If you’re an entrepreneur, this probably sounds familiar.  You may have even thought about outsourcing before, but just haven’t taken that step.  The truth is outsourcing can be a great way to expand your business.

Consider outsourcing as a means of boosting your bottom line and lightening your load a bit.  As an entrepreneur or small business owner, usually you are the “everything person.” You function as the bookkeeper, web designer, content writer, Internet marketer, customer service representative and the executive assistant.  It could take the better part of a day to respond to all of your business emails or to handle bills at the end of the month. 

Utilizing an assistant is a great and affordable choice for small businesses.  People with certain expertise can help your business to grow.  By simply outsourcing your social media, newsletter, graphics, and article marketing, it can free up a good portion of your time.  Ultimately it allows you to focus on what you do best, and what you do best is grow your business!

Pages are used by businesses, organizations and other public figures to broadcast announcements to those who are interested in what they’re doing and want to connect with them.  Using applications you can enhance your page by adding video, audio, news feeds, event announcements and more.

Only the official representative of an organization, business, etc can create a page. Once created, they can assign someone to assist with the management of the page. 

Step 1: Page Setup

a)      Click “Create a Page” in the lower right corner of the home page or click here to get started. http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php 

b)      Select the type of page you want to create; Official Page or Community page. For this demonstration, we’re creating an Official Page for a business. 

c)      Choose what the page is for (local business, product/organization or public figure). You can narrow the focus using the drop-down that appears after you make the first selection.  

d)      Name your page using keywords related to your business. 

e)      Read and agree to the terms. If you don’t agree, obviously, you cannot create a page. 

f)        Click Create Page when you’re finished. 

Step 2: Navigate to Custom Settings Page

Sign in to your Facebook account & you should see a link under your profile picture for Ads & Pages. Click the link to customize your new page.

 Step 3: Page Settings

This is where you can set any restrictions for location, age, whether you want to publish your page or leave it unpublished until you have finished it. You can edit your Wall settings, add applications, etc.

I’m not going to go through these, but I do encourage you to take some time to see what is available. Remember, the goal is to have your page be a positive representation of your business so you can connect with clients, customers and perhaps even some JV partners.

Click “Edit” below each section, to edit those settings. Be sure to click Save Changes for each section before moving on. 

Once you’ve finished with the settings, it’s time to move on to customizing your page.

To get there, simply click the question mark at the top of the settings page. See image above. 

Step 4: Customize your page

Customizing your page is just like customizing your profile page. You’ll want to upload an image that represents your company, add a business summary as a way to introduce your business to members and prospective customers or clients and so forth.

Select “Edit Page” to add specifics such as websites, contacts, addresses and phone numbers.

Step 5: Invite friends view your page

To invite (called “suggest”) people to view your page; click the “Suggest To Friends” link under your profile picture.

Select from your friends list those you would like to invite to your page. Add a personal message if you’d like.  

Click Send Invitation.

If you are comfortable doing so, ask your friends to recommend your page to their friends. If you’re not comfortable doing this, that’s ok. Your following will naturally grow as people see that their friends have joined your page. They will visit out of curiosity and many will join.
 

Additional Notes:

 Where pages show up and how you can find them:

Pages will show up in the search results on Facebook & they are in the main Facebook Page Directory. They also show up on the “Info” tab of any FB member who connects with the page.

Pages can also be found by clicking “Advertising” at the bottom of any FB page then clicking the “Facebook Page” link on the page that populates.

To send your followers an update:

You can update all of your followers or just a select group of followers about new page content, upcoming events, specials and more. These settings are controlled under the “Customize” option in the dropdown next to the “Share” button in the publish box.

All updates will appear in the “Updates” tab of a user’s Inbox. Updates published for a select group will only be visible to those users. They will not show up in the news feeds, on your page or anywhere else on Facebook.

To post an update, click the “Share” button on the left side of your page.

To create an event:

You first have to add the “Events” tab to your page by clicking the + sign at the top of the page publisher and selecting the Events option.

From there, you simply add a new event on the events tab.

To advertise your page:

From the settings page, click Promote your page and follow the instructions given.

Ultimately, most small to midsized business entrepreneurs just don’t have the time to learn how to build, manage and profile themselves in the Social Media world. And it is a world of its own that is ever changing at a rapid speed.

Unfortunately, not jumping into the world of Social Media is going to leave you completely out of the game. In other words, if you don’t utilize Social Media to engage with your customers, you will simply vanish.

