Social Media Part 2 of 2: Believing and Understanding

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Social media, whether you like it or just find it a bother is here to stay. What used to be a realm for teenagers and tech-geeks is now a field of possibilities for the enterprising business.  In 7 ideas for Social Media and Business gives advice on how best to approach it -- 

Don't Isolate Social Media: Position social media as a component of your overall marketing plan. If you engage in print advertising, you're used to making the case that print advertising is a branding component that is used to support your overall marketing messaging. Like social media, the ROI from print advertising is very hard to measure. Social Media should be one medium you're using among many in your communication with your audience and customers.

Feedback: We're also finding success in using blogging as a method for gathering customer feedback through surveys, new product ideas and product feedback forms. Social media is supposed to be a conversation, correct? Well, treat it as such and allow your audience to participate in the future of your products. We've already received valuable feedback that rivals that of an individual order placed.

Which social media tools to use? I'm sure you are pretty familiar with some of them already (if not ask a teenager-- and they'll give you a pretty good idea). Here are a few must-haves according to Mike Sansone from ConverStations in 6 Social Media Tools Every Business Should Use.

1. RSS Feed Aggregator (Google Reader)Always start with a listening tool, and subscribing to feeds is the way we listen. Google Reader is web-based so you can use any computer - and you can now set it up to read feeds offline.
2. Blog (Typepad) Yes, I think WordPress is a great tool - but many business people don't want to mess with setting up servers and travel the learning curve that WP presents. It also has more design freedom than the hosted WordPress.com. Typepad is the blogging platform I recommend most (to businesses)
3. Shared Bookmarks (Delicious)Lots of choices here, but the new features of Delicious, along with their huge audience, make it the first one to choose.
4. ThoughtStream Aggregator (FriendFeed) Again, lots of choices -- and services like Facebook and MyBlogLog do similar things. But FriendFeed has become my most valuable tool. For organization - it helps me keep found things found. For infosumption - I can follow what others are doing/saving/thinking/saying.