Business to Business Social Media

Recently, Business to Business social media has taken on an increasingly important role. Because of this ,it has generated lots of events and quite an assortment of groups are popping up all over the place to to meet the increasing demand. More businesses are looking for ways to generate awareness of what they do and how to do it better. 

There are so many events available out there that it will be impossible to list them all here. Many of them serve the digital professional and many of them are more broad in focus. I have put together some of the groups that I find to be the most effective. 

This is a list of conferences , meetings and other organizations that are excellent starting points for social media marketers and social media strategists. You are welcome to make your own comments here also. 

In addition, online media conferences are available . There are so many of these that you can be busy for quite some time. 

Let's start off with Social media week. It usually happens in February and September and is hosted by social media groups and digital experts in a lot of cities around the world. Most of the time it is spread out so that the conferences are in different places. So watch for this in your city .

In March there is SXSw in Austin. You can find the best in film, music and interactive media here. There is a trade show and presentations as well as networking events. They are all centered around start up technologies that may provide you with a new audience. 

Visit San Francisco to meet with industry leaders , as well as global executives for web 2.0 . You will be amazed at the conversation around the latest trends on the web. 

The Blogwell conference presents , in their words, “eight great case studies on the best social media programs at large corporations.” There are some great Blogwell events that have taken place in  Philadelphia, Chicago and Seattle.

Don't forget BlogWorld. Blogging and Internet TV Gurus will be attending this one . Participants are welcome to learn about new strategies, tools and technologies they will need to make their presence known on the web. 

Its a fact that While you can learn a lot from attending conferences, you will need to do more in the way of learning and training for your niche. That’s because the low frequency of these once or twice a year events can only take you so far as a practicing social media strategist. Supplementing them with monthly or weekly networking meetings will come in handy. 

Look for technology networking and blogging events on the web that are being held on a regular basis . Preferably not far away from where you are. Real Entrepreneurs will look into starting their own groups. 

There's always the option of traveling to New York or San Francisco too. 

Some may be looking to make an even bigger commitment in the way of social media training though. 

If networking and conferences and meetings don't seem to be enough to keep you busy, joining a social media club or another organization may be a great choice. 

Relevant comments and suggestions will be welcomed . 

http://yourexpertwebman.com

What is Social Media?

When I talk to tribes about their social media optimization needs , the question always seems to arise, what is social media. Since the technology is changing and evolving and this makes it an arousing and  exciting field,  I'll try to shed some light on the subject. 

In the beginning, Social media services originated as strictly a personal tool that tribes used to interact with friends and family. Later on Social media services  were adapted to business projects in order to take advantage of a popular new communication platform in order to reach out to prospects and customers. They used it to influence their clientele for example, by informing them of sales and offering them special deals.

To make a long story short, Social Media includes any tool or service that uses digital media to facilitate production and exchange of information and action using telecommunication technology. In this context, private versus work-related use and factors such as the demographics, gender and age of users influences how social media is used for a specific niche.

To be more detailed , Social Media turns consumers of content into producers of content relatively quickly and easily, without having to be technologically savvy. This means that in part social media can shift communication from a broadcast model of tribes to tribes or individuals. in most platforms, Social media means interaction with the tribe. For instance answering questions or replying to an email, exchange of opinions, information, feelings and emotions that hopefully result in better understanding with the tribe's members. The demographics of the tribe and their niche influence how these processes occur.

Interactions can be between tribes , content creators, readers, colleagues, friends and sometimes strangers that may result in action being taken by one or more of the tribes.

The final result of all of this tribal interaction is that social media services take time to do and engage with. There's a lot of opportunity here as well as the risk of wasting time. An example of this , as expected by readers of the platform you're using, is to be authentic and personable. This means you have to write thoughtful answers yourself to blogs and articles. 

In addition, when you are a member of a group or tribe on one of the platforms means that social media monitoring is a factor. This means you have to take part in the discussion and comment on on other tribes posts since this is part of the exchange. Lots of social media activities are aimed at being members of many groups, but this makes it hard to spend the time to contribute. In fact, we are not even sure if they have the time to read what group members post.

What all this comes down to is that less is probably better. Tribes should join fewer groups , but stay more active  and more visible and interact with more substance. The number of friends you have online is really limited to about 150. This limit is called the Dunbar number and theoretically is the number of actual cognitive friends you can handle. 

Some of the platforms have recently reported that even though you may have thousands of friends online , in reality, you can only interact with about five to ten percent of them. So you may ask, can you really have 2000 friends? 

I welcome comments to this article as the social media services arena is still changing and we like to roll with the punches , so to speak. 

http://yourexpertwebman.com

Important Steps to Picking a Social Media Consultant

Picking a Social Media Consultant could turn out too be one of the most important decisions you could make for your tribe. That's because the World Wide Web attracts and is full of social media activities . Major Industry players are on top of the platforms as are small businesses and start ups. Most are trying to use it to increase their influence in their chosen niches..

Becoming familiar with the wide variation in platforms is a job in itself, so if you are not familiar with them, you might be able to use some help from someone with experience in this area. So the question becomes ,  Where do you find social media specialists with the right expertise for you?

There are a few things to look for that will tip you off.

A social media consultant should have some sort of social media strategy that can be discerned. They should be experts in using using their chosen social media strategy to drive and attract new  buyers to the clients niche. Being adept at offering their social media methodologies too you will help show their expertise. Look to see if they are practicing the same things they are talking about.

There should also be some obvious signs in the specialist's social media blogging skills. Look at a sampling of the blog entries made for other clients , for instance. If there are relevant quality entries there, he just might be an expert. Consistency and relevance are important here as entries may at first seem to be clear and concise , but be aware of articles that look like they were generated by spin. Specialists very rarely will use spin in their articles.

You might look at a few testimonials about your consultant and some comments from other readers. Happy clients will generally show their gratitude for superior service and this will tip you off that you have found a good expert. 

 

There are so many applications that are available for social media today and applications that are under development making this niche very exciting to many different tribes. There are new technologies being formed around social media applications daily. There are applications that allow your friends to know what businesses you are in for instance. Many social media platforms are gearing up for mobile access and this has the potential to really change the social media blogging landscape. 

Diverse applications are in development and are developed now that will use your actual location to find the closest mens or ladies room, a new eatery or even letting you know who has a sale going on for a product you need. 

Having a well defined social media strategy and a relevant social media blog influencing the niche you would like to be in is the way to get started in this diverse area of online marketing. Remember to be adaptable and don't get locked into a single platform in case that platform changes into something that won't work for you. You don’t have to be 100% internally focused. Link to other blogs, videos, and news articles. Re-tweet what others have to say as long as it is relevant to what you are saying.