3 Simple Steps for Generating Leads with Social Media

3 Simple Steps for Generating Leads with Social Media

When business owners think of social media, they usually think of the process of building a brand image, and not so much of generating leads. But that’s where they are wrong. Social media can be a huge addition to your overall lead generation strategy, that is if you know how to use it to its fullest potential.

However, before you begin generating leads through social media, it is important to position yourself as an authority figure in your line of work. You can achieve this through your website, blog, your newsletter and by establishing good rapport with your customers. That means being responsive and attentive to your customers’ needs.

Once you’ve mastered that, it’s time to harness the power of social media for lead generation. Below are three basic ways to get started:

---

#1: Join relevant Twitter conversations
Twitter can be a great source of new leads once you start searching. There are thousands of people who are interested in what you have to offer, you just have to find them. Luckily for you, Twitter has made it easy to explore conversation threads already in progress. Here’s how you can search Twitter conversation threads and dive deeper into your search for leads. In addition, you can also create your own threads and generate leads that way.

#2: Follow brand mentions and maintain a positive image
Maintaining a positive brand image is crucial when it comes to generating leads through social media. Brand tracking is important, especially across social media. With this method, utilizing special monitoring tools, such as Hootsuite, Mention, Social Mention, Topsy, Talkwalker, etc., is key.

Monitoring what others are saying about you on social media is important so you can respond to critics when necessary, and engage in relevant conversations. By doing this you’ll be able to keep your brand image positive and (relatively) untainted. This is crucial, as when potential prospects start researching about you, they can see negative comments which can discourage them from doing business with you.

#3: Create Facebook contests
Contests are huge on Facebook, and they tend to attract a lot of people. A Facebook contest is a great way to get tons of likes and comments, and collects email signups by offering a prize in return. The downside is that not all leads will be ideal, but at least you will gather emails which you can use later on for targeting.

---

Don't forget to maintain and track your clients and leads within Client Relationship Management (CRM) software, such as AddressTwo's simple CRM and Email Marketing solution. Staying in contact with your prospects and on top of your sales efforts is crucial to generating sales. Don't allow follow-ups to slip through the cracks and miss out on potential business. Sign up for a Free Trial of AddressTwo, and see what the power of Two, can do for you!

A CRM Might Just Save Your Business

Sending out a warning into the air just won’t work
 to provide your clients with urgent and important information.
Photo credit: alistair Cotton, www.123rf.com

This has been a really trying week here in our office. You see, we have had our website hacked. And we have been frantically trying to get it fixed. You might think that is because we don’t want to miss any potential clients, and it is. But even more important to us is that we don’t want to share any viruses or any bad digital thread with any of our existing clients and contacts.

And, we have several programs with open registrations, blog posts and other bits of information out on social media and in email communications that link back to our site.

Now, you might wonder why I am telling you all of this. Well, we have figured out the protocol for when bad things happen and we have to notify our clients urgently. We know we can’t just stand at our office door and yell out into the street. We have to be effective!

When it’s urgent to reach your tribe…be smart and use your CRM

It’s your CRM. Yes, once again a CRM is key to making business work. With all your contacts in a CRM like AddressTwo, you can very quickly send out an urgent message and reach as many people as possible. With a subject line that lets them know there’s a problem and you have an important message, your open rate (ours did) will soar.

This solution is not limited to letting people know your website is down – or is dangerous to their digital health – but also any time there is a problem, great news, or important information they need.

If you are making regular touches through a weekly email or monthly digital newsletter, your contacts expect to hear from you and your subject line should let them know you are sending a message for them. But when these random important communications go out, you have to let them know there is a special event, reason or warning that you are sending and your subject line is the place to do that.

Of course, you can put the information out in your social media, but social media connections are sporadic. The latest statistic I’ve heard is the only 7-10% of your fans see your posts on Facebook and tweets are swallowed in a blink of the eye. So using your email list makes sense. It’s fast, effective and easy.

The case for a contact list in a CRM

Sure you have contacts in your email and you may even have groups set up for emails, too. But building a contact and client list in a CRMmakes life really easy. You will recognize that when you have an urgent need. And the beauty is that it grows right along with your business. It’s not a fill it in and then continually have to update. No, you build it one person, one contact, one client at a time and before you know it, you have a herd, or a tribe, whichever way you want to think about it.

Choose the technology app that serves you best and can grow with you. Choose one and use it. Don’t get caught out with new somethings that are bright and shiny. Stick with one until it no longer serves your purposes. Learn all the features and utilize every tool inside it.

You’ll find your day-to-day operations and those random, urgent situations can both be handled quickly, easily and professionally.

-Jack Klemeyer

Grow YourBusiness Coaching

Breaking Down CRM- The 3 Keys to Better Business Relationships

Customer Relationship Management is as simple as C-R-M. Breaking down these three parts of a greater whole will help you to deeper understand how a CRM software system is the key to business success. Here are three videos that will explain each of the important aspects of CRM: Customers, Relationships, and Management.

