social media explained for tourism

Social Media Explained

Who is Lara Solomon?

• Owner of the Mocks brandwww.MyMocks.com

• Author of Brand New Day – The Highs & Lows of Starting a Small Business

www.BrandNewDay.com.au

• Chief Rabbit at Social Rabbitwww.SocialRabbit.net

• Big Foot at Steps Online Facebook Trainingwww.StepsLearning.com

• Winner of Telstra NSW Micro Business Award 2008• Finalist in Telstra Young Businesswoman Award in 2005 and 2008• Blogger for www.SmartCompany.com.auThese are Mocks – sock

covers for mobile phoneswww.SocialRabbit.net

• Introductions by you

• What social media is

• Facebook

• Twitter

• YouTube

• LinkedIn

• Blogging

• Flickr

• FourSquare

• How to decide what to use

Let’s Watch a Video

Social media is media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses Internet and web-based technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers…… Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content (UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM). Social media utilization is believed to be a driving factor in the idea that the current period in time will be defined as the Attention Age. Source: Wikipedia.com

What is Social Media?

OR…. a way to have a conversation with your audience

What is Social Media?

How many Social Networking Sites are out there?

Take a guess…………..

Top 20 Social Networking Sites in the world….

Source: Wikipedia.com Jan 2010

Rank Name Description/Focus Registered users Registration 1 Facebook General. 500 million Open to people 13 and older

2 Qzone General. In Simplified Chinese; caters for mainland China users 300 million Open to the General Public

3 Twitter General. Micro-blogging, RSS, updates 145 million Open4 MySpace General, but with a music focus. 130 million Open to ages 13 and up.5 Windows Live Spaces Blogging (formerly MSN Spaces) 120 million Open

6 Habbo General for teens. Over 31 communities worldwide. Chat Room and user profiles. 117 million Open to people 13 and older

7 Orkut General. Owned by Google Inc. Popular in Brazil and decreasingly, in India 100 million Open to people 18 and older,

8 Friendster General. Popular in Southeast Asia. No longer popular in the western world. 90 million Open to people 16 and older.

No children allowed.

9 hi5General. Popular in India,Portugal, Mongolia, Thailand, Romania, Jamaica, Central Africa and Latin America. Not popular in the USA.

80 million Open to people 13 and older. No children allowed.

10 LinkedIn General but mainly business 75 million Open to people 18 and older.

11 TaggedGeneral. Subject to quite some controversy about its e-mail marketing and privacy policy.

70 million Open

12 Flixster Movies 63 million Open to people 13 and older13 Vkontakte Russian social network. 59 million Open

14 NetlogGeneral. Popular in Europe, Turkey, the Arab World and Canada's Québec province. Formerly known as Facebox and Redbox

59 million Open to people 13 and older

15 MyLife Locating friends and family, keeping in touch (formerly Reunion.com) 51 million Open

16 Classmates.com School, college, work and the military 50 million Open to people 18 and older17 Odnoklassniki General. Popular in Russia and former Soviet republics 45 million Open18 Bebo General. 40 million Open to people 13 and older19 Badoo General, Popular in Europe 37 million Open to people 18 and older

20 Flickr Photo sharing, commenting, photography related networking, worldwide 32 million Open to people 13 and older.

Source date: 16/2/10

Age of users on social networking sites

Source date: 16/2/10

Demographics of users on social networking sites

Is social networking worth it video

People use the internet to make purchase decisions and recommendations to others

Are you convinced yet?

Before You Start Work out What You Want

Work out…- Why you want to use social media?- Do your audience use it?- What do you want to achieve from using it?

Do You Google Yourself & Your Business?

80% of people google a business before working with them

0 Realtime results3 Blog results

333 total results

Social Media To Use

®

The Different Facebook Accounts

Types of Facebook Accounts - Profile

Types of Facebook Accounts - Group

Types of Facebook Accounts - Page

Pages express individuality

Why have a page?

To promote your product /service/business To increase brand awareness To reach people globally To increase the number of people you reach To increase sales To tell customers about new products/services To get feedback on products/services To create a community for your business/brand To engage your customers To increase purchase intent To build a relationship with your audience To make your customers feel loved!

Page appears in online search

Page updates appear in news feeds of fans

Position yourself as an expert

Promote Events

Consumers answering each others questions

Grow A Community

Engage with Your Audience

Mocks video comp

Consumers saying that they haven’t received their Mocks

Listen to Your Audience

Love negative comments!

