Checking-In: Location-Based Social Networking

With 200 million users accessing Facebook through their mobile phones, the number of Facebook Check-Ins is also on the rise. These "check-ins" allow people to post where they are and what they are doing. This is known as Location-Based Social Networking. This can be free advertising for your company through your customers. All they do is "check-in" and everyone then can see your company on their post. The most popular places to check in are retail, restaurant and leisure locations. So if your company is one of these industries you have a lot to gain from location-based social networking. If your company is not one of these no worries, you still can gain as much if not more. 

Location-based social networking works well, because it is interactive for your customer. It allows them to be engaged in your company. One great location-based social network is Foursquare. Foursquare allows users who check-in at venues to earn points towards badges and allows the company that is on Foursquare to interact with these check-ins by providing special rewards for those who check-in. If someone holds the most check-ins at one venue they can be the "mayor" of the venue. These location-based social networks allow your company to be seen by hundreds if not thousands of users just by saying they are there. 

Here is our disclaimer and just like any use of online activities you should take precautions and be proactive and responsible when using social media. We want you to succeed, have fun, and be safe.

Twitter: The 140 Character Social Network

I hear people say that don't like to use Twitter since they already have a Facebook account and don't see a need for Twitter. Plus who really wants to tell people what they are doing every minute? Well Twitter is just as important as Facebook in the social media world as that it allows you to connect and "network" with like minded individuals and companies. I find that business use of Twitter allows me to share and learn from others in my industry so that I can provide my customers a better experience and a better product. Unless you are the innovator of your industry, sometimes you need to learn from someone else. 

Now Twitter is unique in that you can only post 140 characters at a time. So you have to sometimes shorten or abbreviate what you post. Twitter is also great for marketing your business. You can send short to the point "Tweets" to your followers, who may interact with your tweet by replying to your tweet which helps expose it to those who follow that person. They can "re-tweet" your tweet and again expose more people to your post. They can even direct message you about your post. 

When posting on Twitter you can use "Hashtags" which makes a topic become a searchable item by using the number symbol "#" as the first character of the tag (i.e. #Twitter, #PHX_Creative, #Socialmedia, #Success). With Twitter there are tons of tools that can allow you to sync your Twitter accounts with other social media accounts that you have created like Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Foursquare, YouTube and Flickr. One such tool TweetDeck allows you to connect with most of your social media accounts and just one Tweet can be posted to all accounts instead of making one post for each account. 

Should your company have a Twitter? Yes it should since it is a third of the size of Facebook in terms of users at over 200 million. The more markets your company can enter into the more exposure you receive, and why shouldn't you it's all free marketing.