8. Overwhelmed? Get Help.
You know building a fan base isn't easy. "Most people won't spontaneously want to become fans of your company," says Victoria Ransom, the CEO of Wildfire Interactive, a Palo Alto, California, company that specializes in helping businesses attract fans on Facebook and followers on Twitter. "You have to give customers a reason to engage with your brand." For anywhere from a few hundred dollars to thousands of dollars, Ransom's company will build you a Facebook application designed to attract new fans to your company's page. The applications typically try to entice users with a contest -- say, a chance to win a $50 gift certificate -- or a coupon. Once a customer clicks on the link, she is directed to a page that asks her to input her Facebook account information. When the customer completes the form, a link to the promotion typically will be published on her Facebook page, which can attract more fans. Read more.
9. Tackle Customer Complaints More Efficiently.
Andy Carlson, owner of an Ace Hardware store in Denver, once came across an angry Twitter update from a customer who had bought a tool that broke after one use. He resolved the issue in a matter of minutes by referring the customer to an area store and notified him of Ace's lifetime guarantee. Best of all, he was able to catch the complaint after store hours—and prevent negative word of mouth. Of course, there's always the temptation to lash out at a harsh rebuke of your business on sites like Yelp. Resist that temptation. It will save your reputation, and stop you from wasting time. Remember: don't feed the trolls. Read more.
10. Let Fans Be The Star – While Helping You.
FrontPoint Security, a home security provider in McLean, Virginia, began collecting video testimonials from its customers, who filmed themselves with Flip cameras. The videos are posted on FrontPoint's site and on YouTube, and even some customers' personal blogs. Video efforts have helped the company more than triple its sales leads. Sometimes, social media fans are willing to take the initiative to spread the word about your company. Crafts supplies manufacturer Fiskars reached out to scrapbookers by inviting four avid users to blog. Its crafts community, called Fiskateers, has since attracted 5,000 users who serve as brand evangelists. Read more.
11. Think Q&A.
Customers love to give input on products and services when asked. They also sometimes throw out questions about you – and you want to be among the first to answer them. Some important sites in this field to familiarize yourself with are Yelp, Yahoo! Answers, and Mahalo. Yelp has millions of reviews of local businesses around the United States. It's free to set up an account, and it allows you to answer questions about your business and see how many users are scoping out your business' page. Setting up a detailed profile with useful information, such as images and a link to your website, will give your company more visibility and clout. You might also offer special discounts or promotions to customers that give you a review. The upside of Yahoo! Answers is that it is immensely popular and largely dominates the Q & A market. However, the quality of the answers is typically low because absolutely anyone can ask or answer a question. On the bright side, that just gives your well-thought-out response more of a chance to shine. Mahalo is a human-powered search engine with a growing Q & A section. That section allows users to post a question and offer a monetary prize or tip for the best answer. A $50 or $100 tip can draw dozens of respondents who are incentivized to think hard about your question and your brand. It's like an instant, public focus group with marketing built in," says Jason Calacanis, Mahalo's CEO. Read more.
12. Get a Fan Facelift
If you just want a bigger audience, getting more fans never hurts. In a ploy to boost holiday sales, Edible Arrangements, a Wallingford, Connecticut, franchiser that sells fruit baskets, announced in October that it would be giving away a coupon that could be redeemed for a $15 box of chocolate-dipped fruit to the first 100,000 people who became a fan of the company on Facebook. Within four days, Edible Arrangements had reached its goal. Many of the new fans went on to make a purchase. Sales were up more than 10 percent compared with the previous year. "The Facebook program exposed a lot of new customers to the company," says Stephen Thomas, the company's vice president of marketing. Edible Arrangements paid about $15,000 for the promotion, plus the cost of the free merchandise. If you can't afford to give stuff away, you can always just ask customers to give you some Facebook love for free. That was the approach taken by Powell's Books, a bookstore in Portland, Oregon. Beginning in 2008, the company placed small graphics at the bottom of every page on its website and e-mail newsletters. These little advertisements entreated customers to "Find us on Facebook" and "Follow us on Twitter." For a month, Powell's even used the marquee in front of its store to ask for Facebook fans, which was surprisingly effective, says Megan Zabel, who manages the company's social media efforts. Over the course of a year, the company went from roughly 3,000 fans on Facebook to 38,500 and from a few hundred followers on Twitter to more than 12,000. Read more.
