A New Social Audience for SMBs!

Small and medium size business owners: Have you’re figured out (yet) how to make your voice heard among the thousands, if not millions of online conversations occurring all at once?

The whole buzz about using social media to get new awareness and create a following is real, but you have to be remarkable. If what you’re saying is the same as 10 or 100 other businesses out there, why should anyone zero-in on what you’re saying?

In order to garner someone's attention you have to either make a loud a statement, or just have something they absolutely want or need - or both. So how do you do that? Give something away!

With over 70% of consumers researching products and services online before making a buying decision, what do you think they are searching for? Certainly they're trying to ensure that what they are about to purchase is a quality product from a verifiable business. But what they're really searching for, more now than ever is a discount or a way to save a few bucks. EVERYONE wants to cut costs. And don't mislead yourself into thinking that wealthy people don't care about savings. A majority of the wealthy became so through frugality.

So if you truly want to be found online, make it easy for someone to find you. Offer steep discounts for a trial period. The relatively new and still growing coupon site is all the proof you need.

But there are other ways too. If your product isn't a consumable, how do you attract your target audience? How do you draw in an audience that could one day need your product or service? The short answer is, branding and awareness - right? Those typically take a lot of time and a substantial investment. Who has that? SMB's need and want the exposure in real time.

What's the hottest electronic device on the market today? Try offering one or two as part of a giveaway promotion and watch your traffic explode. Sweepstakes and giveaways are good short-term attention getters. But there's actually one addition tactic that produces both short and long term results. Scholarships.

Business branded scholarships haven't been a common term in the SMB vocabulary until lately. Historically, larger corporations have held the term and used scholarships purely as a way to give back to their loyal customers.

With the growth of the internet and social media sites, SMBs can also capitalize on the fruits that scholarships produce. Those being a constant flow of fresh new leads and traffic to your business and social media websites; visits by friends and relatives of those applying for the scholarships because they want to help the student and/or they need it just as badly; and, long-term commitment. If you're questioning long-term commitment, consider this. Have you forgotten the name of the first person who either extended or gave you financial support?

The going-to-college audience, 18-30 year-olds is the next generation of consumers. The sooner you can get to know them, and them to know you and your business, the sooner you can begin to instill your brand and its commitments in their minds.

What are you doing today, to reach the audience that will propel your businesses through tomorrow?

Jump-Start your Social Media Marketing!

Social Media has helped level the proverbial playing field and regardless of your business size and marketing budget, you can effectively and efficiently give your online presence a boost with a branded scholarship.

And for your efforts, you will get:

Recurring, unique visitors on your website

Countless Facebook fans

A relationship with Gen-Y and their friends & family

Higher search engine rankings

And, community acknowledgement for "giving back"

This ingenious interactive strategy captures the next generation of customers and jump-starts your social media marketing.

Download our FREE whitepaper to see how to laser-target your online efforts and engage the most-social online audience, 18-30 year-olds.

Get ahead of your competition by acting today.

Here's how we can help jump-start your social media marketing:

Guide you in creating a scholarship program

Write compelling copy that grabs and holds your audience's attention

Target your scholarship marketing campaign to engage the going-to-college audience (18-30 y/o)

Connect your online and offline marketing efforts

Optimize your business and social websites to maximize traffic

Emineo Media is a full service interactive marketing and web services firm. Yes, we develop award-winning web sites, but our specialty is developing, implementing and promoting business-branded scholarships across social media channels.

Contact us today for a free consultation.

info@emineomedia.com

A Study: Twitter Increases Student Engagement!

Communicating in 140-character segments may seem to contradict the goals of generally long-winded academia, but a new study has found that the two are less opposed than one might think. Students in the study who were asked to contribute to class discussions and complete assignments using Twitter increased their engagement over a semester more than twice as much as a control group.



The study used a 19-question survey based on the National Survey of Student Engagement to measure student engagement at the beginning and end of a seminar course for first year students in pre-health professional programs. Four sections (70 students) were given assignments and discussions that incorporated Twitter, such as tweeting about their experiences on a job shadow day or commenting on class readings. Three sections (55 students) did the same assignments and had access to the same information, but didn’t use Twitter.

via Twitter Increases Student Engagement [STUDY].

Emineo Media