Social media is all about being social online. How do you actually find something that will work in the social media marketplace?

The Computer Tan website was a hoax. However, over 30,000 individuals in the UK signed up to participate in the program within 24 hours of its launch. At the end of the day, these users were informed of the dangers of tanning and the harmfulness of the sun’s rays.

Computer Tan’s home page: unexpected viral innovation

While this tactic may be one of the shadier strategies involved in viral marketing (and I’m not sure the 30,000 individuals who fell victim to this hoax were appreciative of its true nature), this is the exact type of brainstorming you can use to create a memorable and successful social media strategy.

If great ideas don’t come to mind, consider the following successful strategies from social news and bookmarking sites.

1. This list is going to be awesome.
2. I’m going to tell you why shortly.
3. You’re going to love it.

Read the preceding sentences. They’re broken up for easy reading. If I provide the same sort of information in paragraph form, you may not be able to actually absorb each individual segment. In fact, lists (see below) often perform better than paragraph posts or articles.

Lists are viral by nature because they encourage heavy engagement, conversation, and communication, and they also often show that the writer has done some extensive research on a specific subject. With a list, you can comment on a single item listed; it’s a lot easier to isolate and nit-pick those facts you may not necessarily agree with (or, on the other hand, that you agree with a lot). By their nature, lists are:

1. Scannable and thus easily digestible.
2. Typically short and the content therein is easy to consume. (If you write a long list, emphasize the main topic of each bullet point in bold before going into specifics.)
3. Resourceful and can provide a great deal of information in a single article. Lists, therefore, can serve as references for a later date.
4. Meant to be shared, thereby increasing traffic and links, and can help increase awareness.
5. Engaging, and encourage individuals to participate.

Lists succeed in social media because they’re heavily referenced

The catch to lists is that they are a bit overused in social media channels, so don’t turn every single article or post into list format. Similarly, don’t break up your list into several pages if you can avoid it. On some online publications, the extra page views help boost advertising rates, but if you’re a blogger or writer who does not utilize such advertising, it’s best to steer clear of that kind of list implementation. Most readers may want to either print out the article or to reference the content easily, and adding additional page views that obstruct and complicate their access to the article can cause frustration.

Are you obligated to share only articles in social media? Not necessarily. There’s video, photography, and even short 140-character blurbs that take seconds to digest. Additionally, there’s the quiz or questionnaire. Give people a chance to participate by answering questions about themselves on a variety of topics, from “Are you a romantic?” to “Are you addicted to the Internet?” to “How bad are your spending habits?”, and you’ve got potential to share something about a specific subject that can ultimately go viral.

You can make up interesting questions that are related to your business. Then, give people the option to participate via true or false answers, by multiple choice, or by providing their own input.

The quiz: give people the opportunity to share, and score them based on their answers

Once the quiz or questionnaire is completed, give people the option to share their results with their peers. They could simply share the data with their friends by linking directly to the quiz. On the other hand, there’s a lot more potential for the quiz to be spread if you create a widget that quiz participants can place on their sites via HTML code once they’ve completed it, as shown below. You can also extend quizzes to social networks like Facebook; quizzes are often popular on that service. The best part about these HTML codes is that, by nature of their existence, they help build relevant links to your site, especially if the quiz is related to your business objectives.

Give your quiz participants the ability to share their results on their websites, social media profiles, or blogs

If you can get a graphic designer to create an interactive game or video that promotes your product, you should definitely pursue that opportunity. Let people personalize pages with your product to share with their friends.

An interactive holiday card

Interactive video that users can personalize may be the costliest option, but the return is substantial: users find that they can really engage with your brand while also being able to provide information about themselves. They are compelled to share these videos and games with their friends, and the result is extremely powerful word-of-mouth marketing that works by virtue of social interactions.

Some examples of successful participatory and interactive video include the Gillette ManQuarium and in the promotion of Bob Dylan’s album titled His Greatest Songs. In the former, participants search an online database for the “perfect body” for their “perfect-looking guy” and plaster their crush’s face onto the body. Once the guy is created, participants are asked questions about their crush and can then interact with their guy. The end result offers increased branding for Gillette as well as entertainment for the participant.

The Gillette ManQuarium interactive game

In an effort to promote Bob Dylan’s new album, one organization created an interactive game in which users could fill out 10 cards; a video would then launch depicting Dylan flipping through the customized cards to the tune of one of his songs (shown below).

