–By Justin Albano, Director of Business Development at Bonfire Social Media–

B2B marketers and business owners often ask me if the benefits of social media only exist in the B2C realm. The answer is a resounding no. The core concepts of social media: establishing your brand as an industry influencer, engaging with your customers, leveraging brand advocates, and nurturing leads along a sales cycle are just as powerful in connecting with companies as they are with consumers. In fact, B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads per month than those who do not [1], and 57% of B2B companies have acquired a customer through LinkedIn [2]. However, just like any other marketing tools, here are some best practices that will get you started in the right direction.

1) Know Your Objectives

What do you want? More customers? A better relationship with your customers? Both? As a biz dev guy I love “to do lists,” strategies, and most of all accomplishing objectives. Often, companies that I talk with are either focused on driving more leads or improving their brand’s perception and share of voice. Dependent upon your company’s objectives, you need to understand which, or both, of these categories your company falls into. Without defining your objectives, you stand no chance of measuring success or understanding the effect of your actions.

Action Items:

• Start macro and go micro. What do you really want out of your business? Do you want to grow a secure company that can be passed on to your kids? Do you have a quick profitable exit in mind? Start with your vision and let it set the framework for your strategies in every business facet. Then develop your bottom up action items, i.e. what will it actually take to get there?
• Set success metrics and milestones and review your progress regularly, not just at the end of the year.

2) Understand Your Demographics

It may seem obvious, but it never ceases to amaze me how few companies actually understand who their demographic is, what their buying cycle looks like, what motivating factors/events cause them to take action or where they get information on products and services.

Action Items:

• Create customer profiles that allow you to examine your demographics in a more intimate way. For example, Suzie is a mother of two who works full time, loves to play tennis and hike, cares about the environment, and prefers to watch movies rather than TV. Setting up these profiles gives you a great demographic snapshot and helps to focus your marketing efforts.
• Once you understand your demographic’s buying cycle, what info, education or resources can you provide to make their buying decision easier? This is not only important for brand awareness and brand perception, but should be the driving force behind your lead nurturing cycle.
• It is crucial for you to understand your industry’s keyword landscape. Which keywords are your demographic using to search for the products/services you offer or information related to your offering? Which keywords are obtainable? How do you currently rank for those keywords? Google provides some free tools for the Do-it-Yourselfers, but any digital marketing shop should help you build the list and give you the analytic insights that will enable you to make sense of it all.
• Discover which social platforms your demographics are already engaged with and focus your efforts there. Currently, there are over 800 million users on Facebook, 300 million users on Twitter, 116 million users on LinkedIn and only 60 million users on Google+ [3]. If you currently have an email database, run it through some social networks to discover who is already using which networks. This could save you mountains of time in the long run and allow you to target your unique demographics.
• Listen via social networks like Twitter, Facebook, blogs, and forums, as well as online news sites. Once you know your demographic’s hangouts and keywords, you can listen to social conversations via CMS platforms like HootSuite/TweetDeck and by setting up Google Alerts that monitor articles, blogs and forums that are currently talking about your keywords.

3) Create Value Based Relationships

Social media is not the place for old-school messaging tactics, and the concept of protecting your secret sauce is dead. Company decision makers typically go to your website, not social networks, to learn the benefits of your products or services. Companies and consumers alike are actively searching for value-based content that makes their lives and their buying decisions easier.

Action Items:

• Offer value-based content. If you help companies streamline their processes, don’t just talk about how you do it; offer them free templates or How-To whitepapers that teach them how to be more efficient. Providing this type of value will convert prospects in to fans of your company and customers in to loyal brand advocates.
• Understand the difference between relevant content (e.g. interesting articles, company update s, etc.) and compelling content that provides value and motivates visitors to take action (either by providing contact information or requesting a demo).
• Monitor conversations within social communities, like LinkedIn discussion threads, and offer advice or input wherever possible.
• Don’t be afraid to give away the secret sauce. As we all know, understanding how to do something and actually doing it are two very different things. Some of Bonfire’s best clients are those who tried to do it themselves first and quickly realized that their time and resources are much more effectively spent doing the things that they already excel at rather than learning how to develop custom Facebook tabs, constantly managing social networks, writing blogs or producing webinars.

4) Leverage Your Current Marketing Mix

A common and dangerous myth is that social media replaces traditional and costly marketing channels with free messaging. This is simply not true. Social media is at its best when it is amplifying other marketing efforts or when integrated in to a well thought-out campaign.

Action Items:

• Install social plug-ins throughout your site. These allow visitors to share your content on their preferred social network quickly and with a minimum of effort.
• Utilize landing pages to capture leads and initiate your lead nurturing cycle.
• 59% of B2B purchase decision makers have used their smartphone to research products and services when they are considering purchases [4], so optimize your content and landing pages for the increasing number of mobile users.
• Include QR codes on in-print advertising and articles with compelling calls to action.

This is not rocket science and it’s not revolutionary. Instead, this is a new application of what the heart and soul of American business was when companies took the time to connect with their communities and develop relationships with their customers. As a B2B marketer your audience might be smaller than your B2C counterparts, but that means you can be much more targeted and strategic with your marketing. While a B2C marketer may segment their demographics down to niche communities, you can target specific decision makers within your target companies and develop a value-based relationship that not only nurtures the current sales cycle but also sets a positive framework for a long and supportive business relationship.

—-
Stat Citations
[1] Source: Hubspot, State of Inbound Marketing Lead Generation Report, 2010
[2] Source: http://www.hubspot.com/social-media-monitoring-in-10-minutes-ebook/?source=hspd-affiliate-PID-3701805-txt-ad-social-media-10-min-day-ebook-20110819&AID=10933127&PID=3701805&SID=skim1024X498223X8a5f920e568fa93e07c8561649950bf2
[3] Source: http://www.business2community.com/social-media/b2b-social-media-marketing-statistics-to-ponder-099980
[4] Source: http://socialmediab2b.com/2011/09/b2b-decision-makers-smartphones/#ixzz1jmUIeJul

Google+ may be the company’s newest hope for an increased social media presence, but YouTube, a Google subsidiary, remains a solid platform which is now becoming more social.

The recent updates to YouTube include streamlined channel design and improved back-end analytics. Many social media experts, including Mashable, also talk of the updates making the platform more “Google-like.” Another major feature of the updates is an emphasis on interacting with channel viewers and subscribers.

Outlined below are the most important updates, showing how they can both improve your channel’s views and improve interaction within the YouTube community.

What do YOU think of the new updates? Comment below!

Channel Design Updates

When switching to the new channel design, one of the first things you will notice is the tab design. The Featured tab now allows for greater customization. Whether you have one channel for your small business or you are trying to link multiple channels and dozens of videos, you can pick the right Featured tab template:

The Blogger Perfect for a channel which regularly updates its channel with fresh, focused content.

The Creator A good choice if your company has high-quality videos, but only a small number to display.

The Network If your company has a multiple channels, this template seamlessly ties them together.

The Everything The best choice if you need it all. The template allows for a featured video, featured playlists, and featured Channels.

It is good to note that you can test out the different templates before choosing which one is right for you. Also, the background and other design assets have had only minimal changes, so most assets will only need to be adjusted slightly, rather than completely re-designed.

The new design also has Feed and Videos tabs. The Feed tab is where comments now live, along with recent activity and other featured channels. The Video tab provides an ability to have all of a channel’s videos displayed in an organized way.

Want to learn more? YouTube’s online support documents will guide you through updating your channel.

Analytics and Optimization

YouTube “Insights” already provided a wealth of information for those looking for in-depth analytics on their videos. The recent updates have continued this trend and improved both their ease of use and analytic insight. In particular, engagement reports allow you to learn more about how people are interacting with your channel’s video content.

YouTube video optimization has also improved. While YouTube is rather straightforward when it comes to search optimization, adding description tags is a new feature which can boost the visibility of your content.

Interactivity

Finally, YouTube should not just be viewed as a static library for promotional videos or other content. While your channel can be a great way to store videos that are uploaded to your blog or website, it is also a perfect place to interact with fans. Fan comments will now be housed on separate tab and new features allow for channel owners to communicate more directly with subscribers. By increasing your subscriber count, you can boost the reach of your content and achieve greater virality for videos.

The new design also moves the “Subscribe” button above-the-fold, allowing for greater conversions from visitors to your channel.

