Social media websites are not your typical website. Traditional websites have static content that is only updated to meet a particular organizational need. Social media networks are more like living, breathing organisms. They are constantly changing, growing and adapting to users’ interests and concerns. While you may be familiar with social media websites in general, it is important to get experience with a particular social media site before marketing to its community.As I said before, social media networking sites are constantly changing and evolving. That’s because these sites are more like online communities than portals for information. Before you attempt to market your products in one of these social media websites, it’s important that you know as much as you can about who visits each particular site and what their interests are.

To begin, you should brainstorm a list of social media websites that may be good platforms to market your product or service. After you develop this list, make a point to visit and join the social media networking communities that have the potential to help you meet your goals. Once you join these communities, you should collect as much information as you can about the members of these social media networking sites and their interests.

Since research is crucial to an effective targeted marketing campaign, it is imperative that you know as much about the members of each social media networking site as possible before you begin to market your services. Consider the first few weeks that you join a site as time dedicated to research. Below are some questions that may be helpful to ask of each community:

• What are some common characteristics of the members of this social media website?

Are the members all women, small business owners, teens, doctors? Knowing who you are dealing with is critical to developing a targeted marketing message. Small business owners may respond best to a marketing message about a service that promises to improve their bottom line whereas teens may respond best to a message that promises a product will impress their peers.

• What are some common concerns, desires or themes discussed on this social media website?

By closely monitoring a site, you will begin to see patterns in the topics discussed. For example, a group of small business owners may talk about how they wish they knew more about selling their products online. You may notice that in these discussions eBay is frequently mentioned. This could point to a potential opportunity for you to offer customized eBay coaching courses. If you didn’t closely monitor the discussions on the site, you may have missed this common concern and the opportunity it provides.

• How do the members of this social media website communicate with each other?

Do the members use formal or informal language? Is there any jargon or inside terms they use that you should master? Once you get a sense for the tone and content of member communications, you should use the same tone for your communications with them. In other words, if you are on a social networking site for teens and they speak to each other in slang and abbreviations, you should sprinkle in some slang and abbreviations in your messages too.

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