Janet Fouts

Getting involved in social media can be a daunting task for some. Many companies think they need to build a forum, a blog or some form of discussion area on their site in order to be engaged. They don’t want to go to the expense and hassle of adding on to their website to get started, so they don’t get involved, and that’s a shame.

You don’t have to host discussion on your own site
Having it on your site is preferable, but if you just want to dip your toe in, there are plenty of places out there where the discussion is going on right now. All you have to do is find them. Then you can build your reputation in comments and discussion and let people find you through your participation. A link in your profile or occasional links back to your website helps bring people  to your site for more information, or better yet to contact you directly.

Part of my  role as a social media coach is to help people find the conversation and show them how to get involved effectively. Every morning I  look over my reports and alerts from the night before and see what’s new. I track subjects clients are interested in and send them a heads-up on discussions that merit weighing in on. It’s an efficient way for them to get involved on a personal level but without the hassle of having to sort through a lot of noise to get there.

Why not just let the bots do it?
This goes beyond Google and alerts from the various feed bots. As great as they are, it’s still helpful to have a human filter through the chaff and get to the good stuff. I can also track particular authors and filter out posts or discussions that have already been addressed or ones that may be getting hot and need a re-visit, or suggest people to follow on Twitter or FriendFeed.

Of course you don’t have to pay somebody to do this
You can do it yourself through some of the sites I listed in Tracking your Brand Online . Set up alerts and get the reports, then schedule some time in your day to scan them. You’ll quickly get a better picture of where people are talking about you, what their feelings are about you, your company or your product and you can begin the conversations.

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