It is a problem that is endemic across multiple platforms, services, and online communities. From Twitter to Facebook, Ning to Reddit, display advertising is sold at record low rates due to the limited user involvement available. Many marketers have written the services off as bust inventory – viewer attention that is so valueless it is not even worth pursuing.

But a small number of innovative marketers are singing a very different tune. They have turned monetizing ‘bust’ inventory into a specialty, buying up spaces on social media platforms at pennies on the dollar and creating dynamic income for themselves. How do they do it? These three tactics appear to be remarkably common, forming the backbone of the social media innovator’s income.

Selling is not the priority, gaining information is.

There is value in social media traffic, even traffic that is largely unfiltered. While thousands of internet marketers chase the short-term sale and instant income, a community of forward thinking marketers have spent their time doing the exact opposite: chasing the eventual sale, and using cheap social media inventory to help themselves get there.

So instead of directing users towards a giant ‘buy now!’ button, these marketers have slowly and carefully guided users through information before requesting their name and email address. The process is the opposite of most direct tactics; it spends little time barraging the customer with tactics, and significantly more time building trust for a sale, be it two weeks or two months down the line.

Social media marketers plan to sell, but not a product.

The smartest social media marketers know that they are only one part of the sales chain, the mark designed to gather information. By removing the sale from the equation, many can generate more valuable output than they would with a shiny, specialized, and specific product at the end of the process.

That is why so many social marketers are no longer attempting to sell products, but to sell information. By gaining an understanding of their audience’s interests and desires, they can generated a powerful resource for other marketers, many of whom will pay for the information. Think in terms of leads and you will quickly monetize social media inventory; treat it as a sales game and you will likely end up with nothing to show for your efforts.

Build an audience first, then monetize.

Far too many marketers jump into the world of social media with products to push, affiliate offers to promote, and businesses to advertise. It is a common mistake, and it is one that tends to backfire early, putting marketers off the format entirely and limiting their future social media efforts.

Instead of going gung-ho right from the start, it might be best to spend your formative social media days developing an audience, and then marketing to them once you have gained a major position. Treat your social media efforts like you would a social media business – gain the numbers, the influence, and the passion first, and introduce the products, services, and offers later.

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But social media marketing is not all about Twitter accounts, Facebook fan pages, and building your own community. A large number of the most successful social media marketers do not even create their own accounts, instead relying on dedicated users to do their marketing for them.

These five methods, tactics, and techniques will help you build a social media presence for your business, all without building a new website or Twitter account. Whether your company maintains a static website or a dynamic blog, incorporating these five techniques will help you gain customers and dedicated social media fans.

Build and Manage a Company Blog

In many ways, blogs are the ultimate social media resource. They are dynamic, they are engaging, and they are something that almost every business should be investing in. Before you add icons to your website or create a company Twitter account, ensure that your business is sharing information on a regular basis that can help your audience stay interested, dedicated, and invested in what you are doing.

Use Social Media Sharing Icons

Social media sharing icons are one of the most common additions to blogging platforms. From Wordpress to Movable Type, almost every blogging back end is accompanied by its own set of Twitter, Facebook, and Ning sharing icons. A quick five minute installation process is all that is required to quickly and easily incorporate sharing icons into your company blog or website.

Encourage Comments

Thanks to commenting platforms like Discus, blog comments are no longer the isolated and unlinked pieces of content that they once were. By encouraging comments, you’ll gain links to new social media presences and help your blog to appear on aggregator websites. Install a dynamic comment tool (Discus) and ensure your anti-spam extension works, then ask readers for their opinions and input.

Use Auto-Tweeting Tools to Gain Twitter Traffic

Marketers constantly bemoan Twitter’s lack of valuable traffic, all the while ignoring its real value: as a huge sharing platform and dedicated community. While Twitter is undeniably ineffective when it comes to selling, it is one of the most important platforms on the internet for helping content go truly viral. If your business has a new blog post or product which is in need of publicity, be sure to configure an auto-tweeting extension to spread the word.

Submit Your Content to Digg, Reddit, and Other Social Bookmarking Websites

Much like Twitter, social bookmarking websites are not renowned for their buy-ready audiences or valuable advertising inventory. However, they are a great tool for creating links to your website, gaining online exposure, and eventually being featured on an influential website. Invest some time into your social bookmarking accounts and you’ll be rewarded, often significantly more so than you would have expected.

