Verizon Business Markets Blog

Kicking off the 2011 series of free webinars presented by the Verizon Small Business Center, award winning social media publisher John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing started by showing how easy it can be to search for business leads on Twitter.  The tips John provided will greatly help to refine search to find good leads.   

Returning again last week to provide more tips, John provided a plethora of tips (seven steps) to convert those leads to sales.  The free webinar entitled “How to Create a Social Media Conversion System” presented by the Verizon Small Business Center is now available for replay.  Giving a historical account of how social media marketing was originally perceived as spam, he brought us forward to the current day and encouraged attendees to realize the value in their social media presence.  Converting customers, according to John, is like courting them.  It’s a slow process that requires building trust and value.  Once you have your customer’s attention, you must then provide them with a reason to keep coming back.  Here’s where the content you provide solidifies the relationship, along with the strategic use of various tools to assist you in automating the process. 

John advised businesses to tie the various social media systems together, creating a personalized campaign that incorporates landing pages with a clear call to action and ultimately conversion. 

View this webinar, as well as many others, in the Verizon Small Business Center located at http://business.verizon.net/webinar.  Or check out some of the  notes “tweeted” by followers… go to http://search.twitter.com and search for #vzsmb.  Of course, once there, sign up if you don’t have an account and follow VZSmallBiz on Twitter to get the latest news, tips and more.

If you are using social media to promote your business, tell us how you are doing in the comments section.