Social Media Growth

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009 | Search Engine Optimization

More than 67% of the global online population now goes online to visit social networks and blogs (Nielsen Online), and even more amazing Twitter grew 33% in only one month according to Compete data. Digging even deeper into the latest stats and mobile users accessing social network sites on their handsets is up 156% from last year in the US.

So what does this mean in a time when newspapers are becoming scarce, nobody looks at a phone book anymore, and you can probably find your 2nd grade teacher online if you look? It means that businesses have real-time opportunities to increase brand awareness, manage their online reputation, drive traffic, and build their customer base.

If a person visits your website, it’s a general rule that you have about 8 seconds to get their attention. That means you need to draw them in, give them an incentive to stick around, and have a means to give them what they want immediately. Also, if they are a repeat visitor they are probably quickly scanning to see what’s new on your site. In comparison, on a social networking site such as Twitter, while people are still quickly scanning, the messages are short and to the point. It’s easy to pick out if a store you like is having a sale and it’s also easy to pass that information on or  make a comment about the company or product.

Properly managed this kind of customer interaction can create real opportunities for your business. So my recommendation is that if you haven’t really taken a look at these social networking sites, take a little bit of time and give them a once over. Look up your favorite business, see how they are talked about, see what they are doing in this arena. Next time, I’ll give you some easy tips to maybe dip your own toes in.

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