Listen to what you’re missing

Women entrepreneurs dipping their toes into the corporate world have a supporter and life coach in Mira Joleigh. Through her company, #Ambitionista, her goal is to “help ambitious women find their passion, rock their confidence and launch their first business.”

Among other skills, Joleigh shows aspiring entrepreneurs how to use social listening to their advantage. She has a soulmate in marketing entrepreneur Madalyn Sklar, who has made a living from connecting, listening and converting contacts into clients.

Together with social relationship experts from Hootsuite, Joleigh and Sklar explained how to strategically improve business through listening — focusing on Twitter.

Hootsuite is enthusiastic about Twitter’s Advanced Search function and lists.

“Advanced Search lets you run precise social listening,” the experts said. “Keep an eye out for location specific tweets, tweets by a given date range and so on.

“Do yourself a favor by listening more — and smarter — on Twitter,” they said. “Lists are a great way to listen in on specific groups of people. You can make lists of customers, competitors, thought leaders or anyone relevant to your business and industry.”

Hootsuite’s blog addresses these tactics in its article, Twitter Marketing: The Complete Guide for Business.”

Content collection

Social listening takes advantage of all content gathering — Google alerts, Twitter lists, trending topics — to see what your audience is talking about. Then apply your specialty to offer valuable solutions.

“For small businesses, social listening means following what people are saying about your company and your industry, tuning in to the needs of your market,” Joleigh said. “Look for themes and insights.”

She noted advantages of social listening every business should discover:

  • Product development.
  • Manage investor relations.
  • Create customer delight.
  • Find leads.
  • Anticipate demand.
  • Discover trends.
  • Verify the effects of a marketing campaign.
  • Identify influencers and opinion leaders.
  • Collect information on competitors.
  • Avoid public relations and communication meltdowns.

“If you’re not paying attention to what’s happening in your industry and with your ideal clients, what are you doing?” Joleigh said. “Get on it.”

Sklar endorsed keeping a social ear to the ground.

“Social listening is paying attention to what is being said,” she said. “This is something you should always do. Make it a daily ritual.”

Great insights

Use social listening to penetrate the noise to hear what people are talking about. Then prepare a focused, helpful response.

“Social listening gives you valuable insight you can use to market your product and service,” Joleigh said. “It differentiates your business from the competition.

“Social listening is truly one of the most effective sources of information you’ll find to guide your business decisions,” she said.

Sklar emphasized it’s “vital to have a pulse on your industry as well as your community. It starts with listening.”

To find your target market, follow people and conversations. See who best matches your customer persona. See whom that person follows.

“You can find your target market by monitoring certain keywords, hashtags and phrases,” Joleigh said. “I swear by using TweetDeck for this. Hootsuite also has similar functions. I can easily create multiple columns for each keyword I want to monitor.

“You also can find your target market within Facebook groups and through Instagram hashtags,” she said. “It’s just a little easier on Twitter because this platform is wide open and transparent — no follow requests or groups to join to participate.”

According to Joleigh, anywhere your ideal client hangs out is a place to be actively listening.

Sklar uses a variety of methods to find her target market:

  • Twitter’s Advanced Search.
  • Hashtag searches.
  • witter lists.
  • Using Hootsuite to view my Twitter lists.

To find new conversations, listen before talking. Even then, don’t dominate the conversation. Let people speak so you can understand their wants, needs and pain points and how they relate to you.

“Let’s say you’re a photographer, and you’re monitoring the hashtag #bridezilla on Twitter,” Joleigh said. “You find someone who says, ‘I need a photographer for my wedding. Help!’

“You could engage with that tweet several ways,” she said, using one of these replies:

  • “Hello, we might be able to help?”
  • Reply with a link to your website.
  • Ask a question to find out more about their needs.
  • Reply with joke or meme.

“Which would you use?” Joleigh said. “How you engage during your social listening campaigns should be aligned with your brand and your brand’s ‘voice.’ Otherwise, it will come across awkwardly — like when someone randomly talks to you on the bus or subway. Who does that?

“Sometimes less is more with social listening,” she said. “By simply adding someone to a Twitter list and liking a few of their tweets, you could generate enough action in their notifications for them to take an interest in you and your brand.”

No disguises

Whichever way you reply, don’t try to be something you’re not.

“You want to be real and transparent,” Sklar said. “I love using Twitter video to connect. It’s fun, and it’s memorable.”

Listen in one form or another all the time on social media as part of a give-and-take conversation.

“Twitter is a daily platform,” Joleigh said. “There’s always something new happening there. I recommend keeping tabs on what the market is saying every day. I’ve created time blocks on my calendar to drop into my feed and engage.

“If you’re a small-business owner wanting to practice social listening daily, you might benefit from hiring an intern or assistant to keep tabs,” she said. “Then you can focus on what you do best.”

Joleigh’s biggest “helpers” include FiverrUpwork and GenM.

“I’m using social listening all day, every day,” Sklar said. “That’s important in your marketing strategy.”

Note that broadcasting — sending out information and not responding — is not listening.

“With social listening, it’s all about being friendly and real when you engage,” Joleigh said. “No one likes the impersonal approach of shoving a business card in their face upon first meeting at an in-person networking event. Don’t do that virtually, either.

“Let’s say you find someone who needs exactly what you offer, and they’ve spelled it out in a tweet — literally asking for help. Show up to address their agenda. Find out how you can serve. Don’t focus on your own agenda.”

These are Joleigh’s social listening do’s:

  • Entertain.
  • Educate.
  • Offer help.

Don’t ignore, annoy or spam,” Joleigh said.

Sklar added wisdom passed down from everyone’s mother.

“Don’t be mean or rude,” she said. “If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say it. Otherwise, it will come back to bite you. Kindness goes a long way. Rude does not.”

Social first

Be social on social media. Create relationships. Get out of the create-business mindset. You might be surprised when someone you’ve talked with for years — yes, years — asks you about what you can do and how you might help.

“As a service-based business, I believe that a personal connection makes the sale,” Joleigh said. “Take it beyond 280 characters on Twitter. Get on the phone with prospects to truly consult them and find a win-win solution.

“As a product-based business, you can benefit from social listening by offering that personal engagement that may turn a browser of your feed into a click to your e-commerce site and a purchase,” she said. “Think of it like next-level customer service.”

Whether offering a product or service, it’s essential to pay attention.

“All businesses can benefit from social listening,” Joleigh said. “Just remember that it’s about that personal touch.

“It’s called ‘social’ media for a reason,” she said. “If it was just about existing and pushing out promotions, it would be called broadcast media. That’s a thing, too, but that’s not what we’re doing here.”

Never forget to promote the person behind a business.

“People buy from people, not brands,” Joleigh said. “We want to know that there’s a real person behind that logo or promotion.”

Both Joleigh and Sklar recalled Twitter success stories.

“I met Los Angeles friend Jaclyn Mullen on Twitter back in 2014,” Joleigh said. “A year later, she attended my wedding.”

Sklar’s connections and listening have been equally rewarding.

“I’ve met so many amazing, awesome people randomly on Twitter,” she said. “They all lead to incredible relationships.”

The coach and marketer continued their conversation — and listening — on Facebook Live.

About The Author

Jim Katzaman is a manager at Largo Financial Services and worked in public affairs for the Air Force and federal government. You can connect with him on TwitterFacebook and LinkedIn.

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