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The way to get “found” today by potential clients and raving fans who deliver referrals to your inbox is to start socializing. Specifically, you need a presence on social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn, or a blog where you can tell your story and provide that free information customers crave.
Industry marketing consultants believe that not using social media is no longer an option: That means at least starting a Facebook fan page for your business, and filling out a LinkedIn profile (completely). “Our future customers are going to expect to find us online,” says Chris Heiler, marketing strategist and founder of LandscapeLeadership.com. “Not all of our customers now are on Facebook, but five years from now, they will be, and they expect to find us there. So, in some capacity, a company has to get on board and get active.”
Where to start?
“The best thing to do is to get out there and engage,” says Jeff Korhan, who blogs and consults about new media and small business marketing. In his 35 years of marketing experience, Korhan says social media is “the opportunity of a lifetime.”
Why? Well, first of all, it’s free. And second, businesses that invest time in developing a following now could set themselves apart from competitors in the industry that are slow to dabble in social media.
Essentially, social media is the new way to go to market: by building friends, linking in with contacts, sharing information and doing so in a non-promotional way. Social media is a key driver for referrals in today’s mobile consumer universe.
Lawn & Landscape spoke to three firms to learn how they successfully use various forms of social media to cement their brand and attract fans who could become customers.
Building community
Susan Cohan was an early adopter of online content marketing, whetting her appetite for the power of participation and information sharing on garden Web forums. Twelve years ago, that was the only type of social media. So Cohan spent a good decade answering questions and starting discussions, then in 2007 she started her own blog: Miss Rumphius’ Rules (www.susancohangardens.com/blog/).
“For the first two years, I had two readers and I was one of them,” laughs Cohan, a landscape and garden design consultant. “I didn’t know about all the things you need to do to have a successful blog.”
Cohan’s blog has evolved over the years into a professional platform – an engaging, well-populated, mixer environment where a mishmash of people gather to read and comment on her posts. This happens because Cohan has dedicated time to seek out a target blogger community, comment on reputable blogs and update her own online news reel regularly.
“The most important thing I learned about blogging is that you have to be consistent and totally authentic in your voice,” Cohan says, calling Facebook and Twitter microblogs that complement Miss Rumphius’ Rules. (She may post links on these social media sites, but she always creates new content.) Another important thing she has learned: Don’t spread yourself too thin on social media. Pick the platforms that work for your business, and use them religiously.
“You can’t be (involved) everywhere, and if you are on all of (the social media sites), you are a robot and people won’t listen to you,” Cohan says, referring to automated systems where a user can program and roll out Facebook posts and Tweets and tools that allow you to post one time across multiple social media platforms. Cohan prefers a more personal approach – and so do her followers.
“Blogging is a visual sport,” she says. “People want to see pictures, so I carry my camera with me everywhere.” She posts work-in-progress photos from projects, and her weekly feature, Tuesday’s Find, highlights interesting garden antiques and finds, along with a question to prompt reader feedback.
She dedicates time to answer all comments on her blog. “When someone takes the time to comment, you have to respect their time with a response,” she says.
In the past few years, Cohan’s blog has cemented her reputation in her field and expanded her network of client prospects. Twitter (@susancohan) has helped drive new contacts, she says. “But the mistake people make with Twitter is they follow people who are like themselves. I try to follow people outside of my discipline,” she says. Cohan follows designers in various fields, magazines and writers. “I establish myself carefully as an authority in my field – someone whose work they might want to look at.”
Cohan is active on Facebook (www.facebook.com/susancohan) and this year decided to purchase a Facebook ad. It was ZIP code targeted, and the ad stayed online for 10 days. Cohan got a call from someone who saw the ad, clicked through to Cohan’s Facebook page and approached Cohan for services. Cohan admits she was somewhat surprised by the response. But for $400, the investment was well worth it. In fact, she has essentially traded traditional marketing, such as sending postcards, for social media like blogging and being active on Facebook and Twitter.
As for keeping up with offering this experience, Cohan commits to blogging three times each week, spends about an hour each day on Twitter and five minutes updating Facebook. She focuses on quality followers. “I don’t care if I have 100,000 followers on Twitter,” she says. “I can’t service 100,000 clients. I’m really looking for engaged followers who I can spur into action in some way.”
That way is usually a referral: a follower has a friend, who has a friend, who sends that person to Cohan’s blog, who checks out her portfolio, who then calls Cohan for more information. And having a web presence is essential today, she says. “It’s important to share, and share broadly,” she says. “And be your own person. Be the voice.”
Creating a following
Twitter has become somewhat of a pet project for Scott Jamieson, vice president, Bartlett Tree Experts. While the corporation has its own Twitter and Facebook accounts, Jamieson’s handle, @ChicagoTreeMD, is not all about the business. It is, however, all about trees. To gain a sense of control over what is a vast, diverse universe of online talk, Jamieson has taken on Twitter as “a personal mission to understand it and build some community.”
