Social Media Monitoring
Social Media Monitoring
You shouldn’t brand yourself online without discovering what is at the core of your personal brand.
– Jill Celeste
Introduction
Social media is an excellent way to improve your brand’s presence. You must, however, use social media correctly in order for it to be effective. It is not enough for you to have social media accounts. You need have a specific purpose for your accounts and monitor them closely. It is also imperative that you implement security as you promote your brand.
Tracking
Social media requires constant monitoring. If you do not pay attention to your social media accounts, they will not do you any good. When using social media, open accounts that are relevant to you and your business. It is difficult to juggle numerous social media accounts. Once you are actively using social media, be sure to check your accounts regularly. You can also implement different tools to track your social media presence. Google alerts are a useful tool to monitor your social media accounts. Some tools are paid and others are unpaid.
Free Tracking Tools:
- Hootsuite
- Viralheat
- Trendrr
Security
Everyone with an online presence needs to focus on internet security. Being secure while using social media requires more than virus software. You need to use all of the security tools available to you such as secure passwords and two factor authentications or a 2-step verification process.
Using two factor authentications will keep your password safe. In this process, you enter your password and a verification code is sent to your phone. The account cannot be accessed without the code. To save time, you may establish your home computer so that the code is not needed to log in on that computer. Since the code is needed for other locations, it becomes more difficult to hack the account.
Choosing secure passwords and using different passwords for each account will improve security. A secure password is typically 8 to 10 characters and includes all of the following:
- Uppercase letters
- Lowercase letters
- Numbers
- Symbols or characters
Have a Clear Objective
People who fail or are not completely successful using social media, often only use it for general self-promotion. While social media is great for self-promotion, you need to have a clear objective in what you are promoting and how you promote it. Why are you there? What are you trying to promote? How does it translate to your brand?
If you only share self-glorifying posts of your triumphs, you lose your authenticity. Take your objectives from your pillars and find ways to reach them. For example, if you are passionate about fair trade, share your experiences and link to other articles, blogs, etc. Having an objective helps you to establish a network of followers with similar ideas.
Promote
Promoting your social media sites takes time and effort on your part. There are many ways that you can increase the visibility of your brand using social media. The first step is to create the same message and theme throughout all of your social media sites, Your Tumblr and your Facebook should not share conflicting information; they should promote each other. Certain tools allow you to link the same post to multiple sites. They should also have a similar look, color scheme, and feel to them.
You need to drive awareness of your brand by attracting people to you. The more connections you make, the more exposure you have. Don’t be afraid to include links in your content. Additionally, SEO can be implemented to improve your visibility. Find useful search terms and integrate them into your content to increase your search rankings. Running an SEO campaign is more complex than this, but choosing useful keywords is an excellent starting point.
Practical Application
Terry opened several social media sites for the startup. She had no interest in social media, but people told her it was the only way to stay in business. She posted daily for the first two weeks. Soon, however, she became too busy to pay attention to her social media accounts. She checked back in after three months and found several flattering comments. She also discovered a complaint that was a month old. The customer was so frustrated by being ignored that he took ranted on all of her accounts. Terry wondered why he had not tried to call her if he was so upset.
