Five Ways To Increase Your ‘Local’ Social Media Presence

I had lunch last week with a new friend and it was refreshing to have a conversation with someone who has the same values towards work, and clients.  Matter of fact most of our conversation was on values and how it relates to charitable donations and purchasing patterns.

Values, like recently our local Humane Society was in financial trouble, and although I have never used their services, I have donated to them and was worried about their situation.  My concern has to do with being a dog owner, and dog lover.  Our local humane society is a no kill humane society that rescues dogs form other humane societies that are going to be euthanized, which endears me to them.  We share the same values… The love of dogs.

Social Media allows small independent businesses to build a following of ‘likes’ and ‘followers’ by finding people with the same values as them.  Finding these individuals amongst today’s clutter can be the difference staying in business and going out of business…

Here are five ways you can target commonality and like values into your social media plan.

Local Causes/Charities:   The best way to add more local ‘likes’ to your Facebook page is to find a cause or a hardship that is taking place in your community, stepping up, and helping.  Donate a dollar a like to their cause up to 500 to 1,000 likes, you donate money to a cause you believe in and just added a lot of likes to your Facebook page with people that share the same values you do… I have written a few blogs regarding this, here is the latest.

Engage locally:  depending on the size of your market, you are going to have anywhere from dozens, to hundreds to thousands of pages that are all about your local community.  Have your business page ‘like’ them. Make comments on their posts under your business name. Be active and play in their pages.

Website Sponsor/Directory:   In most markets, you will find a ‘Buy Local’ company/group that has a website devoted to companies that are locally grown and locally owned.  Their directories and website sponsorships are very affordable.  It is usually just one payment that covers 12 months.

Twitter:  Listorious is a list tool, that allows you to find indivuals who tweet in your area and also find lists that follow individuals with similar interest and values using keywords.

AdWords:   you can run an AdWords campaign through Google using keywords that reflect your values and can target it to your local area.  AdWords if used correctly can be a great tool to generate hits to your website.