Written by Phyllis Zimbler Miller, Twitter Marketing Expert
How do you combine Twitter with Facebook and your website to create an effective online marketing strategy that is more than the sum of the parts?
Step 1 – Create a Twitter profile that connects to your business
If you have an Internet marketing business, for example, it is common sense that your Twitter profile and many of your tweets will have to do with sharing Internet marketing information. You wouldn’t want to have your profile and your tweets only talk about your karate practice if you want to make potential business connections on Twitter.
Step 2 – Create a professional-focused Facebook fan page (Facebook’s term for business page)
You must first have a profile (personal page) before you can create a Facebook fan page. Then create a Facebook fan page, taking advantage of the 75 characters allowed in the title of the page. (Think keywords internally and externally.) FYI – You can’t change the fan page title once you’ve entered it.
It’s a good idea to name another admin for your Facebook fan page in case something happens to your own Facebook account. (Another admin can make changes on the page without knowing your Facebook password.)
Caution: Even if you have strong privacy controls on your Facebook profile page, keep the photos and your comments professional. You do not want to risk a potential business contact catching a glimpse of … whatever.
Now here’s an example of the potential cross-promotional opportunities:
You can use FBML (Facebook’s markup language) to put the email optin code from your website into the left-hand column of the Facebook fan page. And you can even put that same code, thanks to the profile html option, onto the left-hand column of your Facebook profile.
If you are offering an enticing freebie, you should be able to get email optins without having to send people off Facebook to your website. And there’s even room in the limited profile html and FBML options to squeeze in one or two social media icons such as links to your Twitter and LinkedIn accounts.
Step 3 – Add a Facebook fan page widget to your website
This widget — which can be configured in different ways when you get it through your Facebook fan page — enables visitors to your website to become a fan of your Facebook fan page without ever leaving your website.
Or, if visitors want, they can click on the title of your Facebook fan page (at the top of the widget) and visit your Facebook fan page directly from your website.
Step 4 – Review your Twitter, Facebook fan page and website for consistent images and messages
• Use the same (good) photo of you on all three sites to help the instant recognition factor.
• Make sure that the overall message on Twitter, your Facebook fan page, and your website is consistent with a professional representation of your brand, book or business.
• Consider activities, such as running contests on Twitter, to encourage people to move from following you on Twitter to becoming a fan of your Facebook fan page to opting in to your email list.
For more information on combining Twitter, Facebook and your website, get the free report “Twitter, Facebook and Your Website: A Beginning Blueprint to Harnessing the Power of 3 for Your Business” at http://www.MillerMosaicPowerof3.com
This is great advice, Phyllis. Branding is important for every business whether you’re an author with a newly published book or a major corporation. Your brand must be consistent across all platforms or you lose some of the power of your presence on and off the Internet.
I agree with you Bob as social media as made it easier and also more essential to take brand watching more efficiently and every website owner seems to feel the need to take care of its brand online.
And because the Internet enables people to see everything we’ve posted on the web, we must always be careful of what we write online as well as monitor what people are saying about us online.
I just wish my daughters would get that through their heads. A lot of what I’ve seen them write in their Facebook pages is really going to come back to haunt them in the future.
Bob –
The Wall Street Journal has had several articles on how employers look at Facebook and other social media sites to evaluate potential employees. Maybe these articles could convince your daughters to be prudent in what they write on Facebook.
Just the other day I suggested to a young woman on Facebook that she eliminate the glass of wine from her Facebook profile photo. The problem with that photo was that my eyes fastened on the glass and barely looked at her face. She thanked me, took my advice, and replied that she wasn’t even drinking wine any more so the photo with the wine truly wasn’t about her now.
Sometimes it takes outsiders to convince children that our parental wisdom is actually worthwhile.
Phyllis
Thanks, Phyllis. An excellent point. That might even be a low cost service for you to offer. Reviewing people’s social media sites and writing a recommendation profile.
In the past, people have had someone review and change their resume. With social media becoming the new “resume,” it would be prudent for all of us to have our social media reviewed by and third party.
I’m sure there are a lot of people who would be shocked to find out how innappropriate some of the things in their profiles are.
Bob —
What an interesting idea, especially as we’ve just started offering the Miller Mosaic power of 3 social media make-over at http://www.millermosaicllc.com/social-media-make-over after I realized people’s reluctance to leave their ineffective websites. (I wrote a blog post about this at http://budurl.com/wedded )
This new service could be a mini-version of the above service. I just wonder if the people who have inappropriate profiles would even realize they need help.
Phyllis