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You are a small business owner and you can’t possibly make room for another social media tool, right? You’re lucky if you can remember to post to Facebook this week. Well, as we all know, more and more business is being done online than ever. Even if the transaction doesn’t take place online-this is where customers are won. It’s not just about ecommerce sales either. Relationships are built in social media, consumers are educated here, and loyalty is nourished here.

Check out Google’s “Search Plus Your World”

Can’t I Just Ignore this Google+ Thing?

Our clients want to know, what is Google+ and do I have to worry about it? In short, you do if your competition is doing it. Google+ and Your World will now be incorporated into the Google SERPs (Search Engine Results Page). So, that means all those = signs and how people in your Google + social circles recommend things by clicking the + sign will show up in Google search results. Basically, Search just married Social Media so you can be influenced by your friends’ opinions. For example, your friend posts on Google+ that her new LG flat screen is the best purchase she ever made and 250 of her friends comment on how they agree….LG just surged in your query “What kind of flat screen TV should I buy?”

Is Google+ Good or Bad?

Of course, there is a ton of discussion going on about how this will affect businesses, users, and privacy. Get Busy Media reviews the Pros and Cons of Google+. But the bottom line is, if you are not actively participating, sharing your content and promoting your business on Google+ and your competition is, then get ready for your competition to rise above you in the SERPs. So, actually it doesn’t matter if it is good or bad, it just is.

What about Facebook and Twitter?

No, Google isn’t going to crawl Facebook data to include in their search data. They don’t have to. Facebook and Twitter have not allowed Google to scour their social data and it is unlikely Google wants to include other social sites’ user data just to be “nice”. Google will allow YouTube data to be included though. So, keep posting those videos about your new products!

I’m Only One Person

How are you going to keep up with yet another place? Well, you know your business. You have worthwhile information to share with your customers. All you have to do is put it out there on a regular basis. Making it a habit might be hard, but putting it out there doesn’t have to be. For that there is Hootsuite. Set up a dashboard in Hootsuite and you can easily manage all of your social media channels. At the time of this writing, Hootsuite includes Google+ on their Pro version only, which is a paid service. Be on the lookout for that to change. . Keep sharing great content via your blog. Then share a link to that article everywhere else-like Linkedin, Facebook, Twitter, and don’t forget Google+.

We get this question a lot. Social Media may have started out as a questionable marketing tactic to some companies, but Facebook is the Mac-daddy of all social media, right? It is not going away any time soon and Facebook is constantly improving the features for developers and users which will broaden commercial use of the site.

At this point, most business owners agree that a Facebook Page is a smart tool to be used as part of your marketing strategy because it is an easy way to build your community of customers. This free tool allows you another opportunity to have a professional web presence, engage with your customers, and build a loyal community.

Facebook Profiles are for Humans. Facebook Pages are for Businesses.
This actually still confuses some people. Facebook Terms make it very clear that they do not want businesses creating Facebook Profiles. They even published a link to help businesses migrate a Facebook Profile to a Business Page for a time. That feature no longer exists, which makes one wonder if they are going to crack down on companies operating as profiles. A business choosing to use a Facebook Profile to represent their business does run the risk of being deleted by Facebook. You don’t want that to happen.

Facebook Personal Profiles are designed for humans. By using privacy settings, owners have control over who they invite to be “friends” and what content is seen. There is a maximum currently of 5,000 friends per Personal Profile. So, if your business went down this road it is only a matter of time before you hit the limit.

Facebook Pages are designed for Business, brands, or public figures. Previously known as “Fan Pages”, Facebook Pages are public. Anyone can see a Business Facebook Page, including the search engines. No doubt you want Google to be able to index your Facebook Page. Visitors can “like” your page which will then appear on their own personal Facebook Profile. But more importantly, the content that your business posts will appear in their Newsfeed. So now, they are aware of your latest announcement and they can share it with their friends who will hopefully “like” you as well. Now we’re talking about growing your business and spreading your name. The other benefit to a Business Facebook Page is the Analytics. This data gives us real information about our visitors, so we can get to know our customers better, and give them what they want.

Converting Friends to Fans
There is just no getting around the fact that individuals absolutely have to go “like” your Facebook page on their own. You can ask them nicely, you can even give them an incentive and post it on the Profile, but you can’t do it for them. Having both a Facebook Personal Profile Page and a Facebook Business Page could truly cause confusion. At some point an owner must decide whether to delete the Profile, semi-hide it with privacy settings, or let it sit idle.