In the month of July, RMG did a series of radio broadcasts on Social Media. Below is a script of my interview with Jim Poole on July 3 covering Social Media and Linking. This is a longer version than what you heard on WCCO as we had to cut down on the length in studio, but I thought you would want to see the whole recording.
Jim Poole: Jennifer, last week you shared that linking is important to your online visibility and search optimization. What role does linking play, if any, in social media?
Jennifer Risdall: Social media is all about creating dialog with your audiences… your customers, your vendors, your prospects, media, industry analysts or others …
virtually, ANYBODY who is looking for information about your brand, your company, your products, your services or you.
The operative word here is “looking”. We like to say, if people are raising their hands in social media, you better be there to answer those questions. If you’re not there, your competitor will be.
Search engine optimization is about being there when your audiences are looking for you in the search engines. Social media optimization is about being there when your keyword terms are being mentioned within social media. This can be accomplished in two ways:
• Listening and responding when your keyword is mentioned
• And creating social media content based on keyword phrases
As you can see, social media and search optimization are inseparable when talking about linking. Linking plays an important role in both. A link to your website:
• Drives traffic
• Builds online visibility
• And gives you the opportunity to create new customers and serve existing customers.
Linking can take place on all types of online media – from
• websites
• to Social Networks
• to Blogs
• to Wikis
• to Forums
• to Videos
• to RSS feeds
• within Applications
• to directories
Practically anywhere online.
Jim Poole: How do you get links within social media?
Jennifer Risdall: Remember that social media is all about building a relationship. Listening to your audiences and then joining in the conversation starts and builds the relationship with your audience. It is INVALUABLE.
The secret sauce is to listen first and provide value through engaging.
The conversations and networks you are listening to will shift and change – but the key is to be a part of the conversations, not just a fly on the wall.
Linking is part of this process. It may be an answer to a question on your brand or a customer service question, it may be an offer to your social media following, it may be sharing industry news…Whatever it is, a link to the appropriate web page can give your audiences the information they are looking for.
Jim Poole: How do you know where to listen and when to join in?
Jennifer Risdall: That’s social media optimization. At Risdall, we have 5 key pillars that we use to optimize social media for our clients. They are:
• Listen
• Identify
• Strategize
• Engage
• And Measure
Each is integral to being successful on social media and together, they create an ongoing process that needs to be nurtured.