Conclusion

These updates show that YouTube seems to be headed in the right direction. While many social media campaigns focus solely on Facebook and Twitter, incorporating an optimized YouTube channel is a wise choice. The platform has the ability to both enhance your existing social media platforms as well as create another avenue to grow, engage, and interact with your community.

Videos can quickly grab a customer’s attention and stay in their mind longer than a photo or even the written word. But how can you make your videos more interactive? Allow users to not only view your videos, but become immersed with them.

Annotations are a trusted, but under-utilized YouTube tool that can boost both page views and subscribers for a channel. A video’s power can be enhanced by using this simple (and free) tool.

Two examples of annotation creativity:

Interactive Promotions/Games

Annotations can be a fun way to promote products. Instead of a video showcasing a new line of toys, Hot Wheels used annotations and turned their YouTube videos into an online game. Users can choose both the type of car and add-ons to race. While it takes a lot of planning and video production, the end product is a seamless use of YouTube Annotations.

‘Choose Your Own Adventure’

Many adults remember growing up with ‘choose your own adventure’ stories. The digital versions of these use YouTube annotations to create a fun story. Fun and interactive, they can be a nice way to promote products or services in story-form.  And, unlike their hard-copy predecessor, you can’t skip ahead and change your mind!

More Practical Uses
While creativity is key to utilizing annotations, this tool can also be used to increase the number of subscribers.

• Subscribers: By using the Subscribe link type, your video can have a great call-out for viewers to subscribe to your channel, allowing for more video views and greater channel reach.
• Linking : If your channel has a lot of content, annotations can link these videos together. It not only keeps viewers on your channel longer, but also allows for a deeper understanding of your services, products or mission.
• Promoting Other Channels: Does your company have more than one YouTube channel? Annotations can help link these by promoting another channel in a relevant video. This can help to promote smaller channels from a large, central channel.

Where to begin?
Start by mapping out your annotations. Whether they are simple links to other videos, words of wisdom, or interactive elements, planning is key. Try to create a virtual path where users will be compelled to spend more time on your channel.

The actual creation of new annotations is relatively easy. Be sure to keep in mind both the placement and type of annotation.

Like anything, however, annotations can get out of hand. It is important to remember what makes videos great is the actual viewing experience. Annotations should be used to enhance and not detract from the experience. By having timely call-outs it can help increase the amount of time users both spend on your channel as well as the amount they share your content with others.

Learn More

Here are a few great resources for getting started on a YouTube annotations project:

How To: Use Annotations to Promote Your Brand on YouTube – A great step-by-step guide on YouTube annotations.

YouTube Help Guide - A simplified guide that can be used as a resource when getting started.

Company: Judith Arnell
Social Media Marketing Team: Danielle Hoole, William Crane
Campaign Length: 9 months

Results:

• Increased Facebook likers by 1605%
• Facebook was top overall referring site of web traffic
• Increased Monthly Facebook page interactions by 439%

The Challenge
Judith Arnell is a local jeweler in the Portland Pearl District offering high-end, custom jewelry. Their marketing efforts had centered around print advertising and billboards and were yielding no measurable results. At the start of the social media campaign, Judith Arnell had a flaccid Facebook page that wasn’t  recruiting or engaging the community.  The challenge was to create and foster an engaged Facebook community while showing a positive ROI.

The Solution
Bonfire developed Judith Arnell’s Facebook community by focusing on three different areas: fan engagement,  advertising and promotions. continue

Here are 2 video shorts that are entertaining and informative. These videos are a good follow up to our slide presentation, The State of Online Marketing.

Social Media Revolution 2 (Refresh)

This video comes from Erick Qualm, author of the book Socialnomics. It is produced with the same tone of “Did You Know?”, which is a technology video produced annually.

Social Media Revolution 2010

Based on very similar stats, Social Media Revolution 2010 is a quick video about online engagements growing quickly.

When entering into the complicated world of social media marketing, a business must have clear goals and realistic expectations of their efforts.  There are several examples out there of companies that have seen huge results from a simple YouTube video or a photo that went “viral” and changed the whole company’s quarterly performance. Business is a tall-tale factory when it comes to these stories and it is important to dig deep to uncover the methods, tools and preparation that makes for a successful social media marketing campaign. continue