Top 7 Effective Social Media Platforms for Online Business

Which are the best Social Media Platform for an online business or new start-up?

If you have a website or planning to start a new business/website online, then Social Media is one platform which can not be ignored at all. Social Media is the easiest way to reach out your targeted audience, perfect platform to communicate with users online, product or service promotion to increase brand awareness and revenue for your business.

Social Media Marketing for Business

Social Media has become an essential part of online marketing for every business online, but there are few doubts which bother every webmaster

On what channel exactly your targeted audience is present?
Which channel will work best for you?
How should you start on different channel?
How can you best utilize the channels?
Which of your competitor is present on that channel?

Now after solving all these queries, we need to know the step by step process of bringing business on a Social Media platform and get success.

Below is a step-by-step guide to establishing business accounts on the top eight social networks.

Facebook

One of the best social media channel present online. Millions of users are present on facebook and many big brands or small business are using this channel to reach their targeted audience.

Create a Facebook page for your business.
Claim a username for your page so customers can easily find you at Facebook.com/YourBusiness instead of Facebook.com/pages/you/123456. (Note: Once set, your username cannot be changed — so pick wisely!)
Upload a profile image that will still be “readable” in a tiny thumbnail form around the site. Logos or brand stamps work well and allow users to easily identify your content throughout the site.
Upload a cover image that expands beyond a logo to visually represent your brand. This is the largest piece of real estate you will own on the site and your best opportunity to establish a tone for the profile.
Ensure all applicable contact and “About” information is completed on the profile, and ensure that the most applicable “Category” is chosen.
Use your page’s “Short Description” (Settings > Page Info > Short Description) to display your tagline or a one-sentence summary of why your business is great. This description can be automatically displayed when other people share the link to your page, so make sure it’s a good description.
Authorize page administrators at appropriate access levels so multiple people can contribute content to the page.
If appropriate, upload historical “milestones” for your company, industry or products by backdating posts. Prevent these posts from flooding the news feed of any existing followers by checking the “Hide from news feed” option.
Start interacting with your audience. Post some relevant content.
Always replay back to query.
Give some offer or discount to attract more users.
Always remember that you should not try to sell your services or products, try and tell the benefits and advantages to your users.

Twitter

Another very popular and effective social media channel to promote your business online.

Create a Twitter account. (There’s no distinction between personal and business accounts here.)
Claim a username for the account, which will also become part of your profile URL (twitter.com/username).
Upload a profile image, header image, and background, ideally all with coordinating color schemes and messaging. Remember that your profile image will display sitewide in a tiny thumbnail, so it should be visually concise.
Include your website URL in your profile content for easy access.
Familiarize yourself with Twitter 101 (made by Twitter specifically for businesses!) to learn more about hashtags, @ replies and other network best practices.

Google Plus

Google also has joined the social media platform by introducing Google+. Now Google gives more preference to the links which are shared on Google+. Also Google authorship plays an important role in search engine ranking.

Visit google.com/+/business/ and click “Create a Google+ page” in the top-right corner.
Sign in with a Google account that you control, and choose the category that best describes your business.
List your business’s name and website, and confirm whether your content is appropriate for all age groups.
Under “Settings,” add a phone number to the page, and confirm that number via an immediate text message or phone call.
Click on the “Profile” item in the left navigation, then the “About” tab at the top. In the “Links” block below, you should see a “Link website” button. Click this to produce a snippet of code that should be placed on your website in order to link your profile and your website.
Ensure that all location and contact information on this profile stay up-to-date, as Google uses your profile here to provide your address, phone number and more in local search results.
Once you have established the page, go to plus.google.com/dashboard and click “Manage this page,” then “Verify this business” underneath your address. Confirm the business’s mailing address, and a postcard containing a unique PIN will be mailed to you. When the postcard arrives, follow the verification instructions on it to complete the process.

You Tube

Another popular social media channel by Google. This is one of the best channel to promote your video content.

Go to YouTube.com and click on “Sign In” in the top-right corner.
Sign in with an existing Google account (make sure you’ll be comfortable sharing these credentials with anyone else who may need to contribute to YouTube work), or click “Create an Account” and follow the prompts.
Once signed in, click on the user icon in the top-right corner and from the drop-down menu select “My Channel.” In the next pop-up, click the link at the bottom that reads “To use a business or other name, click here.” In the “Name your channel” field, input your business’s name, or a branded username that people can use to find you.
In the “About” tab of your new Channel, list “custom links” to your website or other online properties, as well as “social links” to other networks.
Also in the “About” tab, provide a Channel description, and upload channel artwork to brand your page.

This platform is for professionals. So if your targeted audience is professional people this is the best platform to work on.

Log into a personal LinkedIn profile and in the main menu navigate to Interests > Companies. Then, in the top-right corner, click on “Add a Company.”
Enter your company name and your business email address. (Note: LinkedIn will only allow you to activate a new company name if you have a company email address like me@companyname.com. If your LinkedIn account was set up with a personal email address, you will need to first add a business email to your profile before moving on.)
Populate the following fields of LinkedIn’s prompts with general company details and products or services.
Upload a version of your logo as the page’s profile image. You will need three separate versions sized at 100×60 (displayed on the company page) and 50×50 (displayed throughout the network) pixels to complete the profile.
Upload a page banner (themed similarly to Facebook cover photo) sized at 646×220 pixels.
Create unique banners and thumbnail images to highlight your top products and services. Feel free to use these labels liberally if your business has less traditional offerings.

This is best platform if you have your content in form of images. This is a growing channel and user base is increasing on a regular basis.

Use http://business.pinterest.com/ to sign up as a business page. (If needed, this page also provides a link to convert a formerly “personal” account to a business one.)
Provide contact information and establish a username for your profile.
Upload a 165×165 pixel version of your logo or brand stamp.
Connect other existing social networks to your profile if you want to push out Pinterest activity to those platforms.
In your profile settings, enter your website’s URL. Verify your ownership of the site by uploading an HTML snippet.

Instagram

This is a platform to promote visual content. So if you have amazing visual content which you want to share with your audience, this is the place for you.

Download Instagram from the App Store or from Google Play to a mobile device.
Sign up to create a new account.
Upload a 110×110 pixel logo as the profile image.
Include your site’s URL in the profile settings.
Use the “bio” area to provide an overview of your value propositions.
Review the Instagram for Business blog for tips, trends, and examples of successful brands.

Above platform are very effective to promote your business or new start-up and to create a brand in user mind.

NOTE: Source of the article is Social Media Check List.

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Thursday 21 November 2013