1. Customers: It is important to maintain data on current and future customers of the business, but defining the term “customers” goes far beyond this scope. It’s about maintaining relationships with people who may never even intend to become a customer. Troy has a better way of explaining what I mean:

2. Relationships:

Relationships are much more than just knowing the permanent details of a person. It’s about learning and understanding more about a person through keeping record of the different interactions that you have with one another. In turn, it is important to adapt future interactions based on these records. So how can a CRM software help you to deepen these relationships? This is where video two comes into play.

3. Managment:

In business, we often need more relationships than any one person can manage on their own. In the final installment of “Breaking Down CRM,” Troy explains how a CRM system can help you manage and maintain your business relationships.

The C, R, and M of CRM software is only the tip of the iceberg. You can learn more about the benefits and usability of a simple CRM software by visiting the website for AddressTwo or by attending Troy’s weekly AddressTwo demo on Wednesdays at 3pm. Sign up here today!

Breaking Down CRM: "Management"

What makes up CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we looking at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for you.

Today, let's look at the final term: "Management."

As individuals, we have many relationships that we do not often think about "managing" in any structured sense.  But, that is because we are not seeking the same outcome from every relationship, and we do not have success metrics and goals for how well we do with that process.  In business, however, we do.  And moreover, we often need more relationships than any one human can maintain naturally.  So, naturally, we rely on technology like CRM to manage it all.

Managing business relationships begins with defining how we want relationships to progress.  We cannot begin to manage a process until we have defined it.  How do strangers learn about us?  How do prospects experience our value?  How do leads come to buy our product?  How to customers refer us future customers?  These are all aspects of a relationship that must be defined before they can be managed. 

But once they are defined, management is not a passive tracking or monitoring, it's the act of progressing relationships through the defined processes.  Managing customer relationships using CRM software can be scheduled, held accountable, and even automated in many cases. 

You cannot manage what you cannot define.  The first step in managing customer relationships is to define how they are expected to progress.  But the most effective form of management will automate as many actions as possible so that the human interactions required can be most effective and efficient. 

Without the "M" a CRM is reduced to little more than an archive.  Management is the crucial component that makes CRM an essential tool to any small business.

Breaking Down CRM: "Relationship"

What makes a CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we are taking a detailed look at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for your business.

Today, let's look at "Relationship."

The term relationship is one that we use so often in our personal lives that it seems almost impersonal to attempt a rigid definition of it for business purposes.  Not only so, but relying on a computer system to plan, script, and automate a relationship probably seems even more impersonal.  But in business, every process must be scalable and repeatable, especially the process of building customers.  So, a CRM software is not only wise, it's often necessary.  But just what is it that we're managing?  What is a relationship?

To start, relationships entail things we know.  For sure, relationships are much more than facts we know about a person, but they are not less than those facts.  My relationship with my wife is much more than knowing her birthday, eye color, favorite foods, and her preference in gifts.  But if I did not know this information, deepening the relationship would be difficult, if not impossible.  The first thing that a CRM must do to manage a relationship is store and recall pertinent details.

But we can know facts and figures about complete strangers.  A relationship, by definition, takes on a much more dynamic nature.  There is interaction, messages back and forth, conversations and discoveries that build the relationship over time.  In a good relationship, my interaction today will be impacted by what I've learned over the interactions in the past.  If I do not adapt my own behavior in the relationship based on what I've learned previously, then I am a bad friend (or vendor, or client, or what-have-you).

Lastly, relationships ultimately will entail commitments between parties.  When we say that we are managing relationships with customers, we are not only storing facts, figures, and a log of historical interactions for reference.  We are using the system to hold us accountable to commitments made and future interactions.  Relationships are fluid and must be maintained, not merely archived.

Your CRM must be able to not only archive, but also drive the relationship forward. 

Breaking Down CRM: "Customers"

What makes a CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we are going to take a detailed look at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for you.

Today, let's look at "Customer."

If you took a good look at anyone's CRM database, you might be surprised that it chronicles data on far more than merely the company's existing customers.  It may contain leads and prospects--those whom we hope to become a customer some day.  Just like any relationship in life, customer relationships began long before they became customers.  We each had relationships with our friends long before we may have counted them a friend.  They could have been strangers in our building, attendees at the same church, or even family members.

So, when it comes to relationship management, we have to adopt a broad definition of the word "customer" if the exercise is ever to grow our businesses.  But the scope of the term "customer" often extends even beyond prospects and leads.

Managing relationships with customers entails relationships even with people who will never become a customer, and were never intended to.  For example, in any CRM database we might find vendors.  VRM (Vendor Relationship Management) is a practice all to itself, but often the relationship a business maintains with it's vendors, if well-managed, can lead to new customers.  A vendor relationship is perhaps one of the most common examples of a "Strategic Relationship."

