SMM Final

With my business I used the blogging website Eblogger. I used this platform to inform my customers about promotions that I had going on in my business Direct Hit. The experience wasn’t bad at all. The site was very easy to use and I loved how the site kept track of my page views and posts for me. The hard part I found with having a blog was my consistency. I found it very hard to get my blog post done on Wednesday nights to stay consistent. It was partially due to my procrastination but it was also due to the fact that I don’t have a set work schedule. My work hours change weekly and I don’t always know when I will be working from one week to the next and I feel that as a business owner of a small business I would run into the same problems. Even though consistency is a big part of having a blog I still feel that I would use this at certain parts of the year and instead of using my blog to promote my other social media marketing tools I would do the opposite and use my other social medias to promote my blog.

Twitter was a very difficult social media site for me to use. It wasn’t that the site was hard to navigate or post too but having to come up with 3-5 posts per day was not working for me. I found with this site I could entertain and educate my customers but I found it very hard interact with them. I like seeing their feedback and not just knowing they liked something because they retweeted it. I liked being able to use it to get a link or a quick message out but in real life I wouldn’t use this with my small business because I feel with the small amount of tweets I would make I could actually handle it with Facebook.

Facebook was a very natural site for me to use but I feel that it was because I was familiar with this social media tool because it was the only one that I have ever used. My problem with Facebook is that I have a very hard time changing it up. Everything that I posted was about the same. I need to get more variety in my Facebook statuses. I had mainly statuses that just contained info about things going on or info about things that came in on our truck. Looking at other businesses Facebook statuses, they had almost three times the response to their posts when they posted a picture with their post to get their point across and with my Facebook page that is where I lacked. In a real life scenario I would use this social media site because I feel it is one that is easy to manage and I don’t have to stay consistent like I do with a blog or twitter. Although with being in retail I do want to try and keep my posts right around the middle of the week to get the best responses.

Hootsuite made my life ten times easier with having to do my twitter and Facebook posts. I could make out a little week plan in my notebook and have my posts done for the week in right around ten minutes. The down side to it was the fact that with my business I couldn’t entertain my customers as well with my posts and I feel that with retail you aren’t able to plan out your entire week that easy that the posts I would have to make would be more “in the moment” than anything else. With running a retail store I don’t feel that I would not use this resource because my posts will be very spread out and more on how the day of business is going which is impossible to be able to predict a week in advance.

Pinterest was one of the most useless sights that we used in this class for my business.  All that I was able to do was just pin pictures and with doing that it would link me to another site.  At the end of the day I felt that I was doing more promoting and advertising for everyone else and was doing my business little to no good. I would not use this site in a real life scenario because even though the site is free it would just be a waste of my time.

A niche site that would be effective for my business would be any sort of outdoor niche site. I would want to be on these sites when the time of the season is right.  I would want to be on a duck hunting niche site when it is duck season. I would waste my time and money if I was on a duck site during the spring when the serious sportsman is thinking turkeys. I would post on these sites as more of a sponsor and just to let the public know that when they need something that I got them covered. With these sights being worldwide I feel that I would not do well with being a small family company and not having multiple stores nationwide The problem other with this is the fact that I feel that this will be expensive to advertise on and with being just a small family run business I won’t have that sort have that kind of money to lay down on that. Big companies need to get in on these sites but small shops like mine would not do so well on these sights.

I did not do a podcast. From the exercise we did in class with having to go out on a site and listening to one, I don’t feel that I would use this tool. I don’t feel that I would get the return out of it that would be worth the time and effort into it but then it also comes down to the consistency again. This needs to be done a tight schedule and with running a retail business I don’t have the time or the resources to accomplish this effectively and get my money and time worth out of it.

The vines and videos were actually fun to do.  The part I liked about it most though was that I could give my customer a name and a face with my business. In a way they were able to get to know my business but also me as a person. I got to show off my successes to my customers to show that I do know what I am talking about but also was hopeful that it would get them excited for their next adventure. Even though this was fun I don’t feel that I would use vine or youtube in my business. Local commercials I feel would be crucial for my business and a good way to put a face with the business like I said before.

  Social media marketing is definitely a growing part of marketing. This is a big thing that big companies need to be in. it is an amazing way to engage, interact and educate your clientele. But with the posts you put out there your are getting some great feedback from your customer base but also you can use sites that pull together all of your followers quantitative and qualitative data for you that can be used for better penetration into you customer base.  You can also use these sites to follow trends and to make sure that what you have to offer is still something that a large part of your client base wants.  Facebook has started to show what is trending and hot on your news feed. Just scrolling through can show you what is up to date and what is a big flop. With some of the social media that we used I feel that I would be reaching out to a way larger client base than I need for my store. The sites like Facebook where I can control things a little easier, I feel I will have a much better turn out. At first I hated the idea of this class but now I am glad I attended and tried. The things I learned will bring me a lot further with what I want to do and now I realize just how big this social media is becoming.