertising platforms to drive traffic. The tide has once again turned and all of those expensive methods of promotion are no longer a necessity to succeed online.

Numerous companies and organizations are having great success online with or without a website by promoting their name, brand, products and services through various social media marketing campaigns. Each social media platform has its own method of participation and in many cases the audience you are trying to reach will work better on one platform then it will on another. Some companies will have separate campaigns on several social media sites while others concentrate on one particular platform. Regardless of how many and which sites you promote with, the key to success is having a strategic plan in place. Marketing your business through social media is no different than any other promotional campaign; you need to clearly spell out goals and objectives prior to spending any serious time, energy or funding.

Remember as I stated earlier by participating in a well planned social media marketing plan, you may no longer need to fund the traditional methods of driving traffic to your website. Social media campaigns run by most company’s can be handled internally with their own staff and resources, which will usually be less costly then out sourcing. Additionally as your campaign moves forward you will likely be spending less time and resources while achieving more success as your popularity grows.

Any company can have success with social media. If you don’t know where to get started look at what others are doing in your particular industry with social media and put together a campaign similar to theirs. Much company’s put a lot of effort into this type of promotion for a reason, because it works.

TurnKey Internet just recently launched an aggressive social media campaign to gain followers on several of the most popular social platforms. The campaign revolves around some fairly aggressive marketing tactics to attract visitors to their numerous websites . Once a new visitor lands on one of the Turnkey pages they are prompted by a popup offer to join one, any or all of the social media vehicles Turnkey uses to promote their business. The caveat is a discount offer tied to each social media outlet that will only be provided to the visitor when they become a follower of Turnkey on any of the social media platforms. This is a great example of a very in depth and well thought out strategy with clear goals and objectives in place.

There is no reason any company can’t take advantage of the FREE promotional opportunities that social media platforms offer. This is like anything else in life, your results will be dependent on the thought and effort you put forth.

If you were to type “Social Media and your business” into any search engine, you would most likely receive countless pages and numerous ideas, on how your company can benefit by the utilization of such tools.  Every link you can click on, each person’s different views on the subject, a different rendition however all the same points.

Yes, we all know Social Media can help your business in a multitude of ways.  So let’s be different, let’s take a minute or two to talk about what you’re going to see, upcoming on Turnkey’s social media.

As you know, we are currently running a summer long Social Media contest. Well, contests to be exact. This is your change to take part in daily, weekly and monthly contests, drawings and games. This is your chance to interact with the Turnkey Staff like never before.  Say, maybe games where you win a free month of hosting by contacting a certain staff member and revealing “the secret code”.  Who can get us the most likes on Facebook?  You just never know what that specific day can bring, however I can guarantee you, following us on our social media pages will be without a doubt, worth your while.

So be sure to like us on Facebook, friend us on Twitter, give us a quick + on Google and be sure to find us on Linkedin.

Social media is here to stay. It’s about as mainstream as mainstream gets and pretty much everyone has realized the import of the medium for businesses. As a marketing tool, it’s invaluable, though not without its pitfalls. I have written before about how to use social media to grow your business, market products and run specials. Today I am going to talk about how to use social media to build your business’ reputation with customers.

Interacting with customers in a public way is commonplace on the Internet, but on social networks it gets personal. Social networks, by their very nature, encourage participation, interaction and conversation. For individuals that makes keeping active friendships easier. It keeps families closer. It provides a forum for debating the issues of our day. From a business perspective, it presents a potential problem. In some cases, without the proper forethought, monitoring and attention, that problem can be devastating.

For a business, customer service is a cornerstone of growth. Without good customer service any business can fail, and fail fast. With social networks, customer interaction becomes virally public. In the old days, a customer might complain on a forum or on a blog, but today they complain in a Facebook feed… YOUR Facebook feed… and everyone sees it in real time. How you handle that complaint will define your customer service to existing and potential customers. This makes developing an internal customer service policy for social networks paramount. But how many companies are doing this? Is this critical element of social media business being ignored?

On a social network, a snide remark from a tired employee can influence thousands of potential customers. Incorrect information can snowball into a support nightmare in minutes. Every single interaction is being watched by your customer base, your bread and butter. If you’re not coaching your employees on how to handle social network interactions, you better start… fast.

One way to handle this is to restrict access to your social network account. Only give access to employees you trust, who understand the importance of decorum. It is also very helpful to develop a standard policy for social media interactions that focuses on openness, honesty and fairness. The good side of this kind of transparency is that customers can see when one of their own is being unreasonable just as easily as they can see everything else. If you handle interactions admirably, you will build trust, a kind of trust that no amount of traditional marketing can create.

So the social media of our times is one of the most useful and personal tools we’ve ever had for business. It crosses the divide between personal and commercial, paving the way for companies to build relationships like they used to in the mom and pop businesses of old. But with that incredible access comes great risk. Developing a strategy for social media interaction today will help protect your company tomorrow.