Sunstar Creative

Social Media Marketing Luncheon (Victoria, BC) Recap

Jul 1, 2009 Social Media Marketing Victoria, Social Networking Online

Well, the event yesterday was a great success, and we had a huge turnout of nearly 60 people

Steve Walker-Duncan of Ambrosia was our wonderful host – we had the ballroom and a great spread of food (he even accommodated the vegans in the group!)

We’ve received some excellent feedback, and I’ve noticed quite a few new followers to www.twitter.com/sunstar_media since the event. So you’re all learning to tweet and loving it, right?

10 Reasons to Use Social Media Marketing for your business

1. Reputation Management
From Radically Transparent (book) “In 2007, Dell faced a potential media crisis when news reports revealed its laptops were bursting into flames. Instead of waiting to respond to any resulting media attack, Dell’s Lionel Menchaca took the bold step of posting video of a Dell machine in flames on the Direct2Dell blog. While he took a lot of initial heat from Dell’s own legal counsel, Menchaca understood that this type of incident would quickly spread through the blogosphere, so Dell would be wise to play host to any comments or questions about the incident”.
2. Listen to what others are saying about you – You can set up Google Alerts
3. Great information – Get useful industry info to keep you competitive in your field.
4. Recruitment of new talent (impress and attract new talent).
5. Networking – Networks that were previously hidden from view – like perhaps someone you know happens to be friends with a CEO you want to meet – are now available.  On LinkedIn you can request an introduction to the person you want to meet.
6. Ask Questions – I used Twitter for preparing the talk. Great tool for market research too. (and don’t forget to use the Twitter Question Hashtag – #question at the end of the sentence so all of Twitter can help you out)
7. Increase Traffic – Get more people reading your blog and visiting your website
8. Be seen as an expert in your field – We give information we could probably charge for away for free because it places us in a position of an expert.
9. Build a buzz about what is new with your business, what you’re doing in community
10. SEO – Inbound links – when you write on someone’s blog or create an account with Linked In – that benefits your website ranking.

Other Useful Items from the Talk on June 30th

Michael Geoghegan (@BCLobbyist on Twitter) spoke about his experience using Twitter for business. He mentioned that he often finds out about breaking news from Twitter long before it hits the TV news stations. In fact – he has been interviewed by the media several times on topics that he “tweeted” about. Michael also found one of his newest associates on Twitter. (Thanks again for coming out to the event Michael, your Twitter testimonial was a highlight of the lecture.)

Tweetdeck – an easy way to organize Twitter on your desktop

Naked Pizza – reports that 15% of business comes from Twitter everyday