setting up on the 3 major platforms.
by sandi leyva
the complete guide to marketing for tax & accounting firms
social media can be a great marketing channel, but the big challenge is how to keep it from draining all of your time. the key is having rock-solid systems and procedures and time limits.
more small firm growth strategies: make google adwords work for you | the 5 c’s of successful websites | speaking: how, where and getting leads from it | 3 more kinds of referrals | turn to the abcs for client feedback | use client ‘touch plans’ to stay in touch
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for small businesses trying out social media for the first time or with strict budgets or time limits, i recommend doing minimum activity or only being active in one of the three accounts (linkedin, facebook and twitter). once you get your procedures solidified for these minimum activities, you’ll be able to expand to more venues and more activities if you want to.
many businesses use free interns to do their social media. coupled with solid procedures, this is another good way to go.
you’ll find my approach is as hands-off as possible. i batch, automate and schedule everything i can so that i am almost absent from the social media. some people might criticize this approach, stating that the whole point of social media is to interact. but i feel that this will free up enough time so that when you do spend personal time in these systems, you have more time for true interaction.
the systems discussed here will provide you with a presence in social media. you can then add as much time as you like daily, weekly or monthly, to personally interact and respond to your constituents.
setup
profile
linkedin is free. you can grab your account at www.linkedin.com. many people ask me if they should purchase the premium version of linkedin. the answer is no, unless you are a job recruiter and/or plan to send loads of linkedin messages to people you don’t know. there is truly no reason to pay for linkedin.
to get set up, you’ll need some marketing materials:
- bio
- photo
it should only take an hour or so to fill in your profile. here are some tips for advanced effectiveness:
- when you list your former jobs, list all of them. list each division or dba in your company separately. list both employee and contractor positions. also list all the organizations you are a member or officer of. for example, i’m a member of toastmasters. that way, when you want to link to people, you can choose the organization in which you know the person instead of just your jobs. the more, the better.
- here are some examples of organizations and titles to get you started:
- your own company – president
- chambers of commerce – member
- national association of women business owners – member
- toastmasters – former member
- american heart association – donor, volunteer
- charlie’s meetup group – member
- richardson rotary – treasurer
- the sleeter group – member
- biz boost news – subscriber
- accountant’s accelerator – charter member
- aicpa – member
- intuit – contractor
- consider posting a more informal, personal bio written in first person in your summary section instead of a bio. the first question people always want to know is what’s in it for them.
connections
in these social media programs, connecting with someone can be two-way or one-way. two-way means you both have to consent to the connection. one-way means you can connect to the person, but they do not have to connect back. in linkedin, connections are two-way.
if your outlook or email contact list is clean, i recommend using the wizard provided by linkedin. otherwise, you can use the recommendations and the find function to link to people you know.
groups
join as many groups as you can on linkedin. this is where the action is.
most people join groups of their peers. that’s fine, especially if you tend to get referrals from other accounting professionals because you are niched. but don’t stop there. join groups where your clients will be hanging out. if you’re not sure, ask your clients what groups they belong to (or connect with them on linkedin and view their profiles to find out). this is where you will get some great knowledge about how best to serve your clients.
you might want to change your email settings or set a rule in linkedin about how often you want to be notified of discussion activity because your inbox can fill up fast from linkedin announcements.
recommendations
it’s important in linkedin to have your bosses, team members and clients recommend you. send about 10 initial emails to your strongest bosses and clients to ask for recommendations. here’s a sample email you can send:
subject: a favor, please
hi __,
i value the work we did together at ____ organization. i enjoyed working with you very much and i want to ask a favor.
if you are comfortable doing so, i would very much appreciate you posting a recommendation for me on linkedin.
i appreciate your time and your business.
warm regards,
your name
ongoing
to continue building your network, set a goal to get a certain number of connections and recommendations per month. there is no limit (that i know of) in linkedin for connections, but after 500, the number of connections displays 500+. if you are over 500 and want to know how many you have you can click connections and then click the gear icon on the connections page header banner on the right side. the count will be displayed on the left just below the header.
set up a folder in your email system called linkedin. set a rule to move all of the linkedin emails to the folder. once a week, or once a month, clean out the folder and respond to requests to connect, review email requests, and scan discussions in your groups. post discussion comments if you have something to add or want to increase your visibility.
facebook is free. you can go to www.facebook.com and set up your account. you’ll want to set up both a personal profile and a business page.
first, set up a personal profile using your real name. the personal profile used to have a combined limit of 5,000 friends and pages. (i’m not sure what it is now because i am just below 5,000.)
after you’ve set up your personal page, now set up your page for business. this is the place you really want people to “like.”
personal profile
to set up your profile, you’ll need:
- a photo
- your bio or a personal version of your bio
schedule an hour to get your personal profile set up. the only sections you really need to complete are the basic information, a profile picture and your contact section. be sure to then go into your privacy settings and adjust those to what you want to allow people to see about you.
if you have more time, add photos and videos of you, your education, interests, sports, and arts and entertainment.
friends
in these social media programs, connecting with someone can be two-way or one-way. two-way means you both have to consent to the connection. one-way means you can connect to the person, but they do not have to connect back. in facebook, friends are two-way, and “liking” pages, described below, is one-way.
make a strategic decision about whether you want to connect with business people or people you don’t know very well on your personal profile. if you’re worried about strangers seeing you coo over your grandbabies, or worse, the messages from your teens, you can always create a list and put your closest friends and family in one list. you can filter the messages you see and send by lists, so it’s a nice way to organize people the way you want them.
page
in the long run, you’re best off starting a business page and encouraging people to “like” it. it takes longer to build a following on a page than it does a personal profile. the reason is friends are a two-way requirement; you both have to agree to be friends. on pages, a person can “like” your page, which helps your following, but you don’t have to “like” their page back. so plenty of people are eager to friend you but far fewer are eager to “like” you.
ask your graphic artist to come up with a horizontal banner 851 pixels wide and 315 pixels high for the timeline graphic. mine has the logo on top, my photo in the middle and a tagline on the bottom, with some design elements in the background. this makes for a nicer graphic than your photo alone that you can use on your page.
take another hour and set up your page profile. if you have them, add photos of you, your staff, any certifications, your logo, and you in action, at a conference, speaking or with clients.
once you have it set up, you can invite your friends from your personal account to “like” your business page.
ongoing
friends
respond to friend requests you receive and initiate connections you would like to have. if i didn’t know the people, here is what i sent people who wanted to be friends:
- click on the profile of the person who sent the friend request.
- click “message.”
- copy and paste the following message:
hi_________,
thanks for your friend request. i am out of room on my personal profile. i would love to invite you to “like” my page: http://www.facebook.com/sandismithleyva
hope we can connect that way!
sandi
- click not now to answer the friend request. this will hide the friend request but not delete it.
- delete the friend request by clicking on friends on the left menu. click on the link saying “see all xx requests.” scroll to the bottom. at the end of all the unanswered friend requests, you’ll see a link that says, “see xx hidden requests.” click on this link. the option to “delete request” now appears. click “delete” for all the ones you sent messages to.
i did this in the beginning, but stopped doing it after a while because it was too time-consuming.
page requests
you will have many pages suggested to you. these are at the bottom of the friend request page. work from the bottom to the top because it’s much faster this way the way the page refreshes. click ignore on all of them except the ones you want to join.
i did this in the beginning, but stopped doing it after a while because it was too time-consuming.
events
you will be invited to many events. you can ignore them or delete them. if you want to delete them, go to the home page. on the right column, it will say upcoming events. click the link that says # event invitations. they will expand. click the x next to each invitation. check the box that says “ignore invites from __.” this will keep the volume down. do this for each event until there are no more events.
i did this in the beginning, but stopped doing it after a while because it was too time-consuming.
pokes
if there are any pokes at the bottom of the right column, x each one.
i did this in the beginning, but stopped doing it after a while because it was too time-consuming. now i just ignore all this activity.
app requests
from the left menu, click app request. click x on each app request. if it’s a game like farmville, a rose request or it looks very non-business-y, click block all future requests.
i did this in the beginning, but stopped doing it after a while because it was too time-consuming. now i just ignore all this activity.
many of these actions are not necessary, but will keep your profile clean. feel free to have these pile up for a month at a time. right now, i have 250 friend requests waiting for me to hire a new intern.
twitter is free. sign up for an account at www.twitter.com.
setup
you’ll need a photo and a very short description of your company. the first line of your elevator speech might be fine. you’ll only need half an hour or less to set up twitter.
an optional graphic to upload is a twitter background. ask your artist for a 1750 pixels wide x 750 pixels tall graphic. most of this graphic should be a solid color, and the only design should be a 2-column centered message. the reason is so it will look good on a mobile phone when twitter centers your photo in front of the background graphic. see ours: https://twitter.com/cpaaccelerator.
ongoing
following people
unlike linkedin or facebook, twitter connections are one-way. you can only follow people. those people can follow you back or not. anyone can follow you. one way to build your following is to follow people.
set a goal to follow a certain number of people each week or month. look for your ideal client as well as people you want to listen to. use keywords or names to find these people. view their profiles, and click follow.
in most cases (unless you are a huge celebrity), it’s good etiquette to follow someone back who follows you. set up an automated system to do this by using social oomph.
you can go wild following people until you get to 2,000. then some rules kick in from twitter, and if you are out of balance between the number of people who are following you and the number of people you are following, you won’t be able to follow any more. so keep these numbers fairly equal by using friendorfollow.com and unfollowing people who don’t follow you back.
when someone follows you on social media, it’s not necessarily going to be someone who ever wants to do business with you. it’s a common rookie mistake to think that anyone who follows you is a lead.
leads come in varying strengths, so please don’t hound them. wait until they contact you. work them up your marketing chain. get them to visit your website or sign up for your newsletter, which are both much stronger connections than social media.