Social Engagement: The key to effective, easy, free internet marketingSocial Engagement It seems everyone is talking about how social engagement is the key to successful marketing online with social networks. I would agree, however, I would also be quick to suggest that is very rare to actually see any true social engagement happening. Yes, with respect to customer service there is some actual "social engagement", but that is something else entirely and will be addressed in another article.
It might be easiest to explain what isn't social engagement as the internet and social networking sites are chock full of examples. I think that would be rather boring and pointless though. Knowing what not to do can be important, it isn't too much help getting started on the right path.
I will start with a short story and I think it will be easy to conclude the answers to these questions:
- What is social engagement?
- How do you perform real social engagement?
- Why it is effective?
A couple of years ago, a young woman from another country came to work for me. She was just in her early 20s, smart, energetic and ready to explore life. She would argue with me about things, not in an offensive or demeaning way, but in a way that resulted in many good changes to my business and websites. Really, a good employee, one that doesn't do only what they are told, but rather makes sure things are done right!
Aside from keeping me in line, one of her projects was to participate in an online forum about a certain topic. This was a topic that had inspired her move abroad and she was keen on learning everything about it. It was a topic that she was personally involved with on a number of levels:
- Experiencing it
- Learning about it
- Holding various opinions about it
So, her participation wasn't of the nature you see when you hire some freelance SEO team to engage in "forum participation", which usually results in grammatically incorrect attempts at keyword stuffing and link dropping via redundant, boring forum posts. Her participation was of the caliber of someone who would participate in a forum because of an interest in a topic based on the 3 points listed above.
In other words, she wrote interesting, informative, sometimes opinionated posts and replied to other posts in a similar manner. In fact, she was socially engaging. She also went out of her way to research questions people had and provide detailed answers, usually with a link to other resource(s).
The success of her participation led her to be referred to by many as the forum "goddess". The forum also held regular user group meetings and everyone who came sought to meet her. However, she was elusive and didn't often participate in the user group meetings because she felt the members thought she knew more and was more experienced in the topic than she felt she really was.
By being socially engaging, she quickly became:
- Respected
- Known as an authority on the topic
- Sought after by those seeking more knowledge on the topic
Now, since she had nothing to sell, it was easy for her to simply participate and share her experiences, opinions and information on the topic. In contrast, during the same time, several people came to the forum and made a couple of posts along the lines of "I offer services for members".
Though not as bad as the outsourced keyword stuffing, link dropping, nonsense, they simply never connected with the members and consequently were never sought after at the user group meetings, and probably not respected or seen as an authority. Not because they weren't, but rather no one noticed them because all they offered was the product or service they were "promoting". They lacked connection, engagement, and were viewed as simply advertisements.
I suspect if my forum "goddess" had a product or service to sell, all the group's members would have stood in line to do business with her, while the others were barely noticed and probably went around telling people how ineffective social media marketing is. Think of the possibilities if they had actually taken the time to understand how effectual "real" social engagement is. If they would have become respected for their engagement, known as an authority, and become sought after, the product or service would have sold itself just because the person's knowledge, familiarity and reputation drew customers.
The bottom line is that social engagement and effective social marketing relates to the 3 points we discussed above:
- Sharing your experiences. Story telling.
- Learning more about your topic and sharing it.
- Not being a stuffy or corporate minded product pusher. Sharing your opinions about the topic.
The absolute least important aspect of internet marketing via social engagement is your product or service. The internet is full of products and services, and many of them are just like yours. Nobody cares! You can scream that yours is the best (and it very well may be), but no one is listening. No one cares because you are just one more person trying to stuff your product or service down their throats without gaining their respect.
Be somebody real, interact, tell stories, present useful information, express your opinions. You will then become recognized, important, sought after, the authority, the goddess (well, all you women anyway), and people will want your products and services because they believe in you.
Here are some more parts to this article to check out:
Social Engagement: The key to effective, easy, free internet marketing | 