Our CRM database helps us to manage relationships with members of the media, government offices, bankers, and even some competitors -- none of whom we would ever pursue as a customer.  But, all of whom have the propensity to lead us into new relationships with would-be customers. 

When we speak of "Customers" in business relationship management, we should be careful to consider all the relationships that, either directly or indirectly, impact a customer relationship.

Tying it all together - Integrating CRM into the rest of your I.T. world

Choosing a CRM system such as AddressTwo can be one of the most rewarding decisions a small business can make. You get an affordable, easy to use way to manage your contacts, track your leads, keep in touch with your customers, and measure several pieces of information that are critical to your company's success.

One of the questions I've seen raised across the Internet when someone is looking to choose a CRM is, "How will it integrate with my other systems?" This is especially common when considering a system such as AddressTwo, whose claim to fame is simplicity and ease of use through a cloud based, minimal  frills interface. By it's very nature, systems such as this are not designed to integrate with every other piece of software on the market - it would simply bog down the system with cumbersome rules and "features" that really just get in the way of simple yet effective contact management.

This question can take many forms:

• How do I sync my contacts with Outlook?
• Can I keep my tasks and project schedules coordinated with my Google Calendar?
• We already have some systems in place for [insert A2 feature here]. How can I "connect" my existing system with AddressTwo?
• I'm building an interactive website for my customers / vendors and want to integrate it deeply with my CRM solution for tracking history, tasks, and such.  How can I accomplish that with a system as simple as AddressTwo?

One of the things I love about AddressTwo is the great set of documentation write-ups and videos that they provide. I'm the kind of guy who likes checklists and step-by-step walk-throughs, but I also like to be shown how something works. Take for instance the problem of integrating your Google, Outlook, or other electronic calendaring system with A2. There's a great explanation of all you can do with Google Apps right here. There's also some great walk-through videos that will show you how to sync your Outlook contacts, along with many other common tasks people want to accomplish. It may not be as simple as "flipping a switch" but let's be honest, sometimes all that magic that "just works" just doesn't fit the mold of exactly how we tend to operate day after day. If we're willing to take a minute to learn, put together a process, and develop a habit, many things we didn't think were possible are actually quite simple.

Beyond some of the simple tricks of synchronizing data between other applications, there are also many other things you can do with AddressTwo. Our company, C2IT Consulting, has come on board as an A2 Partner Provider for just those scenarios. When we partner with a small business that has some great internal IT systems already in place but wants to integrate it into a new CRM system, we can confidently say that we can make it happen using AddressTwo. Right now, for example, we're helping a small manufacturing company who is building an online store connect directly with their contact and project records in AddressTwo. When a customer logs on to the public online store, we establish a link to their AddressTwo account. When they create an order, we can log a history item on their account, along with a followup task to check back with them. We could even automatically add them to an e-mail campaign that would automatically follow up with them a week later to invite them to share their experience with their friends.

The sky is the limit when it comes to integrating and connecting tools such as AddressTwo with other systems you may already be using. In future posts, we'll share in a little more detail about how some of these features work, and how you can put them to work in your business.

---

This is a guest post by Chet Cromer of C2IT Consulting, Inc. 

C2IT helps small business DO business in a big business world by leveraging technology in a way that focuses on discovering and meeting true business needs and goals, incorporating existing systems, and focusing on an affordable, flexible solution that is just the beginning of a long term partnership with our clients.

The value of CRM to Small Business

Are you a small business owner still debating the value of CRM? Consider this: A recent study by Nucleus Research revealed that every dollar invested in CRM has a return of more than $5. Nucleus based the figure on 70 case studies of companies in several industries and various sizes, including giants like Microsoft and Oracle.

The study stated, “In terms of overall financial value the CRM projects studied in this analysis delivered 63 percent direct benefits, such as cost savings or avoided hires, and 37 percent indirect benefits, such as increased productivity or greater customer retention.” If numbers like these don’t make you sit up and take notice, you’re probably not paying attention.

Some of the details of the study aren’t as spelled out as I’d like, but it’s difficult to argue with the outcome. The CRM industry is growing. In 2010, the industry achieved global revenue of more than $16 billion. The 2011 numbers are currently estimated at year-over-year growth of 7.6 percent with global revenue up to $18 billion. And as social networking, mobile access, and the related analytics continue to evolve, the power of CRM will only increase.

If you’re not currently using a CRM, what’s holding you back? Up-front costs are low, delivery is simple, and you’ll be more productive. Just think about a nightmare scenario in which your current system is lost. Then ponder how relieved you’ll feel knowing that your database is completely secure.


Questions? Contact us today to learn more about AddressTwo.