Once the cards were filled out and the music video started playing, users could send the video to their friends, which meant that as more and more people received it, there was more and more potential for it to be passed around. This is word-of-mouth marketing at its finest.

Bob Dylan’s interactive messaging game

As children, we grew up preferring illustrations in our printed books. As adults, we still have an emotional attachment to strong visuals and compelling imagery. In an online society where there’s an excess of information, mostly in the written word, some individuals prefer content that is dressed up with images, as an image can contribute to a story’s success. In a social marketing atmosphere, visuals and images tell powerful stories.

If, for example, you work for a data recovery firm, wouldn’t it be interesting if you shared photographs of the hard drives submitted by some of your customers? You’ve likely had customers who have had their computers burned in fires or smashed by exes, so why not share the customer’s story and use the image of the hard drive to show your readers exactly what became of their precious data? On the other hand, what if you work in a drug rehabilitation home? You may want to bring awareness of the dangers of drug dependency by chronicling the last days of a heroin addict’s life in a photo journal of very emotionally provocative images.

The example image essay shown below shows the photographic journey of a mother celebrating the final days of her son’s life as he battled cancer. The story itself is gut-wrenching, and some of the related photographs may even make you cry. However, the mother’s affection toward her ailing son was clear, and the love of her little boy was shared among thousands. The essay won the Pulitzer Prize in 2007 for feature photography.

A photographic journey of a mother’s last days with her son as he battles cancer and succumbs to it

These examples are testaments to the power of using images to raise awareness of different subject matters, but providing commentary, too, can bring additional success to your viral marketing initiatives.

In a similar fashion, if your customers are interested in learning more about the process of manufacturing your products, you may want to give them a tour of your factory or office. Your followers and stakeholders would be most interested in visualizing the company dynamic, which becomes a great opportunity to share what goes on behind closed doors in a video or photo tour.

Does your industry suffer from a problem that you may be able to solve? Perhaps that need is not yet on the top of your mind, but chances are, there’s something you can do that will help make others’ lives (and even your own) easier. Building tools is one such example. In fact, tools are a terrific way to build high-quality relevant links to your site and to establish thought leadership. For example, do you specialize in computer infrastructure for enterprise management? Perhaps you want to provide a tool that will help webmasters monitor their servers, like the one from Dotcom-Monitor shown below.

An online tool that monitors websites

Think about the big online tools that already exist: you’ve probably seen a mortgage calculator or a calorie counter on a website or through a search. If your industry addresses either of these categories, can you use the same tool’s concept and make it even better? Can you think of another problem along those lines that your users may want to use the Net for to solve easily? These applications benefit just about everyone, even those not necessarily looking to buy a product, and they have the added benefit of being shareable and thus helping promote brand awareness.

The iPhone, Palm Pre, and other handhelds allow for the installation of third-party web applications, and these applications are more ubiquitous than ever. You may want to empower mobile-dependent users by giving them a solution that they can access at any time and from any place. Mobile utilities are becoming a lot more prevalent, as they can help users solve everyday problems. In addition, individuals can easily find mobile applications outside your industry’s website (such as through iTunes, for example), and you may accumulate new interested parties without overtly marketing to them. In essence, your new followers will be able to find you easily without even actively searching for you.

Do people look to you for advice? Teach your users how to do something. The best way to do so is to utilize video for the purpose of illustrating a process. For example, there are a number of great videos out there that teach people how to tie a tie, how to fold a shirt in less than 2 seconds (shown below), and how to shuffle poker chips like a professional.

A video showing how to fold a t-shirt

Videos can really work to promote thought leadership. Further, the most compelling of the videos may be referenced on how-to blogs and on other sites. Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse's YouTube channel is filled with informational food videos teaching budding chefs how to prepare great meals. For example, it offers videos titled “How to Make Fire-Roasted Sweet Onions” and “How to Make Mate.”

There are infinite possibilities when teaching someone how to do something. You can illustrate the entire process through a series of photographs and explanatory captions, or you can use videos to speak directly to your readers (in a method similar to videoblogging) to teach them how they can do something well.

While social media is about online collaboration and sharing via newer technologies and methodologies, do not forget about those traditional tactics that gave rise to the social media marketing of today. Old technologies are becoming increasingly “interactive” in the sense that they encourage others to participate in these new marketing initiatives.

