Social Media: Attracting Customers with the Right Stuff

How to gain more business through social media. 

So, you’ve just got your Facebook or Twitter page set up—you’ve added your logo or photo, and your bio and contact information. Now it’s time to start building up your followers and posting.

To grow your followers and get value from social media, you’ll need to start posting news, photos and information that will interest your customers and prospects. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Photos and Videos

Viewing photos and videos are some of the most popular activities on social networks. Catch the eye of potential customers by posting:

• Before and after pictures
• Good examples of your work
• Photos of your staff/crew with some info about them and their role
• Examples of a common or unusual problem
• Videos of your work (keep ‘em short and sweet, though!)

Status Updates and Tweets You’ll also need to regularly post interesting updates on your social media pages. It takes some time to craft good updates, so make an effort when writing them (and double-check your spelling and grammar)! Try to post:

• Thank yous - Thank customers for a job, referrals, etc. A quick thank you note, even on Facebook, can make a great impression.
• Specials – Offer your social media fans a special!
• Seasonal reminders – Overseeding, winterizing, summer watering schedules, etc.
• Company news – New hires, partnerships, sponsorships, offers, specials, etc.
• Tips and advice – Write about common problems your company helps solve. Demonstrate your expertise. Answer frequently asked questions.
• Community news – Links to community news and events.

No matter what you post, try to be helpful and conversational, and not overly promotional.

Getting Followers

Remember that you need followers and people to like your page to see your updates, so devote some time to searching for, and following the people you want to follow you.

Send a link to your new page to everyone in your contacts and ask them to follow you. And try asking your followers to retweet or share particularly important posts to gain more prospects.

Don’t forget to find the social media pages for your associations and business partners (like Ewing!), and give them a “like” or follow to stay up on their news. If you have commercial customers (businesses, agencies and organizations), they may also have pages. Post on their page to say hello, and invite them to “like” or follow your page.

Posting Frequency and Management

It’s important to get your message seen, but without becoming a spammer. Start off by posting updates a few times each week, and increase in frequency.

Spread out your updates, and experiment by posting at different times in the day. Data shows that mid-day (lunch time) is the highest use for social media, so it may be the best time to post updates.

If you start to notice you’re losing followers, you could be turning off people with non-relevant messages or by posting too often. Sign up for a Hootsuite account, or another social media dashboard, that allows you to write your posts in advance and schedule them to be posted at a later date/time for added convience.  

Got social media questions, or more tips to add? Post them in our comments section below. And don't forget to check out Ewing on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.