Guest Blog from Mary Thomas of Concise Training
Have you noticed? Everybody seems to be talking about using Social Media. But does it really work? Yes it does depend on how you use it and what you are using it for. I have many examples on my blog of businesses that have found success from using Social Media. Businesses I have interviewed vary from a lady offering balloons and flowers at weddings to an accountant – and many businesses in between.
The common features from the interviews are businesses:
- Know what they want to get out of social media
- Have identified the audience they are trying to reach and then have focused on the social media channels that will most effectively reach their audience and achieve their aims.
- Have identified what to say on social media
- Are consistent in their use of social media
Training companies are no different – except they have more audience groups and a range of aims. Training companies need to talk to potential, existing and ex learners, potential and existing employers as well as their trainers and others in the industry sector. Each of the different audience groups will use different social media channels.
It may be that students are best found on Facebook and Twitter and employers on LinkedIn, but increasingly we’re finding young people on LinkedIn connecting with employers.
LinkedIn works often through personal relationships between individual trainers or work placement consultants and employers – though LinkedIn company profiles can be very successful – HP for example, as over 1 million followers. Twitter is a fantastic tool for brand recognition and listening / replying to problems faced.
Trainers and others in the industry sector are likely to be found on Twitter and LinkedIn as well, though Google+ cannot be discounted for more technical industry sectors.
For each audience group, some thought needs to be put into content. Just broadcasting how good the training company is needs to be avoided at all costs. What content can be shared that adds value, is interesting and encourages engagement? This comes back to audience – what is going to be of interest to your audience and why should they listen to what you are saying. Another good way of getting noticed is to share content from your potential audience. If you share, like and comment what they are saying (without stalking) they will want to find out more about you.
Remember social media marketing needs to be ‘always on’ so time and resource needs to be allocated to do social media marketing well.
If you need help to get started with Social Media marketing, why not look at the Social Media E-Learning courses from Concise Training which can be found on our profile page on the Elearning Marketplace.