Witmer Group Marketing Blog

We’ve all been there. Recurring emails from a possible vendor. I’m not talking about one that’s obviously not a fit, but instead, one that either your business isn’t quite ready for or that you haven’t decided if they are the best solution. At first, it’s good, even helpful to receive these ongoing ‘personal’ messages. But over time, the messages, which are meant to feel personal and unique, start to feel unusually ‘canned’ – dare I say uncomfortable.

You don’t have to like Facebook or Twitter, Pinterest or LinkedIn. But it will darn sure improve your business if you put social media marketing to work for you.

According to the number of times Lori has scolded me, I’d say I’m about 2-3 weeks late on my blog post. Which is why I was so delighted to discover this awesome Brand Map for Santa that a friend of mine shared with me yesterday evening. She and I were having dinner, let’s just call her Freedom for anonymity sake, and she told me about this hilarious brand guidelines book that an agency in the UK had created for Santa. They were able to share an interesting video of this process as well!

You are a brand. Your online behavior, including content you choose to share online, creates an image of who you are and what is important to you.  It is that plain and simple.  How you represent yourself online gives other people information, good or bad, to evaluate who you are. This is especially true if you own a business or hoping to be employed with a regular paycheck at some point in your future.

When I hear that facebook is already ‘on its way out’ it is often from someone who is secretly happy that they never got on board in the first place. And this always feels like an excuse to avoid engagement with people (prospects, clients, colleagues) in social media. Because the truth of the matter is, social is a thing. A real thing, and whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Scoop.it, Pinterest or whatever, it’s part of our lives.

When wide-eyed twenty-somethings declare, “I wanna be a writer!” they are often given the advice to “Write what you know, kid.”  And, while the reasons for this may be obvious to a seasoned marketer, there are some other reasons businesses can use this same advice to their advantage over the long term.

Flipping through catalogs, or even Facebook, at this time of year – where the Christmas presents are perfectly wrapped and the gift recipients border on looking genetically engineered, has got me thinking.

When a business has a system that can’t afford to fail, they use redundancy to make sure a “plan b” is in place. Everyone from airplane manufactures to wedding planners make sure that even if one part doesn’t work the way it was designed to, the system will still work to complete the job. So, the question is, how does this apply to your marketing strategy? Certainly, in this world of tight budgets and increasing competition, you can’t afford to let your marketing message do anything less than succeed.

I’ve been following LinkedIn’s progress for quite a long time. I used to focus exclusively on employment and recruitment advertising so it was a no-brainer to be heavily engaged with LinkedIn back in the early days.