“The power in Twitter is individual,” says Jamieson, explaining why he decided to open his own Twitter account a year ago after talking with a marketing professional who advised him to dabble in social media. “Can companies tweet? Absolutely,” he says. “But people want to know who is behind that tweet. Who is Bartlett Tree? When it’s ChicagoTreeMD, they know that tweet is from me.”
Jamieson’s goal is to deliver worthwhile information in a light, concise, interesting format. Twitter is just the platform to serve up this order. “People want something of value,” he emphasizes, underscoring how the old days of output marketing – sending the public a message – have been traded in for two-way, relationship/information based sharing. People want to learn, and they want to get to know you. “Give me information. Make me laugh. Make me want to connect with you,” Jamieson says.
“The main thing with Twitter is this building of community that does not have a direct linkage to sales,” he adds. “It’s networking, building trust, creating a sense of community and expertise – ‘If I want to learn about trees, I’ll go to @ChicagoTreeMD.’ I’m hoping at one point I’ll connect (followers) to the business.”
There are certainly links. For instance, Bartlett Tree has been involved with helping the Toomer’s Corner poisoned oak trees at Auburn University in Alabama. He made the connection via a tweet. “From that perspective, I’m providing insight that followers might find useful and ultimately retweet,” he says.
Jamieson shares insight from trade shows with on-the-spot tweets. He has attracted people to his booth this way.
People have even approached Jamieson at shows and events after recognizing his photo from Twitter.
“I have seen amazing things where I connect with people, tweet with them and go to a trade show and then people I have only seen online come up and say, ‘I know you,’” Jamieson says. “It’s like you know them through conversation and you can just pick up.”
But how does a company achieve a personal connection? The key, Jamieson says, is to ensure that tweets and Facebook posts are congruent with the brand. A company needs a strategy: a plan that integrates social media into the overall marketing picture.
“I see us working hard corporately to establish a social media strategy,” he says.
“As a larger corporation that has been more traditional marketing focused, we are trying to work hard at having social media as an integral part of our complete marketing strategy. It’s not a separate thing.”
Delivering information
Once you get into the groove of blogging, when you miss a daily post you feel like something’s missing. “The whole day you feel off,” says David Marciniak, owner and lead designer at Revolutionary Gardens, Manassas Park, Va.
“My blog is my website,” Marciniak says of http://revolutionarygardens.com. Information sharing is his mission and a way he differentiates his business from competitors. “We’re not building rockets,” he says. “Homeowners want information to be accessible to them, and there is reciprocity at play if they find someone who is willing to share that information. It advances me as the authority.”
Marciniak started blogging in 2008 when he took his business full time. “It was definitely a lousy time in the economy,” he says, adding that social media has allowed him to cast a wider net, capture more leads, prompt referrals and nurture relationships so those friends eventually become customers. “There are only so many hours in a day, and social media allows you to be in more than one place at a time, and it gives you cheerleaders who help move you forward,” he says.
Most of Marciniak’s social media time is spent blogging. He posts four days a week, Monday through Thursday – and sometimes Fridays, if he has photos or a tip of the day he wants to share. He doesn’t worry so much about length. “You don’t need to be churning out ‘War and Peace’ every time you sit down at the computer,” he says. “What amazes me is how much people really dig on seeing progress photos or job-site photos, or even plan drawings or renderings.”
Marciniak spends about a half-hour writing each blog. He spends an hour daily on Twitter (@revgardens) following threads. Facebook (www.facebook.com/RevolutionaryGardens) reinforces his blog: He posts links to blog updates, and posts photos and other teasers that eventually guide “friends” to the blog.
As for LinkedIn, Marciniak is still playing with ways to utilize this tool. For now, he treats it as an online resume. His business cards contain a QR code on the back that takes contacts directly to his LinkedIn profile. “They can add me as a contact – it’s a short-hand way to exchange business information,” Marciniak says.
Converting friends into clients isn’t Marciniak’s focus for social media. But he notes that the sales closing rate for people who find him through his blog is about 60-70 percent. That’s because clients can essentially prequalify themselves by reading his blog.
“They get a sense of the type of work I do, my business philosophy and my personality,” he says. “At that point, they can decide whether this is the level of service they want.”
Meanwhile, Facebook drives in leads from his vast network of contacts, which includes friends of friends who learn about his business from job-site photos he posts. “Where the value comes in is through those referrals – where someone who is in my network shares a post or photo with someone in their network, and that comes back to me,” Marciniak says.
But using blogs and other content marketing tools only works if you’re consistent. People have high expectations: They want updates, often. “If you decide to blog, you have to be firm and steadfast in your commitment,” he says. “You have to make time for it.”
The author is a frequent contributor to Lawn & Landscape.
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