A Reality Check… Facebook today has over 400 million active users. Twitter is not far behind with interaction and messages sent.

So, what exactly does a Social Media Manager do? Well, there are a number of roles that the Social Media Manager can play, but the core job entails managing your profile accounts such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Their purpose is to engage with followers and effectively communicate your businesses message. And like any other marketing tool out there, the bottom line is to increase sales and profits.

Many Social Media Managers offer training and/or consulting as well, and can be a good option for the do-it yourselfer or organization that needs to train their staff.

A good Social Media Manager will increase your followers, build relationships, increase brand awareness and convert followers to customers.

The truth is Social Media has drastically changed how entrepreneurs build their business.  Entrepreneurs and Businesses alike are utilizing social media everyday to take their business to the next level.  So, what is a Socialpreneur?

Here is a what a Socialpreneur is: 

A Socialpreneur is an entrepreneur who is using the power of social media to brand, grow and maintain their business.

Mistake #3: Lacking Focus
Lack of focus on your business blog is another common mistake that could kill it. Your business most likely has a target market or niche; therefore your business blog should always be geared toward those same people and topic.

Don’t be all over the place by talking about subjects that have nothing to do with your business. Your readers will quickly become bored and may not return, costing you valuable readership and probably customers in the long run.

Mistake #4: Inconsistency
Your clients and readers depend, rely and look forward to reading your business blog on a regular basis, so being inconsistent is a big mistake. Being consistent means how often you write as well as your writing style and the subject matter you write about.

How Often to Post to Your Blog
How often you write is up to you. If you have time to write every single day and can consistently write every day, by all means do so. If you start out writing every day, your clients and readers will expect something from you on a regular basis. So, if you’re not sure you can continue to produce fresh, new content that often, you don’t want to begin posting every single day. Even if you have new ideas popping up in your head as you’re starting out with your business blog because you’re excited, go ahead and type them up, but set the posts to publish at a later date.

If you choose to post once a week, then be sure to post once a week. This will help set a pattern your subscribers and readers will get used to. You’re customers come to rely on you and when you’re inconsistent, your readers will be too. You may find your business blog readership decreasing because of it.

Mistake #5: Leaving Your Brand Out of Your Blog
Branding your business blog is very important because you want your readers to feel connected to your business through your blog. If your business website is totally separate from your business blog, don’t let it appear that way. You want your readers to feel they are with the same company or business and not off on some other website. Use the same logo, font style and coloring consistently throughout your blog and your website.

Mistake #6: No SEO Tactics
A big killer of a business blog is not having it Search Engine Optimized (SEO). SEO helps the major search engines like Google and Yahoo find your blog when potential new customers do a search for your particular services or products. Simply titling your posts correctly and using a few key words within the body are ways to increase the search-ability of your blog.

Want more tips and tricks?  Visit our Facebook Page at www.facebook.com/bizassistant

Mistake #1: Using Free Hosting to Publish Your Blog
Hosting a blog on your own domain or as an extension of your business site is one of the first things you should do with your business blog. While free blog hosting on sites like Blogger, TypePad, WordPress etc. are ok for personal blogs, it’s not ok for a business blog. You will appear much more professional to your readers if you host the blog yourself instead of using a free hosting service.

You can either purchase a domain name specifically for your blog or simply create an extension on your business website. i.e. www.mybusinessblog.com or www.mybusiness.com/blog

If you create an extension on your current website there is no extra cost needed as you already pay for hosting and you don’t have to buy a new domain name. However, if you choose to purchase a domain name specifically for your blog here is a mistake you’ll definitely want to avoid when you do…

Mistake #2: Making Your URL Difficult to Remember
Another quick killer of a blog is having a domain name that is too hard to remember or type out. If you have a long company name, try to use the first letters of it only or make a catchy acronym. Also, using anything other than a dot com (.com) extension makes it difficult for readers to remember and may direct them to a completely different site when they guess and automatically type the .com from habit.

When choosing a domain name, try to avoid using symbols like underscores or hyphens as this also makes it difficult for readers to remember. Domain names need to be short, sweet, focused and easy to remember.

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1. Search Engine Marketing – Blogs are one of the premier tools you can use to attract organic search engine traffic.
2. Direct Connection – Blogs enable you to connect with your audience in a manner that’s different than articles and social networking.
3. Brand Building – We buy from people we like and feel we can relate to. Personality marketing is easily achieved via your own blog.
4. Niche Specific – Your blog allows you to fine tune your niche to a very specific market and audience.
5. Media & Public Relations – Blogs are great tools for the media to get to know you, become aware of you and contact you.
6. Expert Status – A blog provides you with one more opportunity for publication and the ability to showcase your knowledge and expertise. (We also buy from people we perceive to be experts)
7. Low cost – Blogs offer a low startup cost (you merely need a domain name and hosting) and you can be up and running.

