social media plan
5 Tips for Successful Social Media Marketing
Guest post by Debbie Laskey, MBA
With brands both big and small diving into social media, how do you define successful social media marketing?
First of all, a social media plan must be written. Second, the social media plan must align with the overall annual marketing and communications plan. Despite what some CEOs believe, social media cannot be performed in a silo.
Third, a social media policy must be written and enforced. While it’s great when employees throughout an organization want to post about a brand, there should be some guidance as to the content and voice – which is why employees of many large brands include “Tweets are my own” in their bios.
To get you started on the road to successful social media marketing, here are my five favorite tips:
Facebook and Twitter Are Not Your Best Social Media Marketing Channels Anymore
I’ll 
bet your small business or nonprofit organization spends considerable time on its Facebook page and Twitter account trying to engage new people. After all, aren’t these two social media sites the most effective in reaching prospects, customers, and donors?
Not anymore says a recent Forrester study. “It’s clear that Facebook and Twitter don’t offer the relationships that marketing leaders crave. Yet most brands still use these sites as the centerpiece of their social efforts — thereby wasting significant financial, technological, and human resources on social networks that don’t deliver value,” says Nate Elliott of Forrester.
Now get this… “In the next 18 months… Facebook will become nothing but a repository for display ads,” Elliott predicts. Holy!!
So now what? Continue reading
Charities’ Adoption of Social Media Higher Than Fortune 500!
It’s official. Studies on social media in the business sector (Inc. 500 and Fortune 500) show much lower levels of usage than in the nonprofit sector!
According to a recent study by Nora Ganim Barnes, Ph.D., Chancellor Professor of Marketing and Director of the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, it’s clear that charities are prolific users of social media.
The study demonstrates how 246 charities and nonprofits on the Philanthropy 400 list are using social media. Note that it excluded colleges and universities. And, here are the results: Continue reading