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Of course, blogs share numerous similarities with the top social media websites of today. From communications similarities to self-built communities, bloggers are just as active in social media as anyone else, even if they do not speak outside their blog. After looking carefully at the many similarities between blogs and social media platforms, we have come to one conclusion: they are the same.

Don’t believe it’s true? Check out these four reasons and decide for yourself. Blogs are a powerful social media marketing platform, but by not being incorporated into social media marketing plans, almost all of their value is being left untouched.

1. Blogs let people connect.
The oft-spoken top value of social media is that it lets people ‘connect’. From Twitter to Facebook, Myspace to Ning, the hundreds of social media services out there are designed solely with one goal in mind: bring people together.

Sure, some do it through photos like Flickr; others do it through profiles like Facebook. The shared characteristic is that entire services are based around connections, just like blogs are. Social media marketing is not limited to services — a self-hosted blog can be just as much of a social media asset as a popular Facebook fan page.

2. Blogs integrate with other social media platforms.
A blog post is not just a service; it is a marketing currency. With the right combination of Wordpress plugins, every post can spread like wildfire through the blogging community. Add a ‘Tweet This!’ button to the bottom of your company blog and encourage people to use it. With enough interest, you might just find that your social media marketing ROI shoots up as a result of renewed interest in your blog.

3. Blogs expand on social media micro-services.
Twitter is difficult to describe and define. To some people it is a micro-blogging tool, while to others it is a communications platform similar to an instant messenger. However you see Twitter, the most important point is the same: it is a simplified form of blogging.

While blogging is often too long-form for effective viral marketing, it is unwise to discount and disregard it as a marketing tool altogether. As an expanded social media marketing asset, a great blog is worth its weight in gold.

4. Blogs are the new profiles.
A couple of years ago, a Myspace profile dished out all the information that your audience could possibly want to know. Now, they are as irrelevant as can be — swept up in the next move towards ultra-detailed content.

Instead of allowing profiles, Twitter encourages users to link to their blogs. Blogs are the new profile — they offer an expanded version of what social media can spread. Instead of marketing to visitors in your social media stream, why not lure them in with great social media content and market using your blog?

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Social media changes rapidly, often to the point where it’s difficult to draw up rules for it, or even plan where it will be next year. Just like Friendster drifted into obscurity and Myspace into the back alleys of the internet, the logical progression of communities would suggest that one day, reasonably soon in fact, Facebook and Twitter will lose their thunder and become remarkably less popular.

So then why are companies investing billions of dollars into using the latest marketing and communications platforms? Facebook has been hundreds of millions of dollars in debt, and has only just begun turning a profit. If it runs through the same lifespan as its predecessors, what’s to say that it doesn’t die out before it even becomes profitable on the whole? Likewise, Twitter has yet to even open revenue streams, yet it’s consistently being touted as the most popular and influential online platform since, well, Myspace.

The key to mastering these social media platforms is to take a light approach to the amount that your business invests in each one. Of course, this isn’t about direct financial investments – all are private companies – but about the way you invest your marketing muscle and resources. A campaign that bets everything on Facebook’s longevity may not prove a success in the long-term, but a marketing campaign that bets on the lifespan of social media very well could be.

An event that’s unfortunately absent in a lot of people’s minds is the crash of the early 2000s. After ballooning in value – both financial and in pure hype – hundreds of the most exciting web startups came crashing to the ground. Like Myspace, and Friendster before it, what’s to say that the same crash won’t happen to today’s giant social media presences? Sure, they’re posting profits, but not all are, and the few that are still have hundreds of millions in funding to move past. While money is flowing in, how long will it keep coming in for?

There’s a lesson that small online businesses can take from this, even if they are external from the whole social media show. Direct advertising on social media, particularly through PPC and PPM methods, will be effective. It doesn’t depend on the dynamics of the network, merely on the size of it. However, marketing that depends on the dynamics of the network, for example community building over Facebook and Twitter, may prove less effective as time goes on. Communities naturally progress, and the progression for Facebook users could be towards a different website altogether.

So if you want to invest in social media marketing, move quickly and fluidly. The most effective companies, the ones that can leverage social media easily and effortlessly, are the ones that have no problem moving from one platform to another. Tie yourself to Twitter and you might find yourself aboard a sinking ship; invest in a strategy that includes Twitter and you’ll find yourself moving forwards, no matter what direction the platform moves.

