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5 Social Media Marketing Tips for Technology Companies

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Posted by John Beveridge on Jan 14, 2013 3:12:00 PM

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Technology companies are on the forefront of using social media to promote thought leadership and and generate inbound leads for their products and services.

Executing an effective social media marketing process can create a competitive advantage for your technology company. This article will provide tips on using social media to grow and manage your technology company. Before we share our tips with you, let's start by defining the term "social media marketing process." A social media marketing process is a series of tactics designed to promote your brand as a thought leader and to generate leads for your products and services using your website and social media.

Another term for the social media marketing process is inbound marketing.  Inbound marketing tactics include:

  • Developing a keyword strategy to define the phrases buyers, investors and potential employees use to find companies like yours on the web.

  • Optimizing your website so that you are found when people use your targeted keyword phrases.

  • Creating blog articles and premium content offers like eBooks, whitepapers and videos that educate potential buyers and help move them through the stages of their buying process.

  • Using social media channels like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to promote your content, monitor conversations about your company and industry and to communicate with customers and prospects.

  • Converting website visitors and social media followers into leads by using calls-to-action and landing pages.

  • Nurturing leads through the stages of their buying process with permission-based email marketing.

  • Optimizing your website and social media channels for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.

  • Analyzing the results of your efforts and using data to refine and improve your social media marketing process.

Here are 5 tips for technology companies to optimize their social media marketing process.


Use Social Media to Support Your Funding Efforts

It's no secret that venture capital firms, private equity and angel investors use Google and social media networks to research potential investment opportunities. Make sure and structure your social media efforts so that they find your company when they search for the keyword phrases associated with your business.

Using social media in your funding efforts has another positive effect - it shows potential investors that you have a plan in place to monetize your good idea. Investors are looking to maximize the return on their investment. They aren't just looking for companies with good ideas.  They're looking for companies that have a high probability of using their good ideas to generate revenue.


 Use Social Media to Promote Your Company as a Thought Leader

Technology companies become successful when the market perceives them as having great ideas to solve the problems their customers face. Successful technology companies use social media to promote their thought leadership. The best way to do this is to regularly publish blog articles that answer the questions your customers not only have, but will have in the future.

Great technology companies anticipate the problems and questions their customers will face and provide answers and solutions before their customers experience those problems. In addition to using their blog articles to promote through leadership, they structure their blog articles to generate leads.


 Use Social Media to Attract the Best and Brightest Employees

This tactic goes hand in hand with promoting your company as a thought leader. The best and brightest engineers, scientists and technologists want to work with companies that are on the cutting edge of their chosen field. Use social media to demonstrate to potential employees that you are the employer of choice. Great technology companies employ social media in their recruiting process.


 Use Social Media to Generate Leads

A well-managed social media marketing process is designed to generate leads. This doesn't mean going on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook and posting about how great your products and services are. It means that you provide great educational content that answers your customer's questions and entices them to learn more about how your company can help them solve their problems.

It also means that you're using social media tools to capture contact information for the potential buyers your educating.You then use that information to appropriately provide them with useful information to help them proceed through their buying process and identify your company as a favored solution. Keep in mind that the concept of social proof states that it's far more effective for one of your customers to praise your solution than for you to boast about how great your solution is.


 

Social Media is not an Option, it's Table Stakes for Technology Companies

Because the technology industry is perhaps the most advanced industry in the use of social media, you can't compete effectively without a well-managed social media marketing process. Whether you're looking for funding or a teaming partner for a potential business opportunity, the lack of a social media marketing process makes you look like an amateur. If you don't already have an effective social media marketing process, I highly recommend that you put one on the top of your to-do list.


 Social media plays a prominent role within the technology industry. A well-managed social media marketing process provides your company with a competitive advantage. In the technology industry, the opposite is true as well: the lack of a social media marketing process puts your company at a competitive disadvantage. Make sure and include a social media marketing process in your business plan. It will help you secure funding, hire great employees and generate leads.


 

Topics: Technology Companies, Social Media

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