• As mentioned earlier in this chapter, your business card is a great way to self-promote and share your blog, website, Twitter ID, and all social media profiles.
  Tip: If you promote your social profiles in your business card, you want to pursue the mindset “less is more.” Think about emphasizing only the social profiles you are active in and want to call attention to. You don’t want to overload the recipient of the card with too much information. As a compromise, if you maintain social media accounts on multiple services, highlight only the strongest and most active.
  
• Send relevant marketing initiatives directly to your peers through email or Instant Message. On the same note, if you have a newsletter, utilize it to promote these stories, videos, pictures, or other related viral campaigns. Ensure that the recipients of this messaging have opted in; you do not want to overwhelm unsuspecting individuals, as this will tax the relationships you currently maintain.
• Use the “send to email” features on social websites. This a little-used tactic that still performs effectively, though you should use it sparingly to avoid overwhelming your friends and family with too many “look at this!” requests (remember, your not-so-social friends are also dealing with the challenges of information overload).
• Your email signature is a great way to promote your social media initiatives as well. You shouldn’t go overboard by adding every single social media profile, but you can highlight the active profiles. My own email signature is as follows:
  Tamar Weinberg
  http://www.techipedia.com
  Twitter: http://twitter.com/tamar
  FriendFeed: http://friendfeed.com/tamar
  This email is: [ ] bloggable [x] ask first [ ] private
• Use forums. Forums themselves are social, but they predate the social media of today. Still, forums follow the same rules of social media marketing; you will need to be absolutely genuine and involved in the conversation to be able to promote without running into problems with the community. You will likely also want to be somewhat established in the community before immediately promoting something so that your posts are not perceived as self-serving.

By also focusing on more traditional avenues outside of the social media world, you may receive additional eyeballs on your marketing efforts. These people may not be active in the social networks that this book discusses, and may otherwise not know about the content promoted on these other channels.

When it comes to social media marketing, the rules of engagement are different. Altruism rules above all. Authentic online relationships can further your cause and help foster real relationships that can flourish offline. In fact, you need to always think about the relationships before you think about the marketing goals, which in most cases will be your bottom line for participation on these services (despite the fact that they are just fun in and of themselves). Your first step should be to seek neighborhoods of shared interest. After you determine that there is curiosity in who you are and what you do, that’s the appropriate time to seek a business relationship. That curiosity may not always come, but you can always participate by overtly identifying yourself (where appropriate) as someone who represents a certain organization, company, or industry.

If you plan on promoting yourself and your company, don’t forget to consider the people around you. Acknowledge them by listening and responding. If you’re a blogger, link out to them and highlight their positive and valuable contributions to your blog, especially if you were particularly moved by their commentaries. They took the time to read and respond, and acknowledging them is a great way to show them that you appreciate their contributions. Showing that you care is a big part of being social, and helps tremendously in social media marketing and fostering relationships, which ultimately can translate to powerful marketing. In fact, the best way to seek out promotion is to promote others before you promote yourself.

Online interactions are different than they were in the past, and being personable is the key to succeeding in this day and age. For example, the standard press release does not work as effectively as an email message where you personalize the message and show the readers that their attention really matters. Public relations executive Todd Defren exemplified this strategy with one of his clients. In an effort to promote a client’s product, Defren’s team took the time to write very personalized messages to mainstream bloggers. Defren’s group often tied the client’s messaging into a previous post on each individual blog, and it was clear that each pitch was well researched and written with the specific blogger in mind. In the end, the messaging was very well received and the client’s product enjoyed a lot of mainstream press.

Defren’s example is a brilliant one, but is one that many public relations professionals do not take time to follow. The problem with many PR agencies is that they only have their clients in mind. Bloggers, however, have to wade through hundreds of pitches on a daily basis and are overwhelmed with incoming press releases. The pitches that succeed are the ones in which the blogger or blog is put first. Marketing motivational speaker and writer Seth Godin summarizes the personalized approach quite nicely: “If you have more than a few people to contact, you’ll be tempted to copy and paste or mail merge. Don’t. You’ll get caught. It shows. If it’s important enough for someone to read, it’s important enough for you to rewrite.”

Social media marketing is not an “easy way out.” Sweat and hard work is required for the ultimate success. Whether that means researching a community thoroughly to determine the exact messaging, networking with people who can influence the success of your marketing message, or writing thorough blog posts or emails that really engage the reader and community, this is not something that you can simply do in 12 hours’ time. You must be willing and able to commit time to the task and consistently work toward building your brand in the eyes of your beholders.