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Through a targeted email marketing approach you may tailor or personalize your message to your specific audience or niche. In marketing terms, this is called segmentation.

The advantages to using an email marketing strategy to promote your business are many, such as: low cost as compared to traditional mailing costs, the speed at which your message is delivered, and the ability for recipients to forward the message to others who may also be interested. Moreover, email marketing software allows you to track results of your communications, allowing you to evaluate your success and enhance your messages through your statistical insights.

While there are multiple advantages, keep in mind that email marketing is intended to be an enhancement to your other marketing activities. For example, it may be used to lead your prospects to your website, which should be designed to process sales, while your email marketing campaign will highlight the benefits of your offerings and encourage prospects to make a purchase. Your website should also be the focus of other online marketing strategies such as search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and article marketing. Email marketing allows you to enhance all your marketing efforts and encourages customers to patronize your business and become loyal fans.

Always remember when implementing an email marketing campaign do not overdo it, one of the downsides or disadvantages of email marketing. If you’re sending emails to thousands of people every other day, they’re going to get tired of hearing from you and either delete them or opt out of your mailing list, which will potentially cost you a lot of business. The last thing you want to do is irritate your subscribers by making them feel they’ve been tricked into signing up for something they didn’t actually want.

Email marketing is a very valuable tool to supplement your marketing strategies while giving you an additional method to keep in touch with your customers and prospects to build a loyal following.

Jeannine Clontz, IVAA CVA, MVA, EthicsChecked™, owner of Accurate Business Services is a Virtual Assistant (VA).  ABS provides ‘as needed marketing and social media support, training and consulting to busy entrepreneurs.  Clontz is a writer, author, VA Coach, and speaker on business topics including business ethics. For her free 10-Step Guide to Finding the Right VA, or her FREE Report, Social Media Marketing Benefits, send a request to: service@accbizsvcs.com or visit: http://www.accbizsvcs.com, www.VAbizcoach.com or her book website http://www.entrepreneurialfreedom.com

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It is behavior that is remarkably similar to that of the late 1990s technology bubble. Companies kept going up and up in value, despite no real long-term outlook. Eventually, the bubble burst and the self-proclaimed ‘experts’ ran away, seemingly unable to admit that they were wrong about some things. While social media is unlikely to end the same way, primarily thanks to the massive amount of audience and user participation that is taking place, the marketing strategy applied to social media should reflect the events of the late 1990s.

That means that instead of being remarkably optimistic without reason, companies should be relatively cautious and conservative when embracing social media marketing. Rather than looking at the short-term possibilities, companies should be looking at the long-term implications for their brand, should they sink time and money into a form of marketing that does not offer any long-term solution. Instead of hiring the latest and greatest social media consultant to develop a web strategy, businesses should be looking at their own strategy, and incorporating social media platforms as tactics, not as a replacement.

In short, the focus should not be on social media itself, but on the results that it can bring. As much as we have heard about the myriad ways in which Twitter can change the world, there has been relatively little evidence to support any such theory. Sure, brands are making it big on Twitter and plenty of companies are making some serious marketing income, but there’s yet to be anything to suggest that businesses should discard every marketing method pioneered before 2007 to jump on board the social media train.

If your business is looking to incorporate social media marketing into its strategy, there are several questions you should be asking yourself before you invest the time and money. Is your brand compatible with social media audiences? Are you a business that inspires conversation and discussion? Can you build a reliable, solid community around your business? For most, the answer is no, and a social media presence is not the most effective solution.

For some, the answer is yes, and for them it is wise to look at social media as a piece of the puzzle, rather than as the solution. While Twitter can help you sell products and Facebook can help you generate positive feedback and PR, neither can fix a broken business model or a poor product. Social media thrives on discussion, and when there’s none to be had, there’s nothing but resources to be wasted. Study the social media platforms before you dive in, and invest time and money cautiously.

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That’s why the top social media users optimize their online presence. While it’s essential to know your audience for a good online career, it’s much more important to live a life that doesn’t revolve around serving their every need. If you want to minimize your social media commitment while maximizing the results, these simple optimization techniques can help you decrease the amount of time required to respond to messages, limit your incoming email, and allow you to focus on your projects rather than your audience.

#1: Be clear about your communication limits.
Half of the reason that major bloggers and social media experts receive so many emails and requests is that they don’t specifically and explicitly ask not to receive them. Your audience is going to respond how you let it respond, and without setting limits on emails and personal contact it’s easy for that communications channel to spiral out of control. Focus on what you want from your contact, and make it clear to your audience that some types of contact might not get a response.

#2: Limit your distractions.
Wasting time on distractions and non-essential activities can cost you a lot of valuable time and lost potential income. We’ve all had days that end up wasted in front of the computer, and they’re never the ideal outcome. By limiting your social media distractions you can avoid these productivity nightmares and focus on projects that are more important to you.

#3: Don’t follow everyone that follows you.
When you listen to everyone, it’s impossible to focus on what matters. Sure, they’re your audience and your followers, but two-way contact will always end in missed opportunities and wasted time. To make your audience more controllable, focus on following only the people that you truly want to hear from. If someone out there has a message that’s absolutely essential for you to hear, rest assured that it will find its way to you – those things always do.

#4: If you have to, selectively outsource parts of your social media presence.
Tim Ferriss took outsourcing to new levels in his book ‘The Four Hour Workweek,’ and while it drew controversy, it drew many more adopters. Outsourcing isn’t particularly difficult, and when managed properly it can save you a lot of time. If you’re not a fan of hiring outside help, there are hundreds of programs and plugins that could save you valuable time. Want to alert incoming email that you might not be able to respond immediately? Set up an auto-responder and program it to let people know you’ll get back to messages as soon as possible. Hire a virtual assistant to help manage many of your social media marketing tasks that don’t involve pretending to be you or communicating as you. Small automations and outsourced tasks can end up saving you hundreds of hours of time every year, so be sure to experiment with them.

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Most people who use Twitter do so in order to keep in touch with friends and family. They send updates, called tweets, to let people know what they are up to, as well as receive tweets from users they have chosen to follow. However, many people are also using Twitter for more than personal purposes. For business owners, Twitter has become an essential tool for promoting their products and services online.

Although the basic processes of sending tweets and following users are the same, there are a few things you have to do differently if you are planning to use your Twitter account for business purposes. For one thing, you want to be visible to a wider group of followers and not be restricted to people you already know personally. A great way to do this is with the use of @replies.

An @reply simply means affixing the “@” sign before a user’s name and inserting that before your reply. In order to make the most of @replies on Twitter, you have to use Twitter’s search feature regularly. Find tweets related to products or services you are offering and respond to users who posted related tweets by using @replies.

For example, let’s say you are running a party-planning business. Search for tweets of people posting questions on how to prepare for upcoming birthdays or special events. You can respond to a user who posted by sending her an @reply containing a link to your business website or blog. Your response can be something along the lines of, “@busymom for birthday or party planning tips and professional advice, check out <your url here>” Since the user asked a question, you will essentially be just answering her and your post won’t be considered as unsolicited advice.

This is why @replies are very useful. Instead of simply advertising your products or services to strangers out of the blue, which a lot of people don’t really appreciate, you will actually be providing them a solution to a problem they do have. With the @replies, you will also be addressing the user who posted the question directly, making it less of an advertisement and more of a helpful gesture.Another advantage of using @replies is you don’t necessarily have to be someone’s follower in order to send her @replies. On the contrary, you can even use these @replies to further expand your contact list on Twitter. The more @replies you post, the more people will be able to see you. If they find your @replies or tweets to be quite interesting or relevant to their issues, they may even choose to follow you on Twitter.

Since Twitter is a rapidly growing website with more than two million users, the opportunities of reaching potential clients is limitless. If you use the features of the site properly, you can expand your business tremendously in no time at all.

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However, with the good comes the bad, and there are certainly businesses that are embracing the wrong kind of social media promotion. Marketing is a field that is talked about by many, yet understood by relatively few, and the many recent failed social media marketing campaigns are evidence to the rules that you have to follow when marketing online.

