We have been working with multiple companies developing social media profiles lately. In the efforts of building a branding and consistent character basis for companies, we have seen more and more that there are too many companies without a presence on LinkedIn. Not talking about an individual profile – which is very concerning that over 3.5 million users are on the site, but yet millions more haven’t ventured into building a profile is overwhelming. To start there, if you don’t have a presence on this site as an individual, you are telling the world that either you don’t want to be connected to, you aren’t savvy with the Internet, or you would rather spamming sites publish information about you instead. One of the most beautiful things about LinkedIn is the searchability factor through google. 4 out of 5 customers will search LinkedIn for their potential vendor representative (or potential new hire) to gain character perspective and knowledge about this person. If you don’t choose to put information about your history that you want people to see, they will find out information about you on sites that pay a lot of money to Google to post personal things such as pictures of your home, family members & so on (an example of this is 123people & there are many other sites out there who “phish” for your information & post it freely online). Should you ever find something like this – you can contact the publisher for it to be removed. Know that the most important piece of us mentioning this – is the fact that THE INFORMATION YOU WANT POSTED ON THE INTERNET – SHOULD BE THE INFORMATION THAT YOU CHOOSE TO BE POSTED – NOT WHAT SOMEONE ELSE DECIDES FOR YOU!

This holds true about information for your company. If you don’t have a website – how will your customers know what you offer & if you are a real business person? Same with social media. If you are not “out there” and “current” how will people know how to do business with you, connect with you, follow you and want to maintain relationship with you????

With that being said, as a business owner you have thought about a few things:

(1) what is my logo?
(2) what is my brand?
(3) where will I market?
(4) how will I market?
(5) who will I market to?
(6) build a website

Will all of these things in place, there is still a laundry list of things that need to happen as well.

FACTS:
(1) If you have a website, it will have either detailed – or not as detailed – information about your products/services
(2) You may be choosing some print marketing or mailers for your potential or existing customers

These are important – but what should go in hand with this?

***SOCIAL MEDIA***

If you have a personal presence on Facebook, you should NOT be marketing your company on your “personal” page, rather you should have a business page where people can “like” your company and follow your updates.

If you have a personal profile on LinkedIn, you need to be sure your company profile is established as well so people can easily find you through your company or your personal profile. Individuals can also “like” your company page for updates. You should also have recommendations of your work that your customers, vendors or staff can post about you – this is a great character building piece and can also encourage a history of your experience.

A newer feature of LinkedIn is posting products & services. The great thing about this is you can get recommendations for these products or services right on the company page – a great marketing tool.

My challenge for you – If you have a personal presence on FaceBook or LinkedIn – then create a company profile for them both. It will increase visibility, credibility & ownership of your brand.