Is your Business “Socially Awkward?”

Remember middle school dances? I’m an 80′s kid so I remember the awkward middle school dances where they were playing Michael Jackson, Milli Vanilli and Flock of Seagulls and I was on the dance floor with all the cool kids…ha, I wish! I was a “wall flower” when it came to getting “Social” on the dance floor at school. Now at home, I had my parachute pants, cardboard and shoulder mounted boom box and I could break it down, but get us in a crowd and we cling to the wall in fear and bewilderment not knowing what to do.

So the question is, Is your Business Socially Awkward? Most good business owners know their customers, they know their repeat customers and they make them feel welcomed and taken care of when they visit their business. They have great “social” skills but not when it comes to technology. When it comes to this newfangled technology of “twitting” and “being on the faced book” they don’t have a clue how to get in the game and they are sitting on the wall when it comes to social media for businesses.

It’s not that they don’t know how to be social, it’s just that they are intimidated by these new tools for communication for businesses to customers that haven’t existed before and it takes a little introduction to understand which tool is right for your business.

Elaine Dance Business Model for Social Media

All Businesses Need Social Media, But All Businesses don’t need All Social Media

Do you know who said that? I did, I just made that up You see when I talk with some business owners we sit down and talk about what they want in a website and they respond. “We have to get on social media. We need twitter, pinterest, facebook and all of ‘em because we want to drive people to our site.” And I try to help them by understanding what social media is about and what platform is the best fit for their business. So they are the other end of the spectrum which I like to call the Elaine Dance Business Model for Social Media(TM). They run out onto the dance floor and “bust a move” but they have no idea what they are doing and what to tweet, what to put on facebook for their Business page and they end up looking foolish. S0 instead of attracting customers who use smartphones or social media for purchase ideas, they end up repelling potential clients. They are kinda on the right track in that they understand they need to be on social media, and it is important to drive people to your website, but if when they get to your website and it is old and outdated, no have no good content, or your tweets are all about you at wal-mart or your facebook business page is full of family photos then there is a problem.

Time After Time I Know This Much Is True

Every Business DOES need to be on social media these days if they hope to survive in this highly competitive market. So you have a few options at this point.

You can go to all the social media sites out there (71 at my last count fromwww.IFTTT.com) and figure out which ones fit your business the best.
You can hunker down in your shop and hope this fad of social media just goes away. (It’s only going to get worse)
You can ask your teenage cashier to translate all the social media platforms out there and see if you can figure out which one works.
You can call us (803) 479-7699 and let us help you get your business connected to your target audience so you can get out there on the dance floor and slow dance with your lady friend.

(Caution Don’t Click this image below unless you’re a fan of the 80′s! BTW Props to Pandora’s 80′s station for much of the inspiration for last paragraph