When I get invited to an event as a guest speaker or invited to consult on social media with a client, inevitably the lead question is nearly always something along the lines of…

“Can you explain how we should be using Facebook or Twitter”?

Many brand names have become synonymous with the action we wish to perform:

• “Google for…” instead of “Search for…”
• “Hoover the house” instead of “Vacuum the house”
• “Sellotape it together” instead of “Sticky tape it together”

This is true with marketing terms too.

Social Media Defined

In relation to Social Media, the correct term is Inbound Marketing, the act of drawing potential customers to you; as opposed to Interruption Marketing which attempts to pull customers to you.

As for Facebook and Twitter, these are just channels which you can use for either Inbound or Interruption Marketing. Unfortunately, it’s the later that many companies end up inadvertently doing, and mistakenly believe they are using “Social Media” effectively.

They then question why it doesn’t work for them.

Create Something of Value

When you created your product or service, you did so because it provided value. If it didn’t then your business wouldn’t last very long.

If you think of Social Media in these terms, this is what you need to do with your marketing, create marketing assets of value. And this is what many companies find so hard to do, because it’s similar to creating a product.

It’s unlike traditional marketing in which, in the simplest terms, you create just a message.

Those “assets of value” are content; it’s “how-to” videos, “10 ways to..” articles, case studies, stories, advice, faqs and market sector news curation.

The Rest is Easy

Once you have the content, then you can push it out through the channels, Facebook, Twitter etc.

Produce enough quality content and your marketing becomes a magnet regardless of channel or medium. Keep your content focused and you’ll discover additional benefits such as your market sector authority growing and more traffic from the search engines, as your search engine optimisation grows naturally.

This is the true power of Inbound Marketing, whether it’s through Social Media, offline through talks and conferences, or just having something useful to offer on Twitter.

For a visual example of Inbound Marketing see the infographic below from the whole brain group: