Social Media

Social media is made up of websites that make it easy for people to share articles, photos, videos and links. Some of the more popular social media websites are Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Once you have a business website, you can grow your reach - how many people online see information about your business - by using social media. People can read your posts on Facebook or other social media, or click on a link to visit your website. Social media can also help improve search engine results. Businesses that do not participate in social media risk losing business.

Start posting. Recognizing that people will not read an endless stream of commercials for any business, you will want to post related information: an article about industry trends, a repost of a light-hearted piece, or even upbeat news related to the neighborhood in which your business is located. Occasionally write an article to promote your business’ specials or other commercial.

Doing this well builds your credentials, making your business the one place to go to when people need what you sell.

Posting will be time-consuming until you get used to it. This is because all tasks take time to learn, and more time to get fast at them. However, regular activity on social media will bring people to your store. Reading the articles on social media in this chapter will help.

One other warning: The greater the competition in your industry, the harder you will work on your social media to get the results you need.

Once you have become good at using one social media to bring business into your store, look for another one and follow the same path as above. You will reach a point where you have two or three social media working effectively for your business.