Creating your marketing plan doesn’t need to be complicated.  Here are a few questions you need to ask yourself.

• Where are you now?
• Where are you going?
• How are you going to get there?

Before you can truly make a plan on how to get there, you really need to take the time and answer where are you now and where are you going.

Where are you now should be a pretty easy answer.  Once you have got that figured out, it is time to figure out where you are going.  Focus on your goals.  Where do you want to be this time next year?  How many clients do you want to have?  How many products do you want to sell?  How much money do you want to make?

 Be Specific.  Be Realistic.  Make a Time Frame.

Once you have a focus on where you are going, it is easier to figure out how you are going to get there.  There are many ways to market yourself both online and offline.  We are going to focus on creating a social networking marketing plan.

Social Networking is a great tool for building your business through knowledge, connections, awareness, building your brand, building credibility and creating joint ventures. 

1.  What are your Social Networking Goals?

• Prospecting
• Customers
• Joint Venture Partnerships
• Increase Awareness
• Increases Credibility
• Connect with Experts in your Industry
• Drive Website or Blog Traffic

2.  Who is your target audience?

It’s important to be clear on this before you begin, so that you choose sites that are right for your business and your goals.

3.  What do you have to offer your audience?

What information are you going to offer and how are you going to participate?  Are you going to link to blog posts?  Post tips and information?  Post quotes?

4.  What social networking sites cater to your audience?

This step will involve some research and time, but is important to choose sites that your target market are going to be at.

5.  How often are you going to post/participate?

Create a realistic plan for posting and participating in your chosen social networking sites and schedule it into your day/week/month just like you would an in person networking event.

6.  How are you going to test and track your social networking efforts?

It is important to test and track your efforts.  This can be accomplished by sending followers to test pages, installing analytics on your sites so you know where people are coming from and by creating promotion and posts specifically for your social networking associates.

7.  Cross Promotion

It is important to cross promote your social networking efforts offline as well as promote your website, blog, etc.  Think about installing a banner on your website or blog that links them to your social networking sites, etc.

The key to any marketing plan is to have a clear goals and a map on how you are going to get there.  Remember when posting on social networking sites to be authentic, provide value and have fun.  You are your brand and social networking is a fabulous way to share it with the world.

Here are some tips that you can do yourself to help YOU and YOUR BIZ get found the next time someone is searching for the services or products that you offer!

1. Optimize your title tags. The title tag is that little blurb you see in the tab of your web browser. This is one of the most important things you can do to increase your rankings.

This is how you do it: Go into the html of your page, and you should see a line of code like this:

Between the tags, insert a brief sentence that summarizes the page’s contents, and that contains your keywords/terms. For branding purposes, be sure to also include your company name. Here is an example:

Try to put your keywords as close to the beginning of the title tag as possible. If your brand is well known and established you can consider putting it near the front of the title tag.

2. Internal Linking. A little secret is that internal links (links from one page of your site to another) carry almost as much weight as links from other sites to your site. And the great part about this is that you hold the power as to how many and what kind of links you give yourself.

Example: If you have articles on your site, be sure to hyperlink the text in those articles to the service or product on your site it is talking about. For example is I had am article posted about blogging, I would have a link to that page from that article.

3. When you name your pages, be sure to be descriptive and use your keywords. Use hypens to separate words, as this is the search engines’ preferred method.

For example: If you have a product page for your blog design services, instead of saving it as www.yourwebsite.com/services be more descriptive and use your keywords: www.yourwebsite.com/affordable-blog-design

4. Use your keywords in your link. The words or phrases you use in your links are called the ‘anchor text’. Check out our newest jewelry! – ‘newest jewelry’ would be your anchor text. Instead of saying ‘click here’ to see our newest jewelry or using ‘newest jewelry’ as the link, consider being more specific. You could say check out our newest peace and love ring.

5. Use Google Webmaster. Another way to see how the search engines see your site is to sign up for www.google.com/webmaster. Google webmaster is a great tool for your business and will inform you or issues related to your site including duplicate meta tags, problems the search engines may have in crawling your site, etc. it is also shows you who is linking to your site.