Social Media

Well, today was quite a day… as a social media virtual assistant, I had a very hairy day as Twitter and Facebook both succumbed to Denial of Service Attacks, which appeared to be coordinated attacks too. Their systems in effect were shut down and people could not sign in nor post any updates.

It meant that several items of work done for clients and also to do for clients could not happen.  It also was a wakeup call to me, and hopefully many others, that you should not keep all your social networking eggs in one basket.

Facebook, Twitter and Linked In all can be very useful marketing tools for a business, but by no means should it be your only tool.  I always refer to social media as a support for other marketing efforts and this is a very good example of why that rings true.

If you rely solely on social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook, which help you market your business, but are also free and really they can shut down at any time – that’s not the wisest of business decisions.

Your website and blog are great ways to ensure you always have a web presence and ability to ‘talk’ to others about your business and services. A blog in particular is something that can be easily updated and new information added to, and often.  People can also comment on your ideas/topic, allowing for a two way (of sorts) conversation.

Blogs are not hard to keep up to date – you just have to pencil them in your calendar as you do any other task.  I tend to get inspired several times during the week and either write my ideas in my calendar or write a quick draft directly in the blog and come back when I have time.

If you have not kept up to date with your blog and website, this is a perfect time to remind yourself to do so… and also with Twitter and Facebook both not working – you have a few extra minutes to do it now.

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Marketing, Social Media, social networking, virtual assistant