If you have a small business or own a bar/restaurant, you may have heard of other establishments that have harnessed social media to keep the till ringing. You’re probably thinking, “how hard can it be to be on Facebook or Twitter and market my business?” In simple terms, it is not hard, but it will be a time investment. And that is where I see most establishments fail. Below are some pointers on how to keep the ball rolling.

1. Create a Social Media Workflow
Create a social media work flow that you are comfortable with.  Explore how much time you would like to invest early so you have a firm understanding of the time commitment involved.  Social Media is a great free platform to engage your customers, but you must make a time investment.  By biting off too much, your social media plan will be pushed aside because you’re busy with your normal day to day operations.

2. Consistency builds your brand
By creating a workflow, you can maintain your consistency. The easiest way to loose your customer base is to disappear for weeks on end.  This is especially true if this is your main platform for customer dialogue.  If your customers post negative feedback, address them in a timely manner.  Negative feedback will happen, you can’t please everyone.  Show your customers how you want to keep them as customers and correct the issue at hand.  This does not mean have public dialogue with the person with poor experience.  It can be handled privately, but show other visitors that you care, by posting something as simple as “We are sorry that you had a poor experience at <insert establishment name>.  We take pride in our service and would like to correct the issue so it does not happen again.  Please email us at company@company.com so we can address your concern directly. “

3. Be personal
This may be the first thing that drops off the workflow, but you must be a person first, a business second.  Think of social media as a face to face networking event done via computer.  The example below would not go over very well in person, so why do so many business’s do it in the virtual world.

Bill: Hi, I am Bill from XYC Corp.
Jane: Hi, Bill I am Jane.
XYC Corp(Bill): This week we are providing service A for $199.
XYC Corp(Bill): This Friday only – all widgets on sale for $85.
XYC Corp(Bill): Our new product reduces your out of pocket costs by 24%.
XYC Corp(Bill): Product C on sale for $99.
Jane: ?????????

Get to know your audience, and let them know who you are.  Sales are built on relationships, so build them.

4. Create customer engagement
Ask your customers what they want.  Listen to their feedback.  It will help you grow as a business.  Point 3 mentioned being personal, you need to create that two way dialogue with your customers.  Some ideas on how to involve your social media peeps – hold social media only events, or trivia to get them engaged.  If you have leftover swag from the last trade show, use it as prizes for trivia.  Get them talking about you to their friends, and their friends, in turn will become a fan or a follower.

5.  Use Events (Facebook)
If you have events at your establishment, use the event section on Facebook.  Create an event and send it to your fans.  Sometimes they don’t always see your status update at 6pm on Thursday, but an event will be sent to them as a notification forcing them to view the details.  It also gives you a “light” head count for your event by those that have marked “Attending” or “Maybe Attending”.  When someone marks attending your event, it will be posted to their wall, so their friends, that may not be your fans may also see the event and think it is interesting.  Friend of a friend….and so on.

With these 5 social media tips you can keep your business in front of your fans and followers.