How to use Facebook as an effective business tactic
July 26, 2008 by Colleen Coplick
Filed under Social Media
The following is a guest post from David Mullings of Realvibez Media and Co-Founder of StartupToons.
Social networking is all the rage right now, and yet many business people are not totally sold on the idea or can’t figure out how they can leverage these networks for their businesses.
It’s vital to think of these networks as additional tools in your box of tactics rather than anything big and scary. I set out to build my personal thought leadership brand via Facebook because I believe that personal brands can fuel corporate brands. Since the age of 15 I have been working to become a positive role model for young people around the world and I saw an opportunity to continue this.
I joined Facebook in June 2007 and to date I have managed to accomplish the following:
- Asked to endorse a book on entrepreneurship by a frequent contributor to CNBC’s The Big Idea
- Been introduced to a venture capital firm
- Received an introduction to an angel investor who is now an advisor
- Interviewed for a book by an Inc. Magazine Contributing Editor about Gen-Y entrepreneurs
- Interviewed about effectively using Facebook to network for business
- Paid speaking engagement at Boston College to present to the Entrepreneur Society and major article in school paper
- Landing a mention for a new venture on Inc. magazine’s staff blog on the day of launch
- Asked for quotes for a major magazine article on social media and the Caribbean
- A feature on CollegeMogul.com, a popular blog focused on gen-y ventures
- Built a fan page for the country of Jamaica that has hit 1600 fans in less than 3 months with no money spent
So, how, within just under a year, did I accomplish this?
My strategy on Facebook was very clear from day one:
- Present a professional image
- Find relevant groups e.g. Young Entrepreneurs
- Introduce myself, my business and participate – ask questions, answer questions, share knowledge
- Promote our story
Social networks are tools that can be used for many different things, you simply have to choose what you want to accomplish on them. The "groups" feature allows you to find groups related to terms you search for and I looked for web, business and entrepreneur groups, then evaluated each group based on how many members, how active and the topics being covered. It’s easy to spot the progressive groups by looking at what is on the discussion board.
Case Study on Achieving the Goals: Step by Step How To:
Book Endorsement
A new entrepreneurship book coming out in September 2008 has my testimonial just below Donny Deutsch’s on the website and on the back cover (one of only 4 on the printed book). I was introduced to the author through someone I’d met on Facebook: the president of the Boston College Entrepreneurship Society at the time. The author, Mike Michalowicz, read several of my blog (LINK) posts, and we’ve built up a relationship. he asked me directly to provide a testimonial for his book.
VC Firm Introduction
This came about from my participation in the Web 2.0 Entrepreneurs group. A guy in Miami, Jason Baptiste, contacted me and invited me to his monthly networking event, NextMiami, that allows entrepreneurs and investors mingle. I attended the event and was introduced to the person responsible for the technology and web investments at the VC Firm. We spoke for 45 minutes and asked to follow-up and take a look at our executive summary because they had recently invested US$3 million in a site similar to ours but focused on the Hispanic demographic.
That introduction and conversation lead to the:
Angel Investor Introduction
The VC said we were a little early-stage for them, but he wanted us to meet an angel investor that could help get us to the next level. He sent the executive summary and an introduction via email, the angel investor replied 8 minutes later to arrange a meeting in person. We now meet every regularly and have gotten amazing advice to help grow our venture.
Gen-Y book interview with a Inc. Magazine Contributing Editor
Through my participation on the discussion board of the Young Entrepreneurs Network group, I was invited to become an officer. Shortly after, the admin of the group contacted me to say she’d recommended me for an interview for a book about Gen-Y entrepreneurs. The author, a contributing editor for Inc. Magazine, contacted me for an interview shortly afterwards, which went fantastically. The book is slated for publication in 2009 and I hope our story makes the cut.
Paid speaking engagement
I’ve presented my story at a few universities but have never had a paid speaking gig. I connected with Scott Bradley of the Entrepreneurship Society in July and he was so impressed with our story, especially our mistakes, that asked me to come to Boston College to present that Fall semester.
The Entrepreneurship Society covered our expenses (travel and accommodations) as well as provided an appearance fee. The event went very well and we posted the videos on the web. Check out resulting article in the school paper and the videos here.
Feature on CollegeMogul.com
CollegeMogul is "a blog and online resource for college entrepreneurship" that also reviews "new and existing companies led by students and young entrepreneurs." They were recently added to Guy Kawasaki’s latest venture, Alltop, as a source for "Startup" news.
Despite the fact that I was no longer in college, I landed the feature for two reasons: the first version of the site began while in college and I’d presented at a college. One of the co-founders of the CollegeMogul attended the Boston College presentation and was very impressed. You can read RealVibez: The Caribbean MTV here.
Asked for quotes for a major magazine article on social media and the Caribbean
I was quoted in a Communications World (link) article on social media in the Caribbean – CW is the International Association of Business Communicator’s flagship magazine, available in 70 countries. The author loved my posts about social media and insights I shared in her facebook group. She contacted me and asked for quotes to use. Read all about it here.
Built a fan page for the country of Jamaica that has hit 1600 fans in less than 3 months with no budget
I built a fan page for Jamaica to showcase my skills as a social media marketer and to eventually approach the Jamaica Tourist Board to work with me on it officially. We are now in discussions with them and the page has allowed us to get some of the most amazing stories and quotes from people as far away as Lithuania.
I hope that my stories have provided detailed examples and explanations of how I have used Facebook and how businesses can leverage it. Building a reputation is paramount and social networking allows you to build it faster than traditional means, provided that you really have expertise in the areas you are trying to become a thought leader.
I enjoyed this approach. What I like about this approach, is that it is exactly the same approach one should take in “physical” networking. The general rules for networking in the online and physical worlds are the same.
Be professional.
Tell your story. Be interesting.
Follow up and show genuine interest in others.
Seek to connect others and you in turn will get more connections.
Nice post.
Thanks for the comment David.
I really wanted to convey the idea that online networking is the same as traditional offline networking, not anything overtly unique.
I do have another case study about one thing you can do online that you can’t do offline:
To get my wife’s venture, StartupToons.com, featured on Inc. magazine’s website, I ran ads on Facebook targeting people who worked for Inc. since you can target ads based on workplace.
By 5:46 pm that evening Inc.’s staff blog had a post mentioning her startup that had launched that morning (see http://blog.inc.com/archives/2008/07/02/what_a_coincidence.html)
Naturally, if there was no story though, it wouldn’t work and that is the bottom line – it has to be relevant and interesting to your target audience, but we all know that and you rightly pointed it out.
This is quite an impressive testimonial and very encouraging. I’m curious as to how much, if any time you invest in smaller, niche community sites or if you strictly stick with the larger more widely known social networks. I see benefit in the smaller ones as well, although the results may not be as spectacular.
I have found several mentors whose brains I pick on a regular basis on Facebook, and these relationships are developing into good friendships.
Thank you Angela.
To answer your question – I invest very little time in niche community sites, mainly because I am a stickler for time management and so I focus on the best return on investment of my time.
Audience matters and I would much rather focus on pushing my story out to destinations that already have large audiences because reach is important for me.
Each person’s venture is different and using smaller networks depends on how much money you are trying to raise (if you are trying to raise capital), who comprise your target market and whether or not you are trying to build up a ‘thought leadership brand.
There is no one formula.