Working daily with Carpet One and Flooring America franchise owners from all over the country on their local advertising campaigns, I have found a common response among these local affiliates is, "I think I get it, but...?" when it comes to social media marketing. They understand that social media is important to the overall franchise marketing mix,  the message is coming through loud and clear from their corporate brand, but they are unsure of how to use these tools to market their business. The article, Social Media Marketing: Useful tool or passing fad?, tackles social media from what I consider to be a typical small business owner perspective. Here are some important things to consider:

Social marketing can be considered a modern day word-of-mouth marketing. The difference between traditional word-of-mouth and social media word-of-mouth is that you have to manage the message by consistent interaction. It is not a set it and forget solution. Unlike when a happy customer tells their neighbor about their experience.

It is challenging to know where to start with all the options available between Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to name a few, and how to incorporate them into your local Internet marketing strategy. On top of selecting your social media outlets, it takes a great deal of time to manage the content and keep things current and the conversation evolving. It is recommended to assign this responsibility to one person as a daily job function. Especially, since this is an integral part of the overall marketing mix.

Content should not be all sales and promotional messaging. It is important to incorporate interesting and relevant industry information as well to establish credibility with your community of readers and provide them value.

Social media is a good way to target the younger segment of your audience, which continues to get younger and younger. This generation of consumers are actively involved in this marketing medium and the trend is only going to grow stronger in the years to come.

If still not convinced, most social media marketing is absolutely FREE. We love free media!