Repurpose Content

Research

Facebook Ad’s

Fans grew from 4,333 to 336,000 due to this ad

Stats on Page Likers

React in real time

Started on Feb 3, Fans on Feb 10th = 2322

Facebook Places

Facebook Places & Page Combined

®

Twitter is Growing

Twitter Usage

March 2010 statistics

Twitter Usage

Twitter Usage

March 2010 statistics

Twitter Usage

March 2010 statistics

Twitter is Growing

– Average age on Twitter is 39 Years Old– 2.5 Million Australians are on Twitter

Customise your page

Customise your page

Your profile appears in online searches

Search for Mudgee

Search for #mudgee

Drive people to your website

Hashtags

Direct to your website

Promote blogs

Communicate Offers

Respond to customers

Starting on Twitter

• Jump in!

• Choose to use it for personal or business - choose your name accordingly

• Personalise your profile with a photo

• Follow people

• Follow the top Twitter users for ideas

• Search and see who is talking about your keywords

• Engage/talk to people

• Follow people who follow you (when you start)

• Communicate with customers

• Use favourites to save your favourite messages

• Publish helpful content

• Use Twitter for events – hashtags for others to follow

Starting on Twitter

• Create quality content that will generate interest when someone reads it

• Have a link to allow people to find out more if they like your tweet

• Tweet regularly.  Twitter is all about “recentcy” and your efforts to keep your

content fresh are handsomely rewarded by Google and others

• Get going!  You really could be generating leads using Twitter

• Remember to use keywords important to your business in your tweets

Twitter Don’ts

• Be Overly Self-Promotional

• Only Include Links to Your Own Blog

• Follow Anyone and Everyone

• Don’t Establish a Personality

• Don’t Interact With Other Twitter Users

• Don’t Share Your Twitter Profile on Your Website

• Don’t Monitor Your Own Brand Chatter

• Don’t Customize Your Twitter Profile

• Only Tweet Once Per Week

Measuring Twitter

• The number of followers you have is a measure of your raw

distribution power!

• Use Twitter Grader (www.twitter.grader.com)

• Look at how many @replies you get on tweets

• Number of new leads and visitors

App’s for Twitter

TweetDeck

Can also be used to update your Facebook page & LinkedInPlus you can now schedule message on it

Search for Mudgee Tourism

Create Your Own YouTube Channel

Why YouTube?

Why YouTube?

What is LinkedIn?

• Professional social network with 90 million members• 1.2m in Australia

• Average age of 37 years old• Average income of $108,000

• An online network to build your reputation• A place to find a job• A place to find staff

• A place to do research• A place to find answers

• A place to promote events

Profile

Company Profile

Search Engine Results

Link to your blog

Communicate

Promote yourself as an expert

Research Resource

Recruitment

Get recommendations

Networking Groups

Networking

Promote Events

Integrates with Outlook/webmail & Twitter

Blogging

What is a Blog?

A blog (a blend of the term web log)  is a type of website or part of a website. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. Blog can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Most blogs are interactive, allowing visitors to leave comments and even message each other via widgets on the blogs and it is this interactivity that distinguishes them from other static websites.

Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, Web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability of readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs. Most blogs are primarily textual, although some focus on art (Art blog), photographs (photoblog), videos (video blogging), music (MP3 blog), and audio (podcasting). Microblogging is another type of blogging, featuring very short posts. Source: wikipedia.com

Is Anyone Using Blogs?

Source: Technorati.com State of the Bloggersphere 2010

What do People Say About Blogs?

Source: Technorati.com State of the Bloggersphere 2010

Which sources do you trust for brand, product, or service information?

Source: Technorati.com State of the Bloggersphere 2010

What is your likelihood to recommend a brand, product, or service from these information sources?

Or Photobucket, or Picasso etc….

Photo Blog

Photo Sharing

How FourSquare Works…

• You create a deal• When people check into your place they can claim the deal

Why Use it?• People have to go to your venue to claim it• People can recommend your venue to others’• FourSquare can be linked up to Facebook for users

How to Determine the Best Solution for You

• Which one do you enjoy using?

• How much time do you have?

• Who will implement it?

• Can you be consistent?

• Does it fit into your marketing strategy?

• What content do you already have?

- HARD WORK

You Should know that Social Media is….

- PART OF MARKETING

- NOT A SILVER BULLET

- A WAY TO PROMOTE

- SOMETHING THAT TAKES TIME

Integrating Social Media

1. Add your social media icons to:1. Your email signature & your team’s2. Your website – on every page, not just on one

2. Promote other social media links on your social media, eg Twitter on Facebook

3. Promote your social networks in your current marketing

4. Integrate your on and off line marketing

5. Make it easy for people to contact you online

6. Use your online marketing materials offline and vice versa

7. Look at what you have already created, eg newsletters, posters, flyers etc. and reuse them

8. Make it part of your marketing plan

9. Make someone responsible for it

10. Use it to build relationships, not just SELL

www.SocialRabbit.net

http://au.linkedin.com/in/LaraSolomon

www.Facebook.com/SocialRabbit

www.Twitter.com/LaRoo

www.YouTube.com/user/TheSocialRabbit

Questions