Strategies for Quickly Building an Audience with Social Media March 14, 2008

Web 2.0 Internet Marketing: Strategiesfor Quickly Building an Audience with Social MediaExcerpt from article By Gary Smith (c) 2008The Web 2.0 social media revolution is in full steam. Are people finding your website?As an entrepreneur, how do you make your business website stand out amongst 435 million other websites and more than 1 million blogs competing for your audience’s attention?To begin, let’s look at the demographics of Web 2.0 social networking sites, Myspace.com, Facebook and YouTube.com. This will give you an idea on how to position your message in the Web 2.0 World.The Web 2.0 Social Networking RevolutionWeb 2.0 is a real revolution on the Internet. And these aren’t just college kids… 62% of MySpace visitors are older than 25 (40% are 35+), and 83% are making over $30,000 a year. Nineteen percent (19%) are making $100,000 and up… On Facebook.com 46% are over 25 and 34% are 35+, but they’ve got deep pockets. Eighty-eight percent (88%) make more than $30,000 and twenty-three percent (23%) make $100,000 or more.In the years ahead these numbers will get ridiculous… Social media giant Facebook is currently ADDING a million 25+ (non-student) adults per week to their rosters. That’s 52 million new users a year. YouTube.com gets over 50 million unique visitors per month. That equals over half a billion a year. Facebook and MySpace have the equal daily traffic of Google. Experts predict within the next year they will DOUBLE the daily traffic of Google search.So your prospects are there. The traffic is there. The spending power is there. So NOW is the time you want to establish your presence on the social networking websites.Web 2.0 Strategy: Why You Should Be a Maven, Not a MarketerAs a website owner, how should you position your message in the Web 2.0 world?The increasingly savvy buying public will quickly shun marketers. Internet readers want information from the Internet. They don’t want advertising, marketing, or a “pitch”.According to Schefren in his Attention Age Doctrine, the solution is to become a social media “Maven”.A Maven is a trusted authority, like a friend, on the social media websites. As you gain their trust, your audience will return to you over and over again wanting to invest in your advice.Five Steps to Becoming a Social Media MavenSocial Media Maven Step 1: Get in the GameBegin blogging immediately. Create a video explaining how to solve a problem and put it on YouTube, MySpace, and Facebook with links back to your main website. Just those two things alone will establish more Web 2.0 presence than 90% of your competition.Social Media Maven Step 2: Share your passionBuild your Web 2.0 website around your passions. Thirty-two year old Gary Vaynerchuk transformed his wine knowledge to his video blog. It now has thousands of subscribers and does $50 million dollars a year in wine sales.Social Media Maven Step 3: Be ControversialYour audience will remember you more when you challenge the status quo. Controversy sells. Think like the tabloids and the local news channels here. For example, Web 2.0 Business Coach Rich Schefren challenges traditional marketing wisdom in each release of his Attention Age Doctrine special reports atwww.attentionage.net/doctrine.Social Media Maven Step 4: Create World Class ContentYou will drive repeat traffic to your website by offering top notch “how to” information. Gary’s wine tastings are highly educational on the benefits of wine, how to cook with wine, and how to choose a wine for your special occasion. Rich’s reports teach Web 2.0 marketing principles.Remember, as soon as your audience feels that you are “pitching” them, you’ve lost them. So provide content not advertising.Social Media Maven Step 5: Engage in the ConversationWeb 2.0 is a dialogue not a monologue. Internet businesses profit more when they observe and listen to their communities first before they broadcast their messages. Savvy mavens such as Gary and Rich encourage their audience to ask questions. The answers to these questions then become part of their user-generated content.How Marketing in a Web 2.0 Social Media Environment Is Exciting.Visualize it like a big radio or television station or movie screen where you’re the star. You’re building a fan base so you need to entertain, inform, and deliver consistently for your audience.You have more publishing power at your fingertips right now than at any time in history.So use it.Share your passions.Reveal your trials and tribulationsTell your story.And, watch how quickly your audience builds.