This is the new era, and this is now.

Social media marketing is a comprehensive effort that requires interactions across multiple online properties. When you engage, be open about who you are when and where appropriate. It’s also important to acknowledge that social media is about genuine conversation and communication, and while these are tools to help you achieve that goal, social media marketing goes beyond just utilizing these tools—it is about empowering the voices of both the producers and the consumers. As such, there are many ways to achieve these goals. Tools act as facilitators to make that happen, but the proper mindset should be there all along.

ROI is not necessarily easily traced back to social media, but you can focus on several different metrics to estimate success. These are reach, frequency and traffic, influence, conversations and transactions, and sustainability. However, even after you wrap up a social media marketing campaign, consider monitoring via listening and responding. Don’t wait until there’s a crisis to get involved. Focus on keeping your content fresh and current so that people will have reason to interact with you. Even if you don’t have a new product release on the horizon, you still have something of value to share with your constituents.

The community should always come first, a premise that should be understood and followed throughout your organization. Those who promote but do not understand the feelings of those around them will not see their messages travel very far. If this concept is difficult to understand, it may be useful to hire someone who eats, breathes, and lives in the world of social media, especially in the networks in which you are attempting to market. Those who really are involved in social media sites will often find a way to self-promote (or promote your business) without being perceived as selfish, because they’re likely giving back to the community as well. If you cannot hire someone who can teach you the path, learn by doing, but be sure to follow the examples of others who have been successful.

Online communities exist in abundance, but there are four main types of social sites (social networks, social news sites, social bookmarking sites, and new media/video/photography sites). Don’t limit yourself to one category; be everywhere. While you don’t want to spread yourself too thin, you should definitely maintain accounts on different types of sites and have a general understanding of how they work in the event that you need to share something worthwhile.

Networking online is the majority of the social media marketing battle, but taking it offline is even more powerful. In a face-to-face relationship, you can have real interactions that are genuine, forthright, and can truly make a tremendous difference. Don’t shy away from asking questions and soliciting feedback or learning about other people. Have an open mind and be willing to learn. If you’re ready to take the plunge into the real world, use sites like Upcoming.org and Meetup.com to find events in your area that are relevant to your industry. Attend conferences and trade shows on these subjects. Never be afraid to network—it’s one of the most powerful tools for marketing, period.

If you’re aiming to raise eyebrows via a computer monitor, start thinking along the lines of viral marketing strategies, which, by nature, can be shared and redistributed. List articles and posts, for example, are successful because they encourage participation and sharing. Quizzes let people provide information about themselves to you and to their friends. This often prompts others to participate, and the result is that people are often paying it forward as they pass the meme around. Similarly, interactive games allow users to identify with specific brands, and in the case of distributable personalized games to share their creations with the world. Furthermore, a really compelling photo journal can evoke heavy sentiment and emotion. Some of the most powerful viral photography marketing pieces chronicle the lives and deaths of individuals. Other enlightening photography tours can walk viewers through building or manufacturing processes. In photography, sometimes the images speak for themselves, but commentary can also help.

Tools are yet another way to make it easier for someone to do something, so if you can solve a problem or fulfill a need by creating an easy tool, by all means, go for it. You can also make people’s lives easier by using a video demonstration to show them how to do something. If you can do it, why not teach others? This strategy definitely helps establish thought leadership. The aforementioned tactics can succeed for social media marketing among the various sites discussed throughout this book, but don’t overlook the old tried-and-true tactics of sharing via traditional means, including forums. Some adherents consider forums to be social media, even though they are far older than the social networks and social sites of today. Other traditional strategies include using email signatures (or simply sending out email messages) and IM. Of course, if you’ve looked at a city bus lately, you’ll likely see URLs all over the place; similarly, your social media URLs do not necessarily need to reside on the Internet. You can plaster them on business cards and throughout your print promotional materials.

The bottom line is that social media marketing is about real, genuine relationships. Give of yourself, and others will give back to you because they value what you do. Show others that you appreciate that they are listening to your messaging by putting them first. Also, remember that social media is not a “get rich quick” scheme. Like any marketing channel, it takes time and effort to yield the best results in this space. Your success will come from continued effort and dedication to the task.

Two-way conversation is here, and it is now. Talk to people, listen to them, and keep in mind that it’s not much different than having a real, face-to-face conversation. You truly do not need to fear the big world ahead of you.