These are the five biggest mistakes businesses make when they market online. From spam tactics to destructive marketing messages, everything that could hurt your online marketing image is covered. Get your marketing plan out, take notes, and eliminate any of the following from your marketing efforts:

1. Don’t just link to your company blog on Twitter.

Twitter users hate just being fed linked content. While it is easy to write off the entire medium as a backlink platform, doing so leaves an incredibly powerful marketing resource completely untapped. Invest some time in developing a real strategy for every social media platform that you use, and don’t just half-use something for backlinks and channel funneling. A much better strategy is to combine different social media platforms to create a tailored, powerful message.

2. Facebook groups are great for cult businesses, bad for ultra-small.

Why? Because the entire nature of a group gets destroyed when there are only a couple of people participating in the discussion. If you are a cult brand that attracts a lot of passion from your customers, users, or clients, a Facebook group is a great idea. Otherwise, it is best to keep your conversation in channels that you can easily attach yourself to. Small businesses benefit highly from blogs and micro-publishing, so a Twitter or blogging presence is much more valuable, as is a Facebook Fan Page.

3. Don’t drop everything to take on social media.

There are other marketing channels out there, and they are often much more effective than social media. For some, social media is their marketing calling card, but that does not mean that is has to be the same for you. Some brands translate better than others across different marketing platforms and formats. While one brand may succeed in a social media world, another might fall flat.

4. Don’t always listen to your social media feedback.

Feedback needs to be approached as a whole unit, not as disjointed units of variable value. When you use social media to spread your word, it’s easy to fall for the fallacy of valuing it higher than it really is. Feedback is valuable no matter what the form, and treating social media feedback as more valuable than a mailed letter is a broken strategy.

5. Don’t spam.

There are laws against email spam. There are laws against mailing spam. At this point, there are no laws about spamming your followers on Twitter. Don’t do it. As much as it can boost your short-term returns, spamming is quite possibly the worst long-term strategy imaginable. Focus on real connections, not the false connections that spamming creates.

Now here are some words to live by in your social media marketing campaigns. Write them down on a sticky, post them next to your computer, and refer to them often….

Lighten up, Share, Encourage, Embrace, Inspire, Converse, Listen, Ask, Answer, Be Real, and HAVE FUN!

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Evolving Software

WordPress is free, web-based software that is open source, which means it is available for developers to build upon and alter at will. Over time, its open source flexibility has allowed WordPress to become a content management system (CMS), or a program that creates, edits, and manages website content as well as blog content.

The best part about WordPress is that it doesn’t require knowledge of PHP or HTML code to use it. The blog or website creator chooses the look and rearranges the content simply and without rebuilding whole pages through the code.

While utilizing WordPress to build a website is possible, my preference is to maintain separate platforms for my website and blog by using traditional website development options.  I believe it allows me to take advantage of different options, and search engine optimization methods to capture as many prospects as possible.

Themes and Plug-ins

WordPress has a theme system that allows for easy customization for your blog allowing the creator to change the look of the site as often as they like. WordPress also has features that assist with link management, complex indexing of blog posts, and the ability for multiple authors to add blog or site content. WordPress works well with other blogging services like Trackback and Pingback as well as easy importing of content from other blogs. WordPress also has security features such to control spam and visitor comments, user registration, and password protection for selected posts. There are also hundreds of compatible plugins available that can greatly extend the functionality.

WordPress for Business and Pleasure

WordPress started as a communication tool for the individual, but it also has many benefits to offer to the business world. Since WordPress is so simple to use and maintain, this means less overhead and less time spent for creation and maintenance of the blog platform. The blogging aspect of WordPress also means that companies have an on-demand method for keeping their audiences updated on company business and advertising their products and services. Plus, blogging offers a wonderful method for companies to get feedback from their consumers. It allows you to keep the content fresh, which increases search engine ranking so that the company’s content will have a better chance of audience exposure.

Everyone’s Doing It

With the popularity of social media and the flexible program, ease of installation, and added functionality of plug ins, WordPress provides a way for everyone to be involved and engaged in social media, and utilize the benefits it provides to your overall presence on the Internet.

Jeannine Clontz, owner of Accurate Business Services, a VA practice, is an author, writer, speaker and VA Business Coach specializing in providing professional business coaching to established and start-up virtual assistants (VA’s).  For her FREE audio CD “What’s Holding Back my Business Success?”,  a 2-month trial in her Insider group coaching program, or 1-month trial of her coaching club visit:  http://www.VAbizcoach.com; or contact her at: coach@VAbizcoach.com.

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