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However, spend too much time planning and you don't do enough "doing.
" Here are eight easy ways to get started with social media marketing, 1.
Create a blog You can always refine the blog as you go, but the first step is creating one.
Select a software platform such as Wordpress, Typepad, or Blogger, select a domain name and get rolling.
Start with three or four categories and a few entries in each.
Gradually add and refine.
The longer you spend planning a blog, the less likely you are to start it.
Just start.
Write something every day.
You'll get better.
2.
Visit other blogs and forums and leave comments A great way to get initial traffic to your blog or website is to comment on other blogs and in forums.
While most URLs attached to names on blog comments have no follow tags immediately attached, people can still click on your name and visit the website you attach to it.
The no-follow just means that you won't get a lot of back-links ranking on search engines, but you will still get traffic from people who read your comment, find it interesting and want to learn more about you.
3.
Answer questions - Yahoo answers, Google answers, LinkedIn There is a right way and a wrong way to approach this technique for social media.
When answering questions as a means of promoting your own website, you will want to intersperse citing your website as a source, and citing others.
Too much self-promotion will lower your credibility and your official ranking.
Some sites will actually ban you or shut down your account if you do too much self promotion.
As long as you vary your sources, this is a great way to get the word out about your products and services.
4.
Upload videos to YouTube YouTube is becoming more of a factor in search than ever before.
"Tagging" allows people to upload video and tag it for search, just like tagging a blog post.
Video for the internet doesn't have to be fancy and professional.
In fact, some of the most successful YouTube videos have been shot on little digital cameras with no professional lighting.
Celebrities have their own YouTube channels that feature videos shot on web cams.
It is easy to sign up for an account and get going! 5.
Share pictures Even professionals use photo sharing sites like Flickr to upload and organize their photos.
You can tag all photos for search purposes.
There are widgets you can install on your website that will allow you to import photos from your Flicker account to your website, blog, Twitter feed or other networking sites.
6.
Join groups If you don't have a website or you aren't sure how to get started, joining groups and participating in forums is one of the easiest ways to jump in.
You can find popular forums in your industry group, join, create a profile and start listening and responding to comments from others.
Gradually, you will learn the vibe of the particular group you have joined and will begin to feel comfortable responding and promoting your business or service.
7.
Participate in social bookmarking Even less personal than joining groups and participating in forums is social bookmarking.
Create an account with digg.
com or delicious.
com and start bookmarking and submitting sites that you enjoy visiting.
The more you digg others, the more likely they are to digg you! 8.
Create LinkedIn and Facebook accounts LinkedIn is primarily a business networking site, while Facebook is a social networking site, but they both serve similar functions: connecting people with similar interests.
A very important consideration when creating accounts on social networking sites: never upload anything that you wouldn't want to see on the front page of your local newspaper.
Entire careers have been snuffed out before they really had a chance to start by bad decisions regarding Facebook content.
Want to learn how to integrate social media into your current marketing plan? Go to http://www.
IncreaseSalesWithSocialMedia.
com to find out.
What are you waiting for? Start social marketing today with these eight easy ways in.
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