BulletProofBlog the blog on crisis communications

The top six social media tips to know before you leave the office.

2009 will be known as the Year of Social Media – and for good reason as the numbers are simply staggering: Facebook users have more than doubled in the past twelve months, surpassing 350 million active users globally. Twitter has grown from only a few million users to nearly 40 million in the same time and more than eight hours of YouTube content continues to be uploaded every minute of every day.

As these platforms grow in popularity, their collective influence on the way we get our news, make buying decisions, and form opinions grows as well. Some of this year’s biggest stories broke or were fueled by online communities. Twitter gave us the first pictures of U.S. Airways flight 1549 landing in the Hudson River and became the #1 news source regarding protests following elections in Iran. Corporate brands were also in the spotlight as video of Domino’s employees sneezing in sandwiches, tweets from consumers outraged over iPhone upgrade plans, and a music video about a guitar broken by United Airlines baggage handlers all provided cautionary tales for corporate America in the age of social media.

By all indications, the influence of these sites will only increase in 2010. Likewise, it becomes more important every day for companies to be online, actively monitoring and engaging in conversations about their brands and products. As we enter the New Year and look back on how far we have come, we have compiled the six essential Six @ Six tips from our past posts to help bring your brand up to speed for the year ahead.

1. Be active when engaging in social networks

Establishing a brand presence on any social media site is just the beginning. Building goodwill and developing a community of brand ambassadors requires frequent content updates and fastidious engagement. Post new content on a regular basis, and focus on providing content that your audience cannot find anywhere else. Unless readers find value in your content, they will not be enticed to consistently return to your blog or social media profile. If you are seeking to reach new audiences, identify a specific niche where interest abounds and supply is limited. If your goal is to communicate with existing audiences, make sure to provide information about your brand that is not easily available elsewhere. If it makes sense for your company, try using your blog to provide opportunities for supporters to engage with your brand, following the example of Nuts About Southwest. Southwest cedes a level of message control to its readers, providing them with an ownership stake in its brand and, in turn, building consumer loyalty. From: Six Tips for Bulletproofing Your Reputation on YouTube and Six Tips for Successful Corporate Blogging.

2. Talk with your supporters and fans, not at them

Social media profiles offer great tools to kick-start discussions - but for fans to find value, your messages must be tailored to foster conversation.  Take time to review comments addressing your brand left on your Facebook Wall or your Twitter handle, and be sure to address any popular topics or questions. This is also a great way to monitor for criticism and quall a potential crisis before it does reputational damage. With Facebook, you can even create a Discussion Tab for your page and pose questions to your fans. Assign someone – or better yet, a team of people – to moderate the discussion and respond to questions and comments left by fans. If you are hesitant to give customers that much control over your online brand, Facebook and YouTube allow you to select privacy settings that limit who can leave public comments. From: Six Tips for Building Communities of Support on Facebook.

3. Social Media campaigns should be integrated across multiple platforms

It seems simple, but cross-promoting your content ensures the widest dissemination possible. Does your website include links to your Facebook or Twitter profile? Do your Twitter, blog, and YouTube profiles list your other social media profiles? Facebook, for example, offers the code necessary to create a Fan Page widget that allows visitors to these other online venues to see your current Facebook activity and become a Fan as easily as possible. From: Six Tips for Building Communities of Support on Facebook.

4. Use social bookmarking tools to proactively share important content

One quarter of Facebook users spend more time social networking than they do watching television. Many have abandoned e-mail altogether, choosing instead to message only with their friends through various social media platforms. If approached correctly, this provides an opportunity to make it easy for your supporters to share your content, brand, and messages throughout the social media space – precisely what social bookmarking is all about. The most popular social media sites have their own social bookmarking tools such as Facebook Share, Tweetmeme, Digg, and Yahoo! Buzz. In addition, there are several different tools available online – such as Bookmarkify and AddThis – which enable you to add sharing widgets for your various sites, blogs, or profiles. Using these tools will encourage once casual visitors to your site to become brand ambassadors, broadcasting your good news to their friends with only a couple clicks. From: Six Tips for Making Your Corporate Site Social Media Savvy.

5. Continue to explore new social media opportunities

Deloitte’s 2009 Tribalization of Business Study evaluated the responses of more than 400 companies, including Fortune 100 organizations, which have created and maintain online communities. The study examines the “perceived potential of online communities” and ways organizations believe these networks can be better leveraged. A fifth of respondents have set up formal “ambassador” programs for active community members as a way to broaden their relationship with their most loyal customers. Such a program is another way to ensure you are building goodwill and recruiting legions of supporters to combat possible attacks and insulate your brand during crisis. Your company’s reputation is already in the hands of those who use your products, so why not engage with them proactively to protect your brand? From: Six Tips to Apply Recent Social Media Lessons to Your Brand.

6. Look to the future: mobile access

2010 promises to bring about new horizons in mobile media use, and forward-thinking companies would be wise to address this issue sooner rather than later. Make sure that your website is easily accessible by mobile devices; the best way to accomplish this is to create a parallel mobile site with limited images and no flash or javascript content. Use the same strategies that you use on your regular site and social media profiles for your mobile content. For instance, Facebook has expanded its extremely helpful Facebook Connect tool for use with mobile devices. This tool makes it easier for your audience to engage and provides you with valuable intelligence about who your supporters are, what they like, and how best to market to them in the future. With the Internet and social media increasingly accessed on the go through smart phones and other mobile devices, your company cannot afford to ignore the opportunities to connect with this new wave of customers, clients, and stakeholders. From: Six New Facebook Features to Help Reach Key Audiences.

Click here to receive the Six @ Six in your inbox each week.