Social Media? Um....

Ok, so I went to school for public relations. That was 13 years ago. There have been a few changes in the world since then, I would say.

The internet was out there in 1998, but it wasn't anything like this. I have always been someone whose had the social media account. I had myspace and I have a Facebook. I never got into Twitter because I didn't understand how it was different from Facebook. I used the accounts for my own personal reasons. I never realized how much I more I would have to learn to run an internet based business in today's times!

If you are not moving forward as a business owner, you are getting left out. Trust me, I value the face to face interactions as much as the next person. But if you have no website, no email address, or no presence on Facebook or Twitter, you'd better hope to the heavens that you have a loyal band of followers who buy your product.

When we started this business, we knew that social media marketing, and our ability to do it well, was going to be extrememly important. I started reading anything I could get my hands on. (I am a researcher at heart.) I knew I wasn't going to just starting updating statuses and tweeting without a direction or knowing what the heck I was doing. I needed to launch our site, but I also needed to do it the right way.

I knew we just didn't want a bunch of followers or friends, or people from all over the US visiting our site. Our site was locallly owned and operated. I want people who are going to USE the site. Otherwise, the people paying us are getting no return on their investment. Google Analytics, keywords, those are all things I hear alot of from other site owners. Those are all great, but what I want are the business owners to see that our site is bringing people in and buying their product. All of the exposure in the world is great, but if it's bringing you no money, it's worthless.

So, it's taking a little time to start our marketing campaigns. Facebook and Twitter are great, don't get me wrong. There are essential. But we are also marketing the old fashion way. Face to face. There is still some value left in that, right?

If you are starting a business, you have to have a plan and a direction about everything you do. Nothing can be arbitrary, everything you do must have a purpose. And you need to be somewhat educated about it as well. Because as a business owner, the only thing of value you have in the beginning is your time, and you must